Biomedical subjects

Donald A Saucier

Publications and source records attributed to Donald A Saucier.

7 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Effects of victims' characteristics on attitudes toward hate crimes.

Hate crimes are motivated by perpetrators' prejudice toward targets' group. To examine individuals' attitudes toward hate crime perpetrators and targets, participants responded to vignettes of court cases in which the victim's group membership was varied. Results showed that participants recommended more severe sentences for perpetrators when the targets of their crimes were not White males or White females and reported those crimes as more closely fitting the definition of "hate crime." These results show that participants consider penalty enhancements appropriate for hate crimes and that they do not consider crimes against women to be hate crimes, consistent with present hate crime legislation. These results have implications for the utility and support of hate crime legislation but may showcase the resistance to expanding the legislation to protect individuals of other groups, especially women.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Novelty seeking and drug use: contribution of an animal model.

Although sensation seeking or novelty seeking is a reliable predictor of drug use in humans, individual differences in free-choice novelty seeking in animal models have generally failed to predict drug use. In the current article, hierarchical multiple regression analyses were used on data collected from a large sample of rats. Rats were screened on measures of inescapable and free-choice novelty tests and then were trained to lever press for sucrose or intravenous amphetamine. Although scores from the inescapable novelty test weakly predicted responding for amphetamine, the addition of free-choice novelty preference scores into the regression analyses significantly improved the predictive models. These results indicate that, similar to evidence in humans, individual differences in novelty seeking may be able to predict drug use in rats.

Amphetamine↗

PubMed2005

Differences in helping whites and blacks: a meta-analysis.

The amount of help given to Blacks versus Whites is often assumed to reflect underlying levels of racism (or lack thereof). This meta-analysis assessed discrimination against Blacks in helping studies. The overall effect size for the 48 hypothesis tests did not show universal discrimination against Blacks (d = .03, p = .103). However, consistent with the predictions of aversive racism, discrimination against Blacks was more likely when participants could rationalize decisions not to help with reasons having nothing to do with race. Specifically, when helping was lengthier, riskier, more difficult, more effortful, and when potential helpers were further away from targets, less help was given to Blacks than to Whites. Interestingly, discrimination against Blacks was shown when there were higher levels of emergency. This suggests that discrimination may occur when the ability to control prejudicial responding is inhibited, or when the arousal of the emergency is misattributed to intergroup anxiety.

Black People↗

PubMed2004

Civil unions in Vermont: political attitudes, religious fundamentalism, and sexual prejudice.

In 2000, Vermont passed civil union legislation that granted same-sex couples the same legal rights as traditionally married opposite sex couples. This study examined the influence that sexual prejudice, religious fundamentalism, social dominance orientation, and support for civil unions had on voters' choice for governor in the subsequent election. Results showed that support for civil unions was a primary motivator for many voters in the election, and that sexual prejudice, religious fundamentalism, and social dominance orientation were unique predictors of voters' choices. These results show that prejudice can be a key factor in determining whom voters elect to represent them in government.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

The effects of affective, behavioral, and cognitive components of trait anger on the alcohol-aggression relation.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of affective, behavioral, and cognitive components of trait anger on alcohol-related aggression in men and women. METHODS: Subjects were 300 (150 men and 150 women) healthy social drinkers between 21 and 35 years of age. Trait anger was measured using the ABC Anger Inventory. Following the consumption of either an alcohol or a placebo beverage, subjects were tested on a modified version of the Taylor Aggression Paradigm in which mild electric shocks were received from, and administered to, a fictitious opponent during a competitive task. Aggressive behavior was operationalized as the shock intensities administered to the fictitious opponent under conditions of low and high provocation. RESULTS: Results indicated that alcohol increased aggression only for men with higher behavioral and cognitive anger scores and only for women with higher behavioral anger scores. Results also showed that when all anger components were taken into account, behavioral anger was the only factor that put one at risk for intoxicated aggression. CONCLUSIONS: Two recent studies demonstrated that the trait of "general" anger is a risk factor for intoxicated aggression (Giancola, 2002a; Parrott and Zeichner, 2002). The present investigation confirmed and extended these findings by examining the role of three different components of anger. The results highlight the fact that alcohol consumption does not increase aggression in all persons and in all situations. An important goal for future research is to identify which individual difference and contextual factors are most important in determining who will, and will not, behave in an aggressive manner when intoxicated.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

The persuasiveness of racial arguments as a subtle measure of racism.

These studies provide evidence of the reliability and validity of a new indirect measure of racism, the Racial Argument Scale (RAS). On the RAS, participants rate how well arguments support conclusions that are positive or negative toward Blacks rather than their agreement with the arguments and conclusions. These studies show that the RAS has good internal consistency, high levels of test-retest reliability, good convergent validity with other self-report measures of racism, and does not correlate with social desirability or right-wing authoritarianism. Furthermore, these studies show that the RAS predicts behavioral measures of racism and that the RAS is able to predict positivity and negativity toward Blacks that is not measured by other self-report measures of racism. These studies suggest that the RAS is a reliable and valid measure of racial attitudes.

Black People↗

PubMed2002

A statistical method for analyzing rating scale data: the BBB locomotor score.

The Basso, Beattie and Bresnahan (BBB) locomotor rating scale is widely used to test behavioral consequences of spinal cord injury (SCI) to the rat. Sensitivity of this rating scale can differentiate hind limb locomotor skills over a wide range of injury severities. While the 21-point BBB scale is ordinal in nature, the present discussion recommends the use of parametric statistics to evaluate the locomotor results. Specifically, it defines appropriate statistical analysis of these data in order to facilitate interpretation of results between laboratories and to provide a common methodology for the correct interpretation of SCI behavioral data.

Analysis of Variance↗