The Adams and Reis observations revisited

This experiment was designed as a replication of the Adams and Reis (1971, 1974) experiments, which posited a direct relationship between frequency of stuttering and the number of “off-on” laryngeal adjustments during speech. Twenty adult stutterers read two prose passages equivalent in length, word length, and semantic content. The first passage contained a normal distribution of syllable-initial voiced and voiceless consonants whereas the second contained only voiced phonemes. The results demonstrated significantly greater stuttering during reading of the all-voiced passage (P?0.05). These results did not confirm the earlier observations of Adams and Reis and mitigate the hypothesized relationships between stuttering frequency and “off-on” laryngeal adjustments.     

The differential effect of three auditory stimuli on the frequency of stuttering behaviors

In view of the frequent clinical use of external auditory stimuli in fluency building programs, the purpose of the present experiment was to compare the effects of rhythmic pacing, delayed auditory feedback, and high intensity masking noise on the frequency of stuttering by dysfluency type. Twelve normal hearing young adult stutterers completed an oral reading (approximately 250 syllables) and conversational speech task (3 min) while listening to the three auditory stimuli and during a control condition presented in random order. The results demonstrated that during oral reading all three auditory stimuli were associated with significant reductions in stuttering frequency. However, during conversational speech, only the metronome produced a significant reduction in total stuttering frequency. Individual dysfluency types were not differentially affected by the three auditory stimuli.     

Contingency management in the classroom treatment of long-term elective mutism: A case report

An 11-year-old boy with a six-year history of elective mutism in school was successfully treated with operant reinforcement and contingency management techniques. The plan was carried out by the classroom teacher with a minimum amount of management consultation. Twelve-month follow-up reveals continued maintenance of the verbal interaction indistinguishable from that of other children at school which was set as the criterion for terminating the intervention. The plan was carried out in three stages-relationship-building to develop teacher-pupil interaction into a reinforcing event, audible-response eliciting, and generalization throughout the school building and grounds.     

Individual differences among children in spelling and reading styles

Previous studies have found differences among children in their relative reliance on spelling-sound rules and word-specific associations in reading words. Children at one end of the continuum ("Phoenicians") rely heavily on spelling-sound rules; children at the other end ("Chinese") are more likely to use specific associations. This study found evidence for a Phoenician-Chinese continuum in spelling as well as in reading. Ability to spell nonsense word (e.g., "prunt") correlated more highly with ability to spell regular words (e.g., "grunt") than with ability to spell exception words (e.g., "front"). Children who were skilled at rules tended to overgeneralize them to exception words. In addition, a measure of rule use in spelling correlated with measures of rule use in reading.     

Occupational structure and proprietor preferences: Subject matter displayed by art dealers

A structural model is developed facilitating explanation of art dealer's painting preferences. It is argued that social strains in the form of divergent occupational role patterns are structured in the occupation of art dealership. Two incompatible role models for art dealers are identified: business and artistic. The relative orientation of the art dealers to the artistic or business roles is shown to be differentially associated with their painting preference-subject matter displayed. The model advanced is based upon data produced from Los Angeles art dealers, and it focuses upon bringing together a study of the occupation and a study of painting preferences in the occupation.     

Sex differences-similarities in job preference factors

In this article, the author investigates sex differences in preferences for various job factors which college students consider important in their job selection decisions. The results showed that while college students have stronge differences in their preferences, these differences are not stereotypically male or female. Overall, both male and female college students are primarily looking for jobs in which they can learn, accomplish something worthwhile, and work with friendly and congenial co-workers. Furthermore, having knowledge regarding the extent to which a company demonstrates broad social concern is not among the most important criteria used by students when making their decisions.     

