Jobs Commensurate With Their Skills? Selected Workers and Skilled Job Access in Québec

The ability of recent landed immigrants to find employment that is commensurate with their skills is a frequent subject of debate. This article analyses one dimension of this phenomenon: namely, how well does post-landing employment correlate to pre-landing levels of education as measured through the Québec selection grid. The analysis is done through a longitudinal retrospective survey of a probabilistic sample of principal applicants from the economic class admitted to Québec between January 1997 and June 2000. In order to better measure the condition of immigrants at their time of arrival, the results of the survey are analysed along with the administrative data taken from Québec’s selection grid and the confirmation of permanent residence. This article analyses the speed of the requalification that the members of the economic class undertake. This analysis attempts to answer two questions: Is the level attained by the cohort normal? At what speed do these immigrants attain these expected outcomes?     

Repeated partial eyewitness questioning causes confidence inflation but not retrieval‐induced forgetting

During a crime investigation eyewitnesses are often interviewed more than once. Repeated post‐event questioning offers an opportunity for retrieval practice. Practicing retrieval of a subset of memories may suppress access to related memories, a phenomenon known as retrieval‐induced forgetting. In this short report we investigated the generalization of retrieval‐induced forgetting to episodic eyewitness memory of a complex event. The results indicated that repeated retrieval improves future recall of practiced information, but does not induce forgetting of related information. Retrieval practice, however, did result in higher confidence ratings, both for correct and incorrect answers. The practical consequence of this study is that repeated questioning should be avoided if possible. Not because it may induce retrieval‐induced forgetting, but because it may lead to confidence inflation. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Shroud of Turin: A Historiographical Approach

Criteria of historical assessment are applied to the Turin Shroud to determine which hypothesis relating to the image formation process is the most likely. To implement this, a ‘Minimal Facts’ approach is followed that takes into account only physicochemical and historical data receiving the widest consensus among contemporary scientists. The result indicates that the probability of the Shroud of Turin being the real shroud of Jesus of Nazareth is very high; historians and natural theologians should therefore pay it increased attention.     

Social learning in juvenile lemon sharks, Negaprion brevirostris

Social learning is taxonomically widespread and can provide distinct behavioural advantages, such as in finding food or avoiding predators more efficiently. Although extensively studied in bony fishes, no such empirical evidence exists for cartilaginous fishes. Our aim in this study was to experimentally investigate the social learning capabilities of juvenile lemon sharks, Negaprion brevirostris. We designed a novel food task, where sharks were required to enter a start zone and subsequently make physical contact with a target in order to receive a food reward. Naive sharks were then able to interact with and observe (a) pre-trained sharks, that is, ‘demonstrators’, or (b) sharks with no previous experience, that is, ‘sham demonstrators’. On completion, observer sharks were then isolated and tested individually in a similar task. During the exposure phase observers paired with ‘demonstrator’ sharks performed a greater number of task-related behaviours and made significantly more transitions from the start zone to the target, than observers paired with ‘sham demonstrators’. When tested in isolation, observers previously paired with ‘demonstrator’ sharks completed a greater number of trials and made contact with the target significantly more often than observers previously paired with ‘sham demonstrators’. Such experience also tended to result in faster overall task performance. These results indicate that juvenile lemon sharks, like numerous other animals, are capable of using socially derived information to learn about novel features in their environment. The results likely have important implications for behavioural processes, ecotourism and fisheries.     

Two-, three-, and four-factor PCL-R models in applied sex offender risk assessments

The authors compared 2-, 3-, 4-factor, and 2-factor/4-facet Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) models in a previously unpublished sample of 1,566 adult male sex offenders assessed under applied clinical conditions as part of a comprehensive state-mandated community notification risk assessment procedure. "Testlets" significantly improved the performance of all models. The 3-factor model provided the best fit to the current data, followed by the 2-factor/4-facet model. The 2-factor model was not supported.     

Does analogical transfer involve a term-to-term alignment?

According to dominant models of reasoning by analogy, analogical transfer requires subjects to first define a full one-to-one correspondence between the base and the target problems. Accordingly, these models predict that if there is a cross-mapping between the base and the target (cross-mapping exists when similar or identical elements in the base and the target play different roles), the time spent transferring a property from the base to the target will be greater. The present results are inconsistent with this prediction. Indeed, if the mapping task is more difficult in the cross-mapping condition than in the control condition, the time needed to make the transfer is not affected by the presence of a cross-mapping. Consequently, we conclude that the mapping phase is not a necessary condition for transfer.     

Mild Affective Shifts and Creativity: Effects on Idea Generation,Evaluation, and Implementation Planning

This study investigated the impact of mild shifts in affective tone (i.e., pleasant vs. unpleasant) and arousal (i.e., high vs. low) on three creative processes. Undergraduates read short stories designed to induce affective shifts and then were asked to generate solutions to a complex business problem. Shifts in affective tone and arousal interacted to influence idea generation and implementation planning, but not idea evaluation. The strongest creative performance was exhibited by participants who experienced a stable and pleasantly toned, low-arousal (i.e., relaxed) state and by those who shifted to an unpleasantly toned, high-arousal (i.e., angry) state. In contrast, those who shifted to an unpleasantly toned, low-arousal (i.e., sad) state or a pleasantly toned, high-arousal (i.e., happy) state tended to exhibit poorer creative performance. These results demonstrate the need to revisit the popular conception that organizations should promote intense levels of pleasant affect to enhance employee creativity.     

Creative Failure: Why Can't People Solve Creative Problems

Although people attempt many creative problem solutions, in general, most creative problem-solving efforts, at least real-world efforts, fail. In the present effort, we examine the reasons creative problem-solving efforts typically fail. We argue that creative problem-solving efforts fail, in part, due to the fundamental nature of the kinds of problems that call for creative thought. However, the nature of people's creative problem-solving skills and the context in which they attempt to develop and implement creative problem solutions also results in failed attempts to solve creative problems. Based on these observations, we discuss how one might seek to develop people to encourage more success in creative problem-solving efforts.     

Can bottom-up processes of attention be a source of ‘interference’ in situations where top-down control of attention is crucial?

In this study, we investigate whether emotionally engaged bottom-up processes of attention can be a source of ‘interference’ in situations where top-down control of attention is necessary. Participants were asked to monitor and report on a video of a war scenario showing a developing battle in two conditions: emotionally positive and emotionally negative. Half of the participants (n = 15) were exposed to task-irrelevant pictures of positive emotional valence embedded within the scenario; the other half were exposed to task-irrelevant pictures of negative emotional valence. Sensitivity and Bias scores were calculated using signal detection theory. Overall, task accuracy scores were dependent upon the valence; negative pictures had an adverse effect on performance, whereas positive pictures improved performance. We concluded that negative emotional pictures interfered with top-down control of attention by attracting competing bottom-up processes of attention. We found the opposite effect for positive emotional stimuli.