Revisiting the Effects of Anger on Risk‐Taking: Empirical and Meta‐Analytic Evidence for Differences Between Males and Females

That anger elicited in one situation can carry over to drive risky behavior in another situation has been described since the days of Aristotle. The present studies examine the mechanisms through which and the conditions under which such behavior occurs. Across three experiments, as well as a meta‐analytic synthesis of the data, results reveal that incidental anger is significantly more likely to drive risky decision making among males than among females. Moreover, the experiments document that, under certain circumstances, such risk‐taking pays off financially. Indeed, the present experiments demonstrate that, because the expected‐value‐maximizing strategy in these studies rewarded risk‐taking, angry‐male individuals earned more money than did both neutral‐emotion males and angry females. In sum, these studies found evidence for robust disparities between males and females for anger‐driven risk‐taking. Importantly, although men did not experience more anger than women, they did show a heightened tendency to respond to anger with risk‐taking. Published 2016. This article has been contributed to by US Government employees and their work is in the public domain in the USA.     

Sexual freedoms

Women—still—experience different forms of sexism in their daily lives. After the sixteenth‐century Protestant proclamation of the blessings of motherhood and women's bodies, and the women's sexual liberation movement of the 1960s, women's real freedoms and rights with their bodies, including sexual relations and procreation, are still being negotiated. Violence against women's bodies, including sex trafficking, relates to both the lack of appropriate education and fundamentally distorted views of humanity. Considering Luther's teaching on women as imago Dei, and attending theologically to the issues pertaining to misogyny—such as reforming the traditionally male‐centered God‐language and challenging the culture's implicit permission for ongoing violence against women—are some of the concrete steps that can be taken. Given the revelations with the #MeToo movement, the ELCA's 2018 draft on the Social Statement on Gender and Justice is timely.     

双性化大学生人格特征研究

通过对北京市某所大学826名大学生的调查,探讨性别、性别角色类型和新性别角色类型对大学生人格特征的影响。结果表明：1）双性化性别角色类型大学生约占1／4;2）用贝姆的分类方法,双性化大学生在开放性、宜人性、责任感、和谐性、人情、灵活性人格特征上均高于其他性别角色类型的大学生,可见,双性化性别角色大学生具有较积极的人格特征。按照Brenda Mae Woodhill和CurtisA．Samuels的分类方法,在外向性、开放性、宜人性、责任感、和谐性人格特征上,正性双性化性别角色类型的大学生均高于负性双性化大学生和其他性别角色类型的大学生。     

Episodic chasing in pathological gamblers using the Iowa gambling task

"Chasing ones losses" is a key symptom among pathological gamblers (PGs). This study focuses on quantitative differences in episodic chasing (i.e., sequences of disadvantageous decisions within a single gambling session) between PGs and non-pathological gamblers (NPGs). We compared 61 PGs and 39 NPGs on the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) and the Zuckerman Sensation Seeking Scale (SSS). The PGs showed significantly more chasing and had significantly poorer decision-making strategies than NPGs, particularly among males (F = 4.52, p < 0.05). Random players were significantly less sensation seeking than advantageous and disadvantageous (i.e., chasing) players, but there was no interaction with group or gender. The results suggest that quantifiable within-session gambling behavior holds important implications for detecting underlying vulnerabilities to gambling pathology.     

Women’s preference of therapist based on sex of therapist and presenting problem: An analog study

An analog study was conducted to examine differences in women’s preference for and anticipated comfort self-disclosing to hypothetical therapists of different sexes based on the type of hypothetical presenting problem. The impact of general level of self-disclosure was also examined. Participants included female college students (n?=?187). Anticipated comfort self-disclosing to male or female therapist was rated by subjects when presented with therapists of each sex with the same qualifications. Women preferred and reported higher levels of anticipated comfort self-disclosing to a female therapist. The type of hypothetical presenting problem and general level of self-disclosure also impacted anticipated comfort self-disclosing. There was an interaction between general level self-disclosure and the sex of therapist on anticipated comfort self-disclosing. General level of self-disclosure only impacted anticipated comfort self-disclosing when the therapist was male. This information is relevant for therapists or organizations that provide psychosocial services to women. Organizations may want to inquire about a client’s preferences about sex of therapist beforehand and, if possible, cater to the client’s preference.     

Remarks on an Avoidable Error in a Posteriori Testing

This article discusses a widespread error that occurs with a posteriori testing in factorial analyses of variance. Frequently, an incorrect sample size is used under the radical in the formula for computing a critical difference such as the Fisher least significance difference. This usually leads to an inappropriately large critical difference; thus, few if any significant differences are uncovered between the means. An interesting example of this error, from a journal article by Van Berschot (1979), is examined. Researchers are urged always to use under the radical the number of observations on which each mean being compared is based.     

Concordance Between the Quality of Maternal and Paternal Parenting Behavior Within Couples

There is compelling evidence that the quality of maternal and paternal parenting behavior bears critical importance for child development. Yet, less is known of the degree of similarity between maternal and paternal parenting behavior in families, and especially little is known about the factors that may explain variation in degrees of similarity. This article aims to examine (a) the concordance (similarity) between the quality of mothers’ and fathers’ interactive behavior with their child and (b) the sociodemographic determinants of this concordance. The sample included 74 families (mother, father, and their child). The quality of maternal and paternal interactive behavior was assessed independently, and rated with the Maternal Behavior Q-Sort (mother–infant, 12 months; D. R. Pederson et al., 1990) or the Mutually Responsive Orientation scale (father–toddler, 18 months; N. Aksan et al., 2006). The results indicated that the overall correlation between the quality of mothers’ and fathers’ behavior was moderate. The concordance was greater among higher socioeconomic status families or when interacting with a boy, but did not differ according to the presence or absence of siblings in the family.     

Information Transmission in Young Children: When Social Information Is More Important Than Nonsocial Information

The authors’ aim was to use a highly novel open diffusion paradigm to investigate the transmission of social information (i.e., gossip) and general knowledge within 2 groups of 10- and 11-year-old children. Four children, 2 from each group, acted as a primed information source, selected on the basis of sex and dominance ranking (high or low) within the group. Each source received 1 piece of gossip and 1 piece of general knowledge from the experimenter during natural class interaction, and the information was allowed to diffuse naturally within the group. Results revealed that gossip was transmitted more frequently than knowledge, and that male sources were more likely to transmit gossip than female sources. The relationship between characteristics of the source, and characteristics of the gossip recipient, also appeared influential with the dominant male source transmitting gossip to exclusively to friends, and the nondominant male source transmitting to individuals of higher peer regard than themselves.     

Improving Children's Mental Rotation Accuracy With Computer Game Playing

The authors investigated the relation between mental rotation (MR) and computer game-playing experience. Third grade boys (n = 24) and girls (n = 23) completed a 2-dimensional MR test before and after playing computer games (during 11 separate 30-min sessions), which either involved the use of MR skills (the experimental group) or did not involve the use of MR skills (the control group). The experimental group outperformed the control group on the MR posttest but not on the pretest. Boys outperformed girls on the pretest but not on the posttest. Children whose initial MR performance was low improved after playing computer games that entailed MR skills. The findings imply that computer-based instructional activities can be used in schools to enhance children's spatial abilities.