Self-esteem, authoritarianism, and democratic values in the face of threat

This study investigated the associations among terrorist threat, right-wing authoritarianism, self-esteem, and their relations in support for democratic values. Students (n = 140) completed Altemeyer's Right-Wing Authoritarianism Scale, Rosenberg's Self-esteem Scale, and the Democratic Values Scale. The participants also read an editorial regarding the events of 9/11/01 and completed two mortality-salience questions to induce a sense of threat. Results showed that self-esteem was a significant contributor to the prediction of scores on the Democratic Values Scale. Furthermore, the interaction between self-esteem and right-wing authoritarianism explained significant variance in the Democratic Values Scale scores. The results are interpreted in light of theories addressing authoritarianism and self-esteem.     

Naive beliefs in baseball: systematic distortion in perceived time of apex for fly balls

When fielders catch fly balls they use geometric properties to optically maintain control over the ball. The strategy provides ongoing guidance without indicating precise positional information concerning where the ball is located in space. Here, the authors show that observers have striking misconceptions about what the motion of projectiles should look like from various perspectives and that they estimate when the physical apex of a fly ball occurs to be far later than actual, irrespective of baseball experience. Their estimations are consistent with the highest point they are looking at as the ball approaches, not with the physical apex. These findings introduce a new and robust effect in intuitive perception in which people confuse their perceptual perspective with the physical situation that they mentally represent.     

Forgotten partners of international assignments: development and test of a model of spouse adjustment

The authors developed and tested a model of spouse adjustment to international assignments in a sequence of qualitative and quantitative investigations. From in-depth interviews with expatriate spouses, half of whom had either positive or negative experiences living abroad, the authors identified several potentially important sources of adjustment. These constructs were integrated with others from identity theory and earlier research on expatriates to develop a conceptual model of spouse adjustment. The model was tested by collecting multisource questionnaire data from 221 international assignee couples working in 37 countries. Correlation and regression analyses revealed several important relationships between individual, interpersonal relationship, and environmental sources of identity, and the adjustment of expatriate spouses.     

Reactive Adjustment or Proactive Embedding? Multistudy,Multiwave Evidence for Dual Pathways to Expatriate Retention

The dominant perspective on expatriation characterizes the process as a continuing adaptation to existing job demands on an international assignment. Another, less studied perspective, emphasizes that expatriates can initiate tactics to acquire task, interpersonal, and affective resources for shaping their assignment experiences. Adopting a positive organizational scholarship lens and drawing on the job demands–resources model, we simultaneously examine both of these reactive demand‐based and proactive resource‐based pathways to expatriate retention. We propose that cross‐cultural uncertainty demands and expatriate‐initiated resource acquisition tactics both influence adjustment and embeddedness. Thus embeddedness works alongside adjustment to drive expatriates’ plans to remain in the international position, which in turn leads to actual retention. Using evidence from 2 separate panel studies (one with 2 waves and the other with 4 waves of data), we demonstrate the importance of the resource‐based pathway for expatriate assignments.     

Pediatric Psychologists’ Collaboration in a National Pediatric Obesity Initiative: A Case Study in Interprofessional Collaboration

Health Care reform calls for collaborative team-based care; psychologists must therefore strengthen their competencies for work in interprofessional clinical care settings. Toward that end, a group of psychologists participated with physicians, dieticians, physical activity specialists, nurses, and others in a national interprofessional workgroup focused on pediatric obesity. The interprofessional group was designed to identify areas in need of national advocacy, key assessment and treatment concerns, and gaps in internal policies and procedures in children’s hospitals. This article provides a case report of psychologists’ roles and experience in this workgroup, and focuses on factors that underlie successful collaboration among diverse health professionals, as well as potential barriers to success. The participating psychologists developed a working model for collaboration with other disciplines. Additionally, they formed a Psychology Subcommittee to identify and address discipline-specific issues regarding collaborative practice in pediatric psychology. Lessons learned in this interprofessional collaborative undertaking have relevance for future collaborative endeavors.     

