Constructing and Understanding an Incident as a Social Problem: A Case Study of University Entrance Exam Cheating in Japan

The recent work of Frances Chaput Waksler—The New Orleans Sniper: A Phenomenological Case Study of Constituting the Other—demonstrates, by close examination of the case of the New Orleans Sniper of 1973, how people constitute and unconstitute an “Other” in certain situations. This paper explores the process by which people constituted the Other in Japan in February of 2011 through the course of an incident that surprised Japanese people: university entrance exam cheating by use of the Internet question-and-answer bulletin board. I will further examine how the incident can be constructed as a social problem with the construction of a victim and a villain. For data, I use reports from newspapers with nationwide circulation and reports from news agencies present at the time of the event. I also cite additional data from Internet news sites. Although my research here is small and elementary and my analysis is sociological rather than phenomenological, it is inspired by Waksler’s work. I will show how peoples’ commonsense knowledge frames their understanding and construction of an event. This paper will show that Waksler’s ideas about the New Orleans Sniper and her analysis of this case are applicable to another event in a different time at a different place: contemporary Japanese society.     

Community Psychology: The Case of Cameroon

Community psychology in Cameroon is a budding discipline even its practice, given the scarcity of professionals with specialised training. However, this paper highlights public and private community-oriented projects that resonate with the principles of community psychology. The demands are high with the impact of globalisation, corruption, poverty and HIV/AIDS. Yet it is evident that professional responses to these demands will be slow because even the teaching, research and use of the main discipline of psychology face major problems, blocking its expansion and use. There is the need for strong academic and professional leadership that is usually blocked by tribalism, weakness in the pedagogy of programmes and underdevelopment and unawareness of social problems including the absence of structures for strengthening institutional capacity. These explain why only rudimentary psychological services exist for Cameroonians. There is therefore an urgent need for the rapid formalisation of community psychology in teaching, research and service for alleviating people's distress in Cameroon.     

Methods of Cheating and Deterrents to Classroom Cheating: An International Study

This study examines the methods students use to cheat on class examinations and suggests ways of deterring using an international sample from Australia, China, Ireland, and the United States. We also examine the level of cheating and reasons for cheating that prior research has highlighted as a method of demonstrating that our sample is equivalent to those in prior studies. Our results confirm the results of prior research that primarily employs students from the United States. The data indicate that actions such as having multiple versions of the examination and scrambling the questions on these versions would deter cheating. In addition, given the increased level of cheating and students' increased perception of the social acceptability of cheating in college, the data provided by our international sample also suggest that some relatively simple precautions by instructors could dramatically reduce the level of cheating on in-class examinations.     

The Psychology of the Employment Relationship: An Analysis Based on the Psychological Contract

On esquisse des perspectives conduisant à des changements dans les relations de travail et à la nécessité d'élaborer un cadre conceptuel convenant au monde actuel. La notion de contrat psychologique représente un modèle utile et l'on résume plusieurs études qui ont l'ont adoptée pour aborder certains aspects des relations de travail. A partir de ces investigations, on montre que le contrat psychologique doit être élargi pour accorder davantage de poids au contexte et à ce qui est décrit comme relevant du contenu même de ce contrat, à savoir les idées d'équité et de confiance qui résident au cœur des relations de travail. On présente un programme pour de futures recherches exploitant ce modèle.
Developments are outlined that are leading to changes in employment relations and to the need for a conceptual framework that has contemporary relevance. It is proposed that the psychological contract provides a useful framework, and different studies that have adopted the psychological contract to study aspects of employment relations are outlined. Building on these, it is argued that the psychological contract needs extending to give greater weight to context and to what is described as the state of the psychological contract, incorporating issues of fairness and trust that lie at the heart of employment relations. Based on this model, an agenda for future research is presented.     

Predictors of Cheating Behavior at a University: A Lesson From the Psychology of Work

The present study investigated students' behavior across academic departments to establish how personality, demographic, educational, attitudinal, and climate (both psychological and departmental) predicted self-reported cheating behavior at a university. Participants were 107 students from a variety of academic disciplines. The results explain 50.5% of the variability in self-reported cheating behavior in terms of demographic (male, school education qualifications), departmental climate, and individual differences (Lie and Neuroticism scales). We concluded that an expanded theoretical perspective (utilizing a wide range of person and situation variables) explained more variability than would otherwise be explained from any single perspective, and that findings from the literature of integrity at work generalize to educational settings. Finally, we discuss the limitations and implications of this research.     

