Computer Control of the Gilford Model 252-1 Spectrophotometer Modernization System

ABSTRACT

The construction of an interfacing device between a Gilford Model 252-1 Spectrophotometer Modernization System and a Commodore PET microcomputer is described. Modifications to the Gilford automatic cuvette positioner to allow computer control are also described. The program for operation of the modified system is listed. A comparison between computer and manually obtained rates is included.     

The consequences of pairing questions: Context effects in personality measurement.

The effect of context on responses to questions has been a prominent focus in social and political survey research. However, little investigation of context effects has been done for the measurement of psychological constructs. A measure of anger experience and expression in development uses vignettes describing interpersonal situations that provoke varying degrees of anger and require respondents to indicate their affective and/or expressive response to the situation. In this study, the consequences of pairing the two questions for each vignette are investigated. Pairing the anger-experience and likelihood-of-expression questions changes the item's context. Item response theory analysis similar to that used to detect differential item functioning was performed. For some of the items, responding to a single or paired question affected the extremity of responses. The findings are discussed in terms of their implications for personality measurement. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Perceived social support, self-efficacy, and adjustment to abortion.

Prior to their having a 1st trimester abortion, women's perceptions of social support from their partner, family, and friends and self-efficacy for coping were assessed. Depression, mood, physical complaints, and anticipation of negative consequences were measured after the 30-min recovery period. As predicted, perceived social support enhanced adjustment indirectly through its effects on self-efficacy. Women who perceived high support from their family, friends, and partners had higher self-efficacy for coping. Higher self-efficacy, in turn, predicted better adjustment on the psychological measures but not on the physical complaint measure. No direct path between social support and adjustment was observed. In addition, women who told close others of their abortion but perceived them as less than completely supportive had poorer postabortion psychological adjustment than either women who did not tell or women who told and perceived complete support. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Therapist Satisfaction With Four Manual-Based Treatments on a National Multisite Trial: An Exploratory Study.

Ratings by 44 therapists in 4 modalities (cognitive, supportive-expressive, individual drug counseling, and group drug counseling) were obtained during one of the largest outcome trials ever conducted, the National Collaborative Cocaine Treatment Study. Views of the treatments, desired changes, and influences on implementation were studied. Therapists were highly positive about the treatments. However, their likelihood of using them in the future without modification was low, and they viewed them as too short. Supervision was perceived as more important than manuals and taping of sessions as more important than adherence scales. It took therapists an average of 8 months to feel comfortable with the treatments. New learning was therapists' primary motivation, more than extrinsic factors such as pay. Supportive-expressive therapists reported the most negative views, among modalities. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Vowel categorization by very young infants.

Six-month-old infants are known to categorize vowels despite variation in talker voice and pitch contour. Using the observer-based psychoacoustic procedure, this study asked whether 2- and 3-mo-olds could categorize similarly. Infants were trained to respond whenever the vowel category alternated from /a/ to /i/ and to refrain from responding when the vowel category remained the same, despite variation in spectral cues associated with pitch and talker changes. 80% of 2-, 3-, and 6-mo-olds did not respond the first time a talker change occurred in the absence of a vowel change, suggesting that even the younger infants recognize these spectrally different sounds as perceptually equivalent. This study establishes the observer-based psychoacoustic procedure as a viable research tool in the field of infant speech perception. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

What determines initial feeling of knowing? Familiarity with question terms, not with the answer.

How do people know whether they have an answer to a question before they actually find it in their memory? Two experiments explored this question. Ss were trained on relatively novel 2-digit?×?2-digit arithmetic problems (e.g., 23?×?27). Before answering each problem, Ss made a quick feeling of knowing judgment as to whether they could directly retrieve the answer from memory or had to compute it. Knowing the answer initially appeared to be linearly related to having a feeling of knowing the answer; however, when the frequency of exposure to complete problems and the frequency of exposure to parts of the problems were separately varied, feeling of knowing was better predicted by the frequency of presentation of the problem parts, not by knowledge of the answer. This suggests that the processes involved in knowing the answer are different from those involved in having a feeling of knowing. Specifically, an early feeling of knowing is not just based on an early read of the answer. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Designing and validating a measure of moral judgment: Stage preference and stage consistency approaches.

The Defining Issues Test (DIT) of moral judgment is discussed in light of the recent challenge by C. Lind (1995) with the Moral Judgment Test (MJT), which is widely used in Europe. The 2 tests represent alternative methods as well as support different conclusions about moral judgment. The key difference is a stage-consistency (MJT) vs. a stage-preference (DIT) approach. Construct validity is defined in terms of 7 types of studies, and the approaches are compared. The stage-preference approach systematically outperforms the stage-consistency approach. Benchmarking by using classic studies in moral judgment illustrates an empirical, multistudy, quantitative approach to moral judgment research. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)