Explaining Evidence Denial as Motivated Pragmatically Rational Epistemic Irrationality

This paper introduces a model for evidence denial that explains this behavior as a manifestation of rationality, and it is based on the contention that social values (measurable as utilities) often underwrite these sorts of responses. Moreover, it contends that the value associated with group membership in particular can override epistemic reason when the expected utility of a belief or belief system is great. It is also true, however, that it appears to be the case that it is still possible for such unreasonable believers to reverse this sort of dogmatism and to change their beliefs in a way that is epistemically rational. The conjecture made here is that we should expect this to happen only when the expected utility of the beliefs in question dips below a threshold where the utility value of continued dogmatism and the associated group membership is no longer sufficient to motivate defusing the counterevidence that tells against such epistemically irrational beliefs.     

Book reviews

Ellis, A. W. (Ed.). Progress in the psychology of language, Vols 1 and 2. London: Erlbaum Associates. 1985. Pp. vii+247 (Vol.1), v+274 (Vol.2). ISBN 0-86377-027-4 (Vol.1), 0-86377-028-2(Vol.2). £19.65. each.

Eysenck, M.W. A hondbook of cognitive psychology. London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. 1984. Pp. 417. ISBN 0-86377-016-9. Hardback £26.95; paperback £8.95.

Roy, E. A. (Ed.). Neuropsychological studies of apraxia and related disorders. Amstrdam: North olland. 185 Pp. 414. ISN 0-444-87669-3. $60.00.

Fischer, K. W. and Lazerson, A. Human development frm conception through adolescence. New York: W. H. Freman. 1984. Pp. 747. ISBN 9-7167-1575-9. £24.95.

Sloboda, J. A. The musical mind. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985. Pp. vii+291. ISBN 0-19-852114-6 (hardback) £20; ISBN 0-19-852128-6 (paperback) £9.65.

Howell, P., Cross, I. and West, R. Musical structure and cognition. London: Academic Press. Pp. xiv+ 338. ISBN 0-12-357170-7. £44.     

Book reviews

Gleitman, H. Psychology. New York: Norton, 1981. Pp. xxii + 840. £11.50. ISBN 0 393 95102 2.

Darley, J., Glucksberg, D., Kamin, L. And Kinchla, R., Psychology. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1981. Pp. xvi+65z. £ 413.95. ISBN o 13 733154 I.

Valenstein, E. S. (Ed.).The Psychosurgery Debate : Scientific, Legal, and Ethical Perspectives. Freeman: San Francisco. 1980. Pp. 594. £14.80 (hbk); £7.60 (pbk). ISBN 0 7167 1156 7.

Gregory, R. L. Mind in Science. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. 1981. £18.50. Pp. XIV+641. ISBN o 297 77825 0.

Oborne, D. J., Gruneberg, M. M. And Eiser, J. R. Research in Psychology and Medicine. Volume I Physical Aspects-Pain, Stress, Diagnosis and Organic Damage; Volume II Social Aspects-Attitudes, Communication, Care and Training. London : Academic Press. I979. Pp. 486 and 488. ISBN 0 12 523701 4 and ISBN 0 12 523702 02. £10.80 each.

Sarason, I. G. and Spielberger, C. D. Stress and Anxiety. Volume 7. Washington: Hemisphere Publishing Corporation. 1980. Pp. 308. $25.50. ISBN 0 89116 183 X.

Levitt, E. E.The Psychology of Anxiety, Second Edition. Hillsdale, New Jersey, Erlbaum Associates. 1980. Pp. 188. ISBN 0 89859 040 X.

McGuigan, F. J., Sime, W. E. and Wallace, J. M. (Eds). Stress and Tension Control. New York: Plenum. 1980. Pp. 320. $29.50. ISBN 0 306 40450 8.