Sex Biases in Subject Selection: A Survey of Articles Published in American Medical Journals

This study discusses the results of a survey of 1,800 articles published in American medical journals from 1985--1996. The study finds 9% of these articles reported research that uses only male subjects to examine medical conditions that affect both sexes; the ratio of research on female to male conditions among these articles was greater than 5:1; but 76.5% of the articles reported research that includes both male and female subjects. The study also discusses evidence that sex biases against women (and men) are decreasing. This study also offers some possible psychological, institutional, medical, and economic explanations of the sex biases in medical research published in American journals, and discusses some policy implications of sex biases in medical research. The study concludes by urging others to conduct more empirical research on sex biases in medical research.     

Infants’ responses to objects representing levels of word knowledge and categorical information

The effects of differing levels of word knowledge on infants’ sequential touching behaviors were investigated in two studies. In both, parent report was used to assess three levels of word knowledge: known, frontier, and unknown. In the first study, 14-month-old infants sequentially touched objects consistent with parents’ reports of their word knowledge. In the second study, 20-month-old infants sequentially touched objects by both conceptual category and reported level of word knowledge. It appears that even infants, like adults, can make distinctions among objects on the basis of their knowledge about the objects’ labels.     

When is ignorance bliss? The effects of inaccurate self-assessments of knowledge on learning and attrition

Two studies were conducted to examine the implications of inaccurate self-appraisals in online training. Self-assessment of knowledge moderated the effects of trainees’ performance on subsequent performance and attrition. Performance was highest after uniformly positive ratings (i.e., high self-assessment and high performance), followed by underestimation, overestimation, and uniformly negative ratings, respectively. Attrition was lowest after uniformly positive ratings, followed by underestimation, uniformly negative ratings, and overestimation, respectively. Effort had a more positive effect on performance following low than high self-assessments and this interaction fully mediated the self-assessment/performance interaction on subsequent performance. Commitment had a more negative effect on subsequent attrition following low than high self-assessments and this interaction fully mediated the self-assessment/performance interaction on subsequent attrition. Finally, trainee conscientiousness affected their behavior when their performance and self-assessments were inconsistent—overestimating and underestimating performance increased attrition more for trainees low in conscientiousness and impaired performance more for trainees high in conscientiousness.     

Children's response to sales promotions and their impact on purchase behavior

Despite the growth in children's purchasing power, surprisingly little is known about how children respond to sales promotions. We conduct two experiments to address this issue. Study 1 shows that elementary-aged (second and fifth grade) children's purchase decisions are influenced by the presence of sales. Study 2 demonstrates that both age groups favor conceptually easier promotions, even when the sale is inferior. Additionally, we find that children have difficulty applying mathematical concepts to sales promotions, regardless of classroom mastery of the associated operations. Together, these results indicate that elementary-aged children routinely incorporate sales into purchase decisions, sometimes with suboptimal results.     

Maternal Expressive Style and Children's Emotional Development

Maternal expressive styles, based on a combination of positive and negative expressive patterns, were identified at two points in time and related to multiple aspects of preschool children's emotional development. Mother–child pairs from 260 families participated when the children were 3 years old, and 240 participated again at aged 4 years. Expressive styles were identified at age 3 using cluster analysis, replicated at age 4 and examined in relation to children's emotional understanding, expressiveness and regulation. Three expressive styles were identified: high positive/low negative, very low positive/average negative and average positive/very high negative. Cluster membership was stable in 63% of families from age 3 to 4 years; no systematic patterns of change were evident in the remaining families. Expressive style was related to aspects of children's emotional expression at 3 years and to emotion expression and regulation at 4 years. Children's expressiveness and regulation at age 3 were also related to changes in mothers' expressive styles over 1 year. Identifying mothers' expressive styles provides a unique way to understand the potential role of the emotional climates in which preschool‐aged children learn to express and regulate their own emotions. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Sex differences in estimating multiple intelligences in self and others: A replication in Russia

This was a crosscultural study that focused on sex differences in self‐ and other‐estimates of multiple intelligences (including 10 that were specified by Gardner, 1999 and three by Sternberg, 1988) as well as in an overall general intelligence estimate. It was one of a programmatic series of studies done in over 30 countries that has demonstrated the female “humility” and male “hubris” effect in self‐estimated and other‐estimated intelligence. Two hundred and thirty Russian university students estimated their own and their parents’ overall intelligence and “multiple intelligences.” Results revealed no sex difference in estimates of overall intelligence for both self and parents, but men rated themselves higher on spatial intelligence. This contradicted many previous findings in the area which have shown that men rate their own overall intelligence and mathematical intelligence significantly higher than do women. Regressions indicated that estimates of verbal, logical, and spatial intelligences were the best predictors of estimates of overall intelligence, which is a consistent finding over many studies. Regressions also showed that participants’ openness to experience and self‐respect were good predictors of intelligence estimates. A comparison with a British sample showed that Russians gave higher mother estimates, and were less likely to believe that IQ tests measure intelligence. Results were discussed in relation to the influence of gender role stereotypes on lay conception of intelligence across cultures.     

The shadow of familiarity: a contributor to the intersubjective field

This paper examines the influence of familiarity on the progress of analysis. It is proposed that familiarity is a particular aspect of the intersubjective field which emerges over time and begins to shape and influence the behaviours, perceptions, thoughts, and feelings of the participants. It is also proposed that states of familiarity can have facilitative or defensive functions in an analytic relationship and that it is an influence co-created in the field. The experience of familiarity operates as background to our various foreground concerns in analytic work and therefore exists primarily as an implicit, rather than explicit, experience in analysis. Defensive familiarity often creates a feeling of relatedness that is subtly unrelated, a form of pseudo-intimacy. Parallels between defensive familiarity and related concepts are examined including defences against the unknown, role responsiveness, romantic love, the image of the stranger, and unformulated experience. This paper concludes with two case examples and a discussion of procedural knowledge in the implicit domain as an explanatory framework for the understanding of familiarity states in the analytic setting.     

Growth motivation as a moderator of behavioral self-handicapping in women

Behavioral self-handicapping is a strategy used to protect attributions about ability. People behaviorally self-handicap by creating an obstacle to their success so failure is attributed to the obstacle instead of to their ability. Although past research has observed behavioral self-handicapping exclusively in men, the current research revealed a moderator of behavioral self-handicapping in women: growth motivation, which reflects the desire to develop one's abilities and learn from failure. Participants (N = 100) completed a test purportedly predictive of successful careers and relationships, and some were given failure feedback about their performance. Participants could behaviorally self-handicap by choosing to complete another test in a performance-impairing environment. Although men self-handicapped more overall, women self-handicapped more after failure when they were low in growth motivation. These results highlight a novel moderator of behavioral self-handicapping in women.     

Modeling,Truth, and Philosophy

Knowledge requires truth, and truth, we suppose, involves unflawed representation. Science does not provide knowledge in this sense but rather provides models, representations that are limited in their accuracy, precision, or, most often, both. Truth as we usually think of it is an idealization, one that serves wonderfully in most ordinary applications, but one that can terribly mislead for certain issues in philosophy. This article sketches how this happens for five important issues, thereby showing how philosophical method must take into account the idealized nature of our familiar conception of truth.     

Justification is potential knowledge

This paper will articulate and defend a novel theory of epistemic justification; I characterize my view as the thesis that justification is potential knowledge (JPK). My project is an instance of the ‘knowledge-first’ programme, championed especially by Timothy Williamson. So I begin with a brief recapitulation of that programme.