Fear Extinction to an Out-Group Face: The Role of Target Gender

ABSTRACT— Conditioning studies on humans and other primates show that fear responses acquired toward danger-relevant stimuli, such as snakes, resist extinction, whereas responses toward danger-irrelevant stimuli, such as birds, are more readily extinguished. Similar evolved biases may extend to human groups, as recent research demonstrates that a conditioned fear response to faces of persons of a social out-group resists extinction, whereas fear toward a social in-group is more readily extinguished. Here, we provide an important extension to previous work by demonstrating that this fear-extinction bias occurs solely when the exemplars are male. These results underscore the importance of considering how gender of the target stimulus affects psychological and physiological responses to out-group threat.     

The Pathoplastic Relationship Between Interpersonal Problems and Fear of Failure

ABSTRACT This study advances the understanding of fear of failure (FF), a dispositional avoidance-oriented achievement motive, by employing interpersonal classification techniques to groups of individuals who fear failure in order to examine the pathoplastic relations between FF and interpersonal problems. Shame-based FF is thought to be related to the self-regulation strategies of appeasement and aggression, and these strategies are hypothesized to be associated with the interpersonal problems of Nonassertiveness and Vindictiveness, respectively. Using 2 independent samples ( n s=60 and 38) reporting high FF, interpersonal profiles were examined for the groups in their entirety and for cluster solutions within the larger samples. Results demonstrated that individuals high in FF exhibited 1 of 2 prototypical interpersonal profiles associated with Domineering/Vindictive or Nonassertive/Exploitable problems that correspond with the hypothesized aggression and appeasement regulation strategies. Consistent with the concept of pathoplasticity, these differences were not better accounted for by demographic, affective, motivational, personality, or attachment style characteristics of the samples.     

Overt naming fMRI pre- and post-TMS: Two nonfluent aphasia patients, with and without improved naming post-TMS

Two chronic, nonfluent aphasia patients participated in overt naming fMRI scans, pre- and post-a series of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) treatments as part of a TMS study to improve naming. Each patient received 10, 1-Hz rTMS treatments to suppress a part of R pars triangularis. P1 was a ‘good responder’ with improved naming and phrase length; P2 was a ‘poor responder’ without improved naming.Pre-TMS (10 years poststroke), P1 had significant activation in R and L sensorimotor cortex, R IFG, and in both L and R SMA during overt naming fMRI (28% pictures named). At 3 mo. post-TMS (42% named), P1 showed continued activation in R and L sensorimotor cortex, R IFG, and in R and L SMA. At 16 mo. post-TMS (58% named), he also showed significant activation in R and L sensorimotor cortex mouth and R IFG. He now showed a significant increase in activation in the L SMA compared to pre-TMS and at 3 mo. post-TMS (p < .02; p < .05, respectively). At 16 mo. there was also greater activation in L than R SMA (p < .08). At 46 mo. post-TMS (42% named), this new LH pattern of activation continued. He improved on the Boston Naming Test from 11 pictures named pre-TMS, to scores ranging from 14 to 18 pictures, post-TMS (2–43 mo. post-TMS). His longest phrase length (Cookie Theft picture) improved from three words pre-TMS, to 5–6 words post-TMS.Pre-TMS (1.5 years poststroke), P2 had significant activation in R IFG (3% pictures named). At 3 and 6 mo. post-TMS, there was no longer significant activation in R IFG, but significant activation was present in R sensorimotor cortex. On all three fMRI scans, P2 had significant activation in both the L and R SMA. There was no new, lasting perilesional LH activation across sessions for this patient. Over time, there was little or no change in his activation. His naming remained only at 1–2 pictures during all three fMRI scans. His BNT score and longest phrase length remained at one word, post-TMS.Lesion site may play a role in each patient’s fMRI activation pattern and response to TMS treatment. P2, the poor responder, had an atypical frontal lesion in the L motor and premotor cortex that extended high, near brain vertex, with deep white matter lesion near L SMA. P2 also had frontal lesion in the posterior middle frontal gyrus, an area important for naming (Duffau et al., 2003); P1 did not. Additionally, P2 had lesion inferior and posterior to Wernicke’s area, in parts of BA 21 and 37, whereas P1 did not.The fMRI data of our patient who had good response following TMS support the notion that restoration of the LH language network is linked in part, to better recovery of naming and phrase length in nonfluent aphasia.     

