David A. Routh

An "across-the-board" modality effect in immediate serial recall.

A serial recall experiment comparing visual and auditory presentation is reported which demonstrates that, under certain conditions, there is an auditory advantage in the pre-recency (1–6) as well as the recency (7–8) serial positions. Presentation modality was combined factorially with five levels of a concurrent writing task, which had to be completed for each to-be-remembered digit during presentation: NC, no concurrent task; XX, writing two crosses; DX, writing each digit followed by a cross; XD, the converse of DX; and DD, writing each digit twice. When presentation was visual, there was a monotonic (non-decreasing) trend in the recall errors going from NC to DD (in above order) for both the pre-recency and recency positions on average. With an auditory presentation, however, the trend was more gradual, though still monotonic. For the pre-recency items, an auditory advantage was obtained with conditions XX, XD and DD, but not for NC and DX. Additionally, with an auditory presentation, there was no evidence of a difference between NC and XX, nor between DX and XD. It is argued that both pre-categorical acoustic storage and residual activation effects, engendered in a logogen system (Morton, 1970) by the repetition “structure” of the concurrent tasks, helped to determine the attentional capacity available for secondary (elaborative) rehearsal and, in turn, set the levels of recall.

On the language of breathlessness

Abstract The aim of this study was to obtain and assess the range of expressions used by breathless patients to describe their subjective experience. At interview, 80 patients with respiratory, oncology or cardiac diagnoses provided 63 descriptions of breathlessness. These were sorted according to similarity of meaning by expert health professionals and judged for frequency and severity. Results derived from a series of multivariate analyses on the descriptions and their weightings confirmed 4 classes of breathlessness containing 14 important groups. Most important were the 8 main physical sensations of breathlessness. A second affective and evaluative class contained 3 groups of descriptors. Two minor classes showed low energy in the third, and a fourth with two distinct qualities of hyperventilation and speechlessness. The results provide a foundation for the development of a psychometric instrument which could be used to assess breathlessness in the clinic.

The Transition to the Euro: Some Perspectives from Economic Psychology

The reactions of EU consumers to the arrival of the euro are likely to be far more complex than peoples typical pragmatic and expedient adaptations to everyday economic change. This article discusses the major problems and psychological issues that are likely to arise in domains where the euro can be expected to have a major impact. More specifically, the domains considered include the following: the symbolic meanings of money; learning, remembering and information- processing; judgement and decision-making; expectations, concerns, and beliefs of EU citizens (consumers); and, propaganda, communication and attitude change. The article concludes with a number of tentative policy recommendations.

Constraints on the use of money as a gift at Christmas: the role of status and intimacy

Abstract Recent studies have revealed the existence of interesting constraints on the use of money as a gift. The present investigation attempted to focus on their psychological bases by using an extended-diary method to study aspects of the Christmas gifts given and received by 92 UK undergraduates. Our findings from several correspondence analyses suggest that, in any given relationship, a gift must be capable of carrying meaningful information concerning the level of intimacy and the relative status existing between donor and recipient. In contrast, money was found to lack the necessary attributes for conveying information concerning intimacy, but also to possess attributes that may transmit inappropriate messages relating to status.

Explaining attitudes towards the euro: Design of a cross-national study

AbstractThe aim of this paper is to provide essential background material relating to the accom-panying papers in this special issue. It presents a brief description of the ‘Psychology of theEuropean Monetary Union’ project. This involved a questionnaire study of attitudes towardsthe euro, which was fielded in each of the 15 member states of the European Union in thesummer of 1997. We describe the development of the common survey instrument, and outlinethe rationale and methods pursued in sampling particular conceptual domains. The paper alsodetails the sampling procedures used in each country, together with the response rates andsample sizes attained. Finally, it o•ers a brief cross-national comparison of overall attitudes tothe euro. O 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.PsycINFO classification: 2229; 3920JEL classification: D63; D84; E52; F33Keywords: Control; Currency; Euro; Expectations; Equity; European union; Economic andmonetary union; Money; National identity; Satisfaction; Values

