STRATÉGIES COGNITIVES ET PROCESSUS D'AUTORÉGULATION CHEZ DES FAMILLES EN SITUATION DE RÉSOLUTION DE PROBLÈMES LOGIQUES*

The family is a fundamental learning environment for many basic skills such as the ability to solve everyday domestic problems. A lack of competence in this type of problem solving would expose the individual to more frustration and possibly create the conditions for greater aggression. Forty-two low SES families, each including an aggressive boy, were invited to the laboratory for a problem-solving session on two occasions, at an interval of two years. Subjects were asked to find four preset combinations of colours by systematic permutations of four colours using a computer. Three types of cognitive performance were examined: resolution strategies, autoregulation strategies and the success rate in finding the solution. Results showed that most of the families were consistent in their use of a non-systematic strategy. Although some improvement in planning is observed during the second testing, no other improvement in autoregulation strategies was observed. In general, families had a better rate of success in finding the solution in the second session. The low cognitive level of these families and its stability are discussed. Étant donné que la famille constitue un terrain privilégié d'apprentissage, l'aggressivité comportementale de certains enfants pourrait résider dans le peu d'opportunités offertes par leur famille d'apprendre à affronter les problèmes de la vie quotidienne d'une manière réfléchie. Quarante-deux familles de milieu socio-économique faible, dont un des enfants est à risque d'inadaptation sociale et dont les parents sont peu scolarisés, ont à résoudre un problème nécessitant l'intelligence logique et ce, à deux ans d'intervalle (T-1 et T-2). La tâche consite à résoudre un problème de permutations à quatre éléments et se présente sous la forme d'un jeu d'ordinateur. Le fonctionnement cognitif est examiné selon trois dimensions: les stratégies cognitivcs de résolution, les stratégies d'autorégulation exercées, sur la démarche cognitive et l'issue de la démarche cognitive. L'examen des stratégies cognitives révèle que la majorité des familles utilisent une approche non stratégique et que cette approche est maintenue aussi bien à l'intérieur d'une séance donnée que d'une séance à l'autre. Exception faite de l'amélioration relevée à la séance 2 quant au contrôle exercé par les familles sur le déroulement de leur démarche cognitive, aucun changement n'émerge sur les autres critères de l'autorégulation. Finalement, les familles obtiennent une meilleure performance à la deuxième séance. La discussion porte sur la relative stabilité du niveau de fonctionnement cognitif des familles ainsi que sur la pauvreté apparente de leur répertoire de schèmes.     

Questions of scientific responsibility: the Baltimore case

A number of cases of questionable behavior in science have been extensively reported in the media during the last two or three years. What standards are upheld by the scientific community affect the community internally, and also affect its relations with society at large, including Congress. Here I wish to address questions of scientific responsibility, using the Baltimore case as a concrete instance where they came up. The first part containing historical background is necessary to provide readers with documentation so that they can have some factual bases on which to evaluate respective positions and my conclusions that follow -- based on further but more succinctly summarized documentation. I have reproduced many quotes because I firmly believe people are entitled to be represented by their own wording. Conversely, I hold people accountable for their official positions. Some of these are reproduced in footnotes, and some longer ones are reproduced in appendices. I also do not ask to be trusted. By providing numerous references, I hope that readers who find my documentation insufficient can follow up by looking up these references.... The article is in six parts: Part I. Historical Background. This part gives mostly a historical background of the early phases of the Baltimore case. Part II. The First Issue of Responsibility. This part presents a discussion of certain scientific responsibilities based on that background, specifically: the responsibility of answering questions about one's work, and the responsibility whether to submit to authority. Part III. The NIH Investigations. This part summarizes the two NIH investigations. Part IV. The Dingell Subcommittee. This part deals with the responsibilities of a Congressional Committee vis-à-vis science. Part V. Further Issues of Responsibility. This part goes into an open ended discussion of many issues of responsibility facing scientists, vis-à-vis themselves and vis-à-vis society at large, including Congress. The list is long, and readers can look at the section and paragraph headings to get an idea of their content. Part VI. Personal Credibility, a Shift at the Grass Roots, and Baltimore's Persistence.     

