Assertion modeling and stimuli effects on assertive behavior and self-efficacy in adolescents

The present investigation examined variations of modeling and stimuli with 61 adolescents selected for unassertive or aggressive behavior toward teachers. A 3 × 2 × 2 factorial design evaluated the effects of type of assertion modeling (three sessions of overt vs covert vs no-modeling), type of training stimuli (single involving teachers only vs multiple involving teachers, parents and peers) and type of initial behavior (unassertive vs aggressive) on behavioral role-play and self-efficacy. Modeling, particularly overt modeling, improved assertive behavior in teacher situations, peer situations and total teacher, parent, and peer situations. The use of single type stimuli improved self-efficacy in total teacher, parent and peer situations, and in novel situations involving others. Behavior but not self-efficacy was differentially affected by initial unassertive or aggressive behavior of participants. Self-efficacy and behavior were only moderately correlated. Results suggest effectiveness of short-term modeling with adolescents and different specificity properties of self-efficacy and assertive behavior.     

Lying and deceiving--moral choice in public and private life

Suppose that there are good or morally defensible reasons for not responding truthfully to a question or request for information. Is a lie or a deception better as a means to avoid telling the truth? There are many situations in public and private life in which the answer to this question would serve as a useful moral guide, for instance, clinical situations involving dying patients, educational situations, involving young children and personal situations involving close friends. Intuitively, we feel that there is a moral asymmetry in favor of deceiving over lying. However, doubts have been cast on such intuition. The aim of this paper is to bolster this intuition. It will be argued that the claim of moral asymmetry in favor of deception can be supported on a consideration of the different degrees of expectation involved in communicative ethics. Two other objections to the claim of asymmetry will also be considered.     

Situation-Specific Scripts for Threat in Blood Fearful and Nonfearful Individuals

Self-schemata for threatening situations were examined in blood fearful and nonfearful individuals. In the context of 5 scenarios involving blood, injections, hospitals, or injury, participants listed events that they typically experience in these situations or events that occur when they witness another individual in these situations. Blood fearful and nonfearful individuals generally listed sequences of events corresponding to a similar macrostructure. However, blood fearful individuals included more negative emotional and physiological events than nonfearful individuals, and several of their sequences reflected higher levels of fear and lower levels of positive affect. These results suggest that the self-schemata of blood fearful individuals for situations involving harm or threat consist of both normal and maladaptive elements.     

The development of future-oriented prudence and altruism in preschoolers

This research tested the hypothesis that prudence and altruism, in situations involving future desires, follow a similar developmental course between the ages of 3 and 5 years. Using a modified delay of gratification paradigm, 3- to 5-year-olds were tested on their ability to forgo a current opportunity to obtain some stickers in order to gratify their own future desires—or the current or future desires of a research assistant. Results showed that in choices involving current desires, altruistic behavior was unrelated to age. However, prudence and altruism involving future situations were correlated with one another and with age. Children under 4 years of age demonstrated significantly less future-oriented prudence than the older children (F(1,49) = 15.75; p < .001) and significantly less altruism involving future situations (F(1,49) = 33.24; p < .001). The data for the 3-year-olds, but not for the older children, also showed age-partialled correlations between the two future-oriented choice situations. These results suggest that between 3 and 4 years, children acquire the ability to deal with future-oriented situations through the development of some common mechanism which affects both future-oriented prudence and altruism.     

Attributional styles of aggressive boys and their mothers

To determine if mothers of aggressive boys have the same propensity as their sons to infer hostile intentions in ambiguous interpersonal situations, 50 mothers of aggressive and nonaggressive boys were each asked to interpret hypothetical situations involving themselves with their child, their partner, and a peer as well as hypothetical situations involving their child in interaction with classmates and teachers. Their sons also were each requested to interpret hypothetical situations involving themselves with their mother, a teacher, and a classmate. The results indicated that mothers of aggressive boys do share the propensity to infer hostility in ambiguous situations and may, in effect, model a hostile attributional bias. Mothers of aggressive boys failed to differentiate ambiguous from hostile situations and were as likely to infer hostile intentions in ambiguous as in hostile situations. The results also suggest a generalized tendency on the part of mothers of aggressive boys to infer negative motives and/or dispositions when accounting for the noxious behavior of their sons. Further, for the aggressive boys, the hostile attributional bias was evident with both peers and teachers. The presence of a hostile attribution was predictive of an aggressive response for the aggressive boys. Even in the face of clearly hostile, provocative behavior, nonaggressive boys were less likely to offer aggressive solutions than aggressive boys.The authors acknowledge the contribution of the staff from the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Emergency Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, Emory University School of Medicine, and Grady Health Systems for their assistance and support in conducting this study.     

