A Systematic Review of the Biopsychosocial–Spiritual Health of Active Duty Women

Women make up approximately 15% of today’s active duty (AD) military. Not only are more women volunteering for military service now than ever before in America’s history, but due to recent policy changes, they are also allowed to apply for more jobs. Therefore, since the number of women in the military is continuing to rise and there are more job opportunities for women in the military, it is important to understand the unique health effects they experience that differ from civilian women and AD males. Although there is current literature on the biological, psychological, social, and spiritual health of veteran women, few researchers have explored the biopsychosocial–spiritual effects of military service on AD women. Thus, the purpose of this systematic review was to explore the existing research on the biopsychosocial–spiritual health factors associated with military service in AD women. The results of this study indicated that there is more data on the biological health compared to the psychological and social health of AD women. There is even less research demonstrating the interconnectedness among biological, psychological, social, and spiritual health with AD women. Future research recommendations and policy implications are provided.     

The relative importance of psychopathy-related traits in predicting impersonal sex and hostile masculinity

This paper reports the relative contributions of several facets of subclinical psychopathy (i.e., callous affect, erratic lifestyle, interpersonal manipulation), subclinical narcissism (i.e., entitlement, exploitation), and trait aggression (i.e., anger) to the prediction of four enduring attitudes towards women and sexual assault (i.e., hostility towards women, negative attitudes regarding women, sexual dominance, impersonal sex) and a behavioral indicator of an impersonal sexual behavior (i.e., number of one-night stands). Survey data were collected from 470 single men living in the Detroit Metropolitan area. The importance of personality traits varied as a function of the outcome with anger most predictive of hostility toward women; erratic lifestyle most predictive of impersonal sexual attitudes and behavior, and entitlement most predictive of sexual dominance and negative attitudes toward women. These outcome-specific findings are interpreted and directions for future research are discussed.     

Psicobiología del síndrome de Down

Resumen

En este artículo revisamos los conocimientos que existen en la actualidad sobre el síndrome de Down, atendiendo a todos aquellos aspectos que, por su relevancia, facilitan una mejor comprensión de esta cromosomopatía. Después de una breve reseña histórica, y tras definir lo que se entiende por síndrome de Down, pasamos a ocuparnos de la alteración genética que lo determina, así como de los factores que parecen estar relacionados con su origen. A continuación estudiamos las alteraciones específicas que acompañan a este síndrome, considerando principalmente los aspectos morfológicos externos, el problema de la hipotonía muscular y otros trastornos biomédicos, el retraso mental y las diversas anomalías neuroanatómicas y neurofisiológicas que presentan los sujetos afectados. Por último, indicamos las nuevas perspectivas que se abren en el estudio de esta alteración genética.     

Influences of appearance-behaviour congruity on memory and social judgements

Prior work shows that appearance-behaviour congruity impacts memory and evaluations. Building upon prior work, we assessed influences of appearance-behaviour congruity on source memory and judgement strength to illustrate ways congruity effects permeate social cognition. We paired faces varying on trustworthiness with valenced behaviours to create congruent and incongruent face-behaviour pairs. Young and older adults remembered congruent pairs better than incongruent, but both were remembered better than pairs with faces rated average in appearance. This suggests that multiple, even conflicting, valenced cues improve memory over receiving fewer cues. Consistent with our manipulation of facial trustworthiness, congruity effects were present in the strength of trustworthiness-related but not dominance judgements. Subtle age differences emerged in congruity effects when learning about others, with older adults showing effects for approach judgements given both high and low arousal behaviours. Young adults had congruity effects for approach, prosociality and trustworthiness judgements, given high arousal behaviours only. These findings deepen our understanding of how appearance-behaviour congruity impacts memory for and evaluations of others.     

Directed remembering: Subliminal cues alter nonconscious memory strategies

Much research on memory function has focused on changes in recognition performance brought about by differences in the processes engaged during encoding. In most of this work, participants either receive explicit instructions to remember particular items or they perform orienting (i.e., encoding) tasks that support different levels of memory performance. In daily life, however, the retention or dismissal of information often occurs without conscious intent, thereby suggesting an alternative, nonconscious route through which purposive remembering and forgetting can occur. Based on this line of reasoning, we speculated that recognition performance in a standard item-based forgetting paradigm may be moderated by subliminal cues that trigger the automatic activation of different mnemonic strategies. We report the results of two experiments that supported this prediction. In each experiment, the basic item-based forgetting effect was replicated, but via the subliminal presentation of “remember” and “forget” cues. In addition, cue-dependent differences in memory performance were traced to the operation of a covert rehearsal mechanism during encoding. We consider the implications of these findings for the non-conscious operation of memory processes in everyday life.     

