Helping Unrelated Strangers: Physical and Psychological Reactions to the Bone Marrow Donation Process Among Anonymous Donors1

The development of models that predict outcomes of voluntary action is important for practitioners who manage large groups of volunteers. In accordance with this goal, a path model was generated linking predonation characteristics of volunteer marrow donors to postdonation physical and psychological reactions. Questionnaire data were collected from 343 individuals registered to donate marrow to unrelated strangers at 3 time points: shortly predonation, shortly postdonation, and 1-year post- donation. Although donors had generally positive reactions to donation, a substantial minority reported ambivalence about donating, physical difficulty with donation, and negative psychological reactions postdonation. In addition, our data suggest that predonation ambivalence is a central predictor of postdonation reactions, even after other donor characteristics are taken into account. These results have practical implications for the recruitment of volunteers, and suggest important variables to be considered in evaluating potential bone marrow donors.     

The Relationship between Creativity and Interpersonal Problem-Solving Skills in Adults

The present study evaluated whether creativity training and interpersonal problem-solving training reflect equivalent or complementary skills in adults. A sample of 74 undergraduates received interpersonal problem-solving training, creativity training, neither, or both. Dependent variables included measures of problem-solving and creative performance, and problem-solving and creative style. The results suggested that creativity and interpersonal problem-solving represent complementary skills, in that each training program specifically affected performance only on related measures of performance. A combination of programs affected both abilities. Creativity training and interpersonal problem-solving training are popular psychoeducational interventions that developed in isolation from each other. Originally thought of as a mysterious process, the empirical analysis of the creative act can be traced to the work of Wallas (1926). Under the assumption that creativity is a desirable trait, a number of scales and training programs have been developed to measure and enhance creative skills. Creativity training has been used primarily in educational and industrial settings (e.g., Basadur, 1981). The principles of interpersonal problem-solving training have emerged more recently, in the work of Spivack and Shure (1974; Spivack, Platt, & Shure, 1976) and D'Zurilla (D'Zurilla & Goldfried, 1971; D'Zurilla & Nezu, 1982). These authors conceptualized interpersonal problem-solving training in the context of behavior therapy, and for this reason the literature on interpersonal problem-solving is more closely associated with therapeutic settings. Creativity and interpersonal problem-solving skills can be conceptually distinguished on the basis of their goals. Interpersonal problem-solving refers to one's skill in determining the means by which to achieve a specific end or overcome a specific problem. Creativity, on the other hand, need not be oriented towards achieving specific ends; it is associated with the capacity for thinking in new and different ways. Koestler (1964) has even argued that these two goals can be inimical, at least in adults, in that the ability to combine information in unique ways may be. hindered when the individual focuses his or her thinking on a specific problem. At the same time, there are clear similarities between the two domains of skills. Guilford (1977) noted that “creative thinking produces novel outcomes, and problem-solving involves producing a new response to a new situation, which is a novel outcome” (p. 161). Edwards and Sproull (1984) saw creativity training as a method for improving the quality of solutions to problems and increasing personal effectiveness. They considered problem-solving synonymous with creativity, since both training programs offer a variety of techniques to help identify useful solutions to problems. Similarly, Noller (1979) and others (e.g., Isaksen, Dorval, & Treffinger, 1994) have discussed the concept of creative problem solving, which attempts to integrate principles in the literature on creativity and on problem solving. Isaksen et al. conceptualized the process of creative problem solving as consisting of six steps which fall within three stages. The first stage involves understanding the problem, consisting of three steps: mess-finding, data-finding, and problem-finding. This is followed by the stage of generating ideas, involving the idea- finding step. Finally, there is planning for action, which involves solution-finding and acceptance-finding. The most important difference between the various creativity training models and the interpersonal problem-solving model lies in their emphasis. Creativity training models focus primarily on enhancing skill at generating solutions. The interpersonal problem-solving model places equal emphasis on the implementation and evaluation of potential solutions. Although many authors have suggested that participation in creativity training will have positive effects on social and interpersonal functioning (e.g., Parnes, 1987), only two studies have been conducted examining the relationship between the interpersonal problem-solving training model and creativity skills. Miller, Serafica, and Clark (1989) and Shondrick, Serafica, Clark, and Miller (1992) found that interpersonal problem-solving training for children also enhanced creativity skills, and that children's creative abilities appear to be predictive of their interpersonal problem-solving skills. The question of whether creativity and interpersonal problem-solving are equivalent, complementary, or even inimical has not been adequately addressed in the existing literature. For one thing, there are no studies examining the relationship between the two constructs in adults. This is an important question, given Koestler's (1964) conclusion that they are potentially inconsistent among adults. Second, there are no studies at all regarding the impact of creativity training on problem-solving skills in adults. The purpose of the present study was to evaluate whether creativity and interpersonal problem-solving skills can be distinguished in an adult sample.     

