Foster Care Youth Share Stories of Trauma Before,During, and After Placement: Youth Voices for Building Trauma-Informed Systems of Care

Many research studies address child trauma experiences that take place before foster care placement. However, few studies focus on the types and patterns of trauma experiences that reportedly take place during and after foster care placement; that is, after entry into adult living. This study examined the testimony of 43 foster care youth who spoke to a listening panel comprised of state legislators, child welfare professionals, and university educators. Qualitative analyses of transcribed text data revealed 3 main themes. First, the youth reported experiencing trauma before, during, and after placement. Second, the youth described trauma events and situations that were chronic (i.e., intense, composite, or cumulative). Third, youth offered suggestions for reducing traumatic experiences for foster care youth. They recommended earlier family interventions, access to people who listen and care, improved parenting skills for foster parents, continuity of relationships, and opportunities for leadership for foster youth. Foster youth voices offer important suggestions for building, strengthening, and evaluating trauma-informed systems of care.     

Strategies for spatial organization in adults and children

People have a tendency to organize space by extracting meaningful shapes from the configuration of elements. However, research on spatial correspondence in children suggests that when configural processing is difficult, individuation of elements may be critical. To begin to address the distinction between the use of configurations and individuation, and changes associated with age, we relied upon perceptual grouping and manipulated the colour of the displays—promoting either extraction of configural information (monochromatic) or individuation of elements (multicoloured). In a layout reproduction task (Experiments 1 and 2), children showed a robust advantage for multicoloured arrays, whereas adults showed an attenuated advantage for monochromatic displays. Visual discrimination in adults (Experiment 3) revealed that the influence of the display type occurs at the level of perception. Taken together, these results suggest that there are (at least) two routes to establishing spatial correspondence in arrays of elements, with differential dependence over development.     

Shame,posttraumatic stress disorder,and intimate partner violence perpetration

Drawing from theoretical and empirical literature linking shame to aggression and violence, the authors propose that shame may be an important variable to examine in studies of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and intimate partner violence (IPV) perpetration. The authors review the literature linking shame, PTSD, and IPV, propose ideas for future research, and suggest that shame and shame regulation may be a useful target of clinical interventions aimed at violence perpetrators.     

The relationship between forgiveness and history of suicide attempt

The sentiment of forgiveness in relationship to suicide attempts/completions has been mostly examined through studies of suicide notes and the experiences of survivors and therapists – not attempters. In a cross-sectional sample of 304 consecutive primary care patients, we examined sentiments about forgiveness using the Forgiveness Scale, comparing those individuals with versus without past suicide attempts. According to findings, individuals with past suicide attempts (N?=?55; 19.1%) evidenced significantly lower composite scores on the Forgiveness Scale. As for individual items, compared to participants without past suicide attempts, those with past suicide attempts were significantly less believing of forgiveness by others, were less likely to forgive themselves, and to a lesser degree, were less forgiving of others. There were no between-group differences with regard to confession of wrongdoing or existential forgiveness by God. Findings may offer some salient avenues of therapeutic inquiry and endeavour in the psychological healing of individuals with past suicide attempts.     

The link between logic,mathematics and imagination: evidence from children with developmental dyscalculia and mathematically gifted children

This study examined performance on transitive inference problems in children with developmental dyscalculia (DD), typically developing controls matched on IQ, working memory and reading skills, and in children with outstanding mathematical abilities. Whereas mainstream approaches currently consider DD as a domain‐specific deficit, we hypothesized that the development of mathematical skills is closely related to the development of logical abilities, a domain‐general skill. In particular, we expected a close link between mathematical skills and the ability to reason independently of one's beliefs. Our results showed that this was indeed the case, with children with DD performing more poorly than controls, and high maths ability children showing outstanding skills in logical reasoning about belief‐laden problems. Nevertheless, all groups performed poorly on structurally equivalent problems with belief‐neutral content. This is in line with suggestions that abstract reasoning skills (i.e. the ability to reason about content without real‐life referents) develops later than the ability to reason about belief‐inconsistent fantasy content.A video abstract of this article can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90DWY3O4xx8     

The Apartment Test: Validity of a Memory Measure

ABSTRACT

The Memory in Reality (MIR) test, or Apartment Test, was designed as an ecologically valid alternative to word list recall measures. Participants name 10 everyday objects, place them in a scale model of an apartment and after a delay with interference, recall the objects and their placement. Two studies are reported. Study 1 included 51 older adult volunteers. Study 2 was a population-based sample of 633 older twins. The Apartment Test Recall and Placement tasks were highly correlated with word list delayed recall. Ecological validity was supported by correlations with informant reports of participants' functioning. Apartment Test Recall was not affected by education. Analysis of Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) showed Apartment Test Recall performed as well as word list delayed recall in distinguishing participants with and without dementia. We conclude that the Apartment Test is a valid measure of verbal memory with evidence of ecological and concurrent validity.     

Rational Action Entails Rational Desire: A Critical Review of Searle's Rationality in Action1

Abstract

In this paper I contest Searle's thesis that desire-independent reasons for action – ‘reasons that are binding on a rational agent, regardless of desires and dispositions in his motivational set’ – are inherent in the concept of rationality. Following Searle's procedure, I first address his argument that altruistic reasons for action inhere in the concept of rationality, and then examine his argument for his more general thesis. I conclude that a viable theory of rational action would be centered, not on the concept of desire-independent reasons, but rather on the concept of rational desire.     

Effects of aging on voluntary and involuntary shifts of attention

Abstract

This experiment examined adult age differences in the speed and accuracy of voluntary and involuntary shifts of visual attention. Younger and older adults performed two spatial cuing tasks using central cues and abrupt onset peripheral cues presented at stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) of 100, 150, 200, 250, and 300 ms. Analyses of the magnitudes of cuing effects revealed a similar time course for younger and older adults in the central cue condition, but not in the peripheral condition. Analyses of the Brinley plot for central cues across cue validity conditions indicated that as much as 93% of the variance could be attributed to age-related general slowing rather than to differential aging of a specific visual orienting mechanism.     

Obtaining guilty knowledge in human intelligence interrogations: Comparing accusatorial and information-gathering approaches with a novel experimental paradigm

Substantial research has assessed interrogations seeking to obtain a criminal confession, and consequently much has been learned regarding the potential problems with confession evidence. However, an increasing focus on counter-terrorism, and therefore intelligence interrogations, reveals an obvious gap in the literature. Intelligence interrogations are primarily focused on collecting information from individuals as opposed to a confession linked to an alleged event, and little of the extant psychological literature can speak directly to such a scenario. The current research developed an experimental paradigm to test interrogation approaches in an intelligence-gathering context, providing a method for gathering empirical data on human intelligence collection. In the first implementation of this paradigm, accusatorial and information-gathering interrogation strategies were tested using a procedure high in psychological realism. Results indicate that an information-gathering approach yields more relevant information than an accusatorial approach and leads to more diagnostic impressions by third party observers.     

Cognitive maps and the hippocampus

Following a familiar route and finding a novel route in a familiar environment depend on different cognitive processes and representations. A recent study by Hartley et al. begins to identity the neural basis of route following and wayfinding in humans. Their study also raises important questions about the functions of the hippocampus.