Victim-Blaming and Society-Blaming Scales for Social Problems

Until now, no general scales have been available for measuring victim or society blaming. This constraint has been an impediment to policymaking with regard to those who are affected by social problems. Four scales were constructed: stable victim-blaming scale, unstable victim-blaming scale, stable society-blaming scale, and unstable society-blaming scale. Based on the results of the preliminary exploratory factor analysis and the reliability coefficients, the unstable society-blaming scale was deleted from further analysis. Then, a confirmatory factor analysis using the LISREL 7 program was conducted to evaluate the parameter estimates of the scale items and examine the construct validity of the 3 scales. The scales were judged to have construct validity with satisfactory reliability.     

Dual diagnosis: Clinical issues in the treatment of substance abuse,and affective,personality, and psychotic disorders

Co-morbidity of alcohol and substance with the spectrum of other psychiatric diagnoses is examined with specific emphasis on diagnostic indicators for anxiety and mood disorders. Diagnostic issues for the chemically dependent person are examined with the context of borderline personality disorder, schizophrenia and other psychiatric disorders. Clinical research related to the dually-diagnosed patient is explored     

Discrimination of methadone and cocaine by pigeons without explicit discrimination training.

Pigeons were trained to peck a key on a variable-interval 2-min schedule of food reinforcement. Prior to each session, either 2.0 mg/kg methadone (n = 3), 3.0 mg/kg cocaine (n = 4), or 5.6 mg/kg cocaine (n = 2) was administered. When each pigeon's rate of pecking was stable, a range of doses of the training drug and saline were administered prior to 20-min extinction sessions separated by at least four training sessions. Rate of pecking during these extinction tests was generally an increasing function of dose, with the lowest rates obtained following saline and low doses and the highest rates obtained following doses near the training doses. Dose functions from pigeons trained with 5.6 mg/kg cocaine were steeper than those from pigeons trained with 3.0 mg/kg cocaine. Pigeons trained with methadone or 3.0 mg/kg cocaine were then given discrimination training, in which food reinforcement followed drug administration and 20-min extinction sessions followed saline administration. Rates of pecking under these conditions quickly diverged until near-zero rates were obtained following saline and high rates were obtained following drug. Discrimination training steepened dose functions for the training drugs, and the effects of several other substituted drugs depended on the pharmacology of the training drug. The pigeons trained with 5.6 mg/kg cocaine were tested with d-amphetamine, methadone, and morphine prior to discrimination training. d-Amphetamine increased rates dose dependently, and methadone and morphine did not. The results suggest that discriminative control by methadone and cocaine was established without explicit discrimination training.     

Individual and age-related differences in children’s working memory

The purpose of this study was to investigate the degree to which age-related and individual differences in children’s working memory (WM) are due to a general or task-specific capacity system. Experiment 1 correlated children’s (N=146; age range 5–19 years) verbal and visual-spatial working memory performance with various intelligence and achievement measures. The results supporting a general system were that (1) visual-spatial and verbal WM measures were significantly intercorrelated with and without age partialed out and (2) both verbal and visual-spatial WM measures were significantly correlated with diverse achievement and intelligence measures. Experiment 2 compared three age groups (N=192; 7-, 10-, and 13-year-olds) on working-memory performance tasks under initial, enhanced (cued), and maintenance conditions. The results supporting a general capacity system were that (1) age-related performance differences in WM were found on all conditions and not isolated to specific processes, (2) the maintenance measures (high-load condition) predicted the variance better in age-related performance than process measures, and (3) although individual differences in WM performance reflected two independent operations, these operations produced similar correlations to achievement within age groups. Overall, the results support a general capacity explanation of age-related and individual differences in children’s WM performance.     

Attentional Focus of Students with Hyperactivity During a Word-Search Task

Mirrors have been used to focus attention to aspects of the self (e.g., to known strategies, standards). We hypothesized that this could be important for students with hyperactivity/inattention, who typically direct attention outward to external novelty. In this study, we administered a partially solvable word puzzle to 43 middle school students, with and without hyperactivity/inattention, in the presence and absence of a mirror, counterbalanced for condition and form order. Differences between students with hyperactivity/inattention and comparisons in accuracy were found only in the no mirror condition. Furthermore, the beneficial effect of the mirror for children with hyperactivity/inattention was most pronounced for those who looked at the mirror. Findings were interpreted in terms of their potential to remedy the production deficits of these children.     

