Adult age comparisons in the processing of event frequency information

The usual superiority in frequency-of-occurrence judgments of younger vs. older subjects was hypothesized to result from greater strategic encoding of the materials conveying frequency information. A subject-paced, visual search task was designed to control nontarget word encoding. Relative frequency judgments for the nontarget word pairs were equally accurate for younger and older subjects, and performance of both groups was above chance. Results suggest that strategic cover-task encoding can induce age differences in incidental frequency processing. Consistent with a nonoptimal as opposed to an optimal view, automatic processes require only minimal capacity for above-chance performance, but additional strategic resources can increase performance. When such additional resources are used more by younger than by older subjects, the former are better in frequency performance.     

Preserved organization of semantic attributes in Alzheimer's disease

This study investigated whether Alzheimer's disease (AD) disrupts the basic organization of the semantic attributes of concepts. Young and normal older subjects and AD patients were presented with a target concept followed by a stimulus word and were to decide whether the stimulus was related to the target. On those trials where it was, the stimulus was either a high-, medium-, or low-dominance attribute of the target. The higher the normative dominance, the more important the attribute to concept meaning. In all 3 subject groups, decision time varied as a function of dominance. The higher the dominance, the faster the decision. Attribute dominance affected the performance of AD patients more than that of normal subjects. These results suggest that AD patients retain their knowledge of the relative importance that the different attributes of a concept have for concept meaning.     

Reading Disability: A Model for the Genetic Analysis of Complex Behavioral Disorders

Family, linkage, and twin studies of reading disability are briefly reviewed, and evidence is presented from the twin component of the Colorado Reading Project that implicates genetic factors in the expression of reading disability. Recently developed behavioral genetic methodology is outlined, which provides an estimate of the magnitude of these genetic effects. The present report details the application of this methodology to reading performance data obtained from 96 identical twin pairs and 72 fraternal twin pairs in which at least one member of each pair was identified as reading disabled. Results indicate that approximately 50% of the reading deficit observed in the probands may be attributed to genetic factors. Although such an analysis assumes that reading disability is a homogeneous disorder, there may exist alternative forms with differing genetic etiologies. To test this hypothesis, the methodology can be extended to assess differential genetic etiology in alternative subgroups of disabled readers.     

Systematic 24-hr behavioral observations of sleep and wakefulness in a skilled-care nursing facility

Sleep patterns of aged, infirm, demented, chronically institutionalized residents of a skilled-care nursing facility were studied. The purpose of this naturalistic study was to describe sleep and wakefulness (S/W) within the limits afforded by brief behavioral observations and to examine homeostasis and diurnal rhythmicity of S/W as a function of psychoactive drug intake. Observers noted S/W every 15 min, 24 hr a day for 10 days in 24 Ss. Results indicated substantial individual variation in daytime hours. Daily and weekly variation within Ss was minimal. Sleep was least likely near sunset. Ss on psychoactive drugs showed dampened diurnal variation in S/W rhythms. In Ss not on such drugs, there was a suggestion of homeostasis of S/W between sleep during the morning and evening hours. Results are discussed methodologically (viability of approach), theoretically (age-related change in sleep), and practically (potential treatments).     

Disruption of proofreading by irrelevant speech: Effects of attention,arousal or memory?

A series of five experiments examined the effects of irrelevant speech on proofreading and memory. Four of the experiments used a proofreading task and showed that the deleterious effects of irrelevant speech: (1) depend on the speech being meaningful, (2) are only present when the burden on short-term memory is low and (3) are manifested in a lower detection rate for non-contextual as opposed to contextual errors. Neither the spatial location of the speech (either in terms of spatial dispersion of sources or spatial movement of a single source) nor the intensity of the speech (in a range bounded by 50 dB(A) and 70 dB(A)) had any effect on proofreading. Late selection models of attention are favoured by the results in preference to models having arousal, short-term memory or early selection in attention as their basis. A final experiment showed serial recall for visual lists to be impaired by the presence of any speech-like sound (including reversed speech and speech in an unfamiliar language) which suggests a set of phenomena qualitatively different from those associated with proofreading. Throughout the article the practical consequences of the findings are emphasized.     

Critical flicker fusion in normal elderly subjects; a cross-sectional community study

Critical Flicker Fusion Thresholds (CFFTs) were measured in 644 elderly people identified from community-based general practice records, and the relationship of CFFT with age was investigated. The CFFT was measured using the method of limits with mean scores for three ascending (flicker/fusion) and three descending (fusion/flicker) presentations being recorded. The difference between the ascending and descending means was found to be significantly correlated with age (r=−0.131,P<0.001) and may reflect a reduced sensitivity of the Central Nervous System to suprathreshold flicker with increasing age. The results suggest that CFFT measurement has an important role to play in gerontological research as an objective measure of cognitive aspects of the ageing process.     

Correlates of age at first sexual intercourse in a national sample of young women

A subsample of 814 sexually experienced adolescent females from the 1979 U.S. National Survey of Young Women was analyzed to assess the correlates of age at 1st sexual intercourse. Multiple regression procedures were used to examine sets of variables sequentially. In the hierarchical regression model, the control variables (respondent's age, race, religion, and age at menarche), along with 3 independent variables (household income, ideal age at 1st marriage, and ideal age for 1st birth), predicted age at 1st intercourse. The control variables accounted for a major portion of the variance in the model. Of the controls, chronological age and age at menarche were highly significant across all models tested.     

Reflections on uncomplemented philosophies,integrated curriculums and words that bind and separate in counseling and clinical psychology

Should counseling psychology remain a distinct specialty or should it merge with clinical psychology? Recently, a growing amount of attention has been directed toward the increasing similarities between the counseling and clinical specialties, and musings about integrating them into a generic training model have emerged. This position paper considers some problems with the current divisions existing between counseling and clinical psychology. Three basic points are examined: (a) the effects of language systems on the counseling and clinical specialties; (b) the normal-abnormal dimension of behavior as a weak justification for distinct specialties; and (c) the fostering of distorted views of human behavior through counseling and clinical training programs.     

Empathic interactional sequences and counsellor trainee effectiveness

Consecutive counsellor trainee and client statements from 12 audiotaped assessment interviews were coded to operationalize empathy as a sequential variable. For each two statement sequence the speaking order (counsellor to client, client to counsellor) was also coded, and the resultant matrix analyzed via loglinear statistical procedures for categorical data. For the speaking order client to counsellor, three empathy sequences (empathy enhancing, empathy diverging, empathy commencing) were found to be significantly related to counselling effectiveness. For the speaking order counsellor to client, only one sequence(empathy diverging) was found to be significantly related to counselling effectiveness. Implications for counsellor training and future research are discussed.