Psychometric Properties of the Persian Version of Spiritual Well-Being Scale in Patients with Acute Myocardial Infarction

The purpose of this study was to assess the psychometric properties of the Persian version of Spiritual Well-Being Scale (SWBS) in patients with acute myocardial infarction. A multisite, cross-sectional survey was employed to determine the instrument’s reliability (Cronbach’s α and construct reliability) and validity (face, content, and construct). Using systematic sampling of adult outpatients at primary care clinic sites in the Qazvin City, Iran (N = 300), it was found that the Cronbach’s alpha and construct reliability of both factors associated with the SWBS were above 0.7. The construct validity of the scale was determined using exploratory factor analysis. The findings supported two factors: relation with God and relation with life. Further investigation through confirmatory factor analysis (eigenvalues of greater than one) confirmed a third factor construct associated with the SWBS. A total of 50.65 % of the variance were explained by these three factors. The overall findings of the study demonstrated that the SWBS is a valid and reliable instrument that has potential utility in future research and clinical practice settings.     

Stop and start control: A distinction within self‐control

A theoretical distinction within self‐control, between stop control and start control, was investigated in two studies. Study 1 consisted of a pilot study in which expert ratings of existing self‐control items were used to distinguish between stop and start control items and a confirmatory factor analyses of these items using a student sample (N = 474). Also, stop and start control were related to overall affect and behavioural outcomes. Stop control was negatively related to negative affect, whereas start control was positively related to positive affect. Study 2 (N = 226) replicated some of these findings; stop control was the best predictor (?) of smoking and alcohol consumption whereas start control was the best predictor (+) of exercising and studying. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Development of a Children's Version of the SCORE Index of Family Function and Change

The Systemic Clinical Outcome and Routine Evaluation (SCORE) Index of Family Function and Change is a recently developed outcome measure. It was designed to be acceptable to adults and children aged 12 and over. Thus far no research has been conducted using the SCORE in children under the age of 12. The aim of this study was to pilot a children's version of the SCORE. An existing 29‐item version of the SCORE was completed by a sample of seven children aged 8–10. Time was allowed for group discussion with the children. Feedback from this stage of the study was used to develop a draft version of the SCORE for children. An expert panel of clinicians and researchers were also consulted. A pilot version of the Child SCORE was administered to 80 children aged 7–10 in an inner London primary school. Thirty‐five children also completed the measure for a second time, 1 week later. Findings suggested that the Child SCORE was acceptable to children in the 8–11 age range. Values for internal reliability and test–retest reliability were good. The Child SCORE appears to be a promising instrument. Further research is required to confirm its acceptability to clinical populations, and to demonstrate sensitivity to change.     

The Role of the Syllable in the Segmentation of Cairene Spoken Arabic

The syllable as a perceptual unit has been investigated cross linguistically. In Cairene Arabic syllables fall into three categories, light CV, heavy CVC/CVV and superheavy CVCC/CVVC. However, heavy syllables in Cariene Arabic have varied weight depending on their position in a word, whether internal or final. The present paper investigates the role of the syllable in the segmentation of Cariene Arabic. It reports a psycholinguistic study; syllable monitoring that was conducted on 32 Egyptian Arabic native speakers to examine the perceptual role of the syllable in spoken connected language. Theoretical phonological studies have identified Cairene Arabic as a stress-timed language; however, psycholinguistic studies providing evidence for this theoretical finding are scarce. The present study which is a cross modal (visual and auditory) counterbalanced design, gives evidence for the role of the (CVC) syllable in the segmentation of Cairene spoken language.     

