On becoming neutral: effects of experimental neutralizing reconsidered

Behaviour Research and Therapy 34 (1996) 889–898 found that writing out a negative thought produced anxiety and an urge to neutralize the thought, that instructing participants to neutralize the thought reduced anxiety/neutralization urge in the short run (i.e. within 2 min), but that in the control group 20 min without instruction was attended by the same reduction in anxiety/urge to neutralize (“natural decay”). The observations were made with pariticipants who scored high on “thought action fusion” and the experiment was set up as exerimental model of obsessions. We repeated the study with participants that were not selected on thought action fusion. All the findings reported by Behaviour Research and Therapy 34 (1996) 889–898 were replicated. Correlational analysis indicated that the strength of the effect was not related to scores on scales measuring “thought action fusion”. Behaviour Research and Therapy 34 (1996) 889–898 did not assess whether non-neutralizing was followed by immediate reductions in distress. We did assess this and found that the larger part of the immediate reduction of distress after neutralization also occurs when no neutralization instruction is given. The effects of neutralization instructions in the present type of experiment are considerably less powerful than suggested earlier.     

Women helping chewers: partner support and smokeless tobacco cessation.

Data from 363 male smokeless tobacco users and their romantic partners were analyzed to discern the role of support in cessation. Women reported playing a part in enrollment (71%), and more than half examined program materials or discussed cessation activities with the chewers. Women's reports of delivered support correlated substantially with men's experience of received support. Men's received positive support predicted abstinence at 6-month follow-up (odds ratio = 1.29, confidence interval = 1.03-1.61) and more than 24 hr of abstinence for those still using tobacco at 6 months (odds ratio = 1.75, confidence interval = 1.30-2.36) and moderated the effect of baseline depression and addiction on abstinence. Women played a major role through all stages of cessation.     

Sentential structure and the perceptual spans of two samples of disabled readers

The constructs of accuracy and speed were adopted as performance criteria against which to define two clinical samples of disabled readers. Accuracy-disabled subjects had failed to achieve reliable age-appropriate word recognition skills. Rate-disabled readers were age-appropriate in word recognition accuracy but deficient on measures of contextual accuracy and reading speed. When their eye-voice spans were measured under different text manipulations, accuracy-disabled and rate-disabled children differed in the magnitude of their perceptual spans during the act of reading. The two samples did not differ in the extent to which they availed themselves of contextual constraints to extend their spans in the reading of connected text. Both samples of disabled readers appeared able to use syntactic information as an independent source of sentential information in reading, even the sample whose reading disability was associated with oral syntax deficits. Comparisons with a previous sample of normal beginning readers suggested both types of disabled readers to be reading with perceptual spans of reduced dimensions.This research was supported by operating funds from the Medical Research Council of Canada, the Ontario Mental Health Foundation/COMSOC Provincial Lottery Grants Program, and The Hospital for Sick Children Foundation. The author gratefully acknowledges the generous contributions of Terry Smialy and Judy Millington in assisting with all phases of data collection and data analysis. Special thanks are due Judy Millington for her skill in computing and analyzing the phrase boundary and pseudoboundary counts. Identification of the present rate-disabled subjects was made possible through the assistance of Andrew Biemiller, Donald G. Doehring, and Roger T. Lennon, who made previously unpublished normative data on reading speed available for use in this research project. The generosity of these individuals is very gratefully acknowledged. This paper was presented in part to the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Anaheim, California, August 1983.     

Implementing a long-term computerized remedial reading program with synthetic speech feedback: Hardware,software, and real-world issues

This paper discusses hardware choices, software developments, implementation issues, and preliminary results from an ongoing long-term remedial reading study. Reading-disabled children read books on microcomputers linked to speech synthesizers, obtaining speech feedback on difficult words at whole-word, syllable, or subsyllable levels of segmentation. Word-recognition ability and attitude about reading improved for children using the system. In addition, segmented feedback especially benefited phonological word-decoding skills for most of the children.     