Gender role socialization in toy play situations: Mothers and fathers with their sons and daughters

This study examined the interaction within and between 20 intact families. As in past research, when parents were separated and not influenced by their child (i.e., completing a toy desirability scale), traditional findings were supported; neutral toys are not specific to the gender of the child while feminine toys were preferred for girls and masculine toys were preferred for boys. However, when parents were actively engaged in play with their child this traditional pattern was not supported. In general, parents spent the least amount of time with feminine toys. Children eagerly accepted most of the toys presented by their parents and their enthusiasm was equal for the toys in all three categories. This research suggests a change in parents' perceptions of what is acceptable gender-typing behavior.     

Type of academic training and causal attributions for social problems

To provide evidence of the effects of academic training on causal attributions, university students in social science, commerce and engineering were compared at different points of their training in terms of their explanations of poverty and unemployment. Results of cross-sectional analyses showed no field differences in causal attributions at the beginning of the first academic year but significant differences at the end of the year, with social science students blaming the system more than commerce or engineering students. Longitudinal analysis showed that, within a six-month interval, the causal attributions of the students changed significantly as a function of their field of study. Differential employment prospects, while not accounting for the effects of academic training, were found to be related to attributional change. These results confirm the hypothesis that causal attributions are affected by socialization in a particular culture and that exposure to the culture of the social sciences reinforces a system-blame ideology. The implications of these findings for theories of the attribution process and theories of intergroup relations are discussed.     

On the speed of different senses and nerve transmission by Hirsch (1862)

A translation is given of Hirsch's pioneering paper of 1862 on chronoscopic experiments On the speed of different senses and nerve transmission. Hirsch was the first (1) to use Hipp's chronoscope in scientific literature, (2) to study reaction time in connection to psychological interest, and (3) to study velocity of conduction in humans with appropriate techniques. Using Hipp apparatus, Hirsch showed differences in time for manual response (1) to auditory, visual, and tactile stimulation; (2) between observers; (3) in Hirsch's own results when fresh and when fatigued; (4) according to the locus of tactile stimulation and the hand used for response; and (5) according to whether the stimulus was expected or unexpected. Moreover, observations made on one of his colleagues relate the conduction speed in nerves, from which he concludes that the differences in reaction time were due to the varying lengths of nerves. The speed of transmission in sensory nerves was evaluated by Hirsch at about 34 m/s. This work constitutes a prelude of Donders' research on the speed of mental processes.     

Studies in social influence IV: Minority influence in a context of original judgments

This research was devoted to the studv of minoritv influence in a context of originality of judgments. It was stimulated by a consideration of the role pla-ved by the normative context in influence processes. In most research, this implicitlv underlies the phenomena studied. Thus, studies of social control have naturally appealed to the objectivity context. Innovation, in the social milieu in which it is involved, frequentlv implies an originality context. We hoped to study experimentally its effects on the process of social change. To this end, five experimental conditions were created, in which the originality norm was introduced in different ways – by experimental instructions, by influencing the perception of his own creativity by each individual and by using the time factor to encourage the fuller acceptance of this norm. In each condition, a consistent minority defended a deviant response in a colour perception task (the experimental paradigm used in our previous research using an objectivity context). The originality context affected the development of minority influence. Judgment based on perceptual evidence was abandoned to a significant degree, and new influence behaviours appeared. Individuals followed the minority or avoided the conflict by apparently original compromise responses. They were able to adopt several modes of response in the destructured way during the experiment, as they could oppose the minority by adopting a counter-norm. Although these reactions depended on the way in which the originality norm was introduced, theprimary role in this process was nevertheless played by the minority, which provided the pole of attraction and persuasion in the group.     

Studies in social influence: V. Minority influence and conversion behavior in a perceptual task

The effects of influence attempts by a majority and by a minority were examined on both a manifest response level and a latent perceptual level. Female subjects were exposed to a series of blue slides that were consistently labeled as green by a female confederate. The confederate was presented as a member of either a majority or a minority. On each trial, subjects were required to indicate the color of the slide presented and the color of the afterimage perceived on a white screen following removal of the slide. It was predicted that (a) the subject's judgment of the chromatic afterimage would be modified when the influence agent represented a minority, and (b) this modification will be more pronounced when the source of influence is absent than when it is present. The results supported the prediction in both the main study and its replication.     