An Investigation of Differential Relationships of Implicit and Explicit Aggression: Validation of an Arabic Version of the Conditional Reasoning Test for Aggression

Abstract

Most personality research in the workplace relies on self-reports. Although self-report measures are believed to assess the explicit aspect of personality, a more recent approach for assessing implicit personality is based on conditional reasoning. The Conditional Reasoning Test for Aggression (CRT–A) was developed to assess implicit cognitions that justify aggressive behavior. The integrative model of personality proposes that both the explicit and implicit personality interact together to predict different behavioral outcomes. The results of this investigation are reported in two studies. The purpose of Study 1 was to adapt the CRT–A to the Arabic language and to examine its validity evidence using a large sample of Egyptian employees (n?=?1,046). Study 2 aimed at examining the differential relationships of implicit and explicit components of aggressive personality in explaining different forms of aggressive behavior variance (n?=?271). The results of Study 1 revealed that the psychometric properties of the adapted Arabic version of CRT–A were similar to those obtained for the United States. In addition, factor analysis results were consistent with the psychological theory used to build the conditional reasoning problems. The results of Study 2 provide substantial empirical support for the integrative model of assessment of aggression.     

Alexithymia and its measurement: confirmatory factor analyses of the 20‐item Toronto Alexithymia Scale and the Bermond–Vorst Alexithymia Questionnaire

Alexithymia refers to the difficulties an individual has in experiencing and expressing feelings. The 20‐item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS‐20) and the Bermond–Vorst Alexithymia Questionnaire (BVAQ) with two parallel versions of 20 items have been constructed to measure it. The present study compared the psychometric properties of these two self‐report questionnaires in English (N=290) and French (N=322) language versions. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to examine the fit between the hypothesized factors and the data. Results revealed a better fit to the data for the second version of the BVAQ (BVAQ‐20B) for both language versions as compared to the TAS‐20, the whole BVAQ, or the first version of the BVAQ (BVAQ‐20A). Additionally, the factor comparison of both language versions indicated that only the factorial structure of the BVAQ‐20B was replicable across languages. Concurrent validity of the questionnaires is discussed. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Reading,syntactic, orthographic,and working memory skills of bilingual Arabic-English speaking Canadian children

This study assessed the reading, language, and memory skills of 56 bilingual Arab-Canadian children age's 9-14. English was their main instructional language, and Arabic was the language spoken at home. All children attended a Heritage Language Program in Toronto where they were taught to read and write Arabic. The children were administered word and pseudo-word reading, language, and working memory tests in English and Arabic. The majority of the children showed at least adequate proficiency in both languages. There was a significant relationship between the acquisition of word and pseudo-word reading working memory, and syntactic awareness skills in the two languages. The poor readers in Arabic had lower scores on all linguistic tasks, except the visual task. There were no significant differences between bilingual English Arabic children and monolingual English-speaking children on the reading, language, and memory tasks. However, bilingual English Arabic children who had reading problems in English had higher scores on English pseudo-word reading and spelling tasks than monolingual English-speaking children with reading disabilities, probably because of positive transfer from the regular nature of Arabic orthography. In this case, bilingualism does not appear to have negative consequences for the development of language reading skills in both languages—Arabic and English—despite the different nature of the two orthographies.     

Passion,vitality and life satisfaction for physically active old adults

In Arabic world, few studies are interested in psychological factors influencing the physically active old adults. The specific goals of the present research are the following: (i) test the factor structure and invariance tests for gender and physical activities for the Arabic version of the passion scale; (ii) test a model that describes a mediator role of subjective vitality in the relationships between passion and life satisfaction (iii) test the presence of differences for gender, physical activity practice, education level and age on passion. Two studies were conducted with 551 physically active Egyptian old adult (n = 354; n = 197). Passion, Subjective vitality and Life Satisfaction scales were administered. Passion scale composed of two subscales (harmonious and obsessive). Strong support for the complete invariance between groups. Subjective vitality was a mediator in the relationships between harmonious passion and life satisfaction. Education level and age had an effect on passion subscales.     

Evaluation of the Spiritual Well-Being Scale in a Sample of Korean Adults

This study explored the psychometric qualities and construct validity of the Spiritual Well-Being Scale (SWBS; Ellison in J Psychol Theol 11:330–340, 1983) using a sample of 470 Korean adults. Two factor analyses, exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis, were conducted in order to test the validity of the SWBS. The results of the factor analyses supported the original two-dimensional structure of the SWBS—religious well-being (RWB) and existential well-being (EWB) with method effects associated with negatively worded items. By controlling for method effects, the evaluation of the two-factor structure of SWBS is confirmed with clarity. Further, the differential pattern and magnitude of correlations between the SWB subscales and the religious and psychological variables suggested that two factors of the SWBS were valid for Protestant, Catholic, and religiously unaffiliated groups except Buddhists. The Protestant group scored higher in RWB compared to the Buddhist, Catholic, and unaffiliated groups. The Protestant group scored higher in EWB compared to the unaffiliated groups. Future studies may need to include more Buddhist samples to gain solid evidence for validity of the SWBS on a non-Western religious tradition.     

