Gender-specific macro- and micro-level processes in the transmission of gender role orientation in adolescence: The role of fathers

Family represents a primary environment for the development and transmission of gender role orientation (GRO) in adolescence. Nonetheless, longitudinal approaches delineating the separate influences of fathers and mothers, including all possible same- and cross-sex parent–child dyads within one family are lacking. This article elucidates the process of adolescent gender role socialization in 244 German families (father, mother, son and daughter) utilizing a longitudinal design (two measurement points over 5 years). Direct transmission paths of GRO and gender-specific parenting (GSP) as a mediator were analysed focusing on fathers' contributions. In addition, the impact of parental workplace autonomy and socio-economic status on intra-familial socialization of GRO was examined. Results indicate that fathers and mothers play at least an equally important role in the transmission of gender role beliefs. A mediating effect of GSP was only evident when considering father–child dyads. Based on social cognitive and developmental systems approaches, the findings are discussed considering adolescents embedded within the family context.     

Minds, persons, and space: an fMRI investigation into the relational complexity of higher-order intentionality

Mental state reasoning or theory-of-mind has been the subject of a rich body of imaging research. Although such investigations routinely tap a common set of regions, the precise function of each area remains a contentious matter. With the help of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we sought to determine which areas are involved when processing mental state or intentional metarepresentations by focusing on the relational aspect of such representations. Using non-intentional relational representations such as spatial relations between persons and between objects as a contrast, the results ascertained the involvement of the precuneus, the temporal poles, and the medial prefrontal cortex in the processing of intentional representations. In contrast, the anterior superior temporal sulcus and the left temporo-parietal junction were implicated when processing representations that refer to the presence of persons in relational contexts in general. The right temporo-parietal junction, however, was specifically activated for persons entering spatial relations. The level of representational complexity, a previously unexplored factor, was also found to modulate the neural response in some brain regions, such as the medial prefrontal cortex and the right temporo-parietal junction. These findings highlight the need to take into account the critical roles played by an extensive network of neural regions during mental state reasoning.     

Creativity in Its Social Context: The Interplay of Organizational Norms,Situational Threat,and Gender

Past research has frequently made the assumptions that creativity is an individual, rather than social, behavior; that the factors shaping creative behavior influence everyone in the same way; and that these factors always have the same influence regardless of the situation. This research challenges all 3 of these assumptions. In an experiment, participants (n = 187) assumed the role of members of a business organization with either individualist or collectivist norms that was either under competitive threat or not. Results indicated that, when threat was absent, men exhibited more divergent thinking under individualist than collectivist norms. However, the reverse was true for women when threat was absent and for both sexes when their organization was under threat. Thus, a group norm emphasizing individuality can sometimes enhance divergent thinking performance. However, this influence is moderated by other situational factors such as competitive threat, and, possibly for reasons of differing socialization, does not appear to affect men and women equally.     

The Fisher-Pitman permutation test when testing for differences in mean and variance

The Fisher-Pitman permutation test can detect any type of difference between two samples: hence, a significant Fisher-Pitman permutation test does not necessarily provide evidence for a difference in means. It is possible, however, to test separately for differences in means and variances. Here, we present a recently proposed two-stage procedure to decide whether there are differences in means or variances that can be applied when samples may come from nonnormal distributions with possibly unequal variances.     

Is there any "free" choice? Self and dissonance in two cultures

Four experiments provided support for the hypothesis that upon making a choice, individuals justify their choice in order to eliminate doubts about culturally sanctioned aspects of the self, namely, competence and efficacy in North America and positive appraisal by other people in Japan. Japanese participants justified their choice (by increasing liking for chosen items and decreasing liking for rejected items) in the standard free-choice dissonance paradigm only when self-relevant others were primed, either by questionnaires (Studies 1-3) or by incidental exposure to schematic faces (Study 4). In the absence of these social cues, Japanese participants showed no dissonance effect. In contrast, European Americans justified their choices regardless of the social-cue manipulations. Implications for cognitive dissonance theory are discussed.     

