harnad@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (S. R. Harnad) (04/10/90)
*** PSYCOLOQUY: Sponsored on an experimental basis by the Science
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1. Affiliative and Sexual Differences in Rhesus Monkeys
2. The electronic archive: Scientific publishing for the 90's
3. Collinearity: Similarity between individuals
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1. Affiliative and Sexual Differences in Rhesus Monkeys
From: Dennis Rasmussen dennisr@primate.wisc.edu
The following is an abstract from a report on my research at the
Wisconsin Primate Research Center. While I am a aware of a vast
literature from human demography documenting similar phenomena in
people, I would appreciate comments from social psychologists,
feminists, sociologists etc. on research conducted in psychology on
differences in marital/sexual/courtship behavior in people with
differing numbers of children; perhaps also recent work
on childless women (e.g. childless by choice).
I look forward to any and all comments. Dennis Rasmussen
Affiliative and Sexual Differences between Reproductive
and Nonreproductive Rhesus Groups
Dennis Rasmussen
Wisconsin Regional Primate Research Center
1223 Capitol Court
Madison, Wisconsin 53715-1299 USA
Affiliative and sexual behaviour were compared between a nonreproductive
and a reproductive group of rhesus, Macaca mulatta. The matched groups were
composed of 3 males and 8 females; conceptions were prevented in the
experimental group by vasectomizing the two breeding males. Differences
between groups before the birth of the first infant in the control group were
predicted with three a priori hypotheses deduced from evolutionary theory and
supported by previous empirical studies: (1) more male-female sexual and
affiliative behaviour in the experimental group, (2) less affiliative
behaviour between experimental males and (3) more partners in heterosexual
affiliative and sexual behaviour in the experimental group. A total of 163
hours of quantitative data on 10 affiliative and sexual variables form the
data base for analyses.
Results of comparisons between the two groups indicate: (1) a significant
number of the differences between the two groups were correctly predicted by
Hypotheses 1-3 and therefore evolutionary theory may be used to increase
successfully the ability to predict differences in affiliative and sexual
behaviour between reproductive and nonreproductive captive groups of rhesus.
(2) More heterosexual affiliative and sexual behaviour in the experimental
group was correctly predicted by Hypothesis 1; when comparisons were
restricted to the sexually mature group members there was more affiliative and
sexual behaviour as assessed by all 10 variables used in this study. The
results indicate a causal relationship between greater heterosexual
affiliative and sexual behaviour and repeated nonpregnant ovarian cycles. (3)
Hypothesis 2 was not supported: there was no indication of an overall tendency
for less male-male affiliative behaviour in the experimental group. The
sexually mature experimental males actually tended to engage in more
affiliative behaviour; a tendency balanced by much less affiliation between
these males and the 2 year old male. (3) Hypothesis 3 was supported: there
were more dyads who were observed to engage in affiliative or sexual behaviour
in the experimental group. (4) Two-tailed sign tests indicated significantly
more female-female affiliative behaviour in the experimental group, a
difference primarily due to more affiliative behaviour between the older and
younger females. (5) It is suggested that studies such as this may add
theoretical and empirical insight into how differences in human social
behaviour are associated with differing numbers of children born to women.
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2. The electronic archive: Scientific publishing for the 90's
William Gardner
University of Virginia
Psychological_Science, in press
Abstract: I offer a description and rationale for an electronic journal
publishing program for psychologists, called the electronic archive.
Three principles are critical. First, electronic publishing must retain
the readability of a traditional printed journal. Second, it must be
both accessible and attractive to all members of the discipline,
whether they use computers or not. Most importantly, it must provide
improved facilities for retrieving information, while continuing to
serve as a permanent archive of the Society. I argue that the primary
advantage of electronic publishing is not the inexpensive delivery of
text, but the use of a centralized archive to concentrate resources for
discovering and utilizing information. The archive would provide a
platform for programs embodying knowledge about the field and the
intellectual goals of individual users to facilitate the intelligent
retrieval of text. By using the dynamic branching and graphical display
capacities of the computer, the archive can present texts in ways that
cannot be rendered in print. These facilities can give scholars
personalized access to information with increased scope and depth.
A copy of this paper can be obtained by sending mail to wpg@virginia.edu
or writing to the author ar Department of Psychology, University of
Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, 22903.
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3. Collinearity
From: Tony Stavely Keene State College t_stavely@unhh.bitnet
In the 1950s Runkel and Lemaine studied what they called collinearity:
the degree of similarity in dimensions used by individuals to organize
their cognitive spaces. Two people are said to be collinear if they use
about the same dimensions -- even if their cognitive contents are
different. Collinear individuals were found to communicate more
effectively with each other. Students collinear with their instructors got
higher grades. Zajonc mentions this topic in his chapter of the 1968
*Handbook of Social Psychology* and suggests that G. A. Kelly's Role
Construct Repertory Test is related. I have made some attempts to
examine interpersonal similarity using rank-order correlations of
people's rankings of items (Rokeach values, random nouns, nouns for
common palpable objects) with decidedly mixed results. I am interested
in anything anyone knows about interpersonal cognitive similarity. The
matter seems slippery to me; "similarity" is a difficult notion to pin
down.
Tony Stavely Keene State College, Keene, NH 03431 t_stavely@unhh.bitnet
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--
Stevan Harnad Department of Psychology Princeton University
harnad@clarity.princeton.edu srh@flash.bellcore.com
harnad@elbereth.rutgers.edu harnad@pucc.bitnet (609)-921-7771