The influence of multiple readings on the missing-letter effect revisited

In searching for a target letter while reading, participants make more omissions when the target letter is embedded in frequent function words than when it is embedded in less frequent content words. According to the guidance-organization (GO) model, this occurs because high-frequency function words are processed faster than low-frequency content words, leaving less time available for letter processing. We tested this hypothesis in three experiments by increasing word-processing speed through text repetition, which should translate into higher omission rates. Participants either read the text and searched for the target letter once or read the text three times and searched for a target letter on all readings or the final reading only. In all the experiments in which participants could not anticipate the target letter to be used, results revealed the presence of a large missing-letter effect that was unaffected by familiarity with the text. In addition, when participants knew from the start the target letter to be used on the final reading, the missing-letter effect was eliminated. Repeated search of the same text for different targets increased omissions equally for function words and content words, but this finding was present even when a new text was used, suggesting that repetition of the search task, rather than familiarity with the text, was responsible.     

Search performance without eye movements

Visual search performance (with sets chosen to elicit both serial and parallel search patterns) under two conditions that precluded saccades was compared to the typical situation in which visual inspection of the array is possible. In one condition, the display duration was so brief that any saccades that were executed would be too late to bring the targeted portion of the array into the fovea. In the other, the display remained present until the subject's response, but eye position was monitored and trials with shifts in fixation were excluded from analysis. The latter condition produced search latencies that were nearly identical to those with free inspection. Brief exposure, in contrast, did not produce the pattern typical of serial search, presumably because of strategies induced to deal with the rapid decay of the visual array. It is concluded that saccadic eye movements play little role in the patterns of performance used to infer serial and parallel search, and that brief exposure is not a satisfactory technique for exploring the role of saccadic eye movements in visual search.     

The Role of Social Skills in Predicting Treatment-Recovery in Children with a Social Anxiety Disorder

Research on Child and Adolescent Psychopathology - The current study investigated the role of social skills and its interaction with social anxiety as predictors of treatment outcome in children...     

The clinical vignette: Use in teaching and evaluation of group therapists

This paper describes the use of a written vignette as an aid in teaching group psychotherapy. Educators can determine in advance their expectations of the students' understanding of the vignette. Trainees evaluate the salient data, recognize patients' and therapist's contributions to the process, and conceptualize at three levels: intrapsychic, interpersonal and group-as-a-whole. This method supplements the usual training methods, and offers information about both the individual student and the entire class. This approach has an advantage of enabling educators to assess students in a relatively standardized fashion.     

Self-monitoring and age

Two adult samples were surveyed to investigate the relation between individuals' levels of self-monitoring and age. A negative relation was predicted as older individuals were seen as most likely to exhibit the low self-monitoring tendency of behaving in accordance with one's own attitudes and feelings, whereas younger individuals appeared most likely to exhibit the high self-monitoring tendency of behaving according to social cues. A significant negative correlation between age and self-monitoring was found in both samples. The self-monitoring construct is discussed in relation to other social-cognitive life-span differences and to the idea of critical periods throughout the life span.     

TESTING A HIERARCHICAL MODEL OF SELF-KNOWLEDGE

Abstract— A priming procedure (e g, Klein, Loftus Trafton, & Fuhrman, 1992) was used to lest a hierarchical model of self-knowledge. According lo this model, people simultaneously hold multiple representations of themselves that differ bath in their context specificity and in the type of knowledge of which they consist Specifically, context-independent self-knowledge is assumed to be represented abstractly without reference to any particular behaviors, whereas the representation of context-dependent self-knowledge includes knowledge of one's behavior in specific situations. Our results support a hierarchical model. Subjects accessed abstract knowledge when describing their context-independent personality characteristics, but accessed behavioral episodes when describing themselves in a specific context Possible implications of this research are discussed, as a the relation of a hierarchical model of self-knowledge to a mixed model of self-knowledge (e g, Klein & Loftus, 1993b).     

