Tailoring computerised interventions to client needs

The results are reported of an experimental study in which 91 subjects rated the perceived helpfulness of three computerised interventions - a work values inventory (WAPS), a job-bank (JOB), and a decisions exercise (DECISIONS) - for hypothetical clients with identity, self-awareness, opportunity-awareness, decision-making and implementation problems. As predicted, WAPS was perceived as most helpful for clients with a self-awareness problem, JOB for clients with an opportunity-awareness problem, and DECISIONS for clients with a decision-making problem. Potential applications of the model implicit in the study to counsellor training, to the assessment of client problems and to careers education programmes are discussed.     

The role of attention in automatization: Does attention operate at encoding, or retrieval, or both?

In this research, we investigated whether attention operates in the encoding of automatized information, the retrieval of automatized information, or in both cases. Subjects searched two-word displays for members of a target category in focused-attention or divided-attention conditions that were crossed with block (training vs. transfer). To see whether subjects encoded all available items or only attended items, we compared performance for subjects in different training conditions but in the same transfer condition. Subjects encoded attended items. To see whether subjects retrieved all the items they had in memory, or only items associated with that to which they were attending at retrieval, we compared performance for subjects in the same training conditions but in different transfer conditions. Subjects retrieved attended items. Attention was found to operate at both encoding and retrieval. These findings support the instance theory of automaticity, which predicts the role of attention at encoding and retrieval     

On the ability to inhibit simple and choice reaction time responses: a model and a method

This article reports four experiments on the ability to inhibit responses in simple and choice reaction time (RT) tasks. Subjects responding to visually presented letters were occasionally presented with a stop signal (a tone) that told them not to respond on that trial. The major dependent variables were (a) the probability of inhibiting a response when the signal occurred, (b) mean and standard deviation (SD) of RT on no-signal trials, (c) mean RT on trials on which the signal occurred but subjects failed to inhibit, and (d) estimated RT to the stop signal. A model was proposed to estimated RT to the stop signal and to account for the relations among the variables. Its main assumption is that the RT process and the stopping process race, and response inhibition depends on which process finishes first. The model allows us to account for differences in response inhibition between tasks in terms of transformations of stop-signal delay that represent the relative finishing times of the RT process and the stopping process. The transformations specified by the model were successful in group data and in data from individual subjects, regardless of how delays were selected. The experiments also compared different methods of selecting stop-signal delays to equate the probability of inhibition in the two tasks.     

Personality correlates of the attitude toward women scale

The full and short versions of the Attitudes Towards Women Scale, the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, the Trait Anxiety Scale and the Group Embedded Figures Test were administered to 95 freshmen (male and female). Results indicated a relationship between liberal attitudes toward women and emotional stability. Scores on the Attitudes Toward Women Scale also tended to be independent of Lie scores.     

Decision-making style and career decision-making behaviors among school leavers

This study examines the relationship of self-rated decision style to vocational decision-making behaviors among school leavers before leaving school and to the implementation of their plans after leaving school. Support was found for the active-passive dimension in decision style and for the advantage of using an active logical style. It is suggested that future research examine the relationship of style to locus of control and social desirability.     

Attention and automaticity in Stroop and priming tasks: Theory and data

Three major variables identified with attention and automaticity in the priming paradigm are shown to have parallel effects in the Stroop paradigm. A model is developed to explain the effects in both paradigms in terms of a single decision process that combines evidence from several sources (e.g., habitual associations and temporary contingencies between the prime and the target or between the unreported and reported dimensions). The model is applied to two Stroop experiments in which the faster two of three stimulus dimensions relate associatively and cue through a frequency manipulation the third, which must be reported. Depending on the direction of the cueing relation, attentional effects enhanced or counteracted automatic (associative) effects, and the attentional effects were stronger with the faster unreported dimension than with the slower one. These results corroborate findings in the priming paradigm and confirm the model. Implications of the results and the model for broader issues are discussed.