Comprehension of Sexual Consent as a Key Factor in the Perpetration of Sexual Aggression Among College Men

The comprehension of sexual consent is a crucial factor in healthy sexual relationships. This study examined the connection between the understanding of sexual consent and perpetration of sexual aggression. We surveyed 217 heterosexual male college students (M age = 20.9 years) using measures of sexual aggression, comprehension of sexual consent, rape myth acceptance, conformity to masculine norms, peer support of abuse, and attachment to abusive peers. We tested models examining factors related to comprehension of consent and the extent to which comprehension of consent was related to perpetration of sexual aggression. Rape myth acceptance, peer support of abuse, and conformity to masculine norms were found to predict comprehension of consent, which mediated the relationship between the social and cognitive variables and sexual aggression.     

Beginning adult L2 learners' sensitivity to morphosyntactic violations: A self-paced reading study

This study investigated beginning adult second language (L2) learners' sensitivity to L2 morphosyntactic violations as a function of cross-language similarity. Online sensitivity was indexed by self-paced reading times at: (1) the critical word at which the violation could first be detected, (2) the post-critical word, and (3) the sentence-final word. In conditions in which morphosyntactic marking systems were similar or different in L1 and L2, reading times on the critical word were slower when it cued a violation than when it did not; however, this sensitivity was not apparent in a construction unique to L2. Slower reading times to violations spilled over onto the post-critical word. Cross-language similarity also influenced sentence-final word reading times. Despite this online sensitivity, post-sentence grammaticality judgements were generally poor. However, these judgements were influenced by morphosyntactic markings on words after the critical word, suggesting that learners can make use of this information.     

A preliminary study of autobiographical memory in remitted bipolar and unipolar depression and the role of imagery in the specificity of memory

Autobiographical memory was investigated in a sample of 19 individuals with remitted bipolar affective disorder and a community sample of 16 individuals with remitted unipolar depression who had similar low levels of current symptoms. Each participant was prompted to recall one positive memory and one negative memory, to rate it on several scales, and to describe it in detail. Relative to the remitted unipolar group, the remitted bipolar group reported more general than specific negative memories and more frequent recollections of the negative memory during their everyday life. Across the sample, 95% of all specific memories involved a mental image, whereas only 56% of all general memories involved a mental image, suggesting a role of imagery in the retrieval of a specific memory. Characteristic examples of memories are provided. These results are preliminary yet they suggest that patients with bipolar disorder in remission may show memory characteristics that are often associated with symptomatic unipolar depression.     

Not “just” a coincidence: Frontal‐striatal interactions in working memory and interval timing

The frontal cortex and basal ganglia play central roles in working memory and in the ability to time brief intervals. We outline recent theoretical and empirical work to suggest that working memory and interval timing rely not only on the same anatomic structures, but also on the same neural representation of a specific stimulus. Specifically, cortical neurons may fire in an oscillatory fashion to form representations of stimuli, and the striatum (a basal ganglia structure) may detect those patterns of cortical firing that occur co‐incident to important events. Information about stimulus identity can be extracted from which cortical neurons are involved in the representation, and information about duration can be extracted from their relative phase. The principles derived from these biologically based models also fit well with a family of behaviourally based models that emphasise the importance of time in many working memory phenomena.     

Visually Controlled Locomotion: 40 years Later

Gibson's article, Visually Controlled Locomotion and Visual Orientation in Animals(1958/this issue), is the leading statement of a nonrepresentational, information-based approach to visual control. The core ideas he introduced 40 years ago resurface, explicitly or implicitly, in much contemporary work on perception and action in humans, insects, robots, and autonomous agents. The purpose of this special issue is to assess the continuing pertinence of these insights and illustrate current directions in research on visually controlled locomotion. In this article, I locate the 1958 article in the context of Gibson's emerging theory of perception, contrast information-based control with standard model-based and cybernetic control architectures, evaluate the current status of Gibson's visual control formulae, and situate visual control within an informational-dynamical approach to agent-environment systems. Locomotion is a biologically basic function, and if that can be accounted for then the problem of human space perception may appear in a new light. The question, then, is how an animal gets about by vision.     

The effects of culture and self-construal on responses to threatening health information

Objective: The current studies examined if cultural and self-construal differences in self-enhancement extended to defensive responses to health threats.

Design: Responses to fictitious medical diagnoses were compared between Asian-Americans and European-North Americans in Experiment 1 and between Canadians primed with an interdependent versus an independent self-construal in Experiment 3. In Experiment 2, the responses of Chinese and Canadians who were either heavy or light soft drink consumers were assessed after reading an article linking soft drink consumption to insulin resistance.

Main outcome measure: The primary-dependent measure reflected participants’ defensiveness about threatening versus nonthreatening health information.

Results: In Experiment 1, all participants responded more defensively to an unfavourable than a favourable diagnosis; however, Asian-Americans responded less defensively than did European-North Americans. In Experiment 2, all high soft drink consumers were less convinced by the threatening information than were low soft drink consumers; however, among high consumers, Chinese changed their self-reported consumption levels less than did European-Canadians. In Experiment 3, interdependence-primed participants responded less defensively to an unfavourable diagnosis than did independence-primed participants.

