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.     

La question ontologique et laPhénoménologie de la perception

Sans résuméNous remercions le professeur Gary Brent Madison de l'Université McMaster ainsi que le professeur Théodore Geraets de l'Université d'Ottawa qui ont lu et commenté des versions antérieures de cet article. Nous voulons remercier en particulier la professeure Gisèle Chevalier du Département d'études franÇaises de l'Université de Moncton pour ses précieux conseils sur le fond et la forme du texte. Les erreurs et les omissions demeurent toutefois les nÔtres.     

As time goes by: Sixth graders remember a kindergarten experience

In this research we compared kindergarten children's immediate recall of a class field trip to a museum of archaeology on the same day of the trip to their recall 6 weeks later, 1 year later and 6 years later. Not surprisingly, children remembered less about this event over time. However, what children did recall was recalled as accurately and in as much detail 6 years after the trip as immediately after the trip. Most striking were the effects of cueing on memory over time. Without specific cues the event was forgotten by almost all of the children after 1 year, but with cues, 87 per cent of the children could recall details of the event even after 6 years. The set of ‘core’ activities which all children tended to recall on all recall trials were those activities that made this particular event distinctive. However, with increasing time since experiencing the event, children's recall tended to become more reconstructive and inferential. Thus, forgetting in autobiographic memory seems to involve three processes: decreases in amount recalled, changes in accessibility, and changes in memory content.     

Book reviews

Dharmakirti's Theory of Hetu‐centricity of Anumāna. MANGALA R. CHINCHORE, 1989 Delhi, Motilal Banarsidass i‐xvii+195 pp., Rs. 125.00

A Hindu Perspective on the Philosophy of Religion. ARVIND SHARMA, 1990 London, Macmillan 180 + xi pp., £35.00

Rationality and Mind in Early Buddhism. FRANK J. HOFFMAN, 1987 Delhi, Motilal Banarsidass 126 + xii pp., Rs. 75.00

Allah Transcendent: studies in the structure and semiotics of Islamic Philosophy, Theology and Cosmology. IAN RICHARD NETTON, 1989 London, Routledge 383 pp., £45.00

Moses Maimonides. Arabic Thought and Culture Series OLIVER LEAMAN, 1990 London and New York, Routledge 190 + xii pp., £30.00 hb, £9.99 pb     

A qualitative investigation of Muslim and Christian women's views of religion and feminism in their lives

This qualitative investigation explored a relatively understudied aspect of cultural diversity: feminism and religion in the lives of religiously diverse women. More specifically, structured interviews were used to investigate views of religion, women's issues, gender roles, culture, and feminism for a small group of Muslim and Christian women living in the United States. The data were analyzed using consensual qualitative research methods (Hill, Thompson, & Williams, 1997). Findings indicated a complex relationship between feminism, gender roles, culture, and religion for these women with the majority of the Muslim women reporting that their religion supports feminist principles and identifying themselves as feminist. Christian women were less willing to endorse the feminist label. Implications for multicultural feminist practice are discussed.     

Getting it right by getting it wrong: When learners change languages

When natural language input contains grammatical forms that are used probabilistically and inconsistently, learners will sometimes reproduce the inconsistencies; but sometimes they will instead regularize the use of these forms, introducing consistency in the language that was not present in the input. In this paper we ask what produces such regularization. We conducted three artificial language experiments, varying the use of determiners in the types of inconsistency with which they are used, and also comparing adult and child learners. In Experiment 1 we presented adult learners with scattered inconsistency - the use of multiple determiners varying in frequency in the same context - and found that adults will reproduce these inconsistencies at low levels of scatter, but at very high levels of scatter will regularize the determiner system, producing the most frequent determiner form almost all the time. In Experiment 2 we showed that this is not merely the result of frequency: when determiners are used with low frequencies but in consistent contexts, adults will learn all of the determiners veridically. In Experiment 3 we compared adult and child learners, finding that children will almost always regularize inconsistent forms, whereas adult learners will only regularize the most complex inconsistencies. Taken together, these results suggest that regularization processes in natural language learning, such as those seen in the acquisition of language from non-native speakers or in the formation of young languages, may depend crucially on the nature of language learning by young children.