Implicit interpretation biases affect emotional vulnerability: A training study

Cognitive theories of emotion propose that the interpretation of emotion-eliciting situations crucially shapes affective responses. Implicit or automatic biases in these interpretations may hinder emotion regulation and thereby increase risk for the onset and maintenance of psychological disorders. In this study, participants were randomly assigned to a positive or negative interpretation bias training using ambiguous social scenarios. After the completion of the training, a stress task was administered and changes in positive and negative affect and self-esteem were assessed. The results demonstrate that the interpretation bias training was successful in that participants exhibited a tendency to interpret novel scenarios in accordance with their training condition. Importantly, the positive training condition also had a protective effect on self-esteem. Participants in this condition did not exhibit a decrease in self-esteem after the stress task, whereas participants in the negative condition did. These results demonstrate that implicit cognitive biases can be trained and that this training affects self-esteem. Implications of these findings for research on psychopathology and emotion regulation are discussed.     

企业员工工作压力与应付方式的研究

研究表明应付方式问卷中的幻想与工作压力问卷中的工作兴趣有显著的相关,而与合理化有非常显著的相关。外显性焦虑量表与应付方式量表中的解决问题、自责、求助、幻想和退避因子有非常显著的相关,与合理化有显著的相关;而与上工作压力量表上的三个维度只有弱相关。     

A developmental study of semantic elaboration and interpretation in recognition memory

Two experiments examined semantic elaboration and interpretation in recognition memory of 4-year-olds and college students. Subjects were presented pictures of color-specific and non-color-specific items, and then tested for their recognition of the chroma of the items. In Experiment 1, one-half of the presentation items were black and white and one-half colored, and testing always involved one black and white and one colored choice. In Experiment 2, all of the presentation items were colored, and testing always involved two colored choices. In both studies, the pattern of results of the two age groups was similar. Experiments 1 and 2 indicated that recognition judgments were based on representations that were elaborated with preexperimentally acquired semantic color information, and Experiment 2 also indicated that recognition judgments were based on representations that contained interpretive information about the appropriateness of the colors of the items. The results were considered to support and extend the view that when young children and adults share a common knowledge base, they are likely to engage in similar and extensive semantic processing.     

Three-dimensional interpretation of quadrilaterals.

The three-dimensional interpretation of two-dimensional images was studied by using quadrilateral patterns, and some relationships between their structure, depth, and shape interpretations were analyzed under various viewing conditions. We defined rectangular and nonrectangular viewing conditions as follows: the viewing condition in which the quadrilateral, including parallel sides, could be a projection from a rectangle and the viewing condition in which it could not be so. For 9 subjects, 10 measurements were made in each experiment. Analysis showed that a pair of parallel sides of a quadrilateral were viewed as parallel to the viewer's forehead when the sides were horizontal in the image plane and were seen as slanting in depth if they were slanted in the image plane. The quadrilateral composed of parallel and nonparallel sides was perceived as rectangular when viewed with foveal vision even though under the nonrectangular viewing condition, if that viewing condition was not so different from the rectangular viewing condition. The quadrilateral did not appear to be rectangular when viewed in peripheral vision even though the rectangular viewing condition was used.     

A strategy-based interpretation of stroop

Most accounts of the Stroop effect (Stroop, 1935) emphasize its negative aspect, namely, that in particular situations, processing of an irrelevant stimulus dimension interferes with participants' performance of the instructed task. In contrast, this paper emphasizes the fact that, even with that interference, participants actually can (and usually do) exert enough control to perform the instructed task. An Adaptive Control of Thought–Rational (ACT–R) model of the Stroop task interprets this as a kind of learned strategic control. Specifically, the concept of utility is applied to the two processes that compete in the Stroop task, and a utility-learning mechanism serves to update the corresponding utility values according to experience and hence influence the competition. This model both accounts for various extant Stroop results and makes novel predictions about when people can reduce their susceptibility to Stroop interference. These predictions are tested in three experiments that involve a double-response variant of the Stroop task.     

A model for the description and interpretation of suicide prevention.

Views about suicide prevention are based on underlying beliefs about the origins of problems and basic concepts about humankind. These implicit theories have an effect on prevention practices. Making these views explicit is one of the keys for the further development of suicide prevention. In this study a paradigm for analyzing suicide prevention of means of a coding frame and interpreting findings by means of theoretical models of prevention was elaborated. The analysis was based on empirical data consisting of definitions of prevention given by psychologists (N = 34) participating in the national suicide prevention project in Finland. The study demonstrates that suicide prevention can be differentiated at the operational level by means of the analysis method generated. Moreover, the findings can be interpreted according to theoretical criteria. Views expressed by the psychologists seemed to correspond largely to central features of current prevention models. Furthermore, the data can be seen to serve as an empirical validation of these models. Suicide prevention proved to be a multifactorial concept manifesting mainly process theory and interactional explanations of suicidality, and prevention practices fell into a simple typology of four categories.     

Thematic moment analysis: A didactic application of a procedure for phenomenological analysis of narrative data

Abstract

Following in the theoretical and methodological roots of the ‘Duquesne school,’ this work presents a procedure for the phenomenological analysis of narrative data. After describing its ‘approach,’ this work lays out the procedure for ‘thematic moment analysis’ using the work of Giorgi as a point of reference. Idiographic results of single datum of being afraid are presented along with the steps through which this ‘idiographic thematic narrative’ was developed. Procedures for arriving at ‘comparative analysis’ of more than one piece of data are presented and distinguished from claims of generality sought by works drawing on larger data pools. Finally, this work discusses issues of internal and external validity both specifically in regards to the ‘thematic moments’ procedure and in terms of phenomenological research in general.