Embryos created for research purposes.

The creation of embryos for research use has drawn a great deal of criticism. It is difficult to defend an ethical distinction between what one can do to "spare" embryos and what one can do to "research" embryos. The strongest ground on which to argue against the creation of embryos for research is a symbolic one, having to do with respect for human life. Ronald Dworkin's work in Life's Dominion on the symbolic meaning of the abortion debate throws a helpful light on this dispute. By understanding the basic question to be, Does the creation of research embryos weaken or insult our communal respect for the sanctity of human life in some way that in vitro fertilization (IVF) or the experimental use of "spare" embryos does not?, the debate can move in a more constructive direction.     

An historical preface to engineering ethics

This article attempts to distinguish between science and technology, on the one hand, and engineering, on the other, offering a brief introduction to engineering values and engineering ethics. The method is (roughly) a philosophical examination of history. Engineering turns out to be a relatively recent enterprise, barely three hundred years old, to have distinctive commitments both technical and moral, and to have changed a good deal both technically and morally during that period. What motivates the paper is the belief that a too-easy equation of engineering with technology tends to obscure the special contribution of engineers to technology and to their own professional standards and so, to obscure as well both the origin and content of engineering ethics.     

Sexual assault: Myths and stereotypes among Australian adolescents

Myths and stereotypes about sexual assault reflect a society which excuses perpetrators of assault and blames victims for failing to control men's sexuality. Such views are well-established by early adulthood, but there is little research with adolescents. This study surveyed two hundred forty-four 14–16 year old Australian high school students (105 male, 139 female), of Anglo-European descent. Males were significantly more likely to endorse sexual assault myths, to agree that forced sex was acceptable in some situations, and to hold false stereotypes about sexual assault. Males also held more restrictive attitudes toward women's roles and endorsed a greater level of sexism in dating relationships. This suggests that male and female adolescents have differing expectations of dating relationships, which may underlie sexual assault within relationships. Assault-supportive attitudes are apparent at a young age, supporting the need for educational and social interventions targeting young people.     

Emotional Self-Awareness,Eating Disorders,and Racial Identity Attitudes in African American Women

Certain racial identity attitudes may involve diminished internal emotional awareness, features of a syndrome known as “alexithymia,” which has been observed in survivors of extreme trauma. This study found that levels of alexithymia, but not eating disorders, were related to attitudes characteristic of early stages of racial identity development among African American women.     

Embedding instructive feedback into teacher-student interactions during independent seat work

The effects of embedding a constant time delay procedure into an independent seat work activity and using instructive feedback were evaluated in this study. Seven students with mild disabilities participated in the study that occurred in their special education classroom. A multiple probe design across sets of target behaviors was used, and students' responses to instructive feedback stimuli were evaluated during each probe condition. The procedures were implemented with a high degree of fidelity, and the results indicate that (a) the students acquired the target behaviors taught with the constant time delay procedure that was embedded into independent seat work, and (b) the students acquired some but not all of the responses to the instructive feedback stimuli. These findings are discussed in terms of using instructive feedback in classrooms and future research on instructive feedback.     

Sentencing severity with mock jurors: Predictive validity of three variable categories

Previous studies have identified three categories of variables which influence decisions of mock jurors: type of crime, defendant characteristics, and personal characteristics of jurors. This study manipulated the following variables towards the ends of assessing their influence on mock jurors' sentencing severity: premeditated vs. unpremeditated murder, black vs. white defendant, low SES vs. high SES defendant. Only defendant SES predicted sentencing severity: low SES defendants were assigned significantly longer sentences than high SES defendants. None of the measures of juror characteristics correlated with sentencing severity. Failure to replicate significant relationships with most of these variables and sentencing severity suggest that results of studies which manipulate only one variable dimension may overestimate the influence of these variable dimensions in mock jurors' decisions.     

Counselling and the schizophrenias

Schizophrenia is the collective name given to allied psychiatric disorders each of which has received a number of different professional interpretations. A primary counselling task is to help staff resolve conflicts over treatment, and give them support during their care of patients. Counselling patients and families, particularly through opportunities provided by self-help groups, is also discussed. The specialised work of genetic, psychoanalytical and behavioural counselling is considered, and stress is laid on the importance of counselling the adolescent schizophrenic for whom early help is vital to prevent deterioration. The article focuses on those areas where marriage guidance counsellors, social workers and probation officers are most likely to be consulted.     

Conditioned fear and startle magnitude: effects of different footshock or backshock intensities used in training

In Experiment 1 four groups of rats received 30 light-shock pairings using footshock intensities of either .2, .4, .8, or 1.6 mA. One day later all rats were tested for startle by presenting tones in the presence or absence of the light CS. Potentiated startle (the difference between startle on light-tone vs tone-alone trials) was nonmonotonically related to the shock intensity used in training, with the greatest potentiation at intermediate shock levels. Experiment 3 demonstrated a similar relationship when backshocks instead of footshocks were used. In Experiment 2 rats were trained with either a moderate or high shock and then given an extended extinction-test session 1 day later. The moderate-shock group showed a gradual decline in potentiated startle over extinction. The high-shock group showed a nonmonotonic extinction curve where potentiation progressively increased toward the middle of extinction and dissipated thereafter. The results suggest that acoustic startle bears an inverted U-shaped relationship to fear and are discussed in relation to other studies concerned with this issue.     

A method of restraining goldfish during conditioning of electric-shock-induced suppression of breathing movements

An efficient method of holding individual fish in position for delivery of visual conditioned stimuli and electrical unconditioned stimuli, and for registration of breathing movements with a thermistor, is described. The holder restrains the fish gently and is readily opened and closed. In addition, a “mechanical fish” signal generator, for assessing thermistor performance in detecting breathing movements, and a safe constant-current electrical shock stimulus generator are described.