Cheating the Lie Detector: Faking in the Autobiographical Implicit Association Test

ABSTRACT— The autobiographical Implicit Association Test (aIAT) was recently introduced in this journal as a new and promising lie-detection tool. The initial report found 91% accuracy in determining which of two autobiographical events was true. It was suggested that the aIAT, unlike other lie-detection tests, is resistant to faking. We investigated whether participants can strategically alter their performance on the aIAT. Experiment 1 showed that participants guilty of a mock theft were able to obtain an innocent test outcome. Two additional experiments showed that guilty participants can fake the aIAT without prior experience with the aIAT and when a response deadline is imposed. The aIAT is subject to the same shortcomings as other lie-detection tests.     

The Motivation Analysis Test: An Introduction and Example

This article describes the theoretical basis of the Motivation Analysis Test (MAT) and summarizes its major trait-dimensions and their interrelationships. MAT interpretation is illustrated on 205 disadvantaged females.     

Intervention of Community Social Psychology: The Case of Colombia

La psychologie des Communautés Sociales peut être considérée non seulement comme une approche mais aussi comme un champ d'action prometteur sur la scène colombienne. Le document présent vise à décrire quelques antécédents et le contexte général socio-politique en Colombie, où plusieurs applications de la Psychologie environnementale sociale ont été utilisées pour résoudre les problèmes des communautés. Des considérations théoriques et méthodologiques issues de ces applications seront discutées au travers de trois cas. Enfin, nous présenterons une série de commentaires et de conclusions qui donnent une vision globale des différentes applications données en référence.
Community social psychology can be considered not only an approach but also a promising field of action on the Colombian scene. The aims of the present paper are to describe some of the antecedents and the general socio-political context in Colombia, where several applications of social-environmental psychology have been used to solve community problems. The implied theoretical and methodological considerations of these applications will be discussed in relation to three specific cases. Finally, we will present a number of comments and conclusions that give a global vision of the different applications referred to.     

Protecting Self-Image: The Rationalization of Cheating in an International Billiard League

ABSTRACT

The American Poolplayers Association, founded in 1979, is an international billiard league established in the United States, Canada, and Japan, with more than 250,000 members. The most difficult problem facing the American Poolplayers Association (APA)’s league operators is the deliberate cheating by the competing players. Players cheat to lower their skill level, allowing them to win more easily in important billiard matches such as the APA international championships. Qualitative interviews revealed that when asked about their cheating behavior, the players used all five “techniques of neutralization to rationalize their actions attempting to protect their self-image and to help insulate them from external judgments.     

Introduction: Personality Psychology and the Case Study

ABSTRACT This article introduces the Journal of Personality's special issue on the life voyage of Dodge Morgan who, in 1986 at the age of 54, sailed solo around the world in 150 days. Before the voyage, Morgan agreed to participate in an intensive psychological case study, the data for which provide the focus for this special issue. William Nasby and Nancy W. Read have organized the vast array of psychological data obtained from Morgan and produced a complex and illuminating interpretation of his life, drawing liberally from the five-factor trait model of personality and the life-story model of adult identity. This introduction provides a historical and intellectual context for Nasby and Read's study by considering the various ways in which personality psychologists have employed the case study in research and examining the many conceptual and methodological problems and possibilities that arise in the psychological study of the single case.     

Portfolio Selection from Multiple Benchmarks: A Goal Programming Approach to an Actual Case

This paper deals with benchmark‐based portfolio choice for buy‐and‐hold strategies of investing. Multiple benchmarks for returns are considered, which is more realistic than taking a unique benchmark – a unique aspiration difficult to select in practice among the various aspirations for returns that the investor has in mind. Portfolio selection with multiple benchmarks leads to a multi‐objective problem, which is addressed by mean value – stochastic goal programming. In particular, two benchmarks are considered, which involves two goals. Weights for goals depend on investor's preferences and Arrow's absolute risk aversion coefficients. An efficient frontier of portfolios is obtained. Advantages of this stochastic method in our context are as follows: (i) Mean value‐stochastic goal programming relies on classical utility theory under uncertainty and Arrow's absolute risk aversion, which ensures soundness and strictness, and (ii) the numerical model is easily solved by using available software such as mean–variance software. Numerical results are tabulated and discussed. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Systemic Analysis of Cheating in an Undergraduate Engineering Mechanics Course

Cheating in the undergraduate classroom is not a new problem, and it is recognized as one that is endemic to the education system. This paper examines the highly normative behavior of using unauthorized assistance (e.g., a solutions manual or a friend) on an individual assignment within the context of an upper division undergraduate course in engineering mechanics. The findings indicate that there are varying levels of accepting responsibility among the students (from denial to tempered to full) and that acceptance of responsibility can lead to identification of learning and necessary behavioral changes. The findings have implications for institutions and engineering faculty, in particular the need for consistent academic integrity education and the teaching of professional integrity and ethics.     

