Evaluating psychological injury in motor vehicle accidents (MVA): development and validation of a protocol for detecting pretense

In order to assess the feigning ability of the psychological injury in a motor vehicle accident (MVA), a total of 105 subjects, which never had suffered a serious MVA and lay in psychopathology, responded to the MMPI-2 in line with the standard instructions. Thereafter, subjects were instructed to feign moral damage generated by a MVA prior to being evaluated using a clinical-forensic interview a week later, and responding to the MMPI-2 another week later. The results show that 60.9% of the subjects were able to effectively feign moral damage on the MMPI-2, and 3.8% in the forensic clinical interview. The analysis of the instruments and procedures for the validation of subject responses i.e., the original validity control scales of the MMPI-2 and the analysis of feigning strategies in the forensic clinical interview, revealed no efficacy in feigning detection. Nevertheless, collectively, all the control measures and procedures were effective for the detection of feigning. Therefore, a protocol for the detection of feigning of moral damage has been proposed.     

Order of question presentation and correlation between judgments of comparative and own risk

Unrealistic optimism is often assessed using a single question asking for an estimate of comparative risk. However, it has been proposed that individuals treat such a question essentially as though it were only about their own risk. This proposal leads to the prediction that, when the questions about own risk and comparative risk are asked in sequence, the correlation between the resulting estimates should be lower if the question about own risk comes first than if the question about comparative risk comes first. This prediction was tested using a student sample (N=68). Participants answered the two types of question in sequence, with order of presentation being counterbalanced. Results were in accord with the prediction. Possible reasons are advanced for individuals' answering questions about comparative risk as if the questions concerned their own risk.     

Care For Pastors: Learning From Clergy and Their Spouses

Pastors and their spouses face unique challenges because of the nature of pastoral work, and yet most manage these challenges successfully. Five studies are presented which help distinguish between intrapersonal, family, and community forms of care. Pastors rely heavily on intrapersonal forms of coping such as spiritual devotion, hobbies, exercise, and taking time away from work. The marriage relationship is also quite important for most clergy and spouses. Relationships outside the immediate family are not commonly identified as coping resources. Implications are discussed.     

Effective leadership in salient groups: revisiting leader-member exchange theory from the perspective of the social identity theory of leadership

Two studies compared leader-member exchange (LMX) theory and the social identity theory of leadership. Study 1 surveyed 439 employees of organizations in Wales, measuring work group salience, leader-member relations, and perceived leadership effectiveness. Study 2 surveyed 128 members of organizations in India, measuring identification not salience and also individualism/collectivism. Both studies provided good support for social identity predictions. Depersonalized leader-member relations were associated with greater leadership effectiveness among high-than low-salient groups (Study 1) and among high than low identifiers (Study 2). Personalized leadership effectiveness was less affected by salience (Study 1) and unaffected by identification (Study 2). Low-salience groups preferred personalized leadership more than did high-salience groups (Study 1). Low identifiers showed no preference but high identifiers preferred depersonalized leadership (Study 2). In Study 2, collectivists did not prefer depersonalized as opposed to personalized leadership, whereas individualists did, probably because collectivists focus more on the relational self.     

Normative data for semantically associated Spanish word lists that create false memories

The present study provides norms for Spanish word lists that have been used to create false memories in native speakers of Spanish. The word lists reported are based on the Roediger and McDermott (1995) lists that have been used extensively to examine illusory memories. We employed Roediger and McDermott’s critical lures, translated them into Spanish, and created semantically associated Spanish word lists by testing native Spanish speakers. The resulting lists were then normed with additional native Spanish speakers. Overall, the participants recalled 53% of the list items and 32% of the critical lures with the word lists developed. In addition, 74% of the list items and 69% of the critical lures were recognized by the participants. The present study adds to the literature by providing a set of Spanish lists that can be used by researchers interested in evaluating false memories in individuals who speak Spanish. These norms may be downloaded from www.psychonomic.org/archive.     

