A validity study of existential/dialectical marital questionnaire [EDMQ]: A psychometric questionnaire for assessing marital interaction

This paper reports the successful development of a psychometric questionnaire for analyzing marital functioning and interaction based on an existential/dialectical model originally presented by Charny as the basis for a clinical model for rating couples,Existential/Dialectical Marital Profile [EDMP]. The clinical model and psychometric questionnaire address five main areas of functioning in marriage: family management, companionship, relationship and communication, attraction and sexuality, and parenting; as well as five main dimensions of marital relationship: competence, commitment, respect, power, and closeness.Presented at the Conference of the International Family Therapy Association, Amsterdam, May, 1993. This study was completed as a master's thesis by Shlomit Asineli in collaboration with and under the supervision of Professor Israel Charny at the Bob Shapell School of Social Work, Tel Aviv University.     

Correspondence training, prior verbal training, and control of nonverbal behavior via control of verbal behavior

The role of prior verbal training in correspondence training and later verbal control of nonverbal behavior was examined in two groups of Head Start children. One group received correspondence training without prior verbal training, the other with. Essentially no differences were found between the two sequences; thus it seems appropriate to consider the content phases (reinforcement contingent on target verbalization alone) of previous research as control procedures and not a necessary precursor to correspondence training.     

The elimination of learned helplessness deficits as a function of induced self-esteem

The efficiency of induced self-esteem in reducing various deficits caused by learned helplessness was tested in this study. Sixty undergraduate students were divided into three equal groups. The first group received uncontrollability treatment, the second received controllability treatment, and the third received no treatment. The subjects in the first two groups were asked to reduce the anxiety reaction of a confederate, as shown on an oscilloscope, by talking to him. The anxiety waves were shown on the oscilloscope and were preprogrammed so that subjects in the uncontrollability treatment group experienced lack of control over the results, while the ones in the controllability group were led to belive that they successfully controlled the changes of the confederate's anxiety. Then, half of the subjects in each of the three groups received positive feedback on their personality, while the other half received no feedback. In the last phase all subjects participated in a word recognition task using a tachistoscope operated by a combined push-button and microphone device. Response latency, number of correct identifications, and persistence in the task were recorded. In addition, the subjects completed a mood scale. The results indicate that subjects who received induced self-esteem treatment showed significantly more deficit reversal as reflected in response latency, persistence, feelings of potency, and sadness. The results are discussed in relation to (a) the assumption regarding the similarities between learned helplessness and depression, and (b) the usefulness of induced self-esteem as a form of treatment for helplessness depression.     

On the selection of signals

In a previous paper, it was argued that alertness, selectivity (set), and processing capacity (consciousness) could be identified and studied as separate components of attention. The current paper develops this theme by showing that alertness does not affect the buildup of information within the memory system but only the rate at which a later system responds to that information. Thus, in standard reaction-time tasks, increased alertness produces a reduction in reaction ’time but no decrease in errors. In contrast, providing a model of the signal the S is to process improved both speed and accuracy. The,. presence of a model of what the S is to process varies the vertex neural response to that specific signal as compared to a mismatching signal in the first 200–300 msec after its presentation. Three accounts of this effect are: speeded processing of a matching stimulus, habituation of the electrical response to a matching stimulus, and prolonged or enhanced processing of a mismatch. Evidence favors the first of these explanations, but the other two cannot be dismissed as possible contributors to this effect.     

Lexical access and the brain: anatomical constraints on cognitive models of word recognition.

Recent studies in the cognitive psychology of reading and many other skilled performances have been dominated by models inspired by neural connectivity (e.g., McClelland & Rumelhart, 1986). Such models have not yet begun to consider the accumulating evidence of considerable anatomical localization of component cognitive operations in the human brain (e.g., Posner, Petersen, Fox, & Raichle, 1988). In this article we apply anatomical findings to the job of building computational models of visual word recognition. Brain imaging studies already provide important constraints on how lexical access should be defined in terms of isolable encoding operations that compute the visual form, phonology, and semantics of words. Brain imaging studies also speak to issues of modularity versus interaction between these encoding operations, distribution versus localization of processing within the operations, and orchestration of operations to accomplish different word processing tasks. We conclude that a combined cognitive and anatomical analysis may be of considerable benefit in developing more adequate models of human information processing.     

Instrument considerations in measuring fast eye movements

The dynamic limitations of eye movement recorders can distort the measurement of fast eye movements such as saccades and nystagmic quick phases. In this paper, the effects of the bandwidth and noise of recording methods and the problems incurred by digital sampling are discussed theoretically with respect to the measurement of peak velocity and duration of fast eye movements. As a practical example, a TV-based infrared corneal reflex system is examined and a method for calibrating it for peak velocity measurement is described.     

Orienting of attention

Bartlett viewed thinking as a high level skill exhibiting ballistic properties that he called its “point of no return”. This paper explores one aspect of cognition through the use of a simple model task in which human subjects are asked to commit attention to a position in visual space other than fixation. This instruction is executed by orienting a covert (attentional) mechanism that seems sufficiently time locked to external events that its trajectory can be traced across the visual field in terms of momentary changes in the efficiency of detecting stimuli. A comparison of results obtained with alert monkeys, brain injured and normal human subjects shows the relationship of this covert system to saccadic eye movements and to various brain systems controlling perception and motion. In accordance with Bartlett's insight, the possibility is explored that similar principles apply to orienting of attention toward sensory input and orienting to the semantic structures used in thinking.     

Some thoughts on correspondence between saying and doing

Recent research on verbal-nonverbal correspondence is evaluated, and conceptual, methodological, and applied issues regarding correspondence are addressed. Directions for research concerning the correspondence training procedure and extended applications are suggested.