Academic Cheating in Mathematics Classes: A Motivational Perspective

We investigated the frequency of secondary school students’ self-reported cheating in mathematics and relationships between cheating and motivational beliefs, as well as neutralizing attitudes. Two types of cheating were examined: active cheating, which is aimed to increase a person’s own success, and second-party cheating, aimed to help other students achieve success. Students use second-party cheating very often and more than active cheating. Motivational beliefs are significantly related to active cheating but uncorrelated with second-party cheating. Thus, although active and second-party cheating are both classified as dishonest acts, they do not have the same motivational mechanisms in their background.     

Parenting Assessed by Observation versus Parent-report: Moderation by Parent Distress and Family Socioeconomic Status

Assessment of parenting frequently relies on parent self-report despite well-documented discrepancies between this methodology and observational measures. In the current study, we investigated patterns of disagreement between self-reported and observational measures of positive parenting and negative parenting with 102 dyads of parents and 4–6 year-old children. Specifically, we tested whether differences in parent distress and family socioeconomic status (SES) moderated the association between self-reported and observed parenting. Results showed significant interactions with less agreement between self-report and observational measures among parents reporting higher levels of distress and among families from lower SES backgrounds. Effects were more pronounced in models of negative parenting than those of positive parenting. Findings suggest that two factors relevant to parenting quality, emotional distress and SES, predict meaningful differences in manner of parent-report relative to observational measures. We discuss implications for the extant literature and for future efforts regarding effective and efficient parenting measurement.     

When Reminiscence is Harmful: The Relationship Between Self-Negative Reminiscence Functions,Need Satisfaction,and Depressive Symptoms Among Elderly People from Cameroon,the Czech Republic,and Germany

Reminiscence has various functions, not all of which are beneficial for well-being. In particular, self-negative reminiscence functions—boredom reduction, bitterness revival, and intimacy maintenance—have been shown to be associated with reduced well-being. The present paper examines the link between self-negative reminiscence functions and depression in three cultural contexts. We hypothesize that both variables are indirectly linked via satisfaction of basic psychological needs: Self-negative reminiscing is associated with an impairment of need satisfaction which in turn relates to enhanced depressive symptoms. This hypothesis is tested in elderlies from Cameroon, the Czech Republic, and Germany. A total of 637 elderly participants reported on self-negative reminiscing, need satisfaction, and depressive symptoms. Analyses indicate that for boredom reduction and bitterness revival an indirect effect on depression via decreased need satisfaction can be established in all cultural contexts. For intimacy maintenance, a different picture emerges in that in the Czech and the German sample, there was a direct effect on depression but not an indirect one via need satisfaction. Yet, among Cameroonian participants an indirect effect was found, demonstrating that intimacy maintenance was related to decreased depression via enhanced need satisfaction. These results suggest that reminiscence functions may have partly universal, partly culture-specific effects on well-being.     

Impact of an interactive anti-speeding threat appeal: how much threat is too much?

This study investigates the impact of an interactive television public-service announcement (PSA) containing an anti-speeding threat appeal on feelings of telepresence and behavioral intention. In a 2?×?2?×?2 between-subjects factorial design with 213 participants, the level of threat evoked by a traditional PSA, by the interactive part of the PSA (dedicated advertising location or DAL) and by the preceding program context are manipulated to be either low or high. The results support the assumptions of the Extended Parallel Processing Model with regard to the effect of the level of perceived threat and perceived efficacy in an interactive media environment, and the important role of telepresence as a processing variable. The results of the three-way interaction effect of threat evoked by the program, the PSA and the DAL on telepresence show that when the threat levels of the program and the PSA are both either low or high, exposure to the threatening information in the DAL does not generate a significantly higher feeling of telepresence. However, when a low-threat program is followed by a high-threat PSA, the threat level of the DAL has a positive effect on telepresence. The same trend is found with a high-threat program and a low-threat PSA, although the effect of the threat evoked by the DAL on telepresence is not significant at conventional levels. Finally, there is a positive effect of telepresence on the behavioral intention to reduce speeding, which is partly mediated by the viewer's perceived efficacy to follow the recommended behavior.     

Blinded by the accent! The minor role of looks in ethnic categorization

The categories that social targets belong to are often activated automatically. Most studies investigating social categorization have used visual stimuli or verbal labels, whereas ethnolinguistic identity theory posits that language is an essential dimension of ethnic identity. Language should therefore be used for social categorization. In 2 experiments, using the "Who Said What?" paradigm, the authors investigated social categorization by using accents (auditory stimuli) and looks (visual stimuli) to indicate ethnicity, either separately or in combination. Given either looks or accents only, the authors demonstrated that ethnic categorization can be based on accents, and the authors found a similar degree of ethnic categorization by accents and looks. When ethnic cues of looks and accents were combined by creating cross categories, there was a clear predominance of accents as meaningful cues for categorization, as shown in the respective parameters of a multinomial model. The present findings are discussed with regard to the generalizability of findings using one channel of presentation (e.g., visual) and the asymmetry found with different presentation channels for the category ethnicity.     

