Owning evaluation: Revaluing clinical work in a university context

This paper draws on the experience of a year-long evaluation project in a university counselling service. The author considers some reasons for practitioners' reluctance to undertake formal evaluation, but suggests their confidence in clinical work may be enhanced if ambivalence can be explored. The paper discusses the impact of organizational culture on such ventures and considers what conditions might promote their success.     

Tone of postcards in increasing survey response rates

This study assessed differences in response rates to a series of three-wave mail surveys when amiable or insistently worded postcards were the third wave of the mailing. Three studies were conducted; one with a sample of 600 health commissioners, one with a sample of 680 vascular nurses, and one with 600 elementary school secretaries. The combined response rates for the first and second wave mailings were 65.8%, 67.6%, and 62.4%, respectively. A total of 308 amiable and 308 insistent postcards were sent randomly to nonrespondents as the third wave mailing. Overall, there were 41 amiable and 52 insistent postcards returned, not significantly different by chi-square test. However, a separate chi-square test for one of the three studies, the nurses' study, did find a significant difference in favor of the insistently worded postcards.     

Construct validity of the posttraumatic stress disorder checklist in cancer survivors: analyses based on two samples

The measurement of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is critically important for the identification and treatment of this disorder. The PTSD Checklist (PCL; F. W. Weathers and J. Ford, 1996) is a self-report measure that is increasingly used. In this study, the authors investigated the factorial validity of the PCL with data from 236 cancer survivors who received a bone marrow or stem cell transplantation. The authors examined the fit of these data with the clinical model of 3 symptom clusters for PTSD, as proposed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, and alternative models tested in prior research. By using confirmatory factor analysis the authors found that a 4-first-order-factor model of PTSD provided the best fit. The relations of PTSD symptoms with sociodemographic and medical variables were also explored.     

Some determinants of changes in preference over time

Results of longitudinal studies suggest that the stability of preferences varies across individuals, although it is unclear what variables account for these differences. We extended this work by conducting periodic assessments of preference for leisure activities over 3 to 6 months with 10 adults with developmental disabilities. Although previous research has collectively shown that preferences identified via repeated assessment are highly variable, our results showed that preferences were relatively stable for the majority (80%) of participants. In an attempt to identify some environmental determinants of shifts in preference, we provided extended daily access to high-preference items (preference-weakening manipulation) and paired access to low-preference items with social and edible putative reinforcers during brief sessions (preference-strengthening manipulation). Preference assessments continued over the course of these manipulations with 2 participants. Results showed that changes in preference across time could be produced systematically and suggest that naturally occurring changes in establishing operations or conditioning histories contribute to temporal shifts in preference. Implications for preference assessments, reinforcer usage, and planned attempts to change preferences are discussed.     

The Impact of Parenting Experience on Gender Stereotyped Toy Play of Children

The purpose of this study was to examine gender role socialization as a function of parenting experience in an actual toy play situation and as a function of adults' perceptions of typically gender-stereotyped children's toys. Each of 48 children (24 boys and 24 girls) played with 3 adults: either his or her own mother or father, a matched mother or father of another child, and a matched man or woman who was not a parent. The amount of time children and adults played with gender-specific toys, adults' categorization of toys into gender categories, and adults' desirability ratings of gender-specific toys were examined. The gender-sorting task revealed that adults did not agree with traditional expert categorizations of some of the toys, which suggests a shift in the perceived function of some traditionally stereotyped toys. Regardless of how parents sorted toys into categories, when playing with boys, most time was spent with masculine toys. With girls, however, there was greater flexibility in the categories of toys with which they played. Parenting experience influenced the perceived desirability of toys; parents found toys more desirable than nonparents but these differences did not affect the actual play session with children. These results suggest a change in perceptions of traditionally stereotyped toys and differences as a function of gender in what is appropriate gender-typing behavior.     

Theological reflections on violence and abuse

This article examines the contemporary problem of intimate violence and sexual assault within a larger theoretical and theological context. It does so by tracing two trajectories in theological thinking: first, that suffering is sent from God and requires obedience; and, second, that the roles of men and women are not only specific and hierarchical but must remain so lest society risk moral chaos. It argues that many messages from traditional Christian theology continue to haunt abused women in such a way as to at times facilitate domestic violence. It offers suggestions for transforming common theological interpretations in ways that are empowering for battered women. These recommendations include attempts to emphasize resources within a tradition that may help transform unjust power relations like those in abusive relationships.     

The role of the mass media in promoting a thin standard of bodily attractiveness for women

Eating disorders appear to be more common among women than among men and more common now than they were in the past. Recent speculation has focused upon the role played by an unrealistically thin standard of bodily attractiveness for women in the promotion of these disorders. To demonstrate that this standard does play such a role, and to implicate the mass media in the promotion of this standard, it is first necessary to demonstrate that the current standard of attractiveness for women portrayed in the media is slimmer than that for men, that the portrayed standard is slimmer now than it has been in the past, and that these findings apply to many of the major media. The four studies presented here demonstrate that the current standard of attractiveness portrayed on television and in magazines is slimmer for women than for men and that the recent standard for women portrayed in magazines and in movies is slimmer than it was in the past.     

College student stereotypes of female behavior: Maternal professional women and assertive housewives

Traditional gender stereotypes were normative in that it was believed good mental health depended on members of each gender acquiring the appropriate gender role. Current research that describes subcategories of females (housewife, professional woman, Playboy bunny) suggests that the traditional stereotype cannot be normative. Two studies investigated college student's stereotypic expectations about female behavior related to five role characteristics: maternal sensitivities, financial provider responsibilities, interpersonal tendencies, instrumental tendencies, and passivity. Subject stereotypic expectations indicated that women in all subcategories are expected to be maternal and to be more assertive than passive. For the other role characteristics, women representing the different subcategories are expected to vary. The results were inconclusive about which aspects of the stereotypes are normative.Portions of this paper were presented at the Annual Meetings of the American Psychological Association, 1987. This research was completed at Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA 18015, as part of the author's doctoral dissertation.     

DOES IT MATTER HOW WE GOT HERE? DANGERS PERCEIVED IN LITERALISM AND EVOLUTIONISM

Abstract. Creationism and evolutionism are taken to typify a fundamental opposition among the diverse beliefs about creation to be found in the United Kingdom and the United States. A comparison between the two types and the two countries suggests that people may be more concerned about the credibility and consequences of belief in an alternative account of our origins than about the actual method by which we were created. Examples of concern include interpretations of the Bible, ethical implications, and the epistemological standings of revelation and/or science that are thought to follow from acceptance of a particular belief concerning how we got here.