A behavioral decision theory approach for measuring McClelland's trichotomy of needs.

Describes the initial research associated with a new approach for measuring D. C. McClelland's trichotomy of needs. The method is based on behavioral decision theory and involves modeling an individual's decision-making behavior to determine how the person weights his or her need for affiliation, need for power (nPow), and need for achievement (nAch) in arriving at decisions. 161 scientists and engineers, 149 US Air Force officer graduate students, and 94 management executives were involved in this initial validation effort. All 8 hypotheses concerning inter- and intragroup relationships and concurrent validity issues were supported. The dominant motive for scientists, engineers, and graduate students was nAch, whereas nPow was dominant for management executives. Scientists, engineers, and graduate students had higher nAch scores than management executives, who had the highest nPow scores. Student GPA correlated with nAch, and officer performance scores correlated with nPow. Scientists and engineers who published had higher nAch scores than those who did not. (30 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The effect of experimental arousal of the affiliation motive on thematic apperception.

"The purpose of this study was to develop a method of scoring thematic apperception stories to measure strength of motivation for social acceptance, or n Affiliation. Imaginative stories were written in response to pictures by two groups of male Ss under experimental conditions designed to differ in the degree to which motivation to be accepted and liked by others would be aroused." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Achievement motivation, occupations, and labor turnover in New Zealand.

Used a nonprojective measure of achievement motivation to investigate the relationship among need for achievement (nAch), labor turnover, and occupations in New Zealand. Questionnaire results from 315 entrepreneurs, engineers, accountants, and middle managers revealed low turnover among high nAch self-employed Ss. High-turnover Ss displayed significantly higher achievement motivation levels than low-turnover Ss. Among engineers, accountants, and middle managers, those with high nAch had high labor mobility rates. Results are supportive of D. C. McClelland's theory and demonstrate the feasibility of extension of the model through use of nonprojective research methods. (18 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Ipsative behavioral variability and the quality of thematic apperceptive measurement of the achievement motive.

Ipsative behavioral variability is defined as change in the behavior of an individual in a constant environment. Through computer simulation of the dynamics of action (J. W. Atkinson and D. Birch; 1970, 1978), one may deduce that increases in ipsative variability in the expression of motivational imagery written in response to equally cued TAT pictures will increase the construct validity of that imagery regardless of the internal consistency reliability that remains. Empirical support for this hypothesis is offered by the finding that TAT need for achievement (nAch), measured in 4 stories written in response to weakly cued pictures, showed improved construct validity for 61 male undergraduates who were high rather than low in ipsative variability. TAT nAch showed significant construct validity for the high-variability group even though the internal consistency of this group's motive measure was –2.229. Findings disconfirm the general applicability of classical reliability theory to thematic apperceptive measures. (29 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A second look at need for achievement and need for autonomy as moderators of role perception–outcome relationships.

Work-manifested need for achievement (nAch) and need for autonomy (nAut) were examined as moderators of relationships between facets of role conflict and role ambiguity and the outcomes, organizational commitment, job involvement, psychosomatic complaints, and propensity to leave the organization; Ss were 262 public sector employees. Results fail to provide convincing evidence of pervasive linear moderating effects due to nAch or nAut on the variable linkages examined. Greater support was found for treating nAch and nAut as independent predictor variables in the regression analyses. (19 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"Self Verbalization and Emotional Arousal": Erratum.

Reports an error in the original article by David C. Rimm and Stuart B. Litvak (Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 1969[April],74[2],181-187). On page 187 of the article corrections need to be made in the first and second paragraphs. (The following abstract of this article originally appeared in record 1969-09037-001.) Investigated certain assumptions derived from A. Ellis' theory relating implicit verbalization to emotional arousal. Emotional responses (GSR and respiration changes) of 18 undergraduates instructed to silently read sequences of affectively loaded sentences were compared with those of 9 Ss who read neutral sentences. The relationship between relevance to S of the content of the sentences and level of emotional response was investigated, as was the effect of sentence type (observation, inference, or evaluative conclusion) on level of emotional response. Results were that Ss showed a significantly greater response to affectively loaded than to neutral sentences on 2 out of 3 responses measures. Neither relevance nor sentence type were found to have any significant effect. Results were interpreted as offering only partial support for the theory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Evolution and validation of a behavioral decision theory measurement approach to achievement, power, and affiliation.

