A status theory of the evaluation of sex-role and age-role behavior

An earlier investigation formulated a status theory of behavioral choice evaluation to explain the lesser approval for cross-sex-role behavior of males than of females. Since males are often assigned higher prestige, their deviation from male to female behavior represents a movement from higher to lower status, resulting in a loss of approval. To determine that the fit of previous data with the theory was indeed due to the status characteristic of sex roles, the current study used the theory to predict the evaluations of appropriate and cross-role behavior concerning age roles as well as sex roles. Furthermore, the effect of status upon evaluation was hypothesized to reside in the association of status with social value and, in turn, the effect of social value upon evaluation. Subjects were 57 male and 40 female university students who provided approval ratings of either appropriate or cross-age-role and sex-role behavior. For sex and age, cross-role behavior received less approval for the higher status actor. This indicated that the lesser approval of cross-sex-role behavior of males was due to the differential status ranking of male and female roles, rather than to some other feature more specific to sex roles. The proposition that social value is the explanatory link in the effect of status upon evaluation is supported by the results.     

Operant punishment of eye elevation in the green crab, Carcinus maenas

Extension of the eye after reflex withdrawal was suppressed by punishing each extension with a brief puff of air. Experimental animals showed a decrease in the rate of responding, and an increase in the latency to the next response during 30-min sessions. The effect of punishment per se was controlled for by the use of yoked animals that received punishments whenever the experimental (master) animals did. This control group did not show the increased latency, and kept the eye erect for most of the session. Experiments were performed with pairs of animals, one eye of each used as master or control, or, alternatively, with single animals in which one eye served as the yoked control for the other. This latter group gave more reliable and reproducible differences between master and yoke than the pairs of animals. Retention was tested by subjecting animals to three sessions separated by a 12-hr rest. The results indicated some savings but this was not a dramatic effect. To demonstrate that the learning was operant in nature, that is, that it depended on the contingency between the act of eye extension and punishment, experiments were performed in which a delay was introduced between the response and the onset of punishments. A delay of 20 s was found to completely eliminate the learned suppression: animals showed latencies close to that of naive animals and responded at a constant high rate throughout the session. Delays of 10, 5, and 2.5 s were found to have a decreasing effect on the learning, and a delay of 1.25 s produced behavior that was within experimental error of that of animals subjected to immediate punishment.