Effects of Expectancies and Personalized Feedback on Fat Consumption, Taste, and Preference

Previous studies have shown that people develop expectations about the taste and effects of consumed substances and that those expectations can guide future behavior, cognitions, and affect. Identifying expectancies for the taste of both low- and high-fat foods is important in determining people's reactions to changes in their diets. Study 1 was designed to determine the existence of expectancies for the taste of low-and high-fat foods and the effects of these expectations on food consumption and preference. Ninety-seven subjects tasted a bowl of ice cream and rated the taste on taste judgment forms. The fat content of the ice cream (high- versus low-fat) and the expectancy of high- versus low-fat content were independently manipulated using a balanced placebo design. Expectancy affected the consumption of ice cream under most circumstances: For women who received high-fat ice cream and for men, regardless of the ice cream received, consumption was higher when high-fat ice cream was expected than when low-fat ice cream was expected. Study 2 was designed to investigate the effects of educating individuals about the diet-cancer link on consumption and preference. Receiving information about diet and cancer, especially when the information was personalized, decreased overall consumption and reported preference. Current levels of daily fat consumption also affected laboratory consumption and preference. This study has several implications for interventions to lower dietary fat.     

Magical Contagion Beliefs and Fear of AIDS1

Extreme overreaction to nonrisky contact with persons with AIDS is considered to be a case of the operation of the sympathetic magical law of contagion. Prior work has shown that this principle (once in contact, always in contact) holds in the belief systems of American adults. In this paper, we show that four characteristics of this law correspond to the attitudes of college students toward AIDS: (a) actual physical contact is a critical factor in determining negative reactions, (b) even very brief contact is capable of transmitting substantial negative properties (dose insensitivity), (c) the effects of even brief contact are long lasting (permanence), and (d) the effects of contact can occur in a direction opposite to that of the normal causal arrow (backward contagion). We conclude that the magical law of contagion provides a useful way of formulating overconcern about the transmission of AIDS.     

LINKAGES BETWEEN WOMEN'S PROVIDER-ROLE ATTITUDES, PSYCHOLOGICAL WELL-BEING, AND FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS

The primary aim of this investigation was to examine the extent to which the meanings women attach to their provider-role responsibilities are differentially related to their psychological well-being and family relationships and to the division of labor in the home. The sample included 43 dualearner and 50 single-earner families. In home interviews, wives reported on role overload, depression, satisfaction with the marriage, and attitudes regarding women's and men's roles. Their children completed two measures assessing daily hassles and their relationship with their mother. Reports of daily involvement in household work were obtained from wives and husbands during four telephone interviews. Discriminant function analyses indicated that aspects of women's psychological well-being and marital and parent-child relationships and of the division of labor discriminated women in four different provider groups: maidsecondary providers, ambivalent coproviders, coproviders, and homemakers. Wives who were ambivalent about their provider responsibilities tended to report higher levels of depression and overload and significantly lower marital satisfaction. Wives who saw their employment as secondary to that of their husbands reported relatively higher levels of depression and overload but also the highest levels of marital satisfaction.     

Race effects on students' track mobility in high school

Race effects on track mobility are hypothesized on the basis of racial differences in initial track placement, learning opportunities, course preferences, and academic guidance. Race differences in patterns of track mobility are observed in a large, longitudinal survey that follows students from ninth through twelfth grade. Initial track placements and changes in track over the school year and between school years are described. Multivariate analyses associate race with the likelihood of changing track and the direction of the track change. Black students are less likely than white students to move to Honors and advanced tracks in Mathematics but more likely than whites to move from the Basic to the Regular track in English. Black students are considerably more likely than whites to drop out of the tracking system in English and Mathematics, except for black students in Advanced English and in Honors and Advanced Mathematics. The results of this study point to tracking as an organizational characteristic of schools that can provide students with unequal access to the curriculum and, therefore, to learning opportunities by race. Close monitoring of track changes is recommended to insure that tracking promotes the academic achievement of all students. This research was funded by Grant #R117E10139-01 from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Educational Research and Improvement and by National Science Foundation Grant No. RED-9311800. The author is grateful to these agencies for their support as well as to Warren Kubitschek for his contribution to the data analysis and to Ann Power for research assistance.     

Inconsistency of mothers' feedback and toddlers' misbehavior and negative affect

The general hypothesis that mothers' inconsistent discipline can cause children to misbehave was examined. Mothers, who were otherwise engaged in a telephone conversation, were instructed to respond to toddlers' inappropriate demands for attention with either consistent reprimands or with one of a variety of inconsistent strategies. Reprimanding half of the child's demands and providing positive attention to the rest of the demands resulted in high rates of both demands for mothers' attention and children's negative affect. Reprimanding half the children's demands and ignoring the other demands did not have deleterious effects nor did reprimanding and attending to the same demand half of the time and ignoring the other demands. Thus, clear, positive feedback for inappropriate demands is a type of inconsistent discipline that can cause normal toddlers to become terrible twos.This paper was based on the doctoral dissertation of the first author. We thank Zvi Strassberg for his constructive editorial feedback.