This paper defines a personality construct, the "others-concept," as "a person's general expectancies or perceptions about other people along a positive-negative continuum." This construct helps conceptualize how predictions and assumptions about possible social interactions are made when the amount of information concerning…

This document presents an overview of a survey conducted to determine the educational and social role of interschool sports in the secondary schools of Ontario, Canada. The study is based on the theory that the goal of most youth sports organizations is participation--to get as many children involved as possible. Conversely, professional-athletic…

This study clarifies the relationship between children's social desirability (CSD) response tendencies and their withdrawal from classroom achievement situations by investigating the effects of the child's expectations of peer response. Data gathered included scores on the Children's Social Desirability Scale, scores on an expectancy of response…

Aggression is examined in this paper in conjunction with other social motivational behaviors (e.g., Altruism, cooperation/competition). Its purpose is to illustrate the usefulness of an integrative approach to aggression research. Such an approach appears to be reasonable and potentially productive, since many of the same independent variables…

This study considers some aspects of "prisonization," or the process by which inmates adapt to confinement. Specifically, it further examines two ideas suggested by earlier studies. One is the belief that the structural characteristics of many prisons promote rather than inhibit assimilation into an inmate normative system that is opposed to the…

Seventy-nine members of several types of groups responded to questionnaires which detailed their goals and self-perceptions, and their expectations and perceptions of group leadership, norms, methods, and atmosphere. The questionnaires were administered near the beginning and again at the end (posttest N=69) of the group experience. The groups…

This essay provides an analytic development of a philosophy of rhetoric which focuses its concern on social reality. According to this philosophy, the activity of the human mind invents symbolic constructions of reality. Primary socialization is interpreted as a rhetorical process which tends to maintain prevailing reality constructions.…

Investigates the role of social factors and marital status in the use of expletives among married and single American women between the ages of 40 and 55. (AM)

Choice of language style depends on personality, society and culture, or in another view, on personal needs, immediate situation and background situation. Some of the literature on this subject is reviewed. Available from Instituut voor Toegepaste Linguistiek, Vesaliusstraat 2, B. 3000 Leuven, Belgium. (TL)

This experiment was designed to explore the effects of simple and remedial altruism upon children's subsequent self-reinforcement, generosity, and performance quality estimates. (CS)

Narrative observations were made of kindergarten through fourth grade students' challenges of their peers' inappropriate behavior and of the responses made to the challenges. Approximately 90 hours of observation in 10 classrooms yielded 728 occasions in which an interchange began with one child challenging another. Three types of responses to…

In a survey of 940 adult residents of the metropolitan Columbia (South Carolina) area, sense of community attachment proved to be a more important determinant of newspaper reading habits than such demographic factors as age, years of residence in the community, socioeconomic status, family income, or attained level of education. The telephone…

Marxist/Maoist interpretations of sport in China differ significantly from the functional and meritocratic perspectives in the West which emphasize competition and personal reward. The latter school stresses the ability of the upwardly mobile aspirant to prove ability through competition. Individuals with talent are placed in valued positions in…