Imagining thin: Why vanity sizing works

Vanity sizing, the practice of clothing manufacturers, whereby smaller size labels are used on clothes than what the clothes actually are, has become very common. Apparently, it helps sell clothes—women prefer small size clothing labels to large ones. We propose and demonstrate that smaller size labels evoke more positive self-related mental imagery. Thus, consumers imagine themselves more positively (thinner) with a vanity sized size-6 pant versus a size-8 pant. We also show that appearance self-esteem moderates the (mediating) effect of imagery on vanity sizing effectiveness—while vanity sizing evokes more positive mental imagery for both low and high appearance self-esteem individuals, the effect of the positive imagery on clothing preference is significant (only) for people with low appearance self-esteem, supported by the theory of compensatory self-enhancement.Our suggestion of simple marketing communications affecting valence of imagery and consequent product evaluation have implications for many other marketing domains.     

Plasticity of prospective memory through a familiarization intervention in old adults

Younger adults consistently outperform older adults in laboratory prospective memory tasks. This study examines the effectiveness of an intervention that familiarizes older adults with the sequence of ongoing events to compensate their reduced prospective memory performance. We compared performance and electrophysiological measures of an intervention group (N = 20, 69-83 years) receiving a familiarization intervention to an individually matched control group (N = 20). As ongoing activity a 2-back working memory task was administered. Neural correlates were studied using event related potentials (ERPs) and source localization (standardized low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography). Behavioural data showed faster reaction times in correct prospective trials and fewer prospective false alarms in the familiarization intervention group. ERP analyses displayed differential patterns for the two groups and source localization measures distinctively presented group differences in prospective memory trials with the control group recruiting more resources for a successful prospective memory performance. Together our data support the hypothesis that the familiarity with the sequence of ongoing events increases prospective memory performance and that this might be based on a higher efficiency of attentional monitoring resources and evaluation processes in the intervention group.     

Anxiety and career exploration: Gender differences in the role of self-construal

Given the social nature of many tasks involved in exploring and committing to a career, we hypothesized that social anxiety would correlate to exploration and commitment, even after controlling for general anxiety. We also hypothesized that self-construal and gender would interact with social anxiety in relation to exploration and commitment. In a sample of predominantly European American undergraduates (n = 161), higher social anxiety associated with lower vocational commitment for both women and men, after accounting for general anxiety. For women, interdependence was also associated significantly with vocational commitment. Social anxiety correlated to environmental exploration only for men low in independence. Neither social anxiety nor self-construal associated with environmental exploration for women or foreclosure for either group.     

Can Social Supports Be Engineered? An Example from the Army's Unit Manning System1

The purpose of the study was to examine variables which lead to the perception of instrumental social support among military wives. More specifically, we were interested in two factors: (a) the Unit Manning System, a method of deployment which keeps groups of soldiers and their families together for long periods of time; and (b) husbands' ranks. Both factors were found to be significant predictors of support in a previous study. Using a path analytic model, we demonstrated that being an officer's wife was related to perceived social support only indirectly through its influence on degree of participation in wives' group activities. Participation in the Unit Manning System also had only an indirect influence on social support. Reasons for these findings are discussed with reference to theories about coping and coping assistance.     

A comparative analysis of the validity of several approaches to the scoring of the behavior of the preterm infant

A group of very low birthweight preterm infants (mean WEIGHT = 1193.6 g; mean gestational AGE = 31.1 weeks) were examined with the PREMIE. The PREMIE is a modification of the scoring system of the full term Brazelton Neonatal Behavioral Assessment (BNBAS) examination for use with preterm infants. Infants were assessed during the acute phase of cardio-respiratory illness (mean AGE = 7 days) and during the recovery phase (mean AGE = 22 days). Many modifications in procedure were required. Several analyses were performed to assess the redundancy and the comparative validity of the scoring systems of the PREMIE, the BNBAS, and the BNBAS + (the BNBAS plus a set of five additional preterm items). Results indicated that the three scoring systems were highly redundant, that they were equally related to physiologic and clinical variables, and that they were similar in their sensitivity to behavioral change and stability. Overall the results offered little in the way of differentiating among these three scoring systems with this group of infants, raising doubts about the need to use the PREMIE or other scoring systems like it for many research purposes.     

