Marriage at the Summit: Response to the Commentaries

This article serves as a response to the 13 commentaries on the target article, which introduced the suffocation model of marriage in America. This reply has four main sections. First, it presents an elaborated version of the suffocation model that was inspired by the commentaries. Second, it addresses three areas of significant disagreement that emerged as we digested the commentaries. Third, it examines the circumstances under which being instrumental for one's spouse's needs benefits the self. And fourth, it takes strides toward the development of a mathematically formal version of the suffocation model. It concludes with a discussion of the ways in which policymakers, clinicians, and individual Americans can capitalize upon the suffocation model to strengthen marriage and, in doing so, bolster personal well-being.     

Avoidance temperament and social-evaluative threat in college students' math performance: a mediation model of math and test anxiety

Background and Objectives: Standardized testing has become a common form of student evaluation with high stakes, and limited research exists on understanding the roles of students' personality traits and social-evaluative threat on their academic performance. This study examined the roles of avoidance temperament (i.e., fear and behavioral inhibition) and evaluative threat (i.e., fear of failure and being viewed as unintelligent) in standardized math test and course grades in college students. Design and Methods: Undergraduate students (N = 184) from a large public university were assessed on temperamental fear and behavioral inhibition. They were then given 15 minutes to complete a standardized math test. After the test, students provided data on evaluative threat and their math performance (scores on standardized college entrance exam and average grades in college math courses). Results: Results indicate that avoidance temperament was linked to social-evaluative threat and low standardized math test scores. Furthermore, evaluative threat mediated the influence of avoidance temperament on both types of math performance. Conclusions: Results have educational and clinical implications, particularly for students at risk for test anxiety and underperformance. Interventions targeting emotion regulation and stress management skills may help individuals reduce their math and test anxieties.     

Moral Politics in the 2008 Presidential Convention Acceptance Speeches

This study examines the 2008 presidential party convention acceptance speeches from the perspective of George Lakoff's (1996 Lakoff , G. ( 1996 ). Moral politics: What conservatives know that liberals don't . Chicago , IL : University of Chicago Press . [Google Scholar], 2002 Lakoff , G. ( 2002 ). Moral politics: How liberals and conservatives think . Chicago , IL : University of Chicago Press .[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) theory of moral politics, which argues that a metaphor of the nation as a family guides the adoption of a political ideology and facilitates persuasion. We coded speeches for instantiations of Strict Father and Nurturant Parent morality and for the social and political issues they contained. We found, as expected, that Democrats referenced more Nurturant Parent themes than Strict Father themes but that Republicans used instantiations from both moral worldviews at similar rates. Democrats, but not Republicans, framed party-owned issues in terms of their corresponding moral worldview. We discuss implications for Lakoff's theory and avenues for future research.     

Delayed onset of drunkenness as a protective factor for adolescent alcohol misuse and sexual risk taking: a longitudinal study

A longitudinal structural equation model was tested to examine relationships among adolescent alcohol misuse, sexual risk-taking behaviors, parental monitoring, and demographic variables. Participants (N=561) were between the ages of 15-18 years old and were representative of the Buffalo, New York, metropolitan area. Two waves (separated by a year) of a larger longitudinal project were used. At each of these waves, ongoing (i.e., past year) alcohol misuse and sexual risk taking were measured. Age of onset of drunkenness and of sexual intercourse were also obtained. Among the major results were that later onset of drunkenness diminished future levels of alcohol misuse and sexual risk taking and that parental monitoring mitigated later levels of alcohol misuse. Also, single-parent family structure was directly related to sexual risk taking and indirectly related to greater alcohol misuse through lowered monitoring. Multiple-group modeling revealed that the essential features of the model were consistent across participant race and gender.     

The religious life and happiness of Protestants involved with the charismatic movement

This research compared the religious lives and happiness of American Protestants involved in the charismatic movement and those not involved in it. Data from the General Social Survey were used to answer the research questions. After controlling for basic demographic variables, the results of multivariate analysis indicated that Protestants involved in the charismatic movement attend religious services and pray more frequently; however, they are not significantly happier than those not involved in the movement. The results of this research suggest that happiness can be enhanced when people participate in religious services frequently; however, the ecstatic worship style and theological perspective of the charismatic movement do not make its participants happier than those who do not participate in the movement.     

Extending Neuropsychological Assessments into the Primary Mental Ability Space

ABSTRACT

A battery of 17 neuropsychological tests (including the CERAD battery) and 17 psychometric ability tests were administered to a sample of 499 participants of the Seattle Longitudinal study who had been given the psychometric ability tests seven and 14 years earlier. The neuropsychological tests were projected into a 5-factor psychometric ability space by means of extension analysis. The concurrent regressions of the neuropsychology tests on the psychometric ability tests were then used to estimate neuropsychology test scores from the psychometric ability tests administered in 1984, 1991 and 1998. Neuropsychologists then rated the study participants as either normal, suspect or cognitively impaired in 1998. Changes in estimated test scores were computed over seven and fourteen years. Significant odds ratios between normal and cognitively impaired groups were found for all neuropsychological tests over the proximal period and for most tests over the 14-year period. Similar findings occurred for the odds ratios between the normal and suspect groups for the most proximal 7-year changes.     

New Worlds,New Civilizations? From Science Fiction to Science Fact

ABSTRACT

Although long predicted on theoretical grounds, prior to the 1990s there was no observational evidence of worlds orbiting distant stars; however, the development of new technologies has enabled the discovery of thousands of these exoplanets. The diversity of these worlds exceeds scientific expectations and rivals foreshadowing by the most creative science fiction writers. Extrapolations based on statistical arguments and our understanding of how planetary systems form suggest exoplanets may outnumber the roughly 10 million quadrillion stars in the observable Universe. There are compelling reasons to expect conditions conducive to life on many of these worlds, but the existence of extraterrestrial life remains an open question. Although galaxy-spanning civilizations envisioned in science fiction remain unlikely, future contact with extraterrestrial species is not implausible, and in any case, the likelihood of having a human presence on Mars within the next few decades lends urgency to global, cross-cultural religious and ethical discussions.     

Independence of terminal-link entry rate and immediacy in concurrent chains

In Phase 1, 4 pigeons were trained on a three-component multiple concurrent-chains procedure in which components differed only in terms of relative terminal-link entry rate. The terminal links were variable-interval schedules and were varied across four conditions to produce immediacy ratios of 4:1, 1:4, 2:1, and 1:2. Relative terminal-link entry rate and relative immediacy had additive and independent effects on initial-link response allocation, and the data were well-described by a generalized-matching model. Regression analyses showed that allowing sensitivity to immediacy to vary across components produced only trivial increases in variance accounted for. Phase 2 used a three-component concurrent-schedules procedure in which the schedules were the same as the initial links of Phase 1. Across two conditions, the relative reinforcer magnitude was varied. Sensitivity to relative reinforcer rate was independent of relative magnitude, confirming results of prior studies. Sensitivity to relative reinforcer rate in Phase 2 did not vary systematically across subjects compared to sensitivity to relative entry rate in Phase 1, and regression analyses confirmed again that only small increases in variance accounted for were obtained when sensitivities were estimated independently compared with a single estimate for both phases. Overall, the data suggest that conditioned and primary reinforcers have functionally equivalent effects on choice and support the independence of relative terminal-link entry rate and immediacy as determiners of response allocation. These results are consistent with current models for concurrent chains, including Grace's (1994) contextual choice model and Mazur's (2001) hyperbolic value-added model.