Maturity of personality and family communication

The psychodynamic and the communication/systemic perspectives are commonly considered as two entirely different approaches to psychopathology. The current study is an effort to bridge these opposing perspectives empirically. Maturity of personality, measured according to psychoanalytic principles by the Consensus Couples Rorschach, and relationship control in family communication, as measured by a new coding system (RCC) in an observational study, were related. The results indicate that low level of maturity is associated with egocentric and self-disqualifying communication in situations of conflict, but not in situations involving no or moderate conflict. Additionally, mature wives were prone to react to situations involving perceptual conflict by communicating dominantly, whereas immature wives communicated in more submissive ways. Reversely, the more mature the husbands were, the more they displayed a submissive style of communicating when in conflict.     

Appearing truthful generalizes across different deception situations

The authors investigated whether the ability to appear truthful is specific to deception situations. Male participants were interrogated after they took part in 2 high-stake deception situations, one involving a mock crime and another involving a false opinion. The videotaped interrogations from each situation were shown to independent groups of undergraduate observers. The proportion of observers who judged each participant as truthful in one situation correlated highly with the proportion of observers who judged the same participant as truthful in the other situation. This was not correlated with physiognomy judgments. Follow-up studies revealed that although the participants showed consistency in their facial, body, and paralinguistic behaviors across situations, observers' judgments seemed to be driven only by the consistency of the dynamic facial behaviors. These results are discussed in terms of the evolutionary importance of the face in communication.     

Peer and school problems in the lives of urban adolescents: Frequency, difficulty, and relation to adjustment

This study examined the occurrence of problem situations in the peer and school domains and their relation to adjustment among urban adolescents. Students from three urban middle schools (N = 176) serving a predominantly African American population rated 61 problem situations identified in a previous qualitative study and completed measures of adjustment. Ratings of frequency and difficulty confirmed the relevance of these situations for this population. Confirmatory factor analyses suggested that covariation in the frequency and difficulty of problem situations could be represented by separate factors representing peer situations involving friends, other peer situations, and school situations. The number of different problem situations experienced was significantly correlated with physical and relational aggression, delinquency, depression, anxiety, and self-worth. Several of these relations were strongest for peer situations that did not involve friends. There were few gender differences in the strength of these relations.     

Conflict resolution and social understanding in six to twelve year old boys

Three different aspects of children's social competency were studied, i.e. social methods, (via their suggested solution to given conflict situations), social understanding (via their explanations of the solution given) and role-taking capacity. 75 boys—ages 6, 8 and 12 years—were interviewed concerning different conflict situations, six of which involved a child/child interaction and six a child/adult interaction. A separate role-taking task was also used. Developmental differences in social methods were found only in situations involving adults, where older children to a greater extent chose altruistic methods for solving the conflict. As regards social understanding, developmental changes were found and correspond to results reported by previous researchers. Role-taking capacity was found to increase with age. Role-taking as measured here was not related to social understanding. Social method and social understanding were significantly related to each other in some of the situations, mainly in those involving only children. The results indicate that different norms prevail for solving conflicts with adults versus with peers, and that the role-taking aspect is but one of several involved in the development of social understanding.     

Dealing constructively with negatively evaluated emotional situations: the key to understanding the different reactions of teachers with high and low levels of emotional intelligence

Recent work on the distinctive features of emotions appraised as either negative or positive has links to the investigation of differences in levels of emotional intelligence. In a study with experienced teachers as participants, it was found that emotional reactions to positive or negative situations was moderated by level of emotional intelligence. The reactions to positively charged emotional situations involving students and peers were similar for teachers with high and low levels of emotional intelligence, although the low level group showed somewhat lower likelihood of making an “emotionally intelligent” response compared to the high level group. A much sharper contrast in response likelihood was found for negatively charged emotional situations involving students and peers. Teachers with high levels of emotional intelligence responded quite differently to those with low levels of emotional intelligence. The results indicate the prospect of clarifying a neglected area of exploration of differences in the likely behaviour of teachers differing in levels of emotional intelligence.     

