Religiosity and well-being among older Jewish Israelis: Findings from SHARE

ABSTRACT

This study examined the correlates of religiosity among Jewish Israelis aged 50 and older. Based on the second wave of the Survey of Health, Ageing, and Retirement in Europe, the findings show that almost half the Jewish respondents never pray and that, on average, prayer frequency is lower among Jewish Israelis than it is among most of their European counterparts. Multivariate logistic analyses revealed that those who pray more often have more health conditions, are less able to make ends meet financially, and have fewer years of education. However, when facing ill health those who pray more often display a relatively lesser decline in their sense of well-being.     

Holistic processing for faces and cars in preschool‐aged children and adults: evidence from the composite effect

The current study compared the development of holistic processing for faces and non‐face visual objects by testing for the composite effect for faces and frontal images of cars in 3‐ to 5‐year‐old children and adults in a series of four experiments using a two‐alternative forced‐choice recognition task. Results showed that a composite effect for faces was present as early as years, and none of the age groups tested showed signs of a composite effect for cars. These findings provide the first demonstration that holistic processing is already selective for faces in early childhood, and confirm existing evidence that sensitivity to holistic information in faces does not increase from 4 years to adulthood.     

The representation of negative numbers: exploring the effects of mode of processing and notation

The representation of negative numbers was explored during intentional processing (i.e., when participants performed a numerical comparison task) and during automatic processing (i.e., when participants performed a physical comparison task). Performance in both cases suggested that negative numbers were not represented as a whole but rather their polarity and numerical magnitudes were represented separately. To explore whether this was due to the fact that polarity and magnitude are marked by two spatially separated symbols, participants were trained to mark polarity by colour. In this case there was still evidence for a separate representation of polarity and magnitude. However, when a different set of stimuli was used to refer to positive and negative numbers, and polarity was not marked separately, participants were able to represent polarity and magnitude together when numerical processing was performed intentionally but not when it was conducted automatically. These results suggest that notation is only partly responsible for the components representation of negative numbers and that the concept of negative numbers can be grasped only through that of positive numbers.     

The Effect of Feedback Schedule Manipulation on Speech Priming Patterns and Reaction Time

Speech priming tasks are frequently used to delineate stages in the speech process such as lexical retrieval and motor programming. These tasks, often measured in reaction time (RT), require fast and accurate responses, reflecting maximized participant performance, to result in robust priming effects. Encouraging speed and accuracy in responding can take many forms, including verbal instructions and feedback, and often involves visually displayed RT feedback. However, it is uncertain how manipulation of the schedule of this RT feedback influences speech RT speed and, ultimately, the priming effect. This experiment examined the effect of visually presented RT feedback schedules on priming patterns in 20 older healthy adults. Results suggested that feedback schedule manipulation had a differential effect on reaction time, depending on the interstimulus interval between the prime and the target, but no effect on response priming patterns.     

Teaching a simple meal preparation skill to adults with moderate and severe mental retardation using video modeling

We evaluated whether adults with mental retardation in the moderate or severe range would acquire simple meal preparation skills via video modeling. Training was conducted in the kitchen of the participants' day treatment setting. The intervention consisted of (i) watching a video of an adult with a developmental disability making a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and (ii) receiving verbal praise for each step of the task that was performed correctly. All three participants mastered the task and demonstrated generalization across settings. All three participants also demonstrated maintenance of the skill one month following mastery. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Attachment Theory and Affect Regulation: The Dynamics,Development, and Cognitive Consequences of Attachment-Related Strategies

Attachment theory (J. Bowlby, 1982/1969, 1973) is one of the most useful and generative frameworks for understanding both normative and individual-differences aspects of the process of affect regulation. In this article we focus mainly on the different attachment-related strategies of affect regulation that result from different patterns of interactions with significant others. Specifically, we pursue 3 main goals: First, we elaborate the dynamics and functioning of these affect-regulation strategies using a recent integrative model of attachment-system activation and dynamics (P. R. Shaver & M. Mikulincer, 2002). Second, we review recent findings concerning the cognitive consequences of attachment-related strategies following the arousal of positive and negative affect. Third, we propose some integrative ideas concerning the formation and development of the different attachment-related strategies.     

Retroactive pessimism: a different kind of hindsight bias

In an attempt to regulate disappointments people may sometimes change their perceptions of the events leading to an undesirable outcome so that in retrospect this outcome seems almost inevitable. This retroactive pessimism effect was demonstrated in three studies. In the first, sports fans rated the likelihood of success for their team and its opponent before and after an important soccer match. Evidence for significant pre‐ and post‐game probability shifts was found for the fans of the defeated team but not for the supporters of the winning opponent. In the second and the third experiments participants responded to a scenario depicting a loss of stipend that was either large or small in value. Participants were expected to show more evidence of retroactive pessimism with greater disappointment. Indeed, estimates of the probability of a more favorable counterfactual outcome were sensitive to the magnitude of the loss with lower estimates of the probability that things could have turned out better in the large stipend condition. The effect was attenuated, however, when the loss was not personal but rather that of a friend (Experiment 2), or when the disappointment was mitigated (Experiment 3). Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Automatic semantic feedback during visual word recognition

Four experiments were conducted to determine whether semantic feedback spreads to orthographic and/or phonological representations during visual word recognition and whether such feedback occurs automatically. Three types of prime-target word pairs were used within the mediated-priming paradigm: (1) homophonically mediated (e.g., frog-[toad]-towed), (2) orthographically mediated (e.g., frog-[toad]-told), and (3) associatively related (e.g., frog-toad). Using both brief (53 msec; Experiment 1) and long (413 msec; Experiment 3) prime exposure durations, significant facilitatory-priming effects were found in the response time data with orthographically, but not homophonically, mediated prime-target word pairs. When the prime exposure duration was shortened to 33 msec in Experiment 4, however, facilitatory priming was absent with both orthographically and homophonically mediated word pairs. In addition, with a brief (53-msec) prime exposure duration, direct-priming effects were found with associatively (e.g., frog-toad), orthographically (e.g., toad-told), and homophonically (e.g., toad-towed) related word pairs in Experiment 2. Taken together, these results indicate that following the initial activation of semantic representations, activation automatically feeds back to orthographic, but not phonological, representations during the early stages of word processing. These findings were discussed in the context of current accounts of visual word recognition.     

The Combined Effect of Political Skill and Political Decision Making on Job Satisfaction1

The current study examined the interactive effects of an environment high in political decision making and political skill on job satisfaction. We predicted that as perceptions of political decision making increase, the satisfaction of individuals low in political skill would decrease. Conversely, the negative effects of political decision making on job satisfaction would be minimized among individuals high in political skill. Data were gathered from 105 managerial employees of a financial‐services organization. Results provided strong support for the hypothesized political decision‐making/political‐skill relationship. Implications, strengths and limitations, and avenues for future research are discussed.