Right frontal EEG asymmetry and behavioral inhibition in infants of depressed mothers

Recent studies have shown associations between maternal psychopathology and inhibited behaviors in infants. Moreover, physiological factors have been identified as affecting the continuity of behavioral inhibition across childhood. The purpose of the present study was to examine electroencephalogram (EEG) activity and inhibited behavior in 12-month-old infants of depressed versus non-depressed and mothers. Repeated measures MANOVAs indicated that the infants of mothers with stable psychopathology had greater relative right frontal EEG asymmetry, a pattern that typically accompanies greater negative affect and greater withdrawal behaviors. Infants of affectively ill mothers also showed more proximal behaviors toward a stranger and a novel toy than infants of well mothers, but fewer non-proximal behaviors toward their mothers. These results are discussed within a framework of behavioral inhibition for infants exposed to early psychopathologies in their mothers.     

Gay Stereotypes: The Use of Sexual Orientation as a Cue for Gender-Related Attributes

This study investigated whether gay men and lesbians are assumed to have attributes stereotypically associated with the other gender. Participants were 110 male and female undergraduates from a private, Midwestern, U.S. university. Participants were randomly assigned to one of four conditions (i.e., gay male, lesbian, heterosexual female, heterosexual male) and rated their given target on possession of traditionally masculine and feminine occupational interests, activities, and traits. Results revealed that, despite some changes in the status of gay men and lesbians in society, stereotypes regarding sexual orientation were similar to those seen in studies conducted 20 years ago. Specifically, gay males were viewed as less masculine/more feminine than heterosexual males, and lesbians were viewed as more masculine/less feminine than heterosexual females.     

Contextual influences on interpersonal complementarity

The influence of context on interpersonal complementarity was examined using an event-contingent recording procedure. Setting and role status moderated the relation between how a person behaved and how the other person behaved. Individuals were more likely to respond with agreeable behavior to agreeableness in others when not at work than when at work and when in a high status work role relative to a low status work role. Reciprocity between dominance and submissiveness was found in work settings but not in nonwork settings. Individuals were more likely to reciprocate more submissive behavior by the other person with more dominant behavior and more likely to reciprocate more dominant behavior by the other person with relatively more submissive behavior when in a higher status work role relative to lower status work roles. Results were interpreted in terms of the influence of decreased structure and shared goals on increasing interpersonal complementarity.     

Visions and Realities: Supervisee Perspectives of Multicultural Supervision

This article provides an overview of the experiences of 4 psychologists‐in‐training as supervisees in multicultural supervision relationships. Grounded in the supervision and multicultural literature, this article helps both supervisors and supervisees to (a) understand supervisees' needs and perspectives for culturally integrated supervision and (b) discuss multicultural issues during supervision. Recommendations are provided to facilitate the development of effective multicultural supervision. Este artículo muestra un resumen de las experiencias de 4 psicológos‐en‐entrenamiento bajo supervisión en relaciones de supervisión multiculturales. En base a la literatura multicultural y de supervisión, este artículo ayuda a supervisores y supervisados a (a) entender las necesidades de los supervisados y sus perspectivas hacia temas que integran la cultura en la supervisión, y (b) a discutir temas multiculturales durante la supervisión. Se proveen recomendaciones para facilitar el desarrollo de supervisión multicultural eficaz.     

ITALO SVEVO AND THE FIRST PSYCHOANALYTIC NOVEL

The first fictional work that used psychoanalysis as a central plot device was La Coscienza di Zeno (Confessions of Zeno) , published in 1923 by Ettore Schmitz, a Triestino Jewish businessman who wrote under the pseudonym of 'Italo Svevo'. This paper describes Svevo's background, his relations with such important literary figures as James Joyce and with such central figures in Italian psychoanalysis as Dr Edoardo Weiss. It seeks to demonstrate to the Anglophone reader the particular psychoanalytic elements in the novel and to relate them to Svevo's personal experience (including his indirect contacts with Freud) and to the intellectual currents of the period in a city which had, until the aftermath of the First World War, been a crossroads of European culture.