Televised classroom events as distractors for reading-disabled children

Three experiments examined the influence of videotaped classroom events on the academic performance and study behavior of reading-disabled and normally reading children in grades 1 through 6. In experiments 1 and 2a an experimenter-controlled presentation of these distractors resulted in performance decrements, the magnitude of which was greater for higher difficulty tasks. The distractor effects were similar for the two groups in this condition. However, when the children themselves were allowed to control their degree of exposure to the same distractors in experiment 2b, the reading-disabled children were less likely to act to escape the distraction. Results are discussed in terms of children's metacognitive awareness of distraction, and implications for the classroom are considered.     

Temporal compatibility in dual motor tasks II: Simultaneous articulation and hand movements

Simultaneous articulation did not interfere with hand responses if the responses shared the same time period. Otherwise there was marked interference even after performance had stabilized with practice. These results generalized previous findings for simultaneous left-and right-hand responses (Klapp, 1979) to show that even highly distinctive responses can be generated in parallel only if they have compatible timing.     

Modification of anger in children by affective imagery training

From a school population of normal children third through fifth grades), thirty children initially identified as “angry”were randomly assigned to either an affective imagery training group, an attention group, or a control group. The treatment group received three sessions of affective imagery in which they focused on physiological changes and on their thoughts associated with prior emotional experiences. Teachers recorded pre-, post- , and short term follow-up aggressive behaviors for all thirty children. Cognitive perceptions and attributions were recorded at the same three occasions on the Affect Questionnaire. Results suggested that, as a result of affective imagery training, angry children's perceptions and cognitions shifted from “angry” towards “sad,” and there was a concomitant decrease in observed aggressive classroom behavior.     

Preferences for skill versus chance-determined activities: The influence of gender and task sex-typing

Three experiments tested the hypothesis that skill-chance activity preference by men and women is moderated by task sex relatedness. Men and women (total N = 368) opted to perform either skill or chance versions of masculine and feminine tasks, and then provided ratings of performance expectancy, importance of success, and perceptions of task characteristics. Results support the conclusion that men do not prefer skill and women chance as had been found previously, but rather that while men's skill preferences are higher than women's on a masculine taks, women prefer skill more than do men on a feminine task. Skill-chance preferences were primarily a function of the expectancy of success on skill tasks.     

Sex of leader,leader behavior,and subordinate satisfaction

A 2×2×2 factorial design was employed to examine the influence of instructed leadership style, sex of leader, and sex of followers on leader behavior, subordinate satisfaction, and productivity in a simple task. In general, male and female leaders were equally able and equally willing to display autocratic and democratic leadership styles if so instructed. Similarly, leader sex did not have a significant influence on subordinate satisfaction or productivity either by itself or in interaction with leadership style or follower sex.     

Correlations,contrasts, and components: Fourier analysis in a more familiar terminology

The Fourier transform partitions the energy in a waveform into the sum of the energies of simpler components. This process is the same as the partitioning of variance into linear contrasts and is a way of measuring the correlation between the waveform and each member of a family of prototype model waveforms. Such a partitioning will often, but not always, result in a meaningful decomposition of the original waveform.     

Exposure to pornography,permissive and nonpermissive cues,and male aggression toward females

The present study examined the role of permissive and nonpermissive cues in mediating the relationship between exposure to erotica and aggression. Male subjects viewed either neutral slides with a silent female or erotic slides with a female who made permissive, nonpermissive, or no comments about the slides. The males rated the slides and subsequently rated the female confederate. Male subjects were then given an opportunity to administer their choice of several intensities of shock to the female in a competitive reaction-time task. Subjects in the permissive cues condition rated the erotic slides as more arousing, saw the female as more reasonable and accepting, and selected more intense shocks for the female than did subjects in the other conditions. One explanation of these results is that permissive cues in the presence of erotica led the male to believe that other normally inappropriate behaviors would be tolerated.     

Coping within couples: adjustment two years after forced geographic relocation

Is our understanding of how individuals adjust to stressful life events increased when we analyze their adjustment in ways that recognize that these individuals are also married couples? The data used to answer this question came from a unique “natural experiment” occasioned by the forced evacuation of the Israeli settlement of Ophira under the terms of the Camp David Accords. We found that the adjustment of individuals within couples became more similar across the relocation, that is, couples adapted as a “family system.” This occurred because the coping skills of one member of the couple “drove” the adjustment of both partners.     

The Fraser illusion: complex figures

The cause of the Fraser illusion, which occurs when a line made up of tilted segments itself appears tilted, is examined further. In this series of experiments, we used figures that resembled the original Fraser illusion; they were more complex than those reported on in our previous paper (Stuart & Day, 1988). The figures were used to explore two theories of the Fraser illusion further: that it is the result of interactions between orientation selective units, and that it is a consequence of the local, distributed processing of orientation. The presence of background elements like those used in the original illusion led to an increase in the strength of the illusion, but the shape of these elements had no differential effect on illusion strength. There was a differential effect of the background on the assimilative and contrast illusions, owing respectively to small and large tilts of the inducing elements. The illusion was markedly reduced at small visual angles when the background was absent, but it was only slightly affected when the background was present. All these findings are difficult to explain in terms of interactions between single units, either at the same or at different scales in the image. The effects of luminance contrast and isoluminance on the illusion were not consistent with either theory, but they indicated that researchers need to consider the role of figure-ground organization in this illusion.     

Gender differences in health-related quality of life

In 1986 the life expectancy at birth was 71.3 years for males and 78.3 years for females--providing a 7-year advantage for women. Although women live longer, it has been reported that they paradoxically experience more physical and psychological illnesses. In this article, we estimate the expected well-years or quality-adjusted life years for men and women in the general population. The data were obtained in a random sample of 1,034 residents of San Diego. The well-life expectancy uses standard life expectancies with adjustments for quality of life. The well-life expectancy for men was 59.8 years; for women, it was 62.7 years. Thus, the quality adjustment had significantly more impact on women (15.6 years) than on men (11.5 years). Age-specific estimates of health-related quality of life suggested a male advantage before age 45 and a female advantage after age 45. The benefits of well-years of life as a public health statistic are discussed.