Differential reinforcement with and without instructional fading

We evaluated a differential-reinforcement-based treatment package for the reduction of problem behavior during instructional situations. Differential reinforcement of alternative behavior (DRA; compliance) was implemented across two conditions. During one condition, instructions were presented approximately once every other minute. This condition was considered the terminal goal for treatment. During the second condition, the rate of instructions was gradually increased (beginning at zero and ending when instruction rate was similar to the first condition). Results indicated that DRA with instructional fading resulted in less problem behavior than DRA without instructional fading. These results are similar to previous studies regarding the utility of instructional fading.     

Effect of Intentional Sentences on Visual Attention to Human and Animal Pictures: Evidence from Eye Movements

This study explored the effect of specific vs. general sentences, describing intentional aspects of humans and animals on visual attention on face and body regions. A picture-sentence verification paradigm was used and eye movements were recorded as subjects looked at displays in the absence of any overt task. Results indicated higher visual attention to the body regions for sentences expressing specific intentional states for human pictures and not for animal pictures. A strong preference to look at the body regions in general was observed compared to the face regions. Results suggest that understanding intentional states of other agents requires focusing visual attention on the body region compared to the face region. The findings are discussed in terms of interaction of intentional states and visual attention.     

Understanding Processes of Transformative Change: A Qualitative Inquiry into Empowering Sources and Outcomes Identified by Women in Rural Nicaragua

Sex Roles - Despite decades of research on women’s human rights and empowerment across several academic disciplines, inequities between women and men persist at alarming rates across the...     

Loss is a loss,why categorize it? Mental accounting across cultures

Consumers regularly track their expenses and assign them to categories like food, entertainment, and clothing, which is popularly known as mental accounting. In this paper, we show that consumption biases that result from mental accounting—underconsumption or overconsumption—are not prevalent in Easterners due to their holistic thinking style, whereas Westerners exhibit such biases due to their analytic thinking style. In Study 1, we collected data with Easterners (students from the eastern part of India) and show that they do not exhibit mental accounting biases as is seen in Westerners. In Study 2, we show that such differences in mental accounting across cultures result from their thinking styles by manipulating thinking styles within a Western population (American students from the Midwest). We also show that the differences in styles of thinking across cultures motivate two different types of accounting processes—a piecemeal accounting process in the Westerners and a comprehensive accounting process in the Easterners—which in turn influence the differences in mental accounting biases across cultures. This finding adds to the growing literature in cross‐cultural differences in consumer decision making and explores how and why a well‐documented robust effect, mental accounting, varies with the cultural background of the consumers.     

A gendered approach to workforce participation patterns over the life course for an Australian baby boom cohort

Population ageing and its future implications for governments and individuals have been central to much policy debate and research targeted to retain older people in the workforce. This study identified workforce participation patterns across the adult life course for women and men entering later life, and explored the influences of various early and adult life socio-demographic circumstances. Data were collected from 1261 men and women aged 60 to 64 years in the Life History and Health (LHH) Survey (a sub-study of the Sax Institute's 45 and Up Study, Australia) in 2010–11. LHH provides detailed information on personal histories of paid work, socio-economic resources from childhood (number of books and father's occupation) and adult life factors such as educational attainment, marital histories, childcare and informal caring. Latent class analysis (LCA) was undertaken to identify patterns of workforce participation for participants across their adult life. Significant gender differences were confirmed. Further analysis (LCA with covariates) showed that women who reported having books during childhood, and those who had post-school qualification, were more likely to have mostly been in paid work and less likely to have not been in paid work; while ever partnered women had significantly higher odds of increasing part time work over time. Men who had reported ever having had informal caring activities were likely to have had decreasing participation in paid work over time, and were highly likely to be not in paid work after 55 years. Ever partnered status was protective for being in paid work for men. These findings indicate the need for gender-specific policies and strategies to enable continued workforce participation throughout adult life and into later working years, particularly for people who had fewer social or economic opportunities earlier in life.     

