Psycholinguistics: a half century of monologism

The contention of this article is that, since its inception in the mid-twentieth century, mainstream psycholinguistics has been monologistic, that is, has concentrated on monologue as its source of empirical material and has, largely implicitly, involved a monologistic epistemology. The article is not a comprehensive history of psycholinguistics but does attempt to establish a historical perspective. Monologism has been the historical bias of Cartesianism, positivism, behaviorism, and cognitivism. Monologism is concerned only with the person in whom cognition takes place and from whom communication proceeds. It is essentially asocial. By contrast, the merits of dialogism include an openness to the sociocultural, interactive nature of all cognition and communication and an empirical engagement of contextualized discourse situations. Dialogism is presented here not as a supplement to mainstream psycholinguistics but as a radical innovation that construes mainstream psycholinguistics as "strongly misleading if presented as a full theory of communication through spoken interaction" (Linell, 1998, p. 23). Some approaches to dialogism and research on dialogue are critically reviewed.     

Justice deferred a half century after Brown v. Board of Education

The road to Brown v. Board of Education (1954) was a slow and circuitous climb, whereas the retreat down from Brown has been swift and direct. This article reviews 4 distinct U.S. Supreme Court eras of racial decisions: the segregation, preparatory, desegregation, and resegregation eras. It notes both the strengths and weaknesses of Brown and discusses the effects of school desegregation. Did racial diversity improve the life chances of African American children as intended? The results of longitudinal research demonstrate that the effects have been positive, although these results are not widely known by the American public. The article challenges this and other misconceptions about school desegregation that have become entrenched in the public's thinking and addresses ways to rekindle the spirit of Brown.     

Multidimensional scaling of rorschach inkblots: Relationships with structured self-report

This study attempted a replication of previous multidimensional scaling (MDS) results concerning the most salient perceptual features of the Rorschach inkblots. A second purpose was the investigation of the relationships between individual S's relative reliance on these salient features, and personality characteristics as assessed by the Jackson Personality Inventory (JPI). The two-dimension solution obtained in previous research, involving inkblot color and twomess of form, was closely replicated. Only very low correlations between Ss' use of these dimensions, and personality characteristics as measured by the JPI, were obtained. The MDS-Rorschach approach may prove useful in delimiting peculiarities of attention and perception in clinical states. The usefulness of the approach in furthering study of personality constructs assessed through traditional Rorschach administration is currently in question.     

Practice other than playing games apparently has only a modest role in the development of chess expertise

Evidence that chess expertise rests on practice alone mostly comes from studies using a correlational retrospective recall paradigm, which confounds amount of study with number of games played and possible innate talent. Researchers also often use latest performance rating and include participants who play and study little. Study 1 partially replicated such studies with improvements such as use of peak rating and a large, skilled sample. Number of internationally‐rated games played was the strongest predictor of peak rating. Total study hours was a significant but weaker predictor. Study 2 controlled for sampling confounds by including only very well‐practiced players who had played at least 350 internationally‐rated games. Total study hours did not predict rating at 350 games. Study 3 found that the subjective phenomenon of reaching a performance ceiling and undertaking specific practice to get beyond it does occur but does not distinguish between stronger and weaker players. Study 4 found that many players play relatively few internationally‐rated games mostly because of other commitments, such as work and education. Extensive study may go along with great interest in and persistence at chess but apparently lacks a major causative role in chess performance level.     

A half century of scalloping in the work habits of the United States Congress

It has been suggested that the work environment of the United States Congress bears similarity to a fixed-interval reinforcement schedule. Consistent with this notion, Weisberg and Waldrop (1972) described a positively accelerating pattern in annual congressional bill production (selected years from 1947 to 1968) that is reminiscent of the scalloped response pattern often attributed to fixed-interval schedules, but their analysis is now dated and does not bear on the functional relations that might yield scalloping. The present study described annual congressional bill production over a period of 52 years and empirically evaluated predictions derived from four hypotheses about the mechanisms that underlie scalloping. Scalloping occurred reliably in every year. The data supported several predictions about congressional productivity based on fixed-interval schedule performance, but did not consistently support any of three alternative accounts. These findings argue for the external validity of schedule-controlled operant behavior as measured in the laboratory. The present analysis also illustrates a largely overlooked role for applied behavior analysis: that of shedding light on the functional properties of behavior in uncontrolled settings of considerable interest to the public.     

