Critical procedural variables related to the physiological effects of progressive relaxation: a review.

Twenty-five investigations of the physiological effects of progressive relaxation training were classified according to whether relaxation was found to be superior or equivalent to control conditions. The two sets of studies differed significantly on number of training sessions and in the use of taped vs live administration of training, and they tended to differ in the use of normal vs patient samples. The likelihood of producing significant physiological reductions via progressive relaxation appears to be greater when multi-session, subject-controlled training is conducted with subjects for whom physiological activity contributes to a presenting. clinical problem.     

Cue selection in verbal discrimination learning of retarded subjects.

A series of experiments was conducted to examine cue function in trigram verbal discrimination learning by retarded subjects. The issue was to determine the factors that control attention in this type of learning situation. The two variables of chief interest were trigram meaningfulness and reinforcement history. The major general conclusion was that retarded subjects employ complex cue selection strategies in solving a verbal discrimination involving compound verbal stimuli. Major findings were as follows: (a) Retarded subjects exhibit a response bias in favor of words over nonsense trigrams; (b) relatively little active cue selection based on meaningfulness was observed; (c) a compound stimulus discrimination was more difficult to learn than a discrimination involving single verbal stimuli; (d) compound and single stimuli may be processed differently in original discrimination learning; (e) cue position probably controls attention in compound discrimination learning; and (f) a frequency theory of verbal discrimination learning is supported by these data.     

The halo effect revisited: Forewarned is not forearmed

The purpose of the present research was to determine if forewarning subjects about the halo effect eliminated the effect or made people aware of its impact. The research was a replication and extension of R. E. Nisbett and T. D. Wilson's (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1977, 35, 250–256) experiment on the halo effect. Subjects viewed an interview of a college instructor who was either warm or cold and then rated his physical appearance, mannerisms, and French accent. Some subjects were told to introspect about their cognitive processes while viewing the interview and were told that the purpose of the study was to see how aware they were of the determinants of their ratings. Other subjects were also told specifically what the halo effect was and given a motivation either to show it or not to show it. In addition, a measurement technique different from that used by Nisbett and Wilson was utilized to allow a more precise measurement of awareness, and a new cover story was used to make the task more involving and important to subjects. Despite these attempts to eliminate the halo effect (or, at a minimum, to make people aware of it), the results indicated that subjects in all conditions were very susceptible to it. That is, subjects who viewed the warm version of the interview rated the instructor's appearance, mannerisms, and accent significantly higher than did those who viewed the cold version, even when informed and forewarned about this effect. The forewarning and introspection instructions also had no impact on subject's awareness of the halo effect. Subjects in all conditions indicated that their liking for the instructor had had only a minimal effect on their ratings.     

The effect of monetary incentives on backward digit span performance

In order to determine if monetary-incentive effects, particularly the detrimental effects of such incentives on human learning and performance, might be mediated by anxiety, 52 college students were administered six backward digit trials in a preexperimental, baseline phase and six trials in an experimental, test phase. Of the 52 subjects, 26 were paid 50 cents following each correct recitation of a backward digit series during the test phase. The remaining 26 were unpaid control subjects. Results showed that the rationale for the study was correct because state anxiety was indeed negatively related to backward digit span performance as previous research had shown, but the offer of reward did not elevate state anxiety scores and, more importantly, the offer of reward led to a significant improvement in backward digit span performance—an effect which is the opposite of what would be predicted by the anxiety hypothesis. The reward effects of theoretical interest in planning this research were those facilitating and detrimental effects that are produced by offering elementary, high school, or college students small amounts of money (typically from $1 to $3) as a superfluous inducement to participate in a study of human learning or performance. The results of this study discredit any explanation of such reward effects which attributes the effects to reward-induced anxiety.     

Recognition memory in mentally retarded persons

The continuous recognition memory of retarded and normal subjects was assessed. The stimuli were magazine pictures, arranged so that lags of up to 250 pictures occured. The overall performance of the retarded subjects was poorer, in terms of hit rate or d′. However, the differences were present at 0 lag and the slopes of the forgetting curves were similar in both groups. It was concluded that differences between these subjects were due to a perception related process and not to memory.     

