The results of an ethnographic study of black middle class families in Atlanta, Georgia, are presented in this 10-chapter book. Chapter 1 describes the author's reasons for conducting research in Atlanta and how she acquired contacts for reaching the specific population during the fieldwork stage (which occurred between September 1969 and July…

Current statistics on arrests, convictions, and prison inmates and recent studies on violence by women indicate that the number of women who commit violent crimes is rising. Violent crimes include murder, rape, terrorism, gang participation, domestic violence, and prostitution. The first section, "Women Who Kill," discusses women who…

Type A individuals are characterized by a sense of urgency, hard-driving competitiveness, and hostility which are manifested in their attempts to establish and maintain control over personal and environmental events. In order to investigate conformity and interpersonal dominance in Type A personalities, 87 male college students completed the…

Affective and physiological responses, interpersonal interaction, and alcohol consumption have been significantly correlated with cognitive factors in defining the behavioral effects of alcohol. To investigate alcohol reinforcement expectancies at the abusive end of the drinking continuum, 305 male and female adult alcoholics enrolled in alcohol…

School faculties are complex social communities consisting of countless social interactions that weave the larger web of social relationships. Collective observations of 16 teachers and the author, in an Indiana elementary school over 1 year, identified several distinct forms of social encounters: affirmations are interactions that, while serving…

The manual presents an emperically tested coding system for thoughts concerning interaction with same-sex able-bodied or physically disabled college students. Although the system was developed for use with written thought listing, it may be adapted to in vivo or audiotaped thought listing. Thoughts are coded both for valence (positive, negative)…

Personal relationships can provide comfort and pleasure or strain and disappointment. Relationships which provide the greatest opportunities for support and companionship may also be the ones most open to negative exchanges. Theoretical perspectives can help predict how positive and negative interpersonal experiences can together affect…

The study investigated whether learning disabled fifth, sixth, and seventh graders who were given an easy opportunity to look good would be as likely to take the opportunity as other children. Ss were given the Children's Social Desirability Scale, a questionnaire which lists a series of statements which indicate exaggerated claims of socially…

Research on individual's response to emergency situations in the presence of others has produced conflicting results. The bystander effect is the label applied to inaction or the unlikelihood of assistance with others present. The social facilitation effect occurs when the presence of others energizes response; strong habit responses are…

Physical aggression among institutionalized mentally retarded persons arouses great social concern. To examine the effectiveness of four-point mechanical restraints and a positive adaptive symbol program in the reduction of high frequency, high intensity aggression, three institutionalized severely mentally retarded adolescents (2 females, 1 male)…

A previous study (McCauley and Newman) found that there was less eye contact with strangers in the city than in the suburbs. The interpretation offered was that decreased eye contact in the city is an adaptation to overload of strangers. It is known from laboratory experiments that adaptation to interpersonal overload is relatively fast. Baum and…

The National Alliance Concerned with School-Age Parents (NACSAP) is a private, non-profit, multidisciplinary membership organization specializing in technical assistance to those working with school-age parents, young families at risk, and sexually active youth. This publication represents a compilation of information relating to adolescent…

This is a brief report discussing ways of dealing with aggression in individuals. The author feels that previous approaches, such as catharsis or punishment, have proved inadequate, and that a more successful approach to reducing aggression involves the induction of incompatible reactions among aggressors. In the author's opinion, when angry…

The purpose of this paper is to describe an intuitively appealing continuum along which motives relevant to situations of social interdependence may be located. Aditionally, it is argued that individuals differ in terms of their positions on this continuum, and that such differences are important to a general theory of bargaining. The argument is…

In this paper, the diverse literature bearing on the topic of homosexuality and psychological adjustment is critically reviewed and synthesized. The first chapter discusses the most crucial methodological issue in this area, the problem of sampling. The kinds of samples used to date are critically examined, and some suggestions for improved…