Student-teacher concordance on dimensions of student social competence: A multitrait-multimethod analysis

Teacher and self-ratings of social competence were obtained for 669 (341 males, 328 females) grades 3–6 students using the Social Behavior Assessment—Revised (SBA-R) and a self-report scale consisting of the identical items reworded in first person. Factor analysis and multitrait-multimethod matrix analysis were used to validate construct interpretations. The previous four-factor structure of the SBA-R was not replicated. However, the three-factor structure that did emerge was better defined. Although student-teacher concordance was moderate for the Self-Control/Social Convention and Academic Responsibility factors, it was minimal for the Social Participation factor. Evidence of discriminant validity was weak. As with other studies using rating scales, method bias was in evidence. Sex differences were found in terms of variance explained by each factor and convergent validity. Discussion focuses on problems associated with construct validation in general and validation of school-related social competence in particular.     

A comment on Tooley's Abortion and Infanticide

Tushnet and Seidman attempt to show that, even if Michael Tooley is correct that fetuses have no right to life, others may have a right to their continued existence. Rights-bearing third parties with an interest in the fetus might be biological fathers, prospective adoptive parents, or even society as a whole. Criteria for assessing the legitimacy of claims of interest must be developed and then balanced against the claims of those who support abortion. The authors also discuss principles of bodily autonomy, the destruction as well as the removal of the fetus, and the question of whether legislation prohibiting abortion is mandatory, permissible, or optional.     

The development of children's achievement-related expectancies and subjective uncertainty

Children between the ages of 3 and 6 years were asked to predict their success or failure in two different tasks: a box-lifting task and a task in which marbles had to be rolled through gates of different widths. Both tasks had five difficulty levels which were presented either simultaneously or successively. Along with the verbal or nonverbal responses to questions about their chances of success, the time children needed to make the prediction (decision time), the number of eye movement during the decision time, and, in the box-lifting task, the time taken to approach the box were assessed. The results indicated that children from 3 years on make realistic assessments of their chances for success at the five different difficulty levels. The simultaneous presentation mode enables the children to make more realistic success predictions only in the marble-rolling task. For the box-lifting task, children seem to have a stabilized difficulty scale which allows sure predictions without the whole range of difficulty levels being physically presented.     

Socio-cognitive conflict and peer interaction: Development of compensation

The purpose of this study was to examine under which social conditions cognitive development of children at the same cognitive development level will be stimulated. One hundred and two children (mean age 7.8 years), understanding conversation of area quantity, but not yet able to grasp the compensatory relationships between the dimensions of length and width of an area, participated in two experimental conditions in which the developmental processes of socio-cognitive conflict and coordination were evoked. The results indicate that the resolution of the socio-cognitive conflict and the occurence of coordination is higher in individual than in dyadic conditions, and higher in (inter-group) competitive and (adult) supervised conditions than in conditions were task execution was left to the spontaneous initiative of the children themselves. Cognitive developmental progress generalized from the area concept to liquid and mass concepts.     

STIMULUS VARIATION AS A MEANS OF ENHANCING PUNISHMENT EFFECTS

We compared the effects of varied punishers (presentation of one of three available punishers) with the single presentation of one of the punishers on the occurrence of inappropriate behaviors with three developmentally delayed children. Two children were presented with varied-punisher conditions in which either overcorrection, time-out, or a verbal “no” was presented contingent upon inappropiate behavior. A loud noise was substituted for overcorrection for a third child. Results of the multielement with reversal design indicated that both punishment formats produced a decrease in the target behaviors with the varied-punisher format slightly more effective than the single presentations of the punishers. The results suggest the use of varied punishers as a means of enhancing the effects of less intrusive procedures to effectively reduce inappropriate behaviors.     

An observational analysis of self-stimulatory behavior of older adults in a nursing home

Self-stimulatory behavior is described as a class of stereotyped and repetitive behaviors. This behavior often warrants concern because it can interfere with the learning and maintenance of more appropriate functional behaviors. In the present study, several topographies of self-stimulation were generated and the behavior of three older adult nursing home patients was observed for six weeks. Self-stimulation was high rate in all three subjects, and the manifestation of the behavior was idiosyncratic. Potential etiological factors and implications for treatment were discussed.     

Psychology at a crossroads

The current state of psychology is examined from the perspective that academic psychology and the private practice of psychology are faced with threats of their own obsolescence. Factors contributing to tensions in the discipline, as well as some hopeful signs, are reviewed. Three linked proposals are presented for the long-term resolution of these problems. An appropriate setting and a comprehensive model for graduate education are suggested. The third proposal concerns changes in our view of ourselves. A restoration of a sense of community is seen as a precondition for any constructive action.     

Understanding movement control in infants through the analysis of limb intersegmental dynamics

One important component in the understanding of the control of limb movements is the way in which the central nervous system accounts for joint forces and torques that may be generated not only by muscle actions but by gravity and by passive reactions related to the movements of limb segments. In this study, we asked how the neuromotor system of young infants controls a range of active and passive forces to produce a stereotypic, nonintentional movement. We specifically analyzed limb intersegmental dynamics in spontaneous, cyclic leg movements (kicking) of varying intensity in supine 3-month-old human infants. Using inverse dynamics, we calculated the contributions of active (muscular) and passive (motion-dependent and gravitational) torque components at the hip, knee, and ankle joints from three-dimensional limb kinematics. To calculate joint torques, accurate estimates were needed of the limb's anthropometric parameters, which we determined using a model of the human body. Our analysis of limb intersegmental dynamics explicitly quantified the complex interplay of active and passive forces producing the simple, involuntary kicking movements commonly seen in 3-month-old infants. our results revealed that in nonvigorous kicks, hip joint reversal was the result of an extensor torque due to gravity, opposed by the combined flexor effect of the muscle torque and the total motion-dependent torque. The total motion-dependent torque increased as a hip flexor torque in more vigorous kicks; an extensor muscle torque was necessary to counteract the flexor influences of the total motion-dependent torque and, in the case of large ranges of motion, a flexor gravity torque as well. Thus, with changing passive torque influences due to motions of the linked segments, the muscle torques were adjusted to produce a net torque to reverse the kicking motion. As a consequence, despite considerable heterogeneity in the intensity, range of motion, coordination, and movement context of each kick, smooth trajectories resulted from the muscle torque, counteracting and complementing not only gravity but also the motion-dependent torques generated by movement of the linked segments.     

Skill level, vision, and proprioception in simple one-hand catching

Two experiments examined the interaction of vision and articular proprioception in simple one-hand catching. In Experiment 1 (N = 18) skilled baseball and softball players used the left and right hands to catch slowly moving tennis balls, while Experiment 2 (N = 16) used novice catchers as subjects. In half the trials, sight of the catching hand was prevented by placing a screen alongside the subjects' face. Results of Experiment 1 revealed that the screen caused minimal disruption of the positioning phase of the catch, with moderate disruption of the grasping phase. However, for the unskilled subjects of Experiment 2, the screen caused considerable disruption of positioning. The data provide only minimal support for Smyth and Marriott' (1982) contention that limb position is inadequately specified by articular proprioception. It is argued that skill level serves as a mediator in the ability to use proprioception for limb positioning, but vision appears necessary to control the precise temporal organization of the grasp phase of one-hand catching.