Personality change as a result of an experimental change of environmental conditions.

To what extent can personality change, when it occurs, be understood in terms of effect of specific environmental conditions? In a large clerical organization, two experimental groups were created and subjected for more than a year to different programs of control. A paper-and-pencil questionnaire designed specifically to measure 26 personality trends to which each of the programs had some degree of relevance was administered near the beginning of the experimental period and about a year later at the end." The two programs "were seen to have profound effects on the subjects' attitudes toward the company and satisfactions in it." A table of before-after correlations and incidence of change is presented. "Twelve changes in the predicted direction prove significant at the .05 level of confidence. Six changes significant at the .05 level occur in a direction opposite to that predicted… . Although somewhat ambiguous, the data seem to indicate that measurable change can be effected by a persisting change in environmental conditions." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cardiac change as an index of attention.

Conducted a study with undergraduates in which 7 experimental Ss clinically evaluated segments of a therapy protocol on the basis of specific verbal cues, and 9 controls made the same evaluation with no awareness of the clues. All Ss were monitored for heart rate while listening to the protocol and while making their judgments. All Ss showed lower and less variable heart rate during periods when they were listening to the clinical segments than during periods when they were making a clinical decision. The experimental group showed greater awareness of the verbal clues, but presence of clue was not associated with change in either mean or variability of heart rate. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Inaction inertia: Foregoing future benefits as a result of an initial failure to act.

The circumstances under which initial inaction tends to persist were studied. Inaction inertia occurs when bypassing an initial action opportunity decreases the likelihood that subsequent similar action opportunities will be taken. The authors studied the case in which an initial attractive action opportunity, which is not taken, is followed by another positive but somewhat less attractive action opportunity. In 6 experiments, participants were less likely to take the second action when the discrepancy in attractiveness between the initial and final action opportunities was relatively large, compared with small-discrepancy participants or control participants, who were offered only the second opportunity. This finding was obtained using both a scenario methodology and an actual experimental situation. Possible explanations for inaction inertia based on perceptual contrast, dissonance, self perception, or commitment theories were tested but were not clearly supported. Experiment 6, however, indicated that framing the initial inaction as a loss plays an important mediating role in producing inaction inertia. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Learning as a change in world-view.

Argues that the hegemony of natural science conceptions of learning has led to a tendency to neglect the role of the human inner life in the learning process. Approaching learning as a change in world view is presented as an alternative to natural scientific orthodoxy. Some examples are given of the way learning as a change in world view emerges from common patterns of human existence. Some commonly observed correlates of a change in world view may be described as changes in attitude and patterns of behavior. Such a change could be described in terms of increased receptivity to new experiences. Mainstream Western psychology's relationship with broader perspectives on human learning, such as in gestalt psychology, cognitive psychology, systems theory, and behavioral ecology, is discussed. The interactive relation between perception and learning is considered, and a number of current psychological theories and ideas are presented as examples of how learning can be conceptualized as a change in world view. Such a perspective on learning is offered as a complement to other approaches to learning rather than a replacement. (French abstract) (56 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Extent of opinion change as a function of amount of change advocated.

"Three different degrees of change in opinion were advocated by communications presented in such a way as to be independent of the recipient's own position." Communications advocating most extreme change had the greatest influence, those advocating moderate change had the next greatest influence, and those advocating the smallest change had the least influence. At the same time the ratio of change produced to that advocated declined, average amounts of change being 58%, 62%, and 88%, respectively, of the amount of change advocated. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Ability attribution as a result of variable effort and achievement motivation.

Required 96 community college students to work on 2 tasks with high or low effort and with feedback that indicated successful or average performances on each task. A predicted 3-way interaction showed that high-need achievers (indicated by scores on the Revised and Condensed Achievement Scale) increased judgments of their abilities in response to effortful task success, whereas low-need achievers increased their ability judgments following less effortful success. Both results were confirmed in a multiple correlation analysis of ability attribution. Implications for theory development on achievement motivation are discussed. (11 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Activity valence as a function of mood change.

Investigated variation of activity evaluations as a function of affective change. 32 depressed and 36 nondepressed college students were exposed to 1 of 3 mood induction conditions, including depressive, elated, or neutral statements. Additionally, each S rated several activities for degree of pleasantness before and after mood manipulations. Affect-induction procedures were successful in changing or intensifying characteristic mood. For both groups, the induction of negative affect significantly decreased the enjoyableness attributed to activities, the induction of positive affect significantly elevated activity evaluations, and a neutral induction did not significantly change activity ratings. Contrary to predictions, depressed and nondepressed Ss did not differ in their initial evaluations of activities, indicating that they may approach activities with similar expectations of reinforcement. Implication for P. M. Lewinsohn's (1974, 1975) model of depression are discussed. (34 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Nose deformation as a result of birth injury

The authors have compared the frequency of occurrence of nasal septum deformation in two groups of newborns, using the simplest testing methods for: 1. newborns born by spontaneous labor (254 newborns), 2. newborns born by caesarean section (52 newborns). The deformation from the central position of the nose were found in 2 newborns from group 2 (3.9%) and in as many as 50 newborns from group 1 (approx. 20%) providing the evidence that most deformations occur as a result of birth injury (during labor). 32 deformations (26 in the cartilaginous section of the nasal septum and 6 in the osseous section) have been tested repeatedly in the third or fourth week of life. 19 out of 26 deformations of the cartilaginous section of the nasal septum (73%) have been repositioned automatically. All deformations in the osseous section detected after birth were also analyzed physically in the third or fourth week of life.     

The maverick effect: Increased communicator credibility as a result of abandoning a career.

