RESPONSE STYLE AND CROSS-CULTURAL COMPARISONS OF RATING SCALES AMONG EAST ASIAN AND NORTH AMERICAN STUDENTS

Abstract— This report examines cross-cultural differences in response style regarding the use of rating scales Subjects were high school students 944 from Sendai (Japan), 1,357 from Taipei (Taiwan), 687 from Edmonton and Calgary (Canada), and 2,174 from the Minneapolis metropolitan area and Fairfax County, Virginia Responses to fifty-seven 7-point Likert-type scales were analyzed The Japanese and Chinese students were more likely than the two North American groups to use the midpoint on the scales, the U S subjects were more likely than the other three groups to use the extreme values Within each cultural group, endorsement of individualism was positively related to the use of extreme values and negatively related to the use of the midpoint These small, albeit statistically significant, differences in response styles generally did not alter cross-cultural comparisons of item means.     

Simulation and the Reproduction of Injustice: A Reply

Melinda Vadas rejects my claim that there are morally relevant differences between simulations of unjust events and actual unjust events on the ground that I overlook the connection between simulations and that which they simulate. I argue that this purported moral connection can only be understood as either the result of a necessary psychological disposition or as a “magical,” metaphysical attachment, neither of which is defensible or satisfactory.     

Stereotyped movement disorder in an adult following acquired brain injury: Effect of environmental stimulation

In the present study, a naturalistic functional analysis procedure was used to assess the effect of environmental stimulation on the stereotypic behavior (body rocking) of an adult whose stereotypy appeared to be induced by an acquired brain injury. Environmental stimulation, operationalized in terms of both physical and social characteristics, resulted in only minimal changes in the occurrence of body rocking. Body rocking occurred in excess of 50% of the observations in all environmental stimulation conditions and in a naturally occurring baseline condition. To our knowledge, this is the first published report of a functional analysis of stereotypy associated with acquired brain injury.     

Case study: Examining the relationship between self-initiations of an individual with disabilities and directive behavior of staff persons in a residential setting

This case study examines the relationship between self-initiations of an adult woman with severe disabilities and the directive behavior of staff persons in a community residential setting. Hypotheses generated from functional assessment procedures indicated that (a) Susan's low self-initiations were very likely related to high directive behavior of staff persons, and (b) infrequent problem behaviors during the morning routine were maintained by escape from repeated staff demands. An intervention was implemented to enable Susan to increase self-initiation in choice and sequence of activities and simultaneously decrease staff directives. Results and discussion focus on the need for a contextual approach for addressing problematic situations and an affirmation of the effectiveness of the positive behavioral support technology for increasing adaptive behaviors in individuals with severe disabilities.     

Perceived stressors and stress responses among hospital-based nursing trainees

Perceived sources and levels of stress were assessed with a rating scale describing the experience of stressors and stress responses and an unstructured self-report about the reasons of such ratings in 60 nursing students in their first and final year of hospital training. The results, which show a significantly higher report of stress in the latter group, also point to identifiable sources of stressors in hospital-based nursing training procedures. Several recommendations to alleviate these conditions are discussed.     

Correlates of parent–child communication about specific sexual topics: A study of rural parents with school-aged children

Using data from 600 parents of children aged 5 to 18, and a context-oriented, developmental socialization conceptual framework, the interrelationships between parents' perceptions of themselves, their child, and their family relationships and the amount of parent–child discussion of 16 sexuality topics were explored. Canonical correlation analysis was used to demonstrate how circumstances and contexts influence the complexity of parent–child conversations for mother–daughter, mother–son, father–son, and father–daughter dyads. Results lend support to the conceptual framework used, as well as to previous studies of this topic area. The implications of these findings for parent–child relationships and for future research on parent–child communication about sexuality are discussed.     

Going beyond heart rate: autonomic space and cardiovascular assessment of mental workload

Psychophysiological assessment of pilot mental workload using heart rate should be augmented with an autonomic space model of cardiovascular function. This model proposes that autonomic nervous system influences on the heart may change with psychological processing in ways that are not evident in heart rate. A method of mental-workload assessment was proposed that used multiple psychophysiological measures of cardiovascular responsivity to derive the underlying sympathetic and parasympathetic information needed to represent the autonomic space for heart rate. Principal-components analysis was used to extract Sympathetic and Parasympathetic components from heart period, residual heart period. respiratory sinus arrhythmia, and Traube-Hering-Mayer wave in three experiments that manipulated perceptual/central processing and physical task demands. This initial evaluation of the method concluded that the autonomic components were valid and that the components had greater diagnosticity, and for some manipulations greater sensitivity, than heart rate. These results support the contention that the Sympathetic and Parasympathetic components provided increased precision for mental-workload assessment.     

Vibrotactile pattern discrimination and communality at several body sites

In a series of experiments, the effects of spatial layout on vibrotactile pattern perception were explored by testing the ability to discriminate between two sequentially presented patterns that share active elements in the same spatial locations. Two-dimensional displays were used in order to examine the functional relationship between discrimination performance and patterncommunality, defined as the sharing elements, on different body sites. Accuracy of discrimination judgments was inversely proportional to communality, regardless of the number of pattern elements. For compact arrays fitted to the finger, palm, and thigh, the effects of communality appeared equivalent. The similarity between finger and thigh functions is remarkable, considering the dramatic differences between these sites in receptor components and structure. When these data were compared with those from arrays with distributed contactors, performance was substantially better with well-separated pattern elements. Such findings help to explicate how information from apposed patterns can best be delivered to the skin through tactile communication systems.