The dynamics of operations in visual memory: a review and new evidence for oscillatory priming

Evidence from neurophysiological studies indicates that the synchronization of distributed neuronal assemblies in the gamma frequency range is responsible for the integration of discrete stimulus components into coherent wholes (e.g., see Singer, 1999 for review). Psychophysical support for this hypothesis has been reported in experiments that demonstrate that the presentation of a synchronous-premask frame within a 40-Hz flickering premask matrix primes the subsequent detection of a target Kanizsa-type square by generation of a 40-Hz prime (Elliott & Müller, 1998). Psychopharmacological and electrophysiological evidence suggests that this priming mechanism is related to activity in interneuronal networks and relies on the combined function of prefrontal and posterior circuits. In addition, psychophysical experiments demonstrate the existence of a prime-specific visual short-term memory that oscillates at 40 Hz and remains functional for up to 300 ms post-stimulus offset. These results are consistent with a view of the prime as a form of oscillatory mechanism, related to the persistence of visual information (Coltheart, 1980) and in the capacity guided by (prefrontal) top-down influences upon visual-cortical function.     

The direction of affective priming as a function of trait anxiety when naming target words with regular and irregular pronunciation

Results from an affective priming experiment confirm the previously reported influence of trait anxiety on the direction of affective priming in the naming task (Maier, Berner, & Pekrun, 2003): On trials in which extremely valenced primes appeared, positive affective priming reversed into negative affective priming with increasing levels of trait anxiety. Using valenced target words with irregular pronunciation did not have the expected effect of increasing the extent to which semantic processes play a role in naming, as affective priming effects were not stronger for irregular targets than for regular targets. This suggests the predominant operation of a whole-word nonsemantic pathway in reading aloud in German. Data from neutral priming trials hint at the possibility that negative affective priming in participants high in trait anxiety is due to inhibition of congruent targets.     

Coordinate transformations in object recognition

A basic problem of visual perception is how human beings recognize objects after spatial transformations. Three central classes of findings have to be accounted for: (a) Recognition performance varies systematically with orientation, size, and position; (b) recognition latencies are sequentially additive, suggesting analogue transformation processes; and (c) orientation and size congruency effects indicate that recognition involves the adjustment of a reference frame. All 3 classes of findings can be explained by a transformational framework of recognition: Recognition is achieved by an analogue transformation of a perceptual coordinate system that aligns memory and input representations. Coordinate transformations can be implemented neurocomputationally by gain (amplitude) modulation and may be regarded as a general processing principle of the visual cortex.     

SARA: a cognitive process model to simulate the anchoring effect and hindsight bias

The cognitive process model "SARA" aims to explain the anchoring effect and hindsight bias by making detailed assumptions about the representation and alteration of item-specific knowledge. The model assumes that all processes, namely generating an estimate, encoding new information (i.e., the "anchor"), and reconstructing a previously generated estimate, are based on a probabilistic sampling process. Sampling probes long-term memory in order to retrieve information into working memory. Retrieval depends on the associative strength between this information and the currently active retrieval cues. Encoding the anchor may alter this associative pattern ("selective activation") or the anchor may serve as a retrieval cue, thus directing memory search ("biased reconstruction"). Both processes lead to systematically changed retrieval probabilities, thus causing the anchoring effect or hindsight bias. The model is completely formalised and implemented as a computer program. A series of simulations demonstrates the power of SARA to reproduce empirical findings and to predict new ones.     

Associated or dissociated effects of syllable frequency in lexical decision and naming

Most empirical work investigating the role of syllable frequency in visual word recognition has focused on the Spanish language, in which syllable frequency seems to produce a classic dissociation: inhibition in lexical decision tasks but facilitation in naming. In the present study, two experiments were run in German, using identical stimulus materials, in a lexical decision task and a naming task. In both tasks, there was an inhibitory effect for words with a high-frequency first syllable. This pattern of results, suggesting a stronger weight of lexical access in the naming process in German than in Spanish, is discussed with regard to the issue of stress assignment in the two languages and within the framework of word production models. Items, mean response latencies, and accuracy rates per item for both experiments can be downloaded from www.psychonomic.org/archive.