Spatial cuing in a stereoscopic display: Evidence for a “depth-aware” attentional focus

Two experiments were conducted to explore whether attentional selection occurs in depth, or whether attentional focus is “depth blind,” as suggested by Ghiradelli and Folk (1996). In Experiment 1, observers viewed stereoscopic displays in which one of four spatial locations was cued. Two of the locations were at a near-depth location and two were at a far-depth location, and a single target was presented along with three distractors. The results indicated a larger cost in reaction time for switching attention inx,y and depth than inx,y alone, supporting a “depth-aware” attentional spotlight. In Experiment 2, no distractors were present, similar to the displays used by Ghiradelli and Folk. In this experiment, no effect for switching attention in depth was found, indicating that the selectivity of attention in depth depends on the perceptual load imposed on observers by the tasks and displays.     

Social and Situational Factors Associated With Contraceptive Switching: Implications for Practitioners1

This study was an investigation of contraceptive switching in the context of a 5-wave panel design of diaphragm and pill users from the New York City metropolitan area. The respondents were 525 women between the ages of 14 and 46, who came to one of 10 family planning clinics to obtain birth control, Results indicated a hazard function for switching in which the hazard rate increased in the initial weeks and then gradually declined over time. Clinic experiences on the part of the women were found to alter survivorship trends. Implications of the data for service providers were developed.     

Discrimination of picture requests for missing items among young children with developmental disabilities

Two experiments were conducted to assess discrimination of picture requests for missing items among young children with developmental disabilities. In Experiment 1, three children were first taught to request one object when it was missing from a set of two related leisure items. In Experiment 2, two children were taught to request one object belonging to a set of three leisure items. In both studies the requesting response consisted of pointing to a photograph of the missing item. After acquisition of the initial request, discrimination of picture requests was assessed when the second item (Experiment 1) and second or third item (Experiment 2) was missing. Requests for the untrained items emerged in the presence of natural maintaining contingencies and in the absence of instructional prompts for all but the third child in Experiment 1. This child required continued intervention on the initial request. The results suggest that for some children a sequence of intervention and the programming of natural maintaining contingencies may prove effective in promoting the discrimination of picture requests for missing items among young children with developmental disabilities.     

In Memoriam

The American Journal of Psychoanalysis -     

Predicting Health Behaviors From Attitudes and Subjective Norms: Between-Subjects and Within-Subjects Analyses

Much previous research (Trafimow & Fishbein, 1994a, 1994b) indicates that some behaviors are mostly under attitudinal control and some are mostly under normative control. Further, other research (Trafimow & Finlay, 1996) demonstrates that people, as well as behaviors, can be generally under attitudinal or normative control. The present research applies these ideas to the domain of health behaviors. Analyses conducted between-subjects for each behavior, and within-subjects across all of the behaviors, demonstrate that both behaviors and people can be under attitudinal or normative control when responding to items pertaining to health.     

Media Effects on Women's Body Esteem: Social and Individual Difference Factors

This study examined individual difference and social factors in moderating the effects of media images on women's body satisfaction. Participants heard a conversation wherein 2 people either were judgmental about a mutual friend's weight gain or discussed their friend's recent move. Participants then viewed slides which were either neutral or depicted "ideal" images of women. Results underscored the importance of individual differences. When exposed to ideal images, thinner women more positively evaluated their sexual attractiveness, while heavier women reported more negative self-evaluations. Compared to low self-monitors, high self-monitors who were exposed to ideal images were more positive about their physical condition. The findings demonstrate that media images do not similarly affect all women's body esteem.     

A mere exposure effect for transformed three-dimensional objects: Effects of reflection, size, or color changes on affect and recognition

If the mere exposure effect is based on implicit memory, recognition and affect judgments should be dissociated by experimental variables in the same manner as other explicit and implicit measures. Consistent with results from recognition and picture naming or object decision priming tasks (e.g., Biederman & E. E. Cooper, 1991, 1992; L. A. Cooper, Schacter, Ballesteros, & Moore, 1992), the present research showed that recognition memory but not affective preference was impaired by reflection or size transformations of three-dimensional objects between study and test. Stimulus color transformations had no effect on either measure. These results indicate that representations that support recognition memory code spatial information about an object’s left-right orientation and size, whereas representations that underlie affective preference do not. Insensitivity to surface feature changes that do not alter object form appears to be a general characteristic of implicit memory measures, including the affective preference task.     

A goodness of fit test for the rasch model

The Rasch model is an item analysis model with logistic item characteristic curves of equal slope,i.e. with constant item discriminating powers. The proposed goodness of fit test is based on a comparison between difficulties estimated from different scoregroups and over-all estimates. Based on the within scoregroup estimates and the over-all estimates of item difficulties a conditional likelihood ratio is formed. It is shown that—2 times the logarithm of this ratio isx ²-distributed when the Rasch model is true. The power of the proposed goodness of fit test is discussed for alternative models with logistic item characteristic curves, but unequal discriminating items from a scholastic aptitude test.     

Narcissism,sex roles,and self-functioning

This study examined the relationship between gender, sex role, and narcissism. Two hundred and three students completed the Bem Sex Role Inventory, the Narcissistic Personality Inventory, and the Narcissistic Personality Disorder Scale, along with several measures of self-esteem and depression. Overall, the data indicated that males and masculine individuals were not higher in their levels of maladaptive narcissism, that an adjusted narcissism was more obvious in males and in masculine subjects, and that femininity appeared to inhibit the display of an unhealthy exploitive self-concern. Androgyny failed to appear as the healthiest sex role, although multiple regression analyses suggested that future research may need to further explore this possibility.