THE EFFECT OF CULTURE AND GENDER ON SELF-REPORTED ASSERTIVE BEHAVIOR

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the relationship between cultural affiliation, gender and assertive behavior in two distinct socio-cultural groups. Ninety-seven Israeli Arab students and 97 Israeli Jewish students, of both sexes, filled out the Assertion Inventory (Gambrill and Richey 1975) during a class meeting. Analysis of the results indicated differences between the two cultural groups. In general, Arab participants showed a lower level of assertiveness than their Jewish counterparts. Differences between gender and interaction of culture x gender were found in certain factors related to behavior in specific social situations. These findings were discussed on the basis of accepted social behavior within various cultural contexts.     

Individual differences in the linguistic competence of referential and expressive subjects

The aim of this work was to examine individual differences in referential and expressive style through a longitudinal study. The composition of the first 50 words, communicative gestures, the conversational style of dyads and the percentage of vocabulary produced from 12 to 24 month-olds were analyzed. The vocabulary was collected through interviews to parents and sessions of mother-infant interaction in the laboratory. Significant differences in the proportion of common nouns and frozen phrases between referential and expressive children in the frequency of communicative gestures and style conversation were found. Thus, referential children and their mothers used more pointing gestures than the expressive children and their mothers. Additionally, mothers of referential children used completing more frequently.     

Reciprocated and unreciprocated dyadic peer preferences and academic achievement of Israeli and immigrant students: a longitudinal study

The authors used a longitudinal design to investigate 2 major issues: first, whether popularity with classmates results in better academic achievement or academic achievement improves popularity with classmates; and second, how time affects in-group and out-group contacts in the elementary school. The authors studied these issues by means of an interactive measure of reciprocated and unreciprocated contacts with peers. This measure indicated the extent to which aspirations for close relations were fulfilled or not fulfilled by each member of a dyad. Participants were 305 fifth- and sixth-grade Israeli students and 100 immigrant classmates. Results indicated (a) higher academic achievement predicted higher numbers of bids for reciprocal contacts in class but not higher numbers of bids for contacts that were not reciprocated; (b) a higher level of unreciprocated bids for contact seemed to have a detrimental effect on academic performance; (c) teachers tended to rate as more adjusted to school the immigrant students who were willing to engage in more intensive reciprocated contacts with Israeli peers; and (d) reciprocated contacts tended to increase whereas unreciprocated contacts were inclined to decrease as a function of time. These changes over time were more prominent for the dominant hosts than for their migrant classmates.     

La diferenciación masculino-femenino: Un mito y una realidad

Resumen

El artículo se propone realizar un estudio teórico acerca de las repercusiones psíquicas y sociales de la diferenciación sexual, tomando como marco de referencia la interpretación dada por la perspectiva cognitiva a partir del concepto de «esquema basado en la dicotomía del género».

El enfoque cognitivo destaca la importancia que ejerce la identificación psico-sexual en la adquisición y desarrollo de las ideas de «masculinidad» y «femineidad». Este proceso de partición del mundo en dos clases sexuales diferenciadas ha resultado doblemente pernicioso tanto para varones como para mujeres, empobreciendo, por un lado, el desarrollo global de la personalidad e impidiendo, por otro, el entendimiento entre sus respectivas visiones del mundo.     

Bigger Not Better: Unpacking Future Expenses Inflates Spending Predictions

People often underestimate their future personal spending. Across four studies we examined an “unpacking” intervention to reduce this bias. Participants predicted spending for an upcoming week (Study 1), a weekend (Study 2a), a vacation (Study 2b), and for weeks versus self-nominated events (Study 3), and subsequently reported actual spending. In each case, unpacking the details of expected expenses increased spending predictions. In contexts where predictions tended to be too low (Study 1, 3), unpacking eliminated underestimation bias. However, in contexts where predictions were already unbiased, unpacking introduced an overestimation bias (Study 2, 3). Unpacking appears to make predictions bigger, not necessarily better.     

Examining the development of attention and executive functions in children with a novel paradigm.