Conclusion: Defensive reactions to threatening health information were found consistently; however, self-enhancement was more pronounced in individuals with Western cultural backgrounds or independent self-construals.     

Selling From 1900 to 1949: A Historical Perspective

Selling has developed dramatically in the twentieth century. It has changed from largely an independent and unstructured activity to a modern and scientifically managed profession that has contributed to the economic growth of this century. This paper examines its development from 1900 to 1950, focusing on the practices, events, and philosophies that have influenced the selling profession.     

Self-Regulation and Performance in High-Fidelity Simulations: An Extension of Ego-Depletion Research

This article extends the research literature related to “ego-depletion.” Although numerous studies have focused on the self-regulatory failure associated with ego-depletion, the extant literature is generally characterized by relatively simple behavioral manipulations and dependent measures. Two studies are described that extend previous ego-depletion findings by employing a high-fidelity, customer service simulation as an ego-depleting manipulation (Study 1) and by using performance on a cognitively demanding naval combat simulator as a dependent measure (Study 2). Results of both studies show the generalizability of the effects of ego-depletion; the implications for self-regulatory failure in more naturalistic settings are discussed.     

The Frequency with which a Group of Unselected College Students Experience Colored Dreaming and Colored Hearing

The principal aim of this report has been to clear the air with regard to number development theory and research. We began with a brief overview of the status of the number concept in pure mathematics and psychology. It was argued that although there are clear methological differences between pure mathematical and psychological approaches to the study of number, the two approaches are substantively complementary. Both are attempts to found the number concept on underlying psychological processes.

Three influential mathematical theories of number and three metamathematical criteria by which such theories are judged (consistency, completeness, categoricalness) then were summarized. The first theory, originally proposed by Peano (30) and von Neumann (49), postulates that the number concept may be reduced to a wholistic property of the natural numbers: viz., their inherent ordering. It was found that Peano-von Neumann's ordinal theory allows one to construct natural numbers without contradiction (consistency) and to construct all the natural numbers (completeness). However, the ordinal theory is not only a theory of number; it is a theory of all ordered progressions. The second theory, originally proposed by Russell (39, 40, 41, 42, 51, 52) and Frege (15), postulates that the number concept may be reduced to an atomistic property of the natural numbers: viz., the fact that each natural number is a class which includes all classes containing a particular number of elements. It was found that Russell-Frege's class theory does not allow one either to construct natural numbers without contradiction (inconsistency) or to construct all the natural numbers (incompleteness). The third theory, originally proposed by Piaget (31, 32), is a combination of the Peano-von Neumann and Russell-Frege theories; i.e., it founds number simultaneously on the wholistic property of order and the atomistic property of class. Piaget's theory was found to be contradictory (inconsistent) and to contain a superfluous undefined concept. A comparative analysis of the three theories revealed that although none of them is universally accepted as an ultimate theory of number, Peano-von Neumann's ordinal theory is by far the most satisfactory of the three by metamathematical criteria.

Each of the mathematical theories of number was translated into a cognitive developmental theory by substituting “developmental priority” of “mathematical priority.” The first theory postulated that children's number concepts derive from a prior understanding of the quantification of ordinal relations (ordination). The second theory postulated that children's number concepts derive from a prior understanding of the quantification of classes (cardination). The third theory postulated that children's number concepts derive from a prior understanding of both ordination and cardination. Published research which pertains to the postulates of each of these theories was reviewed (2, 8, 9, 10, 23, 33, 45, 46). Because of incomplete data analyses and poor operational definitions, it was concluded that the existing evidence does not clearly support any of the three theories.

Behavioral methods of assessing ordination, cardination, and natural number competence in children's thinking then were constructed. Care was taken to insure that each behavioral test was the most obvious counterpart of the mathematical definition of the notion that the test was designed to measure. It was argued in this regard that scrupulously precise operational definitions—as opposed to the loose operational definitions that characterize Piaget's (33) original studies of number development—are essential if we hope to decide which of the competing theories of number development is the most tenable. Two developmental studies were reported. In the first study, there were three principal findings: (a) Ordination was found to emerge in three stages (no ordering, spatial ordering, ordination). (b) Cardination was found to emerge in three stages (no correspondence, one-to-many and many-to-one correspondence, one-to-one correspondence). (c) Ordination was found to emerge long before cardination. In the second study, there were three principal findings: (a) The major findings of the first study were replicated. (b) Ordination was found to emerge prior to natural number competence. (c) Cardination was not found to emerge prior to natural number competence. It was concluded that the theory of number development which corresponds to the most satisfactory of the three mathematical theories—namely, the ordinal theory—is consistently supported by the developmental findings.

Possible explanations of the cognitive-developmental sequences reported in the two studies were considered. It was suggested that Flavell's (14) notion of item structure probably accounts for all the sequences. Flavell's notion of item structure specifies that a developmental sequence of the form X₁ → X₂ obtains between two cognitive items when the use of X₂ logically presupposes the use of X₁. It was argued in this regard that the sequences reported in the two studies each reflect logical relationships mentioned in the earlier review of mathematical number theories. Finally, the epistemological question of why such a close relationship exists between logical priorities and cognitive-developmental sequences was considered. It was concluded that there must be at least some structural isomorphism between the domains of cognition and pure mathematics.