Mind, Self, and Personality: Dynamic Interactions from Late Childhood to Early Adulthood

This paper aims to integrate research on mind, personality, and self-development using a general model which hypothesizes that mind and personality are organized in 3 levels. The first level includes environment-oriented, domain-specific systems that specialize in the representation of and interaction with particular types of relationships in the environment in both the cognitive and the social realms. The second level comprises self-oriented monitoring and representation processes that build maps of the environment-oriented systems. Self and identity derive from the interaction between these 2 levels, which is subject to the constraints and the system's processing capacity at the successive ages. These constraints may be taken as the third level of the self. Efficiency in overcoming these constraints is determined by the self-oriented processes, generating feelings and self-representations of self-worth. These feelings are idiosyncratic, and function as a personal constant, which is applied on self-evaluation and self-representations. This constant is rescaled and differentiated with development. Thus, we have simultaneously both modular and transmodular constructs in the mind and the self, which change with relative independence of each other under the constraints of the general processing capabilities and the personal constant. A series of studies are presented to support this model, and its implications for life-span theories of development are discussed.     

The costs and benefits of processing emotional stimuli during rapid serial visual presentation

Using a dual-target identification task during rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP), we examined facilitation and interference effects exerted by emotional stimuli. Emotionally arousing first targets (T1s) were encoded with higher accuracy than neutral T1s. At the same time, identification of a second neutral target (T2) was impaired reflecting a failure of disengaging attention from arousing T1s. Similar interference was triggered by arousing filler stimuli that were not voluntarily searched for in the RSVP stream (Experiment 2). In Experiment 3, we showed that interference is reduced (though facilitation for arousing T1s is maintained) when the second task itself involves variations in emotional arousal. Vice versa, when arousal associated with the T2 stimulus was predictable, interference recurred (Experiment 4). Our findings indicate that the perceived emotional intensity of a stimulus is a determinant of successful identification during RSVP: Encoding of arousing stimuli is reliably facilitated. Interference effects with subsequent processing arise independently and are strongly modulated by the overall task context and specific processing strategies.     

Semantic priming without awareness: Some methodological considerations and replications

Previous studies of subliminal semantic priming effects are considered. The distinction between subjective and objective detection thresholds proposed by Cheesman and Merikle (1984) is accepted, and it is concluded that no convincing evidence has been adduced to support or deny the existence of semantic priming effects at or below objective threshold. New criteria for the assessment of objective thresholds are proposed, and four experiments are reported in each of which pattern-masked primes were presented 10% below objective threshold. The first three experiments presented primes, mask, and targets binocularly; the fourth used dichoptic presentation. Data were analysed using both conventional F ratios and the quasi F ratio advocated by Clark (1973). Results showed that significant subliminal semantic priming effects occurred in each experiment when conventional F ratios were used, and significant effects occurred in all but the first experiment when quasi F was used. Binocular and dichoptic presentation of stimuli gave semantic priming effects whose magnitudes did not differ significantly. It is concluded that semantic priming effects can be obtained below objective detection threshold. It is also concluded that replication with different participants and different stimuli is preferable to the use of quasi F ratios in investigations where verbal stimuli are used.     

Interpersonal needs and functional area of management

This study examines a sample of first-semester MBA students to determine the relationship between their interpersonal needs and their preferences for a functional area of management. The students were categorized according to their preference for one of the following eight functional areas: accounting, systems analysis, finance, small business management, engineering, marketing, manufacturing management, and personnel management. Interpersonal needs were measured by the Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation (FIRO-B) instrument developed by W. C. Schutz. Significant differences in interpersonal needs were found among students preferring different functional specialities. Implications of the results are discussed in terms of occupational choice processes.