The seriousness of crime: A study of popular morality

This article reports the findings from a study that explored how lay people determine the seriousness of criminal offenses. While previous research on this topic has assumed that the perceived seriousness of crimes was primarily determined by differences in physical injury and economic loss, the results of this study indicate that offense seriousness is also affected by judgments subjects make about intent, motive, purpose, “fair play”, and “real harm”.     

A comparison of computer and questionnaire methods of history-taking in a genito-urinary clinic

Abstract

Information on the medical history and symptomatology of 69 patients presenting at a genito-urinary (GU) clinic was obtained either by a computerized interview or a paper questionnaire and the results compared. A comparison was also made between these methods and notes taken during a standard physician interview. Significantly more symptoms were elicited by the computer than the paper questionnaire. Both methods also elicited significantly more symptoms than were recorded by the physician. The patients reported having previously attended a GU clinic more often to the computer than to the physician whereas the questionnaire was no different from the physician. The results indicate that computers can be used satisfactorily to facilitate medical history- taking in GU clinics and may result in a more complete profile of symptoms than either written questionnaire or physician interview.     

Time Perception in Boys With Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder According to Time Duration,Distraction and Mode of Presentation

The present study describes the incidence of test refusal at neuropsychological assessment, investigates its correlates, and its stability. The participants were 124 children aged 3.5 years whose development has been followed from birth in the Jyväskylä Longitudinal Study of Dyslexia (JLD). The frequency of test refusal on the Finnish version of the NEPSY was analyzed with respect to the children's concurrent and earlier cognitive and language skills, assessed using tests and parental ratings. Refusal during test-taking was found to be relatively common at this age, and high frequency of refusal at an earlier age was associated with similar tendency at a later age. High test refusal was associated with compromised neuropsychological and linguistic test scores. Missing data due to refusal were more common in neuropsychological tasks requiring verbal production. It is concluded that test refusals reflect a child's poor underlying skills and an attempt to avoid failure, rather than noncompliant or oppositional behavior.     

Action video game experience affects oculomotor performance

Action video games have been show to affect a variety of visual and cognitive processes. There is, however, little evidence of whether playing video games can also affect motor action. To investigate the potential link between experience playing action video games and changes in oculomotor action, we tested habitual action video game players (VGPs) and non-video game players (NVGPs) in a saccadic trajectory deviation task. We demonstrate that spatial curvature of a saccadic trajectory towards or away from distractor is profoundly different between VGPs and NVGPs. In addition, task performance accuracy improved over time only in VGPs. Results are discussed in the context of the competing interplay between stimulus-driven motor programming and top–down inhibition during oculomotor execution.     

Effects of Data Noise on Statistical Judgement

People made forecasts from graphically presented time series. Series were sinusoids overlaid by a zero or positive linear trend and a zero, low, moderate, or high level of noise. Forecasting performance was affected by both these variables. However, it did not correlate with ability to identify the trend and correlated significantly with ability to detect the sinusoidal pattern only when series were noise-free. A second experiment showed that the effect of data noise was not influenced by the number of forecasts that people made from a series. These findings are consistent with the view that data noise does not affect the way that forecasts are made but that it impairs them for two reasons. First, it renders the anchor-and-adjust heuristics underlying them less effective. Second, it causes people to add more noise to their judgements in their attempts to make them representative of the data.     

Some methodological and training/funding perspectives on the future of personality research

This article provides some methodological and training/funding perspectives on the future of personality research. Traditional correlational approaches to personality data have been useful, but approaches that address the data in new ways (e.g., mean structure, variance structure) permit researchers to ask interesting new research questions, particularly of short- and long-term longitudinal data. Advances and issues in the measurement of personality dimensions, types, situations, and biological markers are considered. Given the shrinkage of training programs in personality, new approaches to training are proposed to take advantage of resources across universities. Finally, some potential unanticipated costs for core personality research of the increased emphasis on grant funding at many universities are considered.