Social influences on remembering: Intellectual,interpersonal and intergroup components

When people recall an event collaboratively we may expect the product to be influenced by the combined cognitive resources of the group, interpersonal acquaintance of the members, and social competition engendered by salient intergroup considerations. Using undergraduate students and serving police officers as subjects, a range of experimental conditions was established which varied on the three factors of cognitive resources of the participants (Cognitive Resources), interpersonal acquaintance of the participants (Interpersonal Acquaintance) and professional salience (Professional Salience) of the recall material. Participants answered a questionnaire concerning a police interrogation they had witnessed, and rated how much confidence they had in their answers. Multiple regression revealed statistically significant associations between (i) Cognitive Resources and number of correct answers, (ii) Interpersonal Acquaintance and confidence for implicational errors, and (iii) Professional Salience and (a) number of implicational errors and (b) confidence in confusional errors. The theoretical implications for our understanding of memory as a social process are discussed, and the practical implications for courtroom testimony briefly described.     

The effect of rehearsal delay on long-term imitation of filmed aggression

An experiment is described which investigates the effect of rehearsal delay on long-term imitation of a film model. The hypothesis tested was that a delay in the opportunity to imitate a film model would result in a reduction of imitation, ‘flitting’ and range of activities during play in the stimulus situation. One group of children played immediately after exposure to the film, a second after a delay of one day, a third after one week. All groups returned after an interval of seven days, and again after 4–5 months. The hypotheses were not accepted; the film influenced behaviour whatever the delay, but it was noted that the general effect of the films on activity level was less marked during the second session in the experimental situation, and increased after a few months' interval. The long-term effect of the film model was noted, and it was observed that at this time retention of the film model's behaviour was not related to imitative behaviour.     

Susceptibility to filmed models: A study of aggressive and constructive imitation

This study supports the view that young boys are, to some degree, consistent in their tendency to be influenced by what they have seen on films. Seventy-two boys were assigned randomly to an ‘aggressive’ film, a ‘constructive’ film, or a ‘mixed’ condition, in which they saw two ‘aggressive’ films, two ‘constructive’ films or one ‘aggressive’ and one ‘constructive’ film. The number of acts a boy imitated after seeing one film was positively correlated with the number of acts imitated after viewing the second film in all three conditions. This tendency is shown to be independent of the initial tendency to act in the way portrayed in the film. Further research into the question of individual differences in the tendency to imitate filmed behaviour is encouraged.     

Group size and satisfaction in shop stewards' meetings and management/union consultative committees

Current Psychology - The investigation examined a number of variables previously observed in laboratory studies. Two kinds of groups were studied: shop stewards' meetings, and joint...