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Discussed are theoretical considerations related to prognostic rehabilitation research with the adult mentally retarded. Noted is the lack of a unifying theory of rehabilitation, and reviewed are two approaches to theory building (deductive and inductive). Deductive functions are defined as formulating and testing hypotheses from already existing research, while inductive is seen to propose and test hypotheses based on a more neuristic or exploratory approach. (CL)

Until recently, the use of contingency contracting has been largely an issue of theory and discussion with little experimental research evidence gathered to support efficacy. Two major reasons for this problem are suggested and discussed: (1) the concept of contingency contracting has not been adequately defined nor its minimal requirements delineated in terms of an applied behavior analysis; (2) the applications of contingency contracting have not been clearly distinguished from other types of contingency management procedures. This paper resolves the above problems by presenting a set of definitive requirements of contingency contracting from an operant point of view. Accordingly, it focuses attention on the importance of both the discovery and control of relevant consequences of adult behaviors in their natural settings and the reliable measurement of those behaviors. Finally, the paper draws attention to the special characteristics of this technique which distinguish its applications from other types of contingency management procedures. (Author)

This paper examines some of the cognitive responses people experience while attending to messages. Two laboratory studies and a field experiment were conducted. In the lab studies, three different audience groups (junior and senior high school students and parents) were shown three different anti-drug abuse messages. Various levels of audio distraction--similar to "real world" viewing situations--occurred during exposure to the messages which were presented in the context of a current television program. The findings were: student groups generally commented about the ads less than parents, senior high students counterargued more and connected less than other groups. and adults were particularly sensitive to distractions. In the second lab study adult subjects were mailed a booklet about drug abuse two weeks following participation in the experiment. Compared to a group that saw no anti-drug ads, those who had seen anti-drug ads were more likely to recall receiving a booklet, to have read it, and to have had a drug discussion recently. In the field experiment two key ads were run during a 32-day period via split-cable facility on the West Coast. Telephone interviews conducted pre-, during, and post-exposure indicated that both ads stimulated interest compared to pre-campaign levels. (Author/WR)

Drug education is conceptualized as a socialization process, particularly as it is related to assuming the adult role. The effectiveness of two processes of social influence, expert power and referent (modeling) power, were measured in three different age groups-early adolescence, middle adolescence, and adulthood-in a drug education program. Learning of factual information and attitude change served as dependent variables. Results indicated strong age--specific effects. Expertise was most effective with adults, modeling most effective with early adolescents. Relationships between effectiveness and age level were monotonic. Implications are drawn for the study of adolescence, the study of attitude change, and the design of drug education programs. (Author)

This document presents cross-sectional and longitudinal data relating the time required to read orally 50 unrelated letters, 50 unrelated words, and 100 words in text among first to sixth grade children and adults. Results include concurrent correlation between letter, word, and text times ranging between .18 and .92 with a median of .77. Longitudinal correlations between grades two and six ranged from .21 to .96 with a median of .78 indicating a high level of developmental stability and strong relationships between the abilities to read letters or words rapidly at an earlier age and reading text rapidly at a later age. Multiple regression analyses indicate that letter time variance is associated with a median of 46 percent of text time variance, while additional skills affecting word time variance is associated with a median of 27 percent of text time variance between grades two and six. These and the remaining results may be interpreted to indicate the existence of a developmental reading speed ability which is not primarily dependent on word identification or context-using skills. (Author/SW)

The purpose of this study was to describe the major sources of job satisfaction and dissatisfaction in the Navy, as well as the relationship of this satisfaction to retention of naval personnel. To identify sources of satisfaction and dissatisfaction, eight Navy ratings (occupational career fields) were analyzed. Individuals in each of the ratings were required to respond, on a one-to-five continuum, to statements associated with 33 job factors. Review of these ratings indicated that, although individuals were provided with the opportunity to assume responsibility in carrying out assigned duties to completion, they were dissatisfied by an apparent lack of sufficient recognition for their efforts. In addition, they were dissatisfied in their perception of the way in which the military system operates. In a separate study conducted to determine the relationship between job satisfaction and reenlistment, equal satisfaction was found for both first-term and career force personnel who stated that they planned to reenlist. Satisfaction factors apparently play a much greater role for first-term personnel than for career personnel. (Author/PC)

