Acquiring complex partial orderings in comparison with acquiring similar-sized linear orderings

The acquisition of a 14-term partial ordering was compared with the acquisition of a 14-term linear ordering. Learning the partial ordering was found to be more difficult because of two factors: (1) Subjects do not appear to have in their knowledge systems a prototype or rule for representing a long list of comparative relations as a partial ordering structure, and (2) the partial ordering must be presented so that some of the adjacently presented premises do not contain a common element. When these two factors were controlled, the partial ordering was as easy to learn as the linear ordering. It was also found that subjects learning the partial ordering showed no evidence of a serial position learning curve, whereas subjects learning the linear ordering showed some tendency to produce a serial position learning curve.     

Breaking-up is hard to study: A review of two decades of dissolution research

The dissolution of romantic relationships can be conceptualized in many ways, from a distressing event or a consequential life decision to a metric of a relationship's success. In the current review, we assess how relationship science has approached dissolution research over roughly the past 20 years. We identified 207 studies (from 195 papers) published between 2002–2020 that captured relationship dissolution events and coded the papers for relevant features. The most common methodological approach to studying breakups was a self-report study (92%) in which relationships were tracked over time (72%) and breakups were treated as an outcome variable (79%). These results suggest that most research on dissolution has focused on predictors of it, rather than processes required to uncouple and circumstances surrounding the breakup itself. Coding revealed heterogeneous theoretical approaches, with the most common perspective across papers—social exchange/interdependence theory—informing only 15% of the papers coded. A majority (61%) of samples were representative of the nations, regions, or localities in which the studies were conducted. Yet, samples still tended to be disproportionately comprised of young, white individuals from Western countries. We conclude by discussing potential avenues for moving our understanding of relationship dissolution forward.     

Thinking about multiple identities boosts children’s flexible thinking

Studies of children's developing social identification often focus on individual forms of identity. Yet, everyone has multiple potential identities. Here we investigated whether making children aware of their multifaceted identities—effectively seeing themselves from multiple angles—would promote their flexible thinking. In Experiment 1, 6‐ to 7‐year‐old children (N = 48) were assigned to either a Multiple‐Identities condition where they were led to consider their multiple identities (e.g. friend, neighbor) or to a Physical‐Traits condition where they considered their multiple physical attributes (e.g. legs, arms). Children in the Multiple‐Identity condition subsequently expressed greater flexibility at problem‐solving and categorization than children in the Physical‐Traits condition. Experiment 2 (N = 72) replicated these findings with a new sample of 6‐ to 7‐year‐old children and demonstrated that a Multiple‐Identity mindset must be self‐relevant. Children who were led to think about another child's multiple identities did not express as much subsequent creative thinking as did children who thought about their own multiple identities. Experiment 3 (N = 76) showed that a Mmultiple‐Identity framework may be particularly effective when the identities are presented via generic language suggesting that they are enduring traits (in this case, identities depicted as noun phrases rather than verbal phrases). These findings illustrate that something as simple as thinking about one's identity from multiple angles could serve as a tool to help reduce rigid thinking, which might increase open‐mindedness in a society that is becoming increasingly diverse.     

Taking Access to the Community: An Ecological Systems Framework for In‐Home Counseling With Older Adults

Bronfenbrenner's (1977) ecological systems theory is a holistic framework placing an individual in a system's context to address their concerns. This article offers a case study demonstrating use of the theory with older adults and the in‐home setting. Implications for the counseling field and future research needs are discussed.     

A comparison of stimulus set size on tact training for children with autism spectrum disorder

Previous studies on skill acquisition have taught targets in stimulus sets composed of different numbers of stimuli. Although the rationale for selection of a stimulus set size is not clear, the number of target stimuli trained within a set is a treatment decision for which there is limited empirical support. The current investigation compared the efficiency of tact training in 4 stimulus set sizes, each of which included 12 stimuli grouped into (a) 4 sets of 3 stimuli, (b) 3 sets of 4 stimuli, (c) 2 sets of 6 stimuli, and (d) 1 set of 12 stimuli. Results of all 4 participants with autism spectrum disorder show tact training with larger (i.e., 6 and 12) stimulus set sizes was more efficient than training with smaller (i.e., 3 and 4) stimulus set sizes.     

