Perception of cross-situational consistency

Eighty-eight undergraduates rated the degree of relation in each of 21 pairs of items that described behavior in the domains of conscientiousness, friendliness, and extraversion. In these three domains, estimates of relations by the average subject correlated, respectively, with actual empirical relations, .63, .58, and .40. Relations corresponding to correlations between .10 to .20 could be significantly distinguished by subjects from relations in the range of .00 to .10 in two of the three domains. The confidence that individuals placed in their perceptions varied directly with the accuracy of their judgments against the empirical criterion. In addition, subjects were more confident of what they perceived to be extreme relations in both directions than of intermediate relations, and they also tended to be more confident of their judgments of strong positive relations than of zero relations. They exhibited an intuitive awareness of the effect of aggregation over occasions and items of behavior on the magnitude of cross-situational relations and the demonstration of traits. They also reported using reasonable strategies in arriving at decisions. Far from being inveterate trait believers, as some have suggested, subjects' intuitions paralleled psychometric principles in several important respects when assessing relations between real-life behaviors.     

Does aggregation produce spuriously high estimates of behavior stability?

A number of arguments as to why aggregation produces spurious correlations are considered and shown to be specious. A series of computer-simulated studies, claimed by H. D. Day and his colleagues to demonstrate that aggregation produces artifactually high stability coefficients, was shown to involve bizarre distributions and inappropriate conclusions. Nevertheless, their data actually indicated the potency of aggregation in detecting whatever empirical relations they built into their data. This was not true of their analyses of their unaggregated data, which, as a result of a high level of noise of measurement, failed to enable them to detect anomalies in their data. No amount of aggregation produced evidence of stability in its absence. It is concluded that aggregation provides a powerful tool for reducing error of measurement and for establishing and enhancing generality as well as stability in measurement. Although there is nothing intrinsic in aggregation that fosters spurious correlations, it like any other technique can be used wisely or foolishly. In order to achieve the former, aggregation must be guided by psychometric principles and theoretical considerations. A procedure guaranteed to achieve the latter is to simply aggregate whatever can be assigned a common label.     

The effect of family variables on child weight change

Previous research has shown that family size, the number of obese persons living at home, and parental weight influence the development of childhood obesity. Our study reports the relevance of these factors to child weight loss during a 1-year treatment period. Multiple linear regression procedures showed that the amount of relative weight change was related to initial treatment success, the number of children in the family, and the gender of the child. Children who were more successful lost more weight initially, had fewer siblings, and were female. These results suggest that family size may interact with treatment to determine weight change. The effects of family size on outcome may be operating simply by reducing the amount of time that a parent has to spend with the child in promoting behavior change. Likewise, increased family size may be operating as a stressor, reducing the effectiveness of parents in effectively managing their children.     

Intermittent low-calorie regimen and booster sessions in the treatment of obesity

The present study investigated two new weight-control strategies: an intermittent low-calorie regimen and intermittent scheduling of booster sessions. A new approach to predicting patient weight loss, based on a pretreatment assessment with a highly-structured eating regimen, was also studied. Forty-eight obese patients were randomly assigned to either a Standard Behavioral weight-control condition or to an Intermittent Low-calorie Regimen (< 750 cal for 2 days/week) condition and to one of two maintenance schedules: a Spaced schedule in which the six booster sessions were held at monthly intervals, or a Massed schedule, in which four of the six meetings were held during the third month. Neither the intermittent low-calorie regimen nor the intermittent scheduling of booster sessions significantly affected weight loss. However, weight loss at 1 year was related to compliance to self-monitoring and to self-reported change in eating habits and exercise. In addition, weight loss at 1 year was related to weight loss during the initial pretreatment assessment period.     

Constructive thinking: a broad coping variable with specific components

The structure of constructive thinking and the development of an instrument for measuring it, the Constructive Thinking Inventory (CTI), were discussed. Scales were derived from a factor analysis of an item domain of people's everyday automatic thinking. When the CTI and other tests were factor analyzed, separate intellective and nonintellective factors were found, with the CTI loading more strongly on the nonintellective factor than any other test. Only measures of IQ loaded on the intellective factor. The global constructive thinking scale correlated significantly with success in work, love, social relationships, and in maintaining emotional and physical well-being, but not with academic achievement, the only criterion with which the measures of IQ correlated strongly. The patterns of correlations between the CTI scales and the various criteria as well as the factor analysis demonstrated that the construct of constructive thinking is differentiated as well as integrated.     

Depressed patients with dysfunctional families: description and course of illness.

Sixty-eight depressed patients were subdivided according to their family's level of family functioning into functional and dysfunctional groups. Patients from dysfunctional families did not differ from those from functional families on measures of severity of depression, chronicity of depression, depression subtypes, other nonaffective psychiatric diagnoses, history of depression, or neuroendocrine functioning. Patients from dysfunctional families did have significantly higher levels of neuroticism. A 12-month follow-up of these patients indicated that depressed patients with dysfunctional families had a significantly poorer course of illness, as manifested by higher levels of depression, lower levels of overall adjustment, and a lower proportion of recovered patients. Thus, impaired family functioning appears to be an important prognostic factor in major depression.     

Cognitive-experiential self-theory and subjective probability: further evidence for two conceptual systems.

Three experiments (N = 1,331) demonstrated that research findings on suspiciousness about coincidences (Miller, Turnbull, & McFarland, 1989) can be accounted for in terms of subjective probability, as predicted by cognitive-experiential self-theory (CEST) but in contrast with the norm theory (NT) account offered by Miller et al. (1989). Ss participated in a hypothetical (Experiments 1 and 2) or real (Experiment 3) lottery game in which they chose between 2 bowls offering equivalent probabilities of winning or losing but differing with respect to absolute numbers (e.g., 1 in 10 vs. 10 in 100). Responses across 4 conditions (2 probability levels x 2 outcome types) and across the 3 experiments supported predictions derived from CEST but not those derived from NT. Results are discussed in terms of 2 conceptual systems, rational and experiential, that operate by different rules of inference.     

Coping ability, negative self-evaluation, and overgeneralization: experiment and theory.

Responses of 3 groups of Ss differing in general coping ability, as measured by the Constructive Thinking Inventory, were compared on matched sets of items that differed according to whether the outcomes were positive or negative and directed at the self or at others. All groups reported widespread overgeneralization to items with favorable outcomes. Groups differed strongly and consistently only in response to unfavorable outcomes directed at the self, with poor constructive thinkers reporting more negative overgeneralization than others following such outcomes. It was concluded that poor constructive thinkers have a selective bias toward making negative inferences about the self, which has widespread implications for their general coping ability. A theoretical framework is presented for understanding why individuals acquire and maintain negative self-schemata, which has implications for depression and self-esteem as well as for general coping ability.