Mission as Factor of Change in Turkey (nineteenth to first half of twentieth century)

This article explores the complex role Protestant missionaries played in late Ottoman Asia Minor. For several generations they were important, even if today almost forgotten, actors of social and mental change. They succeeded in establishing autonomous schools, hospitals and factories not only in the capital, but also in the provinces. They had a vision of integrating minorities into an egalitarian pluralist society which was diametrically opposed to the ideas of the ruling groups and the nationalists. Instead of homogenizing society and strengthening its (Turco-)Muslim unity, missions were differentiating society in religious, ethnic and social terms. Protestant missions supported religious minorities such as the Armenians and Assyrians, heterodox groups such as the Alevis and Yezidis and the poorer classes, but could not win over the state, which was based on the support of the Sunn I majority and saw the missions' successful puritan and liberal modernity as a threat. Even if during and after World War I the missionaries' human networks and social visions tragically broke down, their strong contribution to modern education in Turkey remained.     

Development of a medical management system for psychiatric patients in Prussia in the 1st half of the 19th century

In recent years, som noted authors have been reappraising the distinctive features of the history of psychiatry, setting out its relationship to social history. Trends and models, and the legal basic of psychiatric care are demonstrated, taking the early days of psychiatry in Prussia as an example. In the first half of the 19th century there was in Prussia an especially coherent development from the dual-purpose mental hospital/mental home arrangement (Neuruppin), through total separation of asylum from hospital from home for incurables (Siegburg, Leubus) inaugurated by Langermann, to the more or less linking of asylum with hospital with home for incurables (Nietleben) under Damerow.     

半个多世纪来中国人的心理与行为变化——心理学视野下的研究

半个多世纪以来, 史无前例的快速社会变迁对中国文化和中国人的心理与行为产生了广泛而深远的影响。现有研究探讨了中国人在十多个方面的心理和行为变化, 包括文化价值、人格特征、自我建构、人际信任、幸福感、情绪、动机、关系、心理健康以及其他社会态度和行为等。总体上, 这些研究勾画出了半个世纪以来中国人心理变化的总体倾向：(1)与现代社会相适应的个体主义价值和心理行为日益盛行; (2)传统社会所强调的集体主义价值虽日渐衰落, 但其部分仍在当代社会主流价值中占有一席之地; (3)多元文化共存将是当下和未来中国社会的重要特征。一些具体的变化还包括：中国人的一般信任在下降、幸福感先下降但近年来有上升的迹象、心理健康总体水平上升但是不同社会群体升降不一致、总体的负性情绪在增加、性观念更为开放和包容等。未来的研究应在广度(内容、领域)和深度(原因、机制和过程)上对现有研究进行拓展, 努力建构能同时解释心理和行为变化一般规律及中国人的变化独特性的理论。     

The difference between playing games with and without the computer: a preliminary view

The authors address the question of whether associations between video games and cognitive and metacognitive variables depend either on the features of the computer or on the content of the game that the computer allows one to play. An experiment to separate these two kinds of effects was carried out by using a traditional version and a computer-supported version of Pegopolis, a solitaire game. The two versions were exactly the same except that they were played by moving pieces either on a real board or on a virtual computer-presented board. The performance levels and strategies followed during the game by the 40 undergraduates who took part in the experiment were not significantly different in the real and virtual conditions. None of the participants transferred playing strategies or practice from one version of the game to the other. Scores were not affected by gender or by the studies pursued by participants, the habit of playing games in the traditional manner or playing video games, or intelligence. Retrospective reports did not support differences in the subjective experience between the two versions. Results showed that video games, when they do not make much use of the computer's special features, produce effects because of the situations they simulate rather than because of features of the computer itself.     

