Applied orienting response research: Some examples

The development of orienting response (OR) theory has not been accompanied by many applications of the concept—most research still appears to be lab-based and “pure,” rather than “applied.” We present some examples from our own work in which the OR perspective has been applied in a wider context. These cover the exploration of processing deficits in autistic children, aspects of the “repression” of anxiety in elite athletes, and the locus of alcohol effects. Such applications of the OR concept in real-life situations seem a logical and, indeed,necessary step in the evolution of this area of psychophysiology. With a Comment by E. N. Sokolov     

Social interaction,social observation,and cognitive development in young children

Eighty first-grade childen were pretested on a variety of conservation tasks. Subjects who were either nonconservers or intermediate conservers were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: social interaction, social observation, and individual control. Subjects in the social interaction condition worked collaboratively on conservation tasks with a same sex partner. Subjects in the social observation condition individually observed pairs of subjects working together and control subjects worked individually on conservation tasks. The purpose of the social observation condition was to control for the effects of task relevant information that was expressed during dyadic interactions. All subjects were individually post-tested on conservation tasks that were the same form but different content than the pretest items. Subjects in the social interaction condition had significantly greater cogntive change scores (post-test less pretest) than subjects in the social observation and control conditions. There were no significant differences between change scores of subjects in the latter two conditions. Also, subjects in the social interaction condition gave significantly more novel explanations for conservation judgments than subjects in the social observation condition. These findings supported a socio-cognitive conflict model of cognitive development in young children.     

A Multimethod Exploration of the Friendships of Children Considered Socially Withdrawn by Their School Peers

Friendships of children considered socially withdrawn by their school peers were investigated within a population of elementary school children. Reciprocal friends were identified by a friendship nomination procedure; social withdrawal was assessed by peer nominations. Trained graduate students rated videotapes of dyads of friends (n = 58 dyads, of which 29 contained at least one withdrawn child) for selected features of friendship quality. In addition, each friend within a dyad provided ratings of the quality of the relationship. The videotaped data showed the withdrawn children to be somewhat restricted in their verbal communication with their friends, and less competitive with their friends, than were friends in a comparison group. In dyads consisting of one withdrawn and one nonwithdrawn child, the withdrawn child perceived the relationship as characterized by greater closeness and helpfulness than did the nonwithdrawn friend. Despite some signs of inhibited behavior within the friendship context, withdrawn children seem to have access to close friendships of high quality.     

Psychosocial Correlates of Suicide Attempts Among Junior and Senior High School Youth

Three groups of junior and senior high schools students (total N = 1050) recruited in rural counties of a mid-Atlantic state–those who had made a prior suicide attempt, those reporting high levels of depressed mood or suicidal ideation, and those who were not depressed or suicidal – were compared with regard to their reports of a number of potential risk factors for suicidal behavior. Adolescents with a history of a suicide attempt reported more frequent stresses related to parents, lack of adult supports outside of the home, police, and sexuality (i.e., concerns about pregnancy, pressure to have sex, getting sexually transmitted diseases), compared with both depressed/suicide ideators and nondepressed adolescents. Suicide attempters were also more likely than the other adolescents to report that they were physically hurt by a parent, that they ran away from home, that they lived apart from both parents, and that they knew someone who had completed suicide. Results are discussed in the context of prior studies of adolescent suicidal behavior in community and clinical samples.     

Evidence that rats discriminate between familiar and unfamiliar putative urinary odorants of adult male conspecifics

Adam [1976; Lehman and Adams, 1977] suggested that a resident rat makes an olfactory comparison of cage odor and other rat odor prior to attacking an unfamiliar conspecific intruder. The findings of the present study are consistent with the notion that rats discriminate between familiar and unfamiliar putative urinary odorants Adult male albino rats were tested for preferences between areas treated with familiar urine (11 hours pretest exposure), unfamiliar urine (no pretest exposure), and untreated areas. Subjects (N = 12) preferred areas treated with familiar urine over ones treated with unfamiliar urine (p < 0.05). Also, they (N = 12 per preference-test group) preferred areas treated with either urine over untreated ones (familiar versus clean, p < 0.01; unfamiliar versus clean, p < 0.05).