Measuring social skill in grade school boys

This study examined positive and negative assertive skill in 60 elementary school boys, grades 3–8. Subjects' role-played responses to standard analogue situations requiring expression of positive and negative assertion were videotaped and rated retrospectively. High- and low-assertive subjects were identified through ratings of overall assertiveness. Results of this study indicate that (1) high- and low-assertive subjects differ on a number of response components which are related to age level and type of assertive situation (positive vs. negative), (2) assertive skill is associated with role-taking (or decentering) ability, (3) teachers tend to perceive their assertive boys as more sociable and interpersonally sensitive than unassertive boys, (4) there is essentially no correlation between teachers' ratings of aggressiveness and separate behavioral ratings of assertive skill, and (5) behavioral ratings of assertiveness show little relationship to self-report or teachers' ratings of assertiveness.This article is based on a dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Loyola University of Chicago in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. The study was conducted under the direction of the second, third, and fourth authors.     

Theistic Dissonance Among Religious Jewish Holocaust Survivors: A Psychodynamic Perspective

Coining the term theistic dissonance to capture conflicted attitudes and feelings toward God, this article examines faith-based reactions to the Holocaust. The theological weltanschauung of religious Jewish Holocaust survivors is analyzed, with a particular focus on their attempts to reconcile the notion of a benevolent and caring God with their harrowing experience. Basic religious sources and contemporary literature are presented to elucidate the realm of resolutions of theistic dissonance. It is suggested that elements of defense mechanisms are adapted from the emotional into the cognitive realm, and are used by survivors to facilitate respective interpretations of God’s role during the Holocaust. Dissonance resolution is seen as being informed theologically and experientially for these victims who confronted stark challenges to their religious integrity.     

American and Chinese College Students’ Anticipations of Their Postgraduate Education, Career, and Future Family Roles

American and Chinese college students’ anticipations showed no gender differences in their desires for postgraduate education, marriage, and parental status. Stereotypical gender differences emerged in both countries when caregiving roles were considered: Both men and women rated it more likely for women than for men to quit their jobs to be caregivers. Overall, male college students, the Chinese men in particular, felt less comfortable than did women in situations where their spouses were superior in earnings, achievements, and social status. More Chinese than American students planned to enter marriage and parenthood at a later age, and the Chinese students rated the importance of family lower. These findings are discussed in light of the general sociocultural model and the role distribution theory.This study was supported partially by a summer mini-grant issued by the University of St. Francis in 2000.     

应当重视医生“公共人”的角色定位

“经济人”的价值理念刺激了医疗行业的逐利行为,我国公立医院公益性淡化已然是事实,医生的“公共性”日渐缺失.医患之间的信任危机从来没有像今天这样严峻,很重要的原因是医生的价值取向的迷失.医生确实面临多价值选择冲突,但过分强调“经济人”特性,而忽视公共性的重要,已然导致了种种恶果.所以,应当重视医生“公共人”的角色定位.医生和医院要回归对医疗职业本性的认识,让医生成长为“为了人类的幸福和自身的完美而工作”的“公共人”,让医院回归“为社会公众谋取利益,追求社会效益目标”的公益性.     

The relationship of drive for muscularity to sociocultural factors, self-esteem, physical attributes gender role, and social comparison in middle school boys

This study examines the relationship of three sociocultural factors—media influence, peer teasing, and parent teasing/comments and three potential moderator variables—self-esteem, social comparison, and endorsement of male strength and athleticism—to drive for muscularity in middle school boys. There were 287 seventh and eighth grade boys who completed a questionnaire measuring these variables as well as body mass index (BMI) and pubertal status. Results indicated that media influence and male physical attributes endorsement were particularly important correlates of drive for muscularity. These findings have implications for programs designed to prevent body dissatisfaction among adolescent boys.     

The influence of the immediate visual context on incremental thematic role-assignment: evidence from eye-movements in depicted events

Studies monitoring eye-movements in scenes containing entities have provided robust evidence for incremental reference resolution processes. This paper addresses the less studied question of whether depicted event scenes can affect processes of incremental thematic role-assignment. In Experiments 1 and 2, participants inspected agent-action-patient events while listening to German verb-second sentences with initial structural and role ambiguity. The experiments investigated the time course with which listeners could resolve this ambiguity by relating the verb to the depicted events. Such verb-mediated visual event information allowed early disambiguation on-line, as evidenced by anticipatory eye-movements to the appropriate agent/patient role filler. We replicated this finding while investigating the effects of intonation. Experiment 3 demonstrated that when the verb was sentence-final and thus did not establish early reference to the depicted events, linguistic cues alone enabled disambiguation before people encountered the verb. Our results reveal the on-line influence of depicted events on incremental thematic role-assignment and disambiguation of local structural and role ambiguity. In consequence, our findings require a notion of reference that includes actions and events in addition to entities (e.g. Semantics and Cognition, 1983), and argue for a theory of on-line sentence comprehension that exploits a rich inventory of semantic categories.     

Stress, Rewards, and Change in the Centrality of Women’s Family and Work Roles: Mastery as a Mediator

Although research suggests that stress and rewards experienced in a social role are associated with changes in the centrality (or personal importance) of that role over time, little attention has been given to the mechanisms that account for this relationship. This study was conducted to examine change in role mastery as a mediator in the relationship between changes in role experiences (stress and rewards) and changes in centrality among 195 women who simultaneously occupied the roles of parent care provider, mother, wife, and employee. Regression analyses indicated that increases in parent care, mother, and employee stress eroded mastery in those roles. In addition, increases in rewards were associated with a bolstered sense of mastery in each of the four roles. Mastery was found to be a mediating mechanism in the relationship between stress/rewards and centrality in one of the four roles examined, the employee role. However, changes in womens perceptions of mastery were unrelated to the extent to which women changed the importance of their three family roles. These findings extend prior research by demonstrating that mastery is a mechanism through which stress and rewards are associated with centrality in the employee role.     

Can I leave my hat on? A cross-level study of multiple team membership role separation

This article conceptualizes role separation in multiple team membership (MTM) (i.e., the extent to which a multiteamer's role within a focal team is different from his/her role in another team) as a key predictor of individual and team outcomes. Existing literature on MTM focuses primarily on the total number of concurrent teams that an individual contributes to, and thus largely ignores the potential diversity that may characterize MTM. In Study 1, we develop and validate a measure of MTM role separation that reflects differences in (a) expected work results; (b) team collaboration; (c) leader expectations; and (d) client and/or customer characteristics. In Study 2, we use field data to examine the cross-level implications of MTM role separation. As expected, we find that MTM role separation is positively related to a multiteamer's role ambiguity within a focal team and, by extension, harms the performance of the entire focal team. This indirect relationship is not observed when a focal team's teamwork quality (TWQ) is high. We discuss how these findings advance our understanding of the multifaceted and multi-level nature of MTM and help multiteamers, team leaders, and organizations deal with MTM's challenges.