Quantitative approaches in environmental studies

Psychological scaling methods can be applied and can bring substantial knowledge to bear upon problems within the realm of environmental hygiene. Methodological issues related to the possibility of obtaining calibrated scales of perceptual variables such as discomfort, annoyance, and unpleasant odors are critical when the scale values are to be entered into a physical pollution index or a perceived environmental quality index, both being applied in the form of norms or recommendations. The level of measurement (ordinal, interval, or ratio scale) is related to the question of calibration of scales. From a practical point of view, the effects of observer-environment dependence are important to disguise in the scale values. Problems having to do with calibration of scales and with application of knowledge about perceptual processes to the scales are being explored in ongoing research projects. These include the measurement of temperature discomfort in different climates and the measurement of annoyance in areas with different noise exposures. Attempts have been made to solve an odorous air pollution problem with psychological measurements.     

Effects of novel odors on intermale attack behavior in mice

Offensive, defensive, and nonagonistic social behaviors of resident male mice toward unfamiliar intruders were examined during exposure to the novel odors of chocolate or sheep's wool. Both novel odors reduced lateral attacks and boxing when compared to familiar sawdust odor. Chocolate, but not sheep's wool, also reliably increased flight behavior by residents. Neither social behaviors nor self-grooming were affected by these odors. The novel odors had no effect upon, or actually decreased, the defensive responses of intruders towards residents. The equivalent effectiveness of both predator and nonpredator odors in elevating risk assessment and suppressing attack during firsttime exposure, and the decreased potency of cat odors following repeated exposure, suggests that novelty contributes to the enhanced defensiveness seen among subjects during initial exposure to predator odors. © 1995 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Loneliness: Lost in the Landscape of Meaning

The present study is an examination of sex differences in the sources of annoyance that partners in close relationships might experience as a result of each other's behavior. To test hypotheses derived from S. E. Cross and L. Madson's (1997) self-construal theory and from D. M. Buss's (1989) evolutionary psychology-based model, men and women of varying ages and educational levels were asked to rate how annoyed they would be with each of 13 potentially annoying behaviors of their intimate partner. Results were consistent with self-construal theory in that relationship-threatening behaviors were more annoying to women than to men and autonomy threatening behaviors were more annoying to men than to women. Results were also consistent with evolutionary psychology in that aggressive behaviors were more annoying to women than to men and sexual withholding was relatively more annoying to men than to women. Sex differences in annoyance with relationship-threatening, autonomy-threatening, and reproductive strategy behaviors were independent of age and education level, although these factors did affect respondents' annoyance when partners were unemotional, sloppy, or pleased with their own appearance. Results showed that sources of annoyance in intimate relationships should not only be studied from an evolutionary perspective but from the perspectives of social, personality, and developmental psychology as well.     

Sources of annoyance in close relationships: sex-related differences in annoyance with partner behaviors

The present study is an examination of sex differences in the sources of annoyance that partners in close relationships might experience as a result of each other's behavior. To test hypotheses derived from S. E. Cross and L. Madson's (1997) self-construal theory and from D. M. Buss's (1989) evolutionary psychology-based model, men and women of varying ages and educational levels were asked to rate how annoyed they would be with each of 13 potentially annoying behaviors of their intimate partner. Results were consistent with self-construal theory in that relationship-threatening behaviors were more annoying to women than to men and autonomy threatening behaviors were more annoying to men than to women. Results were also consistent with evolutionary psychology in that aggressive behaviors were more annoying to women than to men and sexual withholding was relatively more annoying to men than to women. Sex differences in annoyance with relationship-threatening, autonomy-threatening, and reproductive strategy behaviors were independent of age and education level, although these factors did affect respondents' annoyance when partners were unemotional, sloppy, or pleased with their own appearance. Results showed that sources of annoyance in intimate relationships should not only be studied from an evolutionary perspective but from the perspectives of social, personality, and developmental psychology as well.     

