AN ANALYSIS OF MULTIPLE MISPLACED PARENTAL SOCIAL CONTINGENCIES1

This study analyzed the training of a mother to modify five subclasses of her attention to her young child's noncompliance with instructions, and also displayed the changes in her child's behavior correlated with these events. Training in four subclasses consisted of teaching the mother to withhold various forms of social attention to her daughter's undesired behavior; training in the fifth subclass involved introduction of a brief room-timeout procedure for noncompliance. The effectiveness of the parent-training procedure, consisting of initial instructions and daily feedback, was demonstrated through a multiple-baseline design across the five subclasses of parent behavior. Sequential decreases in the first three subclasses of the mother's social attention to undesired child behavior resulted in incomplete improvements in some child responses; however, a decrease in the fourth subclass resulted in a significant increase in undesired child behavior. Complete remediation of all child behaviors was achieved following the training of a timeout procedure for noncompliance. Postchecks conducted up to 16 weeks later showed that these effects were durable.     

A SIMULTANEOUS DISCRIMINATION PROCEDURE FOR THE MEASUREMENT OF VISION IN NONVERBAL CHILDREN1

Few nonverbal developmentally disabled children ever receive adequate vision assessment because of their limited language skills. The present study details a simultaneous discrimination procedure for measuring subjective visual acuity in such children. A stimulus fading procedure was used to train a discrimination between Snellen Es differing in orientation, and a psychophysical tracking method was used to determine acuity thresholds. The procedure was tested with 11 nonverbal autistic and schizophrenic children and validated with four nonpsychotic children. Eight of the psychotic children were successfully examined in one to three sessions. Two of these children were identified as having significant acuity losses. The validity assessment showed that the experimental procedure resulted in thresholds equal to or slightly lower than those obtained with the Illiterate E chart.     

Affect and delay of gratification

Three experiments investigated the influence of positive and negative affect manipulations on children's preferences for small immediate versus large delayed rewards. Positive and negative affect were induced via verbal instructions to imagine happy and sad experiences. Elementary school children were randomly assigned to a control condition or to one of several treatment conditions consisting of two affect manipulations: a positive followed by a negative, the reverse, and (in the third experiment) two positives or two negatives. In some conditions (in the second and third experiments) measurement of delayed reward preference followed the first and second affect inductions whereas in other conditions (in the second and third experiments) measurement followed only the second affect manipulation. As predicted, negative affect subjects chose fewer large delayed rewards than did positive affect subjects during the first assessment (p < .02). At the second assessment, comparison among treatment and control conditions revealed the influence of a prior commitment effect which negated the potential influence of a second affect manipulation on preference for delayed rewards.     

Age and task effects in short-term memory of children

Children of 4, 8, and 14 years performed a visual memory task with easy- or hard-to-label displays and with or without repetition of stimuli over trials. Eight pictures were displayed in serial order, and the task was to find the card in the array that matched an identical probe card. Performance improved with age, and strong serial position effects were obtained for all ages and tasks. In contrast to previous studies, primacy effects were obtained for the youngest children tested. Task difficulty increased with difficulty of labeling and with repetition, but order of task difficulty remained the same for all ages. The d’ measure, borrowed from signal detection theory, revealed differences in criterion levels over serial position, which in earlier studies had been confounded with strength of memory.     

Attitudes about gender bias in language: A reevaluation

Past research findings identified the gender-biased nature of language and the need to incorporate linguistic changes to alleviate this problem. One suggested change was the adoption of a generic pronoun. Given that most research in this area was conducted 10–15 years ago, it is important to determine present opinion on language and language change. In the present study, male and female respondents from five samples completed a questionnaire regarding gender bias in language. National Organization of Women (NOW) members and psychology students indicated more interest in and had made more of an effort to change their language, and would be more likely to adopt a new gender-neutral pronoun than faculty, or medical or English students. Student groups were motivated more by authorities requiring nonbiased language and others' use of a new pronoun than faculty or NOW members, and the media was an important influence for all groups.This research was supported in part by a grant from the Department of Health and Human Services, Division of Medicine.     

