EDITORS' NOTE

This study examines certain changes made within the Russian newspaper industry both before and after the political transformations occurring in the former Soviet Union. Although these changes began after Gorbachev came to power, the most dramatic changes took place after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The political economy perspective provides a useful means to explain the relation between these socioeconomic transitions and the newspaper industry. Since the failed coup of August 1991, the Russian media have attempted to adapt to conditions persistent with the free market economy. As a result of the free market economy, the Russian newspaper industry currently tends to depend on advertising revenue for survival.     

A Patient-centered Approach to Breaking Bad News: Communication Guidelines for Health Care Providers

This investigation takes a patient-centered approach to examining strategies physicians use to deliver bad news to patients. Qualitative data were obtained from 68 patients who had received a message they perceived as negative information from a health care provider. Through grounded theory methodology, patient accounts were examined to reveal four provider strategies for breaking bad news. This investigation underscores the importance of using effective communication strategies to achieve patient satisfaction and compliance.     

An empirical framework for understanding how teachers conceptualize and cultivate historical empathy in students

This study reports the results of a case study of four teachers' beliefs about the nature of historical empathy and their means of cultivating such empathy in secondary school classrooms. The results of multiple interviews and lesson observations of history teachers in England suggest that teachers conceptualize empathy in bounded but not parsimonious ways, shaped by the realities of trying to teach it to students; that they select from broad repertoires of strategies, including major activities as well as small‐scale discourse strategies, heretofore largely unexamined; and that they recognize ways in which their empathetic goals exist in tension with other teaching aims, creating dilemmas they must manage rather than definitively resolve. Significant discrepancies between how these teachers actually think and practice and how empathy teaching is discussed in the educational literature suggest that research stands to benefit by attending more closely to teachers' ideas.     

Measurement of Attitudes toward Nursery Schools

This study investigated mathematical behaviors on inequality tasks using two alternative response measures in preschool subjects. With the sympton response, one response measure, age groups five, six, and seven significantly differed from age groups three to four. Using the verbal response, the second measure, age groups six and seven significantly differed from age groups three, four, and five. Developmental notions in the acquisition of mathematical tasks of inequality on conserving behavior were supported. With the symptom response other significant main and interaction effects were noted and described.     

Contingency Awareness in Infants and Children with Severe and Profound Learning Disabilities

Seven infants and children with severe, profound and multiple learning difficulties (CA 3 months to 4 years, MA 2 months to 12 months, mean MA 4.5 months) were presented with a contingency situation where they could control the onset of a visually and auditorily attractive toy. In this situation their responding increased and some positive emotional effects were seen. When they were subsequently unable to control stimulation, negative effects were seen on a range of emotional, motivational and self‐stimulation measures. These results suggest that from a mental age level of 2 months children are equipped to detect cause and effect relationships and build up a picture of their world based on expectancies about such relationships; and that violations of these expectancies can lead to negative effects.