A longitudinal study of change in work values between ninth and twelfth grades as related to high school curriculum

The purpose of this study was to examine the change in work values which takes place during adolescence between the ninth and twelfth grades. The Occupational Values Inventory (OVI) was the instrument selected for use in the study. This instrument was previously developed as part of the longitudinal Vocational Development Study (VDS) project in the Department of Vocational Education at the Pennsylvania State University. The unique features of the OVI is that it is an ipsative instrument with a forced choice format containing work value statements with a seventh grade reading level. The major hypothesis of the study was that important changes do occur between ninth and twelfth grades and that these changes differ depending on the students' high school curriculum. The sample for the study were 659 high school students who were seniors in the Spring of 1972 and who had taken the OVI 3 yr previously when they were in ninth grade. The results of the study indicate that five of the seven OVI values did change over the 3-yr period and at least some of this change appeared to be related to the students high school curriculum. Other important findings observed were: (1) the “Salary” value experienced the greatest increase; (2) value intensity changed so that strong values grew stronger and weak values weaker; (3) the Home Economics curriculum which is totally female experienced almost no change in work values while all other curriculums change on at least three values.     

Drive level and cue utilization in a free operant situation with albino rats

Summary Albino rats under either a daily high (2 gms) or moderate (12 gms) food deprivation condition were presented stimuli at the termination of reinforced fixed ratio bar press response chains. Within each drive group, half the animals received a session of brief light-off stimuli accompanied by reinforcement followed by a session of a buzzer and light-off compound stimuli paired with reinforcement. The remaining animals had the buzzer first paired with reinforcement and then the compound stimulus paired with reinforcement. Each stimulus element was tested for its respective control of nonreinforced food-cup approach behavior. These tests demonstrated that the buzzer cue blocked and overshadowed control of approach behavior of the light-off cue. In animals that received the initial light-off conditioning session, overshadowing by the buzzer of the light-off stimulus was less strong in high than moderate drive animals. These results were discussed in terms of Kamin's (1969) findings and Easterbrook's (1959) arousal-cue utilization hypothesis.The present study was supported by a grant given to the senior author from the National Research Council of Canada (APA 7450). The findings of the single stimulus control groups were also presented as a paper in modified form to the Canadian Psychological Association at its annual meeting, 1974, Windsor, Ontario, Canada.     

ACHIEVEMENT MOTIVE: ANALYZING THE VALIDITY OF THE WOFO

Spence and Helmreich developed the Work and Family Orientation (WOFO) Questionnaire as a multidimensional measure of achievement motivation and attitudes toward family and career because they believed that a unitary construct of achievement motivation was not sufficient to account for broad patterns of behavior in varied situations. This article reviews the evidence for the construct validity of the WOFO questionnaire based on data from a large group (N = 3, 727) of men and women with high educational and career aspirations. Evidence presented includes factor analysis of the WOFO subscale dimensions, subscale reliabilities, and an analysis of the effect of gender and masculinity-femininity on achievement motives. The research confirms new insights regarding the relationship between achievement motives and sex roles for women and men.     

Gender marking on citizens band radio: Self-identity in a limited-channel speech community

Self-assigned handles (nicknames) connote gender images in citizens band radio (CB), a limited-channel, mass participation speech community. Semantic differential analysis of a sample of male and female handles reveals that men project virility, while women collectively refrain from any significant degree of gender marking. Male dominance, absence of nonverbal communication channels, and the newness of the community combine to account for present image patterns.Research was supported by a grant from the University of South Florida Research Council. The author thanks R. Hansen, R. O'Hara, L. Penner, H. Vetter, W. Wheeler, and A. Wolfe for helpful suggestions; R. Fader, J. Fioroni, B. Johnson, and G. Wharton for technical assistance.     

Informational and motivational components of social reinforcement

Thirty-six four-year-old children of each sex were tested in a two-choice marble dropping task. There were three Ss in each cell of a 3 × 2 × 2 × 2 factorial design. The factors investigated were: reinforcement condition (Contingent, Yoked, Nonreinforcement), sex, base preference level (strong vs weak), Base Rate Level (high vs low). The dependent variables were: base preference ratio, base rate, preference ratio change, rate change. The contingently reinforced Ss had significantly higher preference change scores than Ss in the other two reinforcement conditions but only at the high base preference level. The Ss in both the contingent and yoked groups had higher rate change scores than Ss in the nonreinforcement group. The results were interpreted as indicating social reinforcement may have two effects, one a cue function and the other an effect on S's motivational system. The results indicate that regression effects do not operate in the two-choice task and that crossing baseline levels of performance is an effective way to control baseline differences in analyses of change in the two-choice task.     

Effects of uncertainty reduction,material rewards,and variety on children's choice behavior

This experiment was designed to isolate the incentive properties of uncertainty reduction (information) from those of material reward value and variety in a binary, competitive reward situation. After pretraining, fourth-grade children chose between a prescaled high-reward object and a question mark stimulus which concealed one of two lower-valued objects on each of 40 trials. The concealed objects appeared equally often for half the Ss and with a 9:1 ratio for the rest, thus, reducing one or 47 bit of uncertainty, respectively, when chosen. Ss also served as their own controls. In the control condition, stimulus color cued the identity of the concealed object, reducing uncertainty before a choice was made. As predicted, significantly more question marks were chosen when such choice reduced uncertainty (p < .001). Evidence for the influence of relative-reward value and object novelty was obtained. Uncertainty reduction appears to have incentive value independent of other factors.