Group Counseling Intervention for Solving Problems on the Job

This article reports the effects of a group counseling intervention on the social problem solving by and employment preparation of Grade 9 and Grade 10 students. Mathematics teachers implemented the intervention on problem solving on the job within a unit on mathematics problem solving. The intervention used a cognitive approach to counseling, specifically cognitive strategy instruction with teacher modeling and students' thinking aloud to a partner. Both pretest and posttest scores and analyses of interviews with 4 students showed the success of the intervention. An interview with the peer coach of the teachers highlighted teacher experiences in implementing successful group counseling.     

Influence of Destabilization on the Temporal Characteristics of lquot;Volitionalrquot; Stepping

Previous work suggests that there may be fundamental differences between compensatory stepping responses evoked by postural perturbation and visually cued "volitional" stepping (e.g., gait initiation). In contrast to visual cueing, postural destabilization evokes an array of sensory inputs that are intrinsically linked to the mobilization of rapid compensatory responses. The hypothesis examined in this study was that this fundamental difference would lead to distinct changes in the temporal characteristics of the stepping response. Six healthy young adults were instructed to step quickly in response to either visual cueing or anterioposterior platform motion. Both forward and backward stepping responses were characterized, using measures of vertical ground reaction force. A stereotypical temporal patterning of the stepping response occurred in both stimulus conditions and both directions of stepping, and anticipatory postural adjustments were evident in all trials. However, postural destabilization led to a more rapid initiation and execution of the temporal pattern, in comparison with visually cued responses. The most pronounced effect was seen in the duration of the response, which was reduced by a factor of two, with approximately proportional foreshortening of both the preparatory and swing phases. The results suggest that sensory information conveying a state of instability has a distinct influence on the characteristics of a subsequent stepping reaction. The persistence of the anticipatory postural adjustments suggests that the failure to see this element of the response in previous studies may reflect fundamental differences between volitional and unplanned compensatory stepping.     

The Timing Effects of Accent Production in Periodic Finger-Tapping Sequences

When subjects are required to produce short sequences of equally paced finger taps and to accentuate one of the taps, the interval preceding the forceful tap is shortened and the one that immediately follows the accent is lengthened. Assuming that the tapping movements are triggered by an internal clock, one explanation attributes the rnistiming of the taps to central factors: The momentary rate of the clock is accelerated or decelerated as a function of motor preparation to, respectively, increase or decrease the movement force. This hypothesis predicts that the interresponse intervals measured between either tap movement onsets or movement terminations (taps) will show the same timing pattern. A second explanation for the observed interval effects is that the tapping movements are triggered by a regular internal clock but the timing of the successive taps is altered because the forceful movement is completed in less time than the other tap movements are. This "peripheral" hypothesis predicts regular timing of movement onsets but distorted timing of movement terminations. In the present study, the trajectories of the movements performed by subjects were recorded and the interresponse intervals were measured at the beginning and the end of the tapping movements. The results of Experiment 1 showed that neither model can fully explain the interval effects: The fast forceful movements were initiated with an additional delay that took into account the small execution time of these movements. Experiment 2 reproduced this finding and showed that the timing of the onset and contact intervals did not evolve with the repetition of trial blocks. Therefore, the assumption of an internal clock that would trigger the successive movements must be rejected. The results are discussed in the framework of a modified two-stage model in which the internal clock, instead of triggering the tapping movements, provides target time points at which the movements have to produce their meaningful effects, that is, contacts with the response key. The timing distortions are likely to reflect both peripheral and central components.     

Cognitive development: Pastoral implications

How people think influences how they feel, and this combination of thinking and feeling drives behavior. While ministers often have a good understanding of the emotional dimension of the people who seek their counsel, xthe importance of cognitive development has often been understated in their education and training. With this in mind, this article discusses seven developmental stages of cognitive development and how each stage affects daily behavior. This discussion is followed by four pastoral implications.     

Estimating the polyserial correlation coefficient

We develop simple noniterative estimators of the polyserial correlation coefficient. A general relationship between the polyserial correlation and the point polyserial correlation is exploited to give extensions of Pearson's, Brogden's, and Lord's biserial estimators to the multicategory setting. The small sample and asmptotic properties of these estimators are studied in some detail. A comparison with maximum likelihood estimates shows that Lord's polyserial estimator is fairly efficient across three probability models.The authors would like to thank the referees for suggestions that improved the presentation of the paper.     

Detachment and defeasibility in deontic logic

The purpose of the paper is to present a logical framework that allow to formalize a kind of prima facie duties, defeasible conditional duties, indefeasible conditional duties and actual (indefeasible) duties, as well as to show their logical interconnections.     

Too Close to Quit: The Role of Project Completion in Maintaining Commitment1

Conlon and Garland (1993) demonstrated that information about the degree of project completion, as compared with information about sunk costs, seemed to be the driving force behind continued investment in an R&D project. In the present paper, we replicate and extend this work. In studies with experienced bank managers, Chinese graduate students, and advanced-level MBA students, we find overwhelming support for the importance of project completion on investment intentions, with no indication of typical sunk cost effects. We argue that our results support a goal substitution explanation for many escalation phenomena where, as progress moves forward on a project, completion of the project itself takes increasing precedence over other goals (e. g., economic profit) that may have been more salient at the time the project was initiated.