Pheromone‐mediated intrasexual aggression in male lizards,Podarcis hispanicus

Sex recognition is based on color signals in many species of lizards. However, olfactory stimuli are also clearly involved, and many species might rely primarily on chemoreception. We aimed to examine whether color pattern or odors, or a combination of both factors, induce the aggressive response of males of the lizard P. hispanicus. We experimentally manipulated the coloration and odor of male P. hispanicus, thereby creating groups with all combinations between coloration and odor of males or females. Using data from staged encounters, we compared the responses of resident males to the experimental groups of manipulated males and their response to unmanipulated individuals (males and females). Responding males reacted significantly more aggressively to intruders with male odors independent of their coloration, whereas intruders with female odors did not elicit aggressive responses but were preferentially courted, irrespective of their actual sex and body coloration. In addition, intruders with female odors elicited a higher number of tongue‐flick explorations than male odor ones. Comparisons with unmanipulated male and female intruders agreed with these expectations. Therefore, at least at close range, odoriferous cues seem to be more important than color patterns in sex recognition and intrasexual aggression by male P. hispanicus. We suggest that this might be a pattern commoner than expected in many species of reptiles.Aggr. Behav. 28:154–163, 2002. © 2002 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Iranian Herbalists,But Not Cooks,Are Better at Naming Odors Than Laypeople

Odor naming is enhanced in communities where communication about odors is a central part of daily life (e.g., wine experts, flavorists, and some hunter‐gatherer groups). In this study, we investigated how expert knowledge and daily experience affect the ability to name odors in a group of experts that has not previously been investigated in this context—Iranian herbalists; also called attars—as well as cooks and laypeople. We assessed naming accuracy and consistency for 16 herb and spice odors, collected judgments of odor perception, and evaluated participants' odor meta‐awareness. Participants' responses were overall more consistent and accurate for more frequent and familiar odors. Moreover, attars were more accurate than both cooks and laypeople at naming odors, although cooks did not perform significantly better than laypeople. Attars' perceptual ratings of odors and their overall odor meta‐awareness suggest they are also more attuned to odors than the other two groups. To conclude, Iranian attars—but not cooks—are better odor namers than laypeople. They also have greater meta‐awareness and differential perceptual responses to odors. These findings further highlight the critical role that expertise and type of experience have on olfactory functions.     

市民人格特征及其与心理健康的关系研究

为探讨南京市民人格特征及其与心理健康的关系,对南京市民进行抽样调查。结果显示南京市民的人格特征较一般人群更外向,掩饰程度较高;性别、年龄、职业以及文化程度与人格特征存在一定关系;不同人格类型的市民心理健康水平不同;年龄、情绪稳定性及内外向性对心理健康有预测作用。     

Novel odors evoke risk assessment and suppress appetitive behaviors in mice

The effects of four novel odors on risk assessment by mice (i. e., flat back approach, stretched attention, immobility) and the suppression of appetitive behaviors were examined in two experiments. When novel odors were presented in a straight runway, subjects spent significantly less time in the odor compartment, relative to controls, when it contained sheep wool, chocolate, or citronella (but not cat fur) odors. Risk assessment behaviors occurred at similar levels among all groups and appetitive behaviors were not suppressed by the novel odors. When odorants were scattered over one half of the subjects' home cage floor in Experiment 2, all novel odors increased the duration of at least on e risk assessment measure and/or suppressed appetitive behaviors (i. e., eating, grooming, rearing). The results clearly reveal that a reasonably wide range of novel odors evoke at least some level of risk assessment which presumably reflects increased fearfulness. The odors of sheep wool and cat fur induced a wider range of such responses than did chocolate or cinnamon suggesting that mammalian odors may be particularly effective stimuli. If so, however, it is clear that predator odors are not uniquely effective in this regard. Experiment 1 also underscores the importance of the testing environment in assessing the behavioral effects of novel odors in mice. © 1993 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Cognitive-behavioural treatment for tinnitus: A difficult case

