Zuckerman's revised alternative five-factor model: validation of the Zuckerman-Kuhlman-Aluja Personality Questionnaire in four French-speaking countries

The aim of this study was to analyze the replicability of Zuckerman's revised Alternative Five-factor model in a French-speaking context by validating the Zuckerman-Kuhlman-Aluja Personality Questionnaire (ZKA-PQ) simultaneously in 4 French-speaking countries. The total sample was made up of 1,497 subjects from Belgium, Canada, France, and Switzerland. The internal consistencies for all countries were generally similar to those found for the normative U.S. and Spanish samples. A factor analysis confirmed that the normative structure replicated well and was stable within this French-speaking context. Moreover, multigroup confirmatory factor analyses have shown that the ZKA-PQ reaches scalar invariance across these 4 countries. Mean scores were slightly different for women and men, with women scoring higher on Neuroticism but lower on Sensation Seeking. Globally, mean score differences across countries were small. Overall, the ZKA-PQ seems an interesting alternative to assess both lower and higher order personality traits for applied or research purposes.     

Manifestability and Epistemic Truth

I argue that the standard anti-realist argument from manifestability to intuitionistic logic is either unsound or invalid. Strong interpretations of the manifestability of understanding are falsified by the existence of blindspots for knowledge. Weaker interpretations are either too weak, or gerrymandered and ad hoc. Either way, they present no threat to classical logic.     

Learning from others in 9‐18‐month‐old infants

The use of an adult as a resource for help and instruction in a problem solving situation was examined in 9, 14, and 18‐month‐old infants. Infants were placed in various situations ranging from a simple means‐end task where a toy was placed beyond infants' prehensile space on a mat, to instances where an attractive toy was placed inside closed transparent boxes that were more or less difficult for the child to open. The experimenter gave hints and modelled the solution each time the infant made a request (pointing, reaching, or showing a box to the experimenter), or if the infant was unable to solve the problem. Infants' success on the problems, sensitivity to the experimenter's modelling, and communicative gestures (requests, co‐occurrence of looking behaviour and requests) were analysed. Results show that older infants had better success in solving problems although they exhibited difficulties in solving the simple means‐end task compared to the younger infants. Moreover, 14‐ and 18‐month‐olds were sensitive to the experimenter's modelling and used her demonstration cues to solve problems. By contrast, 9‐month‐olds did not show such sensitivity. Finally, 9‐month‐old infants displayed significantly fewer communicative gestures toward the adult compared to the other age groups, although in general, all infants tended to increase their frequency of requests as a function of problem difficulty. These observations support the idea that during the first half of the second year infants develop a new collaborative stance toward others. The stance is interpreted as foundational to teaching and instruction, two mechanisms of social learning that are sometime considered as specifically human. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Le Calcul de L'Ambiguite de Shannon en Code Binaire

Sans résumé     

Predictive Validity of Adult Attachment Measures in Relation to Emotion Regulation Behaviors in Marital Interactions

This study examined the predictive validity of 2 assessment approaches to adult attachment in relation to emotion regulation behaviors during marital conflict interactions. Both partners of 40 couples completed the Adult Attachment Style self-report (AAS; C. Hazan & P. Shaver, 1987), the Adult Attachment Questionnaire (AAQ; J. A. Simpson, 1990), the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI; C. George, N. Kaplan, & M. Main, 1985), and a videotaped interaction during which the partners engaged in a problem-solving discussion. The discussions were coded by means of the Interactional Dimensions Coding System (IDCS; D. Julien, H. J. Markman, & K. M. Lindhal, 1989). Results showed that AAI classification predicted proactive emotion regulation behaviors, whereas the AAS and the AAQ did not. Issues concerning the predictive validity of current measures of adult attachment are discussed.     

Changes in suicide methods in Quebec between 1987 and 2000: the possible impact of bill C-17 requiring safe storage of firearms

This study presents the changes in the overall and firearm suicide rates for Québec (Canada) before and after Bill C-17, which was implemented to secure safe storage of firearms. It covers 20,009 suicide cases reported to the coroner's office. Interrupted time series analysis is used to compare suicide rates in the two periods. Firearm suicide rates have dropped among males and females, but the downward trends were not significant when compared to those prior to the law. Hanging suicide rates have risen considerably among men and women, but those upward trends did not increase significantly when compared with those preceding the law. The decline in suicide rates involving firearms has not resulted in a parallel decline in overall suicide rates. The analyses suggest that Bill C-17 neither improved the downward trend in firearm suicide, which had already begun before the enactment of the law, nor reduced the upward trend of the overall suicide rate. Correlation analyses between firearm suicide, hanging suicide, and the overall suicide rate suggest that firearm suicide is replaced by hanging suicide among males.     

Defining the boundary of childhood amnesia

When adults are asked to recall their earliest autobiographical memories most can recall nothing about their infancy and early childhood, a phenomenon commonly referred to as childhood amnesia. There is general consensus regarding the existence of childhood amnesia, but there remains considerable debate over its boundary. Most researchers have argued that the boundary of childhood amnesia occurs between the ages of 3 and 4 years, but in 1993 Usher and Neisser published a highly influential paper, which has subsequently been used to argue that the boundary may be as low as 2 years. In the present experiment we examined how changes in scoring criteria influence our estimates of the age of adults' earliest memories. We conclude that some coding criteria are more valid than others and that the best estimates of childhood amnesia will include measures of free recall in addition to the specific questions that have dominated prior research in this area.     

La relation entre les conflits conjugaux,la satisfaction conjugale des mères et la qualité de la communication mère‐adolescente

A sample comprising 41 couples and their adolescent daughters participated in a study on the association between marital conflicts and mother‐daughter communication. Observational measurements and questionnaires were used to evaluate the level of the quality of communication between the couple, the marital satisfaction of the parents and the quality of the communication between mother and adolescent daughters. The results show that: (a) conflicts observed between the parents are positively associated with the level of confrontation observed between the mother and the daughter and (b) the marital satisfaction of the mothers plays a mediatory role between the conflicts in the couple and the level of mother‐daughter confrontation. The marital satisfaction of the mothers would be the link in the process of propagation of the affects and the negative behaviour of the couple and the mother‐adolescent daughter relationship.     

The effect of mood on false memory for emotional DRM word lists

In the present study, we investigated the effect of participants’ mood on true and false memories of emotional word lists in the Deese–Roediger–McDermott (DRM) paradigm. In Experiment 1, we constructed DRM word lists in which all the studied words and corresponding critical lures reflected a specified emotional valence. In Experiment 2, we used these lists to assess mood-congruent true and false memory. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three induced-mood conditions (positive, negative, or neutral) and were presented with word lists comprised of positive, negative, or neutral words. For both true and false memory, there was a mood-congruent effect in the negative mood condition; this effect was due to a decrease in true and false recognition of the positive and neutral words. These findings are consistent with both spreading-activation and fuzzy-trace theories of DRM performance and have practical implications for our understanding of the effect of mood on memory.