Methods as Tools

O'Keefe argues that the logic of experiment‐wise error correction is flawed, presenting a number of counterexamples as evidence for his claim. He asserts that there is no consistent principle that discriminates legitimate from absurd uses of this logic. I supply such a principle and defend it with his own counterexamples. In sum, O'Keefe's critique raises important methodological questions, provokes discussion that may help answer them, but goes too far in indicting the logic of experiment‐wise error correction.     

Creative productivity and age: A mathematical model based on a two-step cognitive process

It is argued that several empirical aspects of the relation between age and productivity can be explained by hypothesizing a simple two-step model of the creative process. Such a hypothesis permits a delayed single-peak function to result from an underlying process of constantly decelerating decay. The derived equation describes creative productivity as a function of individual age. The equation is not only shown to be consistent with empirical data on the relation between age and achievement, but additionally several important empirical predictions and theoretical consequences are inferred from the model. For instance, the model (a) maintains that the age curves may be largely the intrinsic outcome of cognitive processes rather than the extrinsic effect of developmental changes or sociological influences; (b) predicts the explanatory superiority of professional over chronological age; (c) explains the observed positive intercorrelation among creative precociousness, productivity, and longevity in terms of their mutual dependence upon individual differences in creative potential; and (d) provides a substantive basis for interpreting the variation in age peaks across disciplines by introducing the concepts of ideation rate, elaboration rate, and creative half-life. Tests to confirm or disconfirm the theoretical model are also proposed.     

The Influence of Communication Processes on Group Outcomes: Antithesis and Thesis

The influence of communication processes on group outcomes is discussed from two perspectives, one in which influence does not exist and one in which influence is central. Formal models for both perspectives are presented as a means of bracketing discussion of the role of communication processes in group outcomes. The implications of these models for future theorizing are discussed. The first of these two models is an extension of Hewes’s socioegocentric model (1986, 1996) . The second class of formal model, dual‐level connectionist models, integrates mental and communication processes to explain moment‐by‐moment communication behavior. This class of models is contrasted with important models of group influence that use atemporal aggregations of messages to predict group outcomes. Implications of dual‐level connections models for the role of “emergence” in group theorizing, the limitations of Markovian models of group communication research, and the decomposability of psychological and communication processes are elaborated.     

Use of a distracting task to obtain defensive head movements to looming visual stimuli by human adults in a laboratory setting.

Defensive responses to looming visual stimuli have been obtained in a wide variety of species, including human infants as young as one week. This phenomenon has not, however, been formally demonstrated for adults under laboratory conditions. In this paper it is reported that similar responses, namely avoidance movements of the head, can be obtained in most human adults provided that they are suitably distracted by playing a computer tracking game. Such behaviours were not obtained when subjects were not so distracted. The use of control conditions also ruled out the possibility that simple movement cues from stimuli presented on a noncollision trajectory are sufficient stimulus to obtain defensive responses. It is of interest to note that latencies for avoidance movements were significantly shorter than those for orienting movements in the same situation, but were no different from the latencies for orienting movements when subjects were not distracted. It is argued that these findings are consistent with the proposition that defensive head movements to looming stimuli, like orienting movements to novel peripheral stimuli, represent a basic visual competence that is normally suppressed (or subsumed) by higher competences. The decision to avoid is probably based on the computation of time to contact, and may reflect the operation of a subcortical system for elementary analysis of optic flow.