REINFORCER MAGNITUDE ATTENUATES: APOMORPHINE'S EFFECTS ON OPERANT PECKING

When given to pigeons, the direct‐acting dopamine agonist apomorphine elicits pecking. The response has been likened to foraging pecking because it bears remarkable similarity to foraging behavior, and it is enhanced by food deprivation. On the other hand, other data suggest the response is not related to foraging behavior and may even interfere with food ingestion. Although elicited pecking interferes with food capture, it may selectively alter procurement phases of feeding, which can be isolated in operant preparations. To explore the relation between operant and elicited pecking, we provided pigeons the opportunity to earn different reinforcer magnitudes during experimental sessions. During signaled components, each of 4 pigeons could earn 2‐, 4‐, or 8‐s access to grain for a single peck made at the end of a 5‐min interval. In general, responding increased as a function of reinforcer magnitude. Apomorphine increased pecking for 2 pigeons and decreased pecking for the other 2. In both cases, apomorphine was more potent under the component providing the smallest reinforcer magnitude. Analysis of the pattern of pecking across the interval indicated that behavior lost its temporal organization as dose increased. Because apomorphine‐induced pecking varied inversely with reinforcer magnitude, we conclude that elicited pecks are not functionally related to food procurement. The data are consistent with the literature on behavioral resistance to change and suggest that the effects of apomorphine may be modulated by prevailing stimulus—reinforcer relationships.     

How Do Body Diagrams Affect the Accuracy and Consistency of Children's Reports of Bodily Touch Across Repeated Interviews?

We examined the amount, accuracy, and consistency of information reported by 58 5‐ to 7‐year‐old children about a staged event that included physical contact/touching. Both 1 and 7 months following the event, children were asked both open and yes/no questions about touch [i] when provided with human body diagrams (HBDs), [ii] following instruction and practice using the HBDs, or [iii] without HBDs. Children interviewed with HBDs reported more information at 7 months, but a high proportion of inaccurate touches. Children seldom repeated touch‐related information across the two interviews and did not incorporate errors made in the 1‐month interview into their open‐ended accounts 6 months later. Asking children to talk about innocuous touch may lead them to report unreliable information, especially when HBDs are used as aids and repeated interviews are conducted across delays that resemble those typical of forensic contexts. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Always Teaching,Always Gracious: Reflections on Ninian Smart

This article presents empirical evidence for the hypothesis that persons consider counterintuitive representations more likely to be religious than other kinds of beliefs. In three studies the subjects were asked to rate the probable religiousness of various kinds of imaginary beliefs. The results show that counterintuitive representations in general, and counterintuitive representations involving a conscious agent in particular, are considered much more likely to be religious. Counterintuitiveness thus seems to be an important element in a folk-understanding of religion.     

How I got Started: Drawn Into the Life of Crime: Learning from,by, and for Child Victims and Witnesses

In this paper, the author describes the origins of a research programme focused on children's testimony, noting that it was prompted initially by a focus on the effects of abuse. Growing evidence of failed communication between researchers and investigative interviewers led his research group to develop a detailed guide, based on extensive research, which forensic interviewers could use to structure their interactions with alleged victims, offenders and witnesses. Considerable research has since documented the value of that tool, and it has also been instrumental in research exploring children's communicative and cognitive development. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How Do Interviewers and Children Discuss Individual Occurrences of Alleged Repeated Abuse in Forensic Interviews?

Police interviews (n = 97) with 5‐ to 13‐year‐olds alleging multiple incidents of sexual abuse were examined to determine how interviewers elicited and children recounted specific instances of abuse. Coders assessed the labels for individual occurrences that arose in interviews, recording who generated them, how they were used and other devices to aid particularisation such as the use of episodic and generic language. Interviewers used significantly more temporal labels than did children. With age, children were more likely to generate labels themselves, and most children generated at least one label. In 66% of the cases, interviewers ignored or replaced children's labels, and when they did so, children reported proportionately fewer episodic details. Children were highly responsive to the interviewers' language style. Results indicate that appropriately trained interviewers can help children of all ages to provide the specific details often necessary to ensure successful prosecution. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Effectiveness of a Consultation Model in Community Mental Health

This one-year study explored the impact of an occupational therapy consultation model on housing status and goal attainment among 57 people with severe mental illness who were homeless or at risk of homelessness. A repeated-measure experimental design was used. Although results were mixed, the significant improvement in housing stability and goal attainment six months into the study supports the value of continued research on the effects of both direct and consultative occupational therapy intervention on client goal attainment.