Extended the present author's (see record 1981-23696-001) research on a behavioral decision theory approach to the measurement of need for Affiliation (nAff), need for Power (nPow), and need for Achievement (nAch). In a decision-making exercise, S made decisions concerning the attractiveness of 24 hypothetical jobs that were described in terms of Aff, Pow, and Ach. Extensive psychometric data gathered from 1,741 Ss (partners in an accounting firm, military officers and cadets, high school students, undergraduates, and graduate students) were also reported. The modified measure was reliable and free of social desirability bias. The Aff, Pow, and Ach scores were significantly correlated with several objective behaviors and an alternative measure of the motives. Group difference tests among the 7 samples also supported the validity of the measurement approach. (33 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sources of adult motives in patterns of parent behavior in early childhood.

Ratings based on 379 mothers' reports of child-rearing practices obtained in 1951 by R. R. Sears et al (1957) when their children were 5 yrs old were correlated with social motive scores obtained from 78 of the children 26–27 yrs later. Scheduling of feeding and severity of toilet training were significantly associated with adult need for achievement (nAch) scores overall and in subsamples obtained either randomly or by sex or social class. Permissiveness for sexual and aggressive behavior in childhood was significantly associated with adult need for power (nPower) scores both among men and women and in random subsamples. No child-rearing practices were associated with adult need for affiliation or intimacy motive scores. The relations for nAch and nPower cannot readily be explained in terms of the child-rearing practices involved being part of larger child-rearing syndromes responsible for promoting motives throughout the life of the child. Rather, the findings point to attitudes or behaviors involving specific practices at certain periods in a child's life as being critical for motive development, as basic-personality theorists have argued. (23 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Synchrony in excitatory neural networks

Synchronization properties of fully connected networks of identical oscillatory neurons are studied, assuming purely excitatory interactions. We analyze their dependence on the time course of the synaptic interaction and on the response of the neurons to small depolarizations. Two types of responses are distinguished. In the first type, neurons always respond to small depolarization by advancing the next spike. In the second type, an excitatory postsynaptic potential (EPSP) received after the refractory period delays the firing of the next spike, while an EPSP received at a later time advances the firing. For these two types of responses we derive general conditions under which excitation destabilizes in-phase synchrony. We show that excitation is generally desynchronizing for neurons with a response of type I but can be synchronizing for responses of type II when the synaptic interactions are fast. These results are illustrated on three models of neurons: the Lapicque integrate-and-fire model, the model of Connor et al., and the Hodgkin-Huxley model. The latter exhibits a type II response, at variance with the first two models, that have type I responses. We then examine the consequences of these results for large networks, focusing on the states of partial coherence that emerge. Finally, we study the Lapicque model and the model of Connor et al. at large coupling and show that excitation can be desynchronizing even beyond the weak coupling regime.     

Social choice conceived as a level of aspiration.

Hypotheses concerning antecedents of interpersonal choice were derived, by analogy, from theories of achievement motivation and level of aspiration. Results of a laboratory experiment on 6-person groups of male high school seniors confirmed hypotheses that (a) more competent persons are perceived by S to be less available to him as task partners, and (b) the person S prefers as a partner is more competent than the person he chooses. 2 sets of motive types of choosers (need for achievement versus fear of failure, and need for affiliation versus fear of rejection), each set conceived as an approach-avoidance dimension, were significantly related to competence of preferred partners. Only the 1st set of motive types was significantly related to competence of chosen partners. The relationships were linear, contrary to prediction. Need for affiliation, originally conceived as an approach motive, was interpreted as an approach-avoidance conflict. (19 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Analyzing nonadditive conjoint structures: compounding events by Rasch model probabilities

