Manipulation of visual information does not change the accuracy of distance estimation during a blindfolded walking task

While humans rely on vision during navigation, they are also competent at navigating non-visually. However, non-visual navigation over large distances is not very accurate and can accumulate error. Currently, it is unclear whether this accumulation of error is due to the visual estimate of the distance or to the locomotor production of the distance. In a series of experiments, using a blindfolded walking test, we examine whether enhancing the visual estimate of the distance to a previously seen target, through environmental enrichment, visual imagery, or repeated exposure would improve the accuracy of blindfold navigation across different distances. We also attempt to decrease the visual estimate in order to see if the opposite effect would occur. Our results would indicate that manipulation of the static visual distance estimate did not change the navigation accuracy to any great extent. The only condition that improved accuracy was repeated exposure to the environment through practice. These results suggest that error observed during blindfold navigation may be due to the locomotor production of the distance, rather than the visual process.     

Talk about a past relationship partner: Metacommunicative implications

Abstract

Within many intimate dyadic relationships, individuals talk to their partners about a past relationship with a former spouse or lover. The impact that “talk about a past partner” (Tapp) has on one's current relationship is reviewed. Four metacommunicative functions of Tapp are suggested: disclosing past relationship history, conveying relationship rules or expectations, creating closeness or distance, and confirming self-perceptions. It is argued that the role of Tapp, within any given relationship, not only affects partners' feelings of security, control, closeness, etc., but also may reveal their characteristic patterns of communicating, metacomrnunicat-ing, interpreting and misinterpreting.     

Preparation for marriage: Beyond the classroom

Abstract

The frustrated sexual needs of the “aging” population have been largely neglected in the professional literature. This bespecially true of the female population, leading the individual post-menopausal woman to believe that she is abnormal in desiring and experiencing sex. The problem must be faced. That sex can be used for relational a d recreational purposes is a historically new concept, which must extend to the older woman as well. The post-menopausal client must be helped to see sexuality at her age as healthy both physically and psychologically.     

Affective states leak into movement execution: Automatic avoidance of threatening stimuli in fear of spider is visible in reach trajectories

Several studies have shown that the attentional blink (AB; Raymond, Shapiro, & Arnell, 1992) is diminished for highly arousing T2 stimuli (e.g., Anderson, 2005). Whereas this effect is most often interpreted as evidence for a more efficient processing of arousing information, it could be due also to a bias to report more arousing stimuli than neutral stimuli. We introduce a paradigm that allows one to control for such a response bias. Using this paradigm, we obtained evidence that the diminished AB for taboo words cannot be explained by a response bias. This supports the idea that the emotional modulation of the AB is caused by attentional processes.     

“We Learn How to Predict and be a Scientist”: Early Science Experiences and Kindergarten Children's Social Meanings About Science

We examine kindergarten children's emerging social meanings about science as a function of their participation in integrated science inquiry and literacy activities associated with the Scientific Literacy Project (SLP). We describe changes in 123 SLP kindergarten children's narrative accounts of learning science in school during three different time periods: (a) in September, before the onset of SLP activities; (b) in December, after children had participated in 17 lessons associated with 4 SLP units; and (c) in March, after children had participated in an additional 13 lessons associated with the SLP Marine Life unit. At the end of the year, we: (a) compare SLP children's narratives about science to those of a group of children (n = 70) who only experienced the regular kindergarten program; and (b) examine differences between SLP and comparison children's reports on a measure of learning activities in kindergarten that include science as well as privileged content areas such as reading, writing, and learning about numbers and shapes. Results support the conclusion that sustained and meaningful participation in conceptually coherent science programs is crucial for children to develop meanings about science as a distinct academic domain that comprises its own disciplinary content, language, and processes.     

Narratives of Treatment Outcome

This article is based on the findings of an interview study that explored the discourses clinicians draw on in their narratives in relation to self-injury. More specifically, the study focused on the clinicians’ discourses of responsibility for treatment outcome, and how they construct concepts of success, failure, and partial failure. Eight mental health clinicians from various disciplines who employed a range of treatment modalities were selected using purposive sampling. An in-depth conversational-style interviewing approach was used. The findings of the study highlight the complexities and difficulties the clinicians encountered with regard to the evaluation of their clinical practice with self-injuring patients. It appears that clinicians have little or no systematic way of thinking or conceptualizing “progress” with regard to self-injury. In relation to who is responsible for treatment outcome, the clinicians occupied various discursive positions. These findings have implications for the education and training of clinicians in developing systematic indicators of progress with respect to self-injury and in creating spaces in which they can speak about and reflect on their clinical effectiveness and failures.     

Sex Roles,Gender, and Fear

Male and female college students classified as masculine, feminine, androgynous, or undifferentiated on the Bern (1974) Sex Role Inventory (N = 199) were given the Wolpe (1969) Fear Inventory. Significant differences in average fear scores were seen between men and women and between the four sex-role categories, with sex role and gender contributing equally to the variability. The argument is raised here that excessive fearfulness or fearlessness might be as much a product of sex-role conditioning as a product of gender.     

Activity under Low Motivational Levels as a Function of the Method of Manipulating the Deprivation Period

Boys and girls in Grades 4, 6, and 8 were presented a 48-word list, in which each item was associated with a 5¢, 3¢, or l¢ reward, in order to test incentive effects on storage by means of a forced choice recognition paradigm assumed to minimize retrieval effects. Results showed (a) higher probabilities of recognition for words associated with higher incentive values, (b) serial position effects, and (c) a suggestive developmental progression in recognition performance. Differential reward influences upon storage and serial position were interpreted in terms of two-process memorial and incentive theories.