Visual transformation of size.

To investigate human visual identification of different-sized objects as identically shaped, matching reaction times were measured for pairs of simultaneously presented random figures. In three experiments, reaction time for correct reactions to test pairs of figures of the same shape and orientation consistently increased approximately linearly as a function of the linear size ratio of the figures. In the second experiment, where this ratio was defined for control pairs as well as for test pairs, reaction time for correct reactions to control pairs showed a similar increase as a function of size ratio. The results suggest that the task was performed by a gradual process of mental size transformation of one of the members of each pair of figures to the format of the other one.     

Wings in the intershaft space contribute to the Mueller-Lyer illusion

The interference of the wings of the wings-in part of the Mueller-Lyer figure was examined for the version of the illusion in which one part of the figure is placed above the other. Wings were removed in pairs from either above or below the shaft of one of the two parts of the figure. Subjects indicated the apparent difference between the lengths of the shafts of the two parts of the figure. Removal of the wings between the shafts of the wings-in part of the figure reduced the amount of the illusion more than removal of the wings from outside the shafts. Removing wings from the wings-out part of the figure reduced the amount of illusion, but it made no difference whether the wing removal occurred between or outside the shafts.     

Attitudes toward sex-roles: Traditional or egalitarian?

This article reports on the development of a Likert-type scale measuring attitudes toward egalitarian-traditional sex roles. A total of 484 undergraduates participated in six phases of the study. An item analysis study yielded 20 items with part-whole correlations <.48. The corrected split-half reliability coefficient is .91 (p.001). Five other phases of research show promising concurrent and construct validity. In particular, traditional attitudes are related to rigidity as measured by authoritarian, religious, same-sex touching, rape acceptance, divorce, and conservative attitudes. Overall, a varimax rotated factor analysis revealed one major factor accounting for 84.6% of the variance. Further, females were shown to have higher levels of egalitarian attitudes as compared to males.     

Paper and plastic in daily diary research: Comment on Green, Rafaeli, Bolger, Shrout, and Reis (2006)

The authors applaud A. S. Green, E. Rafaeli, N. Bolger, P. E. Shrout, and H. T. Reis's (2006) response to one-sided comparisons of paper versus electronic (plastic) diary methods and hope that it will stimulate more balanced considerations of the issues involved. The authors begin by highlighting areas of agreement and disagreement with Green et al. The authors review briefly the broader literature that has compared paper and plastic diaries, noting how recent comparisons have relied on study designs and methods that favor investigators' allegiances. The authors note some sorely needed data for the evaluation of the implications of paper versus plastic for the internal and external validity of research. To facilitate evaluation of the existing literature and assist in the design of future studies, the authors offer a balanced comparison of paper and electronic diary methods across a range of applications. Finally, the authors propose 2 study designs that offer fair comparisons of paper and plastic diary methods.     

Therapists' emotional reactions to patients as a mediator in cognitive behavioural treatment of panic disorder with agoraphobia

The aims of this study were to examine whether therapists' emotional reactions to their patients mediate the effect of personality disorders and interpersonal problem behaviours on the outcome of treatment, focusing on an Axis I disorder; and whether therapists' reactions mediate the effect of personality disorders on the course of interpersonal problems. Therapists completed a checklist of emotional reactions to individual patients after the end of residential cognitive or guided mastery therapy for 46 inpatients with panic disorder with agoraphobia. The severity of DSM-III-R personality disorder was related to therapists' insecurity feelings, but not to interest and anger. A higher level of therapists' insecurity feelings was related to less reduction in self-reported agoraphobic avoidance during treatment, whereas therapists' emotions were unrelated to symptomatic course after treatment. Therapists' insecurity feelings appeared partly to mediate the relationship between patients' severity of personality disorder and persistence of patients' interpersonal dominance and nurturance problems.     

A template-matching pandemonium recognizes unconstrained handwritten characters with high accuracy

Psychological data suggest that internal representations such as mental images can be used as templates in visual pattern recognition. But computational studies suggest that traditional template matching is insufficient for high-accuracy recognition of real-life patterns such as handwritten characters. Here we explore a model for visual pattern recognition that combines a template-matching and a feature-analysis approach: Character classification is based on weighted evidence from a number of analyzers (demons), each of which computes the degree of match between the input character and a stored template (a copy of a previously presented character). The template-matching pandemonium was trained to recognize totally unconstrained handwritten digits. With a mean of 37 templates per type of digit, the system has attained a recognition rate of 95.3%, which falls short of human performance by only 2%–3%.