Personality, Social Networks, and Perceived Social Support among Alcoholics: A Structural Equation Analysis

ABSTRACT In this study we tested relations among personality characteristics, social network properties, and perceived social support both concurrently and prospectively. A sample of 294 men in treatment at a Department of Veterans Affairs Alcohol Treatment Unit was assessed during treatment and 3 months after discharge. Results of the cross-sectional structural equation analyses indicated that the personality characteristics of extraversion and neu-roticism were related to both social network properties and perceived social support. Characteristics of the alcoholic's social network were also related to perceived availability of support. Longitudinal analyses of perceived social support after treatment indicated that two social network properties (size of the network and the proportion of confidants) were predictive net of initial levels of social support. Extraversion and neuroticism were found to be indi-rectly related to perceived social support at Time 2 through their effects on social network properties and perceived social support during treatment. Implications of these findings for models of the nature and determinants of perceived social support are discussed.     

Perceived ethicality of guided imagery in rape research

In our first study, undergraduate students (30 men, 30 women) evaluated the ethical acceptability of two previously published studies that used guided imagery in rape situations. In one, women imagined themselves as rape victims; in the other, men imagined themselves as rapists. Most students rated the research acceptable, but there was a significant interaction (p less than .05): Women found the study of women as victim less ethical, and men found the study of men as rapist less ethical. In our second study, 30 noncollege women evaluated the research on women as rape victims. After reading the scenario, none of these women said they would have agreed to participate or thought the research was ethically acceptable. We discuss issues of informed consent, demands of the research situation, and potential benefits and risks.     

What makes targets redundant?

Two letter-classification experiments that investigated target-redundancy effects on reaction time (RT) were conducted. Both experiments were replicated with choice reaction time (CRT) and go/no-go (GNG) procedures. In each experiment, there were two single-target conditions, one with a noise letter and one without. In one experiment, the letter classes were two letters that could be of either case. In the second experiment, each class consisted of two different capital letters. In both experiments, there were two redundant-targets conditions, one with identical targets and one with the different members of a class. In both of the GNG experiments, redundancy gains were obtained comparing the different-targets condition with the no-noise, single-target condition. Redundant stimuli are ones that lead to the same response. Visually different stimuli may be processed in parallel and jointly activate a response. GNG procedures are more sensitive than CRT in the investigation of redundancy effects.     

Tacit knowledge and the effect of pattern configuration on mental scanning

Two opposing hypotheses are that estimated distances may be used to predict scanning times in mental scanning experiments (Mitchell & Richman, 1980; Pylyshyn, 1981) and that scanning times may be used to estimate distances on maps (Thorndyke, 1981). We tested these hypotheses by having people both estimate lengths and mentally scan diagonal lines, spirals, and mazes. There were large and consistent differences in the rate of scanning the three configurations, regardless of whether people scanned percepts or images. These differences could not be accounted for by differences in length estimates or by people’s tacit knowledge of their scanning rates. We propose that people actually do mental scanning in a mental scanning task rather than use length estimates to generate scanning time and that they do not rely on scanning times to estimate length in a length estimation task.     

Multiple determinants of the effects of reinforcement magnitude on free-operant response rates

Four experiments examined the effects of increasing the number of food pellets given to hungry rats for a lever-press response. On a simple variable-interval 60-s schedule, increased number of pellets depressed response rates (Experiment 1). In Experiment 2, the decrease in response rate as a function of increased reinforcement magnitude was demonstrated on a variable-interval 30-s schedule, but enhanced rates of response were obtained with the same increase in reinforcement magnitude on a variable-ratio 30 schedule. In Experiment 3, higher rates of responding were maintained by the component of a concurrent variable-interval 60-s variable-interval 60-s schedule associated with a higher reinforcement magnitude. In Experiment 4, higher rates of response were produced in the component of a multiple variable-interval 60-s variable-interval 60-s schedule associated with the higher reinforcement magnitude. It is suggested that on simple schedules greater reinforcer magnitudes shape the reinforced pattern of responding more effectively than do smaller reinforcement magnitudes. This effect is, however, overridden by another process, such a contrast, when two magnitudes are presented within a single session on two-component schedules.     

Stimulus intensity,catch trial effects,and the speed-accuracy tradeoff in reaction time: A variable criterion theory interptation

Ss responded to a 1,000-Hz tone of 50, 80, or 100 dB. Catch trial conditions were none, blank trials, a red light, a noise, and an 1,800-Hz tone. Auditory catch signals were of the same intensities. RT distributions in the first three conditions were well described by a family of exponential growth functions dependent upon stimulus intensity and by the parameters of normal criterion distributions dependent upon catch trial conditions and between-session variability. Performance in the auditory catch trial conditions was not dependent upon the same set of sensory growth functions. Performance in these conditions was described by a two-dimensional analysis of information transmitted as a function of time and interpreted in terms of variable criterion theory. The speed-accuracy tradeoff in this situation appears to depend upon differential rates of growth of intensity and associative information and the criterion used in responding to this information.     

List length and the time course of recognition in immediate memory

The response signal method of Reed (1973) was used to study the time-course of list membership recognition after 2 sec of uncontrolled rehearsal, with lists of one, two, and four consonants. Fourteen specific hypotheses about the time course of this process were derived from various theories (Anderson, 1973; Anderson & Bower, 1973; Baddeley & Ecob, 1973; Corballis, Kirby, & Miller, 1972; Kirsner, 1972; Murdock, 1971; Sternberg, 1966, 1969; Theios, Smith, Haviland, Traupmann, & Moy, 1973; etc.) and additional assumptions about the effect of the response signal. When members of the to-be-learned lists are drawn from a small population of highly confusable items, as in the current experiment, list membership recognition appears to follow the model of Theios et al. (1973). Latency functions of signal lag appear to be particularly useful in differentiating among hypotheses which predict similar speed-accuracy tradeoff functions. The lag by positive-negative interaction for latencies of correct responses is highly significant for lists of one consonant, a result predicted by the hypothesis derived from the model of Theios et al. and incompatible with hypotheses derived from exhaustive search and single-threshold strength models.