Independent effects of word concreteness and word valence on immediate serial recall

The present study examined the roles of word concreteness and word valence in the immediate serial recall task. Emotion words (e.g. happy) were used to investigate these effects. Participants completed study-test trials with 7-item study lists consisting of positive or negative words with either high or low concreteness (Experiments 1 and 2) and neutral (i.e. non-emotion) words with either high or low concreteness (Experiment 2). In serial recall performance, we replicated the typical item concreteness effect (concrete words are better recalled than abstract words) and obtained an item valence effect (positive/neutral words are better recalled than negative words). However, there was no concreteness × valence interaction. We conclude that both word valence and word concreteness independently contribute to the serial order retention of emotion words in the immediate serial recall task.     

Emotion effects during reading: Influence of an emotion target word on eye movements and processing

Recently, Scott, O'Donnell and Sereno reported that words of high valence and arousal are processed with greater ease than neutral words during sentence reading. However, this study unsystematically intermixed emotion (label a state of mind, e.g., terrified or happy) and emotion-laden words (refer to a concept that is associated with an emotional state, e.g., debt or marriage). We compared the eye-movement record while participants read sentences that contained a neutral target word (e.g., chair) or an emotion word (no emotion-laden words were included). Readers were able to process both positive (e.g., happy) and negative emotion words (e.g., distressed) faster than neutral words. This was true across a wide range of early (e.g., first fixation durations) and late (e.g., total times on the post-target region) measures. Additional analyses revealed that State Trait Anxiety Inventory scores interacted with the emotion effect and that the emotion effect was not due to arousal alone.     

Three Approaches to the Disjunction Between Psychological Measurement and Psychological Persons: Methodological and Ethical Considerations

In this paper, we take forward Schwarz’s (2009) disjunction between measurement-apparatus-questionnaire and measurement-apparatus-man to examine how the crisis in contemporary psychology is related to assumptions about two sets of connections in research: connections between research tools, research behaviours, and psychological phenomena; and connections between researchers and researchees. By setting up a research problem with methodological and ethical implications, we describe three approaches that involve different assumptions and research activities in relation to the ways each makes these connections: Disassociated, Conventionally Connected and Persons in Dialogue Approaches. We argue that a Persons in Dialogue Approach is the most appropriate approach for a 21st Century psychology in crisis.     

Will the Real Moral Judgment Please Stand Up?

The recent, influential Social Intuitionist Model of moral judgment (Haidt, Psychological Review 108, 814–834, 2001) proposes a primary role for fast, automatic and affectively charged moral intuitions in the formation of moral judgments. Haidt’s research challenges our normative conception of ourselves as agents capable of grasping and responding to reasons. We argue that there can be no ‘real’ moral judgments in the absence of a capacity for reflective shaping and endorsement of moral judgments. However, we suggest that the empirical literature indicates a complex interplay between automatic and deliberative mental processes in moral judgment formation, with the latter constraining the expression and influence of moral intuitions. We therefore conclude that the psychological literature supports a normative conception of agency.

Use of the Brazelton neonatal assessment scale to educate parents of high-risk infants

This article describes how the Brazelton Neonatal Assessment Scale might be used to assist parents in recognizing their infant's cues and capabilities. Infants to whom the scale as administered were high-risk babies requiring care in an intensivecare unit. The scale can be a useful component of an educational program for parents of newborns.     

Theorem counting

Consider the set of tautologies of the classical propositional calculus containing no connective other than and, or, and not. Consider the subset of this set containing tautologies in exactlyn propositional variables. This paper provides a method for determining the number of equivalence classes of each such subset modulo equivalence in the infinite-valued Lukasiewicz propositional calculus.     

Postdrinking Sexual Inferences: Evidence for Linear Rather Than Curvilinear Dosage Effects1

Observers infer more sexual availability and willingness from a drinking dater. We hypothesized that, as dosage rises, these sexual inferences follow a linear pattern. College participants rated a woman (Study 1) and man (Study 2) exhibiting a sober, moderate, or high level of intoxication while with a light-drinking companion. Alcohol was perceived as having linear effects on sexual availability; and, except for male participants in Study 2, alcohol was perceived as having linear effects on willingness. Thus, with rising intoxication and diminished capacity for arousal, drinkers are perceived as more available and willing. Findings are discussed relative to expectancy models of sexuality. Reasons for desynchrony between alcohol's actual supression of sexual arousal and its perceived enhancement of willingness are presented.