The effect of sonority on word segmentation: evidence for the use of a phonological universal

It has been well documented how language-specific cues may be used for word segmentation. Here, we investigate what role a language-independent phonological universal, the sonority sequencing principle (SSP), may also play. Participants were presented with an unsegmented speech stream with non-English word onsets that juxtaposed adherence to the SSP with transitional probabilities. Participants favored using the SSP in assessing word-hood, suggesting that the SSP represents a potentially powerful cue for word segmentation. To ensure the SSP influenced the segmentation process (i.e., during learning), we presented two additional groups of participants with either (a) no exposure to the stimuli prior to testing or (b) the same stimuli with pauses marking word breaks. The SSP did not influence test performance in either case, suggesting that the SSP is important for word segmentation during the learning process itself. Moreover, the fact that SSP-independent segmentation of the stimulus occurred (in the latter control condition) suggests that universals are best understood as biases rather than immutable constraints on learning.     

Athletes' experiences of expressive writing about sports stressors

ObjectivesThis study explored athletes' experiences of expressive writing about competitive sport stressors using standard expressive writing and reversal theory framed writing (Apter, 2001).DesignThe study employed a qualitative approach including narrative analysis of expressive writing and semi-structured interviews with athletes.MethodSixteen athletes were randomly allocated to a standard expressive writing or a reversal theory framed writing group. Both groups completed expressive writing about a stressor using standardised instructions. The reversal theory writing group were instructed on reversal theory states and imagery use to recreate them which they employed to write from different state perspectives in four subsequent sessions. Standard writing group participants completed four sessions following usual expressive writing instructions. Both groups completed a final session following these instructions and were interviewed about expressive writing and their perceptions of the stressor.ResultsKey outcomes were: re-evaluation and perspective changes, self development, stressor confrontation, problem solving, emotion management and, future uses of expressive writing.ConclusionsExpressive writing may be a technique that is useful for some athletes and recommendations for its application are made.     

Formal operations, the imaginary audience and the personal fable

One hundred twenty-nine 6th, 8th, 10th/11th, and 12th graders were administered Enright, Lapsley, and Shukla's Adolescent Egocentrism Scale (AES) and How Is Your Logic?, a Piagetian-based, group-administered, written test of cognitive development. A series of ANOVAs on four scales of the AES (imaginary audience, personal fable, self-in-general, nonsocial) provided partial support for Inhelder and Piaget's, and Elkind's views that adolescent egocentrism is a function of beginning formal operations. Discussion focused on the difficulty of assessing the true thoughts/feelings of persons who are worried how they will appear to others.     

The diminishing marginal value of happy people

Thomas Hurka has recently proposed a utilitarian theory which would effect a compromise between Average and Total utilitarianism, the better to deal with issues in population ethics. This Compromise theory would incorporate the principle that the value which an extra happy person contributes to a possible world is a decreasing function of the total population of that world: that happy people are of diminishing marginal value. In spite of its initial plausibility I argue against this principle. I show that the Compromise theory is actually no improvement over the two original versions of utilitarianism; in particular, it is subject to almost all the objections which are fatal to Average utilitarianism, and more besides. And I attempt to dispell the appearance that intuition supports the Compromise theory as against Total utilitarianism, by arguing that the latter's Repugnant Conclusion, when properly understood, is not intuitively unacceptable. Total utilitarianism remains a plausible ethical theory, while both the Average and the Compromise theories should be definitely rejected.     

A major modification of the Bousfield (1966) measure of category clustering

The measure of category clustering proposed by Bousfleld & Bousfleld (1966) was modified to take into account differences in the distribution of the expected value of number of repetitions. The possible effects of using the clustering index without this major modification are discussed.     

A behaviour modification project with chronic schizophrenics in the community

A major shortcoming of token economies is their failure to ensure carry over of behavioural gains into the community; hence it is logical to investigate the feasibility of behavioural programmes for schizophrenics in their own homes. The token economy literature and the literature on behavioural interventions in the natural environment provide guidelines but also indicate possible difficulties arising from the nature of the illness and the use of the family setting.

