Tactics of manipulation

Manipulation is one means by which environments are altered to correspond to characteristics of individuals. We conducted two studies to identify the manipulation tactics that people use to elicit and terminate the actions of others. Factor analyses of four instruments revealed six types of tactics: charm, silent treatment, coercion, reason, regression, and debasement. Tactics of manipulation showed strong individual difference consistency across contexts. The charm tactic, however, was used more frequently for behavioral elicitation, whereas the coercion and silent treatment tactics were used more frequently for behavioral termination. Manipulation tactics covaried significantly across self-based and observer-based data sources with personality scales of Neuroticism, Extraversion, Ambitious-Lazy, Arrogant-Unassuming, Quarrelsome-Agreeable, and Calculating and with characteristics of subjects' social environments. We draw implications for an interactionist framework of person-environment correspondence, for an expansion of the taxonomic task that faces personality psychology, and for identifying links between personality and other scientific disciplines.     

The influence of Kantor's interbehavioral psychology on behavior analysis

The contributions of J. R. Kantor and his system of interbehavioral psychology to the field of behavior analysis are examined. Two sources of information served to organize this investigation: (1) the historical record as described in the literature and (2) the results of a questionnaire survey sent to past and present editorial board members of the Journal for the Experimental Analysis of Behavior, the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, and Behaviorism. The outcome of this investigation showed that Kantor has had a broader influence than might heretofore have been recognized. More importantly, contemporary behavior analytic research and theory are evolving in directions either influenced by, or consonant with, his approach. We conclude that Kantor's interbehavioral psychology and his writings offer an important and valuable source of ideas and concepts for the future of behavior analysis.     

Sex and least preferred co-worker score effects in leadership behavior

This study investigated the subordinate liking and the leadership style of male and female managers in a simulated business activity. Sixty-seven female and 290 male undergraduate and graduate business students participated in this study. Female managers, on average, were not less well liked, nor were they more accommodative than male managers. Among managers classified as distinctly accommodative, females were not better liked than males; among managers classified as distinctly directive, females were significantly better liked than males. Under pressure to act in a directive manner, males tended to make use of their secondary leadership style as defined by F. E. Fiedler (1972), while females did not.     

Individual differences in the day-to-day experience of chronic pain: a prospective daily study of rheumatoid arthritis patients.

Explored the distribution and temporal patterning of daily pain reported by 47 patients with rheumatoid arthritis (RA) for 75 consecutive days. Approximately half the pain series were significantly positively skewed, trended significantly across the recording period, or both. One fourth of the sample had relatively painful "outlier" days that clustered together. Most series displayed a significant autocorrelation in pain intensity across successive days even when the series were detrended. Patients with more active disease had pain that was more intense but more predictable from day to day and reported fewer painful outlying days and briefer episodes of atypically severe pain. Patients describing themselves as more depressed on the Center for Epidemiological Stress Depression Scale also reported more intense pain across the recording period, independent of their level of disease activity and disability. Implications for daily process studies of RA pain are discussed.     

Interplay of Literacy and Orality in Inaugural Rhetoric

Inaugural addresses require a complex interplay of literacy and orality. They are written to be performed, but oral performance is not explicable in terms of textual analyses alone. Texts of the 55 inaugurals of the 42 U.S. presidents and audio recordings of the 16 dating from F. D. Roosevelt were the corpus for this study. The general hypothesis was that changes in media technology and in Presidential governance have moved both text and performance of inaugurals in the twentieth century in the direction of conversational style. Textual response measures were frequency-of-occurrence ratios of words (per paragraph, sentence, punctuation, and discourse marker), of syllables (per paragraph, sentence, word, punctuation, and discourse marker), and of first-person pronominal forms. Performance response measures were speech and articulation rates, percentage of pause time, pause duration, and phrase length. Use of contractions was also analyzed. Textual analyses showed a shortening of units and a shift from singular to plural first-person pronominal forms in the course of 200 years. Performance of the inaugurals over the past 60 years showed no diachronic changes, but was dramatically slower than that of other speech genres. Use of contractions was limited to three recent inaugurals. Various published texts of Reagan's first inaugural and Bush's and Clinton's inaugurals were compared with one another and with the audio recordings and were found to differ from one another in text, punctuation, and format, and from the audio recordings in text. The notion of conversational style is critically discussed, particularly in terms of the boundaries imposed upon it by the norms of both literacy and orality.     

