Establishing Causal Connections: Meta-Analysis and Psychotherapy

Meta-analysis is a new quantitative technique for integrating diverse empirical data. It has been used most notably to establish causal connections between psychotherapy and beneficial therapeutic outcomes (Smith, Glass, and Miller 1980), but it has also been applied to a variety of other causal problems, including the effects of drug therapies on psychological disorders; the effects of school class size on attainment; sex differences in conformity; experimenter effects; the effects of self-serving bias; and the relationship between social class and achievement. The technique is also likely to be widely used in the future in a variety of areas of the social sciences; one commentator has already referred to the ".meta-analytic revolution". in outcome research (Fiske 1983).     

Randomization tests for ABAB designs: comparing-data-division- specific and common distributions

Monte Carlo simulations were used to generate data for ABAB designs of different lengths. The points of change in phase are randomly determined before gathering behaviour measurements, which allows the use of a randomization test as an analytic technique. Data simulation and analysis can be based either on data-division-specific or on common distributions. Following one method or another affects the results obtained after the randomization test has been applied. Therefore, the goal of the study was to examine these effects in more detail. The discrepancies in these approaches are obvious when data with zero treatment effect are considered and such approaches have implications for statistical power studies. Data-division-specific distributions provide more detailed information about the performance of the statistical technique.     

Balancing Treatment and Control Groups in Quasi‐Experiments: An Introduction to Propensity Scoring

Organizational and applied sciences have long struggled with improving causal inference in quasi‐experiments. We introduce organizational researchers to propensity scoring, a statistical technique that has become popular in other applied sciences as a means for improving internal validity. Propensity scoring statistically models how individuals in a quasi‐experiment have been assigned to conditions in order to estimate treatment effects among individuals with approximately equal probabilities of receiving the treatment. If propensity scores are created from relevant covariates, matching on the propensity score makes treatment assignment ignorable and approximates a true experimental design. We illustrate how matching on the propensity score can be applied by using 2 examples: examining the effects of online instruction and estimating the benefits of preparatory coaching for the SAT. In both cases, propensity‐scoring methods effectively reduced inequivalence between treatment and control groups on many variables. Propensity scoring stands out as a valuable technique capable of improving causal inference from many of organizational research's quasi‐experiments.     

The Value of Social Validation in Single-Case Methods in Sport and Exercise Psychology

Social validation is used to determine satisfaction with an intervention and has been utilized in many single-case studies within sport and exercise psychology research and consultancy. This article reviews current social validation procedures and makes recommendations of how a more thorough consideration of the technique could add greater value to the understanding of single-case protocols within research and applied practice. Recommendations include using semi-structured interviews for data collection, using content analysis to analyze these data, reporting social validation results in a thorough manner, collecting social validation information from significant others, and collecting social validation data as frequently as possible.     

Magnetic stimulation studies of visual cognition

The panoply of non-invasive techniques for brain imaging is responsible for much of the current excitement in cognitive neuroscience; sensory, perceptual and cognitive behaviour can now be correlated with cerebral blood flow as assessed by functional imaging, the electrical fields generated by populations of neurons or changes in magnetic fields created by electrical activity. Correlations between localized brain activity and behaviour, however, do not of themselves establish that any brain area is necessary for a particular task; necessity is the domain of the lesion technique. Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) is a technique that can be used non-invasively to produce reversible functional disruption and has already been used to investigate visual detection, discrimination, attention and plasticity. The power of TMS as a `lesion' technique lies in the opportunity to combine reversible disruption with high degrees of spatial and temporal resolution. In this review we trace some of the major developments in the use of TMS as a technique for the investigation of visual cognition.     

Failures to ignore entirely irrelevant distractors: the role of load

In daily life (e.g., in the work environment) people are often distracted by stimuli that are clearly irrelevant to the current task and should be ignored. In contrast, much applied distraction research has focused on task interruptions by information that requires a response and therefore cannot be ignored. Moreover, the most commonly used laboratory measures of distractibility (e.g., in the response-competition and attentional-capture paradigms), typically involve distractors that are task relevant (e.g., through response associations or location). A series of experiments assessed interference effects from stimuli that are entirely unrelated to the current task, comparing the effects of perceptual load on task-irrelevant and task-relevant (response competing) distractors. The results showed that an entirely irrelevant distractor can interfere with task performance to the same extent as a response-competing distractor and that, as with other types of distractors, the interfering effects of the irrelevant distractors can be eliminated with high perceptual load in the relevant task. These findings establish a new laboratory measure of a form of distractibility common to everyday life and highlight load as an important determinant of such distractibility.     

6 years of electroconvulsive therapy with dexamethasone

The author reports on an improvement in ECT in which Dexamethasone is used to prevent cerebral edema. This improved technique has been used for 823 EC treatment since 1979. Since then, no post-paroxysmal passage syndromes have been observed in gerontopsychiatric patients even in cases where ECT is applied relatively frequently.     

