The effects of continuous phonation on Xenon-inhalation air curves (of the kind used in deriving regional cerebral blood flow)

Regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) may be measured with inhalation techniques that use end-expired values of radioactivity to estimate the isotope concentration in arterial blood. These end-expired data are used as an input function in a mathematical equation to derive rCBF. End-expired air is assumed normally to be in equilibrium with the arterial blood at the alveolar surface of the lung during regular (passive) breathing; this assumption may not be valid during continuous phonation. We therefore have analyzed breathing (inhalation/exhalation) patterns and end-expired radioactivity (¹³³Xe) during (1) speaking, (2) singing, and (3) humming of the national anthem, and also during (4) passive breathing. Statistically significant differences in breathing patterns were measured between a group of nonmusicians and two groups of musicians (singers) during the phonation tasks: The nonmusicians breathed more often (and more rapidly) and exhibited less variability in their breathing patterns than did the musicians. Notwithstanding these differences, the shapes of smoothed functions derived from the end-expired values were not influenced appreciably during phonation (except possibly during talking). The latter finding suggests that estimates of rCBF derived with these data should not be confounded seriously because of the continuous phonation.     

The relationship of affiliative arousal to dopamine release

Higher levels of affiliation motivation after exposure to affiliative films are significantly related to higher dopamine concentrations in saliva in one study of 61 college students of both sexes, and in plasma in another study of 47 adults of both sexes. Individuals high in dispositionaln Affiliation, if they also reported high life stress, showed high gains in dopamine concentration in plasma after exposure to an affiliative film significantly more often than other individuals. Since aroused affiliation motivation was not associated with higher concentrations of norepinephrine, epinephrine, or cortisol in either study, it appears likely that dopamine is especially associated with arousal of affiliation motivation, just as norepinephrine has been found to be associated with arousal of power motivation. Thus, different motives may be subserved by different hormones, making it unlikely that all motives lead to the same state of physiological arousal.This research was carried out when all the authors were connected with the Department of Psychology and Social Relations at Harvard University. We acknowledge with thanks the support of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation through a grant to the senior author.     

Perceptual organization of acoustic stimuli by budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulatus): II. Vocal signals

Operant conditioning and multidimensional scaling procedures were used to study auditory perception of complex sounds in the budgerigar. In a same-different discrimination task, budgerigars learned to discriminate among natural vocal signals. Multidimensional scaling procedures were used to arrange these complex acoustic stimuli in a two-dimensional space reflecting perceptual organization. Results show that budgerigars group vocal stimuli according to functional and acoustical categories. Studies with only contact calls show that birds also make within-category discriminations. The acoustic cues in contact calls most salient to budgerigars appear to be quite complex. There is a suggestion that the sex of the signaler may also be encoded in these calls. The results from budgerigars were compared with the results from humans tested on some of the same sets of complex sounds.     

Peer-group affiliation and adolescent self-esteem: an integration of ego-identity and symbolic-interaction theories

To evaluate expectations derived from ego-identity theory and symbolic-interaction theories about the association between self-concept and peer-group affiliations in adolescence, we examined the self-esteem of 221 7th through 12th graders associated by peers with one of five major school crowds and 106 students relatively unknown by classmates and not associated with any school crowd. Among crowd members, self-esteem was directly related to the position of one's crowd in the peer-group status hierarchy (based on both peer-rated and self-perceived crowd affiliation). Outsiders' self-esteem differed in relation to the accuracy of their reflected appraisal of and the salience they attached to crowd affiliation. Crowd members as a whole exhibited higher self-esteem than outsiders as a whole. Differences, however, were mediated by crowd status, salience of crowd affiliation, and the accuracy of reflected appraisals. An adequate interpretation of the findings required an integration of Festinger's (1954, 1957) social comparisons and cognitive-dissonance theories, Cooley's (1902) notions of reflected appraisal, and Newman and Newman's (1976) extrapolations from ego-identity theory.     

