Suicide Attempts in Preadolescent Child Psychiatry Inpatients

This paper describes a preliminary study examining the relative power of measures of perceived family support, hopelessness, and depression for the classification of suicide attempters and nonattempters in a series of 8- to 13-year-old psychiatric inpatients. Results of a stepwise discriminant-function analysis indicated that a measure of a child's perceived family support discriminated between suicide attempters and nonattempters with an 88% accuracy rate. The addition of measures of hopelessness and depression at later steps did not lead to improved classification. The results are interpreted as providing strong support for a link between suicide attempts in children and perceptions of low family support.     

Response to Mara Sidoli

My paper is a response to the clinical material in Mara Sidoli's paper about two patients who in the course of their treatment create an important symbol – a roaring symbol. In my response I construct a Freudian lion from the material of the first patient, and a Jungian lion from the second one. In both instances the vicissitudes of aggression as discussed are extracted from the therapeutic process.     

Political Participation and Feminist Consciousness Among Women Activists of the 1960s

This paper examined the hypothesis that women who took part in student movements of the 1960s would be distinguishable from their contemporaries in terms of political ideology, political behavior, and feminism in middle age. Women who had been identified as student activists in public records during the late 1960s and early 1970s were compared to a sample of nonactivist peers. Although the two groups scored similarly on variables related to work and family arrangements, former activists scored higher on measures of leftist political orientation and political efficacy, reported greater political salience and collectivism, and reported greater current political participation. Although both groups reported high levels of feminist consciousness and identity, activists scored significantly higher. The difficulty of politically mobilizing women to combat gender discrimination is discussed in light of the discrepancy between consciousness and activism in the comparison group.     

Letter legibility and visual word recognition

Word recognition performance varies systematically as a function of where the eyes fixate in the word. Performance is maximal with the eye slightly left of the center of the word and decreases drastically to both sides of thisoptimal viewing position. While manipulations of lexical factors have only marginal effects on this phenomenon, previous studies have pointed to a relation between the viewing position effect (VPE) and letter legibility: When letter legibility drops, the VPE becomes more exaggerated. To further investigate this phenomenon, we improved letter legibility by magnifying letter size in a way that was proportional to the distance from fixation (e.g., TABLE). Contrary to what would be expected if the VPE were due to limits of acuity, improving the legibility of letters has only a restricted influence on performance. In particular, for long words, a strong VPE remains even when letter legibility is equalized across eccentricities. The failure to neutralize the VPE is interpreted in terms of perceptual learning: Since normally, because of acuity limitations, the only information available in parafoveal vision concerns low-resolution features of letters; even when magnification provides better information, readers are unable to make use of it.     

Prevalence of Disordered Eating Behaviors and Bulimia Nervosa in a Sample of Mexican American Female College Students

Disordered eating behaviors and bulimia nervosa were examined in a sample of female Mexican Americans. Results showed that 1.4% to 4.3% could be classified with bulimia. Just over 11% indicated regular binge eating; dieting and exercising were the primary techniques used for weight control. Implications for intervention are briefly discussed.     

Representing Radcliffe: Perceptions and Consequences of Social Class

Using retrospective data from a sample of women who graduated from Radcliffe College in 1964, this paper examines the perceptions (what women notice) and consequences (how it makes them feel) of social class during college in these women's lives. The majority of women acknowledged that social class was salient at Radcliffe by stating so directly, by noticing members of different class groups, and/or by mentioning their own class backgrounds. In addition, women consistently perceived two markers of social class: exclusivity and the differences between public and private high school graduates. Surprisingly, there were no differences by social class background in the rates of these perceptions; social class indicators were equally apparent to women from different social class backgrounds. However, most commonly among women from working-class backgrounds, there were psychological consequences of social class that were manifested in feeling bad about themselves. In order to understand the psychology of social class most fully, it seems important to distinguish between perception and consequence in the psychological study of social class, and to pay attention to the impact not only of people's backgrounds, but of social class cues in the environments in which they operate.