Ethnic preference and identification among Canadian Indian and White children: Replication and extension.

Examined 3 hypotheses regarding ethnic preference and identification among White and Native Indian children who were asked by either a White or Native experimenter (E) to indicate their preference for either a White or Native doll, a white or brown rabbit, and a white or brown cup. The escape hypothesis suggests that both types of Ss would choose the White doll and that the Natives would show ethnic misidentification. J. E. Williams's (Williams and J. K. Morland, 1976) notion of a pro-light/anti-dark bias suggests that Ss of both races would choose the lighter of 2 objects. A 3rd hypothesis suggests that Ss of both races would choose a doll of the same race as the E; there would be no pattern regarding rabbits or cups. 30 White 5–7 yr olds and 35 Native 5–6 yr olds served as Ss. Results show that Ss of both races chose the lighter of 2 objects, consistent with Williams's hypothesis. Such responses, however, were influenced by both S's race and race of the E. Results also indicate that when choosing the doll that looked more like themselves, Ss of both races chose the White doll more frequently with a White than a Native E, a finding consistent with the E bias hypothesis. The notion that minority group Ss were attempting to escape a minority group label by identifying with objects associated with the majority group was not supported. (French abstract) (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Contact with the dominant culture and cognitive competence in Canadian Indians and Whites.

Tests of 3 different kinds of cognitive competence were administered to 49 White 1st-3rd graders, 48 Indian classmates of the Whites who lived on a reserve, and 63 Indian 1st-3rd graders attending a residential school with isolation from both White and Indian societies. The Whites surpassed both Indian groups on abstract verbal reasoning in the English language, surpassed only the residential-school group on nonverbal reasoning, and scored at about the same level as the Indian Ss on concrete nonverbal skills. The 2 groups of Indian Ss obtained similar mean scores on all 3 tests. Findings suggest a continuum of contact with the dominant White society that interacts with the cognitive competencies sampled by tests, lowest mean scores resulting from testing the components that are most strongly culture-based, in children most isolated from the dominant society. The data also raise the possibility of qualitatively different "intelligences" in the 2 racial groups. (French summary) (25 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Racial awareness and preference of White and Indian Canadian children.

Utilized the doll choices technique of K. B. Clark and M. K. Clark (1947) to study attitudes toward self and others and racial awareness and identification among 63 Canadian Indian students and 108 White children. The samples consisted of 64 younger (5- and 6-yr-old) and 107 older (7–9 yr old) Ss. Results show (a) that Indian Ss consistently drew figures smaller than did the corresponding White Ss, and (b) there was a significant main effect for Age in the analysis of mother's height. Younger Ss drew their mothers a mean of 3.26 inches taller than did older Ss. (French summary) (10 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Expectations and preferences for counselor race and their relation to intermediate treatment outcomes.

The expectations and preferences of 26 White and 8 Black male veterans for the race of their counselor were investigated at the time the clients entered treatment in a midwestern outpatient mental health clinic. In addition, Ss' satisfaction with treatment, measured by a 3-factor self-rating scale and dropout status, were analyzed in relation to Ss' expectations and preferences for counselor race and the racial makeup of the treatment dyad. Results indicate that White and Black clients alike expected their counselor to be White. About half of the White Ss and half of the Blacks indicated that they had no preferences. However, the significant association between race and S preference for counselor race suggests that Ss expressing preferences preferred counselors of their own race. Dropout and satisfaction with treatment were not related to the nature of Ss' racial expectations and preferences or to the racial makeup of the treatment dyads. (35 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Characteristics of spatial memory in pigeons.

In 4 experiments, adult White King pigeons learned a delayed-alternation (DA) task in a T-maze. Few trials were needed prior to accurate performance. Similarly, after little training, Ss performed accurately with delays of 8–26 min. End-of-delay cues, possibly provided by the experimenter, response-based cues, and intramaze cues were all experimentally examined and rejected as bases for the Ss' performances; pigeons appear to rely on spatial (extramaze) cues. Long-delay performances were undisturbed by changes in delay-interval stimuli (illumination shifts and transportation around the laboratory). Ss acquired DA so quickly because of a potent tendency to avoid recently visited locations (i.e., a preexisting "win-shift" tendency). Characteristics of pigeon spatial memory thus include temporal persistence, resistance to retroactive interference, and win-shift bias. In these respects spatial memory of pigeons parallels spatial memory of rats. (39 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A developmental study of balance theory in four cultural groups.

