Preschool children's comprehension and production of directive forms

Thirty preschool children, 10 each at the 3-,4-, and 5-year-old levels, participated in two structured tasks designed to assess both comprehension and production of a full range of directive forms. In contrast to previous reports, the results indicated no significant differences in directive comprehension or production as a function of age; children in all age groups demonstrated the ability to understand and verbally encode the intent of most types of directive forms. However, the two most implicit forms, Question Directives and Hints, were complied with significantly less frequently than the more explicit forms, and were uused less often in the production task. The present findings indicate the importance of analyzing directive forms along a continuum of explicitness rather than dichotomizing them as direct versus indirect. Finally, the results are interpreted as providing indirect support for the general notion that mastery of some implicit forms may be achieved later than the acquisition of more explicit forms.     

Primary-school stutterers: Have attitudes changed?

How concerned are primary-school-aged stuttering children about their communication problem? What are the clinical implications of this concern?Fifteen years ago, Silverman (1970) suggested that primary-school-aged children who stuttered were not concerned about their disfluencies. A clinical implication of that report was that the interpreted lack of concern might negatively affect the children's motivation and desire for change in therapy. Scant research exists to support or refute this implication. While research is available on reactions to stuttering, pretherapeutic attitudes—especially those of children—have not been systematically reported. Guitar (1976) measured the pre-treatment attitudes of 38 adult stutterers and reported that, “those stutterers with more negative attitudes measured just prior to treatment, were most likely to have high levels of stuttering a year later, even though all subjects left therapy entirely fluent.” In related areas, research by Kolb, Winter, and Berlen (1968), McFall (1970), and McFall and Hammen (1971) has indicated that clients who are more motivated do better in behavior modification programs.Whether or not these findings may be generalized to children, in the midst of a developmental process, is purely speculative.     

Locational representation in imagery: The third dimension

Six experiments were conducted to test the relative processing characteristics of picture-plane and three-dimensional imagery as indexed by tasks that required subjects to keep track of successive locations in multiunit visual displays. Subjects were shown symmetrical displays either drawn on cardboard or constructed with three-dimensional blocks. They then were required to imagine these matrices and follow pathways through a series of adjacent squares (blocks) within the matrices. The pathways were described by a series of verbal terms that indicated the direction of the next square (block) in the pathway. Subjects experienced difficulty in performing the task with picture-plane displays composed of as few as 16 squares (4×4), but they rarely made errors with a three-dimensional matrix of 27 blocks (3×3×3). Performance with the three-dimensional task dropped dramatically when the matrix size was increased to 4×4×4. The results replicated previous findings that the image processing capacity for location in two-dimensional imagery is about three units in each direction, and they indicate that adding the depth dimension increases the capacity for representation of spatial location in imagery.     

Work plan availability and performance: An assessment of task strategy priming on subsequent task completion

The relation of task strategy planning to task performance was explored using a series of laboratory investigations. The first study examined the influence of providing a subject a work strategy and a specific work goal on his or her subsequent performance. A total of 72 subjects participated in a 2 (goal) × 2 (task strategy priming) × 3 (performance period) × 3 (task type) repeated measures, factorial design study. The results demonstrate that task strategy priming and goal setting increase the amount of an individual's planning and directs the type of plan developed. A second study was conducted (n = 90) to further explore the effect of task strategy priming on planning and performance. Taken together, the results of the studies demonstrate that (a) goal setting increases strategic planning, (b) priming influences the amount and type of planning engaged in by an individual, and (c) task performance varies as the result of the type of plan an individual develops. The results are discussed as a means of expanding the use of cognitive constructs in theories of work motivation.     

A preliminary report on defenses and conflicts associated with borderline personality disorder

The authors present preliminary psychodynamic findings from a naturalistic study of borderline personality disorder compared to antisocial personality disorder and bipolar type II (depression with hypomania) affective disorder. An independent psychodynamic interview of each subject was videotaped from which ratings were made of the presence of 22 defense mechanisms and 11 psychodynamic conflicts. A factor analysis of ratings from 81 subjects supported the separation of borderline (splitting, projective identification) from narcissistic defenses (devaluation, omnipotence, idealization, mood-incongruent denial). While certain groups of defenses were associated with each diagnosis, defense ratings did not significantly discriminate the three diagnostic groups, suggesting a limit to their diagnostic value. Among 27 subjects rated, borderline personality was strongly associated with two conflicts: separation-abandonment, and a global conflict over the experience and expression of emotional needs and anger. Antisocial personality was psychodynamically distinct and more heterogeneous. Bipolar type II was associated with two hypothesized depressive conflicts: dominant other and dominant goal. Chronic depression, which was more common in both personality disorder groups than in bipolar type II, was associated with a third depressive conflict, overall gratification inhibition. Overall, conflicts were powerful discriminators of the three diagnostic groups. The heuristic value of these findings is discussed.