If you say thee uh you are describing something hard: the on-line attribution of disfluency during reference comprehension

Eye-tracking and gating experiments examined reference comprehension with fluent (Click on the red. . .) and disfluent (Click on [pause] thee uh red . . .) instructions while listeners viewed displays with 2 familiar (e.g., ice cream cones) and 2 unfamiliar objects (e.g., squiggly shapes). Disfluent instructions made unfamiliar objects more expected, which influenced listeners' on-line hypotheses from the onset of the color word. The unfamiliarity bias was sharply reduced by instructions that the speaker had object agnosia, and thus difficulty naming familiar objects (Experiment 2), but was not affected by intermittent sources of speaker distraction (beeps and construction noises; Experiments 3). The authors conclude that listeners can make situation-specific inferences about likely sources of disfluency, but there are some limitations to these attributions.     

Resilience in Young Adulthood: The Moderating Influences of Gender-related Personality Traits and Coping Flexibility

The study was designated to explore the resilient (moderating) influences of gender-related personality traits and coping flexibility on the relations between life event stress and psychosocial adjustment in a sample of 291 Chinese young adults. Multiple outcomes (i.e., psychological, physical, and interpersonal aspects of adjustments) were separately examined with regression analysis. The interaction effects explained 5% of the unique variance in the psychological distress model and 4% of the unique variance in the interpersonal functioning model beyond the main effects. Coping flexibility tended to reduce the associations between life event stress and depression. Furthermore, masculinity buffered the link between life event stress and interpersonal functioning. The three-way interaction masculinity × femininity × stress also predicted additional unique variance in interpersonal functioning, which indicates that non-gender-typed respondents showed greater resilience to recent life stress than did their gender-typed counterparts. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

归因训练在精神卫生领域的应用

归因训练是一种从归因方式入手对认知、情绪和行为问题进行治疗的认知行为治疗方法。综述了归因方式在精神分裂症、神经症、物质滥用、生理心理问题及家庭暴力等精神卫生领域中的作用,以期对归因训练在相关领域的应用提供新的思路。     

Influence of impulsivity-reflexivity when testing dynamic spatial ability: sex and g differences

This work analyzes the possibility that the differences in the performance of men and women in dynamic spatial tasks such as the Spatial Orientation Dynamic Test-Revised (SODT-R; Santacreu & Rubio, 1998), obtained in previous works, are due to cognitive style (Reflexivity-Impulsivity) or to the speed-accuracy tradeoff (SATO) that the participants implement. If these differences are due to cognitive style, they would be independent of intelligence, whereas if they are due to SATO, they may be associated with intelligence. In this work, 1652 participants, 984 men and 668 women, ages between 18 and 55 years, were assessed. In addition to the SODT-R, the "Test de Razonamiento Analitico, Secuencial e Inductivo" (TRASI [Analytical, Sequential, and Inductive Reasoning Test]; Rubio & Santacreu, 2003) was administered as a measure of general intelligence. Impulsivity scores (Zi) of Salkind and Wright (1977) were used to analyze reflexivity-impulsivity and SATO. The results obtained indicate that (a) four performance groups can be identified: Fast-accurate, Slow-inaccurate, Impulsive, and Reflexive. The first two groups solve the task as a function of a competence variable and the last two as a function of a personality variable; (b) performance differences should be attributed to SATO; (c) SATO differs depending on sex and intelligence level.     

Understanding students' motivation in project work: A 2×2 achievement goal approach

Background The project work (PW) initiative was launched in 2000 by the Ministry of Education, Singapore, to encourage application of knowledge across disciplines, and to develop thinking, communication, collaboration, and metacognitive skills. Although PW has been introduced for a few years, few studies have examined the motivation of students in PW, especially with the use of the recently proposed 2 × 2 achievement goal framework. Aim To use a cluster analytic approach to identify students' achievement goal profiles at an intra‐individual level, and to examine their links to various psychological characteristics and perceived outcomes in PW. Sample Participants were 491 Secondary 2 students (mean age=13.78, SD = 0.77) from two government coeducational schools. Method Cluster analysis was performed to identify distinct subgroups of students with similar achievement goal profiles. One‐way MANOVAs, followed by post hoc Tukey HSD tests for pairwise comparisons were used to determine whether there was any significant difference amongst clusters in terms of the psychological characteristics and perceived outcomes in PW. Results Four distinct clusters of students were identified. The cluster with high achievement goals and the cluster with moderately high goals had the most positive psychological characteristics and perceived outcomes. In contrast, the cluster with very low scores for all four achievement goals had the most maladaptive profile. Conclusio The study provides support for the 2 × 2 achievement goal framework, and demonstrates that multiple goals can operate simultaneously. However, it highlights the need for cross‐cultural studies to look into the approach–avoidance dimension in the 2 × 2 achievement goal framework.     

Framing Charity Advertising: Influences of Message Framing,Image Valence,and Temporal Framing on a Charitable Appeal1

This study examined when and how charitable advertisements could be effective in the context of child poverty. An experiment investigated the influences of message framing, image valence, and temporal framing on a charitable appeal. The results indicate that image valence enhances framing effects on advertising effectiveness of a charitable appeal when the image is congruent with the framed message, especially when the image and the message are presented negatively. A short‐term temporal frame facilitates effects of a negatively framed message with a negative pictorial presentation. Alternatively, a long‐term temporal frame increases advertising influences of a positively framed message with a positive pictorial image. Relevance for information processing of charity advertising is discussed.     

Reducing intergroup conflict through the consideration of future consequences

Basic social psychological research has suggested several interventions to reduce intergroup conflict. Most of these interventions, however, have been indirect and impractical to implement outside laboratory settings. Although past research has demonstrated that indirect manipulations of the consideration of future consequences reduce intergroup competition, no study of interindividual–intergroup discontinuity has tested this assumption with a direct manipulation. The present study found that when participants (individuals and members of groups) interacting in an iterated prisoner's dilemma game (PDG) were asked to predict how their opponent's choice on a second trial would be affected by their own choice on an initial trial, intergroup competition was reduced while interindividual competition remained low regardless of the manipulation. On a practical level, implications of this study provide a simple and easily implemented solution to reducing intergroup conflict in non‐laboratory situations. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Effectiveness of school-based prevention and intervention programs for children and adolescents with emotional disturbance: A meta-analysis

The present study evaluated the effectiveness of school-based prevention and intervention programs for children and adolescents at-risk for and with emotional disturbance. Published outcome studies (k = 29) from December, 1988, to March, 2006, including 1405 children and adolescents were reviewed. Each investigation was coded on several variables describing the child, parent, and teacher samples, as well as reported outcome results. The overall mean weighted effect size was 1.00 at post-test and 1.35 at follow-up. Mean weighted ESs were 0.42 for between-subjects design studies, 0.87 for within-subjects design studies, and 1.87 for single-subject design studies. Prevention programs yielded a mean weighted ES of 0.54 and intervention programs produced a mean weighted ES of 1.35. Findings for specific outcome foci are presented and implications are discussed.     

Co‐speech gesture as input in verb learning

People gesture a great deal when speaking, and research has shown that listeners can interpret the information contained in gesture. The current research examines whether learners can also use co‐speech gesture to inform language learning. Specifically, we examine whether listeners can use information contained in an iconic gesture to assign meaning to a novel verb form. Two experiments demonstrate that adults and 2‐, 3‐, and 4‐year‐old children can infer the meaning of novel intransitive verbs from gestures when no other source of information is present. The findings support the idea that gesture might be a source of input available to language learners.