Canadian White and native Indian Ss and New Zealand White and Maori Ss from 5 age groups ranging from 5 to 14 yrs, provided missing sentiment relations for 8 hypothetical interpersonal triads. Ss' explanations for their responses were also systematically obtained. The 2 White groups and Maori Ss showed a steady increase in balanced responses and in balance-type explanations with increasing age, reaching high levels in the older groups. Balanced responses were less frequent among Indian Ss, and there was no clear developmental trend in tendency towards balance. These latter findings may be partly attributable to small Indian samples and a truncated age range. With the exception of the Indians, differences among cultural groups were small. Coherent principles of social reasoning other than balance were rare and did not differentiate among cultural groups. (French summary) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Comparison of the Bender Gestalt test for both Black and White brain-damaged patients using two scoring systems.

Tested for cultural bias in the Bender Visual Motor Gestalt Test. Ss were 72 Black and White hospitalized male patients, diagnosed as either brain damaged or psychiatric, and individually matched by diagnosis, age (15-55 yrs), education, and IQ. Bender protocols were scored by the systems of both G. R. Pascal and B. J. Suttell (1951) and J. D. Hain (1963). Data were analyzed both with and without epileptic Ss. No race effect appeared except for the Pascal-Suttell system with nonepileptic Ss, for which Blacks scored significantly better than Whites. Neither system successfully discriminated organic from nonorganic Ss, either with or without epileptic Ss. It is suggested that these scoring techniques are of little or no value in diagnosing borderline cases. (18 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Anxiety and eating behavior in obese and nonobese American Indians and White Americans.

Compared 80 lower-SES obese and nonobese American Indians and 80 lower-SES obese and nonobese White Americans from multinational backgrounds on a test of emotional arousal theory (EAT), which proposes that obese people overeat when emotionally aroused while nonobese people do not. Ss were administered the trait anxiety form of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) and then assigned to a high-anxiety (HA) or low-anxiety condition. They were then administered the state form of the STAI and given a taste task to determine whether EAT is predictive of eating behaviors for both ethnic groups. Results indicate that women were more trait and state anxious than were men; HA women, all HA Ss, HA American Indians, and nonobese American Indians were more state anxious than were corresponding groups. Behavioral indicator results generally supported EAT: All obese and high-anxiety-condition obese Ss consumed more food than did nonobese and low-anxiety-condition obese Ss, respectively. The overall consumption of food was greater with American Indians than with White Americans, indicating that EAT does not fully explain American Indian eating behavior. An alternative stress-reaction theory is proposed to more fully account for American Indian eating behavior. (18 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Surreptitiously observed hypnotic responding in simulators and in skill-trained and untrained high hypnotizables.

Low-hypnotizable Ss (LHs) administered cognitive skill training exhibited substantially higher posttest hypnotizability than LHs administered no treatment. Next, the Ss in these 2 conditions as well as Ss who attained high hypnotizability without training and LHs instructed to fake hypnosis (i.e., simulators) were individually tested for hypnotizability twice while their responses were recorded by a hidden camera. In the individual session, Ss were first tested for hypnotizability while alone and then tested again in the presence of an experimenter. The skill-trained Ss and high-hypnotizable controls attained equivalent (high) hypnotizability scores with the experimenter both absent and present. However, when the experimenter was absent, the simulators exhibited lowered hypnotizability and apparently failed to adopt the hypnotic role. These findings contradict the hypothesis that high hypnotizability in skill-trained Ss reflects compliant responding. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Racial bias in the use of work samples for personnel selection.

