To examine the consequences of responsiveness in dyadic interaction, explore the effects of irrelevant response on listener processing and retention of content, and determine the impact of irrelevant responses on listener perception of speaker attributes, 108 college students were asked to read a debate between two fictitious political candidates…

Intermediate grade teachers are provided with 14 presidential election learning activities which introduce students to the different stages of the campaign process, past presidents, and the two-party system. Students participate in a presidential facts game, an election vocabulary game, a word search, and a matching game; create campaign slogans…

The purpose of this Children's Defense Fund (CDF) briefing book for child advocates, community activists, professionals, policymakers, parents, citizens, members of the media, and political leaders is to dramatically increase public consciousness about children's needs and solutions to those needs. The book uses the election year process to build…

South Africa is in a state of transition. In viewing the struggle between apartheid's defenders and its opponents, social scientists can make the valuable contribution of projecting alternative scenarios of change as it relates to the way in which state institutions intersect with society. This paper is part of a larger study of South Africa that…

Because a right of information privacy is not firmly imbedded in constitutional case law, advocates of the concept that citizens have the right to control personal information held by others turned to Congress. Enacted to regulate the government's use of personal information, the Privacy Act of 1974 has failed to work in the way intended. Shortly…

This essay examines some of the campaign communication behavior during the 1988 presidential race in terms of ethical criteria for a participatory democracy. Overall, this campaign violated several standards for ethical behavior through strategies such as over-reliance on emotional appeals, ridicule, failure to focus on relevant issues, and…

During 1985-1986, 18 countries in the Asia and Pacific region undertook a survey of their teacher education programs. These survey studies provided statistical data and information, as well as details of trends and developments in teacher education, and were the subject of a workshop sponsored by Unesco's Asia and the Pacific Programme of…

This paper examines recent behavior of public officials at various levels of government in the United States, finds a systemic failure to meet ethical standards, and concludes that the wisdom of James Madison has much applicability to current times. Given his keen perception of human nature, Madison would not be too surprised at today's poor…

A collection of resources for high school history and government teachers and their students, this volume treats core ideas on constitutional government in the United States. James Madison's ideas as found in "The Federalist Papers" are examined in conjunction with their counterpoints in essays of the Anti-Federalists. This volume…

This study describes a proactive approach to teacher empowerment that attended not only to public outside perspectives, but also to private internal ones. This approach is based on the concept that the power and authority which teachers exercise in the classroom can transform the teaching profession from the inside out. A committee of teachers was…

A study examined the relationships among source diversity, medium reliance, and nominal issue diversity. Source diversity is defined as the number of categories or classes of sources, and in the study nominal diversity within media (newspapers, television and magazines) was examined. Medium reliance is defined as the perceived usefulness of a…

Immigration legislation in the United States is aimed primarily at Mexican migrants, who account for over half of all undocumented immigrants in the United States. Citizens of Central American and Caribbean countries contribute another 20%. The first section of this booklet traces the development of United States immigration legislation from the…

Anti-nuclear discourse, which peaked in 1981-82, signaled an emergence of public discourse on the nuclear warfare issue. During the development of the original atomic bomb, public discussion of the issue was severely restricted, but immediately after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, discourse on the subject increased. During the Cold War…

The paper traces the life of the 18th century North Carolinian planter Willie Jones and his transformed political stance from traditional commitment to the Crown to a new constitutional faith in republicanism. Jones' political career and struggles are noted through the Revolutionary era and the controversy of centralized versus decentralized…

Developed as part of a research program directed at obtaining reliable persuasive effects, the two sets of persuasive messages provided in this report--consumer messages and sociopolitical messages--discuss fictitious brands of consumer products and various sociopolitical issues. The consumer messages were developed for the following 12 products:…