中国城乡跨文化心理学刍议

城乡跨文化心理学的母体是跨文化心理学,它旨在探讨城乡两种亚文化背景中的社会结构、思想观念、生活准则、价值体系、行为方式、民俗习惯、神话传说、宗教信仰以及语言特点等方面的共同文化心理特质和文化心态差异,中国的城乡跨文化心理学着重揭示城乡两种文化背景下个体或群体社会心理的基本差别,并因此为心理学提供研究原则和方法方面的启示,进而为乡村城市化过程中各种问题的解决查明心理学上的依据。     

The Psychology of Names: An Empirical Reexamination1

Four studies were conducted to examine how a first name might impact the way a person is perceived when varying amounts of information about the person are available. In Study 1, first names that are used more often today than in the past (young-generation names) were preferred to first names that have never been used often (not-common names), which in turn were liked more than first names that were used more often in the past than they are today (old-generation names). In Study 2, these names were evaluated in the context of résumés and personal ads. Old-generation names received the least favorable reactions, but inconsistencies were obtained between the other two classifications of names. Study 3 suggested that the results of the first 2 studies cannot be attributed to the use of a college-age sample. Study 4 demonstrated that people tend to infer a variety of characteristics from these three classifications of names. Results are discussed with respect to first-impression formation and ageism.     

The Psychology of Leadership Destabilization: An Analysis of the 2016 U.S. Presidential Debates

When contesting for political office, leaders do not only seek to build their own following but also to engage in attacks to destabilize opponent leaders. However, research has yet to explore and explain the nature of attacks that seek to destabilize a leader's influence. Building on the identity leadership model which sees leadership as flowing from a leader's capacity to promote a sense of shared identity with followers, we argue that a leader can be destabilized if followers come to see the leader as defiling, devaluing, dividing, and destroying this shared sense of “us.” To explore these ideas, we analyzed the attack rhetoric used by Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump during the 2016 U.S. presidential debates to examine how they sought to subvert each other's leadership. Our analysis supports the proposed model and sheds light on the hitherto underexplored topic of leadership destabilization. Moreover, by helping us understand the ways in which principles of identity leadership can be weaponized to destabilize leadership, the analysis defines an important agenda for future research.     

应用心理学的学科性质——基于钱学森学科结构模型的分析

纯粹应用观和独立观是解释应用心理学学科性质的两个代表性理论。前者认为应用心理学仅是基础心理学知识和方法的直接应用;后者则认为应用心理学有独立的本质特征。钱学森学科结构模型赞同独立观,认为应用心理学有三个本质特征：1）研究旨趣面向心理工程技术中的重大问题,生产应用性理论;2）内容体系由社会需求决定,随着需求的变化而变化;3）研究方法的个人经验成分多于基础心理学,少于心理工程技术。在应用心理学建设中,1）要敏于实际需求;2）要大力发展、创立我国需要的应用心理学分支;3）要统一人才培养规制。     

The Motivation Analysis Test: an historical and contemporary evaluation

This is an historical review and contemporary empirical evaluation of the Motivation Analysis Test (MAT), one of the first tests to take a psychometric approach to the assessment of motivation. Reviews were quite positive, but the test is now over 50 years old. Nevertheless, it employs innovations in measurement not widely used in objective measurement then or now: (1) subtests with different formats, (2) disguised items, (3) speeded administration procedures, and (4) ipsative format and scoring procedures. These issues are discussed and a contemporary sample (N = 360) obtained to evaluate the Motivation Analysis Test in light of its innovative characteristics.     

作弊为什么会传染?社会损失和作弊态度的中介作用

为了解释考试作弊的"传染"现象,研究探讨大学考试情境中他人作弊对观察者将来作弊意向的效应,假设他人作弊通过社会损失和作弊态度的链式中介作用对观察者将来作弊意向产生效应。研究采用他人作弊问卷、社会损失问卷、作弊态度问卷、将来作弊意向问卷,对765名在校大学生进行调查。在控制了性别、年级、第一次作弊的时间和经常作弊的开始时间之后,研究发现：（1）他人作弊正向预测观察者将来作弊意向;（2）社会损失在他人作弊和观察者将来作弊意向之间起中介作用;（3）社会损失与作弊态度在他人作弊与观察者将来作弊意向之间起链式中介作用。研究为理解考试作弊的"传染"现象及其内在机制提供了有价值的视角。     

An Analysis of the Relations Between Basic and Applied Psychology

This article illustrates the possible application of homeokinetics to the constructive process of the origin of life. The homeokinetic strategy is to seek out cycles at all time scales in a system where they can be discovered (spectroscopy) and to show how interacting cyclic processes can account for historical emergence of new entities, many of which also are cyclic processes. The full story of emergence necessarily begins with cosmology, which eventually results in an earth that can support geological processes, which form the matrix for life.