The Effects of Marital Conflict on Korean Children’s Appraisal of Conflict and Psychological Adjustment

This study examined the effects of marital conflict on Korean children’s psychological adjustment and appraisal of hypothetical marital conflict situations. Children between the ages of 10 and 12 were divided into “high-conflict” (n = 58) and “low-conflict” (n = 58) groups based on their self-reported degree of perceived interparental conflict in the home environment. Hypothetical marital conflict situations were provided in cartoon format, and were differentiated based conflict intensity (verbal versus physical aggression) and content (child-related conflict versus non-child-related conflict). In general, children reported greater negative affect and perceived threat to hypothetical conflict situations involving physical aggression compared to situations involving verbal conflict. In child-related conflict situations, children reported more fear of being drawn in and endorsed coping strategies that involved direct intervention. “High-conflict group” children evidenced stronger reactivity in responding to marital conflict situations in general and endorsed indirect intervention strategies—a finding previously not found in similar studies conducted with European-American children—indicating the possibility of cross-cultural difference in coping preferences in interparental conflict situations. Furthermore, “high-conflict group” children manifested more indices of maladjustment as indicated by externalizing and internalizing behavior problems, in addition to more self-reported depressive symptoms. Results highlight the effects of marital conflict on children’s psychological adjustment and indicate the possibility of cross-cultural differences in preferred coping mechanism in interparental conflict situations for Korean children.     

Discounting by Probabilistic Waiting

In everyday life, many probabilistic situations may be characterized as probabilistic waiting. A gambler, for example, bets repeatedly at the racetrack, the casino, or the card table. The gambler may not win on the first try, but if a gamble is repeated enough times, a win is almost certain to occur eventually. If repeated gambles are structured as strings of losses ending in a win (probabilistic waiting) and the amount won is discounted by the delay caused by the series of losses, then strings with many losses will be discounted more than those with fewer losses, thereby causing subjective value of the series of gambles as a whole to increase. The current study used the opposite effect that amount has on the degree of delay and probability discounting as a marker to determine whether people evaluate situations involving probabilistic waiting as they evaluate situations involving delayed outcomes or as situations involving probabilistic outcomes. We find that the more likely a probabilistic waiting situation is to end in reward (e.g., a gamble is repeated indefinitely until reward is obtained), the more that situation conforms to delay discounting; the less likely a probabilistic waiting situation is to end in reward (e.g., a fixed, small number of gambles), the more that situation conforms to probability discounting. We argue that the former situation is applicable to pathological gambling, and that people with steep delay discount functions would therefore be more likely to have gambling problems. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The reverse double standard in perceptions of student-teacher sexual relationships: the role of gender, initiation, and power

The present study tested the prediction that male teachers are judged more harshly than female teachers for engaging in heterosexual intercourse with a student. One-hundred and eighty-seven adults (116 women, 71 men) evaluated a hypothetical newspaper article describing an alleged student-teacher relationship as part of a 2 (Gender Dyad: Male Teacher/Female Student or Female Teacher/Male Student) x 2 (Initiator: Student or Teacher) between-subjects design. As expected, a reverse sexual double standard was revealed, in which participants judged situations involving male teachers more harshly than they judged situations involving female teachers, but only when the sexual contact was teacher-initiated. Participants also believed that male students received more social benefits from the sexual contact than did female students.     

Identifiability of a class of theories with states not directly observed over trials

The problem of identifying probabilities for sequences involving K underlying states is investigated for experiments in which there are K observed states, with the conditional distribution for these states specified for each underlying state. Conditions for finding unique estimates of the underlying probabilities are outlined for situations in which underlying transitions depend upon the last observed state as well as for situations in which no such dependency is assumed. No restrictions upon the nature of underlying transitions are assumed for a large number of trials. Applications to some known experimental situations are suggested.     

Evaluating the efficacy and generality of a skill-based approach for promoting universal behavioral readiness

Behavioral readiness can take the form of communication and self-control skills during challenging situations that are correlated with the development of problem behavior. A skill-based approach can teach behavioral readiness using procedures that involve synthesized reinforcement, probabilistic reinforcement, and contingency-based delays; however, this approach is commonly used to address severe behavior under specific situations. There is limited research evaluating a skill-based approach to teaching behavioral readiness and addressing emerging problem behavior. Also, it is unclear whether teaching effects under specific situations transfer across other, functionally distinct, situations. We evaluated the generality of a skill-based approach by teaching skills systematically across primary challenging situations involving the interruption of play, presentation of instructions, and removal of reinforcers. Teaching increased communication and self-control skills, and most skills transferred to secondary challenging situations (treatment extension probes) and caregiver-implemented sessions. We discuss challenging situations that required teaching, the generality of teaching, and procedural considerations.     

