Some neurolinguistic implications of prearticulatory editing in production

This paper argues that a complete model of language production must include a prearticulatory editing component. The function of this component is to monitor planned speech for deviations from the speaker's intention and repair any deviations that are found. It is claimed that adding such an editing component onto a production model fundamentally changes any account of aphasic symptoms using that model. As a case in point it is shown that E. M. Saffran's (1982, British Journal of Psychology, 73, 317-337) argument that agrammatic Broca's aphasia involves a deficit at the functional level of M. F. Garrett's (1975, in G. H. Bower (Ed.). The psychology of learning and motivation, New York: Academic Press) production model is no longer sound when prearticulatory editing processes are considered.     

Abortion as a stigma: in the eyes of the beholder

The purpose of this study was to investigate social perceptions of a man who impregnated a woman and advised her to have an abortion, and those of a woman who had an abortion. Each subject rated one of four persons on a social distance measure: either a man involved in an abortion, a woman having had an abortion, a male control target, or a female control target. Both abortion targets were perceived less favorably than the control targets. The female abortion target was rejected more by male subjects than by female subjects, and the male abortion target was more rejected by females than by males. While holding permissive attitudes toward abortion was related to willingness to meet the female abortion target, restrictive attitudes toward abortion predicted willingness to meet the male abortion target. Variables related to stigmatization of the man were lack of identification, restrictive attitudes toward abortion, and perceived responsibility. Restrictive attitudes toward women's rights and roles in this society and restrictive attitudes toward abortion predicted stigmatization of the woman. It is suggested that shifting one's attention from characteristics of the stigmatized to observers' characteristics provides a useful perspective on the stigmatization process.     

Operant techniques used in stuttering therapy: A review

This article reviews research concerning the use of operant conditioning in stuttering therapy, and discusses the clinical implications of this literature. In order to be considered for this review, a report had to treat the findings of research specifically designed to use operant conditioning in the manipulation of speech disfluency. This body of experimental literature clearly indicates that operant management techniques can effectively reduce stuttering with punishment of disfluencies producing more notable results than reinforcement of fluent responses. Operant conditioning is an effective means of modifying stuttering behavior and should be more visible in terms of procedures used by speech therapists.     

Facial and autonomic manifestations of the dimensional structure of emotion

While subjects viewed and rated a series of 25 emotionally evocative slides, their heart rate and skin conductance were continuously monitored and their facial expressions were covertly videotaped. Judges subsequently viewed the videotapes and rated trial-by-trial the pleasantness and intensity of each subject's facial expressions. Both phasic skin conductance responding and judged facial intensity were curvilinearly related to self-reported pleasantness, with the largest responses occurring at both extremes of the self-report scale. In contrast, phasic cardiac reactions and judged facial pleasantness were linearly related to self-reported pleasantness; extreme pleasantness was accompanied by heart rate acceleration, and unpleasantness by cardiac deceleration. The results suggest that visceral information reflects the dimensions that underlie the organization of affects and, hence, may play a more important role in emotional experience than is assumed in a number of currently held theories of emotion.     

Generational differences in work values between parents and children and between boys and girls across grade levels 6, 9, 10, and 12

A cross-sectional comparison of school children in grades 6, 9, 10, and 12 and their parents was made to examine changes in work values and the relationship between children's and their parents' work values as a function of age and sex. Discriminant function analyses revealed support for hypothesized differences in children's values and for the convergence of sex differences in values at later ages. Results also confirmed that at earlier ages there is greater similarity in values between children and their like-sexed parent but older (grade 12) boys and girls are most similar to their fathers. These findings confirm and expand the results of earlier research.