Imagery and olfactory stimulation

The purpose of the present study was to investigate a possible odor-emotion interaction by determining whether humans could differentially detect other humans' odor collected under varying emotional conditions. Odorants were collected from the axillary apocrine glands of four female donors, each of whom underwent different imagery induction procedures of anxiety, relaxation, and sexual arousal. The odorants were chemically preserved and later evaluated by 16 naive white male judges as to the presence of discriminatory odor cues. Judges' imagery was differentially related to the anxiety imagery-produced odorants but only for those produced by the most imaginative donors. The relaxation odorants of all donors were correlated. The judges were unable to detect the sexual imagery arousal odorants.     

The influence of gender and temperament on children's interaction with a baby

This study examined gender differences in children's interaction with a baby who visited their day-care center over several weeks. Twenty-two children ranging in age from 47 to 64 months of age participated. The children's teacher filled out a questionnaire assessing each child's extraversion, activity level, and loudness. A female baby visited the day care center from one to three times a week over a two-month period. Each child's interactions with the baby were observed twice. Active, outgoing, loud girls were much more likely to interact with the baby than either quiet girls or any boys. Several of these highly interactive girls had no younger siblings. Children were found to interact with the baby more on their second observation.The research reported here was supported by a grant from the Purdue Research Foundation. I would like to thank Connie Clauss for her help with data collection.     

The efficacy of stimulus fading and contingency management in the treatment of elective mutism: a case study

Stimulus fading techniques were compared to those of contingency management in the treatment of a 6-yr-old, electively mute girl. Experimental periods consisted of the mother rewarding the child for verbal and motor responses to scheduled tasks, while a stranger slowly entered the room and then gradually administered the task items as mother left the room. A timeout contingency for non-response to task items was also employed. Control periods consisted of a stranger administering the same tasks to the child under the same contingencies but without the presence of the mother or the use of stimulus fading. Experimental and control periods were alternated during each treatment hour. The stimulus fading procedure was found to be a necessary component of the treatment process. While the timeout contingency for non-response was found to facilitate treatment if combined with stimulus fading, it was completely ineffective without the stimulus fading.     

Hispanic and black American adolescents' beliefs relating to sexuality and contraception

Popular beliefs and level of scientific knowledge regarding sexuality and contraception were elicited from black and Hispanic inner-city adolescents. Significant differences were found: Hispanic males were the most knowledgeable, Hispanic females the least, and black males and females were intermediate. A cultural basis for the dramatic difference between Hispanic male and female scores is suggested and the need to design culturally appropriate sexuality education classes is discussed. In addition, the data depicted two conflicting beliefs that were held simultaneously by many of the adolescents: Contraception is "good" because it prevents pregnancy, and it is "bad" because the various birth control methods carry serious health hazards for users.     

From teaching to counselling: An evaluation of the role of microcounselling in the training of school counsellors

During the past 20 years the use of microtraining as a method for training professionals in communication skills has attracted considerable attention. In this paper, the microtraining approach is explained briefly, in terms of the development of microteaching and microcounselling, as a means of training teachers and counsellors respectively. One interesting aspect of the training of teachers is then focused upon, namely the use of microcounselling in the preparation of in-service teachers for the role of school counsellor. The nature of teaching and counselling activities are compared and contrasted, and the resultant difficulties in training teachers to act as counsellors are high-lighted. Finally, a number of procedures for trainers involved in such training are listed, whereby teachers can be encouraged to more readily adopt a style of behaviour appropriate for the counselling context.     

Fear inhibition and species specific defense reaction termination may contribute independently to avoidance learning

A series of three experiments was conducted to test the proposal of Cicala and Owen (Learning and Motivation, 1976, 7, 356–367) that warning signal termination reinforces avoidance learning by permitting fear to dissipate and that a feedback signal reinforces avoidance learning through conditioned inhibition of fear. A CER procedure with a second-by-second analysis was used to measure fear elicitation and fear reduction following classical conditioning or avoidance training. The results show that a feedback signal produces rapid and marked fear reduction, suggesting an inhibitory process. Although warning signal termination produced fear reduction, the slowness of this process suggests fear dissipation and not an inhibitory process. The combination of both events reduced fear no more effectively than a feedback signal alone. It is suggested that warning signal termination is effective in some avoidance learning situations not because it reduces fear, but possibly because it helps terminate an avoidance response that closely resembles a species specific defense reaction.