In 4 experiments, it was shown that hills appear steeper to people who are encumbered by wearing a heavy backpack (Experiment 1), are fatigued (Experiment 2), are of low physical fitness (Experiment 3), or are elderly and/or in declining health (Experiment 4). Visually guided actions are unaffected by these manipulations of physiological potential. Although dissociable, the awareness and action systems were also shown to be interconnected. Recalibration of the transformation relating awareness and actions was found to occur over long-term changes in physiological potential (fitness level, age, and health) but not with transitory changes (fatigue and load). Findings are discussed in terms of a time-dependent coordination between the separate systems that control explicit visual awareness and visually guided action.In conscious awareness, the apparent slant of hills is greatly exaggerated. For example, 5° hills appear to be about 20°, and 10° ones look to be about 30° (Proffitt, Bhalla, Gossweiler, & Midgett, 1995). Be that as it may, people are not especially prone to stumble whenever the terrain over which they walk changes in slant. When ascending a 5° hill, people appropriately raise their feet to accommodate this incline, not a 20° one.In this and our previous article (Proffitt et al., 1995), we suggest that the exaggeration of slant in conscious awareness promotes the function of relating distal inclines to one's physiological potential. Given gravity and one's physiology, a long 5° hill is actually rather difficult to ascend, and consequently it appears to be quite steep. Given this proposal, we predict that geographical slant will change with changes in physiological potential.The first purpose of this article is to provide support for this prediction. In four experiments, we show that hills appear steeper when people are (a) encumbered by wearing a heavy backpack, (b) fatigued after a long run, (c) of low physical fitness, and (d) elderly or in poor health. None of

People judged the inclination of hills viewed either out-of-doors or in a computer-simulated virtual environment. Anglejudgments were obtained by having people (1) provide verbal estimates, (2) adjust a representation of the hill's cross-section, and (3) adjust a tilt board with their unseen hand. Geographical slant was greatly overestimated according to the first two measures, but not the third. Apparent slant judgments conformed to ratio scales, thereby enhancing sensitivity to the small inclines that must actually be traversed in everyday experience. It is proposed that the perceived exaggeration of geographical slant preserves the relationship between distal inclination and people's behavioral potential. Hills are harder to traverse as people become tired; hence, apparent slant increased with fatigue. Visuallyguided actions must be accommodated to the actual distal properties of the environment; consequently, the tilt board adjustments did not reflect apparent slant overestimations, nor were they influenced by fatigue. Consistent with the fact that steep hills are more difficult to descend than to ascend, these hills appeared steeper when viewed from the top.By east coast standards, Virginia is a mountainous state, and many of its roads appear quite steep, especially to midwestern visitors. Yet by law, roads in the state can be inclined no more than 9°from the horizontal, and 9°is a much smaller angle than the inclination that most people estimate these steep roads to have. This is an example ofa pervasive phenomenon: Hills appear to be steeper than they actually are. The first purpose of this paper is to provide a normative description of this overestimation in geographical slant perception.As we will show, a 5°hill is typically judged to be almost 20°in slant; however, when walking up a 5°hill, we do not raise our feet to accommodate a 20°incline and thereby stumble as we begin the ascent. The visual guidance oflocomotion shows no evidence of slant misperception. The second purpose of this paper is to show that a motoric index of geographical slant shows little evidence of the overestimations manifest in visual awareness. The paper's third purpose may be introduced with an anecdote.Not long ago, I (Proffitt) was riding in a l-day, 100-mile, bicycle tour, with the finish-line only a couple of miles ahead. The tour had traversed a number ofsmall mountains in a circuit that began and ended at a site in the rolling hills of the Virginia piedmont. The final hill before the finish seemed incredibly steep, and as I passed another rider I commented on how organizers of these affairs always seemed to arrange for the steepest hills to be located just before the finish. The other rider muttered an oath as she bemoaned what a cruel joke it was to make us climb this hill so late in the ride. (It would have been an even crueler joke to have informed her that the incline of this hill was only about r.) Now the hill in question was relatively steep, but it was far less so than many that we had previously encountered durin...

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The effect of labels on recognition and identification of odors over time was assessed. 30 men and 30 women were presented 20 odors; half of the participants were also told a name for the odor as a label. Five min. and 60 min. later, all participants were given 20 odors (10 from the original set, 10 new) and asked whether each odor was new or old (odor recognition). The group given labels was also asked to recall the label provided (odor identification). Analysis indicated a significant effect of time on recognition. Significantly more odors were recognized at 5 min. than 60 min. The effect of label was also significant, with recognition being better for the Label condition than the No-Label condition. As for odor identification, women identified more labels than did men. Overall, odor recognition was better with labels soon after exposure, and the women were better at remembering the labels than the men.

The purpose of this study was to determine the intercorrelations between religiosity, perceived family support, and self-esteem in adolescents. Using convenience sampling, we recruited the participants from three high schools and one church youth group in Southeast Louisiana. There were 93 participants (32 male and 61 female) ranging in age from 14 to 18 years. The participants filled out a demographic questionnaire, the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, a Religiosity Scale, and the Perceived Social Support Family Scale. No significant correlation was found between religiosity and self-esteem. However, perceived family support and self-esteem had a significant positive correlation, as did perceived family support and religiosity. Male adolescents had lower religiosity than female adolescents. Suggestions for future research include investigating a more diverse sample and other possible variables.