Robert Strausz-Hupé: His Life and Times

The author assesses the long life of Robert Strausz-Hupé and the many roles he played: immigrant, professor, author, diplomat and think tank founder.     

Yitzhak Rabin: An Appreciation

The author wrote that “the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin in his seventy-third year ended the life of another ‘son of the founders’ of the state of Israel. He belonged to the generation of 1948—the young men whose military prowess gave Israel a fighting start. Unlike some of his early mentors, such as Yigal Allon and Moshe Dayan, Rabin was to achieve supreme power twice. And more than any other of his generation he will be recalled as the general who waged both war and peace.”     

Telephone crisis intervention skills: a simulated caller paradigm

Counseling skills were evaluated in a telephone counseling service for Vietnam veterans. Thirty simulated crisis calls were made to telephone counselors by experienced clinical psychologists. The counselors' responses were rated on dimensions that indexed general counseling skills, knowledge of veteran needs, and provision of appropriate advice. Whereas the majority of callers demonstrated adequate counseling skills, many lacked knowledge of veterans' posttraumatic stress, common veteran terminology, and the nature of veterans' experiences. The findings suggest that telephone counseling services that target specific populations should employ comprehensive training to ensure that counselors possess adequate and relevant knowledge about callers and their presenting problems. The simulated caller paradigm appears to be an effective paradigm for training and evaluation of telephone counselors.     

Influence of the developmental schedule of puberty on learning and ego functioning

Developmental schedules refer to temporal factors of pubertal processes as they might bear on ego development. The longitudinal research reviewed here from the 30-year archives of the Guidance Study of the Institute of Human Development pertains to the effects of varying lengths of the prepubertal and pubertal period on the short-term and enduring integration of drive states initiated at puberty. The personality correlates of varying lengths of these periods serve as vehicle for establishing properties of these stages as well as of the transition between them. The different ways the sexes respond to the early onset of puberty, as reported here, may provide an important microcosm for understanding normative sex differences in the general regulation of drive states.This research was supported by Grant MH 06238-02 from the U.S. Public Health Service, grants from the Ford Foundation, and a grant to the author from the Foundations' Fund for Research in Psychiatry.Presented at the Seventh Annual Adolescent Medicine Seminar, George Washington University Medical Center, March 15, 1971.Received Ph.D. in psychology from the University of California. Main research interests are longitudinal study of personality development and validation of psychoanalytic concepts.     

The incongruous achiever in adolescence

The authors wished to study some of the internal psychological dynamics of achievement in a nonpatient identified high school population. Questionnaires were administered to the Grade 13 students and their parents in a large high school. A number of students whose achievement and educational plans were not congruous with their general background were selected for interview. The findings suggest that a wide variety of ages and developmental stages can be discerned as critical points in the development of a student's attitude toward higher education. These students have many values in common, and their values appear related to a positive or negative identification with parental values. The students themselves show a wide range of personality integration. They relate in a special way to a wide variety of teachers' personalities.Received M.D. from University of Alberta, Edmonton, in 1969 and completed specialty training in psychiatry at University of Toronto in 1974. Main interests include psychoanalysis, community psychiatry, and currently antabuse implants.Received M.D. from University of Toronto in 1960, D. Psych. from University of Toronto in 1963, C.R.C.P.(c) in 1965, and F.R.C.P. in 1972. Main interests include adolescent psychiatry, psychoanalysis, psychiatric residency training programs, and mental health delivery systems.     

Measuring the cost-efficiency of basic research investment: Input-output approaches

Restricted research budgets, expanding claims for resources, and steeply escalating costs have increased the demand for methods that establish or predict the efficiency or productivity of expenditures on basic research. Irvine and Martin (I-M) have recently advocated head-to-head efficiency comparisons of research performers using publications and citations. This paper (1) criticizes the I-M approach from the perspective of economics and policy analysis; (2) illustrates the natural production function extension of the I-M approach; (3) demonstrates, by worked out examples, the feasibility of such an extension along with its pitfalls; and (4) argues that combined econometric-bibliometric modeling can be used to improve research allocations with only modest increases in agency “transaction” costs. The paper presents a prototype efficiency analysis using recent NSF data for the behavioral and neural sciences.     

Reliability of bloodhounds in criminal investigations

Anecdotal evidence and legend have suggested that bloodhounds are capable of trailing and alerting to a human by his or her individual scent. This same evidence may be presented to a court of law in order to accuse a particular suspect or suspects of a crime. There is little to no scientific evidence confirming the bloodhound's ability to trail and discriminate the scent of different individual humans. Eight bloodhounds (3 novice and 5 veteran), trained in human scent discrimination were used to determine the reliability of evidence, garnered through the use of bloodhounds, in a court of law. These dogs were placed on trails in an environment that simulated real-life scenarios. Results indicate that a veteran bloodhound can trail and correctly identify a person under various conditions. These data suggest that the potential error rate of a veteran bloodhound-handler team is low and can be a useful tool for law enforcement personnel.