A program of studies (N = 1,404) tested the hypothesis that psychological androgyny (i.e., a balance of masculine and feminine characteristics) permits greater behavioral flexibility and consequently leads to better adjustment. A variety of methods were used to compare androgynous with sex-typed and opposite sex-typed individuals along several attitudinal, personality, and behavioral dimensions. Contrary to expectation a pattern of findings replicated across measures of attitudes toward women's issues, gender identification, neurosis, introversion-extraversion, locus of control, self-esteem, problems with alcohol, creativity, political awareness, confidence in one's own ability, helplessness, and sexual maturity indicated that flexibility and adjustment were generally associated with masculinity rather than androgyny for both males and females. A subsequent experiment further revealed that feminine subjects, independent of gender, would prefer to become more masculine were that possible. These results are interpreted as suggesting an alternative to Bern's theory of androgyny. Additional analyses indicated few differences between the additive and the original definitions of androgyny.

Two separate studies assessed the influence on menstrual distress and related inhibition of such variables as predictability of onset, dispositional susceptibility to cultural expectations, and the attentional focus provided by labels. Greater predictability of onset was associated with more positive feedlings about menstruation in spite of more severe distress. More feminine subjects reported more severe distress, while masculinity was related inversely to inhibition. Subjects reported less distress when the symptoms to which they responded were labeled as related to menstruation. Similarly, subjects' ratings of their general health status were not related to menstrual distress scores if the symptoms were labeled menstrual. Findings are discussed with respect to greater integration of menstrual research into the literature on pain and stress generally.

Primigravid rats were exposed for 20 min to microwave radiation (2450 MHz; trueD˙=31±3mW/g ) in a multimode cavity or to infrared radiation in an incubator ( truet¯ ∼ 47 °C). They were exposed during one of seven days of gestation, the 10th through 16th. The Δ trueT¯ of the dams' colonic temperature, about 3.5 °C, was equated in the microwave and infrared treatments. Control groups of primigravid dams were sham radiated. During the 19th day of gestation, fetuses were taken by Caesarian section and were examined for structural abnormalities and for insult. In addition, fetal brains were analyzed for levels of dopamine (DA) and norepinephrine (NE). Findings: (1) the incidence of lethal dosing was 27% and 12%, respectively, in microwave‐ and infrared‐irradiated dams; (2) the averaged numbers of fetal resorptions in infrared‐ and sham‐irradiated dams are low (both ∼2%) but the number is elevated nearly sixfold in microwave irradiated dams; (3) the incidence of mortality in nonresorbed fetuses was nil; (4) extensive hemorrhagic signs were observed in both microwave‐ and infrared‐irradiated fetuses but there was no discernible evidence of structural malformation; (5) averaged fetal mass is slightly (10%) but reliably smaller in both irradiated groups as compared with controls; and (6) averaged whole‐brain DA levels do not differ reliably as a function of treatment but the averaged level of NE in brains of microwave irradiated fetuses is reliably below those of infrared and sham‐radiated fetuses. While the averaged ΔTs of the two groups of irradiated dams are equal, increments of temperature of microwave irradiated dams were more variable; correlative analysis provided evidence that mortality and resorption are probably a function of peak body temperature irrespective of source of radiation.

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Research on the effects of maternal employment on female children suggests important implications for the development of sex-role identification. In a recent review of this research, Hoffman (1974)