Adding sound to lipread lists: The effects on serial recall of adding an auditory pulse train and a pure tone to silently lipread lists

These investigations examined subjects’ serial recall of lipread digit lists accompanied by an auditory pulse train. The pulse train indicated the pitch of voiced speech (buzz-speech) of the seen speaker as she was speaking. As a purely auditory signal, it could not support item identification. Such buzz-speech recall was compared with silent lipread list recall and with the recall of buzz-speech lists to which a pure tone had been added (buzz-and-beep lists). No significant difference in overall accuracy of recall emerged for the three types of lipread list; however, there were significant differences in the shape of the serial recall function for the three list types. Recency characterized the silent and the buzz-speech lists, and these lists differed in their varying susceptibilities to a range of speechlike suffixes. By contrast, adding a pure tone to a buzz-speech list (buzz-and-beep) produced little recency and no further recall loss as a function of suffix type. We discuss these effects with reference to the contrast betweensensory-similarity and speechlikeness accounts of auditory recency and suffix effects. Sensory similarity accounts cannot capture the effects reported here, but processing in a speech mode (buzz-and-beep) need not always lead to recency effects like those resulting from clearly heard or lipread lists.     

Behavior analysis and public policy

The Task Force on Public Policy was created to examine ways for behavior analysts to be more functional citizen scientists in the policymaking arena. This report informs readers about the contexts and processes of policymaking; and it outlines issues regarding the roles of behavior analysts in crating policy-relevant conceptual analyses, generating research data, and communicating policy-relevant information. We also discuss a possible role for the professional association in enhancing analysis, research, and advocacy on policies relevant to the public interest.     

Production,verification, and priming of multiplication facts

In the arithmetic-verification procedure, subjects are presented with a simple equation (e.g., 4 × 8 = 24) and must decide quickly whether it is true or false. The prevailing model of arithmetic verification holds that the presented answer (e.g., 24) has no direct effect on the speed and accuracy of retrieving an answer to the problem. It follows that models of the retrieval stage based on verification are also valid models of retrieval in the production task, in which subjects simply retrieve and state the answer to a given problem. Results of two experiments using singledigit multiplication problems challenge these assumptions. It is argued that the presented answer in verification functions as a priming stimulus and that on “true” verification trials the effects of priming are sufficient to distort estimates of problem difficulty and to mask important evidence about the nature of the retrieval process. It is also argued that the priming of false answers that have associative links to a presented problem induces interference that disrupts both speed and accuracy of retrieval. The results raise questions about the interpretation of verification data and offer support for a network-interference theory of the mental processes underlying simple multiplication.     

Ongoing postdivorce conflict and child disturbance

This paper reports on the disturbed behavior of children who are subject to entrenched parental disputes over their custody and care after separation and divorce. The 56 children who varied in racial and socioeconomic origin were 4 to 12 years old at entry into the study. They were assessed at two points: at the time of the custody dispute and 2.5 years later. The extent of the child's involvement in the dispute and the amount of role reversal between parent and child predicted total behavior problems and aggression at the time of the legal dispute. These same factors, together with the rate of verbal and physical aggression between parents, predicted total behavior problems, depression, withdrawn/uncommunicative behavior, somatic complaints, and aggression at the 2-year follows-up. There were no main effects for sex and age. However, at the 2-year mark, girls in high-conflict families were more depressed and withdrawn, and older children in high-conflict situations had more somatic complaints and were more aggressive. The findings are considered in the light of a number of etiological mechanisms by which parental conflict affects children. Funds for the clinical work were provided by the Zellerbach Family Fund and the San Francisco Foundation the Van Loben Sels Foundation, and the Morris Stulsaft Foundation. Support for the first author was provided by an NIMH Fellowship in Social Structure, Personality and Mental Illness, Department of Sociology, University of California, Berkeley.     

Job satisfaction: Identifying the important parts among computer sales and service personnel

This article examines overall and job facet satisfaction among computer salesN=552) and service (N=1489) personnel. Results of an anonymous questionnaire indicated that seven of nine job facets were similar in the two samples. However, facets in field service referring to the company and working conditions were replaced in sales by facets concerning work-related information and problem resolution. Existing multifacet measures of job satisfaction would not have identified problem resolution as an important facet. While they are valuable for basic research, standardized multifacet satisfaction measures may not be as useful when the goal is to improve the work situation by identifying issues of concern to employees in different occupations.     

Parents and their children comment on adolescence

The authors completed research on over 700 twelve-year-olds and their parents concerning their attitudes toward the ensuing teenage years. Their responses and written comments reflect and support in large measure the developmental tasks expounded by Robert Havighurst. These include the need to achieve independence, their concern with social relationships, and the acceptance of physical appearance. Parents' concerns about their children becoming teenagers centered on communication and peer pressure.     

Irrelevant incentive learning revisited: Associating flavors and exteroceptive cues with positive incentives

In “irrelevant incentive learning” information stored about an incentive when it is not desired is used later when the incentive is desired. In “habit learning” responses learned under one motive state continue to be made under a new motive state even though they produce goal events that are not appropriate to that motive state. Experiment 1 showed that both types of learning occur simultaneously whether flavor or texture cues are used and whether or not position is also a relevant cue. Thus, contrary to previous suggestions, irrelevant incentive learning is not limited to interoceptive cues, nor is habit learning limited to exteroceptive cues. In both Experiments 1 and 2 it was also shown that motivation affects what is learned as well as affecting current performance. This contrasts with views of motivation as solely a determinant of performance.     

Systematic changes in perceptual reactance induced by physical fitness training

The effect of life-change events on perceptual augmentation-reduction was studied in 72 subjects (40 men, 32 women). In three experiments the kinesthetic figural aftereffect was measured prior to and after either a physical fitness program, a course in yoga, or training in Transcendental Meditation. Each program lasted a minimum of 8 wk. Subjects completing fitness training, all of whom were initially classified as augmenters, became reducers by the end of their program. Subjects enrolled in yoga and meditation courses remained relatively stable in their perceptual tendencies.     

Conditioned orienting and defensive responses in the developing rat

Infant rats (16, 21, and 26 days old) received 3 days of classical conditioning training to Tone/Shock pairings using heart rate as the index of conditioning. The youngest group (16 days old) showed no evidence of conditioning at any stage of acquisition. In the 21- and 26-day-olds, response to the conditioned stimulus (CS) was a deceleration in heart rate during the first day of training. By day 3, the conditioned response (CR) shifted to cardioacceleration. The data were interpreted as offering strong support for a two-stage model of information processing in the infant rat, comprised of a conditioned orienting response in the first stage and a conditioned defensive response in the second.     

HIV counselling in developing countries: the link from individual to community counselling for support and change

Counselling in developing countries can extend from individual to family and community, can be implemented as a means of facilitating changes or support, and in the community context can be used to measure as well as sustain behaviour change. Contrasts between developed and developing countries include the capacity of communities in developing countries to acknowledge loss and find hope. Community involvement in counselling, and capacity for confidential sharing, are building blocks for strategic participatory response to AIDS and HIV, that can link inclusive care to prevention by community-determined change in attitudes, behaviours and environment. The premise that there can be a positive link from the individual to the community through confidential sharing and that it can give rise to prevention through counselling the community is illustrated by reference to programme examples from Brazil, Sri Lanka, North-Eastern India, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Community hope exists through recognition of loss, inclusion of suffering people, and capacity and action for change. One transferable tool for community development is community counselling in relation to HIV and AIDS. A visible and expected outcome is increased community capacity to care and hope.