Self-esteem,motivation and school attendance among sub-Saharan African girls: A self-determination theory perspective

Sub-Saharan samples are severely under-represented in the psychological literature. Taking an ecological approach, the current study examines key propositions derived from self-determination theory in a sample of adolescent girls in Mozambique. As a framework theory, self-determination theory consists of six sub-theories. We test the main premises of two of these theories: organismic integration theory and basic psychological need theory. In line with organismic integration theory, we assess the role of intrinsic, extrinsic, introjected and identified motivation for school attendance. We also test the possible moderating role of the ecological variable resource scarcity. The second part of the study focuses on the main premise of the basic psychological need sub-theory, which states that satisfaction of the needs for relatedness, competence and autonomy underlies intrinsic motivation, goal-directed behaviour (school attendance) and well-being (self-esteem). The study also assesses the moderation of resource scarcity in these relationships. Results provide support for both sub-theories of self-determination theory. Resource scarcity is not found to moderate the relationships between motivation and attendance or between need satisfaction and well-being, motivation and attendance. Implications for the universality claim of self-determination theory, as well as for the field of international development aid, are discussed.     

Independent first- and second-order motion energy analyses of optic flow

The human visual system contains a functional sub-system that is specialized to extract image motion. The sensitivities of neurons change as one moves higher in the pathway. Initially cells collect responses from small retinal areas but later those local signals are combined to extract global motion; either frontoparallel or radial motion relative to the center of the visual field. This sequence of processing is conducted in parallel by pathways sensitive to the motion of either the first- or second-order luminance statistics of the image. Previously it had been shown that these two pathways were independent at the level at which local motion signals and frontoparallel global motion signals are extracted. In this study independence is tested during the extraction of radial global motion; a process strongly associated with cortical area MST (or V6) and the next logical level in the motion pathway. We find that the two pathways do provide independent estimates of radial motion and are, therefore, independent at all levels of the motion pathway that have been tested to date. Received: 20 January 1999 / Accepted: 10 January 2000     

Looking at the past through a telescope: adults postdated their earliest childhood memories

ABSTRACT

Our previous studies have consistently shown a telescoping error in children’s dating of earliest childhood memories. Preschool children through adolescents systematically date their earliest memories at older ages, in comparison with the age estimates provided by their parents or by themselves previously. In the current study, we examined the dating of earliest childhood memories in two samples of college adults and collected independent age estimates from their parents. Consistent with our findings with children, adults significantly postdated their earlier memories by approximately 12 months (Study 1) and 6 months (Study 2). The actual age of earliest memories was 2.5 years after adjusted for telescoping errors, 1 year earlier than what is commonly believed at 3.5 years. These findings challenge commonly held theoretical assumptions about childhood amnesia and highlight critical methodological issues in the study of childhood memory.