Climate change and social order: Knowledge for action?

This article is a critical, sociological examination of policy advice aimed at reducing or limiting CO₂ emissions. The policy proposals are taken from various sources directed to governmental or economic institutions and targeted to cope with the natural and social consequences of global warming. We ask, based on a sociological understanding of features constitutive of practical social science knowledge, how feasible and practical are various policy proposals. Our assessment, in turn, is based on a theoretical model of the characteristics ofpractical scientific knowledge, which is discussed in conjunction with the current field of climate change knowledge. He is currently the editor of theCanadian Journal of Sociology. This article is a revised version of a paper presented at the 27th Annual Meeting of the Canadian Sociology and Anthropology Association, Learned Societies Conference, Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada, June 1992.     

DEFINING,VALIDATING, AND INCREASING INDICES OF HAPPINESS AMONG PEOPLE WITH PROFOUND MULTIPLE DISABILITIES

In this study we attempted to operationalize, measure, and increase happiness among people with profound disabilities. Happiness indices were defined and observed among 5 individuals. Validation measures indicated that (a) increases in happiness indices were observed when individuals were presented with most preferred stimuli relative to least preferred stimuli, (b) increases in unhappiness indices were observed when they were presented with least preferred relative to most preferred stimuli, and (c) practitioner ratings of participant happiness coincided with observed indices. Subsequently, classroom staff increased happiness indices through presentation and contingent withdrawal of activities. Results suggested that a behavioral approach can enhance happiness as one aspect of quality of life among people with profound disabilities. Research directions are offered that focus on using a behavioral approach to investigate other private events that are important among people with disabilities.     

Mobilizing positive reinforcement in communities to reduce youth access to tobacco

A community intervention to mobilize positive reinforcement for not selling tobacco to young people was evaluated. The intervention had five components: (a) mobilization of community support, (b) merchant education, (c) changing consequences to clerks for selling or not selling to those under 18, (d) publicity about clerks’ refusals to sell, and (e) feedback to store owners or managers about the extent of their sales to adolescents. A multiple baseline design experiment was conducted, in which two small Oregon communities received the intervention, while two others continued in baseline. Outlets’ willingness to sell was assessed repeatedly by teenage volunteers. The intervention significantly reduced the proportion of stores willing to sell. Mobilizing socia and material reinforcement for stores not selling tobacco to young people is a viable means of reducing such sales. It may be especially valuable in communities where laws against sales to minors go unenforced. This paper supported in part by the National Cancer Institute Grant CA38273.     

Comparisons of memory for nonverbal auditory and visual sequential stimuli

Properties of auditory and visual sensory memory were compared by examining subjects' recognition performance of randomly generated binary auditory sequential frequency patterns and binary visual sequential color patterns within a forced-choice paradigm. Experiment 1 demonstrated serial-position effects in auditory and visual modalities consisting of both primacy and recency effects. Experiment 2 found that retention of auditory and visual information was remarkably similar when assessed across a 10 s interval. Experiments 3 and 4, taken together, showed that the recency effect in sensory memory is affected more by the type of response required (recognition vs. reproduction) than by the sensory modality employed. These studies suggest that auditory and visual sensory memory stores for nonverbal stimuli share similar properties with respect to serial-position effects and persistence over time.     

Race Differences on a Reading Comprehension Test With and Without Passages

Previous research has found that test takers can score above chance level on reading comprehension tests even when the passages are omitted. The present research investigated whether the effect would vary as a function of race. In Study 1, 386 participants completed a reading test with the passages omitted. General mental ability and race were significantly correlated with test performance. In Study 2, 827 job applicants completed the test as part of an entry-level selection battery. Eliminating items for which large race differences existed in Study 1 had no real effect on the size of the Black-White mean difference.     

Knowing the meaning, getting the point, bridging the gap, and carrying the message: aspects of discourse following closed head injury in childhood and adolescence

Pragmatic communication or discourse was studied in 33 children and adolescents following closed head injury. Three-quarters of the sample was impaired on at least one of four discourse tests (knowing the alternate meanings of ambiguous words in context; getting the point of figurative or metaphoric expressions; bridging the inferential gaps between events in stereotyped social situations; and producing speech acts that express the apparent intentions of others). Resolution of ambiguity was correlated with word fluency and verbal domain knowledge, but not with object naming; understanding of metaphor was correlated with verbal domain knowledge, but not with literal sentence comprehension or with the formation of analogies; making inferences was correlated with working memory capacity but not with social knowledge; and producing speech acts was not correlated either with sentence construction or with social knowledge. These associations and dissociations reveal some of the correlates of impaired discourse processing after closed head injury in childhood and adolescence, as well as bearing on theoretical questions concerning the nature of normally developing discourse processes.     

Effects and aftereffects of continuous noise and computation work on risk and effort choices

Choices between risk and effort, in a format (COPE) previously shown to reflect fatigue, were obtained from subjects in noise or quiet. Both sexes were used in the experiment, half the subjects working at the Norinder arithmetic task while half rested. The COPE test took a computational form, offering choices between digit lists of differing lengths in which target sums were imbedded. The baseline choice levels were established in quiet, but half the subjects were exposed to noise during the posttest. As previously found in comparable conditions, the Norinder task showed no effect of noise. Pretest-posttest comparisons on the COPE test showed that exposure to noise, like computation work, had the predicted effect of decreasing the choice of high-probability, high-effort alternatives. The presence of noise during posttest had no overall effect on risk effort choices, although there were indications that changes of any kind in the test conditions might be a factor. The data seem difficult to explain in an arousal framework, but may be simply interpreted as showing that exposure to noise produces real fatigue.