Motor and cognitive interference effects on unimanual tapping rates

Experiments conducted on both normal and disordered populations have led to the hypothesis that the left hemisphere's specialization for language results from its control over motor activities. This control is reflected in the lateralized disruption of manual activity during cerebral time-sharing tasks. Recent studies have challenged this hypothesis, stating that the interference effects reflect both cognitive and motor mechanisms in the left hemisphere. This experiment investigates whether the left hemisphere's control over speech involves both of these components or is purely motor. The question was examined by measuring the effect of concurrent hemispheric activity on single-finger tapping rates. Forty subjects tapped under two conditions: speaking and listening. The data show there may be both motor and cognitive mechanisms involved in left-hemisphere control.     

The effects of task and practice on search for invisibly displaced objects

The ability to successfully search for an invisibly displaced object is frequently assumed to relate to the emergence of mental representation at around 2 years of age. However, little is known about what is actually being measured in the typical “stage 6” object permanence search task. Two studies examined the effects of task factors and practice on invisible displacements and systematic search tasks to show that simple variations in ways of hiding an object change the child's ability to find it. Experiment 1 compared two common methods of presenting invisible displacements items to 36 children, approximately 2 years of age. One task was significantly easier than the other, despite the fact that they contained identical items that varied only in their order of presentation. Experiment 2 tested the effects of short-term practice on 18- and 24-month-olds' success on invisible displacements trials and on two systematic search tasks. Results indicate that too little practice inhibited performance in 18-month-olds, but that practice beyond an optimum level did not further affect their scores. In contrast, 24-month-olds continued to benefit from increased practice until they reached the maximum possible score. The findings are interpreted to mean that invisible displacements tasks may require only sensorimotor search strategies rather than representation. The findings also have implications for (a) research that attempts to relate object permanence to other variables and (b) programs that use object permanence as an assessment or screening measure.     

Perceived tachistoscopic duration and early visual processing in preschool children and adults

Two experiments further explored the Avant et al. (1975) finding that stimulus familiarity influences prerecognition processing to generate differences in the apparent duration of tachistoscopic flashes. The first experiment tested for developmental differences in the effects of upright versus 90°, 180°, and 270° rotations of a single letter or number upon the apparent duration of pre- and postmasked 30- and 50-msec flashes with adults and 4- and 5-year-old children. All age groups judged upright presentations to be of briefer duration. These differences in apparent duration were interpreted to index the automaticity of contacts between stimulus inputs and their memory representations. Failure of the children to recognize the letter and number in any orientation indicates that contact between stimulus inputs and memory representations precedes allocation of attention to the presented stimulus. The second experiment explored the influence of spatial structures which are not coded verbally by testing effects of good and poor dot pattern Gestalts on the apparent duration of tachistoscopic flashes. Adults discriminated between apparent durations of good and poor Gestalts but 4- and 5-year-olds did not. Apparent duration differences in the two experiments showed that spatial pattern structure and familiarity with verbal stimuli influence early visual processing in different ways.     

Finger localization and reading ability in three groups of children ages three through twelve

Developmental norms for eight finger-localization (FL) tasks similar to those used by Lindgren are extended to include 140 children ages 3 through 12. The strength of the relationship between these scores and two specific reading tasks is explored. Regression analyses reveal statistically significant correlations between FL ability and the ability to match spoken with printed words, as well as between FL scores and scores for silent reading and retelling of a paragraph. Three groups of children are used: children with normal language, those with dysphasia, and those with language impairments other than dysphasia. Performance scores of these three groups on other language tasks are compared.     

Operationalizing the effect of the group on the individual: A self-attention perspective

The effect of the group on the individual is considered from the perspective of self-attention theory. It is proposed that group members will become more self-attentive, and thus become more concerned with matching to standards of appropriate behavior, as the relative size of their subgroup decreases. A simple algorithm, termed the Other-Total Ratio, is presented which numerically describes this effect of the group on the individual. An analysis of group effects on individuals' self-attention supports this perspective, as do analyses of the results of 42 previous studies in four other areas (conformity, prosocial behavior, social loafing, and antisocial behavior). This orientation to the effect of the group on the individual is linked to recent developments in self-attention theory and compared to Latané's social impact theory.     

