The Transracial Adoption Debate: Counseling and Legal Implications

Over the last 30 years, the practice of White American parents adopting African American children has been the focus of much deliberation and commentary. In this article, the authors illuminate relevant literature and research regarding transracial adoption. Counseling and legal implications are also discussed.     

Inhibiting children's memory of an interactive event: the effectiveness of a cover‐up

Children are generally more susceptible than adults to suggestive interview techniques. Children's memories of an event can be altered and added to by presenting post‐event information (PEI). What is not known is whether embedding silence about a particular scene within the PEI makes that scene less likely to be reported. Children aged 5–6 years made cakes with an agent ‘Mrs Flour’. The following day they received PEI in which a target scene from the original event was omitted, resulting in children reporting the target scene significantly less often than did controls (control= 57% and omit= 23% correct responses). There was direct evidence from the children's language that the omission led to a detriment in memory for the original scene itself. Allowing children to draw during the interview did not reduce the effect. Implications are discussed in terms of child victims and witnesses particularly regarding child sexual abuse. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How quickly do children forget events? A systematic study of children's event reports as a function of delay

Sixty‐six children aged between 5 and 7 years participated in the event, ‘Visiting the Pirate’, and were interviewed about it at one of five delays, namely, no delay (immediate interview), or at a 1‐week, 1‐day, 1‐month or 6‐month delay. For open‐ended recall, a significant decrease in the amount of information reported was detected only at the 6‐month delay, although forgetting functions indicated forgetting was most rapid at the shorter delays. Accuracy of open‐ended recall was maintained over all delays. In contrast, in response to specific, leading and misleading questions, accuracy had decreased significantly by the 6‐month delay. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings regarding the effects of delays on children's event reports are discussed. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Wading Through the Quagmire of Religious History

How should we teach religious history? What is the impact of our methodology on what, and on how, our students learn? Is there a methodology that cultivates an awareness of the multiculturalism and the need for deeper social interaction that characterizes many of our classrooms? This essay proposes and briefly explores the potential value of empathetic engagement as a pedagogical tool in response to these concerns. A specific application of empathetic engagement is made to teaching and learning about the history of American Catholicism.     

The sources of skill in seriating cups in children,monkeys and apes

Is a concept of either reversibility or of hierarchical forms of combination necessary for skilled seriation? We examined this question by presenting seriating cups to adult capuchin monkeys and chimpanzees and to 11‐, 16‐ and 21‐month‐old children. Capuchins and chimpanzees consistently created seriated sets with five cups, and placed a sixth cup into a previously seriated set. Children of all three ages created seriated five‐cup sets less consistently than the capuchins and chimpanzees, and were rarely able to place a sixth cup into a seriated set. Twenty‐one‐month‐olds produced more structures containing three or more cups than did the younger age groups, and these children also achieved seriated sets more frequently. Within all participant groups, success at seriating five cups was associated with the frequency of combining three or more cups, regardless of form. The ability to integrate multiple elements in persistent combinatorial activity is sufficient for the emergence of seriation in young children, monkeys and apes. Reliance on particular methods of combination and a concept of reversibility are later refinements that can enhance skilled seriation.     

Mapping the development of white matter tracts with diffusion tensor imaging

In this study, the development of white matter was studied using an optimized diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) protocol in 20 normal subjects (10–40 years old). The normal development of white matter tracts was addressed by comparing the diffusion anisotropy results between two sub‐groups: eight adults (26–38 years old) and eight adolescents (13–15 years old). The difference in myelination extent between these two groups as indexed by the fractional anisotropy was identified by conducting a student t‐test of the measured diffusion anisotropy maps. Significant differences (p < 0.01) were detected in the gyrus frontalis medialis (GFM), gyrus temporalis medialis (GTM) and gyrus cinguli (GC), in addition to the developmental changes in corpus callosum. A brief overview of previous published DTI studies in developmental science and current progress in DTI techniques is also given at the end of this paper. It may be useful for readers interested in using DTI to study developmental problems but who are not familiar with the various technical aspects.     

How Do Consumers Transfer Existing Knowledge? A Comparison of Analogy and Categorization Effects

The trend in recent consumer research has been to emphasize the similarities between analogy and categorization. In this investigation, we merge the literature on analogy, categorization, and structure mapping theory to reach a better understanding of their differences. In 3 experiments, we compare consumers’ responses to analogy and categorization cues and find that analogy places much greater constraints on knowledge transfer than categorization by focusing consumers on relational similarities. Illustrating this, the analogy group in Study 1 was just as likely as the categorization group to generate relational inferences, but much less likely to generate attribute inferences. Likewise, the results of Study 2 indicate that the analogy group restricted their processing of features lying outside the common relational system, leading to inferior recall relative to the categorization group. Building on these findings, Study 3 demonstrates that, under certain circumstances, analogy and categorization work together syn‐ergistically to enhance consumer memory.     

The effects of dropping in‐situation safety behaviors in the treatment of social phobia

Over the past years, important advances in the cognitive–behavioral treatment of social phobia have taken place. There is wide evidence that demonstrates exposure is an effective treatment for social phobia. However, some research has noticed that exposure has limitations in treating this disorder. In clinical practice we find patients who do not achieve marked reductions in anxiety using this technique. One of the mechanisms that can be involved is the use of in‐situation safety behaviors, which patients use to prevent the feared consequences in social situations. The aim of this study is to present a single case study where we compare the improvement achieved using exposure alone versus exposure dropping in‐situation safety behaviors. The social phobic patient improved significantly when exposure was combined with the drop of in‐situation safety behaviors. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.