Reinforcement sensitivity of sex offenders and non‐offenders: An experimental and psychometric study of reinforcement sensitivity theory

This study tested predictions of Gray's Reinforcement Sensitivity Theory (RST) in subgroups of sex offenders and male non‐offenders using an experimental choice task consisting of a reward and a non‐reward phase. In addition, RST‐related psychometric measures were used. Both experimental and psychometric data were of interest to determine whether sex offenders could be reliably differentiated from non‐offenders. Paraphilic (N=50) and impulse control‐disordered (N=48) sex offenders showed greater sensitivity to continuous reward than male non‐offenders (N=51). Impulse control‐disordered sex offenders showed less behavioural adaptation under non‐reward than both paraphilic sex offenders and male non‐offenders. In addition, reward sensitivity, rash‐spontaneous impulsivity, and anxiety measures discriminated sex offenders from male non‐offenders. The results suggest that reinforcement sensitivity is a promising personality trait for differentiating subgroups of sex offenders from non‐offenders. The experimental and psychometric results illustrate that predictive accuracy in forensic settings could be improved by combining several types of data.     

Visual homing in the absence of feature-based landmark information

Despite that fact that landmarks play a prominent role in human navigation, experimental evidence on how landmarks are selected and defined by human navigators remains elusive. Indeed, the concept of a ‘landmark’ is itself not entirely clear. In everyday language, the term landmark refers to salient, distinguishable, and usually nameable objects, rendering the problem of landmark recognition a special case of the general object recognition problem. In contrast, in the insect and robot literature, this notion of landmarks is often replaced by the “local position information” [e.g., Trullier, O., Wiener, S., Berthoz, A., &; Meyer, J.-A. (1997). Biologically based artificial navigation systems: Review and prospects. Progress in Neurobiology, 51, 483–544], referring to the entire set of sensor readings obtained at one location. This set may then serve as a characteristic of the particular location. Honey bees have been shown to base place recognition and homing on a snapshot-like memory of the place’s visual environment, not on the distances to recognized objects [Cartwright, B., &; Collett, T. (1983). Landmark learning in bees. Experiments and models. Journal of Comparative Physiology A, 151, 521–543]. A number of theoretical models of snapshot-based homing [e.g., Franz, M., Schölkopf, B., Mallot, H. A., Bülthoff, H. H. (1998). Where did I take that snapshot? Scene-based homing by image matching. Biological Cybernetics, 79, 191–202; Vardy, A., &; Möller, R. (2005). Biologically plausible visual homing methods based on optical flow techniques. Connection Science, 17, 47–89] predict that the accuracy of snapshot-based homing should depend on image contrast. For rodent hippocampal place fields, models have been developed using additional image information such as three-dimensional depth and allocentric orientations (e.g., room axes) and are thus less sensitive to image contrast and noise [e.g. Barry, C., Lever, C., Hayman, R., Hartley, T., Burton, S., O’Keefe, J., et al. (2006). The boundary vector cell model of place cell firing and spatial memory. Reviews in the Neurosciences, 17, 71–79]. Here, we study human visual homing in a virtual environment void of objects and readily detected image features. The environment was a circular room with a homogenous colour gradient covering the wall and uniform floor and ceiling. Subjects were able to approach remembered places. Accuracy decreased with colour gradient modulation and room size, in qualitative agreement with the snapshot model but not with other models of place recognition. We conclude that human memory for places can make use of a snapshot algorithm.     

The relationship of maternal mentalization and executive functioning to maternal recognition of infant cues and bonding

The study examined associations between maternal mentalization ability, executive functioning, recognition of infant cues, and bonding in a non‐clinical sample of mothers. It employed a correlational design. Sixty‐four mothers of young infants completed assessments of mentalization ability, executive functioning, and bonding. Photographs of infant facial expressions were utilized to assess ability to recognize infant cues of emotion, but this was not found to correlate with either maternal mentalization or executive functioning ability. Whilst a trend towards a significant positive relationship between mothers' cued ability to attribute mental states and their ability to recognize infant facial expressions was observed, no significant relationships were found between bonding scores and performance on the executive functioning and mentalization measures. The present study contributes to our current understanding of the influence of maternal cognitive factors, specifically mentalization and executive functioning, on the development of the mother–infant relationship. Future research, methodological issues, and clinical and theoretical implications are discussed.     

Modular Treatment for Children and Adolescents With Problematic School Absenteeism: Development and Description of a Program in Germany

Problematic school absenteeism is defined as absence from school occurring with a clinical-level mental disorder. It represents a higher-order term for school refusal, school truancy, and the combination thereof and is associated with an increased risk for school dropout, prolonged mental disorders, and unemployment. This article describes the manualized modular treatment of problematic school absenteeism (MT) by a multiprofessional team. The manual was developed to target a broad spectrum of mental disorders characterized by internalizing but also externalizing behavior. The therapeutic focus is on the reintegration into school and on the cognitive behavioral treatment of the mental disorder. The MT is based on a multilevel model of problematic school absenteeism. The treatment is informed by an extensive case-conceptualization and addresses motivational aspects by offering a low-threshold therapeutic design and motivational interviewing. Core interventions are represented in four modules: cognitive behavioral therapy, family counseling, school counseling, and a psychoeducational physical exercise program. A case vignette provides an illustration of the treatment and the specific graduated approach for school reintegration. The current modular approach is discussed in relation to other cognitive-behavioral manuals targeting a broad spectrum of mental disorders or school refusal.     