The development of attention and executive functions in normal children (7-12 years) was investigated using a novel selective reaching task, which involved reaching as rapidly as possible towards a target, while at times having to ignore a distractor. The information processing paradigm allowed the measurement of various distinct dimensions of behaviour within a single task. The largest improvements in vigilance, set-shifting, response inhibition, selective attention, and impulsive responding were observed to occur between the ages of 8 and 10, with a plateau in performance between 10 and 12 years of age. These findings, consistent with a step-wise model of development, coincide with the observed developmental spurt in frontal brain functions between 7 and 10 years of age, and indicate that attention and executive functions develop in parallel. This task appears to be a useful research tool in the assessment of attention and executive functions, within a single task. Thus it may have a role in determining which cognitive functions are most affected in different childhood disorders.     

Motor preparation, motor execution, attention, and executive functions in attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Attention and executive functions were investigated in medicated and unmedicated children with ADHD combined type using a novel selective reaching task. This task involved responding as rapidly as possible to a target while at times having to ignore a distractor. Results indicated that unmedicated children with ADHD showed slow and inaccurate responding. Slow responding reflected problems at the stage of movement preparation but not movement execution. An attentional impairment, rather than a motor planning problem per se, appeared to underlie the slow movement preparation. Inaccurate responding reflected problems with response inhibition and selective attention, impulsivity, set-shifting, and difficulties in maintaining vigilance. Although medicated children with ADHD did not show slow movement preparation, they did show some response inaccuracy, resulting especially from impulsive responding.These findings suggest that ADHD is characterized by slow motor preparation (but not motor execution), and deficits in selective attention, vigilance, and executive functions. Preliminary results suggest that stimulant medication may resolve some of these motor, attentional and executive function deficits.     

Adolescent girls' perceptions of goodness and badness and the role of will in their behavioral decisions

The present study explored adolescents' ethical self-images and related behavioral decisions. Data were collected from two groups of adolescent girls (N = 49) using an open-ended survey. One group attended a public high school for gifted students and the other group attended an alternative public high school. The results indicate that goodness is connected with altruism, adherence to external standards, or self-beneficial actions. Alternatively, badness is associated with going against social norms, harming others, or violating inner values. In these two groups overall, decisions about how to behave seem influenced by both inner standards and relational pulls. Differences between the two groups are also discussed.     

Reactance,the self,and its group: When threats to freedom come from the ingroup versus the outgroup

We investigated the assumption that independent versus interdependent self‐construals yield different manifestations of psychological reactance in different group contexts. We expected collectivists (interdependent) to value the collective freedom of an ingroup more in face of an outgroup threat than individualists (independent) who should be protective of their individual freedom especially within an ingroup. In Study 1, we showed that collectivists (Taiwanese students) did not show reactance when a threat to their freedom of choice originated in the ingroup, but they did show reactance when it originated in an outgroup. In Study 2, Austrian students showed more reactance the more interdependent their self‐construal was when confronted with an outgroup restriction. However, the more independent Austrian students' self‐construal was, the more reactance they showed when the threat came from the ingroup. Priming an independent (versus interdependent) self‐construal in Study 3, we again observed more reactance when freedom was restricted by the ingroup. The findings underline the importance of understanding psychological reactance as a socially situated phenomenon. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Post-Feminist Era: Still Striving for Equality in Relationships

As for the past 30 years, Western society continues to grapple with a major sex-role revolution. Changes from the availability of contraception and persistent feminist protests disrupted the respective duties of men and women in what was called the "traditional family." Since the industrial revolution, traditional meant the patriarchal family with men holding the prominent role of breadwinner in the family. Women stayed home to raise and nurture the children. This arrangement has been questioned, especially as vast numbers of women enter the workforce and improve their education. The position taken here is that although women have made strides in developing their autonomy, they frequently do not feel that they have an equal partnership in their intimate relationships. Men also feel a growing dissatisfaction with their positions in relation to women. The paper discusses the reasons why, despite changes in both society and attitudes of men and women towards their roles, there still exists inequality between the sexes in their lives together. Discussed, as well, is how this inequality negatively affects intimate relationships. Finally, the paper will suggest ways that men and women and society can remedy the situation and encourage greater fulfillment in love.