The following study proposes a Rasch method to measure variables of nonadditive conjoint structures, where dichotomous response combinations are evaluated. In this framework, both the number of endorsed items and their latent positions are considered. This is different from the cumulative response process (measurable by the Rasch model), where the probability of a positive response to an item with measure delta iota is considered a monotonic increasing function of the person's measure beta nu. This is also unlike the unfolding framework, where the probability of a positive response is maximum when beta nu = delta iota, and monotonically decreases as magnitude of beta nu-delta iota approaches infinity. The method involves four steps. In Step 1, items are scaled by the Rasch model for paired comparisons to produce a variable definition. These scale values serve as a basis for Steps 2 and 4. In Step 2, the nonadditive conjoint system is restructured to additive. The quantitative hypothesis of the restructured data is tested by the axioms of conjoint measurement theory in Step 3. This data is then analyzed by the Rasch rating scale model in Step 4 to evaluate individual response combinations, using the Step 1 item calibrations as anchors. The method was applied to simulated person responses of the Schedule of Recent Events (Holmes and Rahe, 1967). The results suggest that the method is useful and effective. It scales items with a robust method of paired comparisons, ensures additivity and quantification of the conjoint person-item matrix, produces a reasonable ordering of person measures from the perspective of individual response combinations, and provides satisfactory person and item separation (i.e., reliability). Furthermore, the restructured data reproduces SRE item scale values obtained by paired comparisons in Step 1.     

Developmental synthesis of affect and cognition and its implications for altruistic motivation.

Presents an argument, based on psychological research and inferences about human evolution, for the plausibility of an intrinsic altruistic motive, following which a theoretical model for the development of such a motive is outlined. The central idea of the model is that a person's empathic response to another person's distress, interacting with his cognitive sense of the other person, provides the basis for a motive is outlined. The central idea of the model is that a person's empathic response to another person's distress, interacting with his cognitive sense of the other person, provides the basis for a motive independent of egoistic motivation to help the other person. Empathic distress and 3 steps in the development of a sense of the other are discussed, along with empirical evidence for the approximate ages at which they occur. A theoretical account of the interaction between these effective and cognitive processes is then presented, followed by an attempt to assess the evidence for the theory. (21/2 p ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Self-verbalization and emotional arousal.

Investigated certain assumptions derived from A. Ellis' theory relating implicit verbalization to emotional arousal. Emotional responses (GSR and respiration changes) of 18 undergraduates instructed to silently read sequences of affectively loaded sentences were compared with those of 9 Ss who read neutral sentences. The relationship between relevance to S of the content of the sentences and level of emotional response was investigated, as was the effect of sentence type (observation, inference, or evaluative conclusion) on level of emotional response. Results were that Ss showed a significantly greater response to affectively loaded than to neutral sentences on 2 out of 3 responses measures. Neither relevance nor sentence type were found to have any significant effect. Results were interpreted as offering only partial support for the theory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Diagnosing item score patterns on a test using item response theory-based person-fit statistics.

Person-fit statistics have been proposed to investigate the fit of an item score pattern to an item response theory (IRT) model. The author investigated how these statistics can be used to detect different types of misfit. Intelligence test data were analyzed using person-fit statistics in the context of the G. Rasch (1960) model and R. J. Mokken's (1971, 1997) IRT models. The effect of the choice of an IRT model to detect misfitting item score patterns and the usefulness of person-fit statistics for diagnosis of misfit are discussed. Results showed that different types of person-fit statistics can be used to detect different kinds of person misfit. Parametric person-fit statistics had more power than nonparametric person-fit statistics. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A new Big Five: Fundamental principles for an integrative science of personality.

Despite impressive advances in recent years with respect to theory and research, personality psychology has yet to articulate clearly a comprehensive framework for understanding the whole person. In an effort to achieve that aim, the current article draws on the most promising empirical and theoretical trends in personality psychology today to articulate 5 big principles for an integrative science of the whole person. Personality is conceived as (a) an individual's unique variation on the general evolutionary design for human nature, expressed as a developing pattern of (b) dispositional traits, (c) characteristic adaptations, and (d) self-defining life narratives, complexly and differentially situated (e) in culture and social context. The 5 principles suggest a framework for integrating the Big Five model of personality traits with those self-defining features of psychological individuality constructed in response to situated social tasks and the human need to make meaning in culture. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Endocrinological evaluation of sellar and suprasellar tumor cases (the eighth report)--on growth hormone secretion of acromegalic patients before treatment (author's transl)

