Discrimination and the positive-negative asymmetry effect: ideological and normative processes

Research using the minimal group paradigm demonstrates that categorization and ingroup identification can foster intergroup discrimination. However, the positive-negative asymmetry effect shows that less discrimination occurs when negative rather than positive outcomes are distributed. The normative hypothesis explains this asymmetry by the stronger inappropriateness of discrimination in negative than in positive outcome distributions. Results obtained in this minimal group paradigm study (N = 257) did not replicate the asymmetry effect: discrimination occurred in both positive and negative outcome distributions, even if norms against discrimination were stronger in negative than in positive outcome distributions. The absence of the asymmetry effect is explained by the effect of the discrimination-justifying ideology.     

Hong Kong Chinese kindergartners learn to read English analytically

We examined the extent to which young Hong Kong Chinese children, taught to read English as a second language via a logographic "look and say" method, used information about letter names and letter sounds to learn English words. Forty children from each of three kindergarten grade levels (mean ages 3.8, 5.0, and 5.9 years old, respectively) were taught to pronounce novel English spellings that were based on letter-name (e.g., DK = Deke), letter-sound (DK = Dick), or visual (Dk= Jean) cues. By the 2nd year of kindergarten, children performed significantly better in the name condition than the other conditions. The 3rd-year kindergartners performed better in the sound condition than the visual condition as well. The results point to the importance of letter-name and letter-sound knowledge for learning to read English, regardless of native-language background or method of instruction.     

Computational models of the hippocampal region: linking incremental learning and episodic memory

The hippocampal region, a group of brain structures important for learning and memory, has been the focus of a large number of computational models. These tend to fall into two groups: (1) models of the role of the hippocampal region in incremental learning, which focus on the development of new representations that are sensitive to stimulus regularities and environmental context; (2) models that focus on the role of the hippocampal region in the rapid storage and retrieval of episodic memories. Rather than being in conflict, it is becoming apparent that both approaches are partially correct and might reflect the different functions of substructures of the hippocampal region. Future computational models will help to elaborate how these different substructures interact.     

Role of Gender in Behavioral Interdependence and Relationship Outcomes for Premarital Couples

One aspect of gender identity, preferences forgender-related activities, was examined using gender andinterdependence theories for a sample of 59,predominately Caucasian, premarital couples. Respondents completed interviews in which they reported ontheir preferences for activities, relationshipsatisfaction, other relationship dimensions, and actualperformance of the activities. Groups of couples were created by using median splits to reflect thesimilarity and traditionality of coupled partners'preferences for gender-related activities. Two mainfindings were apparent: (a) couples in which bothpartners liked the activities and couples in which bothpartners held traditional preferences had positiverelationship outcomes, and (b) couples in which bothpartners disliked the activities had the least favorable outcomes.     

Personal Strategies for HIV Prevention: The Development and Validation of a Strategy-Coding Instrument1

This paper describes the development of a coding instrument to classify college students' strategies for preventing HIV infection, and examines the association of distinct strategies with social cognitive and behavioral measures related to safer sexual behavior. This instrument classifies each strategy into both a content domain (e.g., using condoms, remaining abstinent, limiting sexual partners), and 3 distinct dimensions: commitment, specificity, and effectiveness. We examine the reliability and validity of this instrument by showing the discriminative associations of each dimension with social cognitive and behavioral measures, and demonstrate the differential importance of distinct dimensions in predicting behavior in different content domains. Discussion focuses on the importance of tailoring HIV prevention messages to change strategy dimensions in order to maximize behavior change.     

The import of infancy for individual, family, and societal development: commentary on the special section: does infancy matter?

Across their life spans humans actualize a rich potential for cognitive and behavioral plasticity, a set of developmental changes that require regulation of organism-context relations on the part of both the individual and society. An individual’s action on the context must be started in infancy and maintained in subsequent periods of life for adaptive functioning to occur across ontogeny. The process of the individual acting as an agent of his or her own development is continuous, although the particular ways in which such control is manifested will change in developmentally appropriate ways. As demonstrated by the papers in this special issue, the significance of infancy for the rest of the life-span rests on an integration of this continuity and discontinuity within the person-context developmental system.