Forgetting of pictures over a long retention interval in young and older adults

Young and older adults were presented with pictures for study. Their recognition of the information was tested at five retention intervals: immediately, and 48 hr, 1 week, 2 weeks, and 4 weeks later. The main finding of interest was that picture recognition did not show an age-related decline until the 1-week retention interval.     

Perceptual organization of acoustic stimuli by budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulatus): II. Vocal signals

Operant conditioning and multidimensional scaling procedures were used to study auditory perception of complex sounds in the budgerigar. In a same-different discrimination task, budgerigars learned to discriminate among natural vocal signals. Multidimensional scaling procedures were used to arrange these complex acoustic stimuli in a two-dimensional space reflecting perceptual organization. Results show that budgerigars group vocal stimuli according to functional and acoustical categories. Studies with only contact calls show that birds also make within-category discriminations. The acoustic cues in contact calls most salient to budgerigars appear to be quite complex. There is a suggestion that the sex of the signaler may also be encoded in these calls. The results from budgerigars were compared with the results from humans tested on some of the same sets of complex sounds.     

The influence of mindset abstraction on preference for mixed versus extreme approaches to multigoal pursuits

Facing multiple conflicting goals, consumers may attempt to simultaneously pursue multiple goals by choosing mixed vice–virtue bundles in each consumption episode (mixed approach). Alternatively, they may maximize their pursuit of one goal at a time and sequentially manage multiple goals by alternating between pure-virtue and pure-vice bundles across consumption episodes (extreme approach). The current research proposes that consumer preferences between the two approaches depend on mindset abstraction. Across four experimental studies in the domains of food and financial decision-making, we demonstrate that, relative to an abstract mindset, a concrete mindset increases preference for the extreme approach over the mixed approach. Furthermore, by observing actual food choices over a seven-day period, this research provides a comprehensive picture of how a chronic mindset relates to multigoal management in long-term consumption patterns. The findings have both theoretical implications for the goal literature and managerial implications for marketers and policymakers.     

Preemployment screening procedures: How human resource managers perceive them

A survey of Human Resource practitioners' perceptions of pre-employment screening procedures was conducted. The results indicated differences between tests in terms of perceived accuracy and offensiveness, as well as other attributes. Regression analyses suggested that beliefs about validity, the number of other companies using these procedures, perceived offensiveness of the test, and ease in passing the test were important factors in the willingness to use a particular test. Conversely, perceptions regarding the discriminatory impact of the test and the cost of using the test generally were not related to willingness to use the test. Limitations of this study, which was primarily exploratory, are noted.     

Reasons for Living Following Success and Failure in Suicidal and Nonsuicidal College Students1

To see if suicide ideators responded differently than nonideators after success or failure experiences, 61 college students who were relatively high or low ideators participated in a computer task on which half got bogus success feedback, the other half got bogus failure feedback. Both groups then completed the Reasons for Living Inventory (RFL). Two (High versus Low Suicide) X 2 (Success or Failure) analyses indicated main effects for suicide on overall RFL and four of the six RFL subscales. Although there were no main effects for success versus failure, an interaction indicated that, in the failure condition, low suicidal subjects were significantly higher than high suicidal subjects in overall reasons for living. Results suggest that suicidal individuals may be vulnerable to failure, and may need interventions to help them avoid potential failure or to bolster their coping mechanisms.     

An Application of Brief Therapy to Family Medicine

The Solution-Focused Brief Therapy model has been applied to support families with various problems commonly met at the department of family medicine in a large, urban teaching hospital in Seoul. Korea. Many cases there show a different distribution of problems when compared with a tertiary family therapy center. The majority involve psychosomatic problems, family distress around a chronically-ill member, the loss of a family member, and severe illness, only a few involving drinking problems, family violence, or abuse. The SFBT model meets the seven requirements of Doherty and Baird (1983) for a family therapy model to be useful in a medicine setting.     

Using the HOME inventory with infants in Costa Rica

It has been established through several decades of research that children's home environments significantly influence their development. Many researchers have also been interested in expanding research beyond indirect measures of the home environment, such as socioeconomic status, to help understand the nature of specific environmental mechanisms which influence early behavior and cognitive development. The Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (HOME) Inventory was developed to meet these needs. Specifically, HOME measures the quality of stimulation in a child's early family environment. Almost all studies of the approach's reliability and validity have been conducted with US samples. HOME is, however, being used in other countries. The authors report their findings from a study of whether the psychometric properties of HOME based upon US samples parallel those found in Costa Rica, and whether HOME discriminates between Costa Rican environments with different associations to child health and development. Focus centers upon the infant/toddler version of the HOME Inventory. HOME data for 183 healthy Costa Rican infants were compared to the original HOME standardization sample from Little Rock, Arkansas. The study found the HOME Inventory to be helpful in identifying children at risk for delayed development in this Latin American sample. Lower HOME scores related to a shorter duration of breastfeeding and differentiated children with iron deficiency anemia in infancy, a condition associated with long-lasting developmental disadvantage.     

Analysis of variances and covariances is misleading as a guide to a common factor model

The “factor” analyses published by Schultz, Kaye, and Hoyer (1980) confused component and factor analysis and led in this case as in many others to unwarranted conclusions. They used component analysis to develop factor models that were subjected to restricted (confirmatory) maximum likelihood analysis, but the final models for which good fits with the observed correlations were obtained were not common factor models. They were, however, discussed as such and conclusions drawn accordingly. When their correlation matrices are analyzed by the principal factors method, two factors are sufficient to account for the intercorrelations. These two factors generally support the a priori expectation of a difference between intelligence tasks and spontaneous flexibility tasks. They are also quite similar in younger and older subjects, when similarity is judged in terms of factor pattern. Factor loadings for the younger subjects, however, are much smaller than expectations based on the respective ranges of talent in the two groups of subjects or on past experience with similar tests in undergraduate student populations.     

The Role of Psychological Reactance in Drinking Following Alcohol Prevention Messages1

Two experiments tested whether a dogmatic alcohol prevention message may, by arousing psychological reactance (the motivation to reassert a threatened freedom) result in more subsequent alcohol consumption, compared to a neutral message. In Study 1, 535 college students received either a high-threat (dogmatic) or low-threat (neutral) message recommending either abstinence or controlled drinking. Results indicated that high-threat messages were rated more negatively and resulted in more drinking intentions compared to low threat. The negative effect of high threat on message ratings was most pronounced for habitually heavy drinkers and an abstinence-espousing message. In Study 2, under the guise of a “memory study,” 74 college students received either a high- or low-threat message recommending abstinence from alcohol. Then, under the guise of a “perception study,” all subjects participated in a taste-rating task in which their beer consumption was unobtrusively measured. Results indicated that the effect of high threat was most negative for male heavy drinkers, who drank significantly more beer compared to low-threat controls. These results suggest that the persuasive ability of alcohol prevention efforts depend to a considerable extent on the reactance-arousing properties of the materials and that dogmatic alcohol prevention materials may have counterproductive effects for some college students.