The Influence of Videoconference Technology and Interview Structure on the Recruiting Function of the Employment Interview: A Field Experiment

This field experiment examined whether interview medium and interview structure affects the attractiveness of organizations, interviewer friendliness and performance. Attractiveness ratings of 25 organizations were provided by 92 real job applicants, assigned to either a face–to–face (FTF) or a videoconference (VC) interview. An interview medium X structure interaction showed FTF applicants were attracted most to organizations who conducted their interviews with less structure, while VC applicants were more attracted to organizations using structured interviews. Interview structure had no effect on applicants’ perception of the interviewer’s performance; however, interviewers’ performance was rated higher for FTF than VC interviews. Applicants were more satisfied with their FTF performance in less structured interviews and more satisfied with their VC performance in highly structured interviews.     

Mothers,fathers, and the crisis of newborn intensive care

At hospital discharge of their infant from a newborn intensive care unit, 50 mothers and fathers were interviewed and completed questionnaires. There were significant within-couple correlations for appraisals of the harm that ensued from this crisis, perceptions of personal control over the infant's recovery, and expectations about the infant's future health and development. Mothers perceived more personal control, mobilized more social support, and used more escapist coping strategies than did fathers. Mothers and fathers exhibited different patterns of relations between their own coping strategies and emotional well-being. But, neither the coping strategies used by one's spouse nor differences between spouses in the use of individual coping strategies correlated with emotional well-being. Analysis of parents' perceived differences between their own and their partner's coping strategies suggested the possibility of mutually helpful, complementary strategies of coping with this problem.     

Labor supply and consumption of food in a closed economy under a range of fixed- and random-ratio schedules: tests of unit price

The behavioral economic concept of unit price predicts that consumption and response output (labor supply) are determined by the unit price at which a good is available regardless of the value of the cost and benefit components of the unit price ratio. Experiment 1 assessed 4 pigeons' consumption and response output at a range of unit prices. In one condition, food was available according to a range of fixed-ratio schedules, whereas in the other condition, food was available according to a range of random-ratio schedules. Consistent with unit price predictions, consumption and response output were approximately equivalent across schedule types within the lower range of unit prices. However, at Unit Prices 64 (ratio value = 192) and greater, considerably more consumption and response output were observed in the random-ratio condition. Experiment 2 replicated these findings with 4 pigeons using the rapid demand curve assay procedure that is commonly used in the behavioral economics literature. Findings are integrated with two mathematical models of behavior under variable reinforcer delays.     

Generating animal and tool names: an fMRI study of effective connectivity

The present fMRI study of semantic fluency for animal and tool names provides further evidence for category-specific brain activations, and reports task-related changes in effective connectivity among defined cerebral regions. Two partially segregated systems of functional integration were highlighted: the tool condition was associated with an enhancement of connectivity within left hemispheric regions, including the inferior prefrontal and premotor cortex, the inferior parietal lobule and the temporo-occipital junction; the animal condition was associated with greater coupling among left visual associative regions. These category-specific functional differences extend the evidence for anatomical specialization to lexical search tasks, and provide for the first time evidence of category-specific patterns of functional integration in word-retrieval.     

Attentional disregulation: a benefit for implicit memory

The authors investigated the effect of age and time of testing on the ability to control attention and addressed the possibility that older adults' susceptibility to distraction may sometimes facilitate performance on a later cognitive task. Using a modification of a G. Rees, C. Russell, C. D. Frith, and J. Driver (1999) procedure, the authors asked the participants to make same or different judgments on line drawings superimposed with task-irrelevant letter strings. Memory for the distractors was subsequently tested with an implicit memory task. Both older and young adults demonstrated greater memory for distractors at nonoptimal times of day than at optimal times of day; however, older adults showed considerably better memory for the distractors than did young adults.     

Links Between Antisocial Behavior and Depressed Mood: The Role of Life Events and Attributional Style

Comorbidity between antisocial behavior and depression in adolescence is widely recognized. This paper examines whether links with depressed mood differ among three subtypes of antisocial behavior: oppositionality, physical aggression and delinquency. In addition we examine two possible contributors to these links: negative life events that are dependent upon the individual's actions and depressogenic attributional style. Data are drawn from the G1219 large-scale community twin and sibling sample, and include 2409 questionnaire responses from youths aged between 13 and 19 living in the United Kingdom. Depressed mood was independently associated with both oppositionality and delinquency, but not with physical aggression. Dependent negative life events were strongly implicated in the association between delinquency and depressed mood, whereas depressogenic attributional style was implicated in the associations of both oppositionality and delinquency with depressed mood. Oppositionality remained a significant predictor of depressed mood after accounting for attributional style and life events whereas delinquency did not. The pattern of associations was largely similar in boys and girls. We discuss these results in terms of developmental models of the links between antisocial behavior and depressed mood.     

Reading problems and depressed mood

Although reading difficulties show well-established overlaps with disruptive behavior disorders in childhood, much less is known about reading-disabled children's vulnerability to emotional difficulties. Using longitudinal data from 6 assessments of boys in the Pittsburgh Youth Study, we found robust links between severe, persistent reading problems and increased risk for depressed mood in a community sample of boys aged 7 and 10 years at initial assessment, though not in those who had already entered their teens. These associations could not be accounted for in terms of selected family risks or comorbid disruptive behaviors; instead, the pattern of the findings pointed to the existence of more direct causal processes whereby reading problems influence younger boys' risk of depressed mood.     

Genetic and environmental influences on the relationships between family connectedness, school connectedness, and adolescent depressed mood: sex differences.

This study investigated (a) genetic and environmental contributions to the relationship between family and school environment and depressed mood and (b) potential sex differences in genetic and environmental contributions to both variation in and covariation between family connectedness, school connectedness, and adolescent depressed mood. Data are from 2,302 adolescent sibling pairs (mean age = 16 years) who were part of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health. Although genetic factors appeared to be important overall, model-fitting analyses revealed that the best-fitting model was a model that allowed for different parameters for male and female adolescents. Genetic contributions to variation in all 3 variables were greater among female adolescents than male adolescents, especially for depressed mood. Genetic factors also contributed to the correlations between family and school environment and adolescent depressed mood, although, again, these factors were stronger for female than for male adolescents.     

A suicidal adolescent's sleeping beauty syndrome: cessation orientations toward dying, sleep, and drugs

In a study of hospitalized suicidal youth, the account of a sixteen-year-old girl, diagnosed as schizophrenic, is analyzed to gain insight into a family's role in the suicidal career of an adolescent preoccupied with death and dying, sleep, and drugs; the interplay of her construction of reality with her risk-taking, self-injurious way of life; and her perceived problems of living and need for help. Her cessation orientations revealed a kind of Sleeping Beauty syndrome with fantasies on sleep, drugs, and death, including a death of the mind from overdosing. Such qualitative research on suicidal careers may increase our understanding of the at-risk adolescent population and assist in the development of a policy for identifying and meeting needs and following up on clues for prevention and early intervention.