Optimism and resources: Effects on each other and on health over 10 years

Dispositional optimism may be associated with growth of social and status resources by virtue of optimists' greater persistence and better performance. Conversely, resource growth may give people a more positive view of their future and increase optimism. Changes in dispositional optimism and resources over 10 years were examined in former law students (N = 61). More optimistic first-year law students made more money 10 years later, but income did not predict later optimism. More optimistic students did not have larger social networks 10 years later, but increases in social network size predicted increased optimism. These changes predicted mental and physical health. Dispositional optimism was less stable than many personality traits (r = .35), potentially because it is responsive to resource change.     

Testing neural network models of personality

Attempts to develop neural network models of personality have not generally used empirical data for training and validating the models. Two illustrations are provided which demonstrate the incorporation of empirical data into the modeling of behavioral responses to situations varying in closeness and hierarchical role relationships. An event-contingent recording procedure is utilized to obtain data from the same participant in multiple events for multiple situations. This data is then used in the training and validation of the neural networks. The first illustration models dominant and submissive behaviors in response to situations varying in social role status. The second illustration models agreeable and quarrelsome behaviors in response to situations varying in closeness and gender of the interaction partner. The predictions from both neural network models are consistent with previous research.     

失望情境下小学儿童情绪表达规则的运用

以91名小学一、三、五年级儿童为被试,采用故事访谈法探讨了失望情境下儿童情绪表达规则运用的发展特点及其影响因素。结果表明:(1)从一年级到五年级,小学儿童在失望情景下的真实情绪和表面情绪都变得越来越积极,且失望情境下无论是在真实情绪上还是在表面情绪上,都没有表现出显著的性别差异;(2)三种人际关系类型下儿童的表面情绪和真实情绪都表现出极大的差异,而且人际关系类型不同儿童使用表达规则的情况也有很大不同,这可以用儿童情绪调节策略的不同来解释;(3)失望情境下,儿童情绪表达规则的使用受到不同人际类型的影响,这可能与儿童对情绪表达社会影响的不同预期有关;(4)儿童的情绪表达目标不受其所处的人际关系类型影响,且不同人际关系下儿童的情绪表达目标不受其年级、性别的影响。     

Evolution of the Colored Eco-Genetic Relationship Map (CEGRM) for Assessing Social Functioning in Women in Hereditary Breast-Ovarian (HBOC) Families

The CEGRM was initially conceived as a simple, concise, visual representation of the social interaction domains of information, tangible services and emotional exchanges (Kenen, R., & Peters, J. (2001). J Genet Counsel, 10, 289–309). A blend of the genetic pedigree, genogram, and ecomap, the CEGRM was developed to facilitate contemporary genetic counseling goals. An exploratory pilot study of 20 subjects showed that it was feasible, comfortable and efficiently accomplished, and that the process was useful both for assessment and as an intervention with study participants (Peters, J. A., Kenen, R., Giusti, R., Loud, J., Weissman, N., & Greene, M. H. (2004). Am J Med Genet Part A, 130A, 258–264). Subsequently, we have extended the CEGRM to 150 women from hereditary breast/ovarian cancer (HBOC) families; three different investigators have successfully administered this tool. The preliminary findings from the exploratory study were confirmed in the larger sample. Engaging in the interactive, insight-promoting CEGRM process provides a novel tool for assessing the social context of genetic testing, and helping high-risk women better understand and integrate genetic information into their personal and family identities, health beliefs, and decisions.     

Data-Based Construction of Multidimensional Probabilistic Models with MUDIM

The goal of the paper is to introduce a program system, MUDIM,and to show how it can be used for multidimensional probabilisticmodel construction. The system is being developed with the goalto gain a tool for experimental computations with compositionalmodels which are, in a way, an alternative to Bayesian networks.These models are based on the idea of composing a multidimensionaldistribution from a great number of low-dimensional ones. Whenconsidering knowledge-based systems, this approach quite naturallycope with the difficulty of expressing global knowledge abouta field of practise. We have only to work with a system of piecesof local knowledge from which the global knowledge must be assembled.     

