Verbal fluency and verbal comprehension abilities in synonym tasks

Generating different synonym candidates and evaluating these candidates with respect to their synonymy with the stimulus word are two components of solving an open synonym task, which requires giving synonyms for a given word (cf. Janssen, Hoskens, & De Boeck, 1993). Separate subtasks were designed to identify these components. It is shown in this study that the generation component ability is primarily related to verbal fluency abilities, whereas the evaluation component ability is primarily related to verbal comprehension abilities. Moreover, evidence is given that these two component abilities can account for the correlations of the open synonym task with other ability measures.     

AIDS and condom-related knowledge,beliefs, and behaviors in Mexican migrant laborers

A survey of 87 Mexican migrants (55 males and 32 females) who have lived and worked in the US since 1982 assessed AIDS and condom-related knowledge, beliefs, and sexual practices. Although respondents were highly knowledgeable about major modes of HIV transmission, one-third to one-half believed that HIV could be contracted from mosquito bites, public bathrooms, kissing, and the HIV test. Only 15% knew someone with AIDS. Ever-use of condoms was reported by 70.9% of men and 41.9% of women. Of the 68 subjects who had been sexually active in the year preceding the survey, 20 reported two or more partners. Among sexually active respondents, 16.2% always used condoms with their primary partner, while 43.0% used condoms consistently with occasional partners. 48.9% of men and 57.1% of women never used condoms with their primary partner; with casual partners, these rates were 30.8% and 44.4%, respectively. Worry about contracting AIDS, self-rated on a scale from 1 (very often) to 4 (never), averaged 2.84, with higher worry scores among those 18-31 years of age and with multiple partners. Respondents did not anticipate negative consequences of condom use (e.g., reduced sexual pleasure), but females expressed concern that carrying condoms would cause them to be viewed as promiscuous.     

The validity of personality,service orientation,and reading comprehension measures as predictors of Flight Attendant training performance

The present study examined the predictive power of Big Five personality dimensions, a situational measure of service orientation and a reading comprehension measure as predictors of Flight Attendant training criteria. The criteria consisted of multiple ratings made by trainers of trainees across a number of training dimensions. At least partial data was collected on 424 Flight Attendant trainees. Results indicated significant correlations between all three predictors and a number of the training criteria.The authors would like to thank the Editor and two anonymous reviewers for their help revising this article.     

Gender relations,the gendered division of labour and health: the case of the women factory workers of Rio Tinto,northeast Brazil, 1924-91

This article examines gendered work-health relationships among female factory workers in Rio Tinto, a textile factory town in Brazil. The author draws on her own and her parents' experiences as factory workers and as residents of Rio Tinto. In addition, she gathered research during 1982-86 and 1988-93, interviewing 30 female and 12 male workers. Findings from 1924-58 and 1959-91 indicate that the family structure and work process were interlinked. Self-images are construed to be the intersection of social relations of sex and class, psychopathology, and the concept of work positions. Gendered relations are a social construction, and awareness of these relations is based on a hierarchy and form of power based on a gendered division of labor. Gendered relations arise out of a specific historical context. Social practices reflect the relationship between sexual division of labor and gendered social relations, their modalities, shape, and periodization. The work-health relationship is expressed in the gendered technical organization of work, the gendered socialization of work, and domestic labor. The period of 1917-58 reflects the capitalist influences. When women became wage earners, their management of household tasks was changed. Men took over the heavy tasks, and women performed tasks that required skill and patience. Work-related health impacts, such as deformed knees or severed fingers, and accidents varied with the task. Women adapted to work conditions. During the 1940s, female workers refused to join the collective protests of men for better wages and conditions. The dream of progress faded by 1964. After 1959, new gendered relations of production and reproduction emerged. Labor laws were passed; new machines were introduced. During 1965-70, the health issues were headaches, irritability, and anxiety. 1970-91 brought a hollowness of spirit and the search for an explanation for the violence they had experienced.     

Vector coding in slow goal-directed arm movements

It has been found that the estimate of relative target direction is consistently biased. Relative target direction refers to the direction in which a target is located relative to another location in space (e.g., a starting position in the case of goal-directed movements). In this study, we have tested two models that could underlie this biased estimate. The first proposed model is based on a distorted internal representation of locations (i.e., we perceive a target at the “wrong” location). We call this thedistorted location model. The second model is based on the idea that the derivation of target direction from spatial information about starting and target position is biased. We call this thebiased direction model. These two models lead to different predictions of the deviations that occur when the distance between the starting position and the target position is increased. Since we know from previous studies that the initial direction of slow arm movements reflects the target direction estimate, we tested the two models by analyzing the initial direction of slow arm movements. The results show that the biased direction model can account for the biases we find in the target direction estimate for various target distances, whereas the distorted location model cannot. In two additional experiments, we explored this model further. The results show that the biases depend only on the orientation of the line through starting position and target position relative to the plane through longitudinal head or body axis and starting position. We conclude that the initial part of (slow) goal-directed arm movements is planned on the basis of a (biased) target direction estimate and not on the basis of a wrong internal representation of target location. This supports the hypothesis that we code displacements of our limbs in space as a vector.     

