Older adolescent females' knowledge of child development norms

This study, the first of three designed to investigate different age groups' knowledge of developmental norms of children, focused on older adolescent female university students. Data were collected from 280 midwestern university students through a questionnaire consisting of 16 items focusing on physical and social development of children from birth to three years of age. Results showed that knowledge of normal development was both over- and underestimated regardless of age of student or year in school. These findings are discussed within the context of the importance of knowledge of developmental norms for future parents.     

Some comments on Shettel-Neuber and O'Reilly's "handedness and career choice: another look at supposed left/right differences" (1983)

A property of attitudes, namely, the fact that attitudes select facts, is used to comment upon a paper on handedness and career choice.     

Choice behavior and the accessibility of the reinforcer

In Experiment 1, matching of relative response rates to relative rates of reinforcement was obtained in concurrent variable-interval schedules when the absolute values of the two concurrent variable-interval schedules varied from 6 sec and 12 sec to 600 sec and 1200 sec. Increases in the duration of the changeover delay, however, produced decreases in the relative response rates and, consequently, some deviation from matching. In Experiment 2, matching of relative response rates to the relative duration of the reinforcer failed to occur when the equal variable-interval schedules arranging access to the two different reinforcer durations (1.5 and 6 sec) were varied in size from concurrent variable-interval 10-sec schedules to concurrent variable-interval 600-sec schedules.     

Rehabilitation of the Culturally Different: A Model of the Individual in Cultural Change

Services of rehabilitation agencies and facilities tend to be structured to the needs of the larger American culture. It is important, however, to reconsider our social service programs in view of the needs of different cultural groups when providing services that will aid these individuals to move across cultural boundaries. An attempt is made in this paper to develop a model of the individual who undergoes such cultural transition. Such a model should help define problems in service programs, assess the value of current service activities, and identify areas for developing new services that will aid the overall process of cultural transition. A model of behavior development is outlined, followed by a formulation of a model of the individual in cultural change.     

Information processing,neuropsychological function,and the inherited predisposition to alcoholism

Sons of male alcoholics are at particularly heightened risk for the development of alcoholism. This heightened risk frequently appears in association with increased incidence of conduct disorder or hyperactivity, with deficits in abstract thinking and poor school performance, with abnormalities in cued psychophysiological response, and with increased sensitivity to the putatively stress-response-dampening effects of alcohol intoxication. This risk and its associated features are discussed within the context of a neuropsychological theory, predicated on the notions (1) that deficits in cognitive functions theoretically dependent upon the intact functioning of the prefrontal cortex could underlie manifestation of the idiosyncracies commonly attributed to sons of male alcoholics, and (2) that acute alcohol intoxication could relieve the subjective discomfort associated with the consequences of such deficits.     

Pessimistic explanatory style and response to illness

Previous studies have shown that a pessimistic explanatory style is a risk factor for illness, but the factors linking explanatory style and illness are unknown. One's characteristic response to poor health may mediate this relationship. Perhaps pessimistic individuals act helplessly in the face of their symptoms, thereby exacerbating disease. In the present study, we investigated this possibility by asking 96 young adults to complete measures of explanatory style, habitual response to illness, and ways of coping during their most recent episode of illness. Subjects who explain bad events pessimistically (with internal, stable, and global causes) reported more frequent illnesses during the past year and rated their overall health more poorly than those who habitually favor external, unstable, and specific explanations. When ill, the pessimistic subjects were less likely than their optimistic counterparts to take active steps to combat their illness. Our results suggest that one pathway leading from pessimistic explanatory style to poor health is mundane: passivity in the face of disease.