Towards a theory of collective phenomena: Consensus and attitude changes in groups

This study presents the outline of a model for collective phenomena. A symmetry-breaking model combines a number of well-established social psychology hypotheses with recent concepts of statistical physics. Specifically we start out from the regularities obtained in studies on the polarization of attitudes and decisions. From a strictly logical point of view, it is immediately clear that aggregation effects must be analysed separately from group effects as such. The conceptual analysis of the assumed mechanisms reveals that when we deal with phenomena that have until now been designated as polarization phenomena, we are faced not with a single phenomenon, as was believed hitherto, but with a whole class of phenomena. For this reason it would be appropriate to deal with them differentially both from an empirical and from a theoretical point of view. It is possible to show, moreover, that in principle polarization is a direct function of interaction and, beyond a critical threshold an inverse function of the differentiation between group members. A certain number of verifiable conjectures are presented on the basis of physio-mathematical-psychological considerations. It is to be hoped that these theoretical outlines will make it possible to give a new lease on life to a field of research that has established solid facts, but that became trapped in a dead-end road, for lack of a sufficiently broad analysis.     

Studies in social influence VI: Is Lenin orange or red? Imagery and social influence

Two experiments dealing with the effects of a majority or a minority source influence, solely on the recognition of a portrait, let us study the generalization of the influence to a portrait symbolically linked to a colour. According to the theory of conversion, the bringing into play of the validation process of the stimulus when the source is a minority should allow such a generalization cognitive association. When the source is a majority, a social comparison process should lead to compliance about the portrait, without any cognitive investigation of the whole stimulus. In the first experiment, four slides were shown successively using material similar to Luchins' (1945) and progressively drawing the portrait of Lenin, with a red-orange background for each phase. The dependant variables are: (1) the drawing, (2) the colour of the background, (3) the after-image. On the two last slides for which the answer ‘Lenin’ is given by the source, changes towards red (and the complementary colour green), in the absence of the source under the minority influence, and changes towards orange under majority influence in the absence of the source are registered. Moreoever, the most significant changes of the colour judgment are due to the subjects who refuse to answer ‘Lenin’ during the interaction. In the second experiment, only the fourth slide, on which Lenin's portrait completely appears is shown. The subjects submitted to majority influence answer ‘Lenin’ more than the control group does, only in the presence of the source and change their judgment on the colour of the after-image towards the complementary of orange in the absence of the source. When the source is a minority a sinificant effect towards the red and its complementary colour is shown.     

Studies in social influence III: Majority versus minority influence in a group

This experimental study was aimed at investigating the mechanisms of influence involved in the two functionally opposed phenomena of innovation and conformity. We have been concerned for several years with the former of these two phenomena because of its intrinsic importance and the limited amount of research devoted to it. In the present article we have attempted not only to analyse the position more thoroughly, but also to compare the effects of innovation with those of conformity. In particular, we have endeavoured to show that behavioural style acts as a general source of influence in the two phenomena under consideration, where manifest judgments are concerned. On the other hand, the latent effects of influence may be different in the two cases of innovation and conformity. To investigate these questions, we developed an experimental design consisting of three parts. The first part was intended to study manifest influence on a quasi-physical judgment based on a cultural truism. The second part was aimed at the study of latent modifications in the perceptual-cognitive code as a result of influence. The third, in the form of a postexperimental questionnaire, was intended to provide information about various aspects, including the perception of the agent of influence by subjects. The main function of the experimental manipulations was to vary the minority or majority relationship of the agent of influence within a group, and its behavioural style, consistent or inconsistent. Our main findings indicate that behavioural consistency is the main factor behind the influence exerted by both majority and minority. But whereas, in conformity, influence is limited to modifying manifest judgments, in innovation, it changes the perceptual-cognitive code underlying such judgments.