Optimism and Revolt of the Oppressed: A Comparison of Two Polish Jewish Ghettos of World War II

One World War II Jewish ghetto that revolted, the Warsaw Ghetto, is compared to one that did not, the Lodz Ghetto, in order to examine the causes of violent resistance. This structured focused comparative method (George, 1979) illuminates problems with previous explanations for revolt and nonrevolt in Jewish ghettos and suggest psychological variables that might have led to or precluded organized violence. Specifically, it appears that these two ghettos differed in their perceptions about their future. The residents of the Warsaw Ghetto believed they had no hope of survival while residents of the Lodz Ghetto remained optimistic. These differing perceptions seem to have led to the different outcomes. Possible causes of these percetpions are also discussed.     

Short- and long-term behavioral effects of neonatal exposure to bombesin.

Subcutaneous (sc) administration of the tetradecapeptide bombesin (BN) (1-10 mg/kg) elicited grooming in rat pups of 1-10 days of age and the magnitude of this response decreased as a function of age. The form of grooming induced was qualitatively different from that seen following central injection of BN to adult rats. Subchronic neonatal exposure to BN (5 or 10 mg/kg; sc, twice daily for the first 8 postnatal days) had no effect on subsequent adult behavior displayed under mildly stressful or novel conditions, in the open field or in an elevated plus maze. However, both saline and the high dose of BN (10 mg/kg) pretreatments increased adult sensitivity to central BN (0.1 micrograms; icv) as compared to noninjected but neonatally handled controls or those rats neonatally pretreated with the lower dose of BN (5 mg/kg). This was best demonstrated by increases in scratching activity at the 0.1-micrograms dose of icv BN. Neonatal pretreatments had no effect on later adult sensitivity to BN injected intraperitoneally (ip). These data indicate that BN receptors in the rat central nervous system are pharmacologically functional from an early stage in ontogeny. Systems utilizing BN-like peptides are, to a degree, plastic early in ontogeny and altered adult sensitivity to BN icv can be achieved via subchronic exposure to BN during infancy. Endogenous BN-based mechanisms did not appear to play a role in the development and/or expression of behavior(s) elicited under mildly stressful or novel conditions.     

Reducing Avoidance of Social Interaction with a Physically Disabled Person by Mentioning the Disability Following a Request for Aid1

The effectiveness of strategies for reducing avoidance of social interaction with a physically disabled person was experimentally investigated. Female college students privately expressed their preference for social interaction before and after learning the other was a female in a wheelchair or nondisabled. The results provide evidence for the effectiveness of mentioning the disability following a request for aid related to the disability (the Request-mention Strategy). Change in preference for social interaction was more positive when the disabled person employed the Request-mention strategy than when she said nothing. Requesting aid without mentioning the disability was not found to be effective. A request for aid unrelated to the disability was clearly ineffective. The disabled person who said nothing was avoided, in comparison to when the same person was nondisabled. Favorability of impressions of the other, as measured by ratings of her characteristics, was not influenced by the experimental conditions.     

A Three-Factor Experimental Analysis of Promises and Threats

A questionnaire study was conducted to examine the extent to which variations in the language of promises and threats differentially affect compliance as well as perceptions of the transmitters of these influence attempts. Subjects were asked to imagine that they had been assigned a partner for collaborative work on a project, for which the topic had not yet been decided. In an attempt to persuade them of the value of his topic, the partner (experimenter) sent subjects one of eight promises and threats, which varied along three dimensions: orientation to the consequences of compliance (reward or nonpunishment) vs. noncompliance (punishment or nonreward); transmitter versus recipient orientation of the statement's premise; and transmitter versus recipient orientation of the statement's conclusion. The results indicate that recipient-oriented premise statements and statements of contingent reward or nonpunishment are seen as both more attractive and more likely to gain compliance than those that have a transmitter-oriented premise or that express contingent punishment or nonreward. In addition, compliance was found to be strongly related to a transmitter's attractiveness, but to neither his perceived power nor his activity. The implications of these findings for future research and the resolution of a variety of conflicts were discussed.     

Instrumental conditioning of diastolic blood pressure in essential hypertensive patients

Eighteen male essential hypertensive patients participated in an experiment designed to compare two strategies for controlling high blood pressure. Each strategy was derived from the instrumental learning literature, and the aim was to treat the blood pressure response as an operant and determine the most effective conditioning procedure for manipulating it. The results demonstrate that patients could be conditioned to lower blood pressure by 20% to 30% over a period as brief as four days by providing an external signal and verbal praise contingent upon each reduction in diastolic pressure that met a pre-set criterion.     

Spiral aftereffect durations following awakening from REM sleep and non-REM sleep

Nine Ss were awakened 2 min after the beginning of a REM period and 2 min after the beginning of a non-REM period (Stage 4), and were tested on a spiral aftereffect. The duration of the spiral aftereffect was found to be longer for the tests made following REM periods than for the tests made following non-REM periods. The results were interpreted to suggest a possible “carry over” effect from the particular sleep, stage into the waking state.     

A neural activity interpretation of luminance effects on infant pattern preferences

Visual pattern preferences were established for 9- and 13-week-old infants (N = 96) using stimuli varying in contour density presented either at a low, moderate, or high luminance level. Age differences in the maximally preferred patterns across stimuli and luminance levels indicated that luminance interacts with contour density in determining stimulus preference functions for a given age. A neural activation model based on synchronous neural activity was advanced to describe these results.