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W W Tryon

Publications and source records attributed to W W Tryon.

43 records · Page 3Linked to original sources

Some properties of the ego-resiliency subtle scale of the MMPI.

The Ego Resiliency-Subtle (ER-S) scale was developed by Block (1965) as a social desirability free measure of the first factor of the MMPI. The purpose of the present experiments was to determine whether or not the 40-items comprising the ER-S scale remain neutral regarding social desirability and if the subject's score on the scale remains constant when taken out of the context of the other MMPI items; if so, the ER-S scale could be used as a screening device. Experiment I demonstrated that the items were not neutral regarding social desirability when taken out of context, but Experiment II indicated that this did not influence the responses subjects gave to the items. Because a memory factor may have been operating in Experiment II, a third experiment was conducted to minimize this factor resulting in a male-female vs. embedded-alone interaction and an order of presentation vs. embedded-alone interaction.

Ego

A functional analysis of social reinforcement in vicarious verbal conditioning.

This article reports the results of 629 subjects in three experiments designed to replicate and extend the phenomenon of vicarious verbal conditioning. Experiment I replicated the finding that subjects who responded most to vicarious verbal conditioning were aware of the contingency involved. Experiment II attempted to examine the effects of prior history with the verbal reinforcer on vicarious verbal conditioning by providing seven groups of subjects with varying classic conditioning histories prior to vicarious verbal conditioning. The null results associated with this experiment were hypothesized to be due to the fact that the vicarious verbal conditioning took place in a language laboratory where the subjects could hear but not see the model. Experiment III replicated Experiment II in a live group context as was done in Experiment I. The results showed that vicarious verbal conditioning was again found to take place, that associating the verbal reinforcer with a tone or tone plus money via forward classic conditioning potentiated the effects of the verbal reinforcer, that backward classic conditioning did not potentiate the reinforcer, d) nor did either of two sensitization procedures potentiate the effects of the verbal reinforcer. Both aware and unaware subjects evidenced vicarious verbal conditioning.

Adolescent

A neural network explanation of posttraumatic stress disorder.

An introduction to connectionistic neural networks and their importance for behavior therapists was provided by Tryon (1995a). This article shows that the bidirectional associative memory connectionistic neural networks model meets all four of Jones and Barlow's (1990) requirements and all five of Brewin, Dalgleish, and Joseph's (1996) requirements for a theoretical explanation of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The bidirectional associative memory model provides a theoretical basis for explaining the clinical symptom constellation of PTSD, with special emphasis on why trauma is re-experienced through memory; accounts for individual variation in symptom severity, including why some people do not develop PTSD; explains why persons with PTSD are comorbid with depression, generalized anxiety, and substance abuse; explains how abnormal behavior derives from normal memory formation processes; and makes novel predictions.

Association Learning