Self-efficacy,planning, and preparatory behaviours as joint predictors of physical activity: A conditional process analysis

Objective: Planning can bridge the gap between intentions and action, but what bridges the gap between planning and action? This study helps to answer the question by disentangling the interrelationships between self-efficacy, planning and preparatory behaviours in predicting physical activity. Preparatory behaviours are tested as a working mechanism of planning. Moreover, it is tested whether the utility of preparatory behaviours depends on an individual’s level of self-efficacy.

Methods: A survey assessed planning, self-efficacy and preparatory behaviours for physical activity. Adults (N = 166) provided data at two measurement points. In a longitudinal model, preparatory behaviours were specified as a mediator between planning and physical activity. Self-efficacy was specified as a possible moderator at two points in the model.

Results: Preparatory behaviours mediated the relationship between planning and physical activity. An interaction between self-efficacy and preparatory behaviours on physical activity was found, indicating that individuals with low self-efficacy beliefs were more active if they engaged more frequently in preparatory behaviours.

Conclusion: Planning seems to stimulate preparatory behaviours, which in turn make future physical activity more likely. Furthermore, as performing preparatory behaviours represent a step forward towards the enactment of behavioural goals, preparatory behaviours may be particular beneficial for individuals afflicted by self-doubts regarding physical activity.     

Negation in context: Evidence from the visual world paradigm

Literature assumes that negation is more difficult to understand than affirmation, but this might depend on the pragmatic context. The goal of this paper is to show that pragmatic knowledge modulates the unfolding processing of negation due to the previous activation of the negated situation. To test this, we used the visual world paradigm. In this task, we presented affirmative (e.g., her dad was rich) and negative sentences (e.g., her dad was not poor) while viewing two images of the affirmed and denied entities. The critical sentence in each item was preceded by one of three types of contexts: an inconsistent context (e.g., She supposed that her dad had little savings) that activates the negated situation (a poor man), a consistent context (e.g., She supposed that her dad had enough savings) that activates the actual situation (a rich man), or a neutral context (e.g., her dad lived on the other side of town) that activates neither of the two models previously suggested. The results corroborated our hypothesis. Pragmatics is implicated in the unfolding processing of negation. We found an increase in fixations on the target compared to the baseline for negative sentences at 800?ms in the neutral context, 600?ms in the inconsistent context, and 1450?ms in the consistent context. Thus, when the negated situation has been previously introduced via an inconsistent context, negation is facilitated.     

Relationships Among Paternal Involvement and Young Children's Perceived Self-Competence and Behavioral Problems

We examined the relationships of father involvement to young children's perceived self-competence and fathers' and mothers' perceptions of their children's internalizing and externalizing behavioral problems. The results indicated that mothers in families in which father involvement is high may have a more positive outlook regarding their child's behavior than do mothers in families in which father involvement is low. Fathers who were highly involved indicated their children have more behavior problems than fathers who were not highly involved. High father involvement was associated with increased children's feelings of paternal acceptance, a factor that plays a role in the development of self-concept and esteem.     

Belief in a Just World and Jury Decisions in a Civil Rape Trial

When people's belief in a just world (BJW) is challenged, it can be restored by attributing blame to the victim or alleviating the victim's suffering. In criminal cases, jurors can attribute responsibility to victims, but cannot alleviate suffering. Participants ( n = 106) heard a taped civil rape case. The effect of age of plaintiff, gender of participant, and type of participant on mock jurors' reactions to a plaintiff were examined. Participants evaluated responsibility of plaintiff and awarded monetary damages. It was hypothesized that, given this opportunity to compensate the victim, jurors would be less likely to derogate the victim. As hypothesized, women with high and low BJW attributed the same level of responsibility to the plaintiff but those with a high BJW awarded more monetaly damages. Men with high BJW awarded much less in damages than did men with low BJW. The just-world theory appears to explain many of the decisions made by mock jurors.     

贮备格栅技术：一种对企业组织有价值的工具

角色建构贮备格栅技术是由乔治凯利在 1 95 5年首创的 ,能有效地应用于企业组织中。本文先讨论个人建构心理学的一些有关的主要概念 ;然后 ,对格栅的实质及其分析作了阐述 ,包括它们在心理测量方面的一些特点。对员工选择 /职业指导的文章 ,包括那些有关工作分析、工作各方面的意义和处理工作问题的那些文章作了介绍。     

The Use of the Devereux Scales of Mental Disorders in the Assessment of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder and Conduct Disorder

The present study was designed to gather validity data on the Devereux Scales of Mental Disorders (DSMD) for distinguishing among children and adolescents with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD; N = 32), Conduct Disorder (CD; N = 34), or no clinical diagnosis (NC; N = 65). Three types of indicators were compared: (a) DSMD scale, composite, and total scores, (b) the number of ADHD or CD-related items endorsed, and (c) diagnostic efficiency statistics (e.g., sensitivity, positive and negative predictive power). The clinical groups did not differ significantly from each other, but both were significantly higher than the NC group on all DSMD scales. Moreover, there were significant differences between the ADHD and the CD groups on the number of respective ADHD and CD-related items endorsed. A cut-off of seven to eight items yielded the best discrimination between the two diagnostic groups. Diagnostic efficiency statistics indicate that the DSMD may be effective at differentiating between similar disruptive behavior disorders.     

Is Socrates Essentially a Man?

Philosophical Studies -     

The Immune System as a Sensory System: Implications for Psychology

The brain and immune system form a bidirectional communication network in which the immune system operates as a sense organ to provide the brain with information about infection and injury, thereby allowing the brain to coordinate a defense. Activated immune cells release proteins called cytokines, which signal the brain by both blood and neural routes. Information that reaches the brain across this sensory channel produces large changes in neural activity, behavior, mood, and cognitive functioning. Appreciation of the functioning of this network may illuminate poorly understood aspects of stress, depression, and intraindividual variability in behavior, mood, and cognition.     

Communicating quantities: a review of psycholinguistic evidence of how expressions determine perspectives

The way in which information about proportions, amounts, frequencies, probabilities, degrees of confidence, and risk is portrayed in natural language is not neutral, but reflects presuppositions and assumed norms. In this paper we present a review of evidence in support of this position. We show that the choice of expressions for communication depends in a systematic way on the kinds of inferences communicators draw. We go on to discuss the consequences of this for attribution phenomena, aspects of reasoning, the portrayal of uncertainty, and responses to questionnaires. We also suggest that communicator preferences for using language rather than numbers may have to do with human reasoning being argument‐based, rather than with a preference for vagueness, as has been commonly claimed. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.