A cross‐cultural study of environmental belief structures in USA,Japan, Mexico,and Peru

Throughout history, the way in which people conceive nature/human relationships has dramatically changed, and different cultures also have divergent notions regarding the role humans play in nature. In Western societies a “new environmental paradigm” (NEP) of ecological nature has apparently replaced the old “human exception paradigm” (HEP), which conceives of humans as being superior and apart from nature. Previous research has shown that, in those societies, a marked dichotomy exist between these two apparently contradictory paradigms, meaning that people who accept the NEP reject the HEP. Countries other than Western ones also exhibit a bias towards the ecological paradigm; however, their world‐views are not necessarily dualistic, since they may adhere to the NEP and, simultaneously, believe that human beings are “special.” This study compares world‐views in four different countries. Responses of 1358 undergraduates from USA, Japan, Mexico, and Peru to the HEP and the NEP scale were analysed to see if they confirmed three factors previously found: (1) a vision of separation from nature (HEP), (2) a necessary “balance” between human needs and nature preservation, and (3) the need to impose “limits” on the human impact on nature. This trifactorial structure was tested using confirmatory factor analysis. USA students exhibited two dimensions (HEP‐NEP) and the other samples showed the expected three factors, although they intercorrelated differentially, depending on the national sample. In all samples “balance” and “limits” were positively correlated. In the Peruvian and Japanese samples the HEP and “balance” were negatively correlated while the USA sample produced a negative covariance between HEP and NEP. In the Japanese sample HEP and “limits” were uncorrelated but in Peru these factors covaried negatively, while in the Mexican sample they were positively correlated. The HEP‐NEP two‐factor structure would seem to be limited to Western nations. More countries need to be measured.     

Psychometric properties of the Depressive Experiences Questionnaire for adolescents.

Items of the Depressive Experiences Questionnaire (DEQ) were rephrased and simplified to make them appropriate for younger subjects. This adolescent form of the DEQ (DEQ-A) was administered to high school students; a factor analysis revealed three factors that were highly congruent in female and male students and with the three factors of the original DEQ. Internal consistency as well as short- and long-term reliability for each of the 3 DEQ-A factors were at acceptable levels. Each factor correlated highly with its counterpart factor in the original DEQ, especially the Dependency and Self-Criticism factors. Correlations of the DEQ-A factors with other measures of depression essentially replicate relationships found between these measures of depression and the original DEQ for adults. The reliability, internal consistency, and validity of the DEQ-A indicate that it could be useful in studying depressive experiences in younger adolescents.     

The Witness Credibility Scale: An outcome measure for expert witness research

The judge or jury makes a subjective determination of when an expert is credible. However, no published measure exists for assessment of the credibility of expert witnesses. The current study addressed this gap by developing and cross‐validating the Witness Credibility Scale (WCS). Drawing on the narrative literature, we hypothesized that credibility was a product of four factors: “likeability,” “believability,” “trustworthiness,” and “intelligence.” A 41‐item measure was initially constructed based on successive iterations of ratings by a panel of judges using items from the Osgood Semantic Differential measure and was subsequently administered to 264 undergraduates. A factor analysis of the data yielded a factor structure that consisted of four factors labeled, “knowledge,” “likeability,” “trustworthiness,” and “confidence.” The final version of the WCS used 20 adjectives with four subscales of five items, each subscale reflecting high loadings on the respective factors. The scale was then tested in five additional studies, in which the scale successfully differentiated between groups of videotaped experts testifying in manipulated conditions. The empirical data from these studies permit a foundation for comparing outcome data in future research investigations. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Étude de validation de la version française de l’Échelle d’Estime Corporelle (Body Esteem Scale) chez les adolescentes et les jeunes adultes

IntroductionThe literature of body image suggests that many women and young women suffer from body dissatisfaction and this dissatisfaction is an important risk factor for the development of eating disorders.ObjectiveThe aim of the study was to validate the French female version of the Body Esteem Scale (BES; Mendelson et al., 2001).MethodThis self-administered questionnaire assesses body esteem and includes three subscales: “Weight”, “Appearance” and “Attribution”. The questionnaire was given to a sample of 835 adolescent girls and young adults (mean age = 16.62 ± 1.50).ResultsExploratory factorial analysis yielded three factors “Weight”, “Appearance” and “Desire to modify and negative affect associated with the general appearance”, somewhat similar to those of the original validation study. The goodness-of-fit of the three factors model was satisfactory. Correlations were found between the three subscales of the BES, BMI and general self-esteem.ConclusionThe French version of the BES shows satisfactory psychometric properties and provides a useful tool for better understanding the psychological aspects of attitudes towards one's body. In France, very few questionnaires are available to measure body attitudes, despite the fact that the body dissatisfaction affects many adolescent girls and represents a risk factor for the development of eating disorders.     

