They should have known: Hindsight and outcome biases in child abduction cases

Two cognitive biases might partially account for public support of the ineffective AMBER Alert system. Hindsight bias is a cognitive error in which people with outcome knowledge overestimate the likelihood that this particular outcome would occur; outcome bias is an error made in evaluating the quality of a decision once the outcome is known. Two experiments assessed whether hindsight and outcome bias occur in child abduction scenarios. Study 1 was a pre/posttest experiment that examined whether hindsight bias occurs in situations in which the identity of the abductor (stranger or parent) is manipulated between groups, and all participants are told the child was killed. Study 2, a between-subjects experiment, examined whether hindsight and outcome biases occur in situations in which no AMBER Alert was issued (because the situation did not meet the legal requirements to issue an Alert), and manipulated the identity of the abductor and the outcome (child safely returned, killed, or not outcome provided). Hindsight and outcome biases occurred in both studies, given the correct set of circumstances. Abductor identity also impacted outcome estimates. Results from the two studies indicate that hindsight and outcome bias occur, but this is dependent on the outcome (child killed, child returned safely, no outcome provided) and the identity of the abductor (stranger, dangerous parent, non-dangerous parent). Limitations and future directions are discussed.     

Testing the Deterrent Effects of Personal and Vicarious Experience with Punishment and Punishment Avoidance

This paper reviews the current literature concerning social control in the U.S. Army with special emphasis upon the convergence/divergence debate now guiding much of the legal and sociological conceptualizing in this research. Emphasizing the weaknesses in this literature, a new socio‐legal conceptual model based upon the work of Weber (1921/1978), Rustad (1982), Nonet and Selznick (1978) as well as classical military source material is then proposed as an alternative to the current debate in the literature.     

The sad, the angry, and the asymmetrical brain: dichotic listening studies of negative affect and depression

Dichotic Listening (DL) is a valuable tool to study emotional brain lateralization. Regarding the perception of sadness and anger through affective prosody, the main finding has been a left ear advantage (LEA) for the sad but contradictory data for the anger prosody. Regarding an induced mood in the laboratory, its consequences upon DL were a diminished right ear advantage (REA) for the induction of sadness and an increased REA for the induction of anger. The global results fit with the approach-withdrawal motivational model of emotional processing, pointing to sadness as a right hemisphere emotion but anger processed bilaterally or even in the left hemisphere, depending on the subject's preferred mode of expression. On the other hand, the study of DL in clinically depressed patients found an abnormally larger REA in verbal DL tasks which was predictive of therapeutic pharmacological response. However, the mobilization of the available left hemisphere resources in these responders (reflected in a higher REA) would indicate a remission of the episode but would not assure the absence of new relapses.     

A call for integrating a mental health perspective into systems of care for abused and neglected infants and young children

A system of care for abused and neglected infants and young children should adopt a comprehensive perspective, with mental health considerations systematically incorporated into policies and decisions affecting children and their families. Children age birth to 5 years have disproportionately high rates of maltreatment, with long-term consequences for their mental and physical health. Research on normal development and developmental psychopathology has shown that early development unfolds in an ecology of transactional influences among biological, interpersonal, and environmental domains. Psychologists should collaborate with other early intervention disciplines to create systems of care based on an ecological-transactional model of development that includes early mental health principles in order to serve the needs of these young children. Didactic courses, practicums, and internships in infant and early childhood mental health should become integral components of undergraduate and graduate curricula in psychology in order to build capacity to achieve this goal. Recommendations are offered for systemic change by integrating infant and early childhood mental health principles into existing systems of care for young children and their families.     

The impact of cortisol reactivity to acute stress on memory: sex differences in middle-aged people

Stress has been identified as a main factor involved in the cognitive changes that occur during the aging process. This study investigated sex differences in the relationship between the magnitude of the acute stress-induced salivary cortisol response and memory performance among middle-aged people. To this end, 16 men and 16 women (aged 54-72 years) were exposed to the Trier Social Stress Test and a control condition in a crossover design. Afterwards their memory performance was measured using a standardized memory test (Rey's Auditory Verbal Learning Test). Only among women, there was an acute impact of stress on memory performance and a significant relationship between a higher cortisol response to the stressor and poorer memory performance in both the stress and control conditions. Additionally, a poorer memory performance was related to earlier timing of sexual maturation (age at menarche), which was also marginally related to higher cortisol reactivity to stress. These results confirm that sex is a critical factor in the relationship between cortisol and poor memory performance. Furthermore, the findings emphasize a strong link between the individual cortisol response to stress and memory functioning among postmenopausal women.     

Body Dissatisfaction and Disordered Eating in Three Cultures: Argentina, Brazil, and the U.S.

Body dissatisfaction and associated attitudes were studied in 18–24?years old women from universities in Rosario, Santa Fe, Argentina (N?=?118), Jo?o Pessoa, Paraíba, Brazil (N?=?81), and mid-Atlantic U.S. (N?=?102). Based on anecdotal reports, theoretical concerns, and empirical studies, we expected greater body dissatisfaction and negative body attitudes in our Argentine and Brazilian samples than in the U.S. sample. Body dissatisfaction was a significant problem in all samples, but we found few differences in levels of body dissatisfaction. The Argentine and Brazilian samples scored lower than the U.S. sample on measures associated with disordered eating, experienced less pressure to be thin, and were less likely to internalize the thin body ideal. Body shame was highest in the Brazilian sample and lowest in the Argentine sample. Cultural features in Argentina and Brazil that may offer some level of protection against the thin body ideal were discussed.     

Decision making cognition in primary progressive aphasia

We sought to investigate the decision making profile of Primary Progressive Aphasia (PPA) by assessing patients diagnosed with this disease (n = 10), patients diagnosed with behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD, n = 35), and matched controls (n = 14) using the Iowa Gambling Task, a widely used test that mimics real-life decision making. Participants were also evaluated with a complete neuropsychological battery. Patients with PPA were unable to adopt an advantageous strategy on the IGT, which resulted in a flat performance, different to that exhibited by both controls (who showed advantageous decision making) and bvFTD patients (who showed risk-appetitive behavior). The decision making profile of PPA patients was not associated with performance on language tasks and did not differ between sub-variants of the disease (namely, semantic dementia and progressive nonfluent aphasia). Investigating decision making in PPA is crucial both from a theoretical perspective, as it can shed light about the way in which language interacts with other cognitive functions, as well as a clinical standpoint, as it could lead to a more objective detection of impairments of decision making deficits in this condition.     

The 2 × 2 Model of Goal Orientation and Burnout: The Role of Approach–Avoidance Dimensions in Predicting Burnout

Burnout is typically viewed as resulting from situational factors (e.g., workload). However, as burnout is partly a reaction to frustrated goal striving, dispositional goal orientation may also be important. We used Hobfoll's ( 1989 ) conservation of resources model to develop hypotheses for relationships between goal orientation and 3 dimensions of burnout. Self‐report questionnaire measures of the 2 × 2 model of goal orientation (Elliot & McGregor, 2001 ) and burnout were administered to undergraduate students. Structural equation modeling revealed that all 4 dimensions of goal orientation were related to burnout. Avoidance‐related dimensions were positively associated and approach‐related dimensions were negatively associated with burnout. The findings suggest the importance of considering the role of motivational dispositions in development, prediction, and prevention of burnout.