Neuropsychological Measures in the Arab World: A Systematic Review

Although Arabic is one of the most widely used languages in the world, little is known on the availability of standardized neuropsychological tests in Arabic. We review the literature published before 2016, using the keywords Arab*, cogniti*, and neuropsycholo*, as well as keywords for each Arab country. PubMed, PsycINFO, Education Source, Academic Search Complete, Education Resources Information Center, Shamaa, and Arabpsynet databases were searched, in addition to a selected number of Arabic medical and educational journals. After excluding case reports, studies conducted on Arab groups residing outside the Arab world or Israel, and studies that employed intelligence scales or cognitive screens without standardization, 384 studies were eventually reviewed. Tests with most extensive use, adaptation, validation and norming were identified. The Raven Matrices, with its variants, was the most normed cognitive test for Arab individuals (normed in 16 countries). The rate of neuropsychology publications from the Arab countries combined, per year, was less than half of that of each American journal (top 10 journals pertaining to cognition). Nonetheless, the rate in Arab countries has increased after 2010. Publications were mostly from Egypt and Saudi Arabia, but the ratio of test adaptation-to-publication was the largest in Jordan and Lebanon. Approximately half of these publications did not employ cognitive tests that were developed, translated, adapted, or standardized according to international guidelines of psychological measurement. We provide recommendations on improving clinical neuropsychology to better serve Arab patients.     

Number processing of Arabic and Hebrew bilinguals: Evidence supporting the distance effect

In the current study, a direct assessment of the effect of language lexical‐syntactic structure and magnitude semantic access on numerical processing was made by contrasting the performance of Arabic/Hebrew bilinguals in a digital (Hindi‐digits/Arabic‐digits) and verbal numerical comparison task (Arabic, an inverted language: Units‐Decades, Hebrew, a non‐inverted language: Decades‐Units). Our data revealed in the digital presentation format (Experiment 1) a regular distance effect in Arabic language‐Hindi digits and Hebrew language‐Arabic digits, characterized by an inverse relation between reaction times and numerical distance with no difference in the mean reaction times of participants in Arabic‐L1 and Hebrew‐L2. This indicates that both lexical digits of two‐digit numbers in L1 and L2 are similarly processed and semantically accessed. However in the verbal presentation format (Experiment 2) a similar pattern of distance effect was found, but the mean reaction times in Arabic were lower than in Hebrew in each numerical distance. This indicates that the processing of two‐digit number words in L1 and L2 is semantically accessed and determined by the syntactic structure of each language.     

Vital exhaustion measures and their associations with coronary heart disease risk factors in a sample of spanish-speakers

Abstract

The main purpose of this research was to study the reliability and conceptual validity of two Spanish language measures of Vital Exhaustion (VE), a short-term risk factor for coronary artery disease (CAD). The English version of the Maastricht Questionnaire for Vital Exhaustion was used to make a Spanish language questionnaire (VEQ) and a Spanish language interview (VEI) whose scoring systems were equal to the original version. These instruments were administered to a sample of healthy working men (n = 100) and women (n = 130) in Caracas, Venezuela. Participants also completed questionnaires designed to measure anger-expression and social support and were assessed by means of the Structured Interview to measure Type A Behaviour Pattern (TABP). Information about other CAD-risk factors, such as age, smoking behavior, and health habits, were collected.

High reliability coefficients, .85 and .91, were found for the VEI and VEQ, respectively. Principal component analysis provided one-factor solutions for each instrument. The pattern of correlations between VE, assessed by the VEI, and other personality characteristics was rather similar to the pattern observed in other cultures. In general significant, but modest, correlations were observed between VE and TABP, anger expression, a negative self-concept, and low social support. We conclude that VE appears to be a meaningful construct in this particular cultural context.     