Testing the Impact of a Computer Guide on Visitor Learning Behaviors at an Interactive Exhibit

ABSTRACT

There is a recognized need to rigorously examine the efficacy of approaches to supporting informal learning. In this study, we used a 2 × 2 factorial experimental design to test the impact of a computer guide on 3 proximal measures of visitor learning at an interactive math exhibit. In total, 128 families were systematically assigned to engage with the exhibit either with or without access to a supplementary computer kiosk. Visitor groups with access to the computer spent longer, on average, at the exhibit and engaged in more mathematical behaviors compared to other groups. However, based on interviews, visitors with access to the computer were less likely to fully articulate the mathematical relations in the exhibit. These results suggest that although computer guides are a promising approach to supporting visitor engagement, they may, unless carefully designed, undermine other learning outcomes.     

Meaning is in the beholder’s eye: Morpho-semantic effects in masked priming

A substantial body of literature indicates that, at least at some level of processing, complex words are broken down into their morphemes solely on the basis of their orthographic form (e.g., Rastle, Davis, & New, Psychonomic Bulletin and Review 11:1090–1098, 2004). Recent evidence has shown that this process might not be obligatory, as indicated by the fact that morpho-orthographic effects were not found in a cross-case same–different task—that is, when lexical access was not necessarily required (Duñabeitia, Kinoshita, Carreiras, & Norris, Language and Cognitive Processes 26:509–529, 2011). In this study, we employed a task that required understanding a series of words and, thus, implied lexical access. Masked primes were shown very briefly right before the appearance of the target word; prime–target pairs entertained a morpho-semantic (dealer–DEAL), a morpho-orthographic (corner–CORN), or a purely orthographic (brothel–BROTH) relationship. Eye fixation times clearly indicated facilitation for transparent pairs, but not for opaque pairs (or for orthographic pairs, which were used as a baseline). Conversely, the usual morpho-orthographic pattern was found in a control experiment, employing a lexical decision task. These results indicate that the access to a morpho-orthographic level of representation is not always necessary for lexical identification, which challenges models of visual word identification that cannot account for task-induced effects.     

Physical education and fostering relationships

Rather than presenting an academic paper, I wanted to simply examine my own perspective as a physical educator and classroom teacher and the importance of creating relationships with children. As a relatively new physical educator and recent Masters of Education graduate of the University of Toronto at OISE, but experienced classroom teacher working in a Toronto public school, spirituality at first appeared to be the farthest thing that affected both my life and the life of my classes. During the last two years, I became increasingly aware of the connection between physical education and feelings of enthusiasm and perseverance that have helped my students to see themselves in positive ways. The relationship developed between teacher and student had been apparent to me but I had not realised how important until I began graduate school and reflecting on both my classroom practice and how it had extended into the gymnasium. I often thought that physical education teachers tended to focus on the physical aspects and skills, but instead I found that it was indeed making a shared connection with my students through the various physical and everyday activities as of the highest importance. The shared connections encourage feelings of perseverance, and fit together between mind, body and spirit, which also encouraged active participation and success. What I had suspected to be true for the classroom really was true anywhere in the school community. My experiences as a physical educator and classroom teacher helped me create positive learning environments for children as they struggled with academic and physical activities. With this paper, I am asking academics to help teachers such as myself to understand the correlation to something we as teachers take for granted as part of our everyday teacher–student relationship.     

The simple man: The consumption behavior of the principled life

In this study, we analyze the Simple Man, a label for those men who have above-average means in education, household income, or net worth but who consume inconspicuously and modestly below their means. We interviewed 27 men in the Northwest, Midwest, Southeast and Northeast regions of the United States and found that these men have highly individualistic identities and backgrounds yet appear to stray from products that separate them from others. These men also seem to have reached a level of contentment, not needing products or material possessions to achieve fulfillment, status, or a particular masculine identity. These men have practical and durable tastes that reflect low cultural capital (LCC) consumption but have the means and education in many instances to engage in high cultural capital (HCC) consumption. The men in this study adamantly proclaim that they do not define themselves by what they own nor do they appear to define themselves primarily by what they do, at least in terms of occupation. In short, these men appear complex in many ways yet live simple lives, or what might be termed complex simplicity. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Reliable misrepresentation and tracking theories of mental representation

It is a live possibility that certain of our experiences reliably misrepresent the world around us. I argue that tracking theories of mental representation (e.g. those of Dretske, Fodor, and Millikan) have difficulty allowing for this possibility, and that this is a major consideration against them.