Racial bias and the MCMI

We studied the scores obtained on the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory (MCMI) by Black and White male psychiatric inpatients to determine the presence or absence of racial bias. In predicting psychopathology for the two races, comparisons of MCMI performance indicated significant differences for all diagnoses except the personality disorders. The subjects were then matched into two groups of 209 patients each, according to DSM-III psychiatric diagnoses. The data were analyzed at the item, scale, and structural levels. At the item level, application of the Mantel-Haenszel Procedure revealed that 45 of the 175 items of the inventory were answered significantly different by the two racial groups. Because this number was higher than what could be expected by chance, the finding suggested possible deficiencies in terms of the culture-fairness of the items used in the test. At the scale level, an analysis of variance (ANOVA) demonstrated that the scores obtained by the Black and White groups were significantly different in 9 of the 20 scales (Histrionic, Narcissistic, Antisocial, Paraphrenia, Hypomania, Dysthymia, Alcohol Abuse, Drug Abuse, and Psychotic Delusion). With the exception of the Dysthymic scale, all of the differences were in the direction of the Blacks obtaining a higher score than the Whites. At the structural level, however, a principal components factor analysis performed on each group resulted in factor structures that looked identical.     

The Depressive Experiences Questionnaire: a critical review

The Depressive Experiences Questionnaire (DEQ; Blatt, D'Afflitti, & Quinlan, 1976) is critically reviewed. First the developmental, object representations theory differentiating depression into anaclitic and introjective subtypes is presented. The DEQ factors of Dependency and Self-Criticism were initially found to be consistent with these clinically meaningful depressive subtypes. Subsequent research has generally demonstrated that these subtypes, at least as measured by the DEQ, do not hold up well in clinical populations. Furthermore, the validity of the developmental theory of these subtypes is weak. We suggest that more internally consistent and distinct factors should be developed from clinical populations because of their potential clinical usefulness.     

Learned resourcefulness, drinking, and smoking in young adults

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between learned resourcefulness and two common addictive behaviors, namely, drinking and smoking. Male and female college students (N = 175) completed the Self-Control Schedule (SCS), the Quantity-Frequency-Variability questionnaire, and a smoking history form. Learned resourcefulness was related to self-reported patterns of alcohol consumption; specifically, heavy drinking subjects were lower in learned resourcefulness than were light and moderate drinkers who, in turn, were lower in learned resourcefulness than were infrequent drinkers and abstainers. Learned resourcefulness was only modestly related to smoking, with students who had never smoked evidencing somewhat higher learned resourcefulness than ex-smokers and current smokers. Overall, these data provide correlational support for the notion that learned resourcefulness may protect young adults against substance abuse.     

Unification of models for choice between delayed reinforcers.

Two models for choice between delayed reinforcers, Fantino's delay-reduction theory and Killeen's incentive theory, are reviewed. Incentive theory is amended to incorporate the effects of arousal on alternate types of behavior that might block the reinforcement of the target behavior. This amended version is shown to differ from the delay-reduction theory in a term that is an exponential in incentive theory and a difference in delay-reduction theory. A power series approximation to the exponential generates a model that is formally identical with delay-reduction theory. Correlations between delay-reduction theory and the amended incentive theory show excellent congruence over a range of experimental conditions. Although the assumptions that gave rise to delay-reduction theory and incentive theory remain different and testable, the models deriving from the theories are unlikely to be discriminable by parametric experimental tests. This congruence of the models is recognized by naming the common model the delayed reinforcement model, which is then compared with other models of choice such as Killeen and Fetterman's (1988) behavioral theory of timing, Mazur's (1984) equivalence rule, and Vaughan's (1985) melioration theory.     

Effects of alcohol and extended practice on divided-attention performance

The effects of alcohol and extended practice on divided attention were investigated using a visual tracking task and an auditory detection task. Subjects performed the tasks with and without alcohol, under single-task (S) and dual-task (D) conditions, both before and after they had received extended practice under single-task conditions without alcohol. Tracking accuracy improved with practice and was impaired under divided-attention conditions but was not affected by alcohol. Speed of detection was impaired by alcohol, improved by practice, and impaired by divided attention. Extended practice did not reduce the influence of alcohol. The effects of both alcohol and practice on speed of detection were significantly greater under dual-task conditions than under single-task conditions. Analysis of detection-task reaction times in terms of relative divided-attention costs, (D-S)/S, showed no effect of alcohol, but a highly significant reduction in costs with extended practice. It is concluded that (1) alcohol and practice can have quantitatively, but not qualitatively, similar effects on speeded performance, and (2) the effect of alcohol is not influenced by the attentional requirements of the task.     

Lack of evidence for a tactual Poggendorff illusion

Lucca, Dellantonio, and Riggio (1986) reported large distortions in a tactual analogue of the visual Poggendorff illusion. They also reported large effects in the direction opposite to the visual illusion, which they termed "inversions." However, their evidence for such effects is questionable; they used what we consider to be inappropriate measurement and analysis procedures. In attempting to replicate their experiment, and in conducting four additional experiments, we found no evidence at all for their alleged tactual analogue of the visual Poggendorff effect. Instead, we demonstrated that "inversions" are likely due to the use of a raised stimulus display that causes artifactual mistracking, which is totally unrelated to normal mechanisms of alignment judgment. We also discuss the possible role of intersensory factors in the generation of tactual illusions.     

Cross-gender perceptions of facial attributes and their relation to attractiveness: do we see them differently than they see us?

Examination of perceptions of human facial attributes revealed that individual attributes are similarly perceived by males and females. However, patterns of attribute interrelationships differ as a function of gender of the face. Undergraduate students (N = 280) rated pictures of 40 male or female Caucasians on 12 physical attributes (e.g., nose size, face width) and overall attractiveness. The four sets of attribute ratings (defined by rater gender and picture gender) were submitted to principal components analyses, and five-factor solutions were found for each condition (accounting for about 76% of the variance). Comparisons of the four component solutions using confirmatory factor procedures revealed that male and female raters share one factor structure when rating photographs of female faces and another factor structure when rating photographs of male faces. Multiple regression analyses revealed that the patterns of attribute interrelationships were not "perceptual units" in the perception of attractiveness, and that different "rules" are used to assess the attractiveness of male and female stimuli faces. The importance of these results for models of facial attractiveness and interfacial similarity judgements are discussed.     

The role of discontinuities in the perception of subjective figures

Recently we proposed a theory of visual interpolation (Kellman & Shipley, in press) that addresses a variety of unit formation phenomena, including the perception of partly occluded objects and subjective figures. A basic notion of the theory is that discontinuities in the first derivative of projected edges are the initiating conditions for interpolation of boundaries that are not physically specified. In this paper, we report four experiments in which this claim was tested in the domain of subjective figures. Experiments 1 and 2 demonstrate that discontinuities in the first derivative of the edges of inducing elements have a clear effect on the frequency of report and the perceived clarity of simple subjective figures. Similar effects are found when unfamiliar subjective figures and inducing elements are used (Experiment 3). Experiment 4 rules out the possibility that the discontinuities in the first derivative merely add to the clarity of subjective figures. These experiments suggest that first-order discontinuities play a central role in unit formation.     

Simulation in hypnosis research: the "hidden" role of attribution of meaning

The role played by attribution of meaning in research involving simulation is examined. Acknowledgement of this role, lacking to date, queries the traditional use of simulation but also opens up interesting research questions.