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Reports a series of ethnographic studies of student behavior concerning examinations, conducted in a Canadian university since the mid-1980s. Describes techniques of data gathering and the link between methodology and theory. Examines implications for higher education, including dealing with students' exam-related stress, factors influencing cheating behavior, and differential behavior of student personality types. (MSE)

An approach to staging examinations that uses dramaturgical techniques to achieve fairness and prevent cheating has also been found to communicate important messages about the values of individualism and universalism and emphasize reward on the basis of equal competition. (MSE)

College student interpretation of the messages conveyed by the formal examination process are discussed. It is proposed that while students will most often interpret the spaces, props, equipment, and people involved in examinations as they were intended, sometimes the message is misinterpreted or challenged, making it dysfunctional. (MSE)

Wherever there are rules there will be temptations for people to break them. Consequently, there is always the possibility of people being labelled deviant whether or not they do break the rules. University examinations are rule-riddled events shrouded in a 'suspicion awareness context' where suspecting invigilators are on guard against possible cheaters. Students, aware of this, must avoid all taint of suspicion and the dire consequences of being labelled a cheater. These avoidance strategies consist of impression management in the form of disclaimers. It is the purpose of this article to describe the bizarre and seemingly paranoid length students writing exams go to in: the control of their eyes, deployment of books and notes, and choice of space to avoid the stigma of being labelled a cheater. The emphasis is primarily on the innocent noncheaters but there is brief treatment also of the guilty.

This study was an examination of comfortable proxemic distances assumed by the interactants, female Canadian students. Previous studies were consistent with Hall's (1959, 1966) cultural model only when the interactants were from the same cultural group. When they were from different cultural groups, however, the cultural model was not adequate: The findings were more consistent with a symbolic interactionist interpretation, namely, that a negotiation takes place and the comfortable distance is adjusted to that of both groups. In this study, we held cultural group and sex constant and introduced the problem of the interviewer's retreat from the original comfortable distance established by the subject. In all cases, the subject re-established a new comfortable distance that was a compromise between the one originally chosen and the distance assumed by the interviewer.

Le fondement theorique de notre etude sur l'experience vecue par les etudiants d'une greve du corps professoral d'une universite s'appuie principalement sur la formulation theorique de Blumer selon laquelle l'interaction [...]

This study investigated the relationship of distance to eye contact and perception of possible physical threat by interrelating Argyle and Dean's (1965) compensatory hypothesis with Dosey and Meisels' (1969) perception of personal space as a ' body buffer zone.' Forty male and 40 female Canadians between 18 and 59 years of age served as subjects. Settings were classified as either potentially threatening or nonthreatening. The degree of eye contact was varied by having experimenters wear or not wear sunglasses. As expected, there was support for Dosey and Meisels' theory that in situations perceived to be potentially threatening, people react by standing farther back and using personal space as a buffer zone. Argyle and Dean's hypothesis was not fully supported because in the potentially threatening situation, the lower the degree of eye contact, the farther the distance of interaction between respondents and experimenters. The findings reemphasize the importance of respondents' perceptions for creating meaning within a particular social context.

The suggestion that students at present day universities participate in magic at exam time may seem unusual. This study views 'magic' as behavior directed toward achieving an outcome, involving many everyday and commonplace acts, but seeming to rely for success on some mystical element. Hundreds of personal accounts from students describing their exam-related behaviors provide the basis for a classification system of their 'magical practices.' The classification yields findings regarding the use of magic for luck and the avoidance of bad luck. Student magic is found to be idiosyncratic, inconsistent, and never malevolent as it often is in preliterate societies. Such differences between preliterate magic, other modern forms, and student magic are related to the complexity and heterogeneity of the larger society, the cultural norms, and the degree of collective action involved.

A "pulley" alternative is offered in place of Reiss', "wheel model" of love and Borland's "clockspring" alternative of the same model. In the "pulley" alternative suggested here two shortcomings of the first two models are corrected for: (1) a more realistic provision for direction of rotation of the system and its reversal, and (2) a dependent variable of intensity. Reiss' model seems historically important and useful enough to warrant an attempt to render it more isomorphic with underlying theory. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

White and Indian adult males, speaking whatever words came to mind in their native languages (English and Cree, respectively), attempted to express vocally the emotions of happiness, sadness, love, and anger. After these simulations of emotional state were recorded, the speech samples were rendered unintelligible by means of an electronic filter (which removed verbal meaning while leaving intact the tonal aspects of speech). The filtered vocal expressions from the white and Indian speakers were then played to other groups of white and Indian adult males (receivers). When both heard the samples from the white speakers, the white receivers were able to identify the emotional content of tone of voice more accurately than the Indian receivers. On the other hand, Indian receivers performed more accurately than whites when judging the samples from Indian speakers. The significant interaction suggested that language and culture are crucial factors in the transmission of emotion-even on the nonverbal vocal level. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]