Used questionnaire responses to select 200 undergraduates who did not hold extreme opinions on the topics of unidentified flying objects and ecology. Ss were assigned to 1 of 4 groups and heard a communicator deliver messages either for or against 1 of the 2 issues. One-half of the Ss in each of 4 conditions heard a message from a "maverick" who had quit an organization over the issue he was now discussing. The other 1/2 heard a person who was a member of an organization and who delivered a message in line with the official position of that organization. The "mavericks" were perceived as fairer and more trustworthy than the "nonmavericks," but not as more expert. The mavericks' conclusions were perceived as better justified by the facts, and more opinion change was elicited toward their positions, as measured by the percentage of Ss changing and by the pre-post communication position of audiences. (French summary) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Right-sided pneumothorax as a result of a left-sided chest tube

Chest tubes are inserted for a variety of reasons, and a number of complications have been associated with their use. We report a case of traumatic hemopneumothorax in which the chest tube crossed the mediastinum into the contralateral lung causing a pneumothorax. Its position was not apparent on portable chest radiographs.     

Loss of control and the chronic mentally ill in a rural day-treatment center

The bioartificial pancreas was designed to incorporate islet tissues and a selectively permiable membrane that isolates islets from the immune system of the recipient. The efficacy of agarose, a nontoxic polysaccharide, has been evaluated as a material of microcapsules to prevent allo- and xenograft rejection in rodents. The aim of this study is to demonstrate the possibility of the agarose microcapsule containing allo-islets as a bioartificial pancreas in canine model. In vitro viability of islets was determined by glucose challenge during perifusion experiments (n = 4). Insulin secretion from both encapsulated (enc.) and non-encapsulated (non-enc.) canine islets rose from initial basal levels of 0.09 (encap.), 0.07 (non-encap.) to the peak of 0.2 (encap.), 0.1 (non-encap.) in microU/islet/min after 5 minutes, then decreased to the basal level when the glucose challenge was discontinued. Auto-transplantation was performed in two dogs to evaluated in vivo viability and biocompatibility of encapsulated islets implanted into the splenic sinus by venouse reflux. Two weeks after auto-transplantation, the plasma insulin levels in the splenic vein and artery of two dogs were assayed. In the first dog, serum insulin level was 1 microU/ml both in the vein and the artery and increased, after glucagon (1.0 mg) injection, to levels of 9 microU/ml in the vein, but still kept 1 microU/ml in artery, as well as in the second one. Histological and electron-microscopical examination of the spleen revealed that encapsulated islets remained morphologically intact and the surface of agarose capsules showed no significant adherence of fibroblasts and inflammatory cells. Functional efficacy of the microencapsulated islets was determined using five totally-pancreatectomized diabetic dogs as recipients without immunosuppression. Defined quantity of microencapsulated islets from outbred mongrel donors were grafted through the catheter into omental tissue of the pancreatectomized recipients. All dogs had various degrees of reduced insulin requirements. In three of five recipients, the average fasting glucose values were controlled under 120 mg/dl for 28, 42, 49 days without exogenous insulin, which received totally 4.3 x 10(3), 7.3 x 10(3) and 1.0 x 10(4) (IE/kg) of microencapsulated islets, respectively. In conclusion, the present study indicates that the agarose-based microencapsulated islets can function in large diabetic animals, resulting in the independence of exogenous insulin therapy for prolonged periods without the need for immunosuppression.     

Self-dissatisfaction as a determinent of change in police values.

Pretested experimental and control groups of 384 police officers on the Rokeach Value Survey and for their tolerance ratings on S. A. Stouffer's Nonconformist Tolerance Scale. The experimental group compared their personal ratings with others (both police and nonpolice), were exposed to concepts of equality before the law, and then were asked to indicate the degree of satisfaction-dissatisfaction they felt over their rating of the value equality . Changes in Ss' values resulted from exposure to the inconsistencies between the low priority of equality vs Ss' concept of themselves as just, fair, and tolerant. (19 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attributional complexity as a moderator of dissonance-produced attitude change.

The complexity of one's attributional schemas was predicted to attenuate dissonance-produced attitude change after one writes a counterattitudinal essay (favoring yearly tuition increases). In both Experiments 1 and 2, participants high on attributional complexity (AC) exhibited less of a dissonance (choice) effect than those low on AC. The proposed explanation that AC allows for better external justification of a dissonant act was supported in Experiment 2, in which participants listed their reasons for writing the counterattitudinal essay. No support was found for the views that high-AC participants reduce dissonance through "trivialization" or that high-AC participants are more tolerant of dissonance than low-AC participants. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attention value as a function of illuminant color change.

A 16-dial panel was tested with a check-reading task (to detect deviations) for the effect of illumination changes to aid detection of errors. In one situation (R), from 1 through 8 error dials were presented under constant red illumination. In the other situation (RG) error dials were accompanied by a change in illuminant from red to green. "(a) Differences between response times and also variability of response under the R and RG situations were significant; (b) three times as many errors were committed under the R situation; (c) no significant sex differences were present under either the R or RG situation." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Heart-rate change as a component of the orienting response.

Both Sokolov and the Laceys have proposed that autonomic feedback to central neural structures amplifies or reduces the effects of stimulation. Lacey and Lacey distinguished between the effects of feedback from the cardiovascular system and from other autonomic systems and suggested, specifically, that heart-rate (HR) acceleration should be associated with stimulus "rejection" and HR deceleration with stimulus enhancement. This appeared to be contradicted by evidence that HR increased with the orienting reflex whose function, according to Sokolov, is the enhancement of stimulus reception. However, when studies using simple "nonsignal" stimuli were reviewed, it was found that the criteria identifying an orienting reflex were satisfied by responses of HR deceleration and that instances of HR acceleration probably reflected a "defense," "startle," or "acoustic-cardiac" response. (2 p. ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)