Psychometric characteristics of role-play assessments of social skill in schizophrenia

There is an extensive literature documenting that people with schizophrenia have marked impairments in social role functioning and social skill. One of the most widely employed strategies for assessing social skill has been role-play tests: simulated social interactions that are videotaped for subsequent behavioral coding. There has been considerable discussion of the validity of the approach in the literature, but there has not been adequate consideration of other psychometric characteristics of role-play tests. This paper examines the psychometric characteristics of a representative role-play measure: the Maryland Assessment of Social Competence (MASC). Data from 5 large schizophrenia studies that included the MASC were examined: a study of victimization in women who abuse drugs, a study of health care among people with diabetes, a study of vocational outcomes, a study of social skill among drug abusers, and a clinical trial comparing two antipsychotic medications. Data were examined in terms of five questions: (1) Can role-play scenes be rated reliably? (2) How are role-play ratings distributed across populations? (3) How many and which behaviors should be rated? (4) How many role-play scenes are required? (5) Is role-play behavior temporally stable? Overall, the data suggest that the MASC, and by implication other similar role-play procedures, does have good psychometric properties. However, several things often taken for granted in the literature warrant careful consideration in the design of research using role-play. Implications of the results for design of research are discussed.     

Information quantity and quality affect the realistic accuracy of personality judgment

Triads of unacquainted college students interacted in 1 of 5 experimental conditions that manipulated information quantity (amount of information) and information quality (relevance of information to personality), and they then made judgments of each others' personalities. To determine accuracy, the authors compared the ratings of each judge to a broad-based accuracy criterion composed of personality ratings from 3 types of knowledgeable informants (the self, real-life acquaintances, and clinician-interviewers). Results supported the hypothesis that information quantity and quality would be positively related to objective knowledge about the targets and realistic accuracy. Interjudge consensus and self-other agreement followed a similar pattern. These findings are consistent with expectations based on models of the process of accurate judgment (D. C. Funder, 1995, 1999) and consensus (D. A. Kenny, 1994).     

What-where-when memory in pigeons

The authors report a novel approach to testing episodic-like memory for single events. Pigeons were trained in separate sessions to match the identity of a sample on a touch screen, to match its location, and to report on the length of the retention interval. When these 3 tasks were mixed randomly within sessions, birds were more than 80% correct on each task. However, performance on 2 different tests in succession after each sample was not consistent with an integrated memory for sample location, time, and identity. Experiment 2 tested binding of location and identity memories in 2 different ways. The results were again consistent with independent feature memories. Implications for tests of episodic-like memory are discussed.     

The psychology of telling murder stories: do we think in scripts,exemplars, or prototypes?

According to the story model of Pennington and Hastie, jurors collect information at trial and modify it with general knowledge to create case stories. Schank and Ableson argue that human memory is organized to tell and understand stories. However, Finkel and Groscup questioned the use of manipulated, experimenter-constructed narratives to demonstrate the existence of multiple prototypical crime stories. We interviewed 76 jury eligible, death qualified citizens and asked them to imagine a first-degree murder scenario, describing the events that led to the killing. We coded the presence of dichotomous variables in the resulting stories and identified at least three shared story prototypes using cluster and profile analysis. We conclude that people do not store crime stories as simple prototypes and comment on the implications of this finding for legal decision-making.     

Behavioral and electrophysiological evidence of species-specific face processing

Several recent reports suggest that the behavioral and cortical specificity of face processing may be influenced by experience. To test this hypothesis, behavioral and electrophysiological data were recorded from adults in response to human and monkey faces differing in familiarity and orientation. An analysis of event-related potential and behavioral data revealed differentiation across species, familiarity, and orientation. Behavioral measures were correlated with amplitude and latency measures for each factor of interest. These analyses revealed that accuracy was positively related to the amplitude of the vertex positive potential in the human face task but not in the monkey face task. These findings suggest that previous experience with different categories of faces modulates the link between behavioral and electrophysiological measures of face processing.