Information feedback and the learning multiple-degree-of-freedom activities

The influence of information feedback on the learning of a multiple-degree-of-freedom activity, the overhand throw, was investigated. During learning, feedback was presented in the form of knowledge of results, knowledge of performance, knowledge of performance with attention-focusing cues, or knowledge of performance with error-correcting transitional information. Across 12 practice sessions, performance was assessed with respect to both throwing distance and throwing form. Subjects provided with knowledge of performance along with transitional information demonstrated significant gains in throwing distance, compared with subjects receiving knowledge of performance or knowledge of results alone. Movement form ratings followed the same trend. Providing learners with cues to focus their attention on the relevant aspects of knowledge of performance or directly providing transitional information was a better aid to the acquisition of throwing form than providing knowledge of results or knowledge of performance alone. These results support the hypothesis that knowledge of results may not be the most potent form of feedback in multiple-degree-of-freedom activities and that knowledge of performance, when combined with additional information, can lead to significant gains in skill acquisition.     

Affect, personality, and social activity.

These studies examined relations between social activity and state and trait measures of Positive and Negative Affect. In Study 1 Ss completed scales relevant to 3-factor models of personality and a weekly mood and social activity questionnaire for 13 weeks. In Study 2 Ss completed measures of the 5-factor model of personality and a daily mood and social activity survey for 6-7 weeks. In within- and between-Ss analyses, socializing correlated significantly with state measures of Positive Affect and with trait measures of Extraversion/Positive Emotionality. These relations were relatively general across various types of positive affect and social events; however, specific types of social events also were differentially related to affect. In contrast, social activity had no consistent association with measures of Negative Affect or the other personality dimensions. The results support a temperamental view of Extraversion.     

Repression at encoding: discrete appraisals of emotional stimuli.

In previous research, the emotions associated with repressors' memorial representations were found to be more discrete than those associated with nonrepressors'. In each of the 3 experiments reported here, repressive discreteness was apparent in repressors' appraisals of emotional stimuli at the time they were encoded. In 1 experiment, Ss appraised individual facial expressions of emotion. Repressors judged the dominant emotions in these faces as no less intense than did nonrepressors, but they appraised the blend of nondominant emotions as less intense than did nonrepressors. In the remaining 2 experiments, Ss appraised crowds of emotional faces as well as crowds of geometric shapes. In both crowd experiments, the repressive discreteness was evident in appraisals of crowds of emotional faces but not in appraisals of crowds of geometric shapes. The repressive discreteness effect did not appear to reflect a general repressor-nonrepressor difference in the appraisal of stimulus features. Rather, the results suggested that repressive discreteness may be constrained to appraisals of emotions.     

Mothers with hostile, Type A predisposing child-rearing practices.

The authors examined characteristics of Finnish mothers (N = 924) who use hostile child-rearing practices (i.e., they ignore the child, are punitive and irritable, and perceive the child as a burden), practices that have been shown (R?ikk?nen & Keltikangas-J?rvinen, 1992) to predispose children to Type A behavior. The results of this study indicate that two factors--Type A behavior in the mothers and the mothers' sociodemographic background (low occupational status, low educational level and young age)--increase the probability of the mothers' treating their children in a hostile manner. Also, the mothers of boys in this study reported more hostile child-rearing practices than the mothers of girls did.     

The Personality of Young Adult Couples and Wives'' Work Patterns

The influence of personality in 63 couples at the time of family formation on wives' work patterns 15 years later was examined in variable-centered and person/couple-centered ways. Four factor dimensions on the Adjective Check List assessed personality. Work patterns were assessed with measures of type, amount, and status of work and with schematic work narratives describing characters and plots abstracted from wives' mid-life data. Hierarchical regression analyses showed individuality of husbands to affect work outcomes after wives' college-age goals, their young adult personality, and the duration of marriages were taken into account. Conjoint high-low patterns of individuality in 34 couples were associated with different schematic work stories. These stories show distinctive personality and relational correlates at age 27. They flesh out and qualify hypotheses that individualistic partners would be open to women's careers and would show revealing strategies of combining self- and other interests in the transition to parenthood.     

