Gender bias in estimating political expertise

The present study reveals that there is a gender bias in estimates of spouses' political expertise. Data were collected from married couples in one city in north-eastern Japan and the results showed that when all respondents were included, the estimation of spouses' political expertise was moderately accurate. However, while husbands' estimates of the political expertise of their wives were lowered and less accurate, wives' estimates of the political expertise of their husbands were more accurate. The implication of these findings for the political equality of males and females is discussed.     

What Kind of Paintings Inspire Children when Viewing Art?

Viewing art inspires creativity, which can encourage learning in art education. A previous study revealed that the type of artwork and the way art is viewed affects adults' inspiration; however, no study exists concerning the way children are inspired by viewing art. Thus, the current study aimed to examine whether children's age group/grade level, art style (figurative or abstract), and artwork creators (children or adults) influence children's inspiration, and whether the effects of the art style and creators vary by children's age group/grade level. An online questionnaire survey was conducted with the help of 600 pairs of parents and their elementary-school-aged children. They were asked to view eight paintings that differed in terms of the artists and their individual style and they then rated their inspiration experience when viewing each artwork. The results revealed that children were more inspired when viewing abstract, rather than figurative, paintings, and the effect of the type of painting differed in the third and sixth grades. Additionally, children gained more inspiration by viewing paintings created by children rather than by adults; a difference observed in all grade levels.     

Orthography and phonology in reading Japanese kanji words: Evidence from the semantic decision task with homophones

Correspondences between spelling and sound for Japanese kanji are complex and deep. The meaning of kanji words has generally been assumed to be accessed directly from orthography without phonological mediation. Experiment 1, however, replicated the findings of Van Orden (1987) that subjects made more false-positive errors on homophone foils than they did on nonhomophone controls in a semantic decision task, although they did so only when the foils were orthographically similar to the correct exemplars, which indicates both orthographic and phonological activations of meaning. Experiment 2 showed the same results when subjects were not required to pronounce the target words after semantic decisions, which indicates automatic phonological activation of kanji words. In Experiment 3, under pattern-masking conditions, this homophony effect was reduced but remained on errors, and the orthographic-similarity effect remained strong on both homophone and nonhomophone foils. These results suggest that both orthography and phonology play an important role in the comprehension of kanji words.     

"Robovie, you'll have to go into the closet now": children's social and moral relationships with a humanoid robot

Children will increasingly come of age with personified robots and potentially form social and even moral relationships with them. What will such relationships look like? To address this question, 90 children (9-, 12-, and 15-year-olds) initially interacted with a humanoid robot, Robovie, in 15-min sessions. Each session ended when an experimenter interrupted Robovie's turn at a game and, against Robovie's stated objections, put Robovie into a closet. Each child was then engaged in a 50-min structural-developmental interview. Results showed that during the interaction sessions, all of the children engaged in physical and verbal social behaviors with Robovie. The interview data showed that the majority of children believed that Robovie had mental states (e.g., was intelligent and had feelings) and was a social being (e.g., could be a friend, offer comfort, and be trusted with secrets). In terms of Robovie's moral standing, children believed that Robovie deserved fair treatment and should not be harmed psychologically but did not believe that Robovie was entitled to its own liberty (Robovie could be bought and sold) or civil rights (in terms of voting rights and deserving compensation for work performed). Developmentally, while more than half the 15-year-olds conceptualized Robovie as a mental, social, and partly moral other, they did so to a lesser degree than the 9- and 12-year-olds. Discussion focuses on how (a) children's social and moral relationships with future personified robots may well be substantial and meaningful and (b) personified robots of the future may emerge as a unique ontological category.     

Contextual effects of personal network on individuals' tendency to blame the victims of sexual harassment

Victim-blaming has been studied extensively, especially in the context of sexual violence. In the present study, the distribution of opinion with regard to female victims of sexual violence among people in the respondents' networks was used to explain their victim-blaming tendency. Data from respondents' personal networks were collected, and the results revealed that respondents' attitudes towards victim-blaming correlated positively with the proportion of network others who had positive attitudes towards victim-blaming. The correlation was stronger among respondents who had low concern for the issue. The results supported a model of information bias of personal network on attitudes.     

Maximizing Tendency Predicts Delayed Marriage Among Japanese Adults

The present study examined whether maximizing tendency predicts Japanese adults' likelihood of getting married and their age at first marriage. Registered members of a survey company panel (n = 428) completed the Japanese version of the Relational Maximization Scale, which was used to assess maximizing tendency consisting of two factors. The first factor, “high standards,” was not related to either of the two variables under investigation. The second factor, “alternative search,” was positively related to age at first marriage but not to the likelihood of getting married. The results thus suggest that those who seek the best possible marriage partner tend to get married at a later age, but that they are as likely to get married as those who do not. The finding that maximizing tendency did not significantly predict the likelihood of marriage suggests that getting married remains a strong social norm in Japan.     

Voice onset time characteristics in apraxia of speech

In order to examine the timing control of laryngeal and supralaryngeal articulatory adjustments in apraxia of speech, voice onset time (VOT) data for stop consonants in monosyllables /de/, /te/, /ge/ and /ke/ were obtained from four apraxic subjects and compared with those of fluent aphasic and normal (both young and aged) speakers (Experiment 1). The results indicated that the VOT distribution patterns of the apraxic patients differed markedly from those of the other speakers. A second experiment was conducted to determine whether the VOT distribution patterns of these four apraxic patients and of two normal controls would change with a lapse of time (Experiment 2). The results of the second experiment demonstrated marked changes in the VOT distribution patterns over time in half of the apraxic patients examined, but essentially no change in the normal controls.