Ministry with the Confused Elderly

Clergy and lay visitors often encounter the confused elderly, yet most seem to find it difficult to understand the relevance of their ministry to such persons. Many confused seniors have been active participants in their church or synagogue and have significant faith experiences. However, once they become confused, they are often seen as disruptive in services of worship and unreachable with the current tools of ministry. Thus, older adults who have Organic Brain Syndrome often become disenfranchised from the active life of their religious congregation. This article will summarize the findings of a study that culminated in the development of a model approach to ministry that combines the concepts of sensory stimulation, reality orientation, and worship to provide a focal point for ministry with the confused elderly. Once learned, this technique can be used successfully by anyone who is comfortable with leading worship. It can be applied in many settings, but is particularly useful in long-term care institutions.     

Differenzielle Effekte klassischer Prädiktoren von Jugendgewalt

Previous studies were able to identify numerous predictors of aggressive and violent behavior in youth. Although it is to be expected that these predictors may behave differently with varying personal and situation-specific characteristics, no study has yet empirically examined whether predictors of youth violence really exhibit differential effects. The current study will fill this gap in the literature by asking how do some predictors of youth violence differ between slightly and highly criminal individuals? To answer this question a representative sample of German students of the ninth class from 2007 and 2008 was used (N?=?44,610). Using the technique of quantile regression the effects of the predictors sex, origin, risk seeking, number of delinquent friends, alcohol consumption, parental violence, interparental violence and violent victimization on the number of violent incidents were analyzed. The results showed that all predictors significantly influenced the number of violent incidents; however, the effects of all predictors also varied significantly with the intensity of criminal activity of offenders. Whereas all predictors were valid for highly criminal individuals, only some predictors also influenced the amount of violent crime in occasionally violent youth. These results have important implications regarding the identification of new predictors, theory building and practice. Additionally, the present approach of studying differential effects might prove useful to psychology and law in general. The more empirical research is individualized, the better this research can also be applied in practice.     

Forgetting the lessons of history

While a great deal of behavior analytic research has focussed on studying current contingencies, the amount of work done in the area of conditioning history is spotty, at best. Weiner (1964, 1969) conducted history research with human subjects, but little has followed in either the human or the nonhuman literature. Some direction can also be found in the literature studying the effects of conditioning on drug effects (e.g., Barrett, 1977; Urbain, Poling, Millam, & Thompson, 1978). However, "behavioral history" or "conditioning history" has not been a fully-developed area within behavior analysis. It is suggested that empirical work on history effects might have implications for (a) better understanding human-nonhuman behavioral differences and similarities, (b) clinical applications, especially where clients are resistant to behavioral change, and (c) theoretical assumptions in behavior analysis in relation to both basic and applied concerns.     

Video Game Therapy: Application of the Couple and Family Technology Framework

The couple and family technology framework outlines how technology affects couple and family relationships. This framework has been applied to understanding the impact of technology on infidelity, contributed to our understanding of online gaming issues in couple relationships, and sexting. The purpose of this paper is to outline how to implement video gaming as a disciplinary tool for youth congruent with the couple and family technology framework. Specifically, we identify the elements of video games that can be applied as an intervention in family treatment with youth in a token economy. This proposed technique focuses on utilizing technology (and specifically video games) as a strategy to improve youth’s behavior. Consistent with the couple and family technology framework, this paper outlines how accessibility, affordability, accommodation, and approximation can be used to improve behavior as well as improve parent–child relationships. Implications are included.     

Masking by uniform field flicker: some practical problems

The technique of uniform field flicker (UFF) masking has frequently been used to address issues concerning the relative performance of sustained and transient neural channels in the human visual system. Unfortunately there has been an artifact in the implementation of this method in most published experiments which has meant that the contrast of the target has been flickered in synchrony with the mean luminance. A study is reported in which the artifact was corrected and the effects of UFF masking on the contrast sensitivity function then examined. With this correction, masking was still restricted to low spatial frequencies but it was much weaker than reported originally. It is argued that the original evidence suggesting that UFF masking can be used to examine the functioning of transient and sustained channels has not been interpreted correctly and that the basis for such a claim is weak.     

Differences in semantic and translation priming across languages: The role of language direction and language dominance

In the present study, we examined bilingual memory organization, using the priming paradigm. Many of the previous studies in which this experimental technique has been used in the bilingual domain appear to have had several differences in methodology that have caused there to be a lot of variation in the data reported. The aim of the present work was to create an experimental situation that was well constrained so that automatic processes could be observed. In Experiment 1, Spanish-English bilinguals participated in an unmasked semantic- and translation-priming study in which a lexical decision task was used. The results revealed significant translation-priming effects in both language directions and, unexpectedly, significant semantic priming in the L2-L1 direction only. In Experiment 2, we examined semantic- and translation-priming effects with a forward mask design. The results indicated that significant priming was obtained only for translation word pairs in both language directions. These results are discussed with regard to current models of bilingual memory representation.     

