Lay beliefs about the causes of and solutions to dehumanization and prejudice: do nonexperts recognize the role of human–animal relations?

We investigate laypeople's beliefs about the causes of and solutions to out‐group dehumanization and prejudice. Specifically, we examine whether nonexperts recognize the role that beliefs in the human–animal divide play in the formation and reduction of intergroup biases, as observed empirically in the interspecies model of prejudice. Interestingly, despite evidence in the present study that human–animal divide beliefs predict greater dehumanization and prejudice, participants strongly rejected the human–animal divide as a probable cause of (or solution to) dehumanization or prejudice. We conclude with a meta‐analytic test of the relation between human–animal divide and prejudice (mean r = .34) in the literature, establishing the human–animal divide as an important but largely unrecognized prejudice precursor. Applied implications for the development and implementation of prejudice interventions are considered.     

The Rorschach Records of Suicidal Patients. An Application of a Comparative Matching Technique

The experiment examined whether reliable personality differences exist between (a) women who suffer from spasmodic and congestive dysmenorrhea and (b) women who experience dysmenorrhea and women who do not. A sample of 12 congestive dysmenorrhea sufferers, 12 spasmodic dysmenorrhea suffers, and 24 nonsufferers obtained from a larger sample of university women, completed the Menstrual Symptom Questionnaire, Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, Tennessee Self-Concept Scale, and Personality Research Form. Results indicated that congestive sufferers differed from spasmodic sufferers only in their level of impulsivity. However, dysmenorrhea sufferers differed significantly from nonsufferers in that dysmenorrhea sufferers were more similar to a neurotic sample, were depressed, anxious and introverted, and less independent, playful, satisfied with themselves, positive about their physical and social selves than nonsufferers. In spite of these differences, standard scores from the personality measures suggested that dysmenorrhea sufferers were not maladjusted.     

Humean dispositionalism

Humean metaphysics is characterized by a rejection of necessary connections between distinct existences. Dispositionalists claim that there are basic causal powers. The existence of such properties is widely held to be incompatible with the Humean rejection of necessary connections. In this paper I present a novel theory of causal powers that vindicates the dispositionalist claim that causal powers are basic, without embracing brute necessary connections. The key assumptions of the theory are that there are natural types of causal processes, and that manifestations of powers are identified with certain kinds of causal processes. From these assumptions, the modal features of powers are explained in terms of internal relations between powers themselves and the process-types in which powers are manifested.     

How probability theory explains the conjunction fallacy

The conjunction fallacy occurs when people judge a conjunctive statement B‐and‐A to be more probable than a constituent B, in contrast to the law of probability that P(B ∧ A) cannot exceed P(B) or P(A). Researchers see this fallacy as demonstrating that people do not follow probability theory when judging conjunctive probability. This paper shows that the conjunction fallacy can be explained by the standard probability theory equation for conjunction if we assume random variation in the constituent probabilities used in that equation. The mathematical structure of this equation is such that random variation will be most likely to produce the fallacy when one constituent has high probability and the other low, when there is positive conditional support between the constituents, when there are two rather than three constituents, and when people rank probabilities rather than give numerical estimates. The conjunction fallacy has been found to occur most frequently in exactly these situations. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Convergence between statistically derived behavior problem syndromes and child psychiatric diagnoses

The relations between scores on statistically derived behavior problem syndromes and DSM-III diagnoses were examined for 270 clinically referred children aged 6 through 16. Each child's parent completed the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) and was administered the NIMH Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children (DISC)-a structured interview covering DSM-III diagnostic criteria. Numerous behavior problems scales scored from the CBCL were significantly related to one or more diagnoses. The strongest relations were between scores on the Hyperactive, Delinquent, and Depressed scales and diagnoses of Attention Deficit Disorder, Conduct Disorder, and Depression/Dysthymia, respectively. This convergence supports the validity of some syndromal constructs common to both assessment paradigms.This research was supported in part by NIMH grant no. MH37372 and by NIMH contract no. RFP-DB-81-0027. The first author is supported by a Faculty Scholar's Award from the William T. Grant Foundation. The authors wish to thank Tom Achenbach and Russ Barkley for their valuable comments on an earlier draft.     

Achievement in an alternative high school for emotionally/behaviorally disturbed students

Some 1,300 alternative high schools have been established in the United States for dealing with the special education needs of emotionally and behaviorally disturbed youth. The present study investigated cognitive, academic, and psychosocial variables associated with success in an alternative high school for such youth. Results indicated that psychosocial variables (Family Pathology, Duration of Disturbance, and Age of Admission) were associated with success, whereas cognitive and academic variables were not. These results are interpreted in light of their implications for assessment and placement decisions, management by mental health and school professionals, and curriculum modifications necessary for success.