This paper addresses itself to the use of judicial discrimination as a vehicle of imposing and maintaining superordinate controls on society, especially in the white, male-dominated South. The study, using the North Carolina correctional system as an indicator of fair and equal justice, as manifested by our judicial ideals, shows that this is not the case. Direct relationships seem to exist regarding class, race, and sex in that there is a greater chance for lower classes, racial minorities, and male offenders to be prosecuted, convicted, and incarcerated than is the case for other offenders. While whites account for the majority of felony arrests, blacks are the ones who are adjudicated most harshly, accounting for the majority of incarcerations. Although females, in general, are subjected to reverse judicial discrimination, those adjudicated represent the same discriminatory patterns found among their male counterparts regarding class and race. Justice is viewed by the author as being relative in that it is defined not according to some rational, ideal standard but in line with the power elite's own value system, one that often is used to perpetuate the power differential between itself and perceived threatening outgroups in the society. (Author/PC)

To measure the symmetry of adult categorical phoneme perception, 10 adult male undergraduate students enrolled in an introductory psychology class were the subjects for this study as part of their course requirements. The stimuli used in this study were prepared at Haskins Laboratories by means of a parallel resonance synthesizer and computer. The bilabial stop consonants generated had voice onset times of 0, 20, 40, 60, and 80 milliseconds. Each consonant was followed by the vowel "a." Each subject was tested individually in a sound dampened room. Subjects were seated at a table facing two speakers, one located 90 inches from the subject, the other located 6 inches directly behind the first. A response key was positioned directly in front of the subject. The results replicated those of Liberman and other researchers (1967) which demonstrated that although voice onset time is a continuum, adult perception along that continuum appears categorical. (SW)

A quantitative apporach was used to identify factors relating to emotional adjustment in 84 dying patients. Eleven hospital chaplains collected data by interviewing dying patients. Results indicate that emotional adjustment to the awareness of a limited life expectancy was not related principally to religious orientation, although this was an important factor. Emotional adjustment was influenced more by the patient's physical condition (level of discomfort), by previous experiences with dying persons, and by interpersonal relationships. The most important aspect of the religious variable was the quality of religious orientation rather than mere religious affiliation or verbal acceptance of religious beliefs. (Author)

A research design was created to investigate if adults participating in noncredit courses have different preferences for control of inclass learning activities. Only the variables of "reason for participation" and "type of content" were researched as to whether they affected preference for control. The study provides evidence that different adults do have different attitudes toward control of molar learning in noncredit courses. The research design's reliability, validity, and the data analysis procedures are explained. Appendixes include the course ratings and the questionnaire forms. (JC)

The effects of physical attractiveness, warmth, and sex of an adult model on imitation behavior of adult males and females were investigated. Subjects were randomly paired with confederates of low or high facial attractiveness who interacted with the subject in a cold-unfriendly or warm-friendly manner. The imitation task involved the confederate lighting a specified colored light on the subject's panel in response to a noun. The subject then indicated his color choice on the confederate's panel. The summed score for 20 trials of match or mismatch was used as the measure of imitation. Results indicated that physical attractiveness influences imitation when combined with other variables, but when compared with a salient, interpersonal attraction variable such as warmth, the effects of physical attractiveness are greatly reduced. The data suggests that the effects of physical attractiveness may be substantially altered when subjects have an opportunity to interact with persons of differential attractiveness; thus, one needs to exercise caution in making inferences from the literature on physical attractiveness. (Author/PC)

The author offers some tentative hypotheses regarding barriers which limit progress of mature, married, black females in preparing and entering academe. The assumptions are based on limited data which are still coming in for a larger study on women in academe. The barriers discussed include: (1) limited role models, (2) limited encouragement to enter atypical fields, (3) racism, (4) limited financial support, (5) self-concept, (6) marriage, (7) maturity, and (8) lack of information on black women. Four suggestions are offered for overcoming barriers which impede the progress of this group: (1) development of programs to help develop awareness and solve problems of sex bias, (2) initiation of ongoing human resource development programs, (3) implementation of professionally run child care centers, and (4) establishment of a center for the study and dissemination of information about black women. (Author/PC)

A review of the literature indicated a recognition that interview behavior was critical to job placement and successful employment. Previous research, however, has not specified either the structure of inverview training with the mildly retarded or the outcomes of those programs. In a recent study, 29 of 40 mentally retarded young adults filled the role of job interviewer to a moderately successful extent. This paper attempts to determine the relationship of this finding to subjects' cognitive and personality dimensions; and to subsequent employment. Thirty-four mentally retarded young adults with IQ scores from 42 to 85 served as subjects. They were minimally trained in questioning techniques and instructed to serve as job interviewers. The Ss Performance in the role of job interviewer was measured by summing the number of experimentor-suggested questions and the number of judged relevant questions they asked on their own initiative. On the basis of preliminary findings, the use of the interviewer role task with mantally retarded young adults appears worthy of future exploration as a promising technique to evaluate social skills, particularly in the job interview situation. Success with the interview task appears related to subsequent competitive employment. (Author/PC)

