The role of the frequency of constituents in compound words: Evidence from Basque and Spanish

Recent data from compound word processing suggests that compounds are recognized via their constituent lexemes (Juhasz, Starr, Inhoff, & Placke, 2003). The present lexical decision experiment manipulated orthogonally the frequency of the constituents of compound words in two languages: Basque and Spanish. Basque and Spanish diverge widely in their morphological properties and in the number of existing compound words. Furthermore, the head lexeme (i.e., the most meaningful lexeme related to the whole-word meaning) in Spanish tends to be the second lexeme, whereas in Basque the percentage is more distributed. Results showed a facilitative effect of the frequency of the second lexeme, in both Basque and Spanish compounds. Thus, both Basque and Spanish readers decompose compounds into their constituents for lexical access, and this decomposition is carried out in a language-independent and blind-to-semantics manner. We examine the implications of these results for models of lexical access.     

A response rule for positive and negative stimulus interaction in associative learning and performance

The present article presents a response rule developed to account for both positive and negative stimulus interaction. In the response rule proposed here, positive interaction phenomena (e.g., second-order conditioning) and negative interaction phenomena (e.g., Pavlovian conditioned inhibition) are presumed to occur during performance and acquisition, respectively. Also, in this rule the novelty of the test stimulus determines the expression of positive interaction on responding. As the stimulus loses its novelty over training, positive interaction effects will wane, which will allow negative interaction effects to emerge in responding elicited by the stimulus. It is proposed that this response rule can be adopted by acquisition-focused associative models (e.g., Rescorla & Wagner, 1972) in order to account for contrary associative phenomena in the literature. The simulation program used in this study is available for download from the author’s website and from the Psychonomic Society website at www.psychonomic.org/archive.     

Taxometric analysis of the antisocial features scale of the personality assessment inventory in federal prison inmates

The Antisocial Features (ANT) scale of the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI) was subjected to taxometric analysis in a group of 2,135 federal prison inmates. Scores on the three ANT subscales-Antisocial Behaviors (ANT-A), Egocentricity (ANT-E), and Stimulus Seeking (ANT-S)-served as indicators in this study and were evaluated using the following taxometric procedures: mean above minus below a cut (MAMBAC), maximum eigenvalue (MAXEIG), and latent mode factor analysis (L-Mode). Objective and subjective evaluation of the results revealed consistent support for a dimensional interpretation of latent structure across the di ferent taxometric procedures as well as across gender, race, and security level. As a dimensional construct, antisocial personality disorder arranges respondents along one or more quantitative dimensions (degree of antisociality), rather than assigning them to qualitatively distinct categories (antisocial or not antisocial).     

The Obstacle is the Path: Overcoming Blocks to Homework Assignments in a Complex Presentation of Depression

There is increasing evidence to demonstrate that clients who complete homework assignments have a better outcome in cognitive therapy (Kazantzis, Deane, & Ronan, 2000). Most clinicians recognize that enabling clients to effectively utilize homework can be a major task in itself, particularly with disorders such as depression, where individuals find even the simplest daily tasks daunting. This article begins by highlighting the problem of changing any pattern of activity, and then explores the difficulties of engaging clients in homework when they present with persistent depression with secondary anxiety features.     

Drawing the net: internet identification, internet use, and the image of internet users.

Theory and research suggest that Internet identification may account for some of the gender divide in Internet use. Internet identification is a type of domain identification, and is inherently bound with images of those who use the Internet, a domain traditionally conceived as masculine. Combining the "draw an Internet user" test with an Internet identification scale, this study tests two hypotheses: participants drawing gender-concordant images will (i) identify with and (ii) use the Internet more than those drawing gender-discordant images. Participants were 371 students (121 males, 250 females) from three universities in the United Kingdom and Australia. The need to challenge masculinized images of the Internet is discussed.     

The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale: translation and validation in university students

The aim of this study was to translate into Spanish and to validate the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale (RSES), completed by 420 university students. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed that the model that best fit the data, both in the total sample and in the male and female subsamples, was the one-factor structure with method effects associated with positively worded items. The results indicated high, positive correlations between self-esteem and the five dimensions of self-concept. The scale showed satisfactory levels of internal consistency and temporal stability over a four-week period. Lastly, gender differences were obtained. These findings support the use of the RSES for the assessment of self-esteem in higher education.     

Emotional ambivalence in risk behaviors: the case of occasional excessive use of alcohol

The purpose of this paper is to study the differential and complementary role played by the theory of planned behavior (TPB) variables and by participants' emotions when recalling and describing previous experiences of such risk behavior in the prediction of the intention to repeat a risk behavior in the immediate future. We chose the behavior of occasional excessive drinking, a risk behavior characterized by evoking attitudinal ambivalence and eliciting mixed emotions, joy and sadness. The results show that emotional ambivalence is not equivalent to attitudinal ambivalence (whose indexes include that of the affective component), and that this emotional information is relevant for predicting the intention to repeat the risk behavior in the near future, enhancing the prediction of the TPB model.     

Conditions for young infants' failure to perceive trajectory continuity

When viewing an event in which an object moves behind an occluder on part of its trajectory, 4-month-old infants perceive the trajectory as continuous only when time or distance out of sight is short. Little is known, however, about the conditions under which young infants perceive trajectories to be discontinuous. In the present studies we focus first on infants' perception of trajectories that change during a period of occlusion. Four-month-olds perceive discontinuity in trajectories that change in height or orientation while behind an occluder, and this is true even when a change in direction could be due to an invisible bouncing collision with a surface. Further experiments reveal that infants do not perceive diagonal linear trajectories as continuous across an occlusion unless the occluding and revealing edges are orthogonal to the path of movement. Implications for theories of perceptual and cognitive development are discussed.     

False memory in a short-term memory task

The Deese/Roediger-McDermott (DRM; Roediger & McDermott, 1995) paradigm reliably elicits false memories for critical nonpresented words in recognition tasks. The present studies used a Sternberg (1966) task with DRM lists to determine whether false memories occur in short-term memory tasks and to assess the contribution of latency data in the measurement of false memories. Subjects studied three, five, or seven items from DRM lists and responded to a single probe (studied or nonstudied). In both experiments, critical lures were falsely recognized more often than nonpresented weak associates. Latency data indicated that correct rejections of critical lures were slower than correct rejections of weakly related items at all set sizes. False alarms to critical lures were slower than hits to list items. Latency data can distinguish veridical and false memories in a short-term memory task. Results are discussed in terms of activation-monitoring models of false memory.     

Initial Development and Validation of the Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale–Adolescent Version

The factor structure of a new self-report scale, the Multidimensional Students’ Life Satisfaction Scale–Adolescent version, was examined. Reliability and 2-week stability estimates of the domain scores and total score were calculated. Relationships of the domain and total scores with other well-being measures were examined as well as the impact of social desirability responding. Although additional development is necessary, results provided preliminary psychometric support for the MSLSS–A for research purposes.The usefulness of life satisfaction measures vis-à-vis the positive psychology movement (Seligman and Csikzentmihalyi, American Psychologist, 55(1): 5-14, 2000) is highlighted.