The effects of primary reward on the I.Q. performance of grade-school children as a function of initial I.Q. level

The effect of candy reward on I.Q. scores was investigated in 72 first- and second-grade children. All subjects were administered Form A of the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test and, based upon these scores, were divided into three blocks: low, middle, and high. From each block, subjects were randomly assigned to one of three conditions (contingent reward, noncontingent reward, or no reward) that were in effect during administration of Form B. Results showed that candy given contingent upon each correct response increased I.Q. scores for the initially low scoring subjects, but had no influence on the scores of middle and high scoring subjects.     

Verbal rehearsal and selective attention in children with learning disabilities: A developmental lag

To investigate the development of verbal rehearsal strategies and selective attention in learning disabled children, Hagen's Central-Incidental task was administered to younger learning disabled (M CA = 8.68 years) and normal (M CA = 8.62 years) boys in Experiment 1 and to intermediate (M CA = 10.18 years) and older (M CA = 13.48 years) learning disabled boys in Experiment 2. Also, in Experiment 2, an experimentally induced verbal rehearsal condition was included to determine its effects on serial recall and selective attention performance. In Experiment 1, the serial postion curve of the normals revealed both a primacy and a recency effect, whereas that of the learning disabled revealed a recency effect only. In Experiment 2, both the intermediate and the older learning disabled exhibited both primacy and recency effects under both standard and rehearsal conditions. A developmental analysis of central recall for the three learning disabled groups revealed constant age-related increases in overall central recall and in primacy recall. That the normals recalled more central, but not more incidental, information than the learning disabled in Experiment 1 suggests that the learning disabled are deficient in selective attention. Correlational findings suggest that the selective attention of the learning disabled improves with age. The results were interpreted as support for the hypothesis of a developmental lag in the learning disabled population.     

Transformation of a three-mode multidimensional scaling solution to indscal form

Relations between Tucker's three-mode multidimensional scaling and Carroll and Chang's INDSCAL are discussed. The possibility is raised that it may be profitable to attempt to transform a three-mode solution to the general form of an INDSCAL solution. Operationally, this involves transforming the three-mode core matrix so that each section is, as nearly as possible, a diagonal matrix. A technique is developed for accomplishing such a transformation, and is applied to two sets of data from the literature. Results indicate that the process is both feasible and valuable, providing useful information on the relative appropriateness of the two models.     

How a high working memory capacity can increase proactive interference

Previous findings suggested that a high working memory capacity (WMC) is potentially associated with a higher susceptibility to proactive interference (PI) if the latter is measured under high cognitive load. To explain such a finding, we propose to consider susceptibility to PI as a net effect of individual executive processes and the intrinsic potential for PI. With the latter, we refer to the amount of information that is activated at a given time and that has the potential to exert PI subsequently. In two studies deploying generalized linear mixed models, susceptibility to PI was modeled as the decline of performance over trials of a complex span task. The results revealed that a higher WMC was associated with a higher susceptibility to PI. Moreover, the number of stimuli recalled in one trial as a proxy variable for the intrinsic potential for PI negatively affected memory performance in the subsequent trial.     

Catholic Feminist Ethics Reconsidered

Taking Catholic sexual ethics and liberal feminist ethics as points of departure, this essay argues that both frameworks are ill‐prepared to deal with the moral problems raised by sex trafficking: while Catholic sexual ethics is grounded in a normative understanding of sexuality, liberal feminist ethics argues for women's sexual autonomy, resting upon freedom of action and consent. From a perspective that attends both to the phenomenological interpretation of embodied selves and the Kantian normative interpretation of dignity, it becomes possible to critique both the Catholic and the liberal feminist frameworks of ethics. I argue that Catholic sexual ethics requires a reconceptualization as social ethics in order to meet the challenges of our present time, but that the shift is possible without giving up the moral imperatives of both Catholic and feminist ethics to protect human dignity and women's rights.     

Performance of typical and superior face recognizers on a novel interactive face matching procedure

Unfamiliar simultaneous face matching is error prone. Reducing incorrect identification decisions will positively benefit forensic and security contexts. The absence of view-independent information in static images likely contributes to the difficulty of unfamiliar face matching. We tested whether a novel interactive viewing procedure that provides the user with 3D structural information as they rotate a facial image to different orientations would improve face matching accuracy. We tested the performance of ‘typical’ (Experiment 1) and ‘superior’ (Experiment 2) face recognizers, comparing their performance using high-quality (Experiment 3) and pixelated (Experiment 4) Facebook profile images. In each trial, participants responded whether two images featured the same person with one of these images being either a static face, a video providing orientation information, or an interactive image. Taken together, the results show that fluid orientation information and interactivity prompt shifts in criterion and support matching performance. Because typical and superior face recognizers both benefited from the structural information provided by the novel viewing procedures, our results point to qualitatively similar reliance on pictorial encoding in these groups. This also suggests that interactive viewing tools can be valuable in assisting face matching in high-performing practitioner groups.     

Changes in Children's Episodic Narratives Through Long-Term Repeated Recall: Longitudinal Case Studies1

This study aimed to investigate whether a child's narrative of a particular past episode would change in repeated reporting over the long term, and if so, how it would change. To answer these questions, I conducted longitudinal case studies of episodic reports by children every 2–6 months, from their early childhood to the age of 10–15 years. Criteria for inclusion were set in advance; seven episodic narratives meeting these criteria were analyzed. Two types of changes in the narratives were observed, as expected: that of including other information, and that of an event suddenly being reported after no recall for several years. Information from the children's surroundings seemed to be substantially involved in these changes in their episodic narratives. The present results also indicate that mothers' episodic memories are not always reliable and that the schema children have can influence their episodic memories.     

Treating Childhood Social Anxiety Disorder With Virtual Environments and Serious Games: A Randomized Trial

Disseminating efficacious psychological treatments remains a challenge for researchers and clinicians. In the case of social anxiety disorder (SAD), Social Effectiveness Therapy for Children (SET-C) has been demonstrated as an efficacious intervention, but elements of the protocol, such as peer generalization sessions, remain challenging to conduct in typical clinical settings. To address this need, we developed an artificially intelligent, web-based application, Pegasys-VR™, designed to replace peer generalization sessions and enhance homework compliance. The feasibility of Pegasys-VR™ was tested in a randomized controlled trial in comparison to SET-C. The results indicated that both programs were equally efficacious in decreasing anxiety and improving social skill in social encounters. Sixty-three percent (63%) of children treated with SET-C and 60% treated with Pegasys-VR™ did not meet diagnostic criteria for SAD at posttreatment. Pegasys-VR™ is a feasible, efficacious, and dissemination-friendly element of a comprehensive treatment program for social anxiety disorder in children.     

Trauma exposure and post-traumatic stress symptoms among Syrian refugee youth in Jordan: Social support and gender as moderators

This study assessed relations between exposure to trauma and post-traumatic stress (PTS) symptoms, and whether perceived social support from family and friends and gender moderated these associations. Syrian refugee youth (N = 418, 55.0% female) attending public schools in Jordan participated. Boys reported more age-adjusted PTS symptoms than girls. Analyses revealed that family support and gender moderated the association of trauma on PTS symptoms. For males, the benefits of family support were most evident under conditions of high traumatic stress exposure, while for females, benefits of family support were evident when no loss or injury to family members had been reported. Support from friends was not helpful for either gender. School- or family-based interventions designed to treat PTS symptoms need to consider the different needs of boys and girls, particularly within the Syrian Muslim cultural context.