Adolescent pregnancy, especially among low income non-white groups, is becoming a matter of increasing concern. Data indicated that pregnancy in the adolescent, especially under age 16, is associated with high incidences of toxemia, anemia, contracted pelvis, prolonged labor, and a high maternal death rate. It is also the largest single reason why female students drop out of secondary schools. Considering the relationship between teenage pregnancy and poverty, the paper focused on adult female attitudes toward sexual and contracepting behavior for single, never pregnant, teenage girls. A questionnaire was administered by public health nurses to 50 black Aid for Dependent Children (AFDC) clients in rural Georgia. The study population, which was socioeconomically homogeneous, included 15 respondents who were 19 years of age; 19 who were between 20 and 29; 13 between 30 and 39; and 3 above 40. Eighteen were single; 16 were married; 16 were separated (2 widows were included). Vincent's hypothesis of normative contradiction held for single and separated respondents in their permissive attitudes toward premarital sex and negative attitudes toward illegitimacy. The results seemed to suggest that premarital sex attitudes were more related to the respondent's sexual behavior than to age or role position. It was also noted that the results of this study cannot be taken as representative of low income blacks. (KM)

Data presented from two studies support the hypothesis that normative expectations of youthful deviance are held mainly by those social classes for which youth as a social moratorium exists for some length of time. As youth is a class-dependent social arrangement, it should be expected that normative expectations be held mostly by members of the middle and upper classes of modern industrial societies; the expectation of youthful deviance and protest should be absent or weak in the working classes where youth is not extended and where the moratorium between biological maturity and social maturity is rather short and not supported by social institutions. The first of two small, nation-wide surveys in West Germany included asking the respondents to indicate in which areas youth should behave like adults and where they should behave differently. Answers indicated that the norm of youthful deviance is held by many. Items expressing these normative expectations included in a second survey were two different but related components of expectations of youthful deviance, idealism and radical criticism of existing social institutions. As predicted, support for these statements was related to social class and to age of respondent. (Author/KSM)

Compared were the adaptive behavior and IQ scores of educable retarded persons 16- to 45-years-old who were successful (N=47) in group living. Scores of parts 1 and 2 of the Adaptive Behavior Scale, including domains of independent functioning, language development, antisocial behavior, and unacceptable or eccentric habits were correlated to house parents' determination of success or failure. Data indicated a significant difference between the two groups. Behavior domains linked to nonsuccessful group living included untrustworthy behavior, economic activity, and hyperactive tendencies. Results suggested the feasibility of insuring appropriate placement through behavior rating. (CL)

This study attempted to compare the phoneme shifting ability of nonreading adults, and remedial elementary and good elementary students. The Phoneme Shifting Test was used to evaluate the phoneme shifting skill, specifically the shifting of the first and the last letters of words. Individual testing was done during October 1974. Phoneme shifting skills were found to be a variable that can discriminate among reading groups. Results indicated a difference existed between the good and the remedial groups and the adult group and the good group in the way they responded to the phoneme shifting measure. The remedial group and the nonreading adult group did not seem to differ in the way they responded. The discrepancy between the good readers' responses and those of the illiterate adults provides some evidence that the adult would not profit from a traditional developmental program. (Author/JM)

This report is an attempt to analyze the aggression which occurs within extended dyadic interchanges of parent and child, husband and wife, or sibling and peers. An argument is made for a "performance" theory of children's noxious behaviors based on the assumption that most children, exposed to modeling and reinforcing contingencies through which they learn the techniques of coercive behaviors, differ with regard to performance rates. It is proposed that it is necessary to search for the immediately impinging stimuli associated with altered probabilities in ongoing noxious behaviors. These stimuli may be found in various dyadic interchanges between the child and other family members. Studies based on across-subjects' daya are reviewed which show networks of controlling stimuli for many noxious behaviors observed in family interactions. A pilot study using an extensive series of intraindividual data for one boy is described. The data replicated the stimulus network findings for noxious behaviors as well as the construction of response classes. The interactions between extended interchanges of response class and maintaining stimuli are described in a probability tree. The latter demonstrated the impact of the environment on the child as well as that of the child on the environment. (CS)

