Individual differences in helping behavior

Due to the character of the original source materials and the nature of batch digitization, quality control issues may be present in this document. Please report any quality issues you encounter to [email protected], referencing the URI of the item.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 14-16).This study examined the relations among the personality dimension of agreeableness, empathy and pro-social behavior. College students (N=210) were randomly assigned to either a high or low empathy condition in which they listened to the story of a fellow student in need. After listening to the situation described in a supposed radio broadcast, participants were given an opportunity to help. Outcomes suggest individual differences in empathy and emotionality. Results were discussed in terms of agreeableness as a predictor of emotion variables

Abandon Statistical Significance

We discuss problems the null hypothesis significance testing (NHST) paradigm poses for replication and more broadly in the biomedical and social sciences as well as how these problems remain unresolved by proposals involving modified p-value thresholds, confidence intervals, and Bayes factors. We then discuss our own proposal, which is to abandon statistical significance. We recommend dropping the NHST paradigm--and the p-value thresholds intrinsic to it--as the default statistical paradigm for research, publication, and discovery in the biomedical and social sciences. Specifically, we propose that the p-value be demoted from its threshold screening role and instead, treated continuously, be considered along with currently subordinate factors (e.g., related prior evidence, plausibility of mechanism, study design and data quality, real world costs and benefits, novelty of finding, and other factors that vary by research domain) as just one among many pieces of evidence. We have no desire to "ban" p-values or other purely statistical measures. Rather, we believe that such measures should not be thresholded and that, thresholded or not, they should not take priority over the currently subordinate factors. We also argue that it seldom makes sense to calibrate evidence as a function of p-values or other purely statistical measures. We offer recommendations for how our proposal can be implemented in the scientific publication process as well as in statistical decision making more broadly

Sibling Personality Traits, Dyadic Gender Composition, and Their Association With Sibling Relationship Quality

The current study contrasted two different hypotheses about the relationship between sibling personality and sibling relationship quality: absolute value and dyadic similarity. The absolute value hypothesis suggests that the level of one sibling’s personality will predict sibling relationship quality. The dyadic similarity hypothesis argues that the similarity between siblings on personality will be associated with sibling relationship quality. Observational data on child personality and maternal-report data on sibling relationship quality were collected on 321 sibling dyads (N = 642). Children were videotaped while completing five tasks, and personality traits were rated by independent raters based on thin-slice methodology. Support was found for the absolute value hypothesis but not the sibling similarity hypothesis: the personality traits of younger siblings predicted sibling relationship agonism, particularly when the older sibling was female. Findings suggest that older sisters are more sensitive to negativity in their younger siblings than are older brothers

Resilience in moving water : effects of turbulence on the predatory impact of the lobate ctenophore Mnemiopsis leidyi

© The Author(s), 2017. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Limnology and Oceanography 63 (2018): 445–458, doi:10.1002/lno.10642.Despite its delicate morphology, the lobate ctenophore Mnemiopsis leidyi thrives in coastal ecosystems as an influential zooplankton predator. Coastal ecosystems are often characterized as energetic systems with high levels of natural turbulence in the water column. To understand how natural wind-driven turbulence affects the feeding ecology of M. leidyi, we used a combination of approaches to quantify how naturally and laboratory generated turbulence affects the behavior, feeding processes and feeding impact of M. leidyi. Experiments using laboratory generated turbulence demonstrated that turbulence can reduce M. leidyi feeding rates on copepods and Artemia nauplii by > 50%. However, detailed feeding data from the field, collected during highly variable surface conditions, showed that wind-driven turbulence did not affect the feeding rates or prey selection of M. leidyi. Additional laboratory experiments and field observations suggest that the feeding process of M. leidyi is resilient to wind-driven turbulence because M. leidyi shows a behavioral response to turbulence by moving deeper in the water column. Seeking refuge in deeper waters enables M. leidyi to maintain high feeding rates even under high turbulence conditions generated by wind driven mixing. As a result, M. leidyi exerted a consistently high predatory impact on prey populations during highly variable and often energetic wind-driven mixing conditions. This resilience adds to our understanding of how M. leidyi can thrive in a wide spectrum of environments around the world. The limits to this resilience also set boundaries to its range expansion into novel areas.Seventh Framework Programme Grant Number: 600207; Division of Ocean Sciences Grant Number: 106118