Cross-modal slant and curvature matching of stereo- and motion-induced surfaces

In many laboratory setups and in many day-to-day situations, a unique solution of the structure-fromtwo-views problem is unobtainable. Yet, when the visual system is presented with two projections in a sequence, it nevertheless appears to generate a reasonably stable percept of structure. In the research reported here, we examined whether the same surface would be perceived when subjects were presented with a pair of views that alternated in time monocularly (two-frame motion) or were shown simultaneously to both eyes (stereo). In Experiment 1, we studiedslant perception: human observers were asked to match the slant of a motion-induced planar surface with its stereo-induced counterpart. In Experiment 2, the perceivedcurvature of parabolic surfaces was matched in a similar way. The results show that motion-induced slant is matched with ahigher value of the stereo-induced slant. However, the curvature experiment showed that motion-induced curvature is matched with alower stereo-induced curvature. One possible explanation may be that the slant and curvature are internally inconsistent in at least one of the modalities.     

Assessment of male and female behaviour in the employment interview

Personality assessment has a great impact on the outcomes of the selection interview. Women are perceived to have personality characteristics which are different from men. It is doubtful whether these sex stereotyped personality characteristics are based on real differences in verbal and nonverbal behaviour between men and women. Previous studies have shown the influence of sex stereotypes on interview-outcomes. In this study, the relationship between verbal and nonverbal behaviour of male and female applicants and their personality assessment has been investigated. Results show that males and females are assessed stereotypically based on their sex, but also based on their behaviour. For females, a feminine or masculine assessment is of special importance for her chance of selection. The less feminine is a woman's assessment the more likely she is to be accepted as an eligible candidate by the selection board. These accepted women show ‘female’ behaviour as well as ‘male’ behaviour.     

Self-Other and Third-person Anchored Modes of Thinking in Psychological Expertise: Cognitive Concomitants of Behaviourist,Client-centred,and Psychoanalytic Concepts

Information about people (A and B) can be processed consistent with two alternative modes of thinking: (1) an SO-mode conceiving of A and B as “self” versus “other,” and (2) a 3P-mode conceiving of A and B as “he/she called A” versus “he/she called B.” Previous research showed strong SO-anchoring biases in laypersons' thinking, so the present study focused on psychological experts' thinking. SO- and 3P-modes were associated with the formation of personalized and depersonalized representations of A and B respectively, so it was hypothesized that thinking in psychoanalytic terms would involve both modes, whereas the use of client-centred and behaviourist terms would trigger the SO- and the 3P-mode respectively. Data obtained from experts in psychotherapy confirmed the hypotheses except that the SO-mode was not less but more dominant in thought shaped in the behaviourist way than in thought shaped in the client-centred way. The results shed light on the role of scientific language and discourse as a general instrument of professional thought and communication.     

The Impact of Social Influences in the Context of Attitude,Self-Efficacy,Intention, and Previous Behavior as Predictors of Smoking Onset1

Three different constructs for measuring social influence were utilized in the present study to explain adolescents' present and future smoking behavior at 6 (T2), 12 (T3), and 18 months (T4) after the first test. Social influence was assessed by measuring the social norms, perceived smoking behavior, and direct pressure. The impact of the social influence constructs was also assessed in the context of broader models, including attitudes and self-efficacy expectations, intention, and previous behavior. The three social influence measures correlated significantly with intention and behavior. Stepwise regression analyses showed that perceived behavior and pressure made significant contributions, after entering social norms, in explaining actual and future adolescent smoking behavior. Adding attitudes and self-efficacy increased the predictive power of the model significantly. In agreement with the theory of Fishbein & Ajzen (1975), intention was the most powerful predictor in explaining present and future smoking behavior. Attitudes, self-efficacy, and the social influences also made small unique contributions improving the explanatory power by approximately 5%. Previous behavior, however, had a substantial unique contribution in predicting future behavior after attitudes, social influences, self-efficacy, and intention were entered in the equations. Since social influences may exert their impact via different routes, it is recommended that smoking prevention programs discuss not only overt pressures such as direct pressure from peers, parents, and media, but also address the more covert social pressures such as modeling and the adolescents' ability to cope with these covert influences. Furthermore, norms on nonsmoking should be made explicit.