What is mental representation? A study of its elements and how they lead to language

Mental representation as a psychoanalytic concept has never found a central place in the family of psychoanalytic concepts and gradually has become a stepchild. A modest conceptual outline of infant mental development may help the mental representation concept become more central. The following ideas are hypothesized: (1) Registration is viewed separately from representation so that two distinct types of registration are initiated, one for distinctly mental phenomena, the other for unconscious, reflexive phenomena. (2) Perceptual-apperceptual focus is central, so that consciousness and interest in thinking always occur together whenever registrations are of the mental type. (3) A developmental schema process is proposed that will fill the humanistic object-self and motivational gap between Piaget's and Freud's ideas. (4) Analogy, metaphor, and syntax are seen to contribute to (in addition to being contributed to by) schema formation. (5) The mind is conceived as both an organization of information and as an organizer of information. This allows the separateness of representability from physical influences to be understood as both motivational and basically as process. With these hypotheses, mental representation may be viewed as central to mental organization.     

Equivalence classes generated by sequence training

In Experiment 1, 3, adult females were taught with verbal instructions and contingencies to select, in sequence, three arbitrary visual stimuli from an array of five stimuli. After four different sequences were taught, match-to-sample tests assessed emergent conditional relations among all stimuli that had been selected in the same order in the sequences. Subjects' performances indicated development of four stimulus classes, three based on ordinal position and one based on nonselection. Next, match-to-sample training established conditional relations between each of four novel figures and one member of each of the ordinal stimulus classes. Tests confirmed that the classes were equivalence classes, each expanded by one new member. In subsequent sequence tests, the new stimuli were selected in a sequence that was consistent with ordinal class membership. Experiment 2 replicated Experiment 1 with 2 different adult females, but the verbal instructions were omitted. Results were similar to Experiment 1, except that extensive review and retesting were required before expansion of the ordinal classes with the novel figures was observed.     

Assessing individual differences: effects of responding to prior questionnaires on the substantive and psychometric properties of self-esteem and depression assessments

It has become a common practice among psychological researchers to administer batteries of individual difference assessments to research participants, although little is known about whether the substantive and psychometric integrity of the questionnaires are maintained when they are administered after the subject has completed other instruments. The studies presented here consider these issues in relation to the assessment of self-esteem and depression. In the first study, college students responded to a self-esteem inventory (a) by itself (control group), (b) after one prior questionnaire, (c) after three prior questionnaires, or (d) after five prior questionnaires. Results indicated that filling out one or more questionnaires before an assessment of self-esteem resulted in reports of lower self-esteem relative to the control condition. Additional analyses revealed that filling out three or five prior questionnaires created lower reliabilities of subscale scores and lower estimates of concurrent validity between self-esteem and depression. When the effect of prior questionnaires on the General Self-Esteem subscale was examined, the aforementioned results were replicated, and the prior questionnaire treatment created heterogeneous variances across the experimental groups. The second study was designed as a replication of the first study, using an assessment of depression as the target questionnaire. These results revealed that reports of depressive symptomatology increased as the number of prior questionnaires increased. Again, the prior questionnaire treatment created heterogeneity of variance between the groups, but did not adversely affect its internal consistency.     

Auditory psychomotor coordination and visual search performance

In Experiments 1 and 2, the time to locate and identify a visual target (visual search performance in a two-alternative forced-choice paradigm) was measured as a function of the location of the target relative to the subject's initial line of gaze. In Experiment 1, tests were conducted within a 260 degree region on the horizontal plane at a fixed elevation (eye level). In Experiment 2, the position of the target was varied in both the horizontal (260 degrees) and the vertical (+/- 46 degrees from the initial line of gaze) planes. In both experiments, and for all locations tested, the time required to conduct a visual search was reduced substantially (175-1,200 msec) when a 10-Hz click train was presented from the same location as that occupied by the visual target. Significant differences in latencies were still evident when the visual target was located within 10 degrees of the initial line of gaze (central visual field). In Experiment 3, we examined head and eye movements that occur as subjects attempt to locate a sound source. Concurrent movements of the head and eyes are commonly encountered during auditorily directed search behavior. In over half of the trials, eyelid closures were apparent as the subjects attempted to orient themselves toward the sound source. The results from these experiments support the hypothesis that the auditory spatial channel has a significant role in regulating visual gaze.