Material, Myth, and Magic: A Cultural Approach to Family Therapy

This paper presents a model for a therapeutic approach to the cultural systems of families. Using anthropologically derived concepts of material and ideational planes of culture, magic, and ritualistic intervention, the inducement of culture change in frozen familial systems is framed in dialectical terms. Four brief case studies are presented describing the systems engaged, the material-ideational rituals employed, and the cultural transformations induced. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of some of the theoretical and practical implications of this cultural approach to the family in therapy.     

Physicians' H]ead and Body Positions as Determinants of Perceived Rapport

The relationship between physicians' b]ody movement and judgments of rapport was examined in this study. One-hundred eighteen observers rated physicians' b]ehavior on 14 bipolar scales assessing dimensions of empathy. Physicians' n]onverbal behavior was manipulated so that there were three levels of trunk angle (forward, straight, backward), two levels of arm position (open, folded), two levels of leg position (open, crossed), and two levels of head attitude (nodding, not-nodding). Significant effects were found for trunk angle, head attitude, and arm posture; physicians who leaned forward with open arm positions and nodded their head were judged more positively. Discussion focuses on the reinforcing valuc of nodding, judges' p]erceptions of physicians' a]ccessibility conveyed by trunk and arm postures, and expressions of dominance in physician-patient encounters.     

Feedback interventions and driving speed: A parametric and comparative analysis

Five experiments were conducted to assess the effects of several variables on the efficacy of feedback in reducing driving speed. Experiment 1 systematically varied the criterion used to define speeding, and results showed that the use of a lenient criterion (20 km/hr over the speed limit), which allowed for the posting of high percentages of drivers not speeding, was more effective in reducing speeding than the use of a stringent criterion (10 km/hr over the speed limit). In Experiment 2 an analysis revealed that posting feedback reduced speeding on a limited access highway and the effects persisted to some degree up to 6 km. Experiments 3 and 4 compared the effectiveness of an unmanned parked police vehicle (Experiment 3) and a police air patrol speeding program (Experiment 4) with the feedback sign and determined whether the presence of either of these enforcement variables could potentiate the efficacy of the sign. The results of both experiments demonstrated that although the two enforcement programs initially produced larger effects than the feedback sign, the magnitude of their effect attenuated over time. Experiment 5 compared the effectiveness of a traditional enforcement program with a warning program which included handing out a flier providing feedback on the number and types of accidents occuring on the road during the past year. This experiment demonstrated that the warning program produced a marked reduction in speeding and the traditional enforcement program did not. Furthermore, the warning program and a feedback sign together produced an even greater reduction in speeding than either alone.     

The effects of control on perceived fairness of procedures and outcomes

On the basis of Thibaut and Walker's theory of procedural justice, it was predicted that subjects who experienced control through choosing a trial decision rule would be more satisfied with the outcome of a dispute and the conflict resolution procedure than would yoked subjects who were not given control. Two additional conditions were added to the design in order to investigate the extent to which control had an influence on trial evaluations independent of being allowed to discuss the rules and obtaining a preferred rule in the absence of actual choice. Regardless of role in the dispute (accuser, accused, or no knowledge) and the nature of the rule adopted, those subjects who exercised control through rule choice evaluated all aspects of the trial experience more positively than subjects who did not exercise control through rule choice. The results also revealed that discussion of the rules and obtaining the preferred rule without choice contributed positively to evaluations of the trial procedure and verdict.     