Serum GH levels were measured in 14 acromegalic patients in ITT, TRH test, LH-RH test, arginine test, OGTT, exercise test, CPZ test and PEG. More than 50% increase of serum GH level was observed in 3 of 13 ITT, 8 of 14 TRH test, 6 of 14 LH-RH test, 2 of 12 arginine test, 2 of 9 OGTT and 2 of 7 PEG. Only 2 out of 7 cases showed more than 50% decrease of serum GH level in CPZ test. Striking GH responses were observed in TRH and LH-RH test. Five of 14 cases showed more than 100% increase of serum GH level in TRH test but they did not have a significant response to LH-RH. Four of 14 cases also had more than 100% increase in LH-RH test with no significant response to TRH. The rest of the cases (5 cases) did not have marked response to either TRH or LH-RH. According to these results, serum GH responses of acromegalic patients could be devided into 30 types, 1) TRH responding type, 2) LH-RH responding type, 3) no response type.     

Modeling inhibition of type II units in the dorsal cochlear nucleus

Type II units in the dorsal cochlear nucleus (DCN) are characterized by vigorous but nonmonotonic responses to best frequency tones as a function of sound pressure level, and relatively weak responses to noise. A model of DCN neural circuitry was used to explore two hypothetical mechanisms by which neurons may be endowed with type II unit response properties. Both mechanisms assume that type II units receive excitatory input from auditory nerve (AN) fibers and inhibitory input from an unspecified class of cochlear nucleus interneurons that also receive excitatory AN input. The first mechanism, a lateral inhibition (LI) model, supposes that type II units receive inhibitory input from a number of narrowly tuned interneurons whose best frequencies (BFs) flank the BF of the type II unit. Tonal stimuli near BF result in only weak inhibitory input, but broadband stimuli recruit enough lateral inhibitors to greatly weaken the type II unit response. The second mechanism, a wideband inhibition (WBI) model, supposes that type II units receive inhibitory input from interneurons that are broadly tuned so that they respond more vigorously to broadband stimuli than to tones. Physiological and anatomical evidence points to the possible existence of such a class of neurons in the cochlear nucleus. The model extends an earlier computer model of an iso-frequency DCN patch to multiple frequency slices and adds a population of interneurons to provide the inhibition to model type II units (called 12-cells). The results show that both mechanisms accurately simulate responses of type II units to tones and noise. An experimental paradigm for distinguishing the two mechanisms is proposed.     

Information function of empathic emotion: Learning that we value the other's welfare.

Empathic feelings arise when a person values another's welfare and perceives the other to be in need. As a result, level of empathic response can be used to infer how much one values the welfare of a person in need. Four experiments were conducted to test these ideas. Experiments 1 and 2 revealed that a similarity manipulation led to increased valuing of a similar person's welfare and, in turn, to increased empathy when this person was in need. Experiments 3 and 4 revealed that direct manipulations of empathy (perspective-taking instructions, or false physiological arousal feedback) led to increased empathy and, in turn, to increased valuing of the welfare of the person in need. Once induced, this valuing was a relatively stable disposition; it remained even after empathy had declined. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Empathic mediation of helping: A two-stage model.

Proposes a 2-stage model of empathic mediation of helping behavior, which holds that taking the perspective of a person in need increases empathic emotion; this in turn increases helping. Ss in 2 experiments learned of another person's need from taped radio broadcasts and were subsequently given an opportunity to offer help to that person. The experiments used different strategies for manipulating empathic emotional response to the other's plight. In Exp I, using 44 male and female undergraduates, the empathic emotion of some Ss was experimentally reduced by a misattribution of arousal technique; in Exp II, using 33 female undergraduates, the empathic emotion of some Ss was experimentally increased by a false feedback of arousal technique. Results of each experiment support the proposed model. Ss who experienced the most empathic emotion also offered the most help. Results of Exp I indicate that perspective taking did not directly affect helping; it affected helping only through its effect on empathic emotion. Motivational implications are discussed. (31 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)