Examined the role of evaluation specificity and task relevance in explaining racial bias in the use of work samples. 56 White maintenance mechanics evaluated a videotaped performance of a Black job applicant and a White job applicant performing a relevant task (laying out, drilling, and tapping) and an irrelevant task (indexing drill bits). The applicants were evaluated by using a highly specific behavioral recording form, a global rating scale, or both. Race-linked bias was found only when Ss were asked to make global evaluations after observing an applicant's performance on a task representing irrelevant job behavior. Race-linked bias was not found when Ss used the behavioral recording form or in global evaluations made following the behavioral recordings. Race-linked bias was not evident when evaluations were based on observations of relevant job behavior. It is concluded that by using careful work sample development procedures and by assisting Ss in focusing on and recording relevant behavior, the potential for bias in the use of work samples appears small. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Social anxiety, self-presentation, and the self-serving bias in causal attribution.

Two experiments with 160 undergraduates studied the contribution of self-presentation concerns to the self-serving bias in causal attribution (individuals' tendency to assume more personal responsibility for a success than for a failure) and its occasional, but systematic, reversal. In Exp I, high- but not low-social-anxiety Ss (selected by scores on the Social Anxiety subscale of the Self-Consciousness Scale) presented themselves in a far more modest light when a committee of high prestige others was to join the experimenter in evaluating their behavior than when the committee evaluation was canceled. In Exp II, this reversal of the self-serving bias among high-social-anxiety Ss was replicated, and it was also found that both high- and low-social-anxiety Ss portrayed the causes of their behavior in a more modest fashion when they responded via the "bogus pipeline," a measurement technique designed to reduce distortion and dissimulation in verbal responses, than when they responded in the traditional paper-and-pencil format. (32 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A note on experimenter sampling in the graduate department of psychology.

A reasonable and economic solution to the cost of experimenter sampling and the problem of experimenter bias may be the formation of a pool of graduate students who are currently running either their own or their sponsor's research and who would equitably run a portion of each other's Ss. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

School self-acceptance among Canadian Indian, White, and Metis children.

Compared 334 Indian, 197 non-Indian, and 92 Metis students (aged 10–19 yrs) on an aspect of self-concept, school self-acceptance. A follow-up study was conducted several months later with 40 Ss. Attempts were made to overcome weaknesses in prior research by gathering validity data on the self-concept measure and controlling for extraneous factors such as social assets that could account for Indian/non-Indian differences. Support was found for the prediction that Indian Ss would have lower school self-acceptance scores than White Ss. Metis Ss resembled Indians in their school self-acceptance scores, acculturation level, and social assets, but scored closer to Whites in their childrearing scale scores. Multiple regression analyses revealed that the social assets variable was the most important predictor of school self-acceptance, although the ethnicity factor remained a significant predictor. (French abstract) (26 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Use of the Self-Directed Search with Native American high school students.

Examined the appropriateness of using the Self-Directed Search (SDS) with 104 Native American Indian high school students. Inventory scores from 2 Indian tribes were compared, and then comparisons were made with national normative data. Ss differed among themselves on 4 of the 12 scale comparisons, and there were 6 differences on the 24 scale comparisons with the normative groups. It is concluded that the SDS may be an inappropriate instrument for use with Native American high school students unless local norms are also considered. (18 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Peers as mediators of television food advertisements aimed at children.

Past research on the effects of TV has focused primarily on it as a unitary force rather than as 1 source of influence in a network of cross-pressures. The present study attempted to determine how peer-modeled food preferences combined with TV food commercials to influence the food preferences of school-aged children. 40 Black and 40 White 4th graders were assigned randomly to 1 of 4 conditions: TV control, TV advertisements with similar peer-modeled food preferences, and TV advertisements with dissimilar peer-modeled food preferences. An additional 40 children served as peer models. Ss in the TV advertisement condition preferred foods in the same class as the advertised foods more frequently than did Ss in the TV control condition. Ss in the TV advertisement/peer-similar condition preferred foods like the advertised food more often than Ss in the TV advertisement condition, whereas Ss in the TV/peer-dissimilar condition preferred foods like the advertised food less frequently than did Ss in the TV advertisement condition. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reports of real and false memories: The relevance of hypnosis, hypnotizability, and context of memory test.

