A method for studying visually guided perception and learning in newborn macaques

A maintenance technique was developed in which neonatal monkeys obtain all liquid food by placing their heads in a face mask mounted on their cage wall. Complete self-feeding required only 3-6 days for animals started at birth. Once under a self-feeding Schedule, operant responses were shaped to study visual perception, visually guided motor performance, and discrimination learning at ages much younger than those allowed by most alternative methods. Dark rearing, with the only source of visual input being through the face mask eyeholes, allowed the E to control completely the neonate’s visual experiences and its opportunities for visual-motor responding. The method has proven useful in rhesus monkey newborns for studying adaptation to prismatic displacement at 30 days of age, and to performance on CRF, FI, and FR reinforcement schedules.     

Interpersonal mood induction: Situational and individual determinants

Several situational and individual aspects of interpersonal mood induction were investigated in an attempt to elucidate the mechanisms by which depressed mood is transmitted from one individual to another. Eighty-four psychology students interacted with confederates previously trained to enact one of three mood states — depressed, neutral, or elated. Participants were randomly assigned to same-sex confederates in one of two roles — helper or stranger, resulting in a 3×2×2 design. Mood and self-esteem were independent variables assessed prior to the interaction. Mood, perceptions, and reactions to the confederate were dependent variables assessed following the interaction. Results indicated induction of depression and anxiety in participants exposed to depressed confederates, and induction of hostility following interaction with elated confederates. Induction of depression and hostility were significantly attenuated in participants in the helper role as opposed to person perception role, while the concept of individual vulnerability to mood induction was not supported in this study. Rejection of depressed persons was only modestly associated with negative mood induction. Thus, role components of the situation affected mood induction more than did individual participant differences. The results and their implications for therapists and family members of depressed individuals are discussed within the framework of Lazarus's cognitive model of emotional arousal.The authors gratefully acknowledge the contributions and talents of Bill Dorfman, Mike Harrington, Ginger Johnson, Anita Navarra, and Debbie Illman.     

Metamemory and the transfer of an interrogative strategy by EMR children

EMR children were taught to produce an interrogative strategy as an aid to paired-associate learning. Interrogative training was spread over four sessions with experimenter guidance gradually faded; training was followed by tests of long-term retention for the trained items, strategy maintenance, and generalization. Metamemory was assessed prior to training and following generalization. Analysis of recall demonstrated successful maintenance and generalization of the interrogative strategy; the quality of elaborations produced by the trained children predicted recall accuracy. Importantly, metamemory pretest measures for the interrogative trained children were related to strategy use at generalization. Metamemory posttest reliably predicted recall during training, maintenance, and generalization sessions and strategy use at maintenance. Interrogative training did not noticeably improve general aspects of metamemorial knowledge.     

Human heading judgments in the presence of moving objects

When moving toward a stationary scene, people judge their heading quite well from visual information alone. Much experimental and modeling work has been presented to analyze how people judge their heading for stationary scenes. However, in everyday life, we often move through scenes that contain moving objects. Most models have difficulty computing heading when moving objects are in the scene, and few studies have examined how well humans perform in the presence of moving objects. In this study, we tested how well people judge their heading in the presence of moving objects. We found that people perform remarkably well under a variety of conditions. The only condition that affects an observer’s ability to judge heading accurately consists of a large moving object crossing the observer’s path. In this case, the presence of the object causes a small bias in the heading judgments. For objects moving horizontally with respect to the observer, this bias is in the object’s direction of motion. These results present a challenge for computational models.     

The development of pretend language: Toward an understanding of the child's theory of mind

Is has been suggested that there exists a linkage between the mental representation of pretense, the acquisition of the cognitive internal state lexicon, and the development of theory of mind. Using an empirically derived taxonomy of pretend language, predictions derivable from such a relationship were tested. In three related studies, the pretend lexicons of 4 1/2- to 5-year-old children and the adults who interacted with them in home and school situations were examined for evidence of sophisticated pretend language use, for parallels in child and adult pretend language, and for connections between pretend and other mental state words. Results did not support the hypothesis that pretense and the language associated with it were linked to mental state language acquisition. However, the findings that are reported provide converging evidence for the claim that pretense in young children is a form of acting-as-if behaivor rather than a form of mental represetnational activity.     