Sex differences in self-reported coronary-prone factors

The FABA self-report questionnaire on coronary-prone behaviour was applied to 628 GDR subjects (343 males, 285 females), who included students, blue- and white-collar workers, and hypertensive patients, all split into three age groups (18–30, 31–50, and 51–65 years). Four scales had been previously established by factor analysis: Work Obsession (WO), Dominance/Competition (DC), Reactive Uncontrol (RU), and Need for Planning (PN). Two-tailed MANOVA and ANOVA were applied to analyse the effects of sex, age, and type of respondent (i.e. student, worker, or hypertensive) on scale means, using the defined sub-groups. No significant sex differences on WO and PN were found. With regard to DC, males of all sub-groups consistently rated themselves as more dominant and competitive than females. These differences were highly significant. RU was higher only in female students and female hypertensives. There was a significant age effect on DC and PN: the older the workers and hypertensives of both sexes, the more dominant and obsessed with planning they were. No influence of the type of respondent was apparent. Results are discussed in the light of cross-cultural research on gender differences and the particular socio-economic situation of the former GDR. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An introduction to association rule mining: An application in counseling and help-seeking behavior of adolescents

Association rule mining (ARM) is a technique used to discover relationships among a large set of variables in a data set. It has been applied to a variety of industry settings and disciplines but has, to date, not been widely used in the social sciences, especially in education, counseling, and associated disciplines. This article thus introduces ARM and presents aspects of existing work that will be relevant and useful to researchers practitioners in the social sciences. Definitions and concepts are presented, and examples of ARM applications are highlighted to strengthen these ideas. We also discuss an example from our existing research to show that ARM can be used to investigate help-seeking behavior in a sample of secondary school students in Singapore. We also present some guidelines and recommendations for using ARM.     

Reciprocal Interweaving: A Contribution to the Understanding of Adult Development

Gesell (1939) introduced the term reciprocal interweaving to describe the inconsistent expression of behavior common to the maturation process. Although the concept has been used to characterize development during infancy and childhood, it has not been applied to adult behavior. This article demonstrates that reciprocal interweaving can operate in adulthood and provides examples involving the learning of complex social skills in later life. The examples include personality change as a result of psychotherapy, the acquisition of sex-role behavior, and the effects of assertiveness training.     

Profiles of Dialogue for Evaluating Arguments from Ignorance

This investigation uses the technique of the profile of dialogue as a tool for the evaluation of arguments from ignorance (also called lack-of-evidence arguments, negative evidence, ad ignorantiam arguments and ex silentio arguments). Such arguments have traditionally been classified as fallacies by the logic textbooks, but recent research has shown that in many cases they can be used reasonably. A profile of dialogue is a connected sequence of moves and countermoves in a conversational exchange of a type that is goal-directed and can be represented in a normative model of dialogue. Selected case studies are used to probe special features of using the profile technique as applied to arguments from ignorance of a kind that occur frequently in everyday conversational exchanges. One of these special features is the use of Gricean implicature. Another is the need to use negative profiles of argument.     

Testing reciprocity in social interactions: A comparison between the directional consistency and skew-symmetry statistics

In the present article, we focus on two indices that quantify directionality and skew-symmetrical patterns in social interactions as measures of social reciprocity: the directional consistency (DC) and skew-symmetry indices. Although both indices enable researchers to describe social groups, most studies require statistical inferential tests. The main aims of the present study are first, to propose an overall statistical technique for testing null hypotheses regarding social reciprocity in behavioral studies, using the DC and skew-symmetry statistics (Phi) at group level; and second, to compare both statistics in order to allow researchers to choose the optimal measure depending on the conditions. In order to allow researchers to make statistical decisions, statistical significance for both statistics has been estimated by means of a Monte Carlo simulation. Furthermore, this study will enable researchers to choose the optimal observational conditions for carrying out their research, since the power of the statistical tests has been estimated.     

When Are People Unhappy? Corruption Experience,Environment, and Life Satisfaction in Mainland China

Previous research on corruption and happiness has typically considered corruption perception as an indicator of government quality; however, the impact of direct personal experience of corruption has been largely overlooked. The current research, using the Asian Barometer Survey I data set on China, fills this gap. We found that the negative effects of personal experience of corruption on happiness are moderated by the general corruption environment, as measured by the corruption–victimization rate of a province. Corruption experience reduces life satisfaction significantly only when the external environment has a low level of corruption. We applied concepts from the broken windows theory to provide theoretical explanations for this phenomenon and used a series of models to test the robustness of our findings.