Competence,guilt, and victimization: Sex differences in attribution of causality in television dramas

Sex differences in attribution of causality are investigated in three types of television programs: prime-time family, violent, and daytime serial shows. Both frequency and type of causal statements were studied, using DeCharm's conceptualization of personal causation as origin-like (internal to the self) or pawn-like (external to the self). There were striking sex differences in violent programs, with males modeling more origin behavior and females modeling more pawn behavior. In soap operas there were no sex differences, but both origin and pawn ideas were expressed in terms of personal responsibility, with fewer references to more competent origin behaviors such as goal setting, planned decision making, or self-confidence. These findings have implications for differential socialization of competent coping skills for males and females.The authors would like to express appreciation to Katie Henry and Jennifer Mardoyan, who assisted with this research.     

Gender-based influences: The promotion recommendation

This study used a between-subjects analysis of variance design (2 × 2 × 2 × 2) to estimate the effects of rater gender, ratee gender, the gender stereotype of the job, and the gender stereotype of the ratee's personal characteristics on a promotion decision. The results indicated that female employees with masculine characteristics were evaluated as most promotable regardless of the gender stereotype of the job or the gender of the rater. We also investigated the personal characteristics raters reported using in making their decisions. We asked raters to select ratee personal characteristics that most influenced their promotion decisions. Discriminant analyses showed that male and female raters approached the rating process differently and that it is predominantly the gender stereotype of the ratee's personal characteristics rather than the ratee's gender that influences the promotion process.     

A hot new way to measure aggression: Hot sauce allocation

Laboratory experiments investigating aggressive behavior have operationalized and assessed aggression in a variety of ways; however, these measures are often problematic because they do not create a situation in which participants perceive potential for real harm to come to the target, there is a risk of actual harm to the target, or they are too familiar to participants. To overcome these limitations, we developed a new method for measuring aggression, specifically, the amount of hot sauce administered to a target known to dislike spicy foods. We summarize a series of experiments assessing theory‐based hypotheses regarding aggression in which this measure is employed. We then briefly consider the strengths and limitations of this new measure. Aggr. Behav. 25:331–348, 1999. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Living a Lie: Self-Deception, Habit, and Social Roles

In this paper I give an account of self-deception by situating it within the theory of human conduct advanced by American pragmatists John Dewey and George Herbert Mead. After examining and rejecting the two most prevalent explanations of self-deception - namely, Sigmund Freud's psychoanalytic interpretation and Jean-Paul Sartre's phenomenological one - I provide a brief sketch of some of Dewey's and Mead's fundamental insights into the inherently social nature of mind.I argue that one of the main forms of self-deception involves unreflective acceptance of a belief that impartial inspection would readily expose as spurious. In this instance lying to oneself arises from the failure to analyze an appealing idea from the perspective of the generalized other which we acquire through participation in the universe of rational discourse. I conclude by pointing to certain features of contemporary social life that may indirectly promote such self-dissimulation.     

Presence of administrators differentially impacts eyewitness discriminability for same- and other-race identifications

Best practice guidelines recommend that eyewitness lineup administrators be blind to a suspect's identity, but no research has investigated whether the mere presence of a lineup administrator impacts eyewitness identification decisions. Informed by social facilitation theory, we predicted that the presence of an audience would differentially impact identification accuracy for same- and other-race identifications. Participants (N = 191) viewed same- and other-race lineups either with an audience or alone. Although the presence of an audience did not directly impact identification accuracy, significant indirect effects indicated that the audience provoked evaluation apprehension which hindered other-race identification accuracy and improved same-race identification accuracy. We suggest that using double-blind lineup procedures may not sufficiently protect eyewitness identification accuracy when making other-race lineup decisions in the presence of others.     

A preliminary examination of the evocative effects of the establishing operation

We attempted to isolate the evocative effects of the establishing operation for positively reinforced problem behavior with 2 participants. The study consisted of three phases. First, a functional analysis identified tangible items (Participant 1) and attention (Participant 2) as maintaining problem behavior. Second, access to tangible items and attention was systematically controlled (continuous access vs. no access) immediately prior to functional analysis sessions in which these consequences were delivered contingent on problem behavior. Results of this phase indicated that problem behavior occurred at higher levels when access to tangible items and attention was restricted. In the third phase, prior access was again controlled, but problem behavior produced no consequences. Results of this final phase indicated that problem behavior occurred at higher levels during extinction sessions when participants did not have prior access to the reinforcers.     

Intentions in teasing: when "just kidding" just isn't good enough

Teasing is ambiguous. Although the literal content of a tease is, by definition, negative, seldom do teasers intend for their tease to be taken literally. Toward this aim, teasers often attempt to mitigate the negative surface content of the tease by communicating via gesture, facial expression, or tone of voice that they are "just kidding." The research presented here suggests that such attempts often fall on deaf ears. Despite teasers' attempts to mitigate the tease, targets are often unaware of--and unmoved by--the teaser's benign intentions. As a result, teasers and targets systematically differ in their perceptions of teasing: Although it is often seen as innocent and playful by the teaser, it tends to be construed as considerably more malicious by the target.     

Promoting fluency of performance during morning dressing by two persons with multiple disabilities

This study investigated the possibility of promoting fluency of performance, i.e., a performance independent of caregiver's guidance and without serious interruptions, during morning dressing in two adults with multiple disabilities. The intervention program relied on the use of assistive technology including optic and pressure sensors to monitor the participants' task responding and tape players to present preferred stimuli in relation to such responding, as well as messages of encouragement. Analysis showed that the intervention program was effective with both participants. In fact, they became capable of performing the dressing sequence with only occasional guidance from research assistants, and the time they required for dressing dropped significantly from baseline levels. Implications of the results are discussed.     

Does attention follow the motion in the "shooting line" illusion?

When a line is presented in the vicinity of a recent luminance change (peripheral cue), it is perceived to be drawn over time away from its "cued" end even though the line is actually presented all at once. This study was designed to determine whether attention, exogenously attracted to the cue, would come under the exogenous control of this illusory motion and follow the drawing motion from the cued end to its terminus. Each trial began with the display of four small squares at the corners of an imaginary square centered about fixation. On the critical trials, one of the four squares brightened briefly, after which a horizontal line was presented joining either the two upper or the two lower squares. Shortly thereafter, the distribution of attention was determined by asking the observer to indicate the nature of a change that was equally likely to occur to one of the squares. Responses to targets presented at a noncued location that was at the end of an illusorily drawn line were as fast as those to targets at the cued location and were much faster than those to targets at the remaining noncued locations. This pattern was not shown when the line preceded the cue, strongly suggesting that attention follows the motion in this illusion.     

The ties that bind what is known to the recognition of what is new

Recognition success varies with how information is encoded (e.g., level of processing) and with what is already known as a result of past learning (e.g., word frequency). This article presents the results of experiments showing that preexisting connections involving the associates of studied words facilitate their recognition regardless of whether the words are intentionally encoded or are incidentally encoded under semantic or nonsemantic conditions. Words are more likely to be recognized when they have either more resonant connections coming back to them from their associates or more connections among their associates. Such results occur even though attention is never drawn to these associates. Regression analyses showed that these connections affect recognition independently of frequency, so the present results add to the literature showing that prior lexical knowledge contributes to episodic recognition. In addition, equations that use free-association data to derive composite strength indices of resonance and connectivity were evaluated. Implications for theories of recognition are discussed.