Genetic psychology monographs最新文献

Two procedures were used to assess conservation of number in 56 kindergarten boys and girls. In the Standard condition children responded to the usual verbal questions about number. In the Modified condition the ability to conserve number was inferred from the child's judgments concerning which operations did or did not produce a promised increment in his collection of candies. In comparison to the Standard tests, the latter procedure was intended to be simpler verbally, more motivationally engaging, and more similar to the real-life situations in which children make judgments about quantity. Children performed significantly better in the Modified condition than in the Standard condition, a finding which suggests that the usual tests may not fully capture the child's understanding of number. Performance was also significantly better on tests of identity conservation than on tests of equivalence conservation. This identity-equivalence difference, however, was limited to the Standard condition; the two concepts were of equal difficulty when assessed by means of the Modified procedure.

A review of the research and theory on physiognomic perception was set forth. There have been several types of tasks and methods used to tap this domain; thus, a thorough discussion of this topic was presented. Early as well as recent studies indicative very high degrees of adult consensus in the making of physiognomic attributions. However, with individuals under (approximately) 10 years of age, consensus is not readily apparent--rather, a distinct developmental course has been suggested. Studies dealing with individual differences and several major theories of etiology were also examined in the light of current findings.

The present paper examined the social disengagement theory, which suggests that older people often do not wish to maintain the same level of immersion in social relations as their age increases. The theory suggests that a voluntary, mutual withdrawal takes place on the part of the elderly and the rest of society. The study is based upon a national random sample of 1002 first generation Japanese Americans (Issei). The Issei were interviewed by bilingual Japanese American interviewers. The sample included 66% men and 34% women, whose median ages were 76 and 71 years, respectively, and whose median number of school years completed in Japan was eight. The paper examined a series of indicators of Issei social participation--visiting patterns with friends and relatives, interest in political affairs, and membership in voluntary organizations--to determine whether there was a differential level of social participation by age or sex. The results of the study indicated some support for the social disengagement thesis. The findings indicated that age is inversely related to social participation. One notable exception to this general pattern was found: visiting with Issei's children does not decrease with age. Findings are discussed in light of the theoretical implications of the social disengagement thesis for future research among racial and cultural minorities.

The relationship between psychoanalytic theory and the experimental method is examined, with particular reference to the empirical studies on the oral and anal phases of development. The deficiencies in the design and conceptualization of many studies are discussed, as well as confusions in the writing of psychoanalytic theory. A central issue in bringing the experimental method to psychoanalytic theory is the question: What is being tested? A list of all projective and objective tests used to assess orality and anality is provided.

An integrated, testable, bio-psychological theory which proposes that hyperkinetic impulse disorder (H.I.D.) is determined interactively by polygenically inherited and environmental factors is presented and examined in the light of the literature. The theory holds that H.I.D. is a developmental disorder of intrinsic motivation, characterized by poor appreciation of the contingencies between behavior and environmental events. Characteristics of H.I.D. children, including apparent overactivity, impulsivity, impersistence, inattention, and underachievement in academic and social skills, are accounted for, and implications for treatment and management are spelled out.

The course of visual response integration was examined in four-month-old infants (N = 32 boys and girls) by presenting a bull's eye pattern pair and a striped pattern pair on a single display board. On the basis of Jeffrey's serial habituation hypothesis it was predicted that in the early period of exposure the infant's scanning behavior would be limited to two like pairs, but that as attention waned to the similar pairs one or more of the less preferred stimuli would be integrated into the attending response. A measure of three consecutive looks indicated that attention confined to one similar pair decreased significantly over time, whereas the initially lower three-look sequences to two similar and one dissimilar stimuli increased significantly.

Three experiments were designed to examine the expression of instrumental and hostile aggression by 6- to 10-year-old children during a competitive game. The rate at which a child pressed a button which allegedly interfered with his opponent's progress on the task was the measure of instrumental aggression. Pressing a second button presumably caused one's opponent to hear an aversive noise and served as the measure of hostile aggression. The task was designed in an attempt to isolate (a) frustration from attack as the instigator of aggression and (b) instrumental from hostile aggression as the desired outcome. In all three experiments the measures of instrumental and hostile aggression were generally highly correlated except under provocation conditions during which the number of attacks exceeded the number of frustrations. This suggested that the task was successful in tapping two different classes of aggressive responding. In Experiment 1 older children (N = 161 males and females) expressed more of both instrumental and hostile aggression than did younger children, and males were more aggressive than females on both measures. However, neither measure of aggression varied as a function of level of provocation. This finding was discrepant from the authors' previous research which had focused solely on instrumental aggression. Apparently, the introduction of attack and the opportunity for hostile responding changed the experimental situation. In order to focus more directly on this issue, Experiments 2 (N = 60 males) and 3 (N = 56 males) used various combinations of attack and frustration with 9- and 10-year-old males. Attack, prior to frustration, elicited the greatest amount of hostile aggression. Frustration, with no attack, resulted in the highest level of instrumental aggression. The complex relationship between these sources of provocation and instrumental and hostile aggression was discussed.

Eight middle class infants were administered a series of tasks over a nine month period from 5 to 14 months of age. Major procedures included object permanence, vacillation, memory for locations and pictures, and reaction to unfamiliar adults and to separation. The results suggested that during the last half of the first year there is a major enhancement in the ability to retrieve a representation of a past event, to compare that representation with present experience, and to tolerate both longer delays between an original and transformed event and greater interference during those delays. It was suggested that many of the diverse phenomena that appear during the last half of the first year are mediated, in part, by an amplification of memorial capacity.

Research on psychoactive drugs: antianxiety, antidepressant, and antipsychotic was reviewed. The drug families and their usual side effects were described. Proliferation of drug use, polypharmacy, and tardive dyskinesia were seen as areas of concern; advances in biological explanations of schizophrenia and manic-depressive disorders, and increasing knowledge about the brain's neurotransmitters brightened the investigative efforts.

The effects of physical health status, attitude toward retirement, and social class on temporal experience were studied in 70 male Ss, aged 52--74. A semistructured interview was utilized, and a content analysis by independent raters was performed on the resulting interview material. In general, it was found that chronic illness had a differential effect on experience, depending upon social class, for certain temporal variables. Among the healthy retirees it was also found that willingness to retire interacted with social class, and that blue collar workers who had resisted retirement resembled the chronically ill in terms of affect and temporal experience. The possibility for adjustment in retirement was linked to variations in temporal experience, and implications were drawn for preretirement intervention with specific social class target populations. Finally, psychological and behavioral consequences of variations in temporal experience were discussed, and the possibility of developing methods of altering temporal experience as a means of helping the elderly to adjust to life transitions was explored.