Stick it in Your Ear: The Psychodynamics of iPod Enjoyment

Through a sustained critique of the iPod and discourse about it, this essay advances a psychoanalytic rhetoric of music that characterizes listening experiences in terms of two psychical economies: the psycho-somatic or experiential and the symbolic. We argue that these economies work together to produce the fantasy of a “sonorous envelope,” a re/presentation of losing one's self in music. Because the dis/pleasurable experience of the sonorous envelope is a retroactively imposed understanding of an otherwise ineffable musical encounter, we argue for analyzing representations of the sonorous envelope in popular culture.     

Affiliative and Aggressive Humor,Attachment Dimensions,and Interaction Goals

This study examined humor production in relation to attachment dimensions and interaction goals. Participants (N = 172) completed measures of attachment dimensions (anxiety, avoidance), humor production (affiliative humor, aggressive humor), and primary and secondary goals. Anxiety was negatively related to affiliative humor, whereas avoidance was positively related to aggressive humor. Affiliative humor was related to effectiveness and being playful in the interaction, as well as the secondary goals of arousal management and clarity. Aggressive humor was not related to any of the goals.     

E-Mail as Spectroscopy: Automated Discovery of Community Structure within Organizations

We describe a method for the automatic identification of communities of practice from e-mail logs within an organization. We use a betweenness centrality algorithm that can rapidly find communities within a graph representing information flows. We apply this algorithm to an initial e-mail corpus of nearly 1 million messages collected over a 2-month span, and show that the method is effective at identifying true communities, both formal and informal, within these scale-free graphs. This approach also enables the identification of leadership roles within the communities. These studies are complemented by a qualitative evaluation of the results in the field.     

Simultaneous measurement of back and front foot ground reaction forces during the same delivery stride of the fast-medium bowler

Six male cricket bowlers (mean - s x ¥ : age 23.5 - 1.3 years; height 1.83 - 0.04 m; body weight 826 - 20 N) performed their typical bowling action at a set of stumps positioned at standard pitch length (20.1 m). A specially designed force platform rig allowed the correct positioning of two force platforms to be achieved beneath an outdoor polyflex runway (0.017 m depth) for each player's delivery stride pattern. For the back foot, the peak vertical ground reaction force was 1.95 - 0.08 kN (2.37 - 0.14 BW) and the braking force was 0.77 - 0.12 kN (0.94 - 0.16 BW). For the front foot, the peak vertical force was 4.80 - 0.92 kN (5.75 - 0.98 BW) and the braking force was 2.93 - 0.56 kN (3.54 - 0.67 BW). The mean peak vertical loading rate for front foot contact was 205 - 52.8 kN·s -1 (249 - 64 BW·s -1 ) with mean values ranging from 81 to 446 kN·s -1 (98 to 540 BW·s-1). The range for back foot contact was much smaller, 25-70 kN·s -1 (30-85 BW·s -1 ), with a mean of 41.7 - 7.10 kN·s -1 (50.6 - 8.6 BW·s -1 ). Mean peak impact occurred 24 ms after touchdown for the back foot and 16 ms after touchdown for the front foot. At impact, mean peak loading rates were greater for the front foot at 246 kN·s -1 (298 BW·s -1 ), with a range of 80-483 kN·s -1 (98-534 BW·s -1 ), than for the back foot at 65 kN·s -1 (79 BW·s -1 ), with a range of 40-84 kN·s -1 (49-110 BW·s -1 ).     

Parenting and Child DRD4 Genotype Interact to Predict Children’s Early Emerging Effortful Control

Effortful control (EC), or the trait‐like capacity to regulate dominant responses, has important implications for children’s development. Although genetic factors and parenting likely influence EC, few studies have examined whether they interact to predict its development. This study examined whether the DRD4 exon III variable number tandem repeat polymorphism moderated the relation between parenting and children’s EC. Three hundred and eighty‐two 3‐year‐olds and primary caregivers completed behavioral tasks assessing children’s EC and parenting. Children’s DRD4 genotypes moderated the relation between parenting and EC: Children with at least one 7‐repeat allele displayed lower EC in the context of negative parenting than children without this allele. These findings suggest opportunities for modifying early risk for low EC.     

The relationship between vocabulary and writing quality in three genres

The purpose of this study was to examine the role of vocabulary in writing across three genres. Fifth graders (N = 105) wrote three compositions: story, persuasive, and informative. Each composition revolved around the topic of outer space to control for background knowledge. Written compositions were scored for holistic writing quality and several different vocabulary constructs: diversity, maturity, elaboration, academic words, content words, and register. The results indicated that students vary their vocabulary usage by genre. Story text had higher diversity than informative text as well as higher maturity as compared to persuasive text. Persuasive text contained higher diversity than informative text, and higher register than both of the other genres. Informative text included more content words and elaboration than the other text types as well as more maturity than persuasive text. Additionally, multiple regression and commonality analysis indicated that the vocabulary constructs related to writing quality differed by genre. For story text, vocabulary diversity was a unique predictor, while for persuasive text, content words and register were unique predictors. Finally, for informative text content words was the strongest unique predictor explaining almost all of the total variance in the five factor model, although maturity was also a unique predictor.     

