Purpose: The purpose of this study is to evaluate the influence of a service-learning experience on the personal development of college students, particularly focusing on the expression of empathy. Design/methodology/approach: Reflective writing papers were evaluated using a rubric with definitions for three types of understanding, as defined by…

For Gadamer, understanding moves between two different levels. One is the everyday ontological level in which there is a meeting between the familiar and the alien, between the known and the not-quite-expected. But understanding can also be a skill to be developed. This is the way in which we achieve good knowledge. In pedagogical terms,…

The motive to avoid success has been conceptualized as an ambivalence in life-goal directions, particularly characteristic of white college women. The presence or absence of the motive to avoid success was found to interact significantly with two experimental sets of instructions: Difficult vs. Easy (Experiment 1) and Internal vs. External…

Investigated the relationship between personality priorities (pleasing, achieving, outdoing, detaching, avoiding) and selected psychological and attitudinal variables theoretically linked to those priorities. Undergraduates (N=262) completed four personality measures, which resulted in significant differences. Findings lend support for the use of…

The effect of group composition on risk taking was investigated by having various 3-man groups discuss caution-oriented items. Results indicated: (1) only one of nine group types exhibited a significant shift to caution; (2) except for the homogeneous groups, in which there were no shifts, significant shifts in individual decisions did occur, at…

The relationship between personality factors and political orientation has long been of interest to psychologists. This study tests the hypothesis that there is no significant relationship between self-actualization and liberalism-conservatism. The hypothesis is supported. (Author)

Examined nature of possible sex differences in vocational structure in 808 undergraduates and provided comparative standards for the most commonly studied cognitive features (integration and differentiation). Suggests the operation of sex differences in these features and discusses minimal size and questionable meaningfulness of differences in…

Assessed whether low-assertive college students' locus of control orientations would differentially affect their reactions to assertiveness training procedures. Subjects improved more on all self-report and behavioral measures than placebo or no-treatment control subjects. Externals showed significantly greater generalization of treatment effects…

Undergraduates rated adjectives for appropriateness to men and women. The feminists rated fewer traits as characteristic only of men or only of women and more traits as characteristic of both, than did nonfeminists. Both feminists and nonfeminists evaluated more traits as either neutral or slightly positive. (Author)

Undergraduate students who wished to enter sensitivity groups filled in Shostrom's Personal Orientation Inventory and also indicated their degree of loneliness. Ss low in loneliness obtained higher scores on the personality scale, with eight of the 12 subscales significantly different from Ss high in loneliness. (Author)

This comparison (with University Health Service patients) between emotive psychotherapy and insight oriented analytic therapy confirmed effectiveness of emotive psychotherapy in producing catharsis leading to therapeutic improvement. (Author/EK)

This research was a direct test of the hypothesis that value change as a result of self-confrontation is unidirectional--that is, possible only in a direction that serves to maintain and enhance self-esteem, and thus is consistent with self-conceptions. The effectiveness of a self-confrontation treatment designed to increase the importance of the…

Proposes a hierarchical model based on self-psychology that predicts a reduction in career indecision after a career intervention. Tested model's validity in a study of college students (N=107). Study showed model partially supported with goal instability, self-esteem, and interest pattern predicting change in career indecision level after career…