Sex differences in the educational and occupational aspirations of rural youth

Rural girls (N = 926) and boys (N = 861) in grades 10, 11, and 12 answered questions concerning educational and occupational aspirations. The young women showed significantly higher educational aspiration, the same or higher occupational aspiration, and equal ranges of job choice. The results are discussed with respect to previous findings, and to status attainment models.     

Single-item memory, associative memory, and the human hippocampus

We tested recognition memory for items and associations in memory-impaired patients with bilateral lesions thought to be limited to the hippocampal region. In Experiment 1 (Combined memory test), participants studied words and then took a memory test in which studied words, new words, studied word pairs, and recombined word pairs were presented in a mixed order. In Experiment 2 (Separated memory test), participants studied single words and then took a memory test involving studied word and new words. In a separate test, they studied word pairs and then took a memory test involving studied word pairs and recombined word pairs. In both experiments, patients were impaired at memory for single items as well as memory for associations, suggesting that the hippocampus is important for both of these memory functions. In Experiment 1, patients appeared to be more impaired at associative memory than item memory. In Experiment 2, patients were similarly impaired at associative memory and item memory. These different findings are considered, including the fact that in Experiment 1 the results depended on the fact that controls produced unexpectedly low false-alarm rates to recombined pairs. We discuss single-item and associative memory from the perspective that the hippocampus and adjacent cortex work cooperatively to signal recognition and that simple dichotomies do not adequately describe the division of labor within the medial temporal lobe.     

Community-based instruction for independent meal preparation by adults with profound mental retardation

Three adults with profound mental retardation and very limited reading skills were transitioned to community living after spending more than 20 years in a residential facility. Community-based instruction was used to teach them to independently prepare meals. Directed rehearsal and prompting procedures were used to teach them those meal preparation skills that they were unable to perform independently. We present assessment, training and followup data on the preparation of a dessert by the three participants. Following an assessment on the steps needed to prepare the dessert, training was introduced in a multiple baseline across subjects design. Results showed that the participants were able to independently prepare the dessert in up to 21 pre-training and training sessions. Monthly followup for six months showed that they were able to independently prepare the dessert in various community settings of their choice.     

Roles of women in the large group: Enduring paradigms in a chaotic environment

Group relations conferences offer participants and staff an opportunity to study unconscious aspects of organizational life, in particular, the projections and fantasies surrounding leaders. This paper offers an example of the way one aspect of the group relations conference, the large group, can be useful in understanding a particular set of experiences, namely that of women as leaders. Given the current social, economic, and political climate in the US, a woman working professionally as a consultant in the large group must be available for a barrage of contradictory, irrational projections. In this way, women consultants, and perhaps women leaders, represent the essential paradoxes of our existence, namely that intimacy is created through a simultaneous understanding of our separateness and our connection to one another.     

SILENCING THE SELF AND DEPRESSION AMONG WOMEN

The purpose of this study was to assess the validity and provide normative data for the Silencing the Self Scale, a newly devised instrument for measuring cognitive schemas hypothesized to be related to depression in women. The study also tested the hypothesis that race would moderate the relationship between silencing the self and depression. The sample consisted of 80 women: 40 African Americans and 40 Caucasians. Controlling for income and socially desirable response bias, a significant relationship between silencing the self and depression was found only for Caucasian women. It was suggested that differing values and socialization practices may be responsible for the findings.     

Metacognitive monitoring of attention performance and its influencing factors

Metacognitive monitoring is a central element of metacognitive processing exerting widespread influences on information processing. Albeit being subject to numerous empirical investigations referring to memory performance, there is little research investigating metacognitive monitoring in other cognitive domains. The present study investigated in 45 healthy students whether factors that are known to influence monitoring of memory performance, i.e. task difficulty, time of assessment, and practice, also exhibit a significant impact on monitoring of attention performance. A multivariate analysis of variance with three within-subject repeated measures factors on two dependent variables (monitoring of (a) time, and (b) errors in an attention task) was conducted. Results showed that monitoring ability significantly decreased with increasing task difficulty, was significantly better for post than for pre-assessment, and significantly increased with practice. Therefore, results suggest that the examined factors influenced monitoring of attention performance equivalent to the influence of these factors found in metamemory research.     

Bifactor Models of Personality and College Student Performance: A Broad Versus Narrow View

Research in the area of personality traits and academic performance has been supported by consistent meta‐analytic evidence demonstrating positive relationships between Conscientiousness and grade point average (GPA). However, academic performance is not solely a function of GPA but also a number of other important intellectual, interpersonal and intrapersonal behaviours. This wider criterion space opens up the possibility for many personality factors and their underlying facets to relate to academic performance. Using bifactor latent variable modelling, the current study investigates the six‐factor HEXACO model of personality, along with their 24 underlying facets, for predicting students' academic performance. Model results reveal interpretable and meaningful relationships between both broad factors and narrow personality facets in predicting college student outcomes. Implications for measurement, modelling and prediction are discussed. Copyright © 2014 European Association of Personality Psychology     

Framing of Decisions: Effect on Active and Passive Risk Avoidance

Decision makers intending to avoid risk in a decision situation can choose a less risky alternative (passive risk avoidance) or intervene actively in an alternative applying a risk‐defusing action (active risk avoidance). In Experiment 1 (64 participants), we compared active and passive risk defusing in two framing conditions. In the negative frame, in the uncertain alternative, a change to the worse was possible; in the positive frame, a change to an improvement was possible. Each participant decided in both framing conditions. As expected, active risk avoidance behavior for preventing a negative outcome (i.e., in the negative frame) was more likely than for promoting a positive one (i.e., in the positive frame). If decision makers did not or could not actively defuse the risk, they chose in correspondence to the classical pattern: risk avoidance in the positive frame and risk seeking in the negative one. We replicated the latter result in a second experiment (32 participants). The classical framing pattern in passive risk avoidance in both experiments is remarkable, because participants were not presented or did not search for exact probabilities. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.