A survey on parent-child conflict resolution: intrafamily violence in Italy

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this paper was to investigate factors associated with intrafamily violence toward children in Italy. Family structure and the characteristics of both caretakers and children were explored. Their association with the incidence of minor and severe violence was analyzed to test the hypothesis that child physical abuse is related to a combination of different factors involving the family as a whole. METHOD: This research was carried out by submitting an anonymous questionnaire to 2388 families residing in Tuscany, Italy. The form included two sections, one related to the family cultural substrate, and to potentially influential events affecting the family during the year 1998. The other one, taken from the conflict tactics (CT) scales, presented a hierarchy of possible responses to conflict. RESULTS: Physical punishment appeared to be a general behavior in Italy, because the incidence of minor violence was 77%. The incidence of severe violence was about 8%. When considering family, caretaker, and child characteristics mostly associated with physical punishment in Italy, we found that families with a low income, where caretakers had health problems or were stressed, and with younger and more "problematic" children presented the highest risk of intrafamily violence during conflict resolution. CONCLUSIONS: The results point to the importance of a balance between potentiating and compensatory factors in complex and dynamic relationships among family members, to avoid strategy resolution of conflict ultimately leading to violence. Moreover, minor and severe violence appeared to be two related but different phenomena.     

How do parents learn about adolescents' experiences? Implications for parental knowledge and adolescent risky behavior

Cluster analysis was used to identify groups defined by the patterning of fathers' and mothers' sources of knowledge about adolescents' experiences in a sample of 179 families with adolescents (M = 16.5 years). Three clusters emerged for fathers (relational, relies on spouse, relies on others) and mothers (relational, questioners, relies on others). Cluster membership was associated with socioeconomic status, work hours, personal characteristics, and parent-child relationship quality. Longitudinal path analyses revealed that knowledge sources predicted levels of knowledge, which in turn predicted risky behavior 1 year later, indirect paths that were more consistent for fathers than for mothers. Although direct associations between sources of knowledge and subsequent risky behavior were scant, when fathers relied on spouses, youth engaged in less risky behavior.     

Comparing deaf and hearing college students' mental arithmetic calculations under two interference conditions

Deaf and hearing college students' mean reaction times (RTs) were compared on a mental calculation task in which they had to verify the accuracy of solutions to addition and multiplication problems. The deaf students were divided into higher and lower readers. Higher deaf readers and hearing students had similar RTs and accuracy on addition problems; their RTs were greater in the voicing interference mode than in the manual tapping interference mode. The lower deaf readers showed no RT differences between the two interference modes and had consistently lower RT performance and score accuracy across the verification tasks. On the verification task for multiplication problems, all participants showed a greater RT effect for manual tapping. The lower deaf readers were significantly less accurate on multiplication problems.     

Individual differences in inhibitory control and children's theory of mind

This research examined the relation between individual differences in inhibitory control (IC; a central component of executive functioning) and theory-of-mind (ToM) performance in preschool-age children. Across two sessions, 3- and 4-year-old children (N = 107) were given multitask batteries measuring IC and ToM. Inhibitory control was strongly related to ToM, r = .66, p < .001. This relation remained significant controlling for age, gender, verbal ability, motor sequencing, family size, and performance on pretend-action and mental state control tasks. Inhibitory tasks requiring a novel response in the face of a conflicting prepotent response (Conflict scale) and those requiring the delay of a prepotent response (Delay scale) were significantly related to ToM. The Conflict scale, however, significantly predicted ToM performance over and above the Delay scale and control measures, whereas the Delay scale was not significant in a corresponding analysis. These findings suggest that IC may be a crucial enabling factor for ToM development, possibly affecting both the emergence and expression of mental state knowledge. The implications of the findings for a variety of executive accounts of ToM are discussed.     

不可能性的定理

我们在通常谈话中说到某件事情不可能时，我们的意思常常并不是指它真的不可能，而是说我们还看不到有什么办法可以解决这件事情。以前许多人曾认为比空气重的机器飞起米是不可能的，而更早之前还有许多人认为比水重的机器要浮在水卜是不可能的。但人的智慧不断地克服了这些乍看起来似乎是不可能的事情。     

机械性出错

根据摩尔定律，计算机的运算速度和内存能力大约每18个月翻一番，据此所推今天的主流PC机性能可以大大超过以往的高档主机。如果你确实不想要正确答案的话，那就去相信上面的说法吧。对此我可不敢苟同。因为摩尔定律有一个     

搜寻中微子

搜※寻※中※微※子郭凯声译余炎校地球上难得再有一处地方拥有南极大陆上连续数月的漆黑而明净的天空这一优越条件,它使南极冰盖成了天文学家探寻星空的一块新圣地。然而,目前在南极进行的最富有革命性的天文学项目要利用的却不是南极的清晰视野,而是它那异常洁净的冰...