Communication styles of children of mothers with affective disorders,chronic medical illness,and normal controls: A contextual perspective

Research has demonstrated impaired parent-child relationships in families with affective disorders. The present study examines the association of children's interactional style during a direct conflict-solving task to both the mother's interactional style and the child's diagnostic status. The sample includes 63 children, ages 8 to 16, of mothers with affective disorders, chronic medical illness, and normal controls. Children's dominant coping style profile (CS) (autonomous, neutral, or critical) was related to their mother's affective style (AS) (benign or negative). Affective disorder in the child at 6-month followup was associated with a critical CS profile at intake, while the child's nonaffective symptomatology was unrelated to CS. Findings indicate that children's affective disturbance is linked to interpersonal deficits in affectively charged situations. Results suggest that the child's CS is more strongly predicted by maternal aa than by either the child's or the mother's diagnostic status.This research was supported in part by an award from the William T. Grant Foundation. We are grateful for the contributions of Dorli Burge, Lori Briganty, Jennifer Kim, and Heidi Fink to the project. We also acknowledge the helpful comments of Angus Strachan and Michael Goldstein.     

Gender Differences in Self-Attributions: Relationship of Gender to Attributional Consistency, Style, and Expectations for Performance in a College Course

Results are reported for a study of collegestudents that examined gender differences in theconsistency of attributions over time, in generalattributional style, and in specific explanations forperformance in a course. Both genders demonstratedconsistency over time. There was no difference ingeneral attributional style by gender, and there was nodifference in specific attributions for courseperformance by gender combined with accuracy in predictingperformance. However, there was a difference in theexplanations for performance selected by men versuswomen and in the explanations for performance selected by those students who accurately predictedtheir own performance versus inaccurate predictors. Thesample was comprised of 113 men and 94 women; mostly inthe 21 to 24 age range (108), followed by the 17 to 20 age range (78), the 24 to 27 range (16),27 to 30 range (3) and the older than 30 range (2). Thesample was mostly Caucasian (176), followed by Asian(13), African American (8), Hispanic (7), Other (2), and missing data (1). Most students werebusiness majors (180), with 21 other majors and 6missing data. Implications of these results arediscussed in this article.     

The relationship between work and well‐being in clergywomen: implications for career counseling

This article focuses on the ministry, a profession in which 2 important characteristics intersect to pose special challenges for women in balancing their work and family responsibilities. In this qualitative study of clergywomen (N = 190), the authors examined the impact of being female in a male‐dominated occupation, particularly one that has been traditionally structured as a “2‐person career.” They argue that career counselors are in a unique position to prepare future clergywomen for the special challenges they will face in the ministry and make recommendations for ways in which career counselors may serve this distinctive population.     

Effects of Spirituality on Health‐Related Quality of Life in Men With HIV/AIDS: Implications for Counseling

This study examined the association of spirituality and health‐related quality of life among 226 HIV‐positive men. Two measures of spirituality were used: the Spiritual Growth subscale from the Health‐Promoting Lifestyle Profile II (S. N. Walker, K. R. Sechrist, & N. J. Pender, 1987) and the Spirituality subscale of the HIV Coping Instrument (L. Moneyham, A. Demi, Y. Mizuno, R. Sowell, & J. Guillory, 1998). Health‐related quality of life was measured with the HIV Cost and Services Utilization Study (R. D. Hays et al., 1998). Spiritual coping (i.e., relying on religion‐based coping techniques) was not associated with health‐related quality of life at baseline or 12‐month follow‐up. Spiritual growth (i.e., existential feelings of connection with a force greater than oneself) improved some aspects of mental and emotional well‐being but did not affect physical functioning or pain management.     

Coping Style and Depression in Early Adolescence: Relationships to Gender,Gender Role,and Implicit Beliefs

Three studies were designed to investigate the interrelationships among coping styles, gender roles, and level of depression for early adolescents. Girls displayed more depression than boys, and more highly depressed girls demonstrated coping patterns similar to those of depressed adolescent and adult women. Individuals who identified with the feminine gender role showed increases in depression with age. Participants' implicit beliefs about what constituted appropriate coping behavior were also linked to gender. Both genders believed that men should not ruminate but that they should distract themselves from problems. The implications of these findings are discussed.