Social influence on predictions of simulated stock prices

Herding in financial markets refers to that investors are influenced by others. This study addresses the importance of consistency for herding. It is suggested that, in financial markets perceptions of consistency are based on repeated observations over time. Consistency may then be perceived as the agreement across time between investors' predictions. In addition, consistency may be related to variance over time in each investor's predictions. In an experiment using a Multiple Cue Probability Learning paradigm, 96 undergraduates made multi‐trial predictions of future stock prices given information about the current price and the predictions made by five fictitious others. Consistency was varied between the others' predictions (correlation) and within the others' predictions (variance). The results showed that the predictions were significantly influenced by the others' predictions when these were correlated. No effect of variance was observed. Hence, participants were influenced by the others when they were in agreement, regardless of whether they varied their predictions over trials or not. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The transactional model of early home intervention

This article describes a developmental model for early home intervention and treatment of environmentally and biologically at-risk infants and their parents: The Transactional Model of Home Intervention. The model identifies the development of both infants and parents as targets of intervention and considers their ongoing interactions or transactions within the family context as the vehicle of intervention. The child and his physical/social environment are conceptualized as actively influencing one another in their reciprocal transactions. An early intervention program based on this transactional model is described. The intervention is tailored to suit the needs of both child and parents and, more generally, the needs of the family. The intervention process involves a problem-solving model of education by which parents acquire cognitive strategies that will enable them to assess the needs of their child and to design a program to fulfill these needs.     

Experiential Tasks and Therapist Bias Awareness

All therapists have values, assumptions, and beliefs about groups of people who are different from the dominant culture. How the therapeutic process is shadowed by therapists' assumptions and attitudes toward ethnic minorities is discussed. The author provides experiential techniques such as visualization, role playing, role reversal, family sculpturing, and a written assignment as a vehicle to heighten a family therapists' awareness of underlying assumptions and biases toward clients of an ethnic minority.     

Predictors of Condom Use Among African American Males at High Risk for HIV1

This study compared the influence of HIV risk behaviors and condom use attitudes on condom use among heterosexual African American males. Three models were tested: (a) HIV risk, (b) condom use attitudes, and (c) a model combining the previous two. Brief street intercept interviews were administered to African American males in 2 matched pairs of census tracts. Results are based on 589 males reporting vaginal sex in the last 30 days. The General Linear Test (GLT) was used to test the ability of regression models to reduce error variance. The condom use, attitude model was sufficient to predict frequency of condom use regardless of partner type. The strongest predictors of condom use were condom use enjoyment, social norms, self-efficacy, and social influence.     

Exploring self-forgiveness

This article presents the results of a phenomenological study of the experience of self-forgiveness. On the basis of in-depth interviews with seven subjects, self-forgiveness is described not as an achievement but rather as a gift where one moves from estrangement and brokenness to a sense of at-homeness.This article is based in part on a paper presented at the Eighth International Human Science Research Conference at the University of Aarhus, Denmark, in August 1989. The authors thank their colleagues Carolyn Grissom and Jodi Kelly for their helpful suggestions.     

Male Partners' Appraisals of Undesired Pregnancy and Abortion: Implications for Women's Adjustment to Abortion

The impact of men's attributions for pregnancy and expectations for coping with abortion on their partner's post-abortion adjustment was examined. Men's and women's attributions and coping expectations were assessed in a sample of 73 couples prior to obtaining a first-trimester abortion of an undesired pregnancy. Women's depression was assessed 30 minutes post-abortion. Partners did not differ in their coping expectations or attributions of the pregnancy to chance, situation, another person, or their own behavior, but men blamed the pregnancy more on their own character than did their partners. Male partner's coping expectancies affected women's adjustment only if the women themselves had low coping expectancies. Among women with low coping expectancies, those accompanied by partners who also had low coping expectancies were the most depressed. Men's attributions were unrelated to their partner's adjustment.     

Relationships between eating disorder characteristics and love and sex attitudes

The current study explored theories proposing relationship difficulties in women with eating disorder characteristics. Results for the sample of 232 women (82% White-non-Hispanic, 12% White-Hispanic, 4% Black, 2% Oriental and other) indicated that eating disorder characteristics were most consistently positively related to a possessive and game-playing approach to love, and most consistently negatively related to a passionate and companionate love approach. In addition, eating disorder characteristics were positively related to casual and instrumental sexual attitudes, and negatively related to idealistic sexual attitudes. Women who were more endorsing of eating disorders were also lower in sexual self-esteem. Women who were dissatisfied with themselves physically, differed from satisfied women on several measures. Interpersonal features appear to be related to eating disorder characteristics in various ways.     

Autonomic and psychologic correlates in hypertension and duodenal ulcer

Psychophysiologic response patterns of 47 male duodenal-ulcer patients, 50 male hypertensive patients, and a control group of 65 men were compared by recording skin resistance level and responses, finger pulse volume, and surface integrated electromyograms during a series of verbal, acoustic, and color stimuli. Personality characteristics were examined on the basis of the Eysenck Personality Inventory, the Lüscher Test, Juhász’ Neurosis Scoring Scale, and the Achievement Anxiety Scale of Alpert and Haber. Using stepwise discriminant analysis of these psychophysiologic data for the control and the hypertensive groups and the control and duodenal ulcer groups, errorless postdiction of group membership was obtained, which indicates that the autonomic parameters and psychologic traits selected as characteristics show relationships that are relevant from the diagnostic viewpoint in the groups of patients. The method could be developed into a screening test procedure for use in the early detection of persons potentially at risk.     

Out-of school youth in high-unemployment areas: An empirical investigation

A total of 551 interviews were conducted with 16-20 year olds living in high unemployment areas in Liverpool, London, Manchester and Wolverhampton. The diverse ways in which the young unemployed react to their predicaments are described, and explanations are offered for why black youth tend to be less acquiescent than whites. Overall, however, the analysis emphasises the ability of the young people at greatest risk of unemployment to devise their own coping strategies. Counsellors and other careers workers are advised to take these into account: otherwise their efforts are likely to be discounted by their clients.