Procedure to extract a weekly pattern of performance of human reaction time.

A study of reaction time in six tests (speed of simple identification, simultaneous and sequential letter identification, simultaneous and sequential stimulus word matching, and semantic verification) was carried out on 130 children aged 7 to 12 years. Subjects were tested Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, using a cross-sectional design. The answers to each of the tests are binary in nature (Yes/No) measured by the recording of a click one of the two buttons of a microcomputer. Controlled variables were age, failure, sex, and day of test. The greatest percentage of the variance produced by the data was due to the age (typically 25%). The percentage attributable to the "day of test" (typically 5%) is hence masked by the variance due to the other factors. The method proposed herein makes it possible to isolate the percentage of the variance for the variable "day of test" alone and to provide evidence for a circaseptan effect on reaction time. It used a regressive correction on predominant variables. This effect shows performance is best on Thursday and weakest on Monday, the amplitude of the weekly rhythm being related to the task.     

Sexuality attitudes and behaviors of self-described very religious urban students in middle school

Data from a survey of 869 students aged 11 to 15 years and attending six urban middle schools were analyzed to identify differences in sex attitudes and behaviors between self-reported very religious students and their less religious peers. The two groups were demographically similar. They differed on only two attitude items, one suggesting that intercourse was a normal part of teenage dating and the other suggesting intercourse was alright if the two people were in love. The groups did not differ in their estimation of their peers' sexual activity or attitude or in terms of their own intercourse behavior or future intentions.     

Do novel associative word stem completion and cued recall share the same memory retrieval processes?

The aim of this study was to determine whether word stem completion for novel associations between cue and target words was mediated by automatic unconscious memory processes or effortful memory processes under conscious control. This was done by applying full and divided attention conditions at test to stem completion, cued recall, and recognition, and by administering a questionnaire that probed the memory strategies used by subjects during the completion test. Divided attention had no effect on stem completion performance, but did reduce associative cued recall. Recognition performance was weakened overall by divided attention, but the associative effect was similar under both attention conditions. This suggested that novel associative word stem completion was mediated by automatic retrieval processes. However, the results of the questionnaire indicated that only subjects who attempted to remember the words from the study phase during the completion task showed any novel associative effect. It is concluded that novel association word stem completion and cued recall share automatic retrieval processes, which nevertheless give rise to the experience of remembering.     

Reducing intergroup bias: elements of intergroup cooperation

The authors examined the potentially separable contributions of 2 elements of intergroup cooperation, interaction and common fate, and the processes through which they can operate. The manipulation of interaction reduced bias in evaluative ratings, which supports the idea that these components are separable, whereas the manipulation of common fate when the groups were interacting was associated with lower bias in nonverbal facial reactions in response to contributions by in-group and out-group members. Whereas interaction activated several processes that can lead to reduced bias, including decategorization, consistent with the common in-group identity model (S. L. Gaertner, J. F. Dovidio, P. A. Anastasio, B. A. Bachman, & M. C. Rust, 1993) as well as M. Hewstone and R. J. Brown's (1986) group differentiation model, the primary set of mediators involved participants' representations of the memberships as 2 subgroups within a superordinate entity.     

Robust representations for faces: evidence from visual search.

We report evidence from visual search that people can develop robust representations for highly overlearned faces. When observers searched for their own face versus the face of an unfamiliar observer, search slopes and intercepts revealed consistently faster processing of self than stranger. These processing advantages persisted even after hundreds of presentations of the unfamiliar face and even for atypical profile and upside-down views. Observers not only showed rapid asymptotic recognition of their own face as the target, but could reject their own face more quickly as the distractor. These findings suggest that robust representations for a highly overlearned face may (a) mediate rapid asymptotic visual processing, (b) require extensive experience to develop, (c) contain abstract or view-invariant information, (d) facilitate a variety of processes such as target recognition and distractor rejection, and (e) demand less attentional resources.     

The role of vocabulary ability during visual word recognition in younger and older adults

The role that vocabulary ability plays in adult age differences in word recognition was investigated. In Experiment 1, 44 older adults (ages 61-93 years) were compared with 44 younger adults (ages 18-39 years) on a standard lexical-decision task, with ambiguous words, unambiguous words, and pseudowords serving as stimuli. In Experiment 1, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-R; D. Wechsler, 1981) vocabulary performance was uncontrolled across the younger and older adults, and the older adults had higher WAIS-R scores. There was no Group x Stimulus interaction. In Experiment 2, the data from the same 44 older adults were compared with data from a new sample of 44 younger adults (ages 18-44). Both groups were then matched on WAIS-R performance. Results revealed a significant Group x Stimulus interaction. Reaction time differences between the younger and older groups on the ambiguous words and unambiguous words were identical. The differences in reaction times for words and pseudowords were greater in the older adults. The importance of vocabulary ability during word recognition and lexical processing is discussed.     

Gender Differences in Rape Reporting

This paper compares male and female rapereporting behavior. Participants from National Crime andVictimization Survey data (90% female, 10% male) aremuch like victims of other violent crimes (25%non-white, higher than average unemployment, young, andunmarried). The data indicate that the situationalcharacteristics of rape, and factors that influence arape reporting decision, differ by sex. Whereas men fail to report rape when it jeopardizes theirmasculine self-identity, women fail to report rape whenthe rape does not fit the classic stereotypical rapesituation. Women reported victimization more frequently than did men. It is asserted that furthercomparative research on rape reporting behaviorutilizing qualitative methods is needed in order tofully understand rape victimization for bothsexes.     

A delivery system for olfactory stimuli

This paper describes the design of a new method for controlling and administering olfactory stimuli—namely, thehood system. The hood system involves a stream of vaporized odor (at known concentrations) mixed with odorless air and pumped (at a constant flow rate) into an oxygen therapy hood. It is designed to be used with odorants in solution, such as essential oils, as the olfactory stimulus. The use of oxygen therapy hoods allows for the precise control of a constant concentration of odorized air over time, while allowing subjects to breathe normally. The hood system provides a natural administration of olfactory stimuli and the exact determination of the stimulus concentration. The use of this system will allow experimental conditions to be completely defined and results and replication studies to be accurately interpreted. The hood system is portable, cost effective, and constructed from readily available components. It is proposed that the hood system could be adopted to suit a wide range of olfactory research, particularly that in which the effects of chronic exposure to olfactory stimuli on cognition are examined.