The Impact of Self-Presentations on Self-Beliefs: Effects of Social Identity and Self-Presentational Context

To examine the impact of self-presentations on private self-appraisals, subjects were induced to characterize themselves positively or negatively during a face-to-face interview, during a written interview, or on a private questionnaire. As hypothesized, subjects high in Social Identity (the tendency to root identity in social sources of experience) shifted their self-appraisals in the direction of their positive or negative role after a face-to-face interaction, but were less affected by role in their private self-characterizations. In contrast, subjects low in Social Identity were primarily affected by a private, positive self-characterization. The latter subjects were not indifferent to how they appeared to others, as indicated by their attempts to rationalize negative, face-to-face self-presentations; they simply did not define themselves in terms of their public appearance.     

Discomfort with space and motion: A possible marker of vestibular dysfunction assessed by the situational characteristics questionnaire

Space and motion discomfort (SMD) refers to the situational specificity of symptoms occurring in some patients with vestibular dysfunction, such as those with balance disorders and some with panic disorder. SMD occurs in situations characterized by inadequate visual or kinesthetic information for normal spatial orientation. We report the results of two studies of the construct validity of the Situational Characteristics Questionnaire (SitQ), which has two subscales, both of which measure SMD: the SMD-I and SMD-II. In Study 1, the SitQ was administered to members of a self-help group for balance disorders, a psychiatric sample consisting of patients with panic disorder, nonpanic anxiety disorders, depression, and a sample of normals. SMD levels were the highest in the self-help balance group, next to the highest in the panic groups, and lowest in the remaining groups. In Study 2, the SitQ was administered to otolaryngological patients with vestibular dysfunction and to patients with hearing loss. SMD levels were higher in the vestibular patients. Data on internal consistency, test-retest reliability, and convergent and discriminant validity are presented. The SitQ, particularly the SMD-II, is recommended for quantifying space and motion discomfort in patients with anxiety and/or balance disorders.Study 1 was funded by MH 40757. Study 2 was funded by a grant from the Upjohn Company and MH 19816.     

Computer-aided reporting of the results of mental retardation evaluations

The MR Report Assistant is designed to perform the types of routine tasks that computers do well, while freeing the skilled psychologist to concentrate on tasks that are best done by knowledgeable humans. The Assistant is intended for reporting the results of psychological evaluation of known or suspected mental retardation patients using a standard battery consisting of the WAIS-R, the Vineland, and an interview. The program encourages the inclusion of additional information by writing to a disk file suitable for editing with a word processor, rather than directly to a printer. Research and training are encouraged by making the program available to qualified persons at no charge.     

Alcohol recovery in self-help groups: Surrender and narcissism

This study was designed to determine if subjects participating more actively in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) were higher on surrender and lower on pathological narcissism than those less involved in AA or participating in Rational Recovery. Male subject groups scored as predicted on surrender. As hypothesized, surrender also correlated negatively with pathological narcissism and was not associated with nonpathological narcissism. Results failed to support the predicted relationship between levels of participation in AA and pathological narcissism. A sex difference was found both on pathological narcissism and on surrender. Females scored lower on narcissism and higher on surrender than males.     

A symposium: Elicitation of the orienting response: Problems and future directions introduction

This symposium focuses on global problems associated with the concept of the orienting response (OR) and its elicitation, in order to provide a framework for future research and theory development. Papers by Barry, O’Gorman, Maltzman, Latash, and Tremayne and Barry address a range of issues of current interest in the field. Sokolov, the father of modern work on the OR, provides a commentary on each of these papers, together with a final paper outlining the development of the OR in his work, and his view of future directions in OR research. Together, these papers provide a unique perspective on the OR field at the end of the 1980s.     

Self-observation and the reduction of inappropriate classroom behavior

In an effort to reduce disrurtive classroom behavior, five students attending a school for behavior-disordered youth were shown edited videotapes depicting themselves or a peer appropriately engaged in classroom activities. Effects were idiosyncratic across students, the most significant effects occuring for the self-observation procedure. The results of the present study are compared with other similar investigations.     

Predicting Evacuation in Two Major Disasters: Risk Perception,Social Influence,and Access to Resources1

The complex and somewhat bewildering phenomenon of why people sometimes decide not to evacuate from a dangerous situation is influenced by a combination of individual characteristics and 3 basic social psychological processes: (a) risk perception, (b) social influence, and (c) access to resources. This study used a combined sample of 777 adults interviewed after Hurricanes Hugo and Andrew. Although numerous variables significantly predicted evacuation, much variance in this behavior still remained unexplained. Different population subgroups gave different reasons for not evacuating (e.g., severeness of storm, territoriality). A multifaceted and tailored approach to both individuals and communities is needed; a simple warning is often not enough.     

The Niche

The concept of niche (setting, context, habitat, environment) has been little studied by ontologists, in spite of its wide application in a variety of disciplines from evolutionary biology to economics. What follows is a first formal theory of this concept, a theory of the relations between objects and their niches. The theory builds upon existing work on mereology, topology, and the theory of spatial location as tools of formal ontology. It is illustrated above all by means of simple biological examples, but the concept of niche should be understood as being, like concepts such as part, boundary, and location, a structural concept that is applicable in principle to a wide range of different domains.     

Age of acquisition, word frequency, and the role of phonology in the lexical decision task

In five experiments, we examined the respective roles of word age of acquisition (AoA) and frequency in the lexical decision task. The two variables were manipulated orthogonally (while controlling for concreteness and length) in fully factorial designs. Experiment 1 was a conventional lexical decision task, and Experiments 2-5 involved various attempts to interfere with reliance upon phonology. In Experiment 2, only orthographically illegal nonwords were used; in Experiment 3, pseudohomophone nonwords; in Experiment 4, articulatory suppression by the recitation of a nursery rhyme; and in Experiment 5, articulatory suppression by the repetition of a single word. The same basic pattern of results was observed in all experiments: There were main effects of both AoA and frequency, which interacted in such a way that the AoA effect was larger for low- than for high-frequency words. Although the AoA effect was reduced by manipulations intended to interfere with phonological processing, the manipulations did not eliminate the effect. The results are discussed in terms of current models of reading in which it is proposed that AoA has its primary effect on the retrieval of lexical phonology, which appears to be consulted automatically in the lexical decision task.