Multidimensional scaling (MDS) offers a rigorous approach to many problems in perception, emotion, personality, and cognition, where the stimuli are too complex to be quantified by other means. In these procedures similarity ratings of the stimulus objects are modeled as points in multidimensional space, such that perceived similarity is…

Orientation to time, place, and person is a central aspect of cognitive functioning. Measures of orientation, as employed in the psychiatric mental status examination, evaluate the accuracy of orientation in present awareness, and are applicable only to severely disturbed psychiatric populations in whom obvious deficits would be expected. The…

With few exceptions, the dynamics underlying the mood structures of individuals with Parkinson's Disease have consistently been overlooked. Based on 12 participants' daily self-reports over 72 days, we identified 10 participants whose covariance matrices for positive and negative affect were similar enough to warrant pooling. Dynamic factor models…

This compendium, a deliverable for "Assessments for Social, Emotional, and Academic Learning with Preschool/Elementary-School Children," focuses on tools to assess the social and emotional learning (SEL) of preschool and elementary school students (i.e., five- to ten-year-olds), along with aspects of the contexts in which they learn and…

This study had two purposes: to test the usefulness of partial order scalogram analysis with multivariate response data; and to illustrate the multidimensional nature of suicide risk. A detailed introduction describes partial order scalograms, which locate respondents' profiles in a two-dimensional space (rather than on a unidimensional Guttman…

The impact of divorce on children seems to vary according to the child's age. Previous studies on the impact of divorce on children have generally focused on pre-schoolers and elementary-age children. Since more long-term marriages are ending in divorce, attention should also be given to adolescent and adult children of divorce. Subjects (N=26)…

Reported are the results of a survey of 603 southern, urban Blacks regarding their attitudes concerning environmental issues. These results were compared with earlier studies of Whites and it was found that Blacks exhibited a similar level of concern. (Author/CW)

Although role or perspective taking has been considered important for the development of mature social thought and behavior, and training for perspective taking has been used to remediate deficient behavior, few studies with either normal or disturbed populations have examined naturally occurring behaviors expected to correlate with…

The purpose of this study was to determine how cognitive style instructions to respondents of a survey instrument affected the resulting psychometric properties of the scale. It was hypothesized that a group which is instructed to carefully respond will have a mean score further from the neutral point, a larger standard deviation, and a higher…

Adults' perceptions of infants' cries were evaluated by means of multidimensional scaling. Twenty-four nonparents and 20 parents judged the similarity of all possible pairs of 12 recorded cries. Subjects also rated the cries on 29 attributes, including perceived aversiveness, possible caretaking responses, affective responses, and semantic…

A research project was designed to test two hypotheses concerning the teaching of music notation: (1) the overhead projector would prove superior to the chalkboard as a teaching aid; and (2) the use of the overhead projector would cause students to retain knowledge better and score higher on standardized music tests. The study involved 93 students…

To investigate the effects of mutual perceived understanding on the communicators, 86 undergraduate students in a speech communication course were asked to use a 382 item checklist to identify those feelings and sensations that described their own experiences of intense communication. Analysis of subjects' responses showed that 63 items were…

Listening to an intimate self-diclosure does not always generate attraction for the revealer. One factor which may influence the relationship between disclosure and attraction is emotional empathy (i.e, an observer's reacting emotionally because he/she perceives that another is experiencing an emotion). To investigate whether emotional empathy on…

Research has sought to establish a connection between positive psychological state and physical health and longevity. It has been suggested that persons with a sense of purpose or meaning in life are better able to withstand stress, and enjoy better health. To study the link between a sense of meaning and a sense of physical well-being, 28 college…

A major area of concern in divorced families is compliance with child support payments. Aspects of the former spouse relationship that are predictive of compliance with court-ordered payment of child support were investigated in a sample of 58 divorced persons all of whom either paid or received child support. Structured interviews and…