Effects of arousal on human visual dominance

Human attention research has found that vision controls attention when competing against other sensory modalities, for example, audition, proprioception, taction. Similarly, animal learning experiments have demonstrated visual attentional control when animals are positively motivated but auditory control when aversively motivated. The experiments with animals suggest a way of attenuating visual dominance in humans. Three experiments using human subjects explored the degree of visual versus auditory control exhibited in the presence of different arousal states. In Experiments 1 and 2, an electric shock and a threat of electric shock, respectively, to the subject’s finger resulted in auditory attentional control In Experiment 3, a tactile stimulus resulted in attenuated visual control. The results of these experiments are discussed in relation to the evolutionary advantage conferred by such attentional strategies.     

The reliability of a computer interview for drug use/abuse information

A computer interview was developed to collect information about drug use/abuse from high school students. Responses to this interview were compared with those obtained from an identical paper-and-pencil questionnaire given to the same students, in counterbalanced order. Results were comparable for the two methods, but missing data and logically inconsistent answers obtained with the paper-and-pencil questionnaire were not possible with the computer interview. The overwhelming majority of respondents preferred the computer interview as a means of data collection.     

Motivations for childbearing and fertility behavior among urban and rural families of Iran

A sample of 384 husbands and wives were randomly selected and interviewed to investigate the implication of fertility norms and motivations for childbearing on fertility and family planning behavior among Iranian families in urban and rural areas of Iran, after the Islamic Revolution of 1979. The term "fertility behavior" refers to actual family size, which is defined as number of children the respondent has living at the time of the interview. "Family planning behavior" refers to the duration of time that the subject has used any birth control method(s). Rural families demonstrated larger actual and ideal family sizes than urban families. The rural sample had a median actual family size of 3.5 children and a median ideal family size of 4.7 children. For the urban sample these figures were 2.2 and 2.3, respectively. The median number of years married was 12.33 for rural and 13.91 for urban respondents. Urban respondents tended to emphasize the psychological and emotional benefits and liabilities associated with having children while rural respondents tended to emphasize both economic and security related motivations. Both groups endorsed infant mortality as a motivation for having more children. Male and female respondents were remarkably similar in their endorsed motivations. There was a significant positive correlation between desired and ideal family size. The correlations among ideal/desired family size and practicing birth control methods were the same and significant at the .001 level. The relationship between motivations for childbearing and years of practicing birth control methods was also significant at the .001 level. Stepwise regression analyses were performed to examine the important predictors of fertility and family planning behavior. For both actual family size and years on birth control, males and females were very similar in terms of predictor importance. Those respondents with less education and large ideal family size tended to have larger actual family size. Location (urban/rural) and parents, family size was weighted much more heavily for males than for females. Those respondents with greater education and who lived in an urban areas tended to have used birth control for longer periods of time. Ideal family size did not contribute significantly to this regression. Parents' family size and motivations for childbearing made marginal contributions to regressions on either dependent variable.     

Effects of response-shock interval and shock intensity on free-operant avoidance responding in the pigeon

Two experiments investigated free-operant avoidance responding with pigeons using a treadle-pressing response. In Experiment I, pigeons were initially trained on a free-operant avoidance schedule with a response-shock interval of 32 sec and a shock-shock interval of 10 sec, and were subsequently exposed to 10 values of the response-shock parameter ranging from 2.5 to 150 sec. The functions relating response rate to response-shock interval were similar to the ones reported by Sidman in his 1953 studies employing rats, and were independent of the order of presentation of the response-shock values. Shock rates decreased as response-shock duration increased. In Experiment II, a free-operant avoidance schedule with a response-shock interval of 20 sec and a shock-shock interval of 5 sec was used, and shock intensities were varied over five values ranging from 2 to 32 mA. Response rates increased markedly as shock intensity increased from 2 to 8 mA, but rates changed little with further increases in shock intensity. Shock rates decreased as intensity increased from 2 to 8 mA, and showed little change as intensity increased from 8 to 32 mA.