Wolves in sheep’s clothing: How and when hypothetical questions influence behavior

How and when does responding to hypothetical questions shape future judgment and behavior? We identify knowledge accessibility as an implicit process through which hypothetical questions influence individuals, and examine moderators of accessibility that determine when these effects obtain. In an initial study, we show that hypothetical questions increase the accessibility of the specific positive or negative knowledge referenced by the question. In five subsequent studies, we manipulate factors known to enhance (consistency, elaboration) and attenuate (awareness, delay) accessibility, and show that these factors moderate the influence of hypothetical questions on individuals’ voting choices, legal decision-making, and consumption behavior.     

‘Coming out’ in therapy? Perceived risks and benefits of self‐disclosure of sexual orientation by gay and lesbian therapists to straight clients

Primary objective: The study's primary objective was to investigate the experiences of gay and lesbian therapists, when considering self‐disclosure of their sexual orientation to straight (i.e. heterosexual) clients. This qualitative study set out to ascertain the key factors gay therapists take into account when considering this decision and to explore the effects this self‐disclosure may have on themselves, their clients and their therapeutic relationships. Research design: The research design was based on the use of semi‐structured interviews, undertaken with a non‐random, purposive sample of counsellors and psychotherapists (n=8) in current practice. The rationale for this method was to aid exploration of therapists' experiences of the process of self‐disclosure. Methods and procedures: Inclusion criteria were for therapists who self‐identified as being gay or lesbian, and who were experienced in clinical work with straight clients. Transcribed data was analysed using inductive thematic analysis. Main outcomes and results: Some therapists reported being confident with self‐disclosure relating to their own sexual orientation. However, a common theme related to the reportedly high levels of anxiety and vulnerability, which therapists identified. Key themes emerged around: respondents' fears of client judgement; a need for therapist self‐protection; self‐awareness of the potential impact of their own fears and prejudices on the therapeutic relationship; and the potential relevance of internalised homophobia, as an overall constraining factor. Conclusions: Self‐disclosure of their sexual orientation to straight clients is constructed, in this initial survey, as being potentially problematic and risky for some gay therapists.     

Job satisfaction and women's spheres of work

Job satisfaction for women workers is traditionally researched from the job-gender model in which sex roles generate the research framework. Women employed in the labor market are viewed as responding primarily to the confines of sex roles, as opposed to the structural rewards and constraints of the labor market itself. We reexamined earlier studies that found no effect of the labor market on job satisfaction for women. Reanalysis of the 1972–1973 Quality of Employment national survey revealed significantly different levels of job satisfaction, which are in part structured by the characteristics of the labor market sectors in which women and men work. Women working in labor market sectors that are predominantly male or have a balanced proportion of male and female workers jobs have high job satisfaction. This job satisfaction is predicted almost exclusively by their perceptions of fewer income problems, flexibility of hours, and use of job skills. Factors related to maternity benefits and leaves are related only marginally to job satisfaction for women workers in either labor market sector. Women in predominantly female sectors of the labor market have similarly high job satisfaction scores, but these are related to a wider cluster of factors, including fewer perceived income problems, skills, and challenge factors, as well as the socioemotional rewards of their work. This pattern is most similar to males who work in predominantly male sectors. In contrast, males who work in predominantly female or gender-proportionate jobs have significantly lower job satisfaction scores, even after controling for income issues and other benefits. Labor market sectors and the rewards available within them are important structural dimensions of job satisfaction for women and men employees.     

The form of the auto-shaped response with food or water reinforcers

The relation between the form of auto-shaped responses to the lighting of a key and the consummatory responses of pecking grain and drinking water was examined in pigeons. Responses on the key were analyzed by means of high-speed photography, recordings of the force of contact, and judges' ratings of response-form based on film and videotape recordings. The first experiment showed that food-deprived birds presented grain as a reinforcer responded on the key with a grain-pecking movement, while water-deprived birds presented water as a reinforcer responded with drinking-like movements. The second and third experiments showed that the resemblance between auto-shaped and consummatory responses does not require the dominance of the deprivational state appropriate to the reinforcer. Changing the dominant state of deprivation did not immediately change the form of the key response, and in subjects simultaneously deprived of food and water, the form of response depended on the reinforcer. In the fourth and fifth experiments, subjects simultaneously deprived of food and water received one stimulus signalling food and another signalling water in a random series. In most subjects, the response to each stimulus resembled the consummatory response to the particular reinforcer that was signalled by the stimulus. This result demonstrates the role of association between a stimulus and a reinforcer in producing a resemblance of the auto-shaped response to the consummatory response.     

Complex decision-making in early childhood

Decision-making over time is an important aspect of adaptive social functioning. The main goal of this study was to investigate the development of this ability in young children. A simplified version of the Iowa Gambling Task was given to 69 children at 3 ages (3, 4, and 6 years). Children were also given an awareness test to assess their knowledge of the task. Significant age differences were found for awareness of the task while significant sex effects were found for performance on the task. Females chose significantly more from the advantageous decks than would be expected by chance in the second block. Males demonstrated no significant difference in choice of decks. Further analysis indicated female superiority in the task was not due to greater knowledge of the game. One interpretation of these results is that there are two systems affecting decision-making over time.     

Using indices of happiness to examine the influence of environmental enhancements for nursing home residents with Alzheimer's disease

The present study extends the growing behavioral literature on indices of happiness for persons with developmental disabilities to the geriatric population. Data on indices of emotional affect (i.e., happiness) were collected prior to, during, and after each resident was exposed to environmental enhancement activities of various durations. Results showed that every activity improved each resident's level of happiness when compared to pre- and postactivity levels. These outcomes suggest that indexing affect may be as useful for nursing home residents as it has been for individuals with developmental disabilities.     

Some effects of progressively lowering electromyographic levels with feedback procedures on the frequency of stuttered verbal behaviors

Feedback procedures were used to progressively decrease the EMG activity of three stutterers during connected speech tasks. Single subject experimental designs were used which allowed for procedural changes as dictated by each subject's performance. All three subjects demonstrated clinically significant decreases in disfluencies and generalization of the treatment effects for an oral reading task, while one of the subjects also showed this effect for a conversational speech task. The subjects' strategies for manipulating the feedback tone seemed to be related to reduction in many of the motoric and prosodic complexities of speech which may have been importantly related to enhancing and maintaining fluency.     

Profile of Mood States: Australian normative data

The Profile of Mood States was administered to 90 Australian women, 30 depressed, 30 anxious, and 30 nonpsychiatric controls. Both clinical groups scored higher than the McNair, Lorr, and Droppleman (1971) normative samples on the negative mood states and scored lower on Vigor. The means for these groups are presented and compared with the 1971 normative data of McNair, Lorr, and Droppleman.