Short-term memory in deaf and hearing children in relation to stimulus characteristics

Experiment 1 examined short-term memory with a serial probe task in 20 younger (mean age: 6 years, 3 months) and 20 older (mean age: 8 years, 8 months) deaf children. Four sets of stimuli were used: familiar animals, unfamiliar nonsense forms, fingerspelled letters, and lower-case print. In contrast to earlier research with hearing children, strong primacy effects were found with all stimuli at both ages, with frequent gestural and/or oral labeling but little cumulative rehearsal evident. To determine whether results were uniquely tied to deafness, identical procedures were used in Experiment 2 with 20 younger (4 years, 9 months) and 20 older (5 years, 10 months) hearing children. Again, overt activity was common, with strong primacy effects on animals and nonsense forms in the older group and on animals in the younger group. Contrasts between present and earlier findings suggest the need to consider the degree to which stimulus labels are overlearned, the role of nonverbal mediators in rehearsal, and the effects of changing educational experiences.     

The similarity-attraction relationship: Is there an ideal one?

It is proposed that we are attracted to similar individuals because: (1) such individuals are similar to our ideals and (2) such individuals are similar to ourselves. Previous studies have employed a similarity manipulation which has confounded these two components. When the components are separated, similarity to the ideal was expected to exert a major influence and similarity to the self a minor influence on attraction. A series of experiments orthogonally manipulated similarity to self and similarity to ideal with a new technique involving content-free dimensions. The results indicated a consistent main effect for ideal similarity on liking and no consistent main effect for similarity to the self. Finally, the results also indicated that given any two of the three variables—similarity to self, similarity to ideal, and own self to own ideal discrepancy—subjects seemed able to infer the other or third variable in a fairly logical fashion.     

Binocular disparity as a discriminable stimulus parameter for young infants

The ability of 8-week-old infants to discriminate between projected stereograms with and without retinal disparity was tested with an habituation-dishabituation paradigm. Infants in two experimental groups received six trials with either the disparity or the nondisparity stimulus and then were given two trials with the other display. Infants in two control groups viewed the same stimulus, either disparity or nondisparity, on all eight trials. There was a suggestion of some response decrement over time in both cardiac deceleration and sucking suppression, although this effect was not significant. However, significant increment was obtained on the dishabituation trials for heart rate in the group that was shifted from the nondisparity to the disparity stimulus. These results were interpreted as indicating that the infants could discriminate between stimuli when the only difference between them was binocular disparity.     

Pressures from work,self, and home in the life stages of married women

Following Lopata's (1966) model of the life cycle of the married woman's role, it was predicted and found that a woman's life stage would be related to her role pressures (work, home, self, and time), conflict, and satisfaction. Age and number of roles were not as strongly related to these variables as was life stage. Work activities and pressures declined through the peak child-rearing stage and then increased for women with older children, while pressures from home generally rose throughout the life cycle. The differential impact of various sources of conflict in different life stages was reported, and forms of organizational career support oriented toward particular life stages were suggested.     

A study of some conditions relating to the retarded adult's stereotyped responding in a binary-choice task

This study was a longitudinal one that examined the effects of certain conditions on alternation and perseveration in a binary-choice task. The conditions manipulated included: (1) lapse of time (stability of the pattern), (2) stimulus dissimilarity, (3) spatial location of the two alternatives, (4) time-out (time away from the task), (5) delay between responses, and (6) differential reinforcement of the two choices. Eight mentally retarded adults, identified as “pure” alternaters or perseveraters, served as subjects. Perseveration was “disrupted” only by differential reinforcement. Alternation was affected by all experimental manipulations with the exception of stimulus dissimilarity.     

Teacher attitudes toward stuttering

Attitudes of 100 elementary school teachers toward stuttering were studied using the Teacher Attitudes Toward Stuttering (TATS) Inventory. Teacher attitudes, as indicated by TATS Inventory scores, were compared with teacher knowledge of stuttering, age of teacher, number of years teaching experience, educational level, and whether the teacher had personal experience with a stutterer. Results indicated that significant positive correlations existed between teacher attitudes toward and knowledge of stuttering. Significant negative correlations were demonstrated between teacher attitudes/knowledge of stuttering and the presence of a stuttering child in the classroom. The applicability of the TATS Inventory as a clinical instrument in its current form and the research needed to enhance its flexibility are discussed.     

