TEACHING JOB INTERVIEW SKILLS TO RETARDED CLIENTS

Six retarded adults were taught job application and interview skills including introducing oneself, filling out a standard job application form, answering questions, and asking questions. A combination of instructions, modeling, role playing, and positive and corrective feedback was used across a multiple baseline experimental design. After training, the clients' performance in each area improved substantially over baseline levels. In addition, the newly taught skills appeared to generalize to a different office, application form, and interviewer.     

An individual differences additive model: An alterating least squares method with optimal scaling features

An individual differences additive model is discussed which represents individual differences in additivity by differential weighting of additive factors. A procedure for estimating the model parameters for various data measurement characteristics is developed. The procedure is evaluated using both Monte Carlo and real data. The method is found to be very useful in describing certain types of developmental change in cognitive structure, as well as being numerically robust and efficient.The work reported here was partly supported by Grant A6394 to the first author by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada.     

ON PERCEPTION OF DEPICTED ORIENTATION

La perception de l'orientation picturale. — Les deux expériences décrites ici indiquent qu'en matière de perception picturale, les individus de certaines cultures, outre celles qui sont relatives à la perception de la profondeur, rencontrent des difficultés pour percevoir correctement l'orientation. La grandeur des erreurs relativement à l'interprétation de l'orientation dans les dessins semble dépendre de l'angle sous lequel l'ensemble des stimulus est représenté, la position des sujets relativement à l'appareil et la signification implicite de l'ensemble représenté.     

Help seeking in aggressive and nonaggressive boys as a function of social or mechanical mediation of assistance

The behavior of preadolescent and adolescent boys, rated as aggressive and nonaggressive, was examined to test predictions from Bandura and Walters' social-learning theory and from Weiss and Miller's punishment model of audience-observation effects. The subjects were given a bogus motor task, actually insoluble, with help available on each trial. For half the subjects, help was given through the mediation of a social agent; for the rest, help was on a nonsocial, mechanically mediated basis. The groups for whom help was socially mediated made fewer help-seeking responses and decreased the number of such responses over successive trial blocks. The predictions from Bandura and Walters' theory were not supported, since neither age nor degree of aggressiveness had an effect on help-seeking responses. The results were, however, consistent with the punishment model of audience effects.The preparation of this report was supported by U.S. Public Health Service, Maternal and Child Health Service Project No. 916, and by Grant HD-03110 from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Appreciation is expressed to Miss Sydney Silverstein, who served as experimenter; to Mr. James Blank and Mr. William Blecker of the Iowa City Public School System; and to Dr. Jane E. Anderson, Dr. Dee W. Norton, Dr. A. L. Benton, and Dr. David A. Parton of the University of Iowa.     

Psychophysiological aspects of systematic desensitization: some outstanding issues

Nine psychophysiological propositions generated by systematic desensitization theory were examined in the light of recent research. Four propositions were substantially confirmed, four partially confirmed and one was not confirmed. Facts reviewed did no agree with the prediction from desensitization theory that less threatening stimuli decondition faster than more threatening stimuli. With the exception noted above, desensitization theory was generally supported. A scheme for distinguishing four types of autonomic response change (habituation, reciprocal inhibition, counterconditioning and extinction) was presented.     

TEMPORAL INTEGRATION OF PERCEPTUAL RESPONSE TO SUPRALIMINAL ELECTRICAL STIMULATION

E kman , G., F röberg , J. & F rankenhaeuser , M. Temporal integration of perceptual response to supraliminal electrical stimulation. Scand. J. Psychol ., 1968, 9, 83–88.—The effect of duration of electrical stimulation on perceived unpleasantness was investigated in 10 subjects. Duration of stimulation ranged from 0.05 to 3.00 sec. Three levels of intensity were investigated representing 2, 3, and 4 times the individual sensation threshold. For all stimulus intensities perceived unpleasantness was a simple logarithmic function of stimulus duration over the whole temporal range. This relation describes the trend of both the group data and the data from most individual subjects. The results support previous findings over a narrower temporal range and agree with results recently obtained in several additional sense modalities.     

PATTERNS OF EXPERIENCE AND THE ACQUISITION OF CONCRETE TRANSITIVITY OF WEIGHT IN EIGHT-YEAR-OLD CHILDREN

The effects of empirical control vs. no empirical control, and of fixed vs. free procedure on the acquisition of transitivity of weight was studied. The fixed procedure involved practice on the sequence A > B, B > C, A > C, whereas the free procedure merely required the children to order triads of objects according to weight. Around thirty per cent of the subjects acquired transitivity, but none of the experimental variables had any effect. It is concluded that empirical control is unimportant. The lack of effect of free vs. fixed procedure is contrary to some earlier findings with younger children, who profited only from a free procedure.