Structure of learning environment variables under two instructional conditions

The present study investigated the congruence between the factor structures of the learning environment and cognitive variables for mathematics and English courses in Grade 10. Three common factors were obtained in each course. Procedural characteristics and cognitive factors in mathematics were highly similar to the corresponding factors in English. However, the formative characteristics factor identified in mathematics was not congruent to the corresponding factor in English. Learning environment variables produced two factors. These factors resembled the congruent factor properties for the two courses when the learning environment and cognitive variables were factor analyzed together. Implications for learning and instructional research are mentioned.     

Behaviors associated with “good” and “poor” outcomes in a simulated career decision

What career decision-making procedures enable people to make decisions that yield consequences congruent with their own values? The 40 “best” (most congruent) and 40 “worst” decision makers on the Career Decision Simulation were compared in a sample of 148 community college students. No significant differences appeared in the amount of double checking, number of occupations and information sources checked, amount of information collected, decision time required, and the proportion of information sought about high values. The “best” decision makers, however, were significantly more persistent in immediately seeking more information about an occupation that seemed to match one of their most important personal work values. Following a values-guided search appears more effective than simply searching exhaustively.     

Dimensions of adolescent career development: A multi-instrument analysis

Dimensions of adolescent career development were assessed by several well-established, objectively scored instruments. Attention was given to the correlations between measures of academic achievement and career development. Correlations among 19 scales administered to 237 eleventh graders revealed three clusters of converging scale pairs, labeled “Certainty,” “Decision-Making,” and “Activity.” Four orthogonal factors were identified and given the following heuristic labels: “Cognitive Resources for Decision-Making,” “Decision-Making Style,” “Systematic Involvement in Career Decision-Making,” and “Decision-Making Stage/Certainty.” Results are discussed in relation to practical problems of instrument selection and score interpretation and in the context of theories of adolescent career development.     

A factorial investigation of career salience

A series of career salience items were factor analyzed and related to several indices of occupational choice behavior. Three factors emerged from the factor analysis: (1) the relative priority of a career; (2) general attitudes toward work; and (3) career advancement and planning. Factor 2 was significantly related to the choice of a congruent occupation for males and to the choice of an “ideal” occupation for males and females. Factor 2 was also most highly related to self-esteem for both sexes.     

Cultural Dimensions,Gender, and the Nature of Self-concept: A Fourteen-country Study

Ratings of the importance of and satisfaction with 20 areas of the self were obtained from 3604 first or second year social science undergraduates from 14 countries (15 cultures). Factor analysis at the culture by gender level supported four factors for both sets of ratings. The resulting factor scores were analyzed for mean differences according to the cultural dimension of Individualism-Collectivism by Gender and by correlations with other cultural dimenions and economic indicators. It was found that participants from the 10 collectivist cultures placed greater salience for their self-concepts on “family values” than did those from the individualist cultures. However, this cultural difference was not found for “social relationships”. The expected gender differences, with females valuing “family values” and “social relationships” more highly, were found only for the individualist countries. The findings indicate that there may be a strong cultural level interaction effect between gender and Individualism-Collectivism on the nature of self-conceptions, and that the “family” and “social” aspects of self-concept in collectivist countries need to be considered separately.     

Vocational Satisfaction Among Ministerial Students

84 graduate students attending the Seventh-day Adventist Seminary for North America Q-sorted 50 self-relevant, socially neutral statements to measure self-concept and occupational role percept of the “ideal” Seventh-day Adventist minister. Correlations were computed for congruence between self-percepts and occupational role percepts, as an operational approximation to the construct “vocational satisfaction.” Mean correlations in extreme quartiles of the resultant distribution differed beyond .001; subjects in extreme quartiles were accordingly regarded as “more” or “less” vocationally satisfied. Significant differences were found between more- and less-satisfied subjects on 3 of 16 personality factors (adventuresomeness, shrewdness, ergic tension); on 1 of 6 values (social); on 1 of 10 vocational interests (social service); and on 2 of 15 elements of educational-social history (extent of previous church-conducted education, vocational preference during high school).     