30 high- and 30 low-hypnotizable Ss saw slides of a purse snatching and then imagined seeing the slides in hypnosis or waking conditions. The experimenter suggested the offender had a moustache (true), wore a scarf (false), and picked up flowers (false). Memory was tested by the experimenter after the suggestion, by another experimenter during an inquiry session, and again by the 2nd experimenter after the experimenter appeared to end the session. Hypnotizability, but not hypnosis, was associated with false memory reports; more high- than low-hypnotizable Ss reported false memories. The context of testing influenced true and false memory reports; fewer reports occurred in an informal rather than a formal test context. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal effects of experimenter attractiveness, attire, and gender.

Investigated the effects of experimenter physical attractiveness and attire in same- and mixed-sex dyads. Six male and 6 female experimenters interacted with 30 male and 30 female undergraduate Ss. Each experimenter saw 1 male and 1 female while well-dressed and 1 male and 1 female while casually dressed. A vocabulary test and a photo-rating task were administered to Ss by experimenters in each meeting. Later, Ss completed the Adjective Check List (ACL) to indicate how they perceived the experimenter. Results show that experimenters in opposite-sex dyads received higher positivity ratings on the ACL; these ratings were also differentially affected by experimenters' sex and physical attractiveness, although no main effect for experimenter physical attractiveness was significant. Findings suggest the need for a more integrated, multivariable approach to interpersonal behavior. (41 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Influence of rapport on hypnotically induced pseudomemory.

Three studies examined the influence of rapport on pseudomemory. Study 1 tested 8 groups of 22 Ss in a 2 (level of susceptibility: high, low)?×?2?(state instruction: hypnosis, waking)?×?2?(rapport: present reduced) design, rapport being inhibited by the hypnotist criticizing Ss' performance. Pseudomemory was tested by a 2nd experimenter who also criticized Ss. Study 2 varied level of susceptibility and rapport for 88 hypnotically instructed Ss where criticism was offered only by the 2nd experimenter. Study 3 analyzed effects among 44 highly susceptible hypnotic Ss where the 2nd experimenter refrained from criticizing Ss. Data indicated a significant association between rapport with the hypnotist and pseudomemory in cued recall, strength of pseudomemory being appreciably lowered when negative hypnotist rapport was reinforced by the person testing pseudomemory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Chick (Gallus domesticus) Approach Preferences for Natural and Artificial Sound Stimuli: Erratum.

Reports an error in the original article by Gloria J. Fischer (Developmental Psychology, 1976[Jan], Vol 12[1], 39-46). On page 41, the 1-sec designation was inadvertently cropped from Figure 1; .5 sec should be plotted 6.5 cm from 0 along the abscissa. (The following abstract of this article originally appeared in record 1979-25318-001.) Found that 2-day-old White Leghorn and New Hampshire chicks showed an unlearned preference for an ancestral maternal call over a brief, repetitive pure tone burst when choice preference tests were between stationary models emitting maternal call and tone burst sounds. However, other Ss of both breeds showed an unlearned preference for tone burst over maternal call when choice preference tests were between moving models emitting tone burst and call sounds. These same preferences were found in Ss that had been imprinted (exposed) to moving call and tone burst sounds on their 1st posthatch day. The tone bursts were briefer than the call note duration (25 vs 80 msec). Since very brief sound bursts are easier to localize, it is concluded that Ss preferred tone bursts over calls when sound sources were moving because of the greater ease of localizing tone bursts. Along with other recent data, the failure to find imprinting to a maternal call or to tone bursts (i.e., the call and tone burst preferences found were uninfluenced by a brief prior exposure to either sound) suggests the need to question whether or not auditory imprinting occurs in the domestic chick. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development of racial identity in minority and majority children: An affect discrepancy model.

Proposes an affect discrepancy to explain the processes by which children come to know and identify with a minority or majority group. To test this model, 203 White and 91 Indian children in kindergarten and Grades 1 and 2 answered racial identity, preference, social distance and recognition questions by pointing to pictures of Whites, Indians, and Blacks. Several weeks later Ss completed measures of concrete operational thought and self-esteem. Indian children made more cross-racial choices than did Whites, even though Indians were more accurate than Whites in recognizing the pictures. Structural equation models indicated that for both groups, cognitive development was positively associated with own-group choices. Self-esteem was positively related to own-group choices for Whites but inversely related for Indians. (French abstract) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)