Acceptance of a paradigm in the scientific community depends upon persuasion, upon the supplying of "good reasons" for supporting one paradigm over another. When one paradigm gains long-term acceptance and becomes the standard for scientific thought, scientists defer to such an authority in their thinking, and such established paradigms…

Many people feel that the making of value judgments is an important aspect of the work of science. This paper explores some of the arguments in support of the claim that scientific work requires individual and social values and raises significant moral questions. Discussed here are: (1) the constitutive value of science; (2) the ethics involved in…

A study tested two hypotheses concerning credibility (an auditor's attitude toward a source) and arousal (attention level of an auditor): (1) the effect on learning of credibility will interact with the effect of the vigilance level of auditors, and (2) under conditions of low arousal, auditors will learn significantly more from a message if it is…

A study was conducted to test the empirical merit of R. M. Chisholm's and T. D. Feehan's proposed typology of deception: (1) commission versus omission (lies of commission are those where the liar contributes causally to the receiver's believing the lie, perhaps by telling the falsehood; lies of omission would occur if the liar could have…

Few studies have approached the subject of lying from a rhetorical perspective. Even philosophical studies have concentrated more on truth than on deceit. A central concern of a definition of lying is to recognize that lies must be examined both from the speaker's position and from the perceptions of the listener. Such an examination can be done…

This essay, an outgrowth of the Legislative Ethics and the Media Project, builds upon project meetings and interviews with members of a special task force made up of journalists representing various special ties and perspectives within the media as well as legislators, congressional staff members, and academic experts. The first of five sections…

This paper examines the conspiracy drama which characterizes the rhetoric generated by the John Birch Society. According to the Society, "innocent" America is under direct threat from some organized external and internal force that is seeking its destruction. Members are called to react in a carefully outlined manner: (1) piece together…

Teachers of writing can be compared to tourists in that they often deal only with the superficial aspects of student writing. Some teachers approach written themes carrying correction symbols as gadgets; others dissect student writing through the use of computer terminals and t-units. Still others view the writer romantically as someone with…

Reports a study dealing with the effects of three different Black dialects on perceived speaker image by a Black audience. Research methods, procedures and results are discussed. (MH)

The results of this study indicate that both races, black and white, enter into the counseling relationship with some pre-conceived feelings about the opposite race. Yet, if therapy sessions focus on the here-and-now concept, race was not found to preclude counselors from respecting, uncritically accepting, and recognizing the perceptions or…

Educational Service Unit (ESU) 18 is an independently funded agency providing evaluation services for the Lincoln (Nebraska) Public Schools. ESU employees provide direct services on a regular basis to the school district. A close working relationship exists between members of the ESU and district staffs. Consequently, as the occasion requires, the…

Research has suggested that self-involving responses, i.e., direct present expressions of a counselor's feelings about client statements, are highly effective counselor behaviors, while self-disclosure responses, i.e., references to personal experiences of the counselor, are moderately effective in eliciting positive client perceptions of and…

A study tested several different cognitive models of the way people use supporting arguments to arrive at belief in a claim. The models tested were (1) the model based on the assumption that human information processing is essentially logical; (2) R. S. Wyer's model; (3) the message-plus-context model; and (4) the weighted average model. One…

Three methodological improvements were incorporated into a two-channel study that tested the relationships between communication cues, dynamic/conversational delivery styles, and four dimensions of source credibility--dynamism, competence, evaluation, and trustworthiness. The methodological improvements included a molar rather than molecular…

The examination of credibility effects in predicting achievement, an important step in the study of source credibility effects on attributions, substantiates Birnbaum's findings that variation in the credibility of information can be represented by changes in the weight of the information. Undergraduate subjects (N=65) predicted the performance of…