Childrens' perceptions of parental expressiveness

While the literature suggests that males are less emotionally expressive than females, the issue has been informed by little systematic research. This article investigates the differences between sons' and daughters' perceptions of their mothers' and fathers' expressiveness of several emotions, both verbally and nonverbally. Using a sample of 1,245 students the dependent variable, perceived expressiveness of parents, was determined from responses to a 16-item Likert-type Perceived Parental Expressiveness Scale (PPES). It was hypothesized that fathers would be perceived to be less expressive than mothers. T tests were used to determine whether the mean differences are significant. The data indicate that fathers are perceived as less expressive of all emotions except physical anger. The ramifications of these findings for sex-role learning are discussed.The research reported in this paper is part of National Institute of Mental Health Grant No. 22156-01, The Inexpressive Male (Jack Balswick, Principal Investigator), University of Georgia. The authors wish to thank Dr. Charles W. Peek for his assistance in the revision of this article.     

Teacher reactions to school-based consultation services: A multivariate analysis

The impact of consultation services on teachers' preferences for consultation versus referral approaches and upon teachers' perceptions of severity for common acting out, withdrawal, and academic types of student problems were investigated. The subjects were 96 teachers whose public and parochial schools were matched and randomly assigned to treatment and control groups. Following a 14-week period during which advanced school psychology graduate students served as consultants in the treatment schools, the Pupil Problem Behavior Inventory (PPBI) was administered to all teachers. The results of a repeated measures MANOVA analysis indicated that the teachers in the treatment group rated the acting out and academic problems on the PPBI as significantly less severe than did teachers in the control group. The subjects in both the treatment and control groups indicated a significant preference for consultation rather than referral services for all types of student problems presented in the PPBI. There was a moderate, positive correlation between perceived problem severity and teacher preference for referral rather than consultation services. The study's results were interpreted as supportive of the consultation model.     

Cognitive task effects on hemispheric blood flow in humans: Evidence for individual differences in hemispheric activation

Evidence from two indirect measures of hemispheric activity, EEG α and conjugate lateral eye movements, has pointed to the existence of individual differences in hemispheric activation. Results from a more direct indicator of hemispheric activity, regional cerebral blood flow as measured by the ¹³³Xe inhalation method, show that such individual differences can be detected in the distribution of blood in the two hemispheres and that the amount of increase in blood flow in the right relative to the left hemisphere is correlated with performance on a spatial task. These results corroborate and extend the findings from the EEG and eye movement studies and suggest that the dimension of individual differences in hemispheric activation may exert significant influence on cognitive performance and on problem-solving strategies.     

TEACHING THE HANDICAPPED TO EAT IN PUBLIC PLACES: ACQUISITION,GENERALIZATION AND MAINTENANCE OF RESTAURANT SKILLS

This study examined classroom-based instruction in restauranting skills for handicapped persons. Three male students were taught each of four skill components in sequential order: locating, ordering, paying, and eating and exiting. Training was implemented in a multiple baseline design across subjects and consisted of modeling and role playing in conjunction with photo slide sequences and a simulated ordering counter. The use of a menu containing general item classes and a finger matching procedure for identifying errors in the delivery of change greatly reduced the reading and math skills necessary to enter and complete the program. Periodic probes were conducted in a McDonald's restaurant prior to, during, and up to one-year following the termination of training. In addition, two probes (overt and covert observation) were conducted in a Burger King restaurant to assess further generalization to a location different from the one depicted throughout training. Results showed that students' performance on restaurant probes improved as a result of training, generalized to novel settings, maintained over an extended period of time, and was comparable to that of a normative sample of nonretarded persons.     

Teaching awareness of strategic behavior in combination with strategy training: Effects on children's memory performance

The present study examined the effectiveness of two components (rehearsal training and strategy awareness) of an instructional package designed to train the developmentally young in the use of mature information processing techniques. Two groups of children of equivalent developmental age (MA = 8), one mildly retarded and the other of average intelligence, participated. Rehearsal training was effective in improving recall scores on the training task; however, neither rehearsal training, memory awareness, nor their combination significantly altered memory performance on the generalization tasks. There was evidence, however, that the combination of rehearsal training and strategy awareness did increase the likelihood of strategy transfer on the generalization task (recognition) which most closely resembled the training task. Post-task questioning revealed that instructions concerning memory awareness did improve subjects ability to verbalize appropriate strategic behavior; however, these improvements were not consistently translated into either actual use of a rehearsal strategy or improved performance. Discussion centered on the implications of these results and on the need for increased research on the metamnemonic skills involved in strategy generalization.     

Hypnosis for young adults: Freeing “the doctor who resides within”

This paper explains that the phenomenon of hypnosis is a naturally occurring talent, capacity, and skill that some practitioners suggest exists in nearly 90% of the population. Erickson's concept of and utilization of indirect suggestion is described and critiqued as an approach consistent with the separation/individuation issues confronting contemporary young adults. Hypnotherapy is recommended as a highly effective tool in a society suffering from severe alienation and lack of identity. Hypnosis is compared and contrasted with Cousin's discussion of placebo utilization in medicine. Hypnosis, akin to the placebo, is recognized as giving the doctor who resides within each patient a change to go to work.     

The air gap phenomenon in children's landscape drawings

The “air gap” phenomenon was found to be very common in the free landscape drawings of middle and later childhood. Three experiments are reported in which the contextual cues for such drawings were systematically manipulated. When subjects were supplied with drawing sheets constructed to imply the absence of the air gap, the phenomenon was eliminated in most of their drawings. When supplied with sheets constructed to imply its presence, most subjects produced air gap drawings using contextually provided reference lines. There were no consistent transfer effects across different cuing orders. The susceptibility of the air gap phenomenon to modification by task manipulation suggests that it results from problems of production rather than from defects in the child's internal representation of the world.