Symbols Scales for Use in Beginning Reading

Bayley Mental scores were significantly related to several concurrent ratings of infant and maternal testroom behavior when firstborn black male infants were 14 months (N = 49), 18 months (N = 34), and 22 months of age (N = 32). With increasing age, social responsiveness played a relatively less important role in successful performance, while object responsiveness became increasingly important. Bayley Motor scores were related to many fewer ratings than the Mental scores. Gross Muscle Coordination was related to performance at all three ages, and Energy ratings at two of the three ages. For both the Mental and Motor scores, fewer relationships were observed at the 18-month testings as compared to the 14- and 22-month testings. By 22 months, infants scoring higher on the Bayley Mental scale had mothers who were more highly involved with their child's achievement as judged by testroom behaviors.     

A randomized controlled trial of the impact of a teacher classroom management program on the classroom behavior of children with and without behavior problems

This randomized controlled trial (RCT) evaluated the efficacy of the Incredible Years (IY) Teacher Classroom Management (TCM; Webster-Stratton & Reid, 2002) program to assess whether training teachers in IY-TCM principles improve teacher behavior, whether any observed improvements impact pupil behavior classroom-wide, and whether these effects can be demonstrated with children at risk of developing conduct problems. Six intervention and six control classrooms comprising 12 teachers and 107 children (aged 3 to 7 years) were recruited. Children were screened for high or low behavior problems using the cut-off points of the teacher-rated Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (Goodman, 1997). The primary outcome measure was independent classroom observations using the Teacher–Pupil Observation Tool (Martin et al., 2010). Multilevel modeling analyses were conducted to examine the effect of the intervention on teacher, classroom, and child behavior. Results showed a significant reduction in classroom off-task behavior (d = 0.53), teacher negatives to target children (d = 0.36), target child negatives towards the teacher (d = 0.42), and target child off-task behavior (d = 0.48). These preliminary results demonstrate the potential impact of IY-TCM on both teacher and child behavior.     

Circularity in the conditional analysis of phenomenal concepts

The conditional analysis of phenomenal concepts purports to give physicalists a way of understanding phenomenal concepts that will allow them to (1) accept the zombie intuition, (2) accept that conceivability is generally a good guide to possibility, and yet (3) reject the conclusion that zombies are metaphysically possible. It does this by positing that whether phenomenal concepts refer to physical or nonphysical states depends on what the actual world is like. In this paper, I offer support for the Chalmers/Alter objection that the conditional analysis fails to accommodate the true zombie intuition, and develop a new and far more powerful argument against the conditional analysis. I argue that, as stated, the conditional analysis is radically incomplete. But when fully fleshed out, the analysis becomes viciously circular. The only way to avoid this circularity is to adopt a species of analytic functionalism, on which it’s a priori that phenomenal concepts refer to the state (perhaps physical, perhaps nonphysical) that actually plays so-and-so functional role. While this rigidified analytic functionalism is coherent, it is highly unattractive, running contrary to both the intuitions that motivate functionalism and the intuitions that motivated the conditional analysis.     

Maturational Changes in Canadian Adolescents' Cognitive Attitudinal Structure Concerning Marijuana

Thirty-four items concerning marijuana use were administered three times to a cohort of Canadian high school students between Grades 11 and 13, in 1977 (n = 439), 1978 (n = 419), and 1979 (n = 167). These items were designed to measure four distinct constructs: attitude, perceived peer approval or disapproval, concern about risks, and symbolic protest against conventional society. A cross-sectional factor analysis of the Grade 13 data supported the hypothesized factor structure, as had earlier work with college students. However, analogous analyses on the Grade 11 and Grade 12 data contradicted the hypothesized factor structure. Most notably, separate factors for positive and negative attitude appeared in the Grade 11 and 12 analyses. The data were interpreted primarily in terms of maturational changes, largely through elimination of alternative interpretations by internal analyses and previous findings. Implications were discussed for adolescent cognitive-attitudinal development, attitude theory, and analysis of panel data.     

The Large Pursuit Rotor

The question of whether certain phenomena that occur on the conventional rotary pursuit and other small apparatus also appear on a gross motor task was examined using a large pursuit rotor that required whole-body movements. College males (n=29) were given 90 10-sec trials over three consecutive days with 30 trials of continuous practice per day. The existence of reactive inhibition, reminiscence, and warmup decrement was confirmed, indicating that common mechanisms underlie both fine and gross bodily movements. In addition, the substantial amounts of learning and the high reliabilities for performance and learning indicated that the present apparatus has considerable potential for motor-learning research.     

Procedures for Increasing Sustained Attention in Adults with Mild Intellectual Disabilities

The Psychological Record - This research compared the effects of several factors on sustained attention in four participants with mild or mild-to-moderate intellectual disabilities. In each...     

The Agent‐Relative Probability Threshold of Hope

Nearly all contributors to the philosophical analysis of hope agree that if an agent hopes that p, she both desires that p and assigns to p a probability which is greater than zero, but less than one. According to the widely‐endorsed Standard Account, these two conditions are also (jointly) sufficient for ‘hoping that’. Ariel Meirav has recently argued, however, that the Standard Account fails to distinguish hoping for a prospect from despairing of it – due to cases where two agents equally desire an outcome and assign to it the same probability, yet one hopes for the outcome while the other despairs of it. I argue, against Meirav, that these putative counterexamples depend crucially on the assumption – previously unquestioned – that the degree of probability necessary for hope is invariant across individuals. If the probability threshold is instead understood as agent‐relative, the difficulty disappears. Further, I argue that there is strong independent reason for taking the probability threshold of hope to be agent‐relative, based on similarities to the widely‐accepted agent‐relative probability thresholds of industriousness and risk aversion. And I conclude by noting how the agent‐relative modification to the Standard Account is better equipped than is Meirav's positive view to yield intuitive results. ¹