The impact of pre-employment integrity testing on employee turnover and inventory shrinkage losses

A major home improvement chain located primarily in the western United States initiated the use of thePersonnel Selection Inventory, a written integrity test, as part of its pre-employment hiring process. For two years only, those job applicants who passed this test and other pre-employment criteria were hired by the chain. Following the introduction of the inventory, there was: (1) a 50% reduction in the number of employee terminations for theft, illegal drug use, and violence over a five year period and (2) a savings in shrinkage losses that amounted to over two million dollars over a two year period.     

Pretrial Publicity, the Timing of the Trial, and Mock Jurors' Decision Processes

Pretrial publicity and a temporal interval between the news and trial were explored for their effects upon the jury's deliberation process and verdict. Publicity (neutral, negative) and trial timing (immediate, delayed) were manipulated in a 2 × 2 design. Twenty 12-person simulated juries were exposed either to neutral or negative publicity and viewed a videotaped criminal trial immediately following news exposure or after a one-week delay between news and trial. Dichotomous pre-and postdeliberation verdicts, probability of guilt scales, trial recall, ratings of companion jurors, perceptions of attorneys, assessments of the news article, and recall of news facts were measured. Deliberations were tape recorded and content analyzed. Juries exposed to neutral and negative publicity did not significantly differ on conviction rate, deliberation length, or on quality of deliberations. Prejudicial news elicited counter remarks about the threatening nature of the publicity to the defendant's right to a fair trial. Individual juror data revealed that while the news manipulation did not significantly affect predeliberation verdicts or attention to trial events, negative news lowered jurors' probability estimates of guilt and facilitated their recall of news facts. A discriminant analysis predicting jury verdict indicated a lack of support for prior research showing damaging effects from prejudicial pretrial publicity. Findings are explored for methodological implications and for usefulness of theoretical notions of reactance, and "sleeper effects".     

The accuracy of aimed movements to visual targets during development: the role of visual information

Children aged 1.5 to 8 years were required to touch accurately an illuminated target lamp located on a vertical board. Movements were made when visual information was complete (target lit for 3 s, room illuminated; partial (target lit for 3 s, room dark, and reduced (target lit for 0.7 s, room dark). Dependent variables were response accuracy, reaction time, and movement time. Accuracy decreased with decreasing availability of visual information and improved with age under all conditions. Reaction times were shorter in the dark (Conditions 2 and 3) than in the light; they decreased with age up to age 5 and did not continue to decrease thereafter. Movement time did not change with age under Conditions 1 and 3 but tended to increase with age under Condition 2. Slower movements were more accurate at all ages, provided visual feedback could be utilized. Increased reliance on the strategy "slower movements yield higher accuracy" was held to account for developmental changes under Condition 2, whereas in Conditions 1 and 3 improvement in the efficiency of motor preprogramming was implicated.     

Perceptions by the aged of crime, criminals, and the criminal justice system

A general fear of crime victimization led to modified activities in the community and feelings of relative safety in their own area for 132 elderly respondents on a 24-item questionnaire. They held sympathetic views of crime perpetrators as disadvantaged victims of society themselves, but came to the unlikely conclusions that more police control and harsher prison sentences are needed.     

Poisson models for assessing rater agreement in discrete response studies

In this paper we discuss a method for assessing agreement among raters who are scoring the number of times, a specified event occurs. In such cases, it seems reasonable to define agreement in terms of raters' behaviours in correctly identifying responses which have in fact occurred, and in their falsely counting responses which have not. We exploit the discrete nature of the response variable, and examine a class of models for mean response assuming an underlying Poisson distribution. Test statistics are given for deciding on the applicability of the models, and whether there is agreement with respect to correctly detecting responses, as well as with falsely scoring responses.     

Pastoral theologian of the year,William Barr Oglesby,Jr.

This article acknowledging and celebrating William Barr Oglesby, Jr. as Pastoral Theologian of the Year for 1983, was originally published inPastoral Psychology 32(1) in Fall, 1983. As a result of some errors that inadvertently modified both the tone and the meaning of the text, we are republishing this article here in its entirety.