This paper presents a study which indicates that accurate performance on a simple conservation task need not be related to congnitive maturity. Twenty adults and 20 third graders were given three verbal problems, each requiring a same-different judgment and an explanation of that judgment. Only 3 adults were able to give correct judgments, while 19 of the children were able to do so. It was surmised that the adults were not able to ignore irrelevant information, and that carefree attention to the characteristics of task information is necessary if advances in developmental theory are to be realized. (ED)

To eight pictures of adolescents in the School Scene Apperception Questionnaire, adolescents note their agreement to statements which were derived from free responses by more than 600 adolescents having some difficulty in school. To establish the reactions of school-adjusted adolescents to the pictures, three semantic differential factors--constriction, potency, and activity--were selected. Scores for both constriction and potency were expected to be higher for adolescent-adult situations than for adolescents alone, and scores for activity to show an interaction between sex of adolescent pictured and sex of respondent. Respondents were 50 boys and 50 girls 13 to 16 years old from predominantly urban schools in New York and New Jersey. Sixty-eight children were classified as white; none had salient adjustive difficulties. Adjective intercorrelations were factored and four pictured situations selected to test hypotheses. There were no differences in constriction scores for the two kinds of situations and no interaction effects in activity scores. There were significantly higher potency scores for adult-involving pictures. Further, boys were more active than girls, and adult-involving situations more than adolescents alone. These adolescents see adults as facilitators rather than as sources of constraint. (Author)

The experiment was designed to test the effects of covert behavior upon the verbal expression of emotional words contained in a TAT-like story. Subjects were 63 college students. The first independent variable, "self-regulation," consisted of three levels: (a) a no self-monitoring condition, (b) a self-monitoring condition, and (c) a self-monitoring with self-evaluation condition. The second independent variable, visual imagery, involved the administration of positive, neutral, or aversive images contingent upon an actual or perceived increase in the target response. The data were analyzed using a 3x3 factorial design in a multivariate analysis of covariance and a repeated measures analysis of covariance. No significant differences were found on the major hypotheses, but a remarkable trend in the interaction graphs stimulates a number of specific suggestions to further researchers. (Author)

The Generic Skills project is a research study being conducted in Canada to determine those overt and covert behaviors which are fundamental to the performance of many tasks and sub-tasks performed in a wide range of occupations. Data aimed at determining the needs for adult education and training have been obtained in two surveys. In the first, 340 workers and their 340 supervisors in 27 different occupations answered questions related to mathematics and communications skills. In the second survey, 490 workers and 480 supervisors in 37 occupations, 18 of which were repeated from the first survey, completed questions related to mathematics, communications, interpersonal, and reasoning skills. From the data, certain core skill requirements for work performance appear evident. All occupations require reading and listening at least the literal level of comprehension--reading forms and writing words/phrases on forms. Most of the skills of one-to-one conversation are common requirements and all occupations require instructional communication, the ability to demonstrate and instruct. Complete data are presented in tabular form and conclusions and implications are discussed. (TO)

The summary is based on 8 tables, and on the comparison of these data with assessments of the change in the general quality of life. Data have been aggregated for the percentage of knowledgeable respondents in each county giving a certain answer. These are presented in the form of the range and the median of the county percentages in each of the 6 states (Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Tennessee) and for groupings of states. Measures are shown separately for white, minority, and total knowledgeable respondents, and for Upper South, Deep South, and individual states. Findings indicate that these observers, who are both knowledgeable about the institutional services in their counties and also in considerable degree responsible for them, feel that things have been going in the right direction in the last decade so far as education, welfare, and health are concerned. The major exception are white knowledgeables in the Deep South, many of whom feel that the public schools have been getting worse or only holding their own, which is undoubtedly related to desegregation. (KM)

Courses By Newspaper is a national program that offers college-level instruction through the newspapers. The courses have as a target audience the adult learner who has never attended college, the college graduate, and the college dropout. The newspaper lessons are distributed to participating newspapers by the Copley News Service. The newspapers carry the course without charge. The original course is organized and developed by an authority in the field. At this point, 264 newspapers carry the courses, with the number of credit students for the first course numbering 5,000. What makes national newspaper courses so unique is that they offer every citizen the chance to study with the nation's best scholars. (Author/PG)

This study was designed to extend discussion of fear of success beyond the college population, using Horner's original coding scheme to examine the thematic imagery of TAT stories told by a cross-section of the public during a survey interview. The data collected from this sample of the general public contrasted in several ways with data gathered among college students. First, the percentage of respondents who told fear of success stories were generally lower among the noncollege population. The groups with a high incidence of fear of success were those most similar to college students. Other findings of researchers studying college students were corroborated: (1) blacks were significantly less likely to tell fear of success stories than whites; (2) males told fear of success stories to a male cue almost as often as females did to a female cue. In this study, women who both feared success and were traditional had significantly larger families than women who either did not fear success or who feared success but were not traditional. There is now under way a more detailed analysis of fear of success among the currently-married white females in the study, aged 18 to 55. (Author/PC)

