This study indicated that the child's decision to respond generously to the needs of others may be a function of his evaluation of the relative fairness and deservedness of the other's plight. Whether competition renders the child less responsive is a subject for further research. (JMB)

This paper seeks to explore the usefulness of certain sociological concepts and methods in the field of mental retardation focusing attention to defintional flexibility and spatial relativity of the 'mental retardation' concept. (Editor/RK)

An investigation of the hypothesis that minority groups exhibit social avoidance of the majority class on the basis of perceived dissimilarity in status revealed that social avoidance was significantly associated with the investigator's status. (Author/KM)

Author examined some logical connections between the creative process and the problem of human relations and argued that though antisocial behavior among creative people is normal and expected, it is neither required nor inevitable. (Author/RK)

An antecedent-consequent model of toddlers' socially directed messages to peers was developed to investigate the differential success of themes in eliciting interaction. Videotaped observational data collected under a short-term longitudinal design were obtained from two playgroups, each consisting of six toddler-age boys. Toddlers' social…

Rituals are often present at times of tension, change, and uncertainty and they perform important and diverse functions at such times. They are, however, virtually absent at one important and increasingly common event, divorce. Families do draw upon rituals to deal with in-law relationships following divorce. This report stemmed from a research…

This paper describes the Self-Evaluation Maintenance (SEM) model of social behavior which consists of three variables: the psychological closeness of another, the relative performance of that other, and the relevance of the performance dimension to one's self-definition. The SEM model is described as involving two processes, the reflection process…

Cognitive factors have been shown to play an important role in marital distress. To examine the importance of the self-other distinction for understanding the impact of attributions on marital satisfaction, two studies were conducted. In the first study, causal attributions for naturally occurring behavior by the self and spouse were investigated…

Questions the appropriateness of unidimensional or unidisciplinary approaches to understanding the student activism phenomenon and suggests the likely futility of intervention programs based on them. (RB)

Our understanding of a story is highly dependent upon our ability to recognize the underlying purpose for actions described in the story. We need to view those actions as steps in, or reactions to, plans. This paper sketches some of the components of a model for the understanding of plans and social actions. The model is first applied to narrative…

Describes the structure of spontaneous episodes of dyadic play and suggests some of the basic abilities which underlie social play, based on observation of 36 15-20 minute videotaped play sessions involving groups of three children each, ages 3 1/2 to 5 1/2 years. (ED)

In this paper the physical characteristics of community sites that are common gathering places for adolescents are described and recommendations are given for improving their use. It is suggested that there are some common factors in the society and in the organization of many towns and cities in the United States that contribute to the appearance…

Interviews were conducted with 721 students in fourth, sixth, and eighth grades to study whether children's perceived reality of television would affect the relationship between pro-social and anti-social television content and pro-social and anti-social behavior. Social behavior variables, a perceived reality index, and television exposure…

The purpose of this study was to identify and analyze interaction effects of selected psychosocial variables on the development of subsequent smoking behavior among youth who had originally identified themselves on a survey as never having smoked. The subjects were seventh grade students who had participated in a total of three surveys over a two…