Abstract

Tinnitus is a commonly seen and difficult to cure symptom of ear disease. This case study describes an example of cognitive-behavioural treatment for tinnitus. The patient was a 66-year-old woman with prior medical and psychiatric history. Cognitive-behavioural assessment revealed that her thoughts about the cause of her tinnitus made her focus on it and experience annoyance. The aim of treatment was to decrease the annoyance associated with the tinnitus and consisted of applied relaxation and cognitive distraction techniques. Daily registrations of tinnitus distress and annoyance, and general well-being were collected at pretreatment, mid-treatment and post-treatment on visual analogue scales. No clear effects were found on these measures, although loudness showed a slight tendency to decrease. The patient also completed a questionnaire at pretreatment and post-treatment on which no benefits were found. Verbal report and an in-session behavioural test showed positive effects of treatment, but were not mirrored in the self-reported results. The importance of reporting treatment failures is emphasized.     

Behavioral modulation induced by food odor aversive conditioning and its influence on the olfactory responses of an oscillatory brain network in the slug Limax marginatus

We compared behaviorally and physiologically the olfactory responses of slugs (Limax marginatus) that had been subjected to aversive, appetitive, or unpaired training with food odors (carrot or cucumber). In the aversive training, the slugs were exposed to the food odor as a conditioned stimulus (CS), and then quinidine sulfate solution as an unconditioned stimulus (UCS) was immediately applied to the lip of the slugs. This training caused a decrease in preference level for the CS. The unpaired training, in which the CS and the UCS were presented to the slugs with a 5-min interval, induced no change in the preference level for the CS. In the appetitive training, the slugs were allowed to eat the CS odor source without UCS application. When we used nonstarved slugs, it was found that the preference level for the CS increased upon the appetitive training. These results indicate that each training changed the preference for the odors in a characteristic manner. In the physiological experiments, we used brain-inferior tentacular nose preparations isolated from slugs and investigated the olfactory responses of the oscillations in the local field potential (LFP) of the procerebral (PC) lobe. We found that odor presentation induced various types of changes in the LFP oscillation frequency, although the rate of occurrence of the frequency modulation differed between odors used in the aversive and the unpaired training (aversive-conditioned and unpaired odors). The aversive-conditioned odors induced a decrease in the oscillatory frequency. Unpaired odors did not change it. Moreover, odors used in the appetitive training (appetitive-conditioned odors) induced an increase in the frequency. Thus, it was considered that those modulations of PC lobe oscillatory activity were independent of odor and reflected learned preference for odors.     

NATURALISTIC OBSERVATIONS OF INSTITUTIONALIZED RETARDED PERSONS: A COMPARISON OF LICENSURE DECISIONS AND BEHAVIORAL OBSERVATIONS

In the last several years, various organizations have produced strikingly similar documents by which institutions for retarded persons are judged for licensure. The purpose of the present study was to determine whether residential units that were licensed differed from residential units that were not licensed in terms of the active programming behaviors of their staff and residents. Data were collected through a time-sampling procedure that yielded about 160,000 observations on eight staff and six resident behaviors. Results showed that the licensed units were just as derelict as unlicensed units in providing habilitative programming for their retarded residents. Maladaptive responding by residents occurred at least as much as task-related behaviors: residents spent as much time self-stimulating as they did in programming; they also engaged in self-abusive behavior about as much time as they engaged in on-task responding. Results were discussed in terms of the failure of governmental regulations that are not based on observation to adequately assess habilitative programming.     

The development of reactions of the public to warning and emergency situations in France, Greece, and the Netherlands.

This article describes the different reactions to emergency warning messages among residents living within a 3-km radius of a hazardous chemical complex and by people living at least 10 km from an industrial site in France, Greece, and the Netherlands. Belief in warning, primary and secondary appraisal, emotional response, and adherence to normal routine were assessed by conducting face-to-face interviews in which a four-phase scenario simulating a credible industrial accident was presented. The results showed that respondents who did not reside in the neighborhood of the hazardous site were, in general, more inclined to trust the warning messages than respondents who resided in the neighborhood were. With the exception of primary appraisal, the warning phases evoked very distinct reactions in the respondents from all three countries with regard to warning belief, secondary appraisal, emotional response, and adherence to normal routine.     