Making and Unmaking of Strangers – The Komagata Maru Episode and the Alienation of Sikhs as Undesirable Persons

The Komagata Maru episode, which became a test case for White Canada and Asian Exclusion polices, epitomizes the process of ‘the making and unmaking of strangers’ under British imperialism (Bauman 1997 Bauman, Zygmunt. 1997. Postmodernity and Its Discontents. Cambridge, MA: Polity. [Google Scholar]). While the passengers on board the ship chartered by Gurdit Singh, a descendant of one of the Sikhs who had arrived in the British Malaya as part of Captain Speedy’s force in 1872, viewed themselves as British subjects who were free to move within the borders of the British Empire that included the Dominion of Canada, the Immigration Act of 1910 posited the immigrant, as Audrey Macklin convincingly argues, as the other of the Canadian subject (2011). The Komagata Maru episode strongly underlines grave inconsistencies in the definition of the stranger in different parts of the British Empire. In movements triggered by imperial policies and agendas such as those to Shanghai, the British Malaya or East Africa, the Sikh was regarded as a favourable stranger. In movements initiated by himself, the Sikh was resignified as a hostile stranger and his movements were closely regulated. This paper will closely examine newspaper reports, letters, telegrams and witness statements of the Japanese crew and British officials in the Komagata Maru Inquiry Committee Report to focus on the resignification of the Sikhs from favourable to hostile strangers under the British Empire through their being labelled as aliens, undesirable persons and ‘dangerous seditionists’ prejudicial to the safety and tranquility of the British state.     

Does Selection Measure Scoring Influence Motivation: One size fits all?

Current theories of applicant motivation do not take the scoring of the selection measure into account. We propose that selection measures scored objectively versus using ratings have different motivational antecedents and consequences than selection measures scored using performance ratings. Results from two studies indicated differences between a cognitive ability test (scored objectively) and both an interview and written role‐play (scored using ratings) regarding the amount of self‐reported motivation, factors related to motivation (i.e., procedural justice, perceived performance, and perceived influence), and the relationship between motivation and performance. Both perceived performance and procedural justice were related to motivation across selection measures but only procedural justice was equally important. Perceived influence was only related to motivation regarding the interview. Motivation predicted performance only on the cognitive ability test. Thus, it appears that how a selection measure will be scored should be taken into account when investigating applicant motivation.     

Functional neuroanatomy of gesture–speech integration in children varies with individual differences in gesture processing

Gesture is an integral part of children's communicative repertoire. However, little is known about the neurobiology of speech and gesture integration in the developing brain. We investigated how 8‐ to 10‐year‐old children processed gesture that was essential to understanding a set of narratives. We asked whether the functional neuroanatomy of gesture–speech integration varies as a function of (1) the content of speech, and/or (2) individual differences in how gesture is processed. When gestures provided missing information not present in the speech (i.e., disambiguating gesture; e.g., “pet” + flapping palms = bird), the presence of gesture led to increased activity in inferior frontal gyri, the right middle temporal gyrus, and the left superior temporal gyrus, compared to when gesture provided redundant information (i.e., reinforcing gesture; e.g., “bird” + flapping palms = bird). This pattern of activation was found only in children who were able to successfully integrate gesture and speech behaviorally, as indicated by their performance on post‐test story comprehension questions. Children who did not glean meaning from gesture did not show differential activation across the two conditions. Our results suggest that the brain activation pattern for gesture–speech integration in children overlaps with—but is broader than—the pattern in adults performing the same task. Overall, our results provide a possible neurobiological mechanism that could underlie children's increasing ability to integrate gesture and speech over childhood, and account for individual differences in that integration.     

Nurturing Spirituality: In Conjunction with Integral Education

Journal of Indian Council of Philosophical Research - Spirituality facilitates a deeper contemplation of reality, and it provides a better understanding of the self and the daily struggles of life....