Memory access: The effects of fact-oriented versus problem-oriented acquisition

This study examined the effects of similarity between the processing of acquisition and the processing of test materials on performance in a problem solving task. Previous work by Perfetto, Bransford, and Franks (1983) demonstrated that uninformed subjects’ failure to utilize relevant acquisition information in a later problem solving task is the result of a failure to spontaneously access such information. The present study demonstrated that spontaneous access can be enhanced when both acquisition and test materials are processed in a similar manner, that is, in a problem-oriented manner. Furthermore, the present findings indicate that the processing similarity leading to enhanced access is specific to particular acquisition and test items, rather than a general problem solving set induced at acquisition and the subsequent testing situation. Results are interpreted within a transfer-appropriate processing perspective.     

Improving lecture comprehension: Effects of a metacognitive strategy

In previous research self-questioning strategies have been found to significantly improve reading comprehension, presumably because of the metacognitive nature of the self-questioning process. The purpose of the present study was to determine whether this metacognitive strategy also enhances lecture comprehension, that is, comprehension of non-text, orally presented material. In a self-questioning combined with reciprocal peer-questioning condition, ninthgraders were trained to pose questions for themselves during classroom lectures; following the lectures, they used their questions to engage in reciprocal peer-questioning and responding. Students in a self-questioning only condition also engaged in self-questioning during the lectures and then answered their own questions; in a review condition, students discussed the lecture material in small cooperative groups; and in a control group students reviewed the lecture material independently. On post-practice and 10-day maintenance tests participants in the self-questioning with reciprocal peer-questioning and the self-questioning only strategy groups showed lecture comprehension superior to that of participants in both the discussion review and control groups. These results suggest that: use of a self-questioning strategy can improve high school students' comprehension of lectures; students can maintain this strategy when external prompts are removed; and this metacognitive strategy can be readily taught to high school students and incorporated into their real-world classroom learning environment.     

Emotional Expressiveness during Peer Conflicts: A Predictor of Social Maladjustment among High-Risk Preschoolers

Preschool boys' emotional displays during conflicts with mixed-sex peers were related to individual differences in peer sociometric status and teacher ratings of disruptive behavior. Participants were 60 4- to 5-year old boys from low-income families who were videotaped with a small group of classmates in a Head Start preschool classroom. Conflicts were identified and emotional displays were coded from videotape. Results indicated that conflicts were more negative in emotional tone at the end than at the beginning of the year. Furthermore, children tended to mirror each others' emotional displays at the end but not the beginning of the preschool year. In addition, gleeful taunting, a form of emotional aggression, more strongly predicted negative peer nominations and teacher ratings than anger, suggesting that anger may be a more socially accepted form of emotional expression during conflicts among preschool-age children. Implications and directions for future research and interventions are discussed.     

Psychosocial stages and the accessibility of autobiographical memories across the life cycle

Older adults recalled memories from each decade of life. Memories were classified in terms of the psychosocial stages to which their content corresponded. For the majority of memories it was found that age at encoding corresponded to when specific psychosocial stages would have been most likely to have occurred. In a second experiment older adults recalled memories to cues drawn from psychosocial stages and the same pattern of findings was observed. These findings demonstrate that the goals of the self play a major role in both the encoding and accessibility of autobiographical memories, and they also provide support for Erikson's psychosocial theory of development (1950, 1997).     

Integrating rewards and cognition in the frontal cortex

Research indicates that the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) contributes to working memory and executive control, whereas the ventral frontal cortex (VFC) contributes to affective and motivational processing. Few studies have examined both the functional specificity and the integration of these regions. We did so using fMRI and a verbal working memory task in which visual cues indicated whether recall performance on an upcoming trial would be linked to a monetary reward. On the basis of prior findings obtained in delayed response tasks performed by nonhuman primates, we hypothesized that (1) VFC would show an increase only in response to a cue indicating potential for a monetary reward; (2) DLPFC would show sustained activity across a delay interval for all trials, though activity in rewarded trials would be enhanced; and (3) regions engaged in speech-based rehearsal would be relatively insensitive to monetary incentive. Our hypotheses about DLPFC and rehearsal-related regions were confirmed. In VFC regions, we failed to observe statistically significant effects of reward when the cue or delay epochs of the task were examined in isolation. However, an unexpected and significant deactivation was observed in VFC during the delay epoch; furthermore, a post hoc voxelwise analysis indicated a complex interaction between (1) the cue and delay epochs of the task and (2) the reward value of the trials. The pattern of activation and deactivation across trial types suggests that VFC is sensitive to reward cues, and that portions of DLPFC and VFC may work in opposition during the delay epoch of a working memory task in order to facilitate task performance.     

Stereotypes as dominant responses: on the "social facilitation" of prejudice in anticipated public contexts

This article challenges the highly intuitive assumption that prejudice should be less likely in public compared with private settings. It proposes that stereotypes may be conceptualized as a type of dominant response (C. L. Hull, 1943; R. B. Zajonc, 1965) whose expression may be enhanced in public settings, especially among individuals high in social anxiety. Support was found for this framework in an impression formation paradigm (Experiment 1) and in a speeded task designed to measure stereotypic errors in perceptual identification (Experiment 2). Use of the process dissociation procedure (B. K. Payne, L. L. Jacoby, & A. J. Lambert, in press) demonstrated that these effects were due to decreases in cognitive control rather than increases in stereotype accessibility. The findings highlight a heretofore unknown and ironic consequence of anticipated public settings: Warning people that others may be privy to their responses may actually increase prejudice among the very people who are most worried about doing the wrong thing in public.     

Index

Other Index

Index     

Components of IQ Scores Across Levels of Measured Ability

Forty-three (43) students from the Talent Identification Program's Summer Residential Program living in North Carolina took the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children—Revised (WISC-R; Wechsler, 1974) during the program. The test was also administered to 50 other North Carolina Students who qualified for the SRP but did not attend, as well as 34 students who had not been identified as gifted. The scores were evaluated for normative and idiographic strengths and weaknesses on the 12 subtests of the WISC-R. The idiographic differences were calculated by comparison against the average score of only the 6 subtests in the same subscale of the test (Verbal or Performance) as well as against all 12 subtests on the test. It was found by means of the former comparisons that the gifted students showed significantly more idiographic strengths on the Verbal scales and weaknesses on the Performance scales than the academically competent sample.     

Home correlates of aggression in preschool

Is aggressive behaviour in preschool more closely related to individual characteristics of the child as assessed at home, to aspects of mother-child interaction, or to the motherchild relationship? The issue was studied in three replications. Aggression in preschool was related to temperamental characteristics in girls but not boys, and to Self-esteem. There were very few significant correlations between aspects of mother-child interaction and hostility in preschool, but hostility with peers was related to the absence of positive or presence of mildly negative interactions with the sibling. Aggression in preschool was related to an aspect of the mother-child relationship; least aggression was shown by those childred whose mothers used warmth and control more or less “in balance” (authortative Mothers). Such children also differed in other aspects of the mother-child relationship, and these provided some explanation of those children who appeared to be exceptions to the “balance” hypethesis. © 1993 Wiley-Liss, Inc.