The present study attempted to modify the latencies and errors of adult women on the Matching Familiar Figures test (MFF) by systematically altering task instructions. The results indicated that latencies of impulsive subjects could be altered with "reflective" instructions, while the latencies of reflective subjects were resistent to change; instructions did not significantly alter errors of either reflective or impulsive subjects. Test-retest correlations as well as the relative resistance of errors to altered instructions was interpreted as supportive of the generality and stability of the reflection-impulsivity dimension of cognitive style with adults. (Author)

This speech begins with the presentation of a conceptual scheme of the physical working capacity of a person starting a training program. The scheme shows that after exercise, when recovery begins and sufficient time elapses, the individual recovers and adapts to a level of physical working capacity which is higher than his starting level. From this scheme it is shown that a light workout produces faster recovery but a lesser degree of adaptation to a higher level; a strenuous workout that allows insufficient time for recovery before exercising again might impair the individual's physical working capacity. For an exercise session for cardiopulmonary conditioning for deconditioned or pathological adults, the following is recommended: a warmup, a stimulus period, and a cool-down composed for the most part of aerobic exercises (exercises which utilize energy which is liberated mainly through aerobic rather than anaerobic pathways). It is stated that during the stimulus period the individual should moderate his heart rate so that his heart stays within the "target zone"; the use of the heart rate in this manner provides a built-in barometer of relative exercise stress that is independent of the person's fitness level and requires the individual to perform a higher intensity of work to achieve his heart rate as his fitness improves. Charts and diagrams are referred to in the text and appear as appendixes. (JA)

A 2-day workshop in human sexuality was planned, implemented, and evaluated by the Genesee Region Family Planning Program, Inc., Rochester, New York. The goal of the workshop was to increase participant tolerance to a variety of patterns of sexual behavior. To measure attitudinal change, the Minnesota Sex Attitude Survey was administered one month prior to and two months following the workshop. The results showed a tendency toward an increase in tolerance on the total attitude score, although two survey items showed a decrease in tolerance among participants who generally expressed a positive reaction to the workshop as indicated on the "Happiness Quotient" Evaluation as well as unobtrusive measures of further contact with the agency regarding involvement in human sexuality programs. (Author/PC)

Combinatorial and implicative operations were studied with tasks which eliminated many complexities found in Piagetian tasks, but which did not alter the logical strategies required by Piaget's task. Task difficulty in relation to information-processing demands of tasks and processing capacities of subjects at three age levels (8.0-10.1 and 10.2-12.1 years, plus adults) was investigated. The model used provided accurate predictions of task difficulty. Subjects who passed tasks reduced to rudimentary logical prerequisites subsequently failed logically equivalent tasks when quantitative constraints due to number of task variables or perceptual factors exceeded their processing capacities, and transferred operations to a Piagetian task. (Author)

Because there is a need to measure performance of pupils with complex concepts, the Slide Sorting Task was developed to measure performance on complex concepts of freedom, non-freedom, justice, non-justice. The development of this instrument was presented along with the results of item analyses with several groups of subjects ranging from age seven through adults. The utility of the instrument was shown as a means of differentiating instructional procedures similar to those in regular classrooms. The instrument was shown to differentiate performances of abstract and concrete thinkers and to produce improved performances as a function of increases in age level. (Author/DEP)

Through observation of 26 subjects over a 3 month period, this research project measured the effects of transcendental meditation (TM) on concurrent heart rate, peripheral blood pulse volume, and the alpha wave frequency. The subjects were assigned randomly to three groups. One group practiced TM as prescribed by the International Meditation Society; another followed the meditation procedure but used an English mock mantra; the third made no change in daily routine. Two "blind" measurements were made of subjects before they learned and began their respective procedures and one measurement a month for three months during practice of thier procedures. Experimental results suggested that: (1) practice of TM or routine daily rests over a 3-month period had little effect on heart rate or peripheral blood pulse volumes; (2) when compared with practicing routine rest over 3 months, practicing TM appears to have little effect on, or possibly reduces, the relative frequency of appearance of the parietal alpha rhythm; and (3) there is some suggestion that practice of TM for 3 months may instill a state similar to that of sleep stage 1 during the meditating period. (Author/NM)