Multidimensional Assessment of Trauma Impact,Recovery, and Resilience

Abstract

This paper describes a recent effort to introduce Japanese clinicians to the Japanese language version of the Multidimensional Trauma Recovery and Resiliency (MTRR) measures. The MTRR was translated into Japanese and introduced to a group of Japanese clinicians to gather pilot data on trauma survivors in Japan. Although the sample size limits the generalizability of the results, the findings from a preliminary analysis of 27 cases provide promising results concerning the value of a Japanese version of the MTRR-99. Future psychometric studies of the MTRR-99, parallel to American studies of the English language version of the measure, remain to be conducted. The current investigation opens the door to a series of multicultural studies on trauma impact and resiliency.     

Do Construal Levels Affect Athletes’ Imagery and Performance Outcomes? It Depends on the Task!

We investigated the hypothesis that an interaction of construal levels and task types would improve performance outcomes, mediated by imagery abstraction levels. In a pilot study (N = 30; table tennis rallies, jumps, throws) and a main study (N = 32; badminton rallies, soccer penalties), athletes performed tasks after receiving high or low construal frames, with an imagery recall completed in the main study. Table tennis and badminton players won more rallies in low construal conditions; track athletes and soccer penalties had higher success rates in high construal conditions. Frames impacted self-reported imagery, but abstraction levels of imagery did not affect outcomes.     

The Effect of Arabic Vowels on the Reading Comprehension of Second- and Sixth-Grade Native Arab Children

This study investigated the effect of Arabic vowels on the reading comprehension of native Arabic speakers. This issue has not been addressed yet. Two groups of native Arabic speakers were randomly sampled, one from two elementary schools in the Haifa area, and the other from two elementary schools in Nazareth. Both groups in both experiments read Arabic texts in two reading conditions, vowelized and unvowelized; the older group (n= 74) answered 10 multiple-choice comprehension questions about each story, and the younger group (n= 71) answered seven multiple-choice comprehension questions. The results revealed that vowels were a significant facilitator of reading comprehension in both age groups. Considering these results, reading in Arabic orthography is not an autonomous word recognition process. An alternative approach is suggested for reading Arabic.     

Simulation of brain damage on the Bender-Gestalt test by college subjects.

The study found that nonbraindamaged college subjects could not simulate organicity on the Bender-Gestalt test when instructed to do so. Although Pascal-Suttell and Canter scoring methods failed to differentiate malingerers from an organic criterion group, an ABPP clinician sorted 89% of the records correctly in a pilot study. Differentiating criteria were then spelled out from the pilot study protocols. In the main study the expert clinician correctly identified all 20 malingerers. Subsequent studies of intra- and inter-rater reliability produced satisfactory results.     

The Power of Language and Labels: “The Mentally Ill” Versus “People With Mental Illnesses”

Undergraduate students (N = 221), adults in a community sample (N = 211), and professional counselors and counselors‐in‐training (N = 269) were given a measure of tolerance. Within each sample, half of the participants were given a version that used the term “the mentally ill” and half were given a version that used the term “people with mental illnesses.” Individuals receiving the version with the term “the mentally ill” had lower levels of tolerance. Professional counselors had the largest differences in tolerance on the basis of language.     

Role of Group Affiliation and Gender on Attitudes Toward Women in the Military

The current study examined attitudes of West Point cadets (N = 218), Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) cadets (N = 509), and non-military-affiliated students from civilian colleges (N = 598) toward a variety of roles that women may serve in the military. Respondents were queried whether a woman “should” or “should not” serve in the following military jobs: jet fighter pilot, truck mechanic, nurse in a combat zone, typist in the Pentagon, commander of a military installation, hand-to-hand combat soldier, jet transport pilot, air defense gunner, and crew member on a combat ship. A metric based on a sum of approval across all jobs indicated that women were significantly more approving than men; civilian college students were more approving than ROTC cadets; and West Point cadets showed the lowest overall approval.