Minutes of the Business Meeting
45th Annual Meeting of the Psychonomic Society
Hyatt Regency Minneapolis
November 20, 2004

1. The meeting was called to order at 5:37 p.m. by John Wixted, Chair of the Governing Board.
2. The minutes of the 2003 business meeting were accepted without change as distributed at the meeting.
3. Bob Lorch, Secretary-Treasurer, distributed the financial report for 2003–2004. The cash balance on June 30, 2004 was $120,913.48; the balance on June 30, 2003 was $95,185.81. After several years of losses, the turn-around in the Society’s financial condition was welcome. There are two reasons for the increase in the account balance. First, approximately $20,500 was collected through a surcharge on hotel rooms in Vancouver. Second, the Publications Office forwarded approximately $22,000 in unused prepaid journal credits to the Society. The Society will receive the unused prepaid journal credits in the current fiscal year, but no room surcharge was collected in Minneapolis. It is anticipated that this policy will result in a stable financial situation next year and for the foreseeable future.


4. John Wixted reported on the activities of the Governing Board:
1. 2 new members were elected to the Governing Board. Brian Ross and Mary Peterson will serve from 2005 through 2010. Brian Ross will serve on the Membership Committee in 2005–2007.
2. The newly elected Chair is Randy Engle, who will serve during 2005.
3. The keynote speaker for 2005 has not yet been named, but nominations from the membership were compiled and a short list has been created.
4. Boston was selected as the site of the convention in 2009, which is also the 50th anniversary of the Society. The schedule for the next five years is: Toronto, 2005; Houston, 2006; Long Beach, 2007; Chicago, 2008; Boston, 2009.
5. There were several changes in conference procedures instituted this year. Bob Lorch will send a questionnaire to the session chairs to evaluate the changes. The changes include: (1) all talks are now 15 minutes with a 5 minute question period; (2) session chairs are chosen from the speakers within the session; (3) session chairs were given the option of collection the PowerPoint presentations of all presenters to put on a single laptop.
6. Procedures for selecting symposia were discussed. It was decided that the target number of symposia will be three. More symposia may be permitted in a given year, but only if it does not exclude members from giving talks in regular sessions. It was also agreed that the policy concerning participation in symposia and talk sessions will be changed such that a member may either present in a symposium or give a regular talk, but not both. Finally, the Governing Board discussed the type of symposia that it wishes to encourage. A statement will be made available to the membership at the time of the next call for symposia proposals, if not sooner.
7. Psi Chi requested that the Society join it to offer a Graduate Student Award. The Governing Board discussed the proposal and decided against it, but will solicit suggestions from Psi Chi for other ways to support graduate students.
8. Keith Rayner suggested to the Governing Board that it investigate the possibility of creating a joint conference with the Experimental Psychology Society. The Board was enthusiastic about exploring this possibility and asked Keith to serve as its ambassador.
9. The Governing Board recommended two amendments to the Society’s bylaws. The first was to eliminate all sexist language from the bylaws, replacing all gender references to gender neutral references. The second was a change in the election bylaws to specify that elections to the Governing Board would be by electronic ballot and the voting period would shorten from 60 days to 30 days. Both amendments were approved unanimously by the members attending the business meeting.

5. John Wixted also reported on the activities of the Publications Committee.
1. Wixted will chair the search committee for a new editor of Psychonomic Bulletin and Review. The new editor will replace Dave Balota after he finishes his term in 2005.
2. For awhile, there has been a need for additional copyeditors and typesetters at the publications office. Before additional staff can be hired, however, more space must be found at 1710 Fortview. Fortunately, the second floor of the office can accommodate several additional staff when it is renovated. The Governing Board has voted to provide $150K for the purpose of renovating the publications office and that process has started. Architectural plans have been drawn, building permits are currently being obtained, and construction will begin over the holiday break.
3. Because of past investment decisions at the Publications Office, the Society in a fortunate financial position. Over the past couple of years, the Publications Committee and Governing Board have discussed how the money should be invested and who has the responsibility of making investment decisions. This year, the Governing Board established a finance committee to form policy on handling investments. The finance committee is comprised of three members: Randy Engle (chair), John Wixted, and Nora Newcombe. Over the upcoming year, the committee’s charge is to determine the composition of a permanent committee and how to form an investment policy.
4. Jonathan Vaughan was asked to report on the archival system he developed for the publications operation. That system is now up and running and Jonathan urged editors to make it their habit to use the system to store
5. Manuscript Central is being implemented to process manuscripts submitted to the Society’s journals.

6. Reports on Membership and Program
1. Bob Lorch reported that the number of new associate members was 59 in 2004. There were 71 new membership nominations in 2004, 65 of whom were approved by the Membership Committee.
2. Bob Lorch reported on the 2004 convention program. There were 828 abstract submissions, 821 of which were accepted. There were 502 posters presented in 5 sessions, and 319 talks, including 6 symposia.

7. There was no old business discussed.
8. Under new business, there was discussion of the change in conference procedures from the option of a 10-, 15- or 20-minute talk to all 15-minute talks. Roger Ratcliff argued for the reinstitution of 20-minute talks because he felt that 15 minutes was inadequate for a talk that included both empirical data and theory development. Veronica Dark said she liked the current format because of the improved alignment of talk sessions. Steve Palmer suggested a compromise in which some 20-minute talks are permitted as the final talk of a session. Additional input will be received on this topic from this year’s session chairs, all of whom will receive a questionnaire about format changes introduced in 2004.
9. On behalf of the Governing Board, Bob Lorch presented John Wixted with a plaque to recognize his contributions as the Chair of the Governing Board in 2004. The two members rotating off the Board, Phil Merikle and Ed Wasserman, were not present at the meeting to receive their plaques, but their service is also deeply appreciated.
10. The meeting was adjourned at 6:10.

Respectfully submitted
Robert F. Lorch, Jr., Secretary-Treasurer