Selling and Sales Management in Action: Prospecting: A New Look at this Old Challenge

Prospecting is a fundamental step in the personal selling process. However, a wide variety of prospecting approaches exists among sales organizations and there is substantial disagreement in the terms used to describe prospecting elements and relationships. This article presents a working model that identifies and defines those elements and clearly demonstrates the strategic relationships among them. Insights and implications for managers are presented, along with suggestions for analyzing and modifying existing prospect-development programs.     

Reanalysis of Eysenck’s,Gray’s,and Zuckerman’s structural trait models based on a new measure: The Zuckerman–Kuhlman–Aluja Personality Questionnaire (ZKA-PQ)

The aim of this study was to explore the relationships of the dimensions and facets of the Zuckerman–Kuhlman–Aluja Personality Questionnaire (ZKA-PQ) with other psychobiological personality measures: the EPQ-RS (Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Revised, shortened version), I₇ (Impulsiveness Questionnaire) and SPSRQ-20 (Sensitivity to Punishment and Sensitivity to Reward Questionnaire, 20-item version). It is intended to test if findings reported with Zuckerman’s previous instrument (ZK-PQ) about the relationships between the three biologic-factorial personality models are replicated, giving evidence about the validity of the ZKA-PQ. The sample analyzed was of 584 subjects (50.3% men and 49.7% women) from the Spanish general population. Correlational and factor analysis supported the expected relationships between similar constructs assessed by the ZKA-PQ and the other questionnaires based on Eysenck’s and Gray’s personality theories. On the other hand, the inclusion of the facets from the ZKA-PQ improved the validity of the questionnaire. Findings were discussed in the framework of the biological personality models, emphasizing the contribution of the ZKA-PQ to the psychobiological personality research.     

On the Functional Role of Implicit Visual Memory for the Adaptive Deployment of Attention Across Scenes

Although very little visual information is explicitly retained across views, some continuity of processing is afforded by implicit visual memory traces of previous views. These memory traces interact with attentional mechanisms to guide eye movements, cognition, and action. Two different memory mechanisms are described here. First, the deployments of focal attention and eye movements are facilitated towards recently attended features and locations (priming of popout). Second, attention is guided by implicit memory traces of specific visual contexts experienced in the past (contextual cueing). Compared to the visual memory tapped by change blindness tasks, the implicit memory mechanisms of priming of popout and contextual cueing do not require conscious intervention and may exhibit greater memory capacity, longer durability, and higher discriminability. Thus, these implicit traces of past views guide attention and eye movements to allow for effective access (indexing) to a scene's details, hence providing context and continuity to ongoing interactions with the perceptual world.     

The Levels Hypothesis and the Study of Stimulus Value of Projective Test Items

Summary

Anagrams and semantic differential (S-D) test responses of Ss for whom words were “loaded” on a free association test were compared with those of Ss for whom the words were neutral. No differences in rate of word building or mean productivity of the two groups on the anagrams test were found. Mean S-D scale values similarly failed to differentiate between the two groups. However, when numbers of neutral (0) and extreme (+3 and ?3) responses were compared, “loaded” Ss were found on the whole to rate words more neutrally or more positively. The conclusion was that the stimulus value of the words in the associative condition could not be directly determined from responses in other conditions. The strategy of studying stimulus value of projective test items by using those items as stimuli on tests eliciting different levels of response was, therefore, questioned. Several other related experimental strategies which may mix response levels were also discussed and more appropriate techniques were suggested.     

Age as a Variable in the Connotative Perceptions of Some Animal Symbols

Using the Rorschach as one instrument in the selection of industrial- and business-personnel, the author become aware that in the testing-the-limits (tt1) phase individuals showed a strong tendency (and consistency) in either accepting or rejecting all suggested concepts. The popularity-level of the suggested concept appeared to operate at the best on a secondary level in influencing acceptance or rejection of the concepts.

Three studies described in the present paper conclusively support the existence of such a consistent tendency, at least among normal Ss of average or above-average intelligence.

This finding is interpreted as proof that the ttl measures a different dimension than the Rorschach-test proper.

The nature of the dimension is still questionable but indications are that it is a measure of a person's willingness (and ability) to look at problems, or situations, in a genuinely flexible manner upon demand from persons in authority.     

Application of Projective Tests to Psychotherapy: A Case Study

Case study of a severely disturbed patient seen in psychotherapy in a university counseling center and tested at the beginning and after the termination of therapy. It is concluded that the projective tests proved useful in estimating the extent of pathology prior to therapy and in assessing the degree and direction of change following therapy. Discussion of this patient's projective responses with him during therapy was found to be beneficial, in accord with Richman's views on the reporting of test results to patients. It is suggested that clinical psychologists doing psychotherapy may similarly find projective tests of use to them.     

Interpreter Bias on the Rorschach Test as a Function of Patients' Socioeconomic Status

Hypotheses investigated were: Rorschach interpretation would indicate more negative and pathological factors for patients with lower-class, than for patients with middle-class social histories; and experienced interpreters would be less biased than inexperienced ones. Groups of experts (Fellows of the Society for Projective Techniques) and novices (graduate students) rated the same protocols; a) blind, b) accompanied by a lower-class history, c) accompanied by a middle-class history, on 21 objective scales. Addition of social-class information significantly influences judgments in the predicted directions. Much of the effect was attributable to the novice Rorschachers but the experts were not entirely free of the biasing effect.     

Children's Pets and Adults' Self-Concepts

Self-concepts of adults were related to the age when they had their first pet. The Tennessee Self Concept Scale (TSCS) (Fitts, 1965) Total Positive self-concept scores were higher if subjects were under 6 years or over 10 years old than if they were between 6 and 10 years old when they had their first pet. Similar results were found for the TSCS Physical and Social subscales. Whereas gender effects were also found, no significant pet ownership or other childhood Companion Animal Bonding Scale (Poresky, Hendrix, Mosier, & Samuelson, 1987) effects were found.     

A price above rubies: Patriarchy and the feminine

Jung's understanding of individuation as the way consciousness develops in some people in the second half of life is not well conveyed by images suggesting the heroic capture or sacrifice of consciousness by an ego seeking to gain a broader standpoint. Such images derive from Jung's writings in the first half of his professional career, when his own psychological horizon was rapidly enlarging, but he had not yet arrived at a conception of the Self. What he means by individuation once the Self enters the picture becomes clearer if we turn to Chinese philosophy, whose three main traditions, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism, all influenced Jung's mature psychology. That the move from ego to Self involves a change in perspective as to the nature and origin of consciousness is made evident by the process of “turning the light around,” described in The Secret of the Golden Flower, which has been identified as a practice of Buddhist meditation. As a consequence of the successful cultivation of the Self, individuation also entails a difference in the level of a person's consciousness, a difference that the Confucian Classic of Change, the I Ching, recommends that the person take into account. Finally, the consciousness produced by individuation, because it hovers between ego and Self, is often uncertain of its ground. This paradoxical development is beautifully conveyed by the Taoist philosopher Chuang-Tzu, whose famous dream of himself as a butterfly led him, upon waking, to question his true identity.