Virtual-reality distraction and cold-pressor pain tolerance: does avatar point of view matter?

This study tested the effects of distraction using virtual-reality (VR) technology on acute pain tolerance in young adults. Forty-one undergraduate students, aged 18-23 years, used a VR head-mounted display helmet, steering wheel, and foot pedal to play an auto racing video game while undergoing exposure to very cold water (cold pressor set at 1 °C). Two different game views were tested that were hypothesized to affect the degree to which participants felt "present" in the virtual environment: a first-person view, in which the participant saw the virtual environment through the eyes of the game character being manipulated; and a third-person view, in which the participant viewed the game character from a distance. The length of time participants tolerated the cold-water exposure (pain tolerance) under each distraction condition was compared to a baseline (no distraction) trial. Subjects also rated the degree to which they felt "present" in the virtual environment after each distraction trial. Results demonstrated that participants had significantly higher pain tolerance during both VR-distraction conditions relative to baseline (no distraction) trials. Although participants reported a greater sense of presence during the first-person condition than the third-person condition, pain-tolerance scores associated with the two distraction conditions did not differ. The types of VR applications in which presence may be more or less important are discussed.     

Taking Stock at Mid‐Career: Challenges and Opportunities for Faculty

Abstract. Beginning with a series of questions designed to peak reader curiosity and expose key challenges for mid‐career faculty, the authors uncover several issues in post‐tenure faculty life and work, and they reflect on images for understanding and responding to these challenges. Topics identified include mid‐career as an opportunity for deeper investment in one's teaching, challenges associated with competing claims for time, shifts in research that can accompany the transition to mid‐career, challenges in dealing with an increasing generational gap between oneself and one's students, responsibilities associated with being a longer‐term member of a faculty, and feelings of fatigue and occasional alienation from one's educational institution and/or church.     

Using Attributions to Understand the Effects of Explanations on Applicant Reactions: Are Reactions Consistent With the Covariation Principle?1

Research has shown that explanations for selection decisions may influence a variety of applicant perceptions and behavior, but an understanding of how and why this occurs remains largely unknown. This study attempts to understand the effects of explanations by adopting Kelley's (1967, 1972) covariation model of the attribution process. Specifically, explanations that vary on consensus, distinctiveness, and consistency covariation information should produce predictable effects on applicant perceptions and attributions. Results from 2 studies, the first a laboratory study and the second a field study with actual applicants, support the utility of the covariation model for understanding the influence of explanations for selection decisions on locus attributions, fairness, self‐perceptions, and organizational attractiveness. These results suggest that the covariation model may be a useful means to construe the explanation‐attribution‐perception relationship, and thus provide a number of theoretical and practical implications.     

Predicting Job‐Related Expectancies and Affective Reactions to Employees With Disabilities From Previous Work Experience1

The relationship between the quality of previous work experience with a coworker who was disabled, job‐related expectancies of employees with disabilities, and affective reactions to employees with disabilities was investigated. Data from individuals who had worked with a coworker who was disabled were collected via an Internet‐based survey. The quality of previous experience with coworkers with disabilities predicted job‐related expectancies of employees with disabilities and affective reactions to employees with disabilities. More positive work experiences were associated with more positive expectancies and affective reactions. The relationship between previous experience and affective reactions was mediated by job‐related expectancies. Perceptions of increased job difficulty that were attributed to a coworker who was disabled predicted less positive job‐related expectancies and affective reactions.     

Multicultural and Gender Influences in Women's Career Development: An Ecological Perspective

Any framework used to conceptualize the career development of women and of racial and ethnic minorities must accommodate multiple influences shaping their experiences concurrently and over time. An ecological model of counseling is proposed to expand conceptualizations and interventions of counseling practice with diverse groups of individuals. Cualquier armazón utilizado para conceptualizar el desarrollo de la carrera de mujeres y de minorías raciales y étnicas debe acomodar múltiples influencias que forman sus experiencias concurrentemente y con el tiempo. Un modelo ecológico de aconsejar se propone ensanchar las conceptualizaciones y las intervenciones de aconsejar la práctica con grupos diversos de individuos.     

Promotions Spontaneously Induce a Positive Evaluative Response

Research has suggested that conscious cognitive processes mediate positive responses to promotions. In contrast, we find that exposure to promotional stimuli evokes a positive evaluative reaction spontaneously and that this reaction generalizes to products that are evaluated subsequently. Three experiments support our predictions and rule out alternative possibilities. Specifically, we find that promotions spontaneously evoke positive evaluative responses and that these responses mediate liking for a target product. Our findings also identify conditions under which promotion‐generated evaluative responses are transferred to products unrelated to the promotion and indicate the type of product categories that are likely to produce this effect. The theoretical and substantive implications of this research are discussed.     

Relations Among Milk and Non-Milk Beverage Consumption, Calcium, and Relative Weight in High-Weight Status Children

Relations among weight, calcium, and milk have received considerable attention, but inconsistencies remain regarding strength and direction of associations. Calcium, milk, other beverages, and weight status associations were examined among children >75th BMI percentile from three studies. Results indicated negative relations between z-BMI and non-whole milk and calcium in one sample, with lower z-BMI and percent body fat among older children drinking any non-whole milk. In one older child sample, z-BMI and percent body fat were higher for whole milk consumers. The only significant relation observed for other beverages was the negative association between juice and percent body fat in younger children. Milk, calcium, and child weight status associations are inconsistent, and appear dependent on milk type and child age.     

A Pinch of Salt for Frege

Michael Dummett has argued that a formal semantics for our language is inadequate unless it can be shown to illuminate to our actual practice of speaking and understanding. This paper argues that Frege’s account of the semantics of predicate expressions according to which the reference of a predicate is a concept (a function from objects to truth values) has exactly the required characteristics. The first part of the paper develops a model for understanding the distinction between objects and concepts as an ontological distinction. It argues that, ontologically, we can take a Fregean function to be generated by a property detection device that can register for any object the presence or absence of that property. This provides a direct connection between the semantics of sentences and the structure of perceptual judgment. The second part of the paper deals with arguments that have been mounted against the coherence of Frege’s semantics. It argues that some of these are question begging, while others are correct in so far as Frege’s claim is untenable if we assume that the syntactic categories singular term and predicate are primary, and the ontological categories are simply projections of these syntactic categories. However, the objections dissipate once we recognize that an independent ontological characterization of the distinction is available.