The Impact of Sex and Gender Role Self-Perception on Affective Reactions to Different Types of Film

To what extent do differences in biologicalsexand psychological gender identity influence affectivereactions to different genres of film? In order toaddress this question, this investigation examined the impact of sex and gender roleself-perceptions on viewers' responses to neutral,melodramatic, and violent film segments. Working with apredominantly Caucasian population (93% Caucasian) at asoutheastern university, the results emphasize theimportance of sex and gender role self-perceptions onviewers' affective responses to media entertainment. Theimplications of these findings are discussed.

     

Sexual assault: Myths and stereotypes among Australian adolescents

Myths and stereotypes about sexual assault reflect a society which excuses perpetrators of assault and blames victims for failing to control men's sexuality. Such views are well-established by early adulthood, but there is little research with adolescents. This study surveyed two hundred forty-four 14–16 year old Australian high school students (105 male, 139 female), of Anglo-European descent. Males were significantly more likely to endorse sexual assault myths, to agree that forced sex was acceptable in some situations, and to hold false stereotypes about sexual assault. Males also held more restrictive attitudes toward women's roles and endorsed a greater level of sexism in dating relationships. This suggests that male and female adolescents have differing expectations of dating relationships, which may underlie sexual assault within relationships. Assault-supportive attitudes are apparent at a young age, supporting the need for educational and social interventions targeting young people.     

Effects of task instructions and oscillation frequency on bimanual coordination

Increases in the oscillation frequency of bimanual movements produce a switch from an anti-phase (180° relative phase) to an in-phase (0° relative phase) coordination pattern. This finding is observed when subjects are instructed not to intervene when they feel themselves slipping out of the anti-phase pattern. The question addressed in this study concerned how performance would be affected if subjects were instructed to try to maintain the pattern at all times. This issue was addressed using two separate groups of subjects: one group was given the do not intervene instructions, the other group was told to try to stay with the pattern at all times. Forearm rotations were tested in 15 s trials, paced by an auditory metronome set at 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, and 3.0 Hz. Frequency distributions of the point estimates of relative phase were analyzed. The Do not Intervene group replicated previous findings, as indicated by the development of a bimodal histogram of relative phase distributions with increases in oscillation frequency. However, a very different pattern of findings emerged with increases in oscillation frequency for the group told to stay with the anti-phase pattern. Rather than a bimodal distribution being developed, the data maintained 180° as its central tendency — no secondary distribution developed around 0° relative phase. These data suggest that volitional control can over-ride the inherent dynamical tendencies of the motor system.     

The relationship between childhood violence and alcohol problems among men who batter: An empirical review and synthesis

The available literature indicates that: (a) experiences of childhood violence are associated with mediator variables, including antisocial behaviors and depressive symptomatology, that are themselves associated with development of alcohol problems and perpetration of partner violence for men in adulthood; (b) experiences of childhood violence and, more strongly, observation of interparental violence during childhood predict perpetration of partner violence in adulthood for males; (c) presence of partner violence is associated with certain types of alcohol problems for men; and (d) both partner violence and alcohol problems are associated with marital conflict. However, available research has often excluded important moderator variables, such as history of familial and parental alcohol problems and history of parental psychiatric disorders. Based on the available research, two indirect pathways between childhood violence and adulthood problems (i.e., alcohol problems and partner violence) are proposed as guides for future research in the areas of family violence and alcohol problems for men. Further, bidirectional associations between alcohol problems and partner violence are proposed. Finally, inclusion of important moderator and mediator variables in multivariate research designs is suggested.     

The sampling distribution ofd′

The distribution of sample $\hat d's$ , although mathematically intractable, can be tabulated readily by computer. Such tabulations reveal a number of interesting properties of this distribution, including: (1) sample $\hat d's$ are biased, with an expected value that can be higher or lower than the true value, depending on the sample size, the true value itself, and the convention adopted for handling cases in which the sample $\hat d'$ is undefined; (2) the variance of $\hat d'$ also depends on the convention adopted for handling cases in which the sample $\hat d'$ is undefined and is in some cases poorly approximated by the standard approximation formula, (3) the standard formula for a confidence interval for $\hat d'$ is quite accurate with at least 50–100 trials per condition, but more accurate intervals can be obtained by direct computation with smaller samples.