Adult Attachment Orientations and College Student Distress: The Mediating Role of Problem Coping Styles

In this study, the authors examined relations among adult attachment orientations, maladaptive problem coping styles, and a composite measure of current distress within a sample of 55 undergraduates (17 men, 38 women). Results indicated that each adult attachment orientation and each problem coping style measure was related in expected directions to students' distress. In addition, problem coping styles largely mediated the impact of insecure adult attachment orientations on distress. Implications of our findings to advancing an attachment theory‐informed perspective on college student coping, distress, and intervention are discussed.     

Sequential sampling designs for the two-parameter item response theory model

In optimal design research, designs are optimized with respect to some statistical criterion under a certain model for the data. The ideas from optimal design research have spread into various fields of research, and recently have been adopted in test theory and applied to item response theory (IRT) models. In this paper a generalized variance criterion is used for sequential sampling in the two-parameter IRT model. Some general principles are offered to enable a researcher to select the best sampling design for the efficient estimation of item parameters.     

Controlling Stroop effects by manipulating expectations for color words

An important characteristic of automatic processing is its uncontrollability. The Stroop phenomenon is regarded as a prototypical example of this characteristic of automatic processing, hence, the Stroop effect should not change when the percentages of color words versus neutral stimuli are manipulated to induce controlled processing. We found that Stroop interference decreased as the percentage of color words increased. Furthermore, the magnitude of the inhibitory component of the Stroop effect was negatively correlated with the percentage of color words; the facilitatory component was insensitive to the manipulation. These results suggest that the Stroop effect is controllable (see Logan, 1980) and that the locus of control is postlexical. The results also suggest that facilitation and inhibition are produced by different mechanisms and challenge those models of the Stroop phenomenon (e.g., Cohen, Dunbar, & McClelland, 1990; Phaf, Van der Heijden, & Hudson, 1990) that assume that a single processing mechanism causes facilitation and inhibition and that control affects facilitation and inhibition alike (Logan, 1980).     

Wise: Web Interface for Statistics Education

The Web Interface for Statistics Education (WISE) project includes a World-Wide Web site to support the teaching of introductory social-science statistics courses. The site provides easy access to data bases, archived discussion lists, electronic journals, links to other sites focused on relevant statistics topics, and it includes a prototype of an on-line tutorial. The tutorial, which is the focus of the current paper, is designed to capitalize on special capabilities offered by the Web. The easy linkage between Web pages provides support for a highly interactive tutorial, which uses “failure-based” learning and immediate feedback. Students rated the tutorial as easy to use and indicated that it would have improved their initial statistics course.     

Rapid acquisition of discrete-trial lever-press avoidance: effects of signal-shock interval

Acquisition of discrete-trial lever-press avoidance learning was studied in three experiments. Experiment I compared a new training procedure, which produces rates of lever-press avoidance learning comparable to those obtained in shuttle boxes, with a “conventional”, less efficient training procedure. A factorial design was used to compare continuous versus intermittent shock and a long-variable versus a short-fixed signal-shock interval. Learning was best in the groups trained with the long and variable interval and poorest in those trained with the short and fixed interval. Type of shock had no effect. Experiment II separated the effects of duration from those of variability of the signal-shock interval. Fixed and variable intervals of 10 and 60 sec were tested and duration was the only significant factor. Experiment III addressed the effect of the differential opportunity to avoid provided by long signal-shock intervals by varying this interval from 10 to 60 sec in 10-sec steps. Only the 10-sec group showed slow acquisition relative to the others. Analysis of avoidance response latencies showed that the distributions for all groups were positively skewed and that skewness increased with increasing duration of the signal-shock interval. At intervals longer than 20 sec, the animals made progressively less use of their increased opportunity to respond. The data do not support the opportunity-to-respond interpretation of the effects of duration of signal-shock interval and suggest that some type of inhibitory process may block lever-press avoidance learning at intervals as short as 10 sec. The significance of these findings for species-specific defense reaction and preparedness theories was emphasized.