Difficulty in evoking odor images: The role of odor naming

Many studies report that people have difficulty in evoking odor images. In this article, we explore whether this results from another commonly observed phenomenon, difficulty in naming odors. In Experiment 1, participants both named and attempted to imagine either odors or their common visual referents. More-difficult-to-name odors were reported as being more difficult to evoke as olfactory images, in comparison with the visual condition. In Experiment 2, participants received training prior to forming odor images and naming the same set of odors. As in Experiment 1, more-difficult-to-name odors were harder to imagine, but participants who had learned the odor names during training were significantly better, by their own report, at imagining many of these stimuli, relative to participants who were either exposed to the odors, exposed to their names, or who received no pretraining. In sum, these experiments suggest that odor naming may account for some of the difficulty reported by participants when attempting to evoke odor images; we discuss an associative basis for this effect.     

On Being Annoyed

What is it that unites episodes of the emotion of annoyance? The paper considers possible analyses of the content of the state of annoyance, and concludes that this emotion should be understood to involve a negative construal of an object, event, or state of affairs as having failed to exemplify one of a suite of kinds of everyday quality or excellence. This account permits us to see what is common to a varied range of superficially‐disjointed emotional responses, and to make sense of the conditions under which annoyance is appropriate or inappropriate. Moreover, it reveals something of what we care about in everyday and social contexts, in our ordinary dealings with persons and artefacts.     

Verification of Information Through Direct Experiences With an Industrial Hazard

In this study, differences in feelings of insecurity and ways of coping were assessed between residents of a chemical complex and a control group at a distance of at least 15 km from that complex. The results show that the residents of the industrial area judge the hazards as less threatening and less unacceptable than the control group and report less feelings of insecurity. The residents are less likely to read newspaper articles concerning environmental or industrial hazards and judge these newspaper accounts to be less credible than the control group. No differences were found between the residents of the chemical complex and the control group with regard to another hazard, living in the vicinity of a storage facility for radioactive waste. Our results are mainly explained by social learning theory in which it is assumed that, by a process of verification, the residents of the chemical complex are less affected by the alarming content of mass media reporting and are less negatively biased than people in the control area.     

Smelling what was there: Acquired olfactory percepts are resistant to further modification

Repeated exposure to a mixture of two odors can increase their perceived similarity to each other when presented separately. Experiment 1 failed to detect any reduction of this effect by an interference treatment consisting of separate exposures to the odors after they had first been presented as a mixture. Exposure to a mixture also results in participants mistakenly rating this mixture and its elements as having occurred with equal frequency (i.e., confusing the mixture and its elements). The interference treatment did not affect this either, whereas it did change judgments about the frequency of a color–odor mixture and its elements. The greater resistance to interference of odor–odor learning compared to color–odor learning may result from configural encoding of odor–odor mixtures. Experiment 2 found that separate exposures to two odors not previously mixed decreased their perceived similarity. This result was inconsistent with the possibility that the interference treatment in Experiment 1 had tended to increase the similarity of the two odors, for example, by a process of sensory adaptation. Rather it suggested a process akin to acquired distinctiveness.     

Participating in social enquiry and action

This paper describes the collaborative endeavours of residents and a wide range of professional workers in a particular area of Nottingham, with reference to a community psychology approach to addressing sources of psychological distress. The activities include a survey of people's views about living in the area and the factors they identify as affecting their health; and initiatives in community participation and action. One hundred and twenty three people were interviewed by members of the Sneinton and Bakersfield Community Forum. Harmful influences upon health and causes of stress were revealed as litter, dog dirt, air and traffic pollution, feeling unsafe to go out at night and lifestyle-related issues such as smoking and diet. Public meetings, the local press and short written reports were used to publicize these results and encourage further involvement. Many local residents and professionals are now active in a network of groups which address social and environmental concerns.