Children and adults both see ‘pirates’ in ‘parties’: letter‐position effects for developing readers and skilled adult readers

Developing readers often make anagrammatical errors (e.g. misreading pirates as parties), suggesting they use letter position flexibly during word recognition. However, while it is widely assumed that the occurrence of these errors decreases with increases in reading skill, empirical evidence to support this distinction is lacking. Accordingly, we compared the performance of developing child readers (aged 8–10 years) against the end‐state performance of skilled adult readers in a timed naming task, employing anagrams used previously in this area of research. Moreover, to explore the use of letter position by developing readers and skilled adult readers more fully, we used anagrams which, to form another word, required letter transpositions over only interior letter positions, or both interior and exterior letter positions. The patterns of effects across these two anagram types for the two groups of readers were very similar. In particular, both groups showed similarly slowed response times (and developing readers increased errors) for anagrams requiring only interior letter transpositions but not for anagrams that required exterior letter transpositions. This similarity in the naming performance of developing readers and skilled adult readers suggests that the end‐state skilled use of letter position is established earlier during reading development than is widely assumed.     

Work involvement among college-educated women: A methodological extension

This paper has two objectives: (1) to develop a more complex measure of work involvement than that typically used, and (2) to correlate this measure with selected lifestyle/family and work variables. The data were drawn primarily from a 1981 survey of 110 female graduates of a large Midwestern university who completed their undergraduate degrees in 1967. Respondents were categorized as high, moderate, or low on a work involvement index based on four variables: work continuity, work status, current or most recent occupation, and educational achievement. Findings in the area of lifestyle/family suggest that high work-involved women are more likely to be single and to marry later when they do marry, less likely to have children, and less likely to perceive conflicts between marriage/relationships and/or children and a career. Findings in the area of work suggest that high work-involved women are significantly more likely to work in male-dominated occupations and to earn salaries of $20,000 or more. High work-involved women are also significantly more likely to be supervisors, to report that most of the people in their work group or branch are below them in rank/position, to be working with all or predominantly men, to have men above them in rank, and to have experienced sex discrimination on the job. In the area of job satisfaction, the differences by work involvement are not as pronounced. High work-involved women are significantly more likely to be employed and not job hunting — one measure of job satisfaction. However, they are no more or less likely than moderate or low work-involved women to perceive their job as a compromise with what they expected or to report overall job satisfaction. Some directions for future research are discussed.Environmental Strategies, Inc.Preparation of this report was supported, in part, by the Providence College Fund to Aid Faculty Research. Thanks are due to the staff of The Henry A. Murray Research Center of Radcliffe College for access to the 1970 questionnaires, to Sharon R. Jenkins for data processing consultation, and to the anonymous reviewers for their helpful suggestions.     

MMPI profiles of adolescents charged with homicide

Study of adolescent violence has been impeded by failure to distinguish among the circumstances in which youth engage in violent behavior. The present study investigated MMPI profiles of 36 adolescent murderers and a control group of 18 adolescents charged with larceny. Homicide cases were subgrouped into those who committed homicide secondary to another crime (e.g., robbery or rape) and those who acted in the context of interpersonal conflict with the victim. While there were no significant differences between homicide and larceny groups, crime and conflict subgroups were significantly different on scales F, Hs, Hy, and Sc.     

Rorschach object relations of adolescents who committed homicide.

We investigated the object relations of adolescents who committed homicide. A clinical sample of 55 adolescents who committed homicide did not differ from a comparison group of nonviolent delinquents on Rorschach measures of object differentiation, mutuality of autonomy, and aggressive content. However, the subgroup of adolescents who committed homicides in the context of another crime (e.g., robbery or burglary) did manifest significantly lower object relations (poorer object differentiation and more victim responses) than the subgroup of adolescents whose homicides were committed in the context of an interpersonal conflict or dispute with the victim. These findings support the need for differentiated classification of violent individuals as urged by Megargee (1970) over 20 years ago.     