Affirmation, acknowledgment of in-group responsibility, group-based guilt, and support for reparative measures

Three studies, 2 conducted in Israel and 1 conducted in Bosnia and Herzegovina, demonstrated that affirming a positive aspect of the self can increase one's willingness to acknowledge in-group responsibility for wrongdoing against others, express feelings of group-based guilt, and consequently provide greater support for reparation policies. By contrast, affirming one's group, although similarly boosting feelings of pride, failed to increase willingness to acknowledge and redress in-group wrongdoing. Studies 2 and 3 demonstrated the mediating role of group-based guilt. That is, increased acknowledgment of in-group responsibility for out-group victimization produced increased feelings of guilt, which in turn increased support for reparation policies to the victimized group. Theoretical and applied implications are discussed.     

An amorphous model for morphological processing in visual comprehension based on naive discriminative learning

A 2-layer symbolic network model based on the equilibrium equations of the Rescorla-Wagner model (Danks, 2003) is proposed. The study first presents 2 experiments in Serbian, which reveal for sentential reading the inflectional paradigmatic effects previously observed by Milin, Filipovi? ?ur?evi?, and Moscoso del Prado Martín (2009) for unprimed lexical decision. The empirical results are successfully modeled without having to assume separate representations for inflections or data structures such as inflectional paradigms. In the next step, the same naive discriminative learning approach is pitted against a wide range of effects documented in the morphological processing literature. Frequency effects for complex words as well as for phrases (Arnon & Snider, 2010) emerge in the model without the presence of whole-word or whole-phrase representations. Family size effects (Moscoso del Prado Martín, Bertram, H?iki?, Schreuder, & Baayen, 2004; Schreuder & Baayen, 1997) emerge in the simulations across simple words, derived words, and compounds, without derived words or compounds being represented as such. It is shown that for pseudo-derived words no special morpho-orthographic segmentation mechanism, as posited by Rastle, Davis, and New (2004), is required. The model also replicates the finding of Plag and Baayen (2009) that, on average, words with more productive affixes elicit longer response latencies; at the same time, it predicts that productive affixes afford faster response latencies for new words. English phrasal paradigmatic effects modulating isolated word reading are reported and modeled, showing that the paradigmatic effects characterizing Serbian case inflection have crosslinguistic scope.     

Therapist Use-of-Self Orientations Questionnaire: A Reliability and Validity Study

This article describes the development of the Therapist Use-of-Self Orientation Questionnaire (TUSO-Q), an instrument designed to measure therapists’ use-of-self orientations while working with clients. A total of 373 therapists participated in this study. Exploratory factor analysis in the structural equation modeling context revealed three different therapist use-of-self orientations: Transpersonal, Contextual, and Instrumental. The final model provided an excellent fit to the data. TUSO-Q scores exhibited satisfactory evidence of internal consistency reliability and construct validity. Implications for the scale’s use in clinical research and training are discussed.     

Changes in alcohol intake in response to transdiagnostic cognitive behaviour therapy for eating disorders

Objective

The aim of this study was to examine how alcohol intake changes during and after transdiagnostic cognitive behaviour therapy for eating disorders (CBT-E). Additionally, the paper considers the relationship between alcohol consumption, eating disorder diagnosis and current major depressive episode at the time of first assessment.

Method

One hundred and forty nine outpatients with an eating disorder (body mass index over 17.5) were divided into high or low alcohol intake groups (HIG and LIG) according to their intake at pre-treatment assessment. Their alcohol intake and eating disorder psychopathology were examined over the course of treatment and follow-up.

Results

There was no difference between the groups on response of the eating disorder to treatment. The HIG significantly reduced their alcohol intake following treatment whilst the intake of the LIG remained stable over the course of treatment and follow-up. There were no group differences in major depression and overall severity of eating disorder at baseline.

Conclusions

The response to CBT-E was not influenced by baseline level of alcohol use. The mean alcohol intake of the heavy drinking subjects decreased without being specifically addressed by the treatment.     

Philosophy between science and the humanities

Philosophy should avoid isolation, and should return to being curious and enthusiastic about explanation: about why- and how possibly-questions. The analytic and continental philosophical cultures should establish a dialogue, where each side brings out the distinctive qualities of its work while widening the scope of its concerns.