The possible causes of the sex ratio in stuttering and its implications

The incidence of stuttering has always been reported to be higher in males than in females. Possible causes of the unequal sex ratio include various ascertainment biases, incomplete reporting, social role differences, X-linked inheritance, or a combination of environmental and genetic elements. Each of these factors has been examined against data collected in the large family study of stuttering, and all but one have been eliminated. Only the gene-environment interaction hypothesis can be supported by the data. Statistical analysis confirms that the sex effect in stuttering is real and supports a threshold model for the sex difference. We conclude that the possibility of differences between males and females must be considered in any etiological research in stuttering.     

PROSPECT (HE): An Evaluation of User Responses

The main features of PROSPECT (HE), a major new computer-aided guidance system for higher education institutions, are described. The results of its field trials within six higher education careers services show that the reactions of students and staff to the system are predominantly positive and that it has already established credibility with its users. There are, however, some 'tensions' between some of the principles on which the system is based: between matching and exploration; between coherence and flexibility; and between a phenomenological approach and an approach based on objective realism.     

Testing the status-legitimacy hypothesis: Predicting system justification using objective and subjective socioeconomic status in China and the United States

The status-legitimacy hypothesis proposes that those who are most disadvantaged by unequal social systems are even more likely than members of more advantaged groups to provide ideological support for the very social system that is responsible for their disadvantages. Li, Yang, Wu, and Kou (2020, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin) sought to expand the generalizability of this hypothesis by testing it in China, addressing inconsistencies surrounding the empirical support for this hypothesis by postulating that the construct of status should be separated into an objective and subjective status marker. They reported that objective socioeconomic status (SES; income and education) negatively predicted system justification, while subjective SES positively predicted system justification. In the present study we attempt to replicate and extend the work of Li et al. in a cross-cultural comparison of demographic stratified quota online samples in China and the United States. We test the status-legitimacy hypothesis using objective and subjective SES to predict system justification using cross-sectional and cross-lagged regression analyses. We received partial support for Li et al.'s findings. Specifically, subjective SES positively predicted system justification for both societies during cross-sectional and cross-lagged longitudinal analyses. However, we failed to replicate Li et al.'s findings surrounding objective SES in China during cross-sectional and cross-lagged analyses.     

Guidance in the United Kingdom: past, present and future

The turn of the century is an apposite time to review the development of guidance in the United Kingdom. The concept of guidance, in the terms in which it is now understood, is very much a 20th-century notion. It draws on two distinct but related traditions: the development of the practice of career guidance; and the development of guidance as an educational concept. The history of these two developments, and the relationship between them, are briefly outlined. Some of the conceptual issues they raise are examined, including the important but somewhat problematic interface with counselling. Challenges for guidance in the new millennium are discussed, in relation both to policy and practice and to theory and research.     

Further investigation of increasing vocalizations of children with autism with a speech-generating device

We replicated and extended the findings of Gervarter et al. (2016) by using prompting and reinforcement to produce increased vocal speech with 3 young children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) who used a speech generating device (SGD). We extended Gervarter et al. by adopting a more robust experimental design, conducting session-by-session preference assessments, and measuring the emergence of novel vocalizations. The frequency of vocalizations increased for all 3 participants after the introduction of an echoic prompt. These results suggest that SGD-based interventions may lead to increased vocal output for children with ASD.     

Statistically Induced Chunking Recall: A Memory-Based Approach to Statistical Learning

The computations involved in statistical learning have long been debated. Here, we build on work suggesting that a basic memory process, chunking, may account for the processing of statistical regularities into larger units. Drawing on methods from the memory literature, we developed a novel paradigm to test statistical learning by leveraging a robust phenomenon observed in serial recall tasks: that short-term memory is fundamentally shaped by long-term distributional learning. In the statistically induced chunking recall (SICR) task, participants are exposed to an artificial language, using a standard statistical learning exposure phase. Afterward, they recall strings of syllables that either follow the statistics of the artificial language or comprise the same syllables presented in a random order. We hypothesized that if individuals had chunked the artificial language into word-like units, then the statistically structured items would be more accurately recalled relative to the random controls. Our results demonstrate that SICR effectively captures learning in both the auditory and visual modalities, with participants displaying significantly improved recall of the statistically structured items, and even recall specific trigram chunks from the input. SICR also exhibits greater test–retest reliability in the auditory modality and sensitivity to individual differences in both modalities than the standard two-alternative forced-choice task. These results thereby provide key empirical support to the chunking account of statistical learning and contribute a valuable new tool to the literature.     

English-speaking children's comprehension of relative clauses: evidence for general-cognitive and language-specific constraints on development

Children must possess some ability to process input in a meaningful manner to acquire language. The present study reports on data from an experiment investigating 3- to 5-year-old English-speaking children's understanding of restrictive relative clauses manipulated for embeddedness and focus. The results of the study showed that English-speaking children acquire right-branching before center-embedded structures. Comparisons made with data from Portuguese-speaking children suggest general-cognitive and language-specific constraints on development, and with respect to English, a clause expansion approach to processing in development.     

Putting together prior knowledge, verbal arguments, and observations in category learning

Two experiments addressed the novel issue of how people incorporate verbal arguments into category learning. In Experiment 1, at the start of learning, subjects were given verbal arguments, which had an influence equivalent to a fixed number of category members. In Experiment 2, subjects learned under slower paced conditions, and it was found that both prior knowledge and arguments had multiple effects on categorization: a fixed initial influence plus selective weighting of new observations. The results supported the idea that verbally presented arguments can be treated in a similar manner as other forms of prior knowledge, from the perspective of applying models of categorization.     

Item-specific adaptation and the conflict-monitoring hypothesis: a computational model

M. M. Botvinick, T. S. Braver, D. M. Barch, C. S. Carter, and J. D. Cohen (2001) implemented their conflict-monitoring hypothesis of cognitive control in a series of computational models. The authors of the current article first demonstrate that M. M. Botvinick et al.'s (2001) conflict-monitoring Stroop model fails to simulate L. L. Jacoby, D. S. Lindsay, and S. Hessels's (2003) report of an item-specific proportion-congruent (ISPC) effect in the Stroop task. The authors then implement a variant of M. M. Botvinick et al.'s model based on the assumption that control must be able to operate at the item level. This model successfully simulates the ISPC effect. In addition, the model provides an alternative to M. M. Botvinick et al.'s explanation of the list-level proportion-congruent effect in terms of an ISPC effect. Implications of the present modeling effort are discussed.