The prefrontal cortex (PFC) has a well-established role in the inhibition of inappropriate responding, and evidence suggests that the infralimbic (IL) region of the rat medial PFC (MPFC) may be involved in some aspects of extinction of conditioned fear. MPFC lesions including, but not those sparing the IL cortex increase spontaneous recovery of…

The author found it very satisfying to reread "Toward a technology of 'nonaversive' behavioral support," written in 1990 by Rob Horner and seven of his colleagues. Their predictions of the critical themes for advancing positive behavior support (PBS) ring true. Fifteen years have passed since the publication of this article, and much has happened…

The return to drug seeking, even after prolonged periods of abstinence, is a defining feature of cocaine addiction. The neural circuitry underlying relapse has been identified in neuropharmacological studies of experimental animals, typically rats, and supported in brain imaging studies of human addicts. Although the nucleus accumbens (NAcc),…

Neuroscientific approaches to drug addiction traditionally have been based on the premise that addiction is a process that results from brain changes that in turn result from chronic administration of drugs of abuse. An alternative approach views drug addiction as a behavioral disorder in which drugs function as preeminent reinforcers. Although…

Combining psycholinguistic technologies and systems analysis created advances in motivational profiling and numerous new behavioral engineering applications. These advances leapfrog many mainstream statistical research methods, producing superior research results via cause-effect language mechanisms. Entire industries explore motives ranging from…

Selecting a statistical framework for a behavioral study has profoundly different results than does a linguistically framed research strategy. The linguistic strategy overcomes many limitations inherent in statistical strategies and offers more meaningful results. Inferential statistical studies often discuss how the findings "explain" the results…

This study explored if and how vision rehabilitation services address important life goals of young and middle-aged adults who are visually impaired. It found that services that teach functional skills and offer psychosocial therapeutic-type services were instrumental in addressing life goals and that independence-related goals were most often…

The paper considers whether, and if so how, research evidence can permeate the world of higher education (HE) management in publicly funded institutions. The paper explores the author's experience of two recent research projects (1998-2000 and 2004) on aspects of managing UK HE institutions and issues arising from the preparation of the HE element…

Little is known about the short- and long-term benefits mentors gain from their mentoring relationships. This study examined the extent to which short-term proximal benefits reported by mentors (improved job performance, recognition by others, rewarding experience, and loyal base of support) predicted the long-term distal outcomes of mentor career…

Hope is a core construct of positive psychology that has received only minimal application to work and vocational situations. C. R. Snyder (2000) conceptualized hope as a cognitive process with 3 primary components: goals, agency, and pathways. This article presents the development and validation of the Work Hope Scale (WHS), which was rationally…

The authors examined how college men's conformity to an array of masculinity norms varied as a function of their vocational interests to better understand the gendered context of men's vocational development. Three hundred ten mostly Caucasian and heterosexual college men completed the Conformity to Masculine Norms Inventory, and their answer to…

Fear extinction is defined as a decline in conditioned fear responses (CRs) following nonreinforced exposure to a feared conditioned stimulus (CS). Behavioral evidence indicates that extinction is a form of inhibitory learning: Extinguished fear responses reappear with the passage of time (spontaneous recovery), a shift of context (renewal), and…

In 1994, R. G. Lord and P. E. Levy proposed a variant of control theory that incorporated human information processing principles. The current article evaluates the empirical evidence for their propositions and updates the theory by considering contemporary research on information processing. Considerable support drawing from diverse literatures…

Bernoulli's framework of expected utility serves as a model for various psychological processes, including motivation, moral sense, attitudes, and decision making. To account for evidence at variance with expected utility, the authors generalize the framework of fast and frugal heuristics from inferences to preferences. The priority heuristic…

Performance feedback has facilitated the acquisition and maintenance of a wide range of behaviors (e.g., health-care routines, seat-belt use). Most researchers have attributed the effectiveness of performance feedback to (a) its discriminative functions, (b) its reinforcing functions, or (c) the combination of the two. In this study, we attempted…