The Reverse Double Standard in Perceptions of Student-Teacher Sexual Relationships: The Role of Gender,Initiation, and Power

ABSTRACT

The present study tested the prediction that male teachers are judged more harshly than female teachers for engaging in heterosexual intercourse with a student. One-hundred and eighty-seven adults (116 women, 71 men) evaluated a hypothetical newspaper article describing an alleged student-teacher relationship as part of a 2 (Gender Dyad: Male Teacher/Female Student or Female Teacher/Male Student) × 2 (Initiator: Student or Teacher) between-subjects design. As expected, a reverse sexual double standard was revealed, in which participants judged situations involving male teachers more harshly than they judged situations involving female teachers, but only when the sexual contact was teacher-initiated. Participants also believed that male students received more social benefits from the sexual contact than did female students.     

风险条件下的跨期选择

跨期选择是指对发生在未来不同时间点上的结果做出权衡的决策过程。由于大部分跨期选择的情景都处于某种风险之中, 把风险变量纳入跨期选择的研究中则至为关键。针对以往研究在研究范围、理论构建、现实意义等诸方面的不足, 本研究拟采用实验室实验与纸笔测验相结合的方法, 深入揭示高、中、低三种概率水平下风险对跨期选择的影响特征, 探索其发生的机制、各类经典效应的大小。在此基础上, 根据全国不同地区的大样本调查结果, 了解各地区风险条件下跨期选择的差异及其与本地宏观经济指标(如, 消费者物价指数)的关联, 进而探讨研究的现实意义。本研究期望对风险条件下的跨期选择做出系统、全面的科学探索, 并为国家相关部门制定政策提供有价值的参考。     

Psychophysiological assessment of imagery in obsessive-compulsives: a pilot study

In a within-groups design, four obsessive-compulsive patients imagined four different types of scenes: (1) exposure to feared situations; (2) exposure to feared situations followed by engaging in ritualistic behavior: (3) engaging in ritualistic behavior without provocation; and (4) neutral situations. Each scene type was presented three times with order of presentation randomized. Beat-by-beat heart rate samples were taken during the visualization of each scene and converted to second-by-second heart rate. An examination of second-by-second heart rate for each scene type suggested that scenes involving exposure to feared situations elicited defensive responses (DR), whereas those that did not elicited orienting responses (OR). The implications of these results for compulsive behavior, the fear-reduction model and Sokolov's (1963) OR-DR model, are briefly discussed.     

Seeing love, or seeing lust: How people interpret ambiguous romantic situations

Interpreting ambiguous situations is a task individuals face on a daily basis. In romantic contexts the accurate interpretation of these situations is of particular importance. In the present set of studies we investigated how level of construal guides individual perception in these cases. When a high level of construal was induced participants likely interpreted a given interpersonal situation as the start or the continuation of a long lasting relationship. When a low level of construal was induced the same situations were more likely interpreted as leading to a one-night stand (in a dating situation) or involving little chance of a common future for both actors (in a break-up situation). In sum, the present studies demonstrate construal level to be a crucial determinant of the interpretation of ambiguous romantic situations. We discuss these findings in relation to the functional independence of love and sex, level of construal, and social perception.     

Differentiating between child protection and family support in the Canadian child welfare system's response to intimate partner violence,corporal punishment,and child neglect

Rates of reported child maltreatment nearly doubled in Canada over the period 1998–2003, an increase that reflects growing awareness of the harmful effects of an expanding array of parental behaviors, including corporal punishment, lack of supervision, and exposure to intimate partner violence (IPV). Some of these situations may benefit from voluntary family support programs outside of the child welfare system. Analyzing a sample of 11,807 investigations, this paper compares cases where the sole concern is exposure to IPV, or hitting a child, or neglect, or other forms of investigated maltreatment. Situations where exposure to IPV or potentially abusive hitting were the sole reason for investigation presented with fewer risk factors and were less likely to lead to ongoing child welfare interventions compared to other maltreatment investigations. While situations involving alleged neglect presented a higher risk profile and elicited a more intensive child welfare response than did exposure to IPV or hitting, opportunities for alternative services were nevertheless identified. The study also found that visible minority families were overrepresented in cases involving hitting and that Aboriginal families were overrepresented in cases involving neglect. Overall the findings support the development of alternative response programs in Canada.