Social Costs of Smoking: Effects of Tobacco Smoke on Hostile Behavior1

Male and female undergraduates interacted with a same-sex experimenter and a same-sex assistant of the experimenter. Either the experimenter or the assistant smoked. Subjects were provoked or not provoked by the experimenter and then smoked. Subjects were provoked or not provided by the experimenter and then provided with an opportunity to treat him or her in a hostile manner. Additionally, subjects were classified as smokers or nonsmokers and as supporting or opposing smoking in public places. Tobacco smoke was found to facilitate hostile behavior whether or not subjects were independently annoyed and whether or not it originated from the annoyer or a bystander. No sex differences were observed in this effect. Also, no appreciable difference was observed in the hostile behavior of smokers and nonsmokers. Persons opposed to public smoking reacted more strongly to the provocation than persons supportive of public smoking, but this effect was independent of the presence or absence of smoke.     

Early education,intellectual development,and school performance: A reply to Arthur Jensen and J. McVicker Hunt

In this response to the critiques by Arthur Jensen and J. McVicker Hunt, we focus on three issues that clarity the results and conclusions of our original paper. These issues include the meaning of g, the permanence of effects produced by early education, and the educational significance of IQ gains produced by early education programs. In addition, since the nature of longitudinal studies insures the accumulation of new data to test and refine conclusions drawn from earlier data, we begin by briefly summarizing new data from our study pertinent to these three issues.     

Facilitatory spatial interaction with percutaneous electrical stimuli

To measure the effect of a rectangular percutaneous conditioning shock to one finger on subjective magnitude of a suprathreshold test shock to an adjacent finger, Ss equated a contralateral matching stimulus to the test shock. The conditioning shock generally increased the apparent intensity of the test shock. This facilitation was a negatively accelerated function of test-shock current. Larger conditioning stimuli produced greater facilitation. Over limited intervals, time between conditioning and test or test and matching stimuli had no systematic effects.     

Sexual behaviour in injecting drug users

A survey of the self-reported sexual behaviors of 1239 intravenous drug users recruited off the streets in Sydney, Australia, highlighted the impact of both sexual orientation and gender on the risk of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection in this population. The sample included 908 men (mean age, 27.9 years) and 331 women (mean age, 26.3 years), the majority of whom were unemployed or receiving social security benefits. Among male respondents, 50 were homosexual, 117 were bisexual, and 719 were heterosexual; for females these numbers were 10, 95, and 220, respectively. Oral and vaginal sex were the most commonly reported practices among heterosexuals, while homosexuals primarily reported manual stimulation and oro-genital contact. The regular sexual partners of male intravenous drug users tended not to be addicts, while female drug users were primarily involved with male partners who also abused drugs. Among male respondents, condom use was highest among homosexuals, followed by bisexuals, and lowest among heterosexuals; there were no significant differences by sexual orientation in female respondents' condom use. Overall, condoms were most likely to be utilized in anal sex and least likely in the case of oral sex. Condom use was about 5% lower when a regular as opposed to casual sexual partner was involved. Most of the 64 HIV-positive respondents were homosexuals, suggesting that sexual orientation rather than drug abuse was the primary risk factor. Given the finding that there is substantial variation in condom use among subgroups of intravenous drug abusers, it is recommended that HIV prevention programs adopt a diversified rather than uniform approach.     

A Microcomputer Assessment System (MAS) for administering computer-based surveys: Preliminary results from administration to clients at an impaired-driver treatment program

The Microcomputer Assessment System (MAS), written in C language, allows a researcher to design and administer computer-based surveys by manipulating ASCII text files and requires no knowledge of a traditional programming language. The system was designed to provide maximum user flexibility: MAS allows both multiple-choice and open-ended (fill-in) questions and allows control over text color, allowable answers, and summary output. MAS also assesses response latency and includes support for random assignment of different instruments to respondents. MAS runs under MS-DOS 3.0 or higher, requires 640K of RAM, a color screen (EGA or better), and an extended keyboard. Preliminary results from an application of MAS to a sample of. 121 clients at an impaired-driver treatment program are summarized.     

Irreducibility and subjectivity

Thanks to Marshall Abrams, Irene Appelbaum, Dan Gilman, Jeff Honnold, and the referees of this journal for their comments on earlier drafts of this paper.     

Semantic indeterminacy and the realist stance

Semantic Indeterminacy and Scientific Realism are perhaps the two most ubiquitous and influential doctrines of the Quinean corpus. My concern is to argue against neither in isolation, but against their joint compatibility. Scientific Realism, I argue, when understood as Quine's realistic attitude toward the posits of physical theory, is essentially intentional in character. Thus, Realism requires Intentionality. In Section 1, I provide some necessary exegesis. In Section 2, I attempt to show how this Realism/Intentionality connection arises, surprisingly, within Quine's own mature work to create a tension in his views which he does not himself resolve. In Section 3, I examine the source of the Realism/Intentionality connection more deeply, and respond to possible Quinean objections to my account. In Section 4, I consider the consequences of the connection for various debates in recent analytic philosophy.     

Anterograde and retrograde enhancement of 24-h memory by glucose in elderly humans.

The present experiment examined anterograde and retrograde enhancement of memory storage by glucose in elderly humans. Glucose (50 g) or saccharin was administered shortly before or immediately after acquisition of a narrative prose passage. Recall was tested 24 h later. Glucose administration before or after presentation of the material to be learned significantly improved recall 24 h later compared to performance in the saccharin condition. These findings suggest that glucose retroactively enhances memory storage processing in elderly humans and that the enhancement of memory outlasts the transient elevations in blood glucose levels after glucose ingestion.