How 7-month-olds interpret ambiguous motion events: Category-based reasoning in infancy

This paper investigates the role of static and dynamic attributes for the animate-inanimate distinction in category-based reasoning of 7-month-olds. Three experiments tested infants’ responses to movement events involving an unfamiliar animal and a ball. When either the animal or the ball showed self-initiated irregular movements (Experiment 1), infants expected the previously active object to start moving again. When both objects were moving together in an ambiguous motion event (Experiment 2), infants expected only the animal to start moving again. Initial looking preferences for each object did not influence results. When either the facial features of the animal were removed, or its furry body was replaced by a plastic spiral in an ambiguous motion event (Experiment 3), infants formed no clear expectation regarding future movements. Based on this set of findings we conclude that 7-month-olds flexibly combine information about the static and dynamic properties of objects in order to reason about motion events.     

What Explains Boys’ Stronger Confidence in their Intelligence?

This study investigated whether boys’ stronger confidence in their intelligence is explained by gender differences in measured intelligence and gender-stereotypical parental perceptions of their children’s intelligence. Verbal, numeric, figural, and reasoning intelligence and corresponding self-ratings were assessed for 496 German 11th and 12th graders (284 girls; age: M?=?16.95). Parents also rated their children’s intelligence (339 parents; 205 mothers; age: M?=?46.66). With and without controlling for intelligence, boys rated their numerical, figural, and reasoning abilities higher than girls. The same pattern appeared in parental intelligence perceptions. Boys even judged themselves as more intelligent controlling for both measured intelligence and parental intelligence estimates. Thus, neither intelligence nor gender-stereotypical parental perceptions totally explains boys’ stronger confidence in their intelligence.     

The role of left perisylvian cortical regions in spelling

In order to examine the role of left perisylvian cortex in spelling, 13 individuals with lesions in this area were administered a comprehensive spelling battery. Their spelling of regular words, irregular words, and nonwords was compared with that of individuals with extrasylvian damage involving left inferior temporo-occipital cortex and normal controls. Perisylvian patients demonstrated a lexicality effect, with nonwords spelled worse than real words. This pattern contrasts with the deficit in irregular word spelling, or regularity effect, observed in extrasylvian patients. These findings confirm that damage to left perisylvian cortex results in impaired phonological processing required for sublexical spelling. Further, degraded phonological input to orthographic selection typically results in additional deficits in real word spelling.     

Gods, Rituals, and the Moral Order

The functionalist "law" that religion sustains the moral order must be amended. As is demonstrated in this study, religion has this effect only as it is based on belief in powerful, active, conscious, morally-concerned gods. Contrary to Durkheim's claims, participation in religious rituals per se has little independent impact on morality and none when done on behalf of gods conceived as unconscious essences, or as conscious gods of small scope and lacking moral concerns. Thus, the link between gods and morality is limited mainly to societies having more complex cultures, but even in some highly developed societies a religious basis for morality is missing. Quantitative results are based on 427 societies included in the Atlas of World Cultures, and on surveys of the United States and 33 other nations.     

THE MEANING OF MS.

When Ms. was first introduced as an alternative to Miss or Mrs. it was perceived as a radical feminist innovation. Today, its use is unremarkable, even normative. This study examines two aspects of the meaning of Ms.: changes in its connotative meaning over time, and its current comparability to other titles. Female (n = 83) and male (n = 54) college students rated courtesy titles (Ms., Miss, Mrs., Mr.) on a set of bipolar adjective pairs composing a semantic differential scale in an exact replication of a 1978 study. Of the four titles, the largest change in meaning over time was for Ms., and the direction of the change was positive. These results document the social assimilation of a new gender-related concept.     

Why religious movements succeed or fail: A revised general model

In this essay I refine and greatly expand the scope of my 1987 theory of why religious groups succeed or fail. The initial version was limited to new religions (cult movements). This version applies to all movements, including sects. The theory now consists of 10 propositions which attempt to specify the necessary and sufficient conditions for success or failure.     

Cognitive triad: Relationship to depressive symptoms,parents' cognitive triad,and perceived parental messages

Evaluating the relationship between children's depressogenic thinking, children's depressive symptoms, parents' depressogenic thinking, and perceived parental messages about the self, world, and future was the primary objective of this investigation. Children (n =133) from grades 4 to 7 completed measures of depression and anxiety, including a semistructured clinical interview, a measure of their cognitive triad, and a measure of perceived parental messages about the self, world, and future. Mothers (n =112) and fathers (n =95) completed a measure of their own cognitive triad. Results of a series of regression analyses revealed that (1) children's views of self, world, and future (cognitive triad) are related to severity of depression; (2) mothers' but not fathers' cognitive triads are related to their children's cognitive triads; (3) perceived parental messages to the children about the self, world, and future are predictive of the children's cognitive triads and ratings of depression; and (4) the relationship between perceived parental messages and depression is completely mediated by children's cognitive triads. Analyses of covariance indicated that the obtained mediational relationship between children's views of self, world, and future, perceived parental messages, and children's depressive symptoms was specific to depressive versus anxious symptomatology. Impfications for existing theory and research are discussed.     

Stress Management in Bus Drivers: A Pilot Study Based on the Model of Effort–Reward Imbalance

A number of studies documented associations between work stress and elevated morbidity in professional drivers. The model of effort–reward imbalance (ERI) identifies distinct situational and personal characteristcs which elicit chronically stressful experience at work in terms of a mismatch between high costs and low gain. Fifty-four highly stressed male inner-city bus drivers (mean age 49,5 ± 5,3) were recruited to participate in a 12 weeks stress management program based on the ERI model (intervention group (IG) n = 26, control group (CG) n = 28). Intervention included relaxation, coping with anger and excessive work commitment (“high need for control”), management of conflicts with superiors, and recommendations for structural changes at work. After 12 weeks, mean level of “need for control,” a critical, health adverse style of coping with job demands, was significantly reduced in IG vs. CG, and this effect persisted after 3 months. In conclusion, a theory-based worksite stress management program in an occupational risk group is feasible and shows beneficial psychological effects.