Early predictors of high school mathematics achievement

Identifying the types of mathematics content knowledge that are most predictive of students' long-term learning is essential for improving both theories of mathematical development and mathematics education. To identify these types of knowledge, we examined long-term predictors of high school students' knowledge of algebra and overall mathematics achievement. Analyses of large, nationally representative, longitudinal data sets from the United States and the United Kingdom revealed that elementary school students' knowledge of fractions and of division uniquely predicts those students' knowledge of algebra and overall mathematics achievement in high school, 5 or 6 years later, even after statistically controlling for other types of mathematical knowledge, general intellectual ability, working memory, and family income and education. Implications of these findings for understanding and improving mathematics learning are discussed.     

Mood state-Dependent Retrieval: The Effects of Induced Mood on Memory Reconsidered

Analysis of studies investigating mood-state-dependent retrieval identifies methodological problems that may have contributed to the controversy surrounding the reliability of the effect-in particular, the possible confounding of encoding and retrieval in previous studies. Five experiments are reported investigating the effects of mood on learning and recall. Mood-state-dependent retrieval was observed in Experiment 1a (using Velten's Mood Induction Procedure); Experiment 1b (using a music MIP); and Experiment 1c (using Velten's MIP at encoding and a music MIP at retrieval). Subjects who learned and recalled in different moods had significantly greater decrements in recall than did subjects in the same moods. Experiments 2 and 3 investigated the effect of observable retrieval cues on moodstate-dependent retrieval. In Experiment 2, the presence of observable retrieval cues at recall overrode state-dependent retrieval. In Experiment 3, by manipulating the presence or absence of observable cues at recall, both the occurrence and the erasure of the mood-state dependency was demonstrated.Moodstate during learning andcued recallwas also shownto affect performance in a third session under conditons of free recall.     

Teaching Prosocial Behavior to Typically Developing Toddlers

Toddlers in day care have more toy conflicts, aggression, and peer-inflicted injuries than any other age group. Toddlers are also capable of turn-taking and affectionate behavior, but exhibit these prosocial behaviors less often than aggression and toy-taking. We explored the usefulness and feasibility of contextual and teacher-directed social skills intervention for increasing toddlers' turn-taking and affectionate behavior to peers. Results showed that adding tangible consequences to a basic package of contextual arrangement, prompts, and praise was the most effective strategy for increasing both turn-taking and affection. Aggression decreased when affection or turn-taking increased.     

Culture and Gender Sensitive AIDS Prevention With Mexican Migrant Laborers: A Primer for Counselors

The purpose of this article is to explicate research-informed culture and gender sensitive AIDS prevention strategies aimed at Mexican migrant laborers living and working in the United States for extended time. This unique and extremely marginalized Latino population is yet another emerging high risk group for contracting the HIV virus. Counselors interested in applying their knowledge of psychology and minority groups to preventing such an AIDS epidemic will be challenged by the complex factors that frame this problem.     

Categorization of Ambiguous Sentences as a Function of a Changing Prosodic Parameter: A Dynamical Approach

The present study investigates the dynamics of changes in interpretation of ambiguous sentences. The sentences used had alternative interpretations with different surface structures (bracketing). Continua were created by systematic manipulation of prosodic cues (relative foot duration), resulting in stimulus sentences that spanned the range between the two interpretations. Continua were presented to subjects who were requested to indicate as quickly as possible which meaning they perceived. The pattern of responses and response times revealed the presence of hysteresis. That is, when the values of prosodic parameters are congruent with both interpretations, the individual's recent history decides which meaning will be perceived. Thus, we can treat this categorization process as a transition from an initially stable meaning that loses stability with variations in prosody (our control parameter). The same underlying dynamics have been observed in studies of perception of syllables and aspects of visual perception. Apart from demonstrating the same characteristics of pattern formation at various levels of cognition, the study points to the usefulness of the dynamical approach in the investigation of language understanding.     

Intermodal transfer in temporal discrimination

Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics - This study determined if training for accuracy in temporal discrimination would transfer across sensory modalities. A fractionation method was used in...     

Young children's free responses to anomalous commands

Twelve children, 21–34 months old, six in R. Brown's Stage I and six in Stages II and III, responded to commands varying in length, grammaticality, and meaning. All of the children responded significantly less often when the commands were situationally anomalous and/or ungrammatical. Results failed to replicate the results of E. Shipley, E. Smith, and L. Gleitman (Language, 1969, 44, 332–342) and J. Wetstone and B. Friedlander (Child Development, 1973, 44, 743–750). The results also suggest that young children rely heavily upon situational cues in their earliest comprehension of adult speech, and this supports arguments made by J. Strohner and K. Nelson (Child Development, 45, 567–576) and R. Chapman and J. Miller (Journal of Speech and Hearing, 1975, 18, 355–371). Since subjects rely upon nonlinguistic cues to respond appropriately, syntactic competence cannot be inferred from apparent comprehension.     

The systematic use of positive and negative consequences in managing classroom encopresis

An 11-year-old male with a history of chronic encopresis was successfully treated by his teachers. Through the contingent application of a combination of positive (i.e., social reinforcers, token reinforcers, activity reinforcers) and negative consequences (i.e., required to wash himself and denied access to activity reinforcers), the subject's soiling behavior was reduced from an 80% daily occurrence level during Baseline to just two occasions during the final five-month treatment phase. A six-month follow-up conducted during the next school year revealed no incidences of soiling. The investigation utilized and ABACD type behavior modification design.     

Sex differences in recipients' reactions to aid

The purpose of this study was to determine whether males and females differentially respond to the receipt of aid as a function of their similarity to the donor and their own chronic level of self-esteem. Female and male adults received either help from a fictitious partner or no aid. All subjects were given information that they had been paired with a partner who had an inferior, similar, or superior level of task-relevant experience. Females paired with a partner of equal experience reported greater decrements in situational self-esteem than did males. Furthermore, females who received help reported a higher level of satisfaction with the help, and in all but one of the similarity conditions, females expressed a greater need for help than did males. When self-esteem was considered, high self-esteem females paired with persons with similar experience exhibited greater decrements in mood than did other high self-esteem females; males did not differ across conditions. Implications of the obtained sex differences were discussed in relation to sex differences in help-seeking behavior and sex role stereotypes.The authors would like to express their gratitude to Rob Beller, Mary Greenspun, Cheryl Hepfel, and Andrea Nagel, who assisted in data collection, and to Sanford Braver, who assisted with analyses. Thanks are also extended to Paul Karoly, Clark Presson, and Manuel Barrera for their advice throughout the completion of this study. The study was completed as partial fulfillment for the requirements of a master's degree by the first author at Arizona State University.     

Gender and sex-role appropriateness: Bias in the judgment of disturbed behavior

Male and female undergraduate raters made attributions of mental disorder, personality traits, and diagnostic and treatment judgments for four case studies in which sex of client and sex-role appropriateness of client behavior were manipulated. Significant interactions of sex-role appropriateness with both client sex and rater sex highlighted the significance of sex-role stereotypes in the attribution of mental disorder by nonprofessionals. The data indicated that these cultural sex-role definitions had the strongest negative effect for females and the female sex role. Implications of these findings for the clinical judgment process and female self-perception are discussed.The order of authorship was determined by random selection.