Ideas of culture: Romanian para‐anthropologists in the first half of the twentieth century

Two scholars—outsiders to anthropology in a strictly disciplinary sense—provide a comparison with their contemporaries, Ruth Benedict, Alfred Kroeber, Clyde Kluckhohn, and others who formulated ideas of culture. Anthropogeographer Simion Mehedinţi devised an ecological definition and analysis of the concept in 1928. Poet and philosopher Lucian Blaga (1895–1961) analyzed Romanian folk culture by means of a “stylistic matrix” and elaborated a metaphysical definition of culture. The two figures' systematic thinking, growing out of European traditions, underlines the direction that anthropologists elsewhere chose to take the study of human culture. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Don't ignore the other half: the impact of ingroup identification on implicit measures of prejudice

Recently several implicit measures of prejudice have been developed. Prejudice indices based on these measures are computed from response differences to positive and negative targets resulting from outgroup compared to ingroup stimuli. Up to now the focus of research involving these measures has mainly been on attitudes and relations to outgroups (i.e. negative attitudes towards the outgroup). It is suggested here that implicit measures of prejudice are also influenced by one's relation towards the ingroup (i.e. ingroup identification), because they involve ingroup as well as outgroup stimuli. A correlational study and an experiment were conducted that supported this prediction. Implications for the application of implicit measures are discussed. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Sometimes pursuits don't pan out: Anticipated destinations and other caveats: Comment on Hom, Mitchell, Lee, and Griffeth (2012)

Hom, Mitchell, Lee, and Griffeth (2012) presented an extensive review of employee turnover research, reconceptualized the turnover criterion to include multiple destinations, and proposed to expand the predictor domain. They illuminated the multiple destinations employees pursue following turnover. By crossing desire to remain and volitional control dimensions, Hom et al. defined and described 4 withdrawal states (or predeparture mind-sets). This commentary begins by introducing the issue that people do not know precisely where they will turn over to until they have actually gone. This suggests that researchers should consider anticipated destinations when conducting research on withdrawal states. We note the limitations of measuring withdrawal states as taxonomic categories; instead, we advocate for measuring the underlying continuous dimensions of desire and control or the weight associated with the pressures to leave or stay. Finally, we highlight some temporal considerations, as withdrawal states are temporary and there is much to be learned from studying changes in such states. We conclude with some directions for future turnover research based on Hom et al.'s contribution. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

Six in one hand,half a dozen in the other: An ontological content analysis of radical Islam and the Christian right

The purpose of this paper is to examine the logics of justification embedded in the discourse of radical Islam and fundamentalist Christianity. Proponents of either side mostly suggest that their ideological system stands in opposition to the other. But such opposition holds only for the substantive content of these religious ideologies, not necessarily their underlying logics. That is, they indeed worship different deities, practice different customs and rituals, and in many respects, see the world in very different ways. However, our analysis examines the logical construction of their respective ideological discursive justifications, finding that differences in content are nonetheless underpinned by a remarkably similar system of logic. Previous comment on underlying similarities between these religions has been based on a sense of their affective tenor, observations of their similar rhetoric and methods of activism and otherwise random fragments of coincidence. We instead apply an ontological schema to paradigmatic discursive examples of each, thereby illustrating that their core logics are fundamentally the same.     

Effect of playing a video game on a measure of spatial visualization

70 undergraduate students, without any prior experience of video games playing, were given a pretest and a posttest on the Space Relations Test of the DAT, Forms A and B being, respectively, administered on the two occasions. The experimental group of 38 had eight sessions of playing the Zaxxon video game, each session including five plays. The control group of 32 received no such treatment. A 2 (sex) by 2 (group) analysis of covariance, using pretest scores as the covariate, yielded a significant effect for group which supports the hypothesis that spatial visualization test scores can be improved by video game playing. Moreover, the sex-related difference in visual-spatial skills frequently reported does not appear on the pretest. Finally, no effect for sex and no interaction of group X sex were found, indicating that both male and female subjects gained equally from playing Zaxxon.