Gender-moderated dorsolateral prefrontal reductions in 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome: implications for risk for schizophrenia.

To investigate the impact of the microdeletion on morphology of the prefrontal cortex in 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome (22q11.2 DS), high-resolution, anatomic magnetic resonance imaging was performed on 19 children and adolescents with 22q11.2 DS (11 females, 8 males) and 18 unaffected controls (10 females, 8 males). Tissue volumes of the dorsolateral, dorsomedial, orbitolateral, and orbitomedial prefrontal cortex were measured. Tasks of executive function and working memory were administered to investigate the association between anatomy and function. Whole brain volume and frontal lobe tissue volume were preserved in girls but reduced in boys with 22q11.2 DS relative to age-matched controls. Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) volumes were reduced in participants with 22q11.2 DS, although the gender-by-diagnosis effect found for frontal lobe was not as robust for DLPFC. DLPFC volumes were associated with performance on tasks of planning and emotional facial recognition. Longitudinal studies are needed to clarify whether gender differences in frontal lobe and DLPFC persist with development, and whether the volumes of the DLPFC are associated with eventual deterioration in adaptive/psychosocial function that may presage the onset of schizophrenia, for which individuals with 22q11.2 DS are at a disproportionately high risk.     

VOUCHER‐BASED CONTINGENT REINFORCEMENT OF SMOKING ABSTINENCE AMONG METHADONE‐MAINTAINED PATIENTS: A PILOT STUDY

This study evaluated the efficacy of a contingency management (CM) intervention to promote smoking cessation in methadone‐maintained patients. Twenty participants, randomized into contingent (n = 10) or noncontingent (n = 10) experimental conditions, completed the 14‐day study. Abstinence was determined using breath carbon monoxide and urine cotinine levels. Contingent participants received voucher‐based incentives for biochemical evidence of smoking abstinence. Noncontingent participants earned vouchers independent of smoking status. Contingent participants achieved significantly more smoking abstinence and longer durations of continuous smoking abstinence than did noncontingent participants. These results support the potential efficacy of using voucher‐based CM to promote smoking cessation among methadone‐maintained patients.     

Effects of Initial Abstinence and Programmed Lapses on The Relative Reinforcing Effects of Cigarette Smoking

Fifty-eight smokers received abstinence-contingent monetary payments for 1 (n  =  15) or 14 (n  =  43) days. Those who received contingent payments for 14 days also received 0, 1, or 8 experimenter-delivered cigarette puffs on 5 evenings. The relative reinforcing effects of smoking were assessed in a 3-hr session on the final study day, when participants made 20 choices between smoking or money. The reinforcement contingencies exerted robust control over smoking, and programmed smoking lapses produced few discernible effects. These results further illustrate the robust control that reinforcement contingencies can exert over cigarette smoking and suggest that any effects of lapses on the relative reinforcing effects of smoking are modest under conditions involving abstinence-contingent reinforcement contingencies.     

A Test of Contextual Theory: The Relationship Among Relational Ethics,Marital Satisfaction,Health Problems,and Depression

Few studies have examined the theoretical underpinning of contextual theory. Using structural equation modeling, the relationship among relational ethics (recognized as the most important aspect of contextual theory), marital satisfaction, depression, and illness was examined. Data came from a national sample of 632 mid-life, married individuals. Results supported Nagy’s contextual theory. The total score of the Relational Ethics Scale was a significant predictor of marital satisfaction, and marital satisfaction was significantly associated with depression and health problems. Vertical and horizontal subscales of relational ethics also were significant predictors of depression and health problems through the mediating variable of marital satisfaction.