Why does visual working memory ability improve with age: More objects,more feature detail,or both? A registered report

We investigated how visual working memory (WM) develops with age across the early elementary school period (6–7 years), early adolescence (11–13 years), and early adulthood (18–25 years). The work focuses on changes in two parameters: the number of objects retained at least in part, and the amount of feature-detail remembered for such objects. Some evidence suggests that, while infants can remember up to three objects, much like adults, young children only remember around two objects. This curious, nonmonotonic trajectory might be explained by differences in the level of feature-detail required for successful performance in infant versus child/adult memory paradigms. Here, we examined if changes in one of two parameters (the number of objects, and the amount of detail retained for each object) or both of them together can explain the development of visual WM ability as children grow older. To test it, we varied the amount of feature-detail participants need to retain. In the baseline condition, participants saw an array of objects and simply were to indicate whether an object was present in a probed location or not. This phase begun with a titration procedure to adjust each individual's array size to yield about 80% correct. In other conditions, we tested memory of not only location but also additional features of the objects (color, and sometimes also orientation). Our results suggest that capacity growth across ages is expressed by both improved location-memory (whether there was an object in a location) and feature completeness of object representations.     

Discourse after Closed Head Injury in Young Children

This study examined narrative discourse in 23 children, ages 6 to 8 years, who sustained a severe closed head injury (CHI) at least 1 year prior to assessment. Narratives were analyzed at multiple levels using language and information structure measures. Results revealed significant discourse impairments in the CHI group on all measures of information structure, whereas differences in the linguistic domain failed to reach significance. In addition, effects of age at injury and lateralization of lesion on discourse were considered. Although no significant differences were found according to age at injury, a consistent pattern of generally poorer discourse scores was found for the early injured group (<5 years). With regard to lesion focus, the group findings were unimpressive. However, preliminary examination of individual CHI cases with relatively large lateralized lesions suggested that the late injured children may show the language–brain patterns reported in brain-injured adults, whereas early injured children may not.     

Maya Women, Gender Dynamics, and Modes of Production

This paper provides a perspective on theconnection between the roles performed by Yucatec Mayawomen and global economic trends, particularly thosefocused on the increase of migration and incorporation of women into wage-labor employment. Theanalysis is founded on the gender dynamics in the MayaYucatec society. The fieldwork sites for this study werethe Maya village of Chan Kom and the developing resort area of Cancun. The discussion centerssocioeconomic and ideological implications of theresponses of Maya women to the increasingly complexexpansion of global capitalism and its acceleratingvolatility. Maya women, associated with the domestic andprivate realm, are also believed to serve as guardiansof tradition. Maya women who migrate, leaving theirvillages, face a social and economic challenge. The discussion frame of this studyleads to arevision of the anthropological agendas traditionallypresented in Chan Kom's ethnographic record. Assumptionsabout power and authority have misrepresented women as part of the labor force in the Mayaproductive system. The tension between peasant andmigrant Maya roles and world-wide economic trends isforging a negotiated space for Yucatec Mayawomen.     

Solving problems by analogy: The benefits and detriments of hints and depressed moods

In Experiment 1, mildly depressed (dysphoric) and nondysphoric subjects tried to solve logic problems that were analogous to subsequent target problems; then they attempted target solutions with or without hints in the form of the anologues’ themes. Target solutions were impaired by the hints in the nondysphoric group alone. Experiment 2A was a no-training control to verify that transfer did indeed occur. In Experiment 2B, all subjects received hints in the transfer phase; the training phase was either problem oriented (as in Experiment 1) or memory oriented. Again, nondysphoric subjects solved fewer problems following problem-oriented training than did both dysphoric subjects in that condition and nondysphoric subjects with memory-oriented training. Experiment 3 replicated the previous results in the nondysphoric samples. We interpret these findings within the transferappropriate processing framework.