A simple LSI-11 system for real-time control,interevent time storage,and data analysis

A simple laboratory computer system based on a Digital Equipment Corporation LSI-11, floppy disk, DRV11 parallel input-output board, and the RT-11 operating system is described. Interface to experimental devices is provided through a lab-built relay driver and relay closure sensing interface. An extensive high-level software package provides an easy-to-use control language (e.g., stimuli can be controlled with a simple “TURN ON” or “TURN OFF” instruction) and easy-to-use FORTRAN subroutines for data exploration (e.g., “IFIND” searches a data file for a particular event). The control software automatically generates, codes, and stores a complete log of every input and output event and its time of occurrence in each of five simultaneously running experiments. This provides the capability to reanalyze data in light of hypotheses not available when the experiment was designed. The FORTRAN subroutine library for data exploration provides a conditional and iterative search facility to sift out events or sets of events from the data file for analysis. Standard FORTRAN statements perform arithmetic operations on the resulting data.     

Decision Control and Process Control Effects on Procedural Fairness Judgments1

Process control, the capacity to influence the content of a conflict resolution hearing, has been found repeatedly to affect disputants' judgments of the fairness of conflict resolution procedures, but never has there been an unambiguous test of the effect in nonbinding procedures. It was hypothesized that disputants experiencing nonbinding conflict resolution procedures, as well as those experiencing binding conflict resolution, would judge as more fair procedures high in disputant process control. One hundred nineteen undergraduate males and females were placed in apparent conflict with other suhjects. The procedure used to resolve the conflict was either high or low in disputant process control and was either binding or nonbinding. The outcome of the conflict resolution procedure was either favorable or unfavordblc to the subject. High disputant process control procedures were judged more fair than low disputant process control procedures regardless of whether the decision was binding, confirming the hypothesis. The results support new applications of procedural fairness theory and research and encourage testing of process control-like variables in nonlegal settings.     

Dimensions of metaphor

Two rating studies examined several dimensions of metaphorical sentences. A pool of 260 metaphors was constructed, all in the form “(noun phrase) is/are (noun phrase).” In Study 1 all of the items, and in Study 2, 98 of the items were evaluated on ten scales presumed to be important to the comprehension or interpretation of metaphors: semantic relatedness of the subject and predicate, comprehensibility, imageability, imageability of the subject (topic), imageability of the predicate (vehicle), degree of metaphoricity, metaphor goodness, ease of interpretation, number of alternative interpretations, and felt familiarity of the metaphoric ground. Both experiments revealed the rated dimensions to be highly interrelated, but some analyses allowed evaluation of alternative predictions based on current theoretical approaches to metaphor quality and interpretation. The results indicated consistent but mixed support for the general poisitions under consideration as each appeared to have strong and weak areas of applicability. The interrelationships among the scales are discussed, together with implications of the findings for current theories and future metaphor research.     

Relating early child adjustment to infant and parent temperament

The central question at issue was the role of both infant and parent temperament in determining child adjustment at age 4. Within the conceptual framework of the New York Longitudinal Study (NYLS), both infant and parent temperament were assessed. Factor analyses yielded three comparable infant and parent temperament factors: Mood, Energy, and Consistency. Correlations with teacher ratings of child adjustment indicated the most significant relationship to be with the infant girls' Mood factor (comparable to the NYLS high-risk "difficult" infant factor). No infant factors were found to relate to boys' adjustment, while maternal Mood was significant across sexes. Indices of the temperamental similarity within families also revealed sex differences relative to adjustment, with similarity across all family members significantly related to adjustment for girls and boy-father dissimilarity significant for boys. Discussion centered around continuity-discontinuity issues relevant to sex differences.     

A machine-level software program for the generation of aversive conditioning schedules using the KIM-1 microprocessor

A microprocessor system can be used both to control aversive conditioning (classical, signaled and Sidman avoidance, and conflict) experiments and to acquire behavioral data in multiple subjects at a fraction of the cost of solid state systems. The software described in this paper can be used to program tones and shocks and count responses, independently, in up to 12 animals simultaneously.     

Infants' discrimination of internal and external pattern elements

Human infants' discrimination of changes in internal and external elements of compound visual patterns was investigated in four experiments employing a familiarization-novelty paradigm in which visual reinforcing patterns were presented contingent upon rate of high-amplitude nonnutritive sucking. In Experiment 1, 4-month infants discriminated changes in the shape of internal, external and both internal and external figures. One-month infants discriminated external changes in both internal and external figures, but failed to show reliable response recovery when only internal figures were changed. Experiments 2 and 3 failed to explain the 1-month results on the basis of poor resolution of internal figures by showing comparable discrimination of small and large singly-presented figures and by failing to find improved internal discrimination with large separation between internal and external figures. In Experiment 4, 1-month infants showed response recovery to figure additions made adjacent to the initial figure, but not to internal additions. The results are interpreted in terms of attentiveness by young infants to external pattern elements and may indicate early processing of figure-ground information. The developmental differences observed suggest an increased breadth of attention to pattern elements.     

The neural pathways mediating quiet-biting attack behavior from the hypothalamus in the cat: A functional autoradiographic study

Electrical stimulation of the region of the lateral hypothalamus produced a consistent form of quiet-biting attack behavior in cats. In one series of experiments, cats, implanted with electrodes from which attack had been elicited, were anesthetized and then were injected with a bolus of ¹⁴C-2-deoxyglucose at the same time as electrical stimulation was delivered through the attack electrodes. Brains prepared for X-ray autoradiography revealed that lateral hypothalamic stimulation activated the classical medial forebrain bundle pathway supplying the septal region, diagonal band, lateral preoptic area, and ventral tegmental region. Stimulation of quiet-attack sites in perifornical hypothalamus resulted in the activation of a much more extensive projection system which included the central and lateral tegmental fields of the midbrain and pons, and central gray region, as well as the structures described above. In a second series of experiments, ³H-leucine was placed into the region of the electrode tip from which attack was elicited in order to identify more precisely the pathways arising from that site. In general, tritiated amino acid radioautography replicated the ¹⁴C-2-deoxyglucose findings. In addition, the amino acid radioautographic data revealed the presence of extensive projections from perifornical hypothalamus to such pontine structures as the nucleus locus coeruleus, motor nucleus of NV , and the lateral pontine tegmental field. The functional connections between the lateral hypothalamic “attack region” and lateral preoptic zone were also confirmed by electrophysiological methods.