Computational evidence for the foundations of numerical competence

INFANT is a computational model of Simon's (1997) ‘non-numerical’ account of the foundations of numerical competence. It operationalizes the memory, individuation, object permanence and spatiotemporal representation competencies of that account into a simulation of the Simon, Hespos & Rochat (1995) study. Results demonstrate that infants’ responses can indeed be reproduced without numerical representations.     

INCREASED PEER-TEACHING WITH GROUP-ORIENTED CONTINGENCIES FOR ARITHMETIC PERFORMANCE IN BEHAVIOR-DISORDERED ADOLESCENTS1

Group-oriented contingencies were applied to increase the arithmetic problem-solving rates of four behavior-disordered adolescent residents in a psychiatric hospital. The experiment followed an ABAC reversal design consisting of baseline conditions (A₁ and A₂), and cumulative (B) and mixed (C) interdependent group-oriented contingency conditions. Under the cumulative arrangement, the subjects earned five cents for every correctly solved multiplication problem. The same conditions were in effect with the mixed contingency, except that each subject was required to work at least three problems before any subject could earn money. The results indicated consistent increases in the subjects' arithmetic computation rates as a function of the group-oriented contingencies. Concurrent observations were made across the four conditions of the experiment on four categories of the subjects' verbalizations: antecedent peer-teaching, consequent peer-teaching, positive statements, and negative statements. The subjects' rates of antecedent peer-teaching verbalizations covaried with the group-contingency-induced increases in their levels of computation behavior. The majority of the verbalization involved answers to number fact questions or redirecting peers to engage in on-task activities. The three other categories of the subjects' verbalizations that were observed—consequent peer-teaching, positive statements, and negative statements—were not found to covary with the subjects' altered rates of computation behavior.     

Stress,healthiness and health behaviours: An exploration of the role of life events,daily hassles,cognitive appraisal and the coping process

In a study of 220 participants, the relationship between life events, daily hassles, cognitive appraisal and coping, stress and general healthiness was investigated utilizing a self report methodology. The different aspects of healthiness and health behaviour/lifestyle appear to be related to different appraisal and coping styles. The role of daily hassles and life events in the process also vary across different aspects of health, illness and health behaviours. In fact the number of life events experienced appear to contribute more to hardiness than to vulnerability. It is proposed that to understand the process an integrative model is required which allows for flexibility in analysis.     

A study of system execution of performance appraisal

Dissatisfaction with traditional performance appraisal (PA) has led some organizations to eliminate formal reviews entirely and to substitute alternative methods of performance feedback, while other firms search for ways to improve the formal process. This study attempts to contribute to the ongoing debate about the future of PA by investigating the effects of an understudied aspect of the PA process: how well the PA system is executed by the supervisor. Our results indicate that system execution explains a significant amount of variance in intention to improve over and above a host of variables studied in previous PA studies, and that these effect sizes suggest clear practical significance.     

Control groups in psychosocial intervention research: ethical and methodological issues

This article summarizes a National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) workshop that was convened to address the ethical and methodological issues that arise when conducting controlled psychosocial interventions research and introduces 6 thoughtful and inspiring papers presented by workshop participants. These papers, on topics ranging from informed consent to ethnic minority issues, reflect the depth and breadth of expertise represented by the multidisciplinary group of scientists and ethicists present at the meeting. More extensive follow-up, particularly from federal research applications and publications, of how investigators balance the need for strong research design with ethical considerations may help advance the science of psychosocial intervention research.     

Infants' behavioral reenactment of "failed attempts": exploring the roles of emulation learning,stimulus enhancement,and understanding of intentions

Two studies were conducted to examine whether infants' reenactment of intended but unconsummated acts in A. N. Meltzoff's (1995) failed-attempt paradigm is due to reading the adult's underlying intention or to the effects of nonimitative social learning processes. Two novel conditions that emphasized the object affordances and the spatial contiguity of the object sets were devised. When infants' first actions only were counted, infants who observed the full-demonstration model produced more target acts. When all target acts produced within the 20-s response period were counted, infants in the emulation-learning and spatial contiguity conditions produced as many target acts as infants in the full-demonstration and failed-attempt conditions. This pattern of findings suggests that nonimitative social learning processes may influence infants' response in the behavioral reenactment paradigm.     

Memory and memory confidence in obsessive-compulsive disorder

Pathological doubt, often found in individuals with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), has been theoretically linked to memory deficits, but empirical evidence for such deficits has been mixed. In contrast, many studies suggest that individuals with OCD have low confidence in their memories. The present study aimed to build upon previous research by measuring memory accuracy and confidence in OCD using ecologically valid, idiographically-selected stimuli. Individuals with OCD (OCs), anxious controls (ACs), and nonanxious controls (NACs) were exposed to a set of objects that the OCs had identified as safe, unsafe, or neutral. Participants were then asked to recall as many objects as possible and to rate their confidence in each memory. This process was repeated 6 times, using the same stimuli for each trial. Contrary to hypothesis, no group differences emerged in memory accuracy. However, OCs' memory confidence for unsafe objects showed a progressive decline over repeated trials. This pattern was not observed among NACs or ACs. Furthermore, OCs with primary checking reported lower confidence in long-term memory than did OCs without primary checking. These results suggest that when OCs are repeatedly exposed to threat-related stimuli (such as repeated checking), their level of confidence in remembering these stimuli paradoxically decreases.