MINDFULNESS IN SCHOOL PSYCHOLOGY: APPLICATIONS FOR INTERVENTION AND PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE

Although the use of mindfulness is increasing in other areas of applied psychology, school psychology has yet to embrace it in practice. This article introduces school psychologists to the burgeoning field of mindfulness psychology and to the possibilities that it offers to their discipline. A background on the Western scientific study and application of mindfulness provides a theoretical foundation to those unfamiliar with the topic. We then discuss the application of mindfulness technologies to various forms of service provision in the professional practice of school psychology. The innovative and novel avenues that mindfulness psychology offers to psychological science     

Speech Is Dead; Long Live Speech

EARLY REAGAN: THE RISE TO POWER. By Anne Edwards. New York: William Morrow &; Co, Inc., 1987; pp. 491 + appendices. $21.95.

DOCUMENTARY AND THE MASS MEDIA. Edited by John Corner. Baltimore, MD: Edward Arnold Publishers, 1986; pp. xiv + 178. Paper $19.95.

THE ETHICS OF READING: KANT, de MAN, ELIOT, TROLLOPE, JAMES, AND BENJAMIN. By J. Hillis Miller. New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 1987; pp. 138. $20.00.

FOUR THEORIES OF MYTH IN TWENTIETH‐CENTURY HISTORY. By Ivan Strenski. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1987; pp. vii + 234. $22.50.

THE RHETORIC OF THE HUMAN SCIENCES: LANGUAGE AND ARGUMENT IN SCHOLARSHIP AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS. Edited by John S. Nelson, Allan Megill, and Donald N. McCloskey. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1987; pp xiii + 445. $24.00.

IMAGING AMERICAN WOMEN: IDEA AND IDEALS IN CULTURAL HISTORY. By Martha Banta. New York: Columbia University Press, 1987; pp. xviii + 844. $50.00.

GLAS. By Jacques Derrida. Translated by John P. Leavey, Jr. and Richard Rand. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1986; pp 262. $40.00.

GLASSARY. By John P. Leavey, Jr. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1986; pp. 320. $40.00.

THE CULTURE OF CRITICISM AND THE CRITICISM OF CULTURE. By Giles Gunn. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987; pp. xv + 216. $24.95.

MEANING AND MORAL ORDER: EXPLORATIONS IN CULTURAL ANALYSIS. By Robert Withnow. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1987; pp. xiii + 435. $38.50.

HOPE AMONG US YET: SOCIAL CRITICISM AND SOCIAL SOLACE IN DEPRESSION AMERICA. By David P. Peeler. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1987; pp. xi + 340. $35.00.

POWER AND COMMUNICATION. By Andrew King. Prospect Heights, Illinois: Waveland Press Inc., 1987; pp v + 153. Paper $8.95.

HANDBOOK OF ORGANIZATIONAL COMMUNICATION. Edited by Fredric M. Jablin, Linda L. Putnam, Karlene H. Roberts, and Lyman W. Porter, Newbury Park, CA: Sage, 1987; pp. 781. $59.95.

THINGS HIDDEN SINCE THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD. By René Girard, with Jean‐Michel Oughourlian and Guy Lefort. Trans. by Stephen Bann and Michael Metteer. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1987; pp. 469. $30.00.

MACHIAVELLI AND THE HISTORY OF PRUDENCE. By Eugene Garver. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1987; pp. xiv + 238. $28.50.

LANGUAGE AND TRUTH. By Garth L. Hallett. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1988; pp. viii + 234. $21.50.

MARCUS GARVEY LIFE AND LESSONS. Edited by Robert A. Hill and Barbara Bair. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987; pp. xv + 451. $19.95.

GIVING GLORY TO GOD IN APPALACHIA: WORSHIP PRACTICES OF SIX BAPTIST SUBDENOMINATIONS. By Howard Dorgan. Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press, 1987; pp. xxvii + 224. $24.95.

LISTENING TO THE CICADAS: A STUDY OF PLATO'S PHAEDRUS. By G.R.F. Ferrari. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987; pp. xiii + 293. $39.50.

ARISTOTLE: THE DESIRE TO UNDERSTAND. By Jonathan Lear. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988; pp. xi + 328. $39.50; paper $12.95.

RENAISSANCE HUMANISM: FOUNDATIONS, FORMS, AND LEGACY. Volume 3: HUMANISM AND THE DISCIPLINES. Ed. Albert Rabil Jr. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1988; pp. xvii + 692. $51.95.

RHETORIC: ESSAYS IN INVENTION &; DISCOVERY. By Richard McKeon. Edited with an Introduction by Mark Backman. Woodbridge, CT: Oxbow Press, 1987; pp. xxxi + 220. $25.00.

IN DEFENCE OF RHETORIC. By Brian Vickers. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988; pp. xvii + 508. $79.00.