Persuading people to stop smoking

Forty smokers attending a chest clinic were given a questionnaire designed to measure motivation to stop smoking. The effects of three variables on their smoking level were investigated: (1) advice from the chest physician to stop smoking; (2) subjection to a further ‘motivating’ interview by a psychologist: (3) the wearing of a white coat by the psychologist during his interview. The questionnaire proved a useful predictor of smoking reduction over a 3-month follow-up period. Advice from the chest physician had a significant effect in getting people to reduce smoking over 3 months but the extra ‘motivating’ interview was ineffective. Patients responded to the white coat by reducing their smoking level significantly, irrespective of whether the psychologist wearing the white coat was advising them to reduce smoking or not. These results suggest that the advice-giving role of the doctor could be used more effectively than it currently is in preventive medicine, and that the psychologist has an important role to play in measuring the successful parameters of such advice and hence improving its quality.     

Misconceptions about the Fishbein model: Reflections on a study by Songer-Nocks

Songer-Nocks has questioned the generality and sufficiency of Fishbein's model of intentions. It is shown that her conclusions reflect a basic misunderstanding of the model and its implications. Several misconceptions are identified and an attempt is made to clarify some of the theoretical and methodological issues involved.     

Misconceptions revisited: A final comment

Although Songer-Nock's reanalysis of her data is consistent with our earlie comments, her reply indicates that some of her misconceptions persist.     

Semantic category effects in visual word search

The initial question was whether subjects could categorize a word semantically before they precisely identified the word itself. This failed to occur. When searching a visual display for a single target word, subjects searched at the same rate whether the distractors were in the same or in a different semantic category. However, when the size of the target set was increased to three, then six, items, subjects increasingly used category information to speed their search rate when targets and distractors belonged to different categories. Subjects appeared to perform the task by comparing the category of each display word to the category of the target set.     

A note on responses to ethyl alcohol before and after smoking1

Differential sensitivity was measured before and after smoking a cigarette by 10 smokers, using 10 nonsmokers as controls. Stimuli consisted of reagent grade ethanol in eight concentrations ranging from 4% to 12%. No significant differences were observed between smokers and nonsmokers or before vs after smoking, although slightly higher overall correct responses and correspondingly smaller jnds were obtained for the nonsmokers. No practice affects were noted among the control group between the first and second set of samples. The findings confirm previous results which had been recently questioned.     

Aligning the eye to the actively or passively positioned hand

Observations were made of the reversal rate of a three-dimensional skeletal cube as a function of observing condition and state of rest or motion of the cube. Perspective reversal rate of the stationary three-dimensional cube is greater than direction reversal rate of the same cube set in motion. Reversal rate of the rotating cube drops with rest, replicating a similar finding with the Necker cube. Comparisons are made with the rotating trapezoidal window illusion. nt]mis|The author is most grateful to Marshall P. Smith, Chairman of the Psychology Department of Trenton State College, for his aid in securing space and college students, and to David L. Hoats, of the Johnstone Research Department, for wiring the apparatus.