Quality service in supermarkets: a proposal of measurement

This assignment has the aim of going deeply into the study of service quality perception in supermarkets. The research tries to find the criterion used when rating the services received in a supermarket and also to elaborate an instrument to measure the service quality in this context. From the review of the existing bibliography, four theoretical factors and a thirteen items scale have been composed. These four factors are: price, product, service and image and fresh product. In order to check the psychometrical properties of the questionnaire we carried out a computer assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) with a sample of 300 interviews. The results obtained allow us to show a scale with a factorial structure of 4 dimensions that throws up optimal indexes of reliability and validity. At the same time we conclude that the variable called establishment global rate is an important variable in the perceptive structure of the consumers.     

Conditioned orienting and defensive responses in the developing rat

Infant rats (16, 21, and 26 days old) received 3 days of classical conditioning training to Tone/Shock pairings using heart rate as the index of conditioning. The youngest group (16 days old) showed no evidence of conditioning at any stage of acquisition. In the 21- and 26-day-olds, response to the conditioned stimulus (CS) was a deceleration in heart rate during the first day of training. By day 3, the conditioned response (CR) shifted to cardioacceleration. The data were interpreted as offering strong support for a two-stage model of information processing in the infant rat, comprised of a conditioned orienting response in the first stage and a conditioned defensive response in the second.     

Hand movements and nondominant fluency in bilinguals.

16 subordinate bilingual subjects produced 5-min. monologues in their nondominant languages, i.e., English or Spanish. Hand-movement activity manifested during the videotape monologues was scored and related to measures of fluency in the nondominant language. The hand-movement behavior categorized as Groping Movement was significantly related to all of the nondominant-language fluency measures. These correlations support the assumption that Groping Movement may have a function in the process of verbal encoding. The results are discussed in terms of the possibility of monitoring central cognitive processes through the study of "visible" motor behavior.     

The Acceptance of Cosmetic Surgery Scale: Confirmatory Factor Analyses and Validation among Serbian Adults

We examined the validity of the Serbian version of the Acceptance of Cosmetic Surgery Scale (ACSS; Henderson-King and Henderson-King 2005). A total of 622 Serbian adults completed the ACSS, along with Serbian translations of measures for the discrepancy between actual body weight and ideal body weight, body appreciation, sociocultural attitudes toward appearance, and demographics. Confirmatory factor analyses were conducted to compare how different ACSS models fitted the collected data. A three-factor model provided the best fit to the data relative to two- and one-factor models. The three-factor model had good internal consistency, convergent and discriminant validity, and nomological validity. The ACSS seems to be a valid instrument for use in Serbian populations. Our study will contribute towards better understanding of the acceptance of cosmetic surgery from a cross-cultural perspective.     

Reply to Myszkowski et al. (2020): Some matters of fact concerning aesthetic sensitivity

We respond to some of Myszkowski and colleagues’ (2020, Br. J. Psychology) critical comments on our recent work on aesthetic sensitivity (Corradi, Chuquichambi, Barrada, Clemente, & Nadal, 2020, Br. J. Psychology). We show that these comments stem mostly from factual inaccuracies.     

Adaptation and validation to Spanish of the Psychological Capital Questionnaire–12 (PCQ–12) in academic contexts

Current Psychology - Psychological Capital is a construct that is experiencing strong growth within the framework of Positive Psychology. In work contexts, it has been related to employee...     

Semiotic Regulation through Inhibitor Signs: Creating a Cycle of Rigid Meanings

This study aims to analyze the process of semiotic regulation in youth transition to adulthood from the perspectives of cultural developmental psychology and dialogical self theory. The focus is on the transformations that occur in youth’s self-system configurations during a critical developmental period. In this paper, we will advance the idea that semiotic regulation may lead to the construction of strong signs (i.e. those signs that bring rigidity to personal meaning systems)—and more specifically, of strong inhibitor signs—that block the emergence of alternative meanings, leading to rigidity in the self-system. We present a longitudinal case study of a young man who participated in a social project in Salvador, Bahia to illustrate the process. Data was collected through two rounds of in-depth interviews at ages 18 (1st round) and 21 (2nd round) years. Analysis followed a mapping of positions and counter-positions, as well as emerging tensions and their resolution over time and in different spheres of life (i.e. work, school, and family life). The idea is to show how negotiations of self-positions evolve and activate a mechanism of inhibition of hierarchical integration and construction of alternative future meanings, in which rigid meanings are created and do not allow for emergence of alternative life trajectories.     

Conditions for positive and negative recencies in running memory-span recognition

A positive recency effect in a running-span recognition procedure was obtained in Experiment 1 for hits and for intratrial false alarms. In running recall procedures, recency does not fit well with an active updating hypothesis. In Experiment 2, in which the beginning of the target set was marked with a cue upon presentation, the recency effects disappeared. In Experiments 3 and 4 participants were forced to maintain 2 items in memory until the last one was presented for recognition. These three items were the target set. When the last item presentation was uncertain—because of the variable length list—an unexpected negative recency effect appeared. An explanation for this change from positive to negative recency is offered based on the sharing of attentional resources put forward by others for similar procedures.     

Embodied Religious Thought: Gender Categories in Mesoamerica

This paper presents, discusses and evaluates empirical studies concerned with Christian prayer. These studies are classified within four main areas. The first area concerns what is known about the practice of prayer from empirical surveys and demonstrates that a much higher proportion of people pray privately than attend public places of worship. The second area concerns what is known about changing patterns of prayer during childhood and adolescence and argues that these changes need to be interpreted within the context of both developmental and social psychology. The third area concerns the subjective effects of prayer, beginning with Galton's early observations concerning the comparative longevity of the clergy (who are regarded as praying people) and including more recent studies of the psychological correlates of self-reported prayer, like personal well-being and purpose in life. It is concluded that, while such studies may demonstrate the beneficial nature of prayer, they cannot demonstrate the causal effcacy of prayer. The fourth area concerns the objective effects of prayer, beginning with Galton's early observations concerning the absence of comparative longevity among royalty (who are regarded as prayed for people) and including more recent studies of the growth correlates of prayer for pot plants. It is concluded that such studies currently provide contradictory evidence. It is recommended that further research in the field needs both to observe the strict criteria of objective empirical research and to be alert to theological nuances regarding the actual claims made for the efficacy of prayer within the community of believers.