COORIENTATION ON COMMUNICATION RULES IN MANAGERIAL DYADS

This field study compared the effects of three dimensions of supervisor-subordinate coorientation regarding two communication rules (initiation and termination) on satisfaction with supervision and performance evaluations. For supervisors accuracy and perceived agreement on rules had positive effects on performance ratings of subordinates, even after controlling for frequency of contact. For subordinates, only perceived agreement on rules had an impact on satisfaction with supervision. For both supervisors and subordinates agreement on communication rules was not a significant predictor of evaluations.     

Rape as an Essentially Contested Concept

Because “rape” has such a powerful appraisive meaning, how one defines the term has normative significance. Those who define rape rigidly so as to exclude contemporary feminist understandings are therefore seeking to silence some moral perspectives “by definition.” I argue that understanding rape as an essentially contested concept allows the concept sufficient flexibility to permit open moral discourse, while at the same time preserving a core meaning that can frame the discourse.     

Communicating Distressful Information: A Video Training Program in a Special Education Setting

The authors developed and evaluated a videotape training program on teaching process and problem-solving skills specifically related to issues associated with the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975. Results indicated that exposure to the training program reduced anxiety specific to the targeted issues. Feedback about the program was positive. Development and evaluation issues are discussed.     

Effects of Community Service on Adolescent Personality Development

Community service programs have been implemented to promote positive personality development in adolescents. Theoretical and anecdotal evidence suggests that such programs are important in instilling values and nurturing development of positive personality and behavioral characteristics. The study sought to determine the effects of participation in community service activities on the personality development of high school students. We used quantitative and qualitative analyses to evaluate the research question. Quantitative analyses yielded limited evidence of positive change, but qualitative analyses indicated that community service produced strong positive effects for participants. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

A gift from the ghetto

Counselors and their clients must communicate effectively. Because the trained counselor is not always able to relate to the problems of his clients who are both black and poor, this article examines the significant role that paraprofessionals, or indigenous counselors, can play in the ghetto.     

The child development consultant: an experiment

The effects of a new type of practitioner in elementary schools—the Child Development Consultant—were evaluated in contrast to the effects of persons carrying out typical functions of the elementary school counselor and social worker. This two-year project shows trends but no significant differences favoring one type of worker over the other. Evidence suggests the value of a pupil services practitioner in a school, and indicates that although such practitioners were prepared informally and relatively briefly, their effects are the same as those who engage in full, formal preparation programs.     

The Spectacular Showing: Houdini and the Wonder of Ethnomethodology

This essay is about Houdini’s escapes and ethnomethodology’s studies.¹ By accomplishing what appears to be impossible, Houdini leaves his audience considering not only how did he manage to do that, but also just what is it that we consider to be possible. Magicians and escapologists warn us off an interest in the mechanics of their tricks that might spoil the thrill of what they dramatically present to us: a sense of the limits to whatwe can apprehend as an audience. While marking out the differences in their projects, this essay brings out the sharedurge of escapologists and ethnomethodologists to question our senses, openmembers to particular phenomena, and awaken us tothe wonder of the world.In reflecting on what happens when magicians reveal the devices that constitute their tricks, I ask whether the purpose of studying methodologies canonlyreside in revealing how they are practically produced as intelligibleactions. What more might ethnomethodology’s invitation be?     

Emotional Reactions While Watching Graphic Medical Procedures: Vocational Differences in the Explicit Regulation of Emotions1

We examined the role of occupation in how people regulate emotional responses. Graduate nursing students were compared to undergraduate psychology students on self‐reported emotional reactions to videos depicting graphic medical procedures. Skin conductance was also recorded. Overall, nursing students reported less disgust and fear, but more sadness while watching the clips, compared to psychology students. The 2 groups did not differ in skin conductance activity when watching a video with no specific instructions. When instructed to suppress or reappraise their emotional reactions to the videos, however, the psychology students showed increases in skin conductance arousal, whereas the nursing students did not. The results are discussed within the context of research on strategies to regulate one's emotions in the workplace.