Power and speed components of individual differences in letter matching

Several previous studies have reported a correlation (typically around −.30) between standardized verbal ability test scores and name identity minus physical identity reaction times (NI-PI) in a letter-matching task. This correlation has usually been thought to reflect the mutual dependence of both measures on long-term memory access time. The present research was designed to assess Carroll's (1981) suggestions that: (a) NI — PI may not be the optimal formula for predicting standardized test scores from letter matching data, and (b) NI — PI may actually be related to the speed rather than the power component of standardized tests. Fifty-one subjects previously tested with a standardized reading test participated in letter-matching and word-reading tasks. The latter tasks required subjects to read words and specially constructed pseudowords. Power and speed measures were derived from the word-reading tasks and the standardized test on theoretical grounds (and supported by a principal components analysis). The results supported both of Carroll's contentions. NI — PI reaction time was related more to speed than power and the NI — PI statistic (as usually used) was not the optimum formula for predicting standardized test scores.     

Doctoral dissertations in pastoral psychology June, 1961 to June, 1962

Pastoral Psychology -     

Reproductive Freedom, Educational Equality, And Females' Preference for Resource-Acquisition Characteristics in Mates

Females' preference for resource-acquisition characteristics in mates has been explained as an evolved psychological mechanism that conveyed reproductive advantage to human ancestors. To explore the hypothesis that females express this preference more strongly when their educational opportunities and reproductive freedom are limited, we reanalyzed mate-preference data collected from 37 cultures by Buss et al. (1990). The results demonstrate that females (but not males) strongly prefer resource-acquisition characteristics in mates when they live in cultures low in both female reproductive freedom and educational equality between the sexes. Discussion focuses on how evolutionary, interactionist, and social-role theories might explain these results.     

Physical Attractiveness Contrast Effect and the Moderating Influence of Self-Consciousness

Separate studies provided evidence of amoderating effect of public selfconsciousness (trait)and public self-awareness (state) on the physicalattractiveness contrast effect involving socialcomparison between the self and others. Generally, whenexposed to photographs of attractive women withidealized physiques, women's self-perceptions of theirown physical attractiveness, social physique anxiety, and social self-esteem were each negativelyaffected. However, these negative contrast effects weremost apparent among women with high publicself-consciousness (trait assessment, Study 1) or highpublic self-awareness (state inducement, Study 2).Implications of these findings are considered.     

Forms of Competitive Attitude and Achievement Orientation in Relation to Disordered Eating

The primary focus in this study was anexamination of the differential contributions of twodifferent forms of competitive attitude to disorderedeating in a nonclinical sample of Caucasian universitywomen. The results showed that it is not competitionper se that is a primary contributor to eatingdisorders, but rather a particular form of competitiveattitude. Specifically, hypercompetitiveness was related strongly to eating disorder symptoms, butpersonal development competitiveness was unrelated. Asecond purpose considered the relationship ofcontext-specific measures of achievement to eatingdisorder symptoms. Disordered eating was associatedpositively with the need to achieve in appearance, butnot to a need to achieve in academics and career.Discussion centered on the potential usefulness of these findings in the treatment of women who areeating disordered. It also argued for changes in asocialization process which often leads to thedevelopment of hypercompetitive attitudes and anovervaluing of beauty in American women.     

Morpholexical access and naming: the semantic interpretability of new root-suffix combinations.

In two experiments, pseudowords made up of Italian roots and derivational suffixes were investigated. In visual lexical decision, the licensing of a new root-suffix combination was affected by its semantic interpretability, but not by its grammatical appropriateness. By contrast, the degree of interpretability of new root-suffix combinations did not affect naming. However, and irrespective of differences in interpretability, pseudowords made up of two morphemes were named more efficiently than pseudowords with no morphological constituency. These results, while showing the involvement of the semantic component in the licensing process, also show its dissociability in lexical naming, thus suggesting morpholexical nonsemantic naming.     

Political Ideologies and Support for Censorship: Is It a Question of Whose Ox Is Being Gored?

Two studies are described. one of 381 university students and the other a statewide survey of 295 adults, both of which examine the relationship between attitudinal support for censorship and political ideologies. The results of these studies are interpreted as challenging the view of Suedfeld, Steel, and Schmidt (1994) that support for censorship is a function of both the works in question and the political ideologies of the respondents. In both studies we find that support for censorship is somewhat consistent across messages and images of differing political content. and that support for censorship is generally greater among those with conservative political attitudes, regardless of the content of the works in question. A model of political attitudes (Maddox & Lilie. 1986) that conceptualizes American political idcologies as consisting of two relatively independent dimensions, rather than a single left-right dimension. is proposed as a more effective means of conceptualizing this issue.