A method of studying attachment behavior in infants was devised using time series and time sequence analyses. Time series analysis refers to relationships between events coded over adjacent fixed-time units. Time sequence analysis refers to the distribution of exact times at which particular events happen. Using these techniques, multivariate…

This paper is an ardent plea for simplifying experimental design and the associated statistics. The emphasis is on design itself. Traditional designs from simple to complex and reviewed and the simplest, most basic ways of handling the data are presented. Design is stressed in such a way that simple statistics follow. The intactness of…

In a nationwide study, data about attitudes, behavior, and socioeconomic and personal characteristics were collected from over 6000 low-income people. Both the welfare poor and the working poor were included in the study. The research results are reported in four volumes. This report covers only that part of the results that is relevant to…

In an attempt to move the principles and technology of the therapeutic community into the college classroom, the author used mutual interviews and first-name group discussion among his students to build group rapport. Once group leaders were assigned, the students again used interviewing techniques to admit members to the groups. Other features of…

The five papers which comprise this volume share a common interest in the relationship of the problems of instructional technology to the insights of the behavioral sciences. The first chapter is concerned with the applications of present knowledge and empirical methodology to the solution of particular behavioral problems, an activity that…

This review of literature on children's learning focuses on the following seven subject areas: (1) Infant learning, particularly studies of conditioning and individual differences in infants, (2) New perspectives on Piaget, reviewing studies where conservation and transitive inferences have been taught to young children, (3) Language and…

The emergence of a new theoretical framework for research in human development is discussed. The theoretical perspective is contrasted with the classical laboratory experiment, which produces ecologically invalid research because of the restrictions of the artificial laboratory environment. The emerging framework enhances ecological validity by…

Seeking to understand where students are at in reference to their preconceived attitudes and knowledge concerning environmental issues was the purpose for undertaking this research study. An analysis of environmental information sources, both the schools and the media, appeared necessary. Only in this manner can environmental education programs be…

Behavioral observations have the advantages of being direct, tangible, and informative as to the contextual determinants of behavior. Considerable evidence exists that a three-dimensional structure gives meaning to many child behaviors in a variety of life settings. Three bipolar dimensions constitute this framework: introversion vs. extroversion,…

The comparative effectiveness of an aversive stimulus, withholding of resources, withdrawal of love and reasoning, when used alone and combined with praise, was assessed in the standard laboratory punishment paradigm using 120 first and second graders as subjects. Resistance to deviation was used as the measure of punishment effectiveness. Sex of…

Four to five-year-old children were asked questions on length involving single or double comparatives in a transitive inference task. The number of comparatives varied within or across pairs. The pairs of sticks were color-coded. Initial pair-wise discrimination training on four adjacent pairs from a five stick array with only verbal feedback was…

The purpose of this study was to determine if white university students were aware of any peer group attitudes toward blacks. Student respondents to a questionnaire felt that college students do not like racists, but a similar group of college students made negative racial responses when their attitudes were measured. The findings provided some…

This study, which used systematic desensitization (SD) behavior therapy to reduce anxieties associated with giving speeches, was based on the hypothesis that subjects given SD therapy five times in 1 week (massed training) would achieve greater reduction of communication anxiety than would subjects treated once a week for 5 weeks (spaced…

External reinforcement paradigms are useful and necessary in a complete instructional system and external reinforcement is not antithetical to a belief in an intrinsic motivation hypothesis. Teacher training, parent education, and classroom management, as well as complex learning sequences, can be improved by the use of principles emerging from…

The effects of immediate and delayed feedback on perseverance and learning were investigated with a 3 x 3 factorial design. It was hypothesized that delayed feedback would reduce perseverance while immediate feedback would increase it. Subjects were 72 male college students, paid for participation. They read prose sentences and completed cloze…