Psychosocial predictors of stress associated with the male midlife transition

This study was designed to examine the correlates of developmental psychological stress for 36 middle-aged professional men. Based on sex role convergence and role adjustment theories, two sets of predictor variables were hierarchically entered into a multiple regression equation with a third set of variables entered to control for individual stressors. Controlling for individual stressors, midlife stress outcome was found to be influenced only by role adjustment (R²=.3593). The sex role convergence cluster did not account for a significant increase in variance. Controlling for individual stressors, the best univariate predictors of stress outcome associated with the midlife transition were (a) the quality of the parent-adolescent relationship and (b) marital satisfaction.     

NUMBER AND QUALITY OF ROLES

We used longitudinal personality data to test whether number and quality of roles were associated with health and self-enhancement in 100 privileged midlife women. Number of roles (from the set of partner, parent, and worker) was not related to autonomy, individuality, and complexity, as had been hypothesized, but to respect for norms, being well-organized considering oneselt like other people. Through women with one role were lower in well-being than women with more than one, hierarchical multiple regression showed no advantage to number of roles after psychological health at age 21 was taken in to account. However, quality of role, as assessed by marital satisfaction and status level in work, was associated with contentment and effective functioning, respectively, even after antecedent psychological functioning was taken into account. Particular roles were associated with particular advantages. The enhancement model of the accumulation of roles is compared with Erikson's theory of the development of personality.     

THE CASE FOR THE PHILOSOPHY OF CHEMISTRY

The philosophy of chemistry has been sadly neglected by most contempory literature in the philosophy of science. This paper argues that this neglect has been unfortunate and that there is much to be learned from paying greater philosophical attention to the set of issues defined by the philosophy of chemistry. The potential contribution of this field to such current topics as reduction, laws, explanation, and supervenience is explored, as are possible applications of insights gained by such study to the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of social science.     

Text Comprehension Training for Disabled Readers: An Evaluation of Reciprocal Teaching and Text Analysis Training Programs

Forty-six reading disabled adolescents were randomly assigned to one of three 25-hr instructional programs. Two programs provided training in expository text comprehension, and a third offered training in academic problem solving and organizational and study skills (an alternative treatment control). One reading comprehension program was designed to remediate a deficient knowledge base, forcing disabled readers to elaborate and further process new text knowledge, focusing on both specific informational content in a text and knowledge of text structure per se. The second program was patterned after the Palincsar and Brown (1984) reciprocal teaching techniques and focused on training four text comprehension strategies used by skilled comprehenders. Both the “knowledge-base” and the “strategy” training approaches were associated with significant improvement in disabled readers' comprehension skills, although training effects did not generalize across all aspects of reading comprehension performance. Strategy-trained readers applied the trained strategies with equal success on instructed and uninstructed text materials, providing strong evidence of transfer of learning. Knowledge-base readers also demonstrated successful transfer of specifically trained procedures (semantic mapping, text analysis) to unfamiliar text. In both programs, the best outcomes were obtained when specific strategies and operations were targeted for training.     

Personality correlates of retrieval processes in intentional and unintentional forgetting

Early accounts of intentional forgetting relied exclusively on mechanisms that operate at encoding. The results of more recent experiments indicate that memory-retrieval inhibition also is involved, thus linking waking intentional forgetting with hypnotic amnesia. The present Experiment 1 was designed to provide further support for the retrieval-inhibition hypothesis by testing four alternative explanations for some of the recent results. Experiment 2 examined the role of word affect in both intentional forgetting and unintentional forgetting to evaluate theoretical interpretations of the retrieval mechanisms thought to be involved. Unintentional forgetting of negative words was consistent with a repression-like interpretation, whereas intentional forgetting of negative words appeared to be limited by sensitization. Personality correlates of the recall results were identified and were found to be in support of these interpretations.     

Brilliant but cruel: Perceptions of negative evaluators

Using edited excerpts from actual negative and positive book reviews, this research examined the hypothesis that negative evaluators of intellectual products will be perceived as more intelligent than positive evaluators. The results strongly supported the hypothesis. Negative reviewers were perceived as more intelligent, competent, and expert than positive reviewers, even when the content of the positive review was independently judged as being of higher quality and greater forcefulness. At the same time, in accord with previous research, negative reviewers were perceived as significantly less likable than positive reviewers. The results on intelligence ratings are seen as bolstering the self-presentational explanation of the tendency shown by intellectually insecure individuals to be negatively critical. The present methodology is contrasted to that of previous research which obtained apparently contradictory results.     

Gait patterns during free choice ladder ascents

Twenty two male subjects each performed five climbing trials of a portable straight ladder. Each subject was instructed to ascend the ladder at a “comfortable” pace using only the rungs for support. For the first, third and fifth trials, the temporal and movement characteristics of the performances were recorded using capacitive touch sensors mounted on each of the rungs and high-speed cinematographical techniques. The results revealed little evidence to suggest a preferred climbing gait. The two most commonly utilized methods of ascent for all trials were the lateral and four-beat lateral gaits. Only 31.8% of the subjects adopted the same gait pattern during each of the three trials. The temporal characteristics of each gait pattern showed a relatively longer time for each segment contact phase than for the corresponding airborne phase. The shortest average period was found for the four-beat diagonal gait followed, in order, by the lateral, diagonal and four beat lateral gaits. Variability measures assumed the same ranking in reverse order with the four-beat diagonal gait producing the most variable period times.     

The effects of a microcounselling programme with social work students: A preliminary look at cognitive issues

Microcounselling has featured widely as a systematic approach to improving the interviewing and counselling skills of a range of professional groups (Dickson, 1981). Reviews of research largely attest to its effectiveness in this regard (Baker & Daniels, 1989). The outcome criteria upon which such conclusions have been based have, however, been essentially behavioral and proximal. In an earlier study (Dickson & Mullan, 1990), only limited evidence for the generalisability of outcomes was forthcoming. This paper extends that work by presenting a preliminary investigation of the impact of microcounselling on some of the cognitive processes which are thought to mediate skilled performance. As part of a more extensive evaluation (Dickson & Mullan, 1990), a pre-experimental single group pretest-posttest design was used to assess the extent to which measures of locus of control (Rotter, 1966), evinced by a group of social work students, would change following a microcounselling intervention. Despite predictions of a move towards greater internality of control, no significant pre-post training differences emerged. This result is discussed within the context of the limitations of the design and, in keeping with the preliminary nature of the study, a number of areas for further investigation are indicated.     

A negativity bias in interpersonal evaluation

Two studies were conducted to demonstrate a bias toward negativity in evaluations of persons or their work in particular social circumstances. In Study 1, subjects evaluated materials written by peers. Those working under conditions that placed them in low status relative to the audience for their evaluations, or conditions that made their intellectual position within a group insecure, showed a clear bias toward negativity in those evaluations. Only individuals who believed their audience to be of relatively low status and at the same time believed their intellectual position to be secure did not show this bias. In Study 2, subjects viewed a videotape of a stimulus person and rated him on several intellectual and social dimensions. Again, subjects believed their audience to be of either relatively high or relatively low status. As a cross dimension, they were given instructions to focus on either the intellectual or the social abilities of the stimulus person while viewing the videotape. A strong main effect of audience status was demonstrated, but only in ratings of intellectual traits; subjects who believed their audience to be of relatively high status rated the stimulus person's intellectual qualities significantly more negatively. Moreover, this effect was independent of the instructional focus subjects had been given. The negativity bias is discussed in the context of previous demonstrations of biases toward weighting negative information more heavily than positive information, as well as previous demonstrations of seemingly pervasive positivity biases in memory and judgment.