Achievement motivation theory and occupational choice

Two studies are reported which aimed to answer several questions relating to Atkinson's model of achievement motivation. Firstly, how successfully the theory can predict the occupational choices of two different populations and what changes, if any, need to be made to the model to make it more suited to such predictions. Several conceptual errors were found in the theory which make it unsuitable in its present form for predicting occupational choices and suggestions are made as to the possible correction of these. Secondly, a comparison is made between Atkinson's model and the expectancy-valence models currently utilized to describe and predict occupational decision-making. In particular Atkinson's incentive component is contrasted with the valence measure described by expectancy-valence models, and the possible influences of the motive factors (motive to succeed and motive to avoid failure) are considered since these are typically omitted by other models of career choice. Finally, the existence of sex differences in career choice, as well as in the various components of the model are studied and discussed. The changing conceptualization of ‘fear of success’ is also included in this consideration.     

Soccer,rooms, and the quality of your life: Mood effects on judgments of satisfaction with life in general and with specific domains

Two studies on the impact of temporary moods on judgments of satisfaction with life in general and with specific life-domains are reported. It was hypothesized that individuals simplify the complex task of evaluating their life in general by referring to their mood at the time of judgment, but evaluate specific life-domains on the basis of domain-specific information. In accordance with this hypothesis, both studies demonstrated strong mood effects on judgments of general life-satisfaction but only weak and non-significant effects on judgments of specific domain-satisfactions. The findings are interpreted as supporting the hypothesis that affective states serve informative functions.     

The association between social withdrawal and internalizing problems of children

Children identified as low-frequency interactors or socially withdrawn were compared to outgoing children to evaluate whether socially withdrawn children display concurrent internalizing problems. From a sample of 640 children in grades 2-5, 48 children were identified by teachers as low-frequency interactors and 72 children were selected as outgoing or sociable. When these two groups were compared on a battery of teacher, peer, and self-report measures that assessed internalizing difficulties, the low-frequency interactors were found to display concurrent problems in adjustment. Children who rarely interacted with peers were less well liked by their peers, displayed poorer self-concepts, and were more depressed and anxious than sociable children. In contrast to these findings regarding internalizing problems, the two groups did not differ on measures of externalizing problems. The results lend support to the concurrent validity of the low-interaction method of identifying socially withdrawn children.     

The effects of cognitive-behavior modification on private speech and task performance during problem solving among learning-disabled and normally achieving children

Recent research has supported the hypothesis that poor performance among learning-disabled (LD) children is frequently the result of deficits in self-regulation of strategic behaviors, rather than structural or ability deficits. As a result, cognitive-behavior modification (CBM) techniques that emphasize development of self-regulation through self-verbalizations (private speech) have been strongly recommended. The present study examined the natural occurrence of regulatory private speech among LD and normally achieving children during problem solving, as well as the effects of CBM training on private speech and task performance. Results indicated significant deficiencies in private speech and task performance among LD children; CBM training resulted in significant improvements. These results provide further verification of deficits in self-regulation of cognitive activity among LD children and import implications for intervention.The author would like to thank Gerald Halpin, Glennelle Halpin, and Ronhie Wilbur for their assistance throughout this study.     

Playing hard-to-get: A two-determinant model

Walster, Walster, Piliavin, and Schmidt (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1973, 26, 113–121) found that a hard-to-get woman was liked only if she was hard-to-get for other men but easy-to-get for the subject. They suggested that the subjects liked this type of woman because of the socially desirable personality characteristics they attributed to her. A second determinant of liking is proposed in the present study. It concerns the effect of a person's evaluation of a subject on the subject's self-esteem. It was predicted that there would be a positive relationship between changes in the subject's self-esteem and liking for the evaluator. The results demonstrated that this determinant, as well as the one that Walster et al. suggested, is important in understanding the type of opposite-sex person that men and women find most attractive. These results, and the differences between the Walster et al. and the present studies, were discussed in terms of the relative impact of the two determinants in laboratory and real-life situations.