Word frequency and children's stuttering: The relationship to sentence structure

This study investigated the relationship between word-frequency level and stuttering within the context of four slected sentence types. Fifteen stuttering children, aged 8–12, read 48 sentences of four different transformational types, and three word-frequency levels 12 simple active-affirmative-declarative (SAAD), 12 negative, 12 passive and 12 negative-passive. All sentences were identical in terms of underlying swings and variations of the SAAD sentences. Results agreed with Ronson's study with adults (1976) in that when the group rating was severe and the sentence type was negative, stuttering increased significantly as word-frequency level decreased. It appears that children's stuttering in relationship to word-frequency level is a different response that is subject to variables of sentence type and the severity rating of stuttering.     

Managerial aspirations of high school seniors: A comparison of males and females

Empirical research in the past has indicated that young people are generally not oriented toward managerial careers and that females are less so than are males. However, the greater career orientation of today's students, recent changes in societal values, persistent attempts by women to obtain equality, and federal legislation expressly forbidding discrimination may have changed this situation by the late 1970s. A survey of 2112 high school seniors in the state of Alabama was conducted to investigate these issues. Results indicate that few high school seniors aspire to management careers and that sex continues to be a major discriminator. The “male managerial model” continues to be reinforced by the values and attitudes of society as reflected in its young people.     

Attention and automaticity in Stroop and priming tasks: Theory and data

Three major variables identified with attention and automaticity in the priming paradigm are shown to have parallel effects in the Stroop paradigm. A model is developed to explain the effects in both paradigms in terms of a single decision process that combines evidence from several sources (e.g., habitual associations and temporary contingencies between the prime and the target or between the unreported and reported dimensions). The model is applied to two Stroop experiments in which the faster two of three stimulus dimensions relate associatively and cue through a frequency manipulation the third, which must be reported. Depending on the direction of the cueing relation, attentional effects enhanced or counteracted automatic (associative) effects, and the attentional effects were stronger with the faster unreported dimension than with the slower one. These results corroborate findings in the priming paradigm and confirm the model. Implications of the results and the model for broader issues are discussed.     

Attributed influence: The importance of observing change

The presence of a target's unexpected change in behavior following an influence attempt was hypothesized to be a critical variable for attributing influence to a particular agent. Observers read a brief story in which an agent's intervention was followed by the target's compliance, noncompliance, or countercompliance to the request. The results indicated that influence was attributed to the agent in the conditions demonstrating change, i.e., compliance and countercompliance, regardless of the direction of that change. Additional findings indicated that influence attributed to an agent decreased if the target delayed final compliance with the intervention.     

Lunchroom noise control using feedback and group contingent reinforcement

Reduction of noise levels in an elementary school lunchroom was examined as a function of feedback and feedback plus reinforcement using group contingency procedures. Feedback consisted of signals from a traffic light, with green indicating acceptable levels, yellow indicating levels approaching undesirable, and red indicating unacceptable levels. Other behaviors, including running, hitting, pushing, and kicking, were measured incidentally. Results indicate that feedback plus reinforcement was effective in reducing noise levels. Feedback only was also effective, but to a lesser degree. No response-response relationship was found to exist between noise level and the other behaviors.     

Semantic aphasia: A neglected entity

Three cases of semantic aphasia are reported. Computerized brain tomography showed bilateral temporo-parieto-occipital junction hemorrhages in one patient, and left parieto-occipital junction infarctions in the other two patients. The auditory comprehension defect of the three patients was characterized by preserved understanding of single words and impaired understanding of grammatically complex constructions. It is suggested that this comprehension defect reflects an inability to fully grasp the meaning of words and grammatical constructions imbued with spatial or quasi-spatial significance. Each of the three patients showed a complex spatial disorder that included constructional apraxia, spatial agnosia, and elements of Gerstmann's syndrome. The aphasic as well as the spatial disorder of semantic aphasics may be manifestations of a common defect in the perception of spatial relationships produced by left temporo-parieto-occipital region damage.     

How school-aged students define stuttering and stammering

Fifty students from each of the grades 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, and 12 were asked to complete a questionnaire containing the following three questions: 1) What is stuttering? 2) What is stammering? 3) How did you know that? Analysis of their responses indicated students were more familiar with stuttering as opposed to the term stammering. From grade 6 onward, we can expect at least three-fourths of the students to define stuttering as a disruption of speech consisting chiefly of sound or syllable repetitions. Only about one-fourth of students in grade 6 and above defined stammering as a speech disruption. This disruption was characterized chiefly by repetitions, injections, and pauses. Most of the students were unable to specify how they learned the definitions. The few who did identified family and friends as their chief source of knowledge.     

A comparison of dichotic and visuo-acoustic competition in hemispherectomized patients

Following hemispherectomy, patients performing dichotic listening tasks have great difficulty reporting items presented to the ear ipsilateral to their intact hemisphere. One possible cause is an attentional imbalance which, when competing inputs are received from both sides of space, restricts the patient's attention to the stimulus contralateral to his remaining hemisphere. If this explanation is true, then a similar ipsilateral ear decrement should occur when a competing visual stimulus is presented in the contralateral field. In the present study, however, hemispherectomy patients easily reported a digit presented to the ear ipsilateral to their intact hemisphere despite the concurrent presentation of a visual digit to their contralateral field.     

Hemispheric alpha asymmetries of stuttering males and nonstuttering males and females for words of high and low imagery

Alpha hemispheric asymmetries of nonstuttering males, nonstuttering females, and stuttering males were explored with electroencephalographic procedures during exposure to two lists of one-syllable words which the subjects were required to recall following presentation. One word list contained low-imagery words while the other contained high-imagery words. Stuttering males were found to have significantly less alpha in their right hemispheres, suggesting right hemispheric processing strategies. This finding was interpreted as supporting the “segmentation dysfunction” explanation of stuttering suggested by Moore and Haynes (1979b). Nonstuttering males showed less left than right alpha while nonstuttering females revealed no difference between their right and left hemispheres. Differences between nonstuttering males and females are discussed as being task and stimuli dependent relative to the segmental/nonsegmental nature of both task and stimuli. Differential hemispheric asymmetries for words of high or low-imagery were not observed.