Despite numerous accounts of effective behavioural treatment of schizophrenics (Ullman and Krasner, 1965; Ayllon and Azrin, 1968; Atthowe and Krasner, 1968; Stoffelmayr et al., 1973) here and there in the literature a note of caution is sounded. Meyer and Chesser(1970) and Yates (1970) suggest that there is undue optimism. Kazdin (1973) notes that reports of non-response in psychotics range from 10 per cent (Atthowe and Krasner. 1968) to 52 per cent (Panek 1969). Non-response is sometimes attributed to practical or administrative obstacles (Ayllon and Azrin, 1968; Hall and Baker, 1973) or shortcomings in the application or Operant principles (Ayllon and Azrin, 1965; Atthowe and Krasner, 1968; Kazdin and Bootzin, 1972). but more serious objections stem from the view that Operant principles may be applicable only to certain aspects of the behaviour of psychotics, such as apathy and withdrawal fostered by institutional environments. Operant technology may fail to take into account the antecedents of behaviour, including anxiety, delusions and hallucinations or covert consequences such as relief of anxiety (Davison, 1969). ‘Non-functioning’ behaviour, particularly deficit in social interaction, and paranoid behaviour, have been found especially resistant, the former because of initial low levels of the desired behaviour, the latter because of covert self-reinforcement (Libermann, 1968). Kazdin (1973) suggests that there is support from laboratory studies for the view that response patterns in psychotics may be atypical. A further qualification is that one cannot readily generalise from the American ‘chronic schizophrenic’ to his British counterpart (Cooper et al., 1972) nor from the long-stay patient to the chronic schizophrenic in the community.

The literature on behavioural intervention in the family setting gives further cause for caution. Thomas and Walter (1973) report a 27 per cent dropout, and suggest this was due to client inaccessibility, “countervailing environmental influences”, non-compliance, crises and unstable domestic situations. Patterson (1972) and Sajwaj (1973) cite parents' personal problems. Tharp and Wetzel (1969) rejection of Operant methods, and Salzinger et al. (1972) parents' poor verbal ability and low educational achievement as factors related to unsuccessful outcome. In the Project described below, it was hoped that problems would be more clearly identified and that a beginning might be made in selecting suitable cases for behaviour modification in the family setting.     

Categorical and schematic organization and the development of retrieval strategies

This study investigated the effects of schematic and categorical organization on young children's recall. Preschool and kindergarten children recalled either a taxonomic list or a story in one of two presentation conditions: an alternate condition, in which the material was presented, children recalled it and the procedure was repeated, or a successive condition in which the material was presented twice and children recalled it twice. Although preschool children's story recall was well organized, their list recall was poorly organized, and organization did not increase over recall trials in either presentation condition. In contrast, kindergarten children's recall of both the story and the list was well organized, and their recall was better organized on the second recall trial than on the first in both presentation conditions. These results are discussed in terms of the development of retrieval strategies during the preschool years/     

Working memory in chess

Three experiments investigated the role of working memory in various aspects of thinking in chess. Experiment 1 examined the immediate memory for briefly presented chess positions from master games in players from a wide range of abilities, following the imposition of various secondary tasks designed to block separate components of working memory. Suppression of the articulatory loop (by preventing subvocal rehearsal) had no effect on measures of recall, whereas blocking the visuospatial sketchpad (by manipulation of a keypad) and blocking the central executive (by random letter generation) had equivalent disruptive effects, in comparison with a control condition. Experiment 2 investigated the effects of similar secondary tasks on the solution (i.e., move selection) of tactical chess positions, and a similar pattern was found, except that blocking the central executive was much more disruptive than in Experiment 1. Experiment 3 compared performance on two types of primary task, one concerned with solving chess positions as in Experiment 2, and the other a sentence-rearrangement task. The secondary tasks in each case were both designed to block the central executive, but one was verbal (vocal generation of random numbers), while the other was spatial in nature (random generation of keypresses). Performance of the spatial secondary task was affected to a greater extent by the chess primary task than by the verbal primary task, whereas there were no differential effects on these secondary tasks by the verbal primary task. In none of the three experiments were there any differential effects between weak and strong players. These results are interpreted in the context of the workingmemory model and previous theories of the nature of cognition in chess.