Semantic differential studies of children's language development: Some methodological problems

A semantic differential study of development of antonym meanings revealed methodological problems (e.g., concept-scale interaction and developmental changes in scale-checking style) not fully considered in previous semantic differential investigations of child language development. Twenty adjectives were rated on 10 scales by subjects from grades K to 5 (approximately 6 through 11 years old) and adults. Analyses by means, polarity ratings, and average sums of squared differences failed to yield consistent developmental trends. Subjects' choices of scale ratings did show clear age-related differences: Grades K and 1 chose extreme ratings almost exclusively; grades 2 through 4 showed an increase in neutral choices and decreases in extreme ratings; grades 4 and 5 and adults chose extreme ratings least often, neutral choices most often, and more intermediate ratings than any younger subjects. Results show that scale choice is a crucial factor in designing semantic differential studies with children, there is a low correlation between mean scores and ratings given by individual children, and shifts in scale-checking style should be considered when interpreting apparent developmental changes in children's semantic differential ratings.     

Teacher Gender and Nonverbal Behavior in the Teaching of Gender-Stereotyped Materials1

Twenty teachers each taught a male and a female student two different lessons. One of these lessons was in a stereotypically masculine domain (mechanics), the other in a stereotypically feminine domain (vocabulary). Judges viewed clips from the videotaped lessons and rated teachers' nonverbal behaviors. The students also rated their teachers on a variety of behavioral dimensions. The results showed that teachers exhibited more positive behavior toward the students for whose gender the material being taught was stereotypically appropriate. Similarly, teachers exhibited more negative behavior toward those students for whose gender the material being taught was considered stereotypically inappropriate. Additionally, teacher gender was shown to interact with the above-mentioned biased teaching behavior. Generally speaking, women teachers behaved in a less gender-biased way than did men teachers. It is suggested that these kinds of differential teaching behaviors may contribute to the differential performance of male and female students in traditionally gender-stereotyped academic domains.     

Teaching cotherapy: Instructional and supervisory processes

A course on cotherapy for mental health practitioners is described. The authors strongly recommend that clinicians from all disciplines be taught and trained to do cotherapy, since it is a highly effective therapeutic modality in treating individuals, families and groups.     

A new typology of health behaviours for personality-health predictions: The case of locus of control

Psychological investigations of the impact of personality on health behaviours have tended to emphasize fine distinctions among personality variables while failing to distinguish among different kinds of behaviours. For example, theoretical treatments of perceived personal control are quite sophisticated; in contrast, only one well-known analysis of health behaviours exists. We propose four categories of health-enhancing behaviours, which take into account contemporary views of the shift in health care from acute and physician-directed actions to long-term and patient-directed efforts. In addition, we suggest that perceived control (we emphasize locus of control because of its generality and parsimony) is an important predictor variable when combined with other factors common to current models of health behaviour.     

Conditioned approach and withdrawal behavior in pigeons: Effects of a novel extraneous stimulus during acquisition and extinction

Three experiments examined the effects of complete removal of reinforcement and of the introduction of a novel stimulus on conditioned approach and withdrawal behavior exhibited by pigeons in an autoshaping paradigm. Experiment 1 indicated that complete omission of food from the experimental situation resulted in the gradual disappearance of both approach and withdrawal behavior in subjects that had received either explicitly paired or explicitly unpaired conditioning. Subsequent presentation of a novel visual stimulus reinstated both approach and withdrawal. Experiment 2 replicated these findings in a within-subjects, discriminative paradigm. In Experiment 3, presenting the novel visual stimulus during acquisition when approach and withdrawal behaviors were asymptotic did not produce significant disruption of performance. These data suggest that removal of reinforcement leads to the disappearance of withdrawal as well as approach performance, and that subsequent presentation of a novel stimulys reinstates whatever behavior was dominant prior to extinction—a finding that seems analogous to results of experiments concerning proactive interference.     

Psychometric and instructional validation approaches in the hierarchical sequencing of learning tasks

Two strategies used to test prerequisite relationships among intellectual skills were employed to examine the sequence of three types of subtraction tasks. A psychometric validation strategy yielded results similar to an instructional validation strategy. This finding provides support for the use of the more efficient psychometric approach for validating large numbers of learning hierarchies in relatively short periods of time.