Guy J. Manaster

The Relationship with Grandparents: Contact, Importance, Role Conception

While studies have considered the importance of the grandparent and grandchild relationship from the perspective of the former, the present study explores the perspective of young adult grandchildren concerning this relationship. Four relationship variables are examined: 1) the amount of contact; b) the assessed adequacy of contact; 3) the importance of the relationship; and 4) the role conception. The results of this study support the position that grandparents remain a significant factor in the lives of young adults.

A framework for understanding gifted adolescents’ psychological maladjustment

A framework for understanding common psychosocial problems of gifted adolescence is based on the assumptions that people want to fit into society, and people want to understand how they fit. Common problems for the gifted are: being different in cognitive development from average (out of stage), having abilities and interests which make it difficult to adjust socially (out of phase), and feeling different from others.

Youths' outlook on the future: A past-present comparison.

Gillespie and Allports descriptive data (1955) on attitudes and values of youth 20 years ago afforded a comparison with a presentday sample of 320 undergraduates at The Univeristy of Texas at Austin. Items for the original questionnaire (Youths Outlook on the Future) were combined with other measures (Locus of Control, Dogmatism, and Conservatism scales) for the purpose of replicating the original study and expanding the scope of the comparison. A breakdown of the present group into activists and nonactivists yielded significant differences within the present sample as well as between samples. In general, the trend appeared to be toward less conservatism and traditionalism in moving from past to present nonactivist to present activist. Within the present sample, activists were also more oriented toward the present while nonactivists were more oriented toward success and prestige in the future.

Internal-External Control: Studied through the Use of Proverbs

This study investigated the factorial structure and the construct validity of the factors based on responses to a 25-item Internal-External Control Proverbs Test. 488 university students were given the series of proverbs in a battery that included the Rotter Internal-External scale. Responses to proverbs were factor analyzed, the factors subjected to analysis of variance by sex and year in school of S, and the factors correlated with the total external score from Rotters scale. The results point to a single construct, internal control, and two broad types of subconstructs under the aegis of external control, situational and behavioral potential.

Anglo and Mexican-American adult children's feelings toward their aging parents

Abstract This article questions whether Anglo and Mexican-American adult males and females feel and behave differently toward their aging parents. The sample consisted of 315 Anglo and Mexican-American staff and faculty from two universities in Austin, Texas, who were between 35–45 years of age and had at least one living parent. Respondents were given a questionnaire that included information on (a) attachment behavior (proximity of living arrangements between adult children and their aging parents, frequency of visits and phone calls to their aging parents) and (b) feelings of attachment (level of closeness, value consensus, compatibility, and perception of parents personality traits). A 2 × 2 fixed-effects analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to test these hypotheses of the study. Results indicated that there were statistically significant differences in the way Anglo and Mexican-American children feel and behave toward their mothers and fathers. There were no differences between gender groups in the way they felt and behaved toward their mothers and fathers.

IQs and etiologies: The two-group approach to mental retardation

A review of the mental retardation literature failed to reveal any empirical studies supporting the assumption that “the retardate having an extremely low I.Q. (below 40) is almost invariably of the physiologically defective type... (while familial retardates... are almost invariably mildly retarded)” (Zigler, 1967, p. 1). Thus, the two-group approach to mental retardation, despite its research and clinical implications, rests on assumption. We report herein on 20,218 institutionalized retardates on whom both IQ and etiologies were available. For institutionalized retardates, the criterion of “invariability” was not met. Since our sample was small relative to the total estimated retarded population, the two-group theory still retains research and practical merit, and suggestions for increasing its heuristic value are provided.