Children's strategy preferences for resolving contradictory story information under two social conditions

This paper attempted to examine how children, when confronted with a literary implicature, resolve this implicature under two types of social conditions. More specifically, this paper identified five types of strategies which people employ to resolve text anomalies arising when old information in a story setting is incompatible with new information in a story ending. Two experiments demonstrated that third graders (8.4 and 8.6 years) and sixth graders (12.5 and 12.8 years) consistently selected certain strategies for resolving old and new, empirical and value, contradictory information. Although third and sixth graders demonstrated a similar strategy preference for resolving contradictory old and new information in formal conditions, the principal difference was that third graders modified old information to fit new information while sixth graders modified new information to fit old information. In contrasting the formal and informal conditions, third graders shifted their strategy preferences so as to minimize the amount of text restructuring in the formal condition; sixth graders, on the other hand, shifted their strategy preferences so as to maximize the amount of text restructuring in informal conditions. These findings suggest that story schema structures are more interpretive than story grammar psychologists presently assume.     

Facial and vocal cues of deception and honesty

Facial expressions and vocal cues (filtered speech) of honest and deceptive messages were examined in posed and spontaneous situations. The question of interest was the degree to which nonverbal cues transmit information about deception. Results indicated that (a) for both the facial and vocal channels, posing (as compared to spontaneous behavior) produced a higher level of communication accuracy; (b) facial expressions of deceptive (as compared to honest) messages were rated as less pleasant, while vocal expressions of deception were rated as less honest, less assertive, and less dominant, particularly in the posed condition; (c) the sender's ability to convey honesty was negatively correlated with his/her ability to convey deception, suggesting the existence of a demeanor bias—individual senders tend to appear and sound consistently honest (or dishonest) regardless of whether they deliver an honest or a deceptive message; (d) in the posing condition, the sender's abilities to convey honesty/deception via facial and vocal cues were positively and significantly correlated, whereas in the spontaneous condition they were not; and (e) senders whose full (unfiltered) speech indicated more involvement with their responses were judged as more honest from both their vocal (filtered speech) and facial cues, in both the honest and deceptive conditions.     

Indirect social influence: Change in judgmental process or anticipatory conformity?

In three experiments, subjects imposed sentence in a criminal case before and after reading the harsh sentence imposed by the trial judge. They then read and imposed sentence in another case. In one experimental condition the subjects anticipated learning the judge's sentence in Case 2; in the other condition they were told not to anticipate learning the judge's sentence. Control subjects made their judgments without ever seeing the judge's sentence. Direct influence was the change in sentences within cases; indirect influence was the difference between initial sentences in Cases 1 and 2. Though direct influence was minimal and not significant, indirect influence was substantial, and was greater in the anticipation than no-anticipation than control conditions, indicating that both modification of the judgmental process and anticipatory conformity were operating. Indirect influence may then reflect a change of either type, depending on a number of methodological and other factors.     

Psychosocial maturity and interpersonal attraction

Psychosocial maturity (PSM), assessed by scores on the Inventory of Psychosocial Development, was related to interpersonal behavior. In Experiment I PSM and proportion of attitude similarity was varied using Byrne's attraction paradigm in a between-subjects design. The personality variable failed to affect attraction. In Experiment II PSM and proportion of attitude similarity were manipulated in a within-subjects design. High PSM subjects rated the stranger significantly higher in attraction at high levels of similarity and significantly lower in attraction at low levels of similarity when compared to Low PSM individuals. The results were discussed in terms of design differences in personality research and potential mechanisms by which PSM affects attraction (self-esteem and/or competence).     

Evidence for differentiation of right hemisphere visual-perceptual functions

Performance on tasks sensitive to right hemisphere dysfunction (facial discrimination and perceptual closure) are reported in eight patients with right hemisphere lesions. Patients demonstrated an apparent double dissociation of performance on the two measures. Site-by-task specificity for the closure task was strongly suggested. Implications for right hemisphere organization and underlying psychological processes are considered.     

The perceptual span and peripheral cues in reading

Skilled readers read passages that were displayed on a Cathode Ray Tube controlled by a computer. The readers' eye movements were monitored and certain critical words were changed by the computer as the eye was in motion. The experimental technique utilized in the study provided data on how wide the area is from which a reader acquires information during a fixation in silent reading. The results also delineate different types of visual information that are acquired from various areas within the perceptual span. It was found that a reader was able to make a semantic interpretation of a word that began 1–6 character spaces from his fixation point. When he fixated 7–12 character spaces prior to a word, he was able to pick up such gross visual characteristics as word shape and initial and final letters. It was concluded that the skilled reader is able to take advantage of information in the periphery. However, the size of the area from which he does is rather small.     

Perceived characteristics of “competent” people

The purpose of this research was to determine the specific behaviors and cues which 104 assessors perceived as indicating the presence of psychological variables shown to be related to competent job behavior. The cue systems utilized were found to be reminiscent of theory Y conceptions of effective job behavior. Implications of the lack of correlation of cue utilization with assessor characteristics are discussed.