Eva Dreikurs Ferguson

Gender-Linked Stereotypes and Motivation affect Performance in the Prisoner's Dilemma Game

40 men and 40 women played a Prisoners Dilemma Game against a simulated partner for 30 trials. The task simulated corporate managerial decisions with a profit motive, and higher profits were obtained when subjects made noncooperative choices. All subjects received the same preprogrammed sequence of “partner” responses, and half played against a female, half against a male “partner.” The female “partner” received significantly more cooperative responses than the male. Trial blocks and the interaction of “partners” gender with trial blocks were significant effects, and motivation played a significant interactive role that modulated subjects game behavior. Self-fulfilling confirmatory hypothesis testing appeared to be operative in the display of gender-linked stereotypes.

From Leadership to Parenthood: The Applicability of Leadership Styles to Parenting Styles

Lewin’s (1948) three styles of leadership and group dynamics provided the basis for Dreikurs’ (1995) formulation concerning parental styles. Baumrind’s (1971) later parenting typology, also based on Lewin, focused on parent– child dyads, whereas Dreikurs referred to the total family patterning with parents as group leaders. The present article measured young adults’ perceived parenting values that occurred in childhood and corresponded to Dreikurs’ and Lewin’s leadership styles: autocratic, democratic, and laissez-faire. This investigation was the foundation for a long-term program of research. Two large samples of college students in a midwestern university provided data that partially supported the Lewin–Dreikurs three-factor formulation for leadership styles and that, interestingly, also revealed an independent individualism factor described by Triandis (1995). Implications of the findings are discussed.

Motivational influences on word recognition: I. Foveal and parafoveal viewing

The effects of motivation (hunger vs. satiation) on tachistoscopic word recognition were investigated. Overall procedures were identical for foveal viewing (Experiment 1) and parafoveal viewing (Experiment 2). Results with foveal viewing confirmed earlier findings (Ferguson, 1983) that hunger facilitated word recognition and no need-relevance effects were evident. Under foveal viewing, words were recognized significantly earlier under conditions of hunger, but overt responding was not significantly faster. Under parafoveal viewing, no significant motivation effects occurred. It is possible that different processing mechanisms operate under parafoveal and foveal viewing conditions.

Motivational influences on word recognition: II. Affective coding

The effects of motivation and affective word content on tachistoscopic recognition were assessed in two experiments. Even with arousal heightened by white noise and with the word exposure slowed (15 vs. 10 msec) per trial, the earlier finding (Ferguson, 1988) was replicated, that under parafoveal viewing hunger, compared to satiation, fails to have a significant effect. Hemispheric asymmetry in affective bias for pleasant and unpleasant words was not found. However, strong evidence was found for significant affective word coding at the lexical stage: for categories with comparable interletter and word frequencies, food words required fewer trials for word recognition, and negatively emotional words required the most trials. In contrast, the reaction times, which likely are more representative of postlexical processing, were fastest for animal words.

RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EGO-INVOLVEMENT INSTRUCTIONS AND VARIOUS MOTIVATION AND PERFORMANCE MEASURES'

The effects of ego-involvement instructions (EIS) were investigated in two studies. In Exp. I, EIS had no significant effect on a response measure of ego-involvement (EIn) nor on RT and paired-associate verbal learning. Anxiety, as measured by the MAS, and n achievement, as measured by the EPPS, did not significantly correlate with any of the measures, but a significant effect was found for EIR when anxiety and EIS were analyzed in a 2 × 2 design. When more extreme EIS were used in Exp. II, EIS had a significant effect on EIR and verbal learning: higher EIR ratings were obtained for high than low EIS and, for Ss receiving a low response-competition list, fewer errors were made under high than low EIS.

EFFECT OF EGO-INVOLVEMENT INSTRUCTIONS AND INTRALIST SIMILARITY ON STIMULUS GENERALIZATION ERRORS IN PAIRED-ASSOCIATE LEARNING

To assess the effect of motivation and list characteristics on verbal learning performance, 60 Ss in a 3 × 2 factorial design learned paired associates consisting of CVC as stimuli and digits as responses, in lists of high or low formal intralist similarity and under high, low, or control Ego-involvement (E-I) conditions. No significant differences in errors were found as a function of ego involvement. The increase of errors with high formal intralist similarity was specific to the effect of stimulus generalization and did not represent an over-all increase in list difficulty: no significant differences were found between lists for non-generalization errors but significant list differences were found for stimulus-generalization intrusions (p < .01).

Teachers as Leaders: The Impact of Adler-Dreikurs Classroom Management Techniques on Students' Perceptions of the Classroom Environment and on Academic Achievement

In response to growing interest in universal school-based interventions, we taught Adlerian-Dreikursian classroom management techniques to teachers and investigated how these techniques impacted both the students’ perception of the classroom environment and the students’ grades. A quasi-experimental design with pretest and posttest control groups was employed. The sample consisted of 30 Iranian elementary school female teachers and 745 students (407 girls, 338 boys) aged 7 to 12 years. The 30 teachers were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. The teachers in the experimental group received Adlerian-Dreikursian classroom management training in 10 two-hour sessions. Students were assessed using the My Classroom Scale (Burnett, 2002). Analyses revealed that students’ perceptions of “satisfaction with the classroom environment” and “relationships with teacher,” as well as their academic achievements, were enhanced in the experimental group for all grade levels. We show that Adlerian-Dreikursian classroom methods can improve classroom effectiveness by increasing students’ satisfaction and academic achievement.

Role of Individual Differences in Measures of Ego-Involvement.

When 2 measures of ego-involvement were examined, ego-involvement in a task reflected both long-term as well as momentary response to experimentally induced conditions, which may mask the effects of ego-involving instructions. It was also found that transitivity of goal choices is related to verbal aptitude as measured by college entrance tests.

Development of the Social Interest Scale for Iranian Children Aged 4–12: A Qualitative Model of Knowledge, Skills, and Attitudes Supporting Adlerian-Based Trauma Psychotherapy

Abstract:Although numerous social interest scales and questionnaires exist, none has specifically been developed to measure social interest in Iranian children. In response to this gap in research, we developed the 24-item Social Interest Scale for Iranian Children (SISIC), which was based on a first-approximation 66-item scale that had less convincing factor-analytic support. The SISIC measures parents’ statements about their children. Boys and girls from age 4 to 12 were selected from different cities in Iran. Confirmatory factor analysis identified three factors in our final 24-item scale, each of which revealed a critical Adlerian construct related to social interest: concern for others, courage, and vertical striving (reverse scored). We found that girls demonstrated more overall social interest than boys and less vertical striving. Differences among grade level were also identified. The SISIC will allow for more effective future research on social interest in children. Implications and future directions are discussed.

Work as a Life Task in Contemporary Times

In the working environment, relations among people can be far more complex than in other spheres of human life. The focus of this column is to show how the ideas and methods of Individual Psychology are useful in the workplace and to compare Adlerian methods with other approaches. Individual dynamics, as well as organizational and group dynamics issues, will be discussed in detail. Potential contributors are encouraged to submit manuscripts, including case studies, illustrating the application of Individual Psychology to business and organizational settings. Send manuscripts to Linda J. Page, Adler International Learning, 890 Yonge Street, 9th Floor, Toronto, Ontario M4W 3P4, Canada (ljpage@adler.ca).