ANALYSIS OF THE EFFECTS OF TASK PREFERENCES,TASK DEMANDS,AND ADULT ATTENTION ON CHILD BEHAVIOR IN OUTPATIENT AND CLASSROOM SETTINGS

Two studies were conducted with children who displayed behavior problems to evaluate the effects of task preference, task demands, and adult attention on child behavior. In Study 1, we conducted brief functional analyses in an outpatient clinic to identify variables that facilitated appropriate behavior. For 8 of 10 children, distinct patterns of performance occurred; 3 children displayed improved behavior with changes in task demands, 1 child displayed improved behavior with a preferred task, and 4 children displayed improved behavior with changes in adult attention. In most cases, the children's parents carried out the assessments with adequate procedural integrity. In Study 2, we applied similar assessment methods to a classroom setting over an extended period of time. We identified independent variables controlling appropriate, on-task, and academic behavior for 2 children on two tasks, with slightly different treatment procedures across tasks for both children. In addition, the results of brief functional analyses for both children corresponded to the extended classroom assessments.     

Assessing stress in cancer patients: a second-order factor analysis model for the Perceived Stress Scale

Using the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), perceptions of global stress were assessed in 111 women following breast cancer surgery and at 12 and 24 months later This is the first study to factor analyze the PSS. The PSS data were factor analyzed each time using exploratory factor analysis with oblique direct quartimin rotation. Goodness-of-fit indices (root mean square error of approximation [RMSEA]), magnitude and pattern of factor loadings, and confidence interval data revealed a two-factor solution of positive versus negative stress items. The findings, replicated across time, also indicate factor stability. Hierarchical factor analyses supported a second-order factor of "perceived stress." This alternative factor model of the PSS is presented along with observations regarding the measure's use in cancer research.     

Consumer information processing strategies in middle and late adulthood

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the extent to which performance of a complex cognitive task of a type resembling that encountered in everyday life is maintained through adulthood. A total of 80 subjects participated; 20 in their thirties, 20 in their fifties, 20 in their sixties, and 20 in their seventies. Subjects were asked to make preference judgments with respect to 32 pocket-size notebooks of a sort they might encounter as consumers in a stationery or variety store. Independently, they were also asked to express their preferences with respect to each of the four dimensions on which the notebooks varied. With only minor differences across age groups, most subjects demonstrated the ability to integrate their individual dimension preferences into a complex preference judgment of an object embodying those dimensions, in a logically consistent manner.     

Teaching What I'm Not: Embodiment,Race, and Theological Conversation in the Classroom

This article examines the theoretical and practical concerns of a White professor who teaches a course on African American religious thought. It begins with a discussion of what it means to be embodied White, and how that affects the teaching of another embodied reality. From there it moves to the major assignment of the course, the evolutionary essay, and how this assignment facilitates student reflection upon their own embodied existence, particularly in terms of race. The article concludes with a brief reflection on the continuing challenges the author faces when teaching such a course.     

Assessing general maladjustment with the MMPI-2

The validities of 7 MMPI-2 (Butcher, Graham, Ben-Porath, Tellegen, & Kaemmer, 2001) measures of general maladjustment were compared using a composite criterion measure based on self-reported symptom severity and clinicians' ratings of symptom severity and level of functioning. Participants were 274 male and 425 female clients at a community mental health center and 105 male and 247 female clients at a university psychological clinic. All MMPI-2 measures were significantly related to the composite criterion measure for both male and female clients in both settings. The mean score on 8 clinical scales (M8) consistently was the best indicator of maladjustment. Although other MMPI-2 measures sometimes added significantly to the variance accounted for in the criterion measure, increments were small and probably not clinically meaningful. However, M8 added significantly and meaningfully to each of the other MMPI-2 measures in predicting maladjustment. Implications for using the MMPI-2 to assess general maladjustment in outpatient mental health settings are discussed.     

Aging and variety seeking

The authors examined the influence of age on variety seeking in 3 experiments. When given choices among jellybeans or music, age differences in variety seeking emerged. Younger adults selected similar levels of variety when choosing what to consume immediately and what to consume later. In contrast, older adults consistently chose less variety when making choices to be consumed at a later time than when making choices to be consumed immediately. This pattern may be related to an increased focus on regulating future emotional experience that is associated with age.     

The effects of movement direction and hemispace on estimates of distance traveled

BACKGROUND/HYPOTHESIS: The degree of attention directed to a stimulus and the presence of anisometric representations can alter the perception of the magnitude of a stimulus. We wanted to learn if normal right-handed subjects' estimates of distance traveled are influenced by the right-left direction or hemispace of movements. METHODS: We had blindfolded participants estimate the distance their arm was moved in a rightward or leftward direction, in right and left hemispace. Since we wanted subjects to estimate the distance traveled rather than compute the distance between the start and finish points, the subjects' arms were passively moved in sinusoidal trajectories at a constant speed. RESULTS: Subjects estimated leftward movements as longer than rightward movements, but there was no effect of hemispace. COMMENTS/CONCLUSIONS: People often attend more to novel than routine conditions and therefore participants might have overestimated the distance associated with leftward versus rightward movement because right-handed people more frequently move their right hand in a rightward direction and learn to read and write using rightward movements. Thus, leftward movements might be more novel and more attended than rightward movements and this enhanced directional attention might have influenced estimates of magnitude (distance).