We examined whether self-restraint in early childhood predicted individual differences in 3 executive functions (EFs; inhibiting prepotent responses, updating working memory, and shifting task sets) in late adolescence in a sample of approximately 950 twins. At ages 14, 20, 24, and 36 months, the children were shown an attractive toy and told not…

A sequence of behaviors consisting of appropriate responses, inappropriate responses, or a combination of both can be linked together in a behavior chain. Several operant processes may disrupt behavior chains. For example, one or more members of the behavior chain may be affected when reinforcement is withheld for the last response in the chain…

Behaviors that are appropriate, inappropriate, or a combination of both can be linked together in a behavior chain. When the contingencies for one response change (e.g., reinforcement is withheld for the last response in the chain; the last response is reinforced even if it occurs without the other responses in the chain) or the environmental…

Measures of active sleep, quiet sleep, sucking, crying, body size and gestational age were factor analyzed for 137 normal newborns at 2 days of age. The results yielded 3 stable factors: reactivity-irritability, maturity, and reflexive and discriminative sucking. (JMB)

Before empirically based theories of loneliness can be formulated, it may be necessary to probe people's feelings, explanations, and reactions in a relatively unstructured way. Toward this end, three multiple response items relating to these issues were included in an 84-item questionnaire, published in the Spring of 1978 in several northeastern…

The influence of age, sex, representational detail of objects (prototypicality) and adult play suggestions on children's progression of pretend behaviors was studied. A checklist was developed and utilized for coding the responses of 20 children (10 males, 10 females), to objects judged to be high and low prototypical by 12 adults. Children ranged…

Factor-analyzed objective measures of interpersonal behavior presumed to be tapping assertiveness. Most of the behavioral measures loaded highly on a general factor of assertiveness. The fifth behavioral measure loaded highly on a separate factor, response latency. All behavioral measures with the exception of response latency evidenced…

Reviews research focusing on problem-solving deficits and their relationship to suicidal behavior and considers some of the methodological problems that arise. Discusses findings in terms of active versus passive problem solving, state or trait factors, and the psychological processes underlying problem solving. (Author/JDM)

An analysis of the responses of 1,614 adult subjects from 10 cultures show that the Leung-Bond procedure provides ways of extracting both strong and weak etics relevant to individualism and weak etics relevant to collectivism. The most complete picture is obtained when both etics and emics are examined. (SLD)