人际关系适应特征的情境评价方法研究

本研究运用情境评价法对人际关系适应特征进行了实验研究 ,结果表明 :1以 Schutz提出的人际关系六因素为评价标准 ,采用情境评价法比问卷形式能更有效地揭示人际适应特征 ;2在情境评价中 ,以合作为主的情境设置比以竞争为主的情境设置更利于反映出人际适应特征 ;3情境评价采用定向、组织、交流和问题解决等阶段的过程设计符合情境评价的实际进程 ,有助于分阶段展开被试的行为特征 ,提高情境评价的可控性和准确性。     

Effects of differential reinforcement on the behavior and self-esteem of children with emotional and behavioral disorders

Students in a residential special school for children with emotional and behavioral disorders participated in a study designed to reduce their levels of inappropriate behavior. The residential care staff rated the students' behavioral problems and their class teachers rated their overt self-esteem pre and post intervention. In addition, the students completed self-ratings of their self-esteem. The students were divided into two groups, experimental and control. A multiple baseline across behaviors design was used to assess behavioral changes in the experimental group. Both groups received tangible rewards to the same level but only the experimental group received them contingent upon behaving appropriately. Results showed that the experimental group students made substantial reductions in their levels of inappropriate behavior, which were maintained at a three-month followup. Also, ratings of their behavioral problems by residential child care staff suggested that this improvement in behavior had generalized beyond the classroom to the residential setting. However, no significant differences were found between the pre- and post-intervention ratings of their self-esteem or teacher ratings of their overt self-esteem.     

Change in goals and values of men and women from early to mature adulthood

Changes in goals and values between early and middle adulthood were investigated using a longitudinal sample of women and their male partners. Measures designed to assess personality changes as described by Gutmann and Jung were coded from open-ended responses to questions about middle-aged subjects' concurrent and recollected goals and values. The findings indicated that both women and men declined in gender-traditional goals and values and increased in individual goals and values. Archival data for women showed that recollections were accurate and that both cohort and personality factors were related to the extent to which individuals' goals and values changed over time.     

TEACHING FOSTER GRANDPARENTS TO TRAIN SEVERELY HANDICAPPED PERSONS

Five foster grandparents were taught training skills for use in their daily interactions with severely handicapped persons in an institution. Following baseline, specific teaching procedures consisting of teacher instructions, prompts, modelling, and praise were implemented. The grandparents' frequency of training three skill areas increased as the specific teaching was implemented in multiple-baseline format. The total amount of training continued as teacher instructions, prompts, and modelling were terminated and praise continued, although the grandparents spent their training time emphasizing only two of the three skill areas. Teacher presence was gradually reduced over an 11-week period, with no decrease in grandparents' frequency of training. Four of the foster grandchildren, all profoundly retarded and multiply handicapped, demonstrated progress throughout the study. Results were discussed in light of the available contributions of foster grandparents in institutional settings and maintenance of staff training.     

TRAINING PRESCHOOL CHILDREN TO RECRUIT NATURAL COMMUNITIES OF REINFORCEMENT1

Four normal and four deviant children aged four-to-six years were taught to judge the quality of their academic work in a preschool classroom, and to prompt or cue their teachers to comment about the quality of that work. When these skills did not generalize spontaneously to other teachers in concurrent natural situations, generalized responding was taught by the experimenter, in multiple-baseline design across subjects. This generalization programming enabled the children to contact a sometimes dormant, but readily available natural community of teacher praise and reinforcement, i.e., to recruit an increase in cued praise and schedules of praise for their good work. These behaviors may be important to young children who find themselves bereft of attention in classrooms.     

AN INDEX FOR ASSESSING WEIGHT CHANGE IN CHILDREN: WEIGHT/HEIGHT RATIOS1

Weight and height data from two studies were recomputed, and original data were computed using a Weight Index formula that accounts for the interaction of actual weight/height changes in growing children and compares this ratio with that of normed weight/height ratios for equal-aged children. Recomputing the data of one study showed that the Weight Index is a more sensitive procedure for assessing long-term behavioral treatment of obesity for girls than weight alone. Recomputing the data of a second study showed that the Weight Index formula is consistent for boys and girls and is a more sensitive procedure for assessing long-term effects of a variety of medical treatments for obesity than the Ponderal Index or weight alone. Computation of the data for 17 “normal” children in a preschool class showed a zero Weight Index score before and after a six-month interval elapsed without treatment. The procedure may be useful in assessing ponderosity or anorexia over intervals of six months or more with growing children or difference between actual and normed weight over shorter intervals.     

Infant search tasks reveal early concepts of containment and canonical usage of objects

It is difficult to gain unambiguous evidence on the use of concepts by infants. Many results can be accounted for in terms of action-based strategies. The evidence reported here fulfils the minimal criteria for the operation of working concepts in infants. Search tasks are used with a filled interval which forces memory-search, and the object is hidden in containers which fulfil their customary job or violate it. Infants treat an upright cup as a more reliable location marker than an inverted one. A series of experiments probes the phenomenon. The results indicate that the infants have a working concept of containment which can be triggered by the provision of containers in their canonical orientation. Even “object permanence tasks” lead infants to access their knowledge of the relationships into which things typically enter in the world outside the laboratory.     

Response rate, latency, and resistance to change

Pigeons were trained on a multiple variable-interval/variable-interval schedule with pacing contingencies that generated high response rates in one component and low response rates in the other. Timeout periods separated the schedule components. During resistance-to-change tests, response-independent food was presented during the timeout periods, and the duration of that food presentation was varied among test sessions. Response rates in the schedule components decreased and latencies to the first response increased as a function of the duration of food presentations during the timeout. Both dependent measures changed about the same amount relative to their own baseline levels. The conclusions are that baseline response rates controlled by pacing contingencies are equally resistant to change, given equal reinforcement densities, and latency is a sensitive measure of resistance to change.