Children's and Parents’ Well‐Being in Joint Physical Custody: A Literature Review

Joint physical custody (JPC), a parental care arrangement in which a child lives with each parent for at least 25–50% of the time after separation or divorce, is increasingly common in many Western societies. This is a major shift from the standard of sole physical custody, with mostly mothers providing primary childcare after a parental separation or divorce. The increasing share of separated or divorced parents who practice JPC, which in some countries, US states, and regions reaches 30% and more, results from increasing gender equality due to mothers participating considerably in the labor force and fathers being actively involved in their children's daily lives. This review focuses on the effects of JPC on children's and parents’ well‐being, based on 40 studies from North America, Australia, and Europe published between 2007 and 2018. In sum, there is empirical evidence from different countries that suggests that JPC arrangements can have positive effects on the well‐being of children and of parents. However, the existing studies are conceptually, methodologically, and contextually very heterogeneous. In addition, self‐selected highly educated parents with a high socio‐economic status, a low conflict level, and children between the ages of 6–15 practicing JPC dominate the samples. Thus, the risks and benefits of JPC are not clear yet and are heavily debated by advocates and academics. The review concludes with suggestions for future research.     

Should supervisors communicate goals or visions? The moderating role of subordinates' psychological distance

There is an ongoing debate about how supervisors should communicate desired end‐states to subordinates, that is, whether they should set concrete goals (according to goal setting theory) or communicate abstract visions (according to transformational leadership theory). In this paper, we draw on construal level theory (CLT) to reconcile both views and develop a model of when supervisors communicating concrete goals versus abstract visions are seen as more effective. According to CLT, being psychologically removed from (vs. near to) an event or object makes people construe the event or object in a more abstract (vs. concrete) way, which, in turn, leads people to process abstract (vs. concrete) information more fluently and thus evaluate the sender of this information more favorably. Accordingly, supervisor effectiveness may be higher in conditions where communication and psychological distance to the supervisor converge (vision/far and goals/close) rather than diverge (vision/close and goals/far). We tested this hypothesis in two experiments, using different operationalizations of psychological distance. In these studies, we found supervisor effectiveness to be higher when vision was communicated at a far versus near distance and goals were communicated at a near versus far distance.     

Revisiting Ego Depletion: Moderators and Measurement

We developed and validated two web-based tasks to induce and measure ego depletion in two online experiments (N?=?122 and N?=?788). Ego depletion describes the phenomenon that exerting self-control temporarily reduces people’s capacity to subsequently control themselves. To induce ego depletion, we adapted the e-crossing task, and to measure ego depletion, we adapted the color Stroop task. We successfully induced ego depletion. Participants’ implicit theories about willpower as well as their mood moderated ego depletion. We also discuss several methodological issues and compare different approaches of measuring ego depletion using aggregated reaction times.     

The influence of information redundancy on probabilistic inferences

Information redundancy affects the accuracy of inference strategies. A simulation study illustrates that under high-information redundancy simple heuristics that rely on only the most important information are as accurate as strategies that integrate all available information, whereas under low redundancy integrating information becomes advantageous. Assuming that people exercise adaptive strategy selection, it is predicted that their inferences will more often be captured by simple heuristics that focus on part of the available information insituations ofhigh-information redundancy, especially when information search is costly. This prediction is confirmed in two experiments. The participants' task was to repeatedly infer which of two alternatives, described by several cues, had a higher criterion value. In the first experiment, simple heuristics predicted the inference process better under high-information redundancy than under low-information redundancy. In the second experiment, this result could be generalized to an inference situation in which participants had no prior opportunity to learn about the strategies' accuracies through outcome feedback. The results demonstrate that people are able to respond adaptively to different decision environments under various learning opportunities.     

An Examination of the Psychometric Properties and Factor Structure of the Feelings of Stigmatization Questionnaire

As the experience of stigma and its psychological dimensions require careful measurement, the purpose of this study was to examine the psychometric properties and factor structure of the Feelings of Stigmatization Questionnaire (FSQ). A total of 170 participants with psoriasis and 124 with atopic dermatitis (AD) completed the FSQ. AD participants self-rated AD severity, while psoriasis severity was determined by a clinician. Confirmatory (CFA) and exploratory factor analytic (EFA) techniques were used to examine the factor structure of the FSQ. The FSQ total score was not related to age, age at onset, illness duration or psoriasis severity but it was negatively associated with AD severity (r = −.25, p < .01). The original six-factor structure of the FSQ was not replicated in our sample. Using EFA, a fixed three-factor solution proved the most stable, with the dimensions of feeling flawed, anticipation of rejection and secrecy, and positive attitudes towards skin disease being identified.     

High impact running improves learning

Regular physical exercise improves cognitive functions and lowers the risk for age-related cognitive decline. Since little is known about the nature and the timing of the underlying mechanisms, we probed whether exercise also has immediate beneficial effects on cognition. Learning performance was assessed directly after high impact anaerobic sprints, low impact aerobic running, or a period of rest in 27 healthy subjects in a randomized cross-over design. Dependent variables comprised learning speed as well as immediate (1 week) and long-term (>8 months) overall success in acquiring a novel vocabulary. Peripheral levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and catecholamines (dopamine, epinephrine, norepinephrine) were assessed prior to and after the interventions as well as after learning. We found that vocabulary learning was 20 percent faster after intense physical exercise as compared to the other two conditions. This condition also elicited the strongest increases in BDNF and catecholamine levels. More sustained BDNF levels during learning after intense exercise were related to better short-term learning success, whereas absolute dopamine and epinephrine levels were related to better intermediate (dopamine) and long-term (epinephrine) retentions of the novel vocabulary. Thus, BDNF and two of the catecholamines seem to be mediators by which physical exercise improves learning.