Self,community and the overcoming of prejudice

Using discussion from Gadamer, Burbules and Rice, and Banks, and practical examples from a multicultural teacher education classroom, this paper examines the effects of community on the construction of identities and on the development and overcoming of prejudice.     

Dimensions of Suicide: Perceptions of Lethality,Time, and Agony

Two hundred ninety-one lay persons and 10 forensic pathologists rated the lethality, time, and agony for 28 methods of suicide for 4117 cases of completed suicide in Los Angeles County in the period 1988–1991. Whereas pathologists provided consistent ratings, lay persons demonstrated extreme variability and a tendency to inflate ratings of all three dimensions. Significant gender differences emerged, with females rating frequently used suicide methods more similarly to pathologists than the males did. Males who suicided used the most lethal and quickest methods whereas females selected methods varying in lethality, duration, and agony. African Americans were overrepresented in the use of the most lethal and quickest methods.     

Vocal learning in the Grey parrot (Psittacus erithacus): effects of species identity and number of trainers

Grey parrots (Psittacus erithacus) learn referential English labels when they view and interact with 2 humans who model vocal labeling and who demonstrate referentiality and functionality of a label (I.M. Pepperberg, 1990a). To test if both trainers are necessary, the authors contrasted 2-trainer modeling with training by 1 human who presented targeted labels to a bird in concert with appropriate items, who asked questions, and who would reward attempts at the label with the item. The bird was also tutored by either 1 or 2 interactive humans in conjunction with a conspecific who already used referential labels. Referential labels were learned from multiple live tutors but not a single trainer. Presence of a conspecific enhanced learning compared with single-trainer sessions but did not affect acquisition in 2-human sessions. Specific aspects of paired tutoring seem critical for acquiring referential vocal labels.     

Access and equity issues in employment and service provision for NESB immigrants in New Zealand public sector organizations

This article discusses the extent to which New Zealand public sector policies and practices concerning employment and service provision cater for immigrant access and equity needs. The views presented are based on the findings of a study that examined two interrelated areas: (a) the employment and deployment of immigrants with non-English-speaking backgrounds in government organizations; and (b) the degree to which the government services available include, in their delivery systems recognition of the linguistic and cultural requirements of an increasingly diverse population. On the basis of the survey findings, conclusions are reached regarding the need for a coherent and comprehensive policy framework for dealing with immigrant issues.     

A Beta Unfolding Model for Continuous Bounded Responses

An unfolding model for continuous bounded responses is proposed, derived both from a hypothetical interpolation response mechanism and from the hypothesis of two opposite sources of item refusal being collapsed. These two sources of refusal are made explicit in a three-component Dirichlet response model and then collapsed to obtain a (two-component) beta response model. The two natural parameters of the beta are interpreted as acceptance and refusal parameters and expressed as functions of person-item distances on a latent continuum. The potentially bimodal shape of the beta is exploited to model chaotic response choices among ambivalent subjects.     

Academic achievement and behavioral health among Asian American and African American adolescents: testing the model minority and inferior minority assumptions

The present study tested the model minority and inferior minority assumptions by examining the relationship between academic performance and measures of behavioral health in a subsample of 3,008 (22 %) participants in a nationally representative, multicultural sample of 13,601 students in the 2001 Youth Risk Behavioral Survey, comparing Asian Americans (N = 408) and African Americans (N = 2,600). Specifically, the study examined associations of students’ self-reported grades with suicide risk, substance abuse, and violent behaviors. The findings revealed that high academic performance is a protective factor against behavioral health problems for both ethnic groups. The results raise questions about the focus on high achievement among Asian Americans versus academic underachievement among African Americans. Implications for theory, research, training and practice in addressing the mental health implications of achievement behavior in Asian American and African American youth are discussed.     

Book Notes

The Psychological Record -     

Word shape's in poor shape for the race to the lexicon

Current models of fluent reading often assume that fast and automatic word recognition involves the use of a supraletter feature corresponding to the envelope or shape of the word when it is printed in lowercase. The advantages of mixed case over pure case and of pure lowercase over pure uppercase have often been taken as evidence favoring the word-shape hypothesis. Alternative explanations for these phenomena are offered. Experiment 1 shows that previous demonstrations of word-shape effects during proofreading are better described as individual letter effects. Experiments 2-4 explore the possibility that word shape facilitates lexical access through uncertainty reduction. In all three experiments performance on words with rare shapes is compared to those with common shapes. There were no effects of shape frequency in either tachistoscopic recognition or lexical-decision tasks. This was true regardless of the degree to which the visual shape cue was supplemented by the nonvisual factors of familiarity and expectancy. Possible reasons why fluent readers ignore word shape are discussed within the framework of a model that assumes that automatic word recognition is mediated by the activation of abstract letter identities.