Coping In the Corporation: Sex Role Constraints

In this paper, the predictive power of status-based and socialization-based explanations of the differential rewards accruing to men and women in the corporate world are compared. Ninety-five experienced managers were asked to evaluate persuasive dialogues between two individuals in a corporate setting. Sex of the actor, sex of the other, and the influence technique used by the actor all affected the personality traits attributed to the influential actor. Our respondents perceived influential males as significantly more powerful, higher in corporate position, and warmer than identically described females. Implications of these and other findings for both male and female managers are discussed.     

Surprise but not coherence: Sensitivity to verbal humor in right-hemisphere patients

Verbal humor deficits were investigated in right-hemisphere-damaged patients. It was hypothesized that the appreciation of jokes presupposes two elements: sensitivity to the surprise element entailed in the punch line of a joke and apprehension of the coherence which results when the punch line has been integrated with the body of the joke. The possible dissociation between these elements was tested by asking subjects to select from four alternatives the appropriate ending to a joke. Right-hemisphere patients exhibited a selective attraction to endings which contained an element of surprise but which were not otherwise coherent with the body of the joke. This finding suggests that right-hemisphere patients have difficulty in integrating content across parts of a narrative and confirms the psychological reality of the proposed distinction between the surprise and coherence elements of humor processing.     

Gender and family/career conflict: Reactions of bosses

How do managers attribute the cause for a late and inaccurate proposal by a junior manager and how do they (the manager-respondents) think they would handle the problem? Previous research indicates that the attribution of cause for the poor performance is crucial to determining the response. However, gender may affect the attribution of cause, the interpretation of the circumstances, and the response chosen. In the present study, we assess the usefulness of an attribution model of leader behavior. We vary both the circumstances surrounding the poor performance and the gender of the putative junior manager. We are particularly concerned with the causal interpretation of conflicts between family and career responsibilities. We assess the effect of gender and situation on the attributional ratings given by experienced managers. We also investigate the effect of gender of the fictive junior manager and the structure of the causal interpretation of the respondents' choice of remedial action, on their estimates of the junior managers' job effectiveness, future success, and relationships with others in the organization.     

The propensity to recall another's completed and uncompleted tasks as a consequence of varying social relationships

Two laboratory experiments are reported. Each investigates the bias that social relationships exert on a subject's propensity to recall another's completed and uncompleted tasks. Using closed circuit television, subjects in both experiments observed a bogus other working on a set of puzzles. The person working completed only one-half of the puzzles. In three of the six experimental conditions in both experiments, subjects believed that the remaining puzzles could be completed at a later time. In the first experiment, a subject's relationship to the other was determined by cooperative, competitive, or individualistic economic incentives. In the second, the relationship was determined simply by their similarity or dissimilarity on a bogus personality test. Utilizing a combination of Lewinian assumptions and contemporary theory about memory, we hypothesized that the opportunity to resume work would result in an increased propensity to recall uncompleted tasks in the competitive (or dissimilar) conditions and a decreased propensity to do so in the cooperative (or similar) conditions. Results confirmed this hypothesis. Additional data in both experiments suggest that subjects' relationships with the bogus other altered the accessibility of this information. Theoretical implications of these findings and their relationship to research on prosocial behavior are discussed.     

Autonomous Motivation and Chinese Adolescents’ Creative Thinking: The Moderating Role of Parental Involvement

The relationship between motivation and creativity has long been of interest and many studies have been conducted to demonstrate the role of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation on creativity. The autonomous/controlled distinction of motivation suggested by self-determination theory (SDT) provides a new perspective on the motivation issue. Based on both SDT and the confluence approach of creativity, this study attempted to examine the relationship between autonomous/controlled motivation and creative thinking as well as the moderating role of parental involvement/autonomy support on this relationship. Five hundred and fifty Chinese high school students participated in the study and their autonomous/controlled motivation, parental involvement/autonomy support, and creative thinking were measured. Results indicated that autonomous motivation positively predicted creative thinking, and this relationship was moderated by parental involvement. For both junior and senior high school students, autonomous motivation was more strongly related to creative thinking when there was high maternal involvement. The moderating role of paternal involvement, however, differed between junior and senior high school students and there existed a 3-way interaction effect. Implications of this study for cultivating creativity among Chinese adolescents are also discussed.     

Changing perspectives on the benefits of newborn screening

The likelihood of benefit is fundamental to decision making about newborn screening. But benefit is construed in different ways by different stakeholders. This article begins with a review of benefit as considered historically by various expert panels and organizations. We then show how 78 conditions fared when experts recently rated them on benefit using a scoring system recommended by a task force of the American College of Medical Genetics. Finally, we analyze how benefit is reflected in the public comments submitted in response to the ACMG report. Results show that benefit has been and remains a core consideration for screening decisions. Historically the focus has been on improved physical health as a result of medical treatment; however, in only 4 of the 78 conditions rated does newborn screening prevent all negative consequences. In fact the majority of both core conditions (51.7%) and secondary targets (87.5%) recommended in the ACMG report were rated as having treatments that prevented only some negative consequences. All conditions rated had perceived benefits for family and society, but currently no conditions are screened on the basis of family or societal benefits alone. No agreed-upon threshold exists for what would be considered meaningful benefit, and stakeholder groups differ in their perceptions of benefit. We conclude by suggesting several key research studies needed to further inform public policy.     

Effects of syntactic features on sentence-picture matching in Broca's aphasics: a reply to Drai and Grodzinksy (2005)

We reanalyzed the data in , considering individual patients' responses to different sentence types to be non-independent events. The analyses revealed effects of two of the three factors identified by Drai and Grodzinsky--constituent movement and passive mood. The result is inconsistent with the trace deletion hypothesis; we conclude that features of syntactic structure other than constituent movement are relevant to understanding performance variation in patients with Broca's aphasia.     

Stress versus discrete negative emotions in the prediction of physical complaints: does predictive utility vary across ethnic groups?

Reports of stress and negative emotion are important predictors of health. However, whether discrete emotions or stress measures are more useful, whether they contribute independently to outcome, and whether they relate to health equally across ethnic groups remain unclear. In the current study, 207 US-born European American, US-born African American, Black English-speaking Caribbean, and Dominican men aged 40 years and older completed measures of somatic symptoms, trait emotions, and stress. Sadness and stress independently predicted symptom reports, even when examined concurrently, and with demographics controlled; trait anger did not predict symptoms. Moreover, the relations between trait emotions and symptoms varied across groups. Levels of sadness were associated with greater symptoms among US-born European American and Dominican men, but negatively associated among Black English-speaking Caribbean men, and the relations for anger also differed marginally across groups. The results underscore the importance of differentiating among discrete emotions and stress and considering ethnic interactions when examining reports of somatic symptomology. We suggest that the impact of psychological characteristics on health must be considered within cultural and ethnic contexts to be fully understood.     

The allocation of memory resources during sentence comprehension: Evidence from the elderly

Two experiments were carried out to examine the ability of elderly subjects to establish syntactically governed dependency relations during the course of sentence comprehension. The findings reveal the manner in which memory constraints operate during syntactic processing.     

The Boa constrictor or the hat: a dilemma for child therapists

The child therapist must satisfy two prerequisites for successful treatment. These conditions are: 1) a positive alliance with the parents; 2) an understanding of the child's world. At times, the demands imposed on the therapist via these conditions conflict. Empathy, for either child or parent, may become blocked. This paper will explore the vicissitudes of conflicting identifications within the child therapist. Possible resolution of this conflict via simultaneous empathy will be discussed.