Fear of Success in Black Male and Female Graduate Students: A Pilot Study

In accordance with Horner's (1969) assumption that the intensity of fear of success arousal increases with the subject's success potential, graduate students from a prestigious university were chosen for a pilot investigation of the motive to avoid success in black men and women. Thirty-five subjects (14 female; 21 male) received a verbal TAT and a 54-item sex role questionnaire designed for purposes of this investigation. Fear of success was scored according to the new, experimentally derived scoring system for this motive. Contrary to expectation, the results did not indicate any evidence of success avoidance in either sex. However, fear of success in females was clearly associated with striving to develop career interests compatible with their strong commitment to home and husband, while among similarly motivated males it was suggested that the pragmatic career orientation observed was the product of compensatory motivational dynamics. It was concluded that these subjects were motivated to avoid what are perceived to be role-inappropriate behaviors while conforming to socially accepted values internalized in earlier years.     

Addressing Summer Reading Setback Among Economically Disadvantaged Elementary Students

Much research has established the contribution of summer reading setback to the reading achievement gap that is present between children from more and less economically advantaged families. Likewise, summer reading activity, or the lack of it, has been linked to summer setback. Finally, family socioeconomic status has been linked to the access children have to books in their homes and neighborhoods. Thus, in this longitudinal experimental study we tested the hypothesis that providing elementary school students from low-income families with a supply of self-selected trade books would ameliorate summer reading setback. Thus, 852 students from 17 high-poverty schools were randomly selected to receive a supply of self-selected trade books on the final day of school over a 3-year period, and 478 randomly selected students from these same schools received no books and served as the control group. No further effort was provided in this intervention study. Outcomes on the state reading assessment indicated a statistically significant effect (p = .015) for providing access to books for summer reading along with a significant (d = .14) effect size. Slightly larger effects (d = .21) were found when comparing the achievement of the most economically disadvantaged students in the treatment and control groups.     

What Produces Television Attention and Attention Style?

Individual looks at television vary enormously in length, and this has previously indicated differences in ongoing cognitive processes. Furthermore, the relative frequency of looks of different lengths may indicate styles of attention to television. This article compares visual attention of 152 subjects across a variety of genres and examines differences located by situation, person, and media perception variables. Attention style was not consistent for individuals but varied for different types of programming and between‐program breaks. Situational, person, and media belief variables did not predict the proportions of four types of looks. They did, however, predict differences in the proportion of moderately short (orienting) looks across types of content, but not the previously more important very short (monitoring) or moderately long (engaged) looks. The overall importance of type of content in these results suggests that further research should examine within‐program differences in message construction and assess attentional style as patterns or sequences of looks.     

A haptic error: Skew in a symmetrical curve

Symmetrically curved edges are often felt to be skewed, i.e., the highpoint feels off center. The direction of the skew depends on the direction of the hand’s scanning movement, the highpoint being felt to be towards the right when the hand scans in a left to right direction and towards the left when scanning right to left. The result clarifies some earlier studies and raises questions about relationships between the nature of the scanning movement and the quality of judgment.