Smiling and relative status in news photographs

To test the hypothesis that lower social status is associated with more smiling, the authors used newspaper photographs and their associated news stories as the basis for scoring the smiling and relative social status of the 2 individuals in each photograph. Independent raters judged smiling and 5 dimensions of relative status for 496 individuals in 248 newspaper photographs. There was no relation between status and smiling, although status and smiling were both related to other variables such as gender, age, and story valence. These findings add to a growing body of evidence that there is no generalized relation between smiling and status.     

Relationship between the rorschach and the MMPI-2 in a Swedish population: a replication study of the effects of first-factor related test-interaction styles

A sizeable amount of research literature has failed to demonstrate a stable relationship between self-report and the Rorschach (Exner, 1993). However, principal component first-factor related test-interaction style has been shown to moderate convergence. In this study 78 psychiatric patients completed the Rorschach and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2; Hathaway & McKinley, 1989). Practically no correlation was evident between the MMPI-2 and the Rorschach, measuring similar constructs, in all patients. Patients with similar test-interaction styles demonstrated positive intermethod correlations between both conceptually related and conceptually not directly related test indexes. The same scales were negatively correlated in patients with discordant test-interaction styles, and this difference between test-interaction style groups was significant. It is suggested that first-factor related test-interaction style moderates convergence. It is further suggested that test-interaction style moderates convergence between both conceptually related and conceptually not directly related measures of distress or psychopathology.     

Lack of association of computer use and ability with spontaneous mental visualization

Relationships between frequency of computer use or ability to use the computer effectively with the tendency to construct and process visual mental images were investigated by administering a computer-use questionnaire and a visualization questionnaire to a sample of 185 Italian and Spanish undergraduates. Analysis did not support associations between either (a) frequent computer use of any kind or (b) high competence in using the computer for various purposes and spontaneous use of imagery.     

Lapses of intention and performance variability reveal age-related increases in fluctuations of executive control

We examine the hypothesis that the efficiency of executive control processes is less stable over time in older than younger adults. An age-related decrease in the efficiency of executive control should result in an increase in performance variability in task conditions requiring the recruitment of executive control processes and not in task conditions requiring minimal involvement of executive control. Performance variability was similar for younger and older adults in task conditions requiring minimal executive control and greater for older than younger adults in task conditions requiring executive control. These and other data are consistent with the proposal that aging is associated with a decrease in the stability of executive control over time.     

Oxytocin links mothering received,mothering bestowed and adult stress responses

We review recent discoveries that implicate oxytocin in the intergenerational transmission of similar levels of maternal behavior and acute stress responses in female rats. First, ICV-infused oxytocin antagonist decreased the display by nursing dams of pup-licking (PL) and arched-back nursing (ABN), but not other components of maternal behavior, and increased maternal self-grooming suggesting that oxytocin may shift the balance of oral grooming by dams away from themselves and toward pups. Second, oxytocin receptor concentrations in areas of the adult brain where oxytocin stimulates maternal behavior or diminishes anxiety and adrenal axis responses to acute stress were positively related to PL-ABN received during infancy. Third, oxytocin and oxytocin antagonist treatments of pups on postnatal days 2-10, respectively increased and decreased PL by the treated rats when adult and themselves nursing dams. This indicates that oxytocin activity in female pups, which may be regulated by PL-ABN received from their mothers, influences their adult levels of PL. These three lines of evidence suggest that oxytocin selectively enhances PL-ABN by rat dams, which then increases oxytocin activity in female pups and, thereby, facilitates their expression of central oxytocin receptors (and perhaps other aspects of central oxytocin systems) and, consequently, their adult PL-ABN frequencies and acute stress responses.     

Longing for Life Extension: Science Fiction and Late Life

Rejuvenescence has long been a topic of legend and medicine. As the body became the property of medical science, speculative fiction asked how fantastic experiments with bodies would affect the life course. In science fiction, medical breakthroughs promise or threaten to forestall or even reverse the decline from midlife through old age to senility and decrepitude. Responding to debates over evolution, eugenics, and scientific experimentation with human and animal subjects, rejuvenescence novels such as Bruce Sterling's Holy Fire (1996) ask readers whether they desire long life or heightened quality of life; the consolations of age or the hungers of youth; short-lived intensity or perpetual ennui.     

Family functioning and early onset of sexual intercourse in Latino adolescents

The purpose of this study was to identify factors associated with early onset of sexual intercourse. Within an ecological system's conceptual framework, familial factors associated with early onset of sexual activity were identified in a sample of 425 adolescents from San Juan metro area schools. Measures included questions about sexual activity, sexual permissiveness, and such familial variables as: discipline, parental supervision, and parental support. Significant relationships were observed between early onset of sexual intercourse and parental supervision, discipline, parental support, and parents' marital status. Results suggest the key role of parents and family in prevention of HIV-risk behaviors among adolescents in terms of delaying sexual onset. Overall, the study described youths who postponed sexual activity as having greater support, supervision, and parental involvement.     

Children's reasoning about the causal significance of the temporal order of events

Four experiments examined children's ability to reason about the causal significance of the order in which 2 events occurred (the pressing of buttons on a mechanically operated box). In Study 1, 4-year-olds were unable to make the relevant inferences, whereas 5-year-olds were successful on one version of the task. In Study 2, 3-year-olds were successful on a simplified version of the task in which they were able to observe the events although not their consequences. Study 3 found that older children had difficulties with the original task even when provided with cues to attend to order information. However, 5-year-olds performed successfully in Study 4, in which the causally relevant event was made more salient.