Understanding Observational Learning: An Interbehavioral Approach

Observational learning is an important area in the field of psychology and behavior science more generally. Given this, it is essential that behavior analysts articulate a sound theory of how behavior change occurs through observation. This paper begins with an overview of seminal research in the area of observational learning, followed by a consideration of common behavior analytic conceptualizations of these findings. The interbehavioral perspective is then outlined, shedding light on some difficulties with the existing behavior analytic approaches. The implications of embracing the interbehavioral perspective for understanding the most complex sorts of behavior, including those involved in observational learning are considered.     

Intrahousehold Resource Allocation: Do Parents Reduce or Reinforce Child Ability Gaps?

Do parents invest more or less in their high-ability children? We provide new evidence on this question by comparing observed ability differences and observed investment differences between siblings living in the United States. To overcome endogeneity issues, we use sibling differences in handedness as an instrument for cognitive ability differences. We find that parents invest more in high-ability children, with a 1 standard deviation increase in child cognitive ability increasing parental investments by approximately one-third of a standard deviation. Consequently, differences in child cognitive ability are enhanced by differential parental investments.     

Professional women “rebalancing” in retirement: Time,relationships, and body

ABSTRACT

This is an interview-based study focused on how professional baby boomer women negotiate and narrate postretirement lives. This group came of age in the 1960s and represents a socially privileged segment of the baby boomer generation, a cohort that created new gendered pathways in employment. Today, these retired professional women are attempting to make sense of their multilayered complex and changing realities. In their accounts, the most salient themes are shifting identity, embodiment, and relationships. By using what we call a relational lens, we will show how many aspects of postretirement life, for these professional women, are mediated by changing relationships—relationships to time, work identity, friends and family, and body. Through these individual and relational contexts we see how female professional baby boomer retirees grapple with liberation and loss, autonomy and control, ongoing gendered work, and rebalancing in a new chapter of life. Perhaps most importantly, we see how learning about self in this stage of life, and perhaps across the life course, takes place largely in the context of relationships.     

The influence of collaboration on program outcomes: the Colorado Nurse-Family Partnership

Though collaboration is often required in community initiatives, little evidence documents relationships between collaboration and program success. The authors contend that clarification of the construct collaboration is necessary for investigating its contribution to the success of community initiatives. After respecifying collaboration, they present a study of a multisite program that involved varying degrees of collaboration in the 16 communities adopting a nurse home visitation program. The authors employ hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) to test the predictive power of individual participant characteristics and examine the increased accuracy of predictions from a second level model of site qualities-specifically, features of the collaborative process associated with different sites. The first-level model predicted approximately 10% of the variance in attrition, or dropout, of program clients. The second-level model accounted for an additional 28% of the variance in attrition. A theory of commitment transfer is offered as a first explanation of this result.     

Harper's Magazine

An analysis of the performance of five major review periodicals showed that School Library Journal and Booklist were most likely to have reviewed both a large percentage of total juvenile publication and those books singled out by the 1972–1974 and 1978–1980 Notable Children's Books Committees; the New York Times Book Review was least likely to have done so. There was a decline in coverage of the selected titles by the Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books. Even so, Bulletin and Horn Book, as well as Booklist and SLJ, continued to do a good job of calling attention to better books.

Recent reviews appeared closer to the publication date of the book in question, with the time lag reduced in all but the New York Times, where it increased. Booklist's record of little more than a month was relatively impressive, with all other periodicals taking over two months or more, on the average. Each periodical showed tremendous internal inconsistency in promptness, however.

The longest reviews, on the average, were published in NYTBR, the shortest in Bulletin. Recent reviews in SLJ and Booklist were longer than those found for the earlier sample.

All but Horn Book reviews reflected increased critical attention in general. The practice of referring to other books and authors continued on a limited but definite scale for 1978–1980 titles. Attempts to predict readership were somewhat more likely to appear in the more recent issues of Booklist and Bulletin than earlier.

The use of volunteer reviewers by School Library Journal resulted in a multiplicity of reviewers (25 people). Horn Book and NYTBR utilized eight people each. Booklist and Bulletin relied on reviews prepared by fulltime staffers.

Opinions on general quality of the books examined continued to be basically consistent.     

Network Parenting in International Service Development

This paper explores theoretical and practical aspects (i.e. resources allocated, activities undertaken, actors/decisions involved) of corporate 'parenting' in the development of international service networks. A review of the relevant corporate strategy, supply-chain, networks and services management literature underpins a preliminary content (capability; market orientation) and process (top-down; bottom-up) typology of network parenting. This provides the structure for discussion of two telecommunications-sector case studies. Analysis of the data acknowledges the influence of generic network mechanisms (e.g. weak and strong social ties) but the parenting typology also highlights other mechanisms, the effectiveness of which appears contingent on specific parenting roles. The paper details these roles (labelled: governing; training; curating; facilitating) and makes some preliminary comments on the role trajectories (e.g. governing ↔ training) observed. The paper concludes with a discussion of possible directions for future work.