The roles of self-esteem and self-consciousness in the Wortman-Brehm model of reactance and learned helplessness

The present experiments were designed to study the conditions under which failure would enhance or inhibit subsequent task performance. Based on the theory of Wortman and Brehm (1975), it was expected that small amounts of failure would produce reactance (manifested by improved performance at a subsequent task), whereas large amounts would lead to learned helplessness (i.e., impaired later performance). It was further expected that individual differences in self-esteem and private self-consciousness would serve as moderator variables for the above effects. In Experiment 1, subjects were exposed to either a small amount of failure or no failure before working on an anagrams task. As predicted, subjects high in self-consciousness, who have shown greater reactance arousal in attitude change studies, performed better on the anagrams task than subjects low in self-consciousness in the small-failure condition, but not in the no-failure condition. Further analyses revealed that this Self-Consciousness X Small Failure interaction was attributable to the performance data of the low, but not the high self-esteem subjects. Experiment 2 was designed to replicate and extend these results. Subjects were pretreated with either a small amount of failure, an extended amount of failure, or no failure before working on the anagrams task. A significant Self-Esteem X Helplessness Training interaction emerged. Relative to the no-failure condition, in which the two self-esteem groups did not differ, low self-esteem participants (low SEs) performed marginally better than did high self-esteem individuals (high SEs) in the small-failure condition but significantly worse than high SEs in the extended-failure condition. The effect of private self-consciousness was considerably weaker in this study, possibly because the sample included few low SEs (who are especially influenced by self-focused attention) who were also relatively low in self-consciousness. Questionnaire data from Experiment 2 were consistent with the notion that enhanced performance reflected reactance, whereas impaired performance signified helplessness.     

Predicting contraceptive behavior from attitudes: a comparison of within- versus across-subjects procedures

Within- versus across-subjects procedures for predicting behavior from attitudes were contrasted. Each procedure requires a comparison among attitudes in order to generate a prediction; the comparison is either among the same attitudes held by different people (across subjects) or among different attitudes held by the same person (within subject). It was hypothesized that the within-subject model provides a more adequate explanation of behavior from attitudinal constructs and, hence, more accurate prediction of behavior from attitudes than does the across-subjects model. To test this view, a sample of 349 married couples was administered a questionnaire containing measures of three attitudinal components--affect, cognition, and conation--toward each of four contraceptive methods--oral contraceptives, IUD, diaphragm, and condoms. Contraceptive behavior was assessed 1 year later. In support of the hypothesis, the within-subject predictions bore a significantly stronger relation to the behavioral criteria than did the across-subjects predictions. This effect was consistent for each of the three components of attitude, for the prediction of behavior and behavioral intention, for male and female respondents, and for a variety of contraceptive behaviors. In addition, both the within- and the across-subjects analyses demonstrated a clear rank ordering in the predictive validity of the three attitudinal components: Conation was a better predictor of behavior than was affect, which, in turn, was better than cognition.     

A critique of Plomin and Foch's "A Twin Study of Objectively Assessed Personality in Childhood"

Plomin and Foch's (1980) study of objectively assessed personality in childhood is critiqued on five points: (a) conceptual validity of the measures, (b) stability of the measures for the population age range, (c) comparability of populations, (d) accuracy of literature review, and (e) appropriate interpretation of broad heritability data. The Plomin and Foch study contains major errors; it is theoretically and methodologically flawed. Their report is especially significant because it is representative of problems critical to the study of the genetic correlates of personality.     

Reaction times of younger and older men and temporal contingencies of reinforcement

Influences of extended training and temporal contingencies on reaction time were studied in relation to developmental differences. Older and younger men were trained on a chained schedule in which completion of a variable interval produced a terminal link in which reaction time was measured. The reaction-time procedure involved a conditional discrimination with matching to sample in one component and oddity matching in the other. During baseline training, no time limit was placed on the response to the discrimination choice stimuli. Subsequently, increasingly severe time limits were imposed over a series of sessions. Older and younger men showed increased speeds (decreased reaction times) when temporal contingencies were imposed, and these changes were maintained during post-training baseline sessions when there was unlimited time in which to respond. The younger men generally responded faster than the older ones, and age differences were not appreciably reduced during the course of the experiment. The results indicated the feasibility of studying reaction time in human subjects using operant procedures analogous to those developed for the study of nonverbal organisms.