A comparison of the roles of exemplar,action, coordinate,and superordinate relations in the semantic processing of 4- and 5-year-old children

Four types of semantic relation, assumed by different researchers to be implicated in the organization of semantic information, were investigated by means of false recognition and word association tasks presented to independent samples of 4- and 5-year-old children. The same set of basic object stimulus words was used for each task as a means of validating the findings. Twenty-four girls and twenty-four boys at each age level were divided into four experimental groups for the false recognition task. One of four categories of experimental foil words, representing the four types of semantic relation, namely, exemplar, action, coordinate, and superordinate, was presented to one of the four groups. It was found that 4-year olds produced false alarms to exemplar and action relations significantly more frequently that to coordinate and superordinate relations. Five-year olds, in contrast, produced false alarms to exemplar and coordinate relations significantly more frequently that to action and superordinate relations. An independent group of 12 girls and 12 boys at each age level took part in the word association task. Among the 4-year olds, action relations were produced significantly more frequently than either particularization (exemplar and contextual) or coordinate relations. Among the 5-year olds, action relations were produced significantly more frequently than particularizations but the difference between action and coordinate relations was no longer significant. Coordinate groupings, following Riegel [in G. B. Flores d'Arcais & W. J. M. Levelt (eds.), Advances in psycholinguistics. New York: American Elsevier, 1970], were interpreted as implicit classifications derived from the intersect of stored relations. There was little evidence to support the hypothesis that young children comprehend word meanings in terms of logical class inclusion structures.     

The naive perception of masculinity-femininity on the basis of expressive cues

Groups of naive judges rated 18 videotaped stimulus persons on masculinity, femininity, “dominance, assertiveness,” and “compassion, sensitivity to others.” Stimulus persons were broken down by sex and sex-typing—half were male, half female—and within sexes one third were classified as masculine, feminine, and androgynous on the basis of their scores on the Bem Sex Role Inventory. Two experiments are reported in which groups of judges rate stimulus persons on the basis of such different expressive information as videotaped pictures and recorded voices, videotaped pictures alone, videotaped bodies, videotaped heads, recorded voices, and still photos. The results showed: (1) Judges reliably rated masculinity-femininity from largely expressive cues: (2) judgments of masculinity-femininity were not predominantly determined by judgments of sex role-related traits: (3) the naive judgment of masculinity-femininity significantly corresponded to stimulus subjects' assessed sex roles; (4) stimulus subjects (particulary males) showed a consistent display of masculinity-femininity across expressive channels; and (5) judges used different expressive cues in judging masculinity-femininity in males and females. These results are related to broader questions concerning the relation between expressive behavior and personality.     

Generality of persistence: The role of stimulus and response factors in persistence to punishment

Previous research has shown that intermittent punishment of a response increases its persistence to continuous punishment and that intermittent punishment training in one situation produces persistence to continuous punishment in other situations. Experiment 1 showed that as long as the instrumental response and punishing stimulus were held constant from intermittent to continuous punishment marked differences between these situations had no decremental effect on persistence. Experiment 2 showed that intermittent punishment training of one response resulted in substantial persistence to continuous punishment of a different and apparently incompatible response and that such response change had no more than a marginal effect on persistence. The results were seen as requiring some revision to the traditional conditioning-model interpretation of persistence to punishment.     

Attending to multiple sources of information: I. The integration of information in decision making

Information relevant to a decision is often available from several sources, such as different sensory modalities or different spatial locations. Processing or utilization of such information is often selective in that some sources seem to have more influence on a decision or response than others. Many different theoretical mechanisms have been proposed to account for such selective (i.e., attentional) aspects of human information processing. This paper considers theoretical mechanisms which operate to integrate separate sources of information in order to make a binary decision. In particular, these mechanisms are studied in simple visual and auditory detection tasks as well as a Bayesian decision problem. Data from these experiments reject the idea that one integrates the relevant information from several sources prior to making a decision. Rather, one seems to form separate decisions about the information from each source and then integrate these decisions in order to select a response.