Exposure to Scientific Explanations for Gender Differences Influences Individuals’ Personal Theories of Gender and Their Evaluations of a Discriminatory Situation

Sex Roles - Gender lay theory is a framework of information interpretation related to gender categorisation and can be divided into two general forms: gender essentialism versus gender as socially...     

Postnatal trajectories of maternal depressive symptoms: Postpartum antecedents and differences in toddler adjustment

Infants are uniquely vulnerable to maternal depression's noxious effects, but few longitudinal studies have tried to identify discrete postnatal trajectories of maternal depressive symptoms (MDS) beginning in infancy. This study extends evidence of heterogeneous change in postnatal MDS by examining their cross-contextual antecedents in infancy and their consequences for children's early behavior problems and language skills in late toddlerhood. A community sample of mother–child dyads (N = 235, 72% Caucasian) was assessed when children were 7, 15, and 33 months old. Mothers reported their socioeconomic status (SES), social support, marital relationship quality, family dysfunction, parenting stress, and infants’ functional regulatory problems at 7 months postpartum, and children's internalizing and externalizing symptoms at 33 months. Children completed a receptive vocabulary assessment at 33 months in the lab. Latent class growth analysis identified three postnatal MDS trajectory classes that fit the data best: low-decreasing, moderate, and increasing. Psychosocial measures at seven months postpartum primarily predicted membership to these postnatal trajectory classes, which subsequently differed in children's internalizing, externalizing, and receptive vocabulary in late toddlerhood, controlling for family SES and functional regulatory problems in infancy. We discuss salient antecedents and consequences of postnatal depression for mothers and their offspring.     

Das Symptom Schwindel im Fokus der Psychiatrie

Das Symptom Schwindel wird in der klinischen Praxis organisch meist regelrecht durch die zuständige Fachrichtung abgeklärt. Ein möglicher psychiatrischer Impact im Symptom Schwindel wird oft übersehen und somit vernachlässigt. Die Folge ist ein Persistieren und Chronifizieren einer Symptomatik, die unter dem Namen phobischer Schwindel bekannt ist. Neuere Begriffe wie die somatische Symptomstörung des DSM‑5 und der heute stigmatisierende Begriff des somatoformen Schwindels werden in diesem Fallbericht klinisch und theoretisch umrissen. Sofern der phobische Schwindel richtig diagnostiziert wird, kann im Rahmen eines Gesamtbehandlungsplanes unter Einbeziehen von Physiotherapie, dem Erlernen von Angstbewältigungsstrategien und adäquater Aufklärung und Information des Betroffenen konkret an Beschwerden gearbeitet werden. Voraussetzung dafür ist ein interdisziplinäres Denken beim behandelnden Arzt. Im Fallbericht geht es um einen älteren Patienten, der neben schwerwiegenden körperlichen Ursachen für Schwindelsymptome letztlich einen phobischen Schwindel bietet, der nach der richtigen Diagnosestellung umfassend behandelt werden kann.     

Consumer engagement on social media: Evidence from small retailers

This study investigates which characteristics of the social media posts of small firms in Tasmania, Australia elicit higher levels of consumer engagement. Results from an analysis of small retail firms’ social media postings (Facebook, Instagram and Twitter) (N = 2,607) illustrate the importance of the content of the post (i.e., businesses‐related vs. non‐business‐related), the activity (i.e., text, image or video), the time of day of the posting and the platform on which the activity was posted, in eliciting responses from followers. Results show Facebook received significantly higher levels of engagement, compared with Twitter and Instagram. Contrary to expectations, the specific day of the week did not have any impact on levels of engagement. This research demonstrates how small businesses can improve their use of social media marketing to engage more effectively with customers and followers.     

Resistance and outcome expectations in cognitive‐behavioural therapy for generalised anxiety disorder

Greater client resistance has been consistently found to be negatively associated with outcome in psychotherapy. However, the pathways through which resistance impacts such outcomes are underexplored. Given that client outcome expectation (OE) has been identified as an important common factor in psychotherapy, the goals of the present study were to examine: (a) the impact of resistance on subsequent client and therapist OE (COE & TOE, respectively); and (b) whether COE and/or TOE mediate the relationship between resistance and outcome. These relationships were tested among 44 clients with severe generalised anxiety disorder treated with cognitive‐behavioural therapy in the context of a randomised controlled trial (Westra, Constantino, & Antony, 2016). Resistance was measured at a mid‐treatment session, and COE and TOE were assessed at baseline and immediately after the resistance session. Treatment outcome was measured via client‐rated worry severity at post‐treatment. As predicted, higher resistance was associated with lower subsequent COE and TOE; B = ?.73, p < .001 and B = ?.46, p < .001, respectively. In turn, lower post‐resistance COE predicted higher post‐treatment worry (B = ?.5, p < .001), indicating mediation. In contrast, TOE did not mediate the relationship between resistance and outcome (B = ?.02, p = .876). These results suggest that resistance can be demoralising to both clients and therapists. However, only lower client morale may be detrimental to therapy outcome. This study contributes to understanding outcome pathways through two common therapy processes.     

Where and when to look: Sequential effects at the millisecond level

Attention, Perception, & Psychophysics - Learning and imitating a complex motor action requires to visually follow complex movements, but conscious perception seems too slow for such tasks....     

The assessment of individual “Aggressiveness” in pigeons by a variety of means

Pigeons attack or threaten animate and inanimate targets. The assessment of their aggressiveness was studied by exposing them in their home cages to three different stimuli: the experimenter's hand, a live pigeon, and a rear-projected conspecific image when the birds were exposed to intermittent access to food. A positive correlation between the hand test and live pigeon test was evident, but no relationship between either of these responses and the response to a pictorial image was observed. These results combined with other ethological observations cast doubts on the usefulness of schedule-induced responses to pictorial targets in the assessment of the individual aggressiveness in pigeons, but suggest that the hand test is an adequate and reliable procedure for such evaluations.     

The relation between hiding skill and judgment of eye direction in preschool children

This study examines J. H. Flavell, S. G. Shipstead, and K. Croft's (1978) finding that 2 1/2-year-old children can hide an object behind a screen but cannot achieve the same result by placing the screen in front of the object. Experiment 1 replicated this finding alongside a task in which children judged what a person in a picture was looking at. Performance on the move-object task approached ceiling; performances on the move-screen and looking-where tasks were highly correlated even after age and control task performance were partialed out (r = .54, p < .01). Experiment 2 examined whether the finding resulted because the object was more interesting to manipulate than the screen. The move-object task remained easier than the move-screen task with an interesting screen and a dull object. The move-screen task again correlated specifically with the looking-where task. Results are explained in terms of engagement, a precursor to a mature understanding of attention.     

Specifying the impulsivity of female inmates with borderline personality disorder

Impulsivity is regarded as a core feature of borderline personality disorder (BPD; M. C. Zanarini, J. G. Gunderson, & F. R. Frankenburg, 1989) despite lack of evidence from laboratory research (D. M. Dougherty, J. M Bjork, H. C. G. Huckabee, F. G. Moeller, & A. C. Swann, 1999). This study examined impulsivity in incarcerated women with BPD using a passive avoidance task (J. P. Newman & W. A. Schmitt, 1998) and the Impulsiveness-Monotony Avoidance-Detachment inventory (IMD; D. Schalling, 1978). As predicted, incarcerated women diagnosed with BPD committed more passive avoidance errors and reported more impulsivity on the IMD than controls. These findings identify disinhibition as a potentially important component of the impulsivity that characterizes BPD. Specifying the impulsive behavior identified with BPD may contribute to the effective assessment and management of the disorder.