Ten principles of counselling: Grounded theory in a mixed methods research project

This grounded theory (GT) study is part of an extensive mixed methods research project to develop general principles for counselling. Nine hundred counselling protocols were examined. The material is characterised by a quantitative amount of data with a qualitative character. The research is based on the systemic-constructivist research paradigm. The variety of perspectives is an important aspect of the work. Therefore, it is important that the entire research process with GT takes place in exchange with other research settings in order to minimise the limitations caused by the perspective of the researchers. During the research process, there was an intensive examination of GT in order to adapt it to the research project. By using the GT to analyse the extensive qualitative material, the actions of the counsellors were observed and 10 counselling principles were developed. This article presents the research process and the findings.     

The effectiveness of computerized instruction at the college level: Five suggestions for successful implementation

Although the literature suggests that computers cannot completely replace traditional learning environments, a closer examination of factors that confound method with medium offers new research avenues for successful implementation of computer-based learning at the college level. Five suggestions for successful implementation of computers in the university setting are discussed.     

Having it all? Combining work and family in a male and a female profession

Are women in a female-dominated profession more successfully able to combine work and family obligations than women in a male-dominated profession? To explore this question, a comparison was made between the family status and careers of 747 women librarians (a female-dominated profession) and those of 449 women MBAs (a male-dominated profession). It was expected that the librarians would marry earlier and have more children. This general prediction was not supported. Over half of both groups of women were married, and after controlling for age, there were no differences in number of children. However, many women without children in both groups reported that they would like to be mothers. This disparity between wanting children and not having them was more common for women MBAs than women MLSs. MBAs and librarians were about equally likely to have had job interruptions, but librarians were more likely to have worked part-time. Reasons for an interruption to full-time work were as likely to be for problems finding (full-time) work as for family responsibilities. Librarians' salaries were much lower, but job interruptions and part-time work had a more negative effect on the salaries of women in business. In sum, the data suggest that many of the women surveyed have not combined motherhood with a professional career and that it is probably somewhat more difficult to combine a family with a career in business than with a career in library science.     

On the Relation between Representational and Processing Models of Asyntactic Comprehension

Most accounts of asyntactic comprehension fall along a spectrum from pure representational accounts to pure processing accounts. The double dependency hypothesis of Mauner, Fromkin, and Cornell (1993) is an example of the former, while the SYNCHRON model of Haarman and Kolk (1991; see also Kolk, this volume) is an example of the latter. This paper attempts to demonstrate some of the ways that these two approaches interact. We introduce GENCHRON, a computer model based on Haarman and Kolk′s SYNCHRON. GENCHRON is a parser subject to the kinds of processing deficits examined in Haarman and Kolk (1991). We present a simple grammar which leads GENCHRON to produce the kinds of semantic representations which Mauner, Fromkin, and Cornell (1993) propose for asyntactic comprehenders.     

Homicide by juvenile girls

We investigated offense characteristics for a national sample of 38,749 homicide arrestees identified in the FBI Supplemental Homicide Reports for 1984 and 1993. Analyses indicated little change from 1984 to 1993 in the circumstances of homicides committed by adolescent girls; however, there were consistent offense differences between girls and boys, and between girls and women. Homicides by adolescent girls were more likely than those committed by boys to involve interpersonal conflict rather than a criminal motive such as robbery. Girls were more likely than boys to use a knife rather than a firearm and their victims were more likely to be under the age of 13 years. Compared to women (18 years or older), girls were more likely to act with an accomplice and their victims were more likely to be female and between 13 and 20 years of age. Results were inconsistent with a stereotypic masculinization theory of the increase in female violence, but provide indirect support for the importance of domestic stress and relational conflict experienced by adolescent girls. Overall, this study supports the need for differentiated study of violence by juvenile girls, and for preventive interventions which target domestic and interpersonal stress.     

Male-Female relationships in best-selling “modern Gothic” novels

This study is a content analysis of 24 randomly selected best-selling modern Gothic or romantic suspense novels published between 1950 and May 1974. The focus was on the interrelationships between the male and female characters in terms of their sex-role characterization and the attitudes and behavior of the hero towards the heroine and the supporting female actor. The findings indicate that (1) the hero displays more positive attitudes and behavior toward the nontraditional woman (generally the heroine) than towards the traditional one (generally the minor female) and (2) the hero who chooses the less traditional female is usually characterized as traditional.Response Analysis CorporationThe authors wish to express their gratitude to William Diggins for his assistance in the coding and analysis of the male characters.