A factorial, reliability, and validity study of the Devereux Elementary School Behavior Rating Scale

This investigation explored the factor structure, reliability, and validity of the Devereux Elementary School Behavior Rating Scale, employing a large (n = 648) sample of children. Factor analysis suggested that the Devereux scale can be described by four factors, which were named Disruptive-Oppositional, Poor Comprehension-Disattention, Cooperative-Initiating, and Performance Anxiety. All four factors showed high internal consistency, and three of the four were stable over a 17-mo. period. Correlations of the four factors with academic achievement, IQ, socioeconomic status, and peer ratings of social competence are presented. All four factors showed significant relations with these variables, with Poor Comprehension-Disattention the strongest of all. Multiple regression analysis indicated that the Poor Comprehension-Disattention factor accounted for significant variance in academic achievement even after IQ was taken into account. Large differences between classroom means on the factor scores suggested that Devereux ratings for individual students may need to be interpreted cautiously.     

Hello From the New Editor

The research goal was to identify potential “contextual” predictors of job performance for military officers. Exploratory factor analysis of job component ratings by military officers (n = 105) in the Irish Defence Forces revealed two “contextual” and two task-related factors. There were no differences in the extent to which contextual job components were a part of the jobs across four military units, but for one contextual factor, contextual components were a significant part of some jobs. Other research shows contextual components increment validity beyond both g and task-related job components. In this first reported study using a sample of military officers to examine contextual job behaviors, the findings suggest contextual components may also increment validity in officer selection models.     

Comparing hierarchical models of personality pathology

Two dimensional, hierarchical classification models of personality pathology have emerged as alternatives to traditional categorical systems: multi-tiered models with increasing numbers of factors and models that distinguish between a general factor of severity and specific factors reflecting style. Using a large sample (N = 840) with a range of psychopathology, we conducted exploratory factor analyses of individual personality disorder criteria to evaluate the validity of these conceptual structures. We estimated an oblique, “unfolding” hierarchy and a bifactor model, then examined correlations between these and multi-method functioning measures to enrich interpretation. Four-factor solutions for each model, reflecting rotations of each other, fit well and equivalently. The resulting structures are consistent with previous empirical work and provide support for each theoretical model.     

Bridging the intention–behaviour gap: Planning,self-efficacy,and action control in the adoption and maintenance of physical exercise

Although some people may develop an intention to change their health behaviour, they might not take any action. This discrepancy has been labelled the “intention–behaviour gap.” Detailed action planning, perceived self-efficacy, and self-regulatory strategies (action control) may mediate between intentions and behaviour. This was examined in a longitudinal sample of 307 cardiac rehabilitation patients who were encouraged to adopt or maintain regular exercise. At the first time point, the predictors of intention and intention itself were assessed. Two months and four months later, the mediators and outcomes were measured. Results confirmed that all the three factors (planning, maintenance self-efficacy, and action control) served to mediate between earlier exercise intentions and later physical activity, each of them making a unique contribution. The results have implications for research on the “intention–behaviour gap,” and indicate that planning, maintenance self-efficacy and action control may be important volitional variables.     

Examining the cross‐cultural validity of the positive affect and negative affect schedule between an Asian (Singaporean) sample and a Western (American) sample

The positive affect and negative affect schedule (PANAS) is a popular measure of positive (PA) and negative affectivity (NA). Developed and validated in Western contexts, the 20‐item scale has been frequently administered on respondents from Asian countries with the assumption of cross‐cultural measurement invariance. We examine this assumption via a rigorous multigroup confirmatory factor analysis, which allows us to assess between‐group differences in both strength of scale item‐to‐latent factor relationship (metric invariance test) and mean of each scale item (scalar invariance test), on a large sample of 1,065 respondents recruited from Singapore (Asian sample) and the United States (Western sample). We found that two items assessing PA (“excited” and “proud”) and three items assessing NA (“guilty,” “hostile,” and “ashamed”) exhibited metric noninvariance whereas 11 of the remaining metric invariant items exhibited scalar noninvariance, suggesting that the PA and NA constructs differ from what the PANAS is expected to measure for Asian respondents. Our findings serve as a cautionary note to researchers who intend to administer the PANAS in future studies as well as to researchers interpreting the results of past studies involving respondents from Asian countries.     

Is ‘Spiritual But Not Religious’ a Replacement for Religion or Just One Step on the Path Between Religion and Non-religion?

