The effects of sexual and/or aggressive film exposure on helping, hostility, and attitudes about the sexes

After viewing an aggressive, sexually aggressive, erotic heterosexual, or control film, 129 females and 135 males expressed their willingness to help and hostility toward the male or female experimenter. Males extended the least help to the experimenter following the aggressive film and expressed more positive affect than females. Erotophilic males expressed slightly less hostility toward a female than a male experimenter. Erotophiles expressed more positive attitudes toward women and toward men after viewing either the rape film shown by a male experimenter or the erotic film shown by a female experimenter, compared to erotophobes. Among erotophobes, these two experimental conditions generally produced the most negative effects on general attitudes about the sexes. Affective responses to sex variations in dominant status and to aggressivity were employed to provide explanations for these results.     

The development of an instrument for measuring leadership behaviors in therapy groups

Research on leadership behavior in therapy groups emphasizes the need for precise theories and clinically meaningful instruments to study leadership variables. This paper reviews the development of the Group Leader Behavior Instrument (GLBI) and investigates its relationship to an earlier measure, the Group Leadership Questionnaire (GTQ-C). Both instruments were completed by 40 practicing group therapists. Analyses confirm a moderate degree of similarity between the leadership profiles obtained from the GLBI and GTQ-C. Differences due to the construction of the two scales are also examined. The authors conclude with a discussion of the potential uses of the GLBI to assess leadership behaviors in ongoing groups, to train group therapists, and to further progress in process and outcome research on group leadership.The authors thank Dr. Mary Fox, Director of the Group Therapy Program, Department of Psychiatry, University of Rochester, for her continued support in this work.     

Comprehension and memory of the literal and figurative meaning of proverbs

Proverbs were used to examine recognition memory for four types of sentence information (figurative meaning, literal meaning, lexical information, syntactic information) with two levels of comprehension. Forced-choice recognition tasks showed that subjects were successful in remembering all four types of information. Recognition scores for the figurative meaning of unfamiliar proverbs presented in isolation were above chance and were also significantly improved when procedures were employed which encouraged comprehension of this level of meaning. The results are most consistent with theories of comprehension which provide for different types of processing for figurative and literal language.     

Temporal brightness enhancement studied with a large sample of observers: Evidence for individual differences in brightness perception

Brightness vs. duration relations were measured for 80 naive observers using a method in which a short pulse (10–500 msec) was compared to a pulse 500 msec longer in duration at the same luminance. Pulses were presented under two conditions of pulse asynchrony: simultaneous onset and simultaneous offset. Three classes of observers were found: Type A observers (57% of all observers) showed temporal brightness enhancement (the Broca-Sulzer effect) for both simultaneous onset and offset conditions. Type B observers (33% of the sample) showed brightness enhancement for simultaneous offset but not onset. Type C observers (10% of the sample) did not exhibit brightness enchancement under either asynchrony condition. The distribution of these classes was not affected by the specificity of instructions concerning the brightness judgment or by the sequencing (ordered vs. random) of stimuli. We analyze how these classes of observers might be explained either on the basis of differing neurophysiological mechanisms or responses or on the basis of differing psychophysical criteria. Further, we present a model of the data which illustrates how behaviorally distinct types of observers could be generated by continuous distributions within the general population of either perceptual criteria or neurophysiological responses.     

Individual versus organizational predictors of job satisfaction and turnover among professionals

In a constructive replication and extension of previous research, the relative importance of individual (personality and professional attitudes) versus organizational (professional reward system and tenure) variables in predicting job satisfaction and turnover was investigated for the case of professionals. Support among a sample of computer specialists was found for the notion that, among professionals, individual variables are more important than organizational factors in predicting satisfaction with the work itself; but individual variables often played a major role in satisfaction with contextual aspects of the job as well. Organizational factors were found to be significantly predictive of satisfaction with all aspects of the job, but were the only significant predictors of turnover. Thus the importance of organizational factors over individual factors for professionals was supported more clearly for the behavioral outcome, turnover, than for attitudinal outcomes.     

Predicting Adolescent Drinking From Alcohol Expectancy Values: A Comparison of Additive,Interactive, and Nonlinear Models1

Additive, interactive, and nonlinear models of alcohol expectancy values were compared using survey data from 1,758 high school students. Expectancies and values independently predicted drinking in the additive model. Expectancies were more important as predictors than were values, and negative expectancies were more important than positive expectancies. Significant expectancy-value interactions also were found. Drinking was highest when positive consequences were believed to be likely and desirable and was lowest when negative consequences were believed to be likely and undesirable. Significant nonlinearities indicated that beliefs about negative consequences had greater effects at lower levels of likelihood and evaluation whereas beliefs about positive consequences had greater effects at higher levels of likelihood and evaluation. However, the interactive and nonlinear effects were small.     

Genetic Counseling for Confined Placental Mosaicism: A Case Report

New technologies can lead to unforeseen discoveries which in turn can lead to diagnostic and counseling dilemmas. A case which involved confined placental mosaicism for trisomy 16 is presented to illustrate such a situation. While interpreting data and explaining a newly described phenomenon created uncertainties for the genetic counseling team, the patient and her husband were primarily dealing with grief surrounding the loss of a wanted pregnancy. It is important to recognize that the counseling issues may be different for the professionals and the families. Genetic counselors must be cognizant of their own reactions and those of their clients and be prepared to use all of their counseling skills to address these varying needs.