Classification of adult attachment: an integrative taxonomy from attachment and psychoanalytic theories.

Developmental and psychoanalytic theorists have focused increasingly on empirically determined early childhood antecedents of adult attachments, with several resulting taxonomic models. This article suggests a theoretically based and clinically based model of attachment consistent with both psychoanalytic and attachment theories, resulting in an integrative taxonomy of four adult attachment styles: dependent, avoidant, hostile, and resistant-ambivalent. These styles reflect behavioral manifestations of dependence and anger, as derived from the interaction of primitive relational drives, defenses, and interpersonal experience. In addition to theoretical construction, brief clinical examples are presented to facilitate discussion of the model.     

Marital processes predictive of later dissolution: behavior, physiology, and health.

Seventy-three married couples were studied in 1983 and 1987. To identify marital processes associated with dissolution, a balance theory of marriage was used to generate 1 variable for dividing couples into regulated and nonregulated groups. For studying the precursors of divorce, a "cascade" model of marital dissolution, which forms a Guttman-like scale, received preliminary support. Compared with regulated couples, nonregulated couples had (a) marital problems rated as more severe (Time 1); (b) lower marital satisfaction (Time 1 and Time 2); (c) poorer health (Time 2); (d) smaller finger pulse amplitudes (wives); (e) more negative ratings for interactions; (f) more negative emotional expression; (g) less positive emotional expression; (h) more stubbornness and withdrawal from interaction; (i) greater defensiveness; and (j) greater risk for marital dissolution (lower marital satisfaction and higher incidence of consideration of dissolution and of actual separation).     

Maximizing versus matching on concurrent variable-interval schedules

Maximization and matching predictions were examined for a time-based analogue of the concurrent variable-interval variable-ratio schedule. One alternative was a variable interval whose time base operated relatively independent of the schedule chosen, and the other was a discontinuous variable interval for which timing progressed only when selected. Pigeons switched between schedules by pecking a changeover key. The maximization hypothesis predicts that subjects will show a bias toward the discontinuous variable interval and undermatching; however the obtained results conformed closely to the predictions of the matching law. Finally, a quantitative comparison was made of the bias and sensitivity estimates obtained in published concurrent variable-interval variable-ratio analogue studies. Results indicated that only the ratio-based analogue of the concurrent variable interval variable ratio studied by Green, Rachlin, and Hanson (1983) produced significant bias toward the variable-ratio alternative and undermatching, as predicted by reinforcement maximization.     

Statistical power and the Rorschach: 1975-1991

The Rorschach Inkblot Test has been the source of long-standing controversies as to its nature and its psychometric properties. Consistent with behavioral science research in general, the concept of statistical power has been entirely ignored by Rorschach researchers. The concept of power is introduced and discussed, and a power survey of the Rorschach literature published between 1975 and 1991 in the Journal of Personality Assessment, Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, Journal of Abnormal Psychology, Journal of Clinical Psychology, Journal of Personality, Psychological Bulletin, American Journal of Psychiatry, and Journal of Personality and Social Psychology was undertaken. Power was calculated for 2,300 statistical tests in 158 journal articles. Power to detect small, medium, and large effect sizes was .13, .56, and .85, respectively. Similar to the findings in other power surveys conducted on behavioral science research, we concluded that Rorschach research is underpowered to detect the differences under investigation. This undoubtedly contributes to the inconsistency of research findings which has been a source of controversy and criticism over the decades. It appears that research conducted according to the Comprehensive System for the Rorschach is more powerful. Recommendations are offered for improving power and strengthening the design sensitivity of Rorschach research, including increasing sample sizes, use of parametric statistics, reduction of error variance, more accurate reporting of findings, and editorial policies reflecting concern about the magnitude of relationships beyond an exclusive focus on levels of statistical significance.