We analyze survey data collected from six universities in the United States, Sweden, Norway, and Denmark (n?=?6571). Survey respondents were asked to self-identify as “spiritual and religious,” “spiritual but not religious,” “religious but not spiritual” or “not religious or spiritual.” Using a battery of items describing both religious and spiritual beliefs, we uncover which beliefs are most regularly shared by persons choosing each of the four self-identity labels. Even though American students are generally more religious than the Scandinavian students, we find that three of the four self-identity labels have quite similar meanings across cultural settings. Factor analyzing the belief items, we find two latent factors that we label as “religio-spirituality” and “anti-institutional spirituality.” However, when plotted in a two-dimensional space defined by these two latent factors, respondents in each of the four self-identity categories mostly align along a single continuum from “spiritual and religious” to “not spiritual or religious.” Nevertheless, the “spiritual but not religious” students stand out for their high scores on “anti-institutional spirituality.”     

条件推理:“演绎”与“概率”两种实验研究范式之比较

本研究通过推理心理学研究中的“演绎”和“概率”两种实验范式设计对同一个班级的大学生参与者(实验一中N=57,实验二中N=43)进行先后两次有关条件推理的实验研究后,得出如下主要结果:(1)推理者在对不同的“纯形式条件命题本身的认可度”以及对由它们各自建构的同类型推理题的推理结果之间的作答反应模式之间的差异都很小且具有较高的一致性;(2)对由不同的“含具体内容的假言命题”本身的认可度之间以及由它们建构的同类型条件推理题的推理结果之间具有较大的差异性;(3)推理者对“演绎”和“概率”两种不同实验范式分别建构的内容近似的推进题进行推理时具有大致相同的作答反应趋势。由此可以推论推理者在“概率推理实验范式”中的作答或推理结果可以被视为只是对“演绎推理实验范式”的相应推理题给出“概率解”的心理加工过程。     

Separate factor analyses of the McCarthy Scales for groups of black and white children

Factor analyses of the McCarthy Scales of Children's Abilities (MSCA) were performed on separate groups of black (N = 124) and white (N = 688) children, aged 3.0 to 7.6 years, to assess the comparability of the underlying structures and to evaluate the construct validity of the MSCA for each racial group. Little Jiffy I (principal components) solutions produced four factors for the blacks and three for the whites. Each “white” factor had a coefficient of congruence of .85–.93 with one “black” factor, indicating the close similarity of the solutions. In addition, the factors which emerged for the blacks and whites corresponded to several of the scales constituting the MSCA, offering evidence of the instrument's construct validity for each racial group. The results of the study should enhance the use of the McCarthy Scales for assessing young children of all races.     

Symbolic forms can be mnemonics for recall

Form symbolism using squares and circles can aid recall. In Experiment 1, subjects saw 20 words, each presented in a circle or a square. Words like SOFT and MOTHER were presented in circles in the “congruent” condition, whereas the same words were presented in squares in the “incongruent” condition. Two experiments revealed that words in the congruent condition were more likely to be recalled. A comparison of the conditions with a baseline condition, in which 20 listed words were not closely related to either of the shapes, suggests that the effect was more likely due to facilitation produced by the congruent condition than to inhibition from the incongruent condition.     

The structure of social attitudes in three countries: Tests of a criterial referent theory(1)

A criterial referents theory of attitudes was tested cross-culturally by administering a social attitude referents (single words and short phrases) summated-rating scale, suitably “transformed”, to 500 graduate students of education in the United States, 470 mature students of psychology in Spain, and 270 students of the social sciences and a stratified random sample of 685 persons in the Netherlands. The theory claims a dualistic (two second-order factors) structure of social attitudes, thus challenging the common assumption of attitude bipolarity, which arises from the notion that differing attitude orientations oppose each other, e. g., conservatism versus liberalism. First-order factor analysis of the correlations among the items and second-order factor analysis of the correlations among the first-order obliquely rotated factors supported the theoretical predictions with certain exceptions. In general, the first-order factors of the referents scales contained only conservatism or only liberalism items; negative loading were mostly low in magnitude. Four similar conservative factors and four similar liberalism factors appeared in the three countries, with one, two, or three unique factors in each sample. The second-order factor analyses yielded two main orthogonal factors, one identifiable as conservatism, the other as liberalism; a third factor was complementary to one of the two main factors. Bipolarity was a relatively minor phenomenon. Thus the results indicated the empirical cross-cultural validity of the theory, but also the need for its further specification.