Effects of Gender and Profession Type on Definitions of Violence Against Women in Hong Kong

This study investigated the criteria chosen by male and female Chinese public servants (clinical psychologists, social workers, police officers, physicians, nurses, teachers, and lawyers) in Hong Kong to classify and define violence against women. Data were gathered via questionnaires completed by 2589 (686 male) public servants from 10,476 polled (response rate 24.7%). The questionnaires included a 14-item check-list of various behaviors constituting violence against women and a 10-item check-list of criteria that could be used to categorize behavior as violence against women. It was found that for this population, use of physical force and lack of consent were the main determinants of violence against women. Only half of respondents considered murder a form of violence against women, the rest categorized it as a crime that was "not merely violence." Most respondents defined sexual harassment, rape, and unwanted physical contact as forms of violence against women. The female public servants were more likely to define behaviors as violence against women and to use more criteria to define violence against women. Public servants who worked with the law enforcement and legal system were more likely than others to choose narrow definitions and rigid criteria.     

A mere exposure effect for transformed three-dimensional objects: Effects of reflection, size, or color changes on affect and recognition

If the mere exposure effect is based on implicit memory, recognition and affect judgments should be dissociated by experimental variables in the same manner as other explicit and implicit measures. Consistent with results from recognition and picture naming or object decision priming tasks (e.g., Biederman & E. E. Cooper, 1991, 1992; L. A. Cooper, Schacter, Ballesteros, & Moore, 1992), the present research showed that recognition memory but not affective preference was impaired by reflection or size transformations of three-dimensional objects between study and test. Stimulus color transformations had no effect on either measure. These results indicate that representations that support recognition memory code spatial information about an object’s left-right orientation and size, whereas representations that underlie affective preference do not. Insensitivity to surface feature changes that do not alter object form appears to be a general characteristic of implicit memory measures, including the affective preference task.     

Detection and recognition of auditory patterns

The detection/recognition theorem (Starr, Metz, Lusted, & Goodenough, 1975) provides a signal detection theory prediction of an observer's ability to identify one of a set of possible signals on the basis of the observer's ability to detect whether any signal is presented. The present findings show that the theorem can be applied to complex auditory stimuli in a fashion that is not merely a trivial extension of the results obtained with simple auditory stimuli.     

Switching time between overt and covert speech: Generative attention

Four experiments investigated a new phenomenon: the existence of a very large switching time effect that occurs from rapidly alternating between overt and covert (mouthed) speech. This is referred to as an intensity switching effect, and the time taken for each switch is, in itself, long enough for a spoken or mouthed character (letter or digit) to be produced. In Experiments 1 and 2, the intensity switching effect was shown to be different from the switching that occurs between categories of materials (letters and digits) because it is both much larger and much more resistant to practice effects. The intensity switching effect was also shown to be distinct from a memory load effect, since it holds even for perceptually available lists. In Experiments 3 and 4, the issue of a peripheral vs. a central origin of intensity switching was addressed. Evidence was found for a central origin. In addition, two models -of response intensity representation were contrasted: a symbolic or digital model, with intensity altered by parameter substitution, and an analog model, with intensity represented by a moving pointer on an intensity continuum. The results supported the symbolic model. It is concluded that the intensity switching effect is a measure of control processes at work in altering the intensity parameters of the vocal response system.     

Histamine reverses a memory deficit induced in rats by early postnatal maternal deprivation

Early partial maternal deprivation causes long-lasting neurochemical, behavioral and brain structural effects. In rats, it causes a deficit in memory consolidation visible in adult life. Some of these deficits can be reversed by donepezil and galantamine, which suggests that they may result from an impairment of brain cholinergic transmission. One such deficit, representative of all others, is an impairment of memory consolidation, clearly observable in a one-trial inhibitory avoidance task. Recent data suggest a role of brain histaminergic systems in the regulation of behavior, particularly inhibitory avoidance learning. Here we investigate whether histamine itself, its analog SKF-91844, or various receptor-selective histamine agonists and antagonists given into the CA1 region of the hippocampus immediately post-training can affect retention of one-trial inhibitory avoidance in rats submitted to early postnatal maternal deprivation. We found that histamine, SKF-91844 and the H2 receptor agonist, dimaprit enhance consolidation on their own and reverse the consolidation deficit induced by maternal deprivation. The enhancing effect of histamine was blocked by the H2 receptor antagonist, ranitidine, but not by the H1 receptor antagonist pyrilamine or by the H3 antagonist thioperamide given into CA1 at doses known to have other behavioral actions, without altering locomotor and exploratory activity or the anxiety state of the animals. The present results suggest that the memory deficit induced by early postnatal maternal deprivation in rats may in part be due to an impairment of histamine mediated mechanisms in the CA1 region of the rat hippocampus.