The differential reinforcement of reward-produced and response-produced stimuli

In two experiments, groups received successive large-reward trials on odd-numbered days and successive small-reward trials on even-numbered days in the same gray alleyway. This produced a discrimination problem in which the memory of large reward (S^L) was reliably discriminative of large reward and the memory of small reward (S^S) was reliably discriminative of small reward. Intertrial interval (ITI) was varied both between and within groups. In the within-groups manipulation, ITI separating S+ trials differed from that separating S- trials. Experimental groups learned the discrimination, running slower to S^S (S- cue) than to S^L (S+ cue), and showed a negative contrast effect, running slower to S- than a small-reward control group. Discrimination was somewhat faster at massed than at spaced trials. The within-groups manipulation of ITI suggested that the effects of ITI were mediated by time-dependent changes in internal cues produced by reward events and by the instrumental response. The control exercised by internal cues was shown to be associative rather than nonassociative, e.g., motivational. Similarities with, and implications for, conventional brightness differential conditioning were discussed.     

A review, analysis, and some new data on hand-posture distributions in left-handers

Different methods have been employed to assess handwriting posture in left-handers, and different dimensions of hand posture have been used for categorization. Within North American samples, there is a remarkable consistency between studies in the distributions when the same assessment method is used, but there are very large and highly significant differences for different methods of assessment. The various methods and dimensions of categorization evidently index different variables, and these are likely to have different relations with neuropsychological factors. It is possible, however, to gather questionnaire data on handwriting posture that closely resemble direct experimenter observation, as a brief report on left-handed males shows.     

Effects of career orientation on retirement attitudes and retirement planning

The impact of career orientation and demographic variables on retirement attitudes, intended age of retirement, and retirement preparation is examined among a sample of university employees. Results indicate that occupational status is associated with unique patterns of career orientation as well as differences in anticipated age of retirement. Career orientation variables are observed to be stronger predictors than demographic characteristics of retirement attitudes, while the demographic factors are found to be more efficient in predicting retirement age and level of preparation. Use of career orientation variables in the retirement preparation process is discussed.     

Some theorems in haploscopic vision

Three formal hypotheses are specified concerning the combination of neural signals from the two eyes. The hypotheses are (1) that a large uniform light presented to the opposite eye has no effect (independence), (2) that all information from one eye relevant to a given percept (for example, brightness) is encoded by a single neural signal (isolation), and (3) the mutually exclusive and exhaustive alternative to isolation (interaction). Though independence or isolation often has been claimed or simply assumed to hold, these hypotheses imply specific empirical relationships. These relationships are derived for brightness and for equilibrium colors. In addition, one model consistent with the interaction hypothesis is developed. The isolation hypothesis is important for generalizing results from monocular experiments to normal binocular vision. If it is false, monocular results can reflect a combination of one eye's neural signals that never occurs with binocular stimuli.     

Toward a reconceptualization of the reciprocal imitation phenomenon: Two experiments

This paper reports two experiments which consider the increased imitation exhibited by models who have been imitated. Experiment 1 was concerned with whether the reciprocal imitation effect is really reciprocal or if the subsequent imitation will generalize to someone else. It was found that adult subjects who were previously imitated at the 75% rate on a perceptual judgments task subsequently imitated their partner more, rated their partner more attractive, and felt more confidence when imitated than did subjects imitated at the 25% rate. These results were obtained regardless of which confederate the subjects imitated, thus indicating that reciprocal imitation is not necessarily reciprocal, but is generalizable. Experiment 2 assessed whether the subsequent imitation is the product of the effects of being imitated or is the result of the subject observing the imitator's imitation. The results indicated that after having observed imitation at a 75% rate, adult onlookers are more likely to subsequently imitate and be attracted to the imitator, the imitated person, and a person new to the situation than are onlookers who observed a 25% imitation rate. A theoretical modification is advanced which holds that subsequent imitation effects, whether from observing others imitate or from being the target of the imitation, result from a process of imitation of imitativeness. The results of these two experiments have implications for theory in imitation and social learning.