Attack, avoidance, and escape reactions to aversive shock

Aversive stimuli are known to produce the behaviors of both escape and attack. The interaction between these two basic reactions was studied with rats and monkeys using many shock-escape and shock-avoidance procedures. All procedures produced attack if a target was present, the attacks occurring shortly after shock delivery. The number of attacks during escape or avoidance was a direct function of the number and duration of shocks received. Consequently, any aspect of the procedure that produced many shocks also produced many attacks such as initial acquisition, extinction, or an increase of the response requirement for escape. The escape tendency acquired prepotency over the tendency to attack since successful escape eliminated attack behavior. The attack tendency retarded escape behavior only during acquisition when the preoccupation with attack precluded the opportunity to learn the escape response. This mutual interference of escape and attack was eliminated when the attack and avoidance tendencies were combined by using biting attack as the shock-avoidance response. The result was unusually rapid conditioning of the biting-attack response. These interactions indicate that both the attack and escape tendency should be considered whenever aversive stimulation is delivered.     

Elicitation of aggression by a physical blow

Squirrel monkeys were exposed to brief tail-pinches in the presence of a cloth-covered ball. Attack was elicited against the ball as a direct function of the force of the tail-pinch. This finding in conjunction with previous findings regarding electric shock and intense heat demonstrates that several types of aversive stimulation can elicit aggression.     

Assessing violent offending in serious juvenile offenders

The convergent validity of the two most frequently used methods for assessing violent offending in juveniles (i.e., selfreports and arrests) was evaluated. Participants were 87 serious juvenile offenders and their maternal figures, primarily from disadvantaged families. Validation measures tapped established behavioral, family, and peer correlates of delinquency. Results failed to support the ability of either arrests for violent crimes or selfreported violent offenses to index violent criminal behavior accurately. Several methodological features of the study support our hypothesis that the findings were not spurious. Procedural and conceptual implications of the findings are discussed.The Family and Neighborhood Services Project was funded by Grant 2H87MH43557-04 to the South Carolina Department of Mental Health from the National Institute of Mental Health. The authors extend their most sincere appreciation to Commissioner Joseph Bevilacqua, Commissioner Richard McLawhorn, Joe James, Dale Chandler, Madeline Blackwell, Kristen Rowden, Pam King, Nancy King, Nancy Yue, and Jerry DeLoye.     

Netscal: A network scaling algorithm for nonsymmetric proximity data

A simple property of networks is used as the basis for a scaling algorithm that represents nonsymmetric proximities as network distances. The algorithm determines which vertices are directly connected by an arc and estimates the length of each arc. Network distance, defined as the minimum pathlength between vertices, is assumed to be a generalized power function of the data. The derived network structure, however, is invariant across monotonic transformations of the data. A Monte Carlo simulation and applications to eight sets of proximity data support the practical utility of the algorithm.I am grateful to Roger Shepard and Amos Tversky for their helpful comments and guidance throughout this project. The work was supported by National Science Foundation Grant BNS-75-02806 to Roger Shepard and a National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowship to the author. Parts of this paper were drawn from a doctoral dissertation submitted to Stanford University (Hutchinson, 1981).     

Unsupervised category learning with integral-dimension stimuli

Despite the recent surge in research on unsupervised category learning, the majority of studies have focused on unconstrained tasks in which no instructions are provided about the underlying category structure. Relatively little research has focused on constrained tasks in which the goal is to learn predefined stimulus clusters in the absence of feedback. The few studies that have addressed this issue have focused almost exclusively on stimuli for which it is relatively easy to attend selectively to the component dimensions (i.e., separable dimensions). In the present study, we investigated the ability of participants to learn categories constructed from stimuli for which it is difficult, if not impossible, to attend selectively to the component dimensions (i.e., integral dimensions). The experiments demonstrate that individuals are capable of learning categories constructed from the integral dimensions of brightness and saturation, but this ability is generally limited to category structures requiring selective attention to brightness. As might be expected with integral dimensions, participants were often able to integrate brightness and saturation information in the absence of feedback--an ability not observed in previous studies with separable dimensions. Even so, there was a bias to weight brightness more heavily than saturation in the categorization process, suggesting a weak form of selective attention to brightness. These data present an important challenge for the development of models of unsupervised category learning.     

The relationship between skin tone dissatisfaction and sun tanning behaviour

Understanding the factors that contribute to sun exposure is vital for skin cancer prevention. The present study aimed to examine the utility of a new measure for cancer prevention research, the Skin Tone Rating Scale. Australian undergraduate women (N = 156) completed an online questionnaire measuring skin tone dissatisfaction, peer and media norms surrounding tanning, internalisation of a tanned ideal, appearance reasons for tanning, and self‐reported tanning behaviour. The two‐item Skin Tone Rating Scale provided a short and easy‐to‐administer measure of skin tone dissatisfaction that correlated with self‐reported tanning behaviour. The Skin Tone Rating Scale was also moderately related to appearance reasons for tanning and internalisation of a tanned ideal, demonstrating concurrent validity. Socio‐cultural influences (from peers and media) were positively correlated with skin tone dissatisfaction, and this relationship was partially mediated by internalisation of a tanned ideal. Although more research is needed to establish causation, this study provides an important addition to sun tanning literature; it provides a new measure to predict self‐reported tanning behaviour, the Skin Tone Rating Scale, which highlights the importance of appearance concerns in relation to tanning and sun exposure.     

Unsinnig: A Reply to Hutto∗

Abstract

In the late 1930s Heidegger makes allusions to ‘the wild’ and ‘the mild’ in connection with a human liberation that he understands as a steadfast response to the claim that historical being (Seyn) makes upon us. The following paper elucidates these allusions in terms of the overturning of metaphysics that they entail.     

The Effects of Music and a Coxswain on Attentional Focus,Perceived Exertion,Motivation, and Performance During a 1,000 m Ergometer Rowing Sprint

Music has often been portrayed as a dissociative (i.e., distracting) mechanism. This study demonstrates that music may not be unifunctional in regards to attentional focus; that is, external concentration on music can coexist with task-relevant thoughts. Female intercollegiate rowers (N = 26) performed four 1,000 m sprints on a rowing ergometer at maximal effort under music, coxswain, combined music and coxswain, and control conditions. Findings indicate that during the 1,000 m rowing sprint, both external and task-relevant dimensions of attentional focus can exist simultaneously. This implies a new consideration of music as either dissociative or associative based on task-related factors.     

Training fast and frugal heuristics in military decision making

Fast and frugal heuristics have been used to model decision making in applied domains very effectively, suggesting that they could be used to improve applied decision making. We developed a fast and frugal heuristic for infantry decisions using experts from the British Army. This was able to predict around 80% of their decisions using three cues. Next, we examined the benefits of learning to use the fast and frugal heuristic by training junior officers in the British Army to apply the heuristic and assessing their accuracy and mental workload when making decisions. Their performance was compared to a control condition of junior officers who applied standard military decision methods. Participants using the fast and frugal heuristic made decisions as accurately as participants in the control condition, but with reduced mental demand. This demonstrates that fast and frugal heuristics can be learnt and are as effective as analytic decision methods.