The large-scale structure of semantic networks: statistical analyses and a model of semantic growth

We present statistical analyses of the large-scale structure of 3 types of semantic networks: word associations, WordNet, and Roget's Thesaurus. We show that they have a small-world structure, characterized by sparse connectivity, short average path lengths between words, and strong local clustering. In addition, the distributions of the number of connections follow power laws that indicate a scale-free pattern of connectivity, with most nodes having relatively few connections joined together through a small number of hubs with many connections. These regularities have also been found in certain other complex natural networks, such as the World Wide Web, but they are not consistent with many conventional models of semantic organization, based on inheritance hierarchies, arbitrarily structured networks, or high-dimensional vector spaces. We propose that these structures reflect the mechanisms by which semantic networks grow. We describe a simple model for semantic growth, in which each new word or concept is connected to an existing network by differentiating the connectivity pattern of an existing node. This model generates appropriate small-world statistics and power-law connectivity distributions, and it also suggests one possible mechanistic basis for the effects of learning history variables (age of acquisition, usage frequency) on behavioral performance in semantic processing tasks.     

A Dual Process Model of Attitudes towards Immigration: Person × Residential Area Effects in a National Sample

This research took a person × situation approach to predicting prejudice by looking at how social worldviews interact with real‐world environmental factors to predict how people respond to immigrants within their local area. Taking a Dual Process Motivational approach, we hypothesized that a higher proportion of immigrants in the local community would be associated with negative attitudes toward immigration for respondents high in dangerous world beliefs. Conversely, we hypothesized that living in a highly affluent (as opposed to socioeconomically deprived) community would be associated with negative attitudes toward immigration for respondents high in competitive world beliefs. Both hypotheses were supported using regional information derived from national census data combined with representative survey data from a large telephone sample conducted in New Zealand (N = 6,489). These findings support the proposition that individual differences interact with specific features of the environment to predict people's levels of prejudice in distinct ways.     

The Future of Public Policy

This article reports the results of research that uses policy network theory and advocacy coalition theory to deduce the implications for the future of public policy in EU Member States of king trends: all those technological, economic, environmental, and social trends that can be empirically verified, affect the lives of large numbers of people and are expected by relevant experts to continue for at least the next 20 years. The resulting policy implications can be summarized as more assertive security policies, more business-friendly economic policies, more liberal social policies, and increased public spending.     

The effect of repetitive saccade execution on the attention network test: Enhancing executive function with a flick of the eyes

The simple act of repeatedly looking left and right can enhance subsequent cognition, including divergent thinking, detection of matching letters from visual arrays, and memory retrieval. One hypothesis is that saccade execution enhances subsequent cognition by altering attentional control. To test this hypothesis, we compared performance following repetitive bilateral saccades or central fixation on the revised attention network test, which measures the operation of three distinct attentional networks: alerting, orienting, and executive function. The primary finding was that saccade execution increased the subsequent operation of the executive function network, which encompasses attentional control. Specifically, saccade execution decreased response time to target stimuli in the presence of response-incongruent flankers. A secondary finding was that saccade execution decreased response time to targets when an invalid location was cued prior to target onset. These findings suggest that saccades are an effective means of improving attentional control. Of greater theoretical importance, the study establishes attentional enhancement as a potential mechanism by which saccades enhance other aspects of cognition. Although some saccade execution effects have been found to depend on consistency of handedness (i.e., the consistency with which an individual uses one hand over the other), saccade-induced enhancement of attentional control occurred independently of handedness consistency.     

基于知识异质性团队的异质性知识网络运行机制

基于知识异质性团队的异质性知识网络是指团队内每个异质性知识成员因原来的学习经历或工作经历所建立起来的跨组织异质性知识网络.本研究旨在探明这一异质性知识网络的互动机制、创新路径与双向动态演变过程.努力将知识管理、社会网络、认知心理学理论结合起来,选择典型的高管团队,研发团队,以现场研究为主,综合运用实验研究和问卷调查等方法对异质性知识网络的三种基本形态、知识流运行特征和模式进行研究.同时考察基于网络交互记忆系统、知识冲突和个人图式拓展的多重创新路径,并在此基础上考察异质性知识网络的双向动态演变过程和相应的结网与优化策略.