Being in two minds about a single currency: A UK perspective on the euro

Recent public opinion polls show that the majority of UK citizens are opposed to replacing the pound by the euro. In this paper, we report an initial attempt to elucidate some of the psychological bases of this adherence to the status quo. We tested a latent variable model which postulates that there are two kinds of attachment to national identity, cultural and instrumental attachment, each having both direct and indirect influences upon anti-euro sentiment. The former kind of attachment reflects the symbolic aspects of nationhood, whilst the latter captures the benefits of citizenship, such as the quality and delivery of social goods. Secondly, we investigated the extent to which peoples expectations about euro benefits mediates the impact of attachment on anti-euro sentiment. It was found that only cultural attachment had a direct, amplifying effect upon anti-euro sentiment, whilst both forms of attachment had indirect effects via their opposite influences upon euro benefits. Cultural and instrumental attachment respectively had attenuating and amplifying effects on the latter, which itself tended to act as an attenuator on the level of anti-euro sentiment.

The Basis and Implications of the Restoration of a Recency Effect in Immediate Serial Recall

When a spoken presentation of a supra-span sequence of to-be-remembered (TBR) items is followed immediately by a similarly-spoken non-TBR item (stimulus suffix) the typical salience of the terminal item in recall is almost destroyed. However, Salter (1975) observed restoration of salience when pre-terminal and terminal TBR items differed in category membership. Five experiments are reported which aimed to clarify the basis and locus of Salters effect. Survival of salience for the heterogeneous item was found under the following conditions: with the occurrence of the item unpredictable from trial-to-trial (Experiment I); with enforced processing of the suffix (Experiment II); with performance of a secondary task during list presentation (Experiment III); with the requirement to retain both the location and identity of the item (Experiment IV); and with the item as the terminal member of a non-suffixed visual list (Experiment V). It is argued that the effect has a postcategorical locus, and that its origin is not in better registration (mediated by selective attention), but, rather, in the enhancement of retrieval (mediated by access to distinctive information encoded during presentation). It is suggested that the latter hypothesis may have wide application in accounting for many kinds of salience.

Beliefs about Financial Organization in Marriage: The “Equality Rules OK” Norm?

Summary: Survey and interview studies have identified the existence of a number of systems of financial organization in marriage, but their origins remain a mystery. One possibility is that people develop normative beliefs that are carried forward into marriage. The present questionnaire study aimed to elucidate such beliefs by means of the responses of 408 undergraduates to one of five different vignettes, each containing a choice dilemma. Each vignette described a couple of recent graduates about to get married, with particular income levels that varied across the five versions. Respondents were asked to select the “best” system of financial management from six possibilities, to rank the possibilities in order of fairness, to decide whether or not one partner should have more personal spending money (PSM) than the other, and to explain their answers where relevant. While the differences between vignettes had some impact on the system chosen, the commonest choice was for one in which all income was poole...

A qualitative study of adaptation to the Euro in the Republic of Ireland: II: Errors, strategies, and making sense of the new currency.

Abstract. This is the second of two reports using semistructured interviews to explore the current and recollected experiences of Irish people for the period before, during, and after the introduction of Euro notes and coins (1 January 2002). A total of 24 adults were interviewed between October 2002 and February 2003. Most people felt they were adapting well although their knowledge of new prices tended to be fairly sparse. Some reported still experiencing confusion with notes and coins or making errors associated with habitual behavior based on the value of the former currency, the punt. Initially respondents had routinely attempted to make mental or electronic comparisons of Euro and punt prices, although this had become more selective. One year after the transition, some respondents claimed to be thinking in Euros, while others were still thinking in punts. Peoples reported experience appeared to reveal an adaptation strategy comprising at least two stages, initially involving currency conversion, bu...

An asymmetrical effect of similarity in the attenuation of stimulus suffix interference

The effects of similarity between an eight-digit memory string (8) and a stimulus suffix (0) were studied in an immediate serial recall task. Four conditions (80, 80′, 8′0, and 8′0′) were created by the orthogonal variation of the addition and omission of a brief 1000 Hz tone (′) during the spoken presentation of the string and suffix, respectively. In Experiments I and II the potential contribution of attentional strategies was minimized and maximized, respectively, yet, in each instance, an asymmetrical attenuation of suffix interference was observed. The recall errors were reduced in condition 8′0 as opposed to the others, but not in Experiment III, in which a visual presentation was used and the tone replaced by overprinting the digits with a slash. These findings appear to be inconsistent with existing accounts of suffix interference. A new hypothesis considers suffix interference to be a manifestation of central backward masking, at least in part.