A microswitch program to foster simple foot and leg movements in adult wheelchair users with multiple disabilities

This study assessed a microswitch program to foster simple foot and leg movements in 2 adult wheelchair users with multiple disabilities. The participants' mood (indices of happiness) was recorded throughout the study. Data showed that participants rapidly increased the target foot and leg movements and maintained those movements during the course of the study, which lasted about 4.5 months. With regard to indices of happiness, 1 participant showed a fairly modest increase during the intervention while the other participant showed a substantial increase. Implications of the findings are discussed.     

Detection of change in shape: an advantage for concavities

Shape representation was studied using a change detection task. Observers viewed two individual shapes in succession, either identical or one a slightly altered version of the other, and reported whether they detected a change. We found a dramatic advantage for concave compared to convex changes of equal magnitude. Observers were more accurate when a concavity along the contour was introduced, or removed, compared to a convexity. This result sheds light on the underlying representation of visual shape, and in particular the central role played by part-boundaries. Moreover, this finding shows how change detection methodology can serve as a useful tool in studying the specific form of visual representations.     

Perception and Reactions to Inequity as a Function of Social Comparison Referents and Hierarchical Levels1

Perceptions and reactions to inequity may hinge on referents of comparison and also on employees' rank in the organization. This study examined how three comparison referents—internal same-rank, external same-rank and external whole-organization—and respondents' hierarchical status in the company influence perceptions of inequity. The study also examined the relationship of perceived inequity with affect, job satisfaction, job involvement, organizational commitment, and stress. Seventy-five employees randomly selected from the three hierarchical levels of a manufacturing company (managers, supervisors, and workers) were the respondents. Results suggest that when individuals made comparisons with external same-rank and external whole-organization referents they experienced more inequity than when they made internal same-rank comparisons. Managers in comparison to supervisors and workers perceived less inequity related to pay, general rules administration, promotion, company and fringe benefits, advancement opportunities, and social power. Perception of inequity was found to be negatively related to job involvement, job satisfaction, and affect, and positively related to stress. Results implicate the role of social comparison referents in the evaluation of organizational rewards and perceptions of inequity.     

Clues to aural discrimination

Five measures of the items of the Multiple-Choice Intelligibility Test were obtained: apparent aural similarity of the four words available to a listener on hearing a stimulus, interconsonantal differences among the prevocalic portions of these words, phonemic discrepancies among these words, distinctive feature differences among these words, and the pooled discrimination score of the four words that were available to the responder on hearing the stimulus. The last score was made the target in a multiple correlation problem, and the relative contribution, combined and separately, of the four remaining measures to the target measure was determined. These four measures accounted for approximately 45% of the variance among the scores of discrimination. The strongest contributors were apparent aural similarity of the available responses and the phonemic discrepancy among the available responses.