A typology of marital dyads derived from Kelly's (1955) Personal Construct Psychology was used to investigate the communicative behaviors of married companions. Four groups based on Kelly's Commonality (dyadic similarity) and Sociality (dyadic understanding) corollaries were contrasted: similar-understanding, dissimilar-understanding, similar-misunderstanding, and dissimilar-misunderstanding couples. It was expected that dyadic understanding would contribute more to self-disclosure, cooperative involvement, and marital satisfaction than dyadic similarity. Furthermore, it was anticipated that couples high in understanding and low in similarity would represent optimally functioning couples, as evidenced by disclosure, satisfaction, and involvement with each other. Sixty-three married couples who had known each other at least two years completed questionnaire items assessing demographic variables, marital satisfaction (Dyadic Adjustment Scale) and self-reported communication behaviors (Partner Communication Inventory, Dyadic Disclosure Inventory). Each spouse also completed an 8 X 8 Repertory Grid and predicted the mate's responses on the Rep Grid. Subjects then participated in three different audio-taped discussion tasks (an informal conversation, a consensus decision-making task, and a role-played conflict-resolution scene) which were rated for avoidant, competitive, and cooperative responses, as well as overall self-disclosure. Although understanding facilitated disclosure in conflict situations and similarity fostered marital satisfaction, communicative behaviors generally reflected the joint influence of both similarity and …

This study investigated the relationship between the degree of involvement with video games of 72 male university students with performance on pilot screening tests of psychomotor abilities, perceptual abilities, and cognitive style, and also with several personological variables, school performance, locus of control, sociability, and social presence. Additionally, the effects of experience with a video game on the learning of perceptual and psychomotor skills was examined for different levels of previous computer game involvement. It was found that those students who began playing at earlier ages and who more recently played the most demonstrated increased psychomotor abilities, and those abilities appeared to be enhanced by video game play. Greater amounts of time per week spent with computer games were found to correlate with increased facility in learning perceptual skills on computerized instrumentation, and with relative underachievement in school. No systematic relationship was found between degree of video game involvement and measures of sociability, social presence, and field dependence-independence. The study concluded that computer games may have effects upon those individuals who play them, but the effects may not be as negative as many people believe.

The present study investigated female sexuality by examining a range of experiential, historical, attitudinal, and behavioral variables, and conceptualizing sexual orientation along several dimensions on a heterosexual/homosexual continuum. The focus was on determining what, if any, important etiological factors emerged, as well as differences in behavior, attitudes, and preferences among women with various sexual orientations. It was concluded that a nonconventionality factor could be interacting with certain experiential and situational variables to produce a bisexual or homosexual lifestyle. Consequently, the ideosyncratic variable nature of such a paradigm could partially explain inconsistencies in past research. Results of this study were comparable to previous ones indicating that the women were similar (across sexual orientations) in their emphasis on emotional aspects of a relationship, history of heterosexual dating and coitus, few (relative to males) sex partners, and a less (than males) actively assertive sexual pattern of behavior. Future research might include males in the investigation of the role of a nonconventionality factor in sexual orientation. Also, relationship between cognitive/perceptual styles and sexual orientation could be explored.