Examining the Factor Structure of the Self-Compassion Scale in Four Distinct Populations: Is the Use of a Total Scale Score Justified?

This study examined the factor structure of the Self-Compassion Scale (SCS) using a bifactor model, a higher order model, a 6-factor correlated model, a 2-factor correlated model, and a 1-factor model in 4 distinct populations: college undergraduates (N = 222), community adults (N = 1,394), individuals practicing Buddhist meditation (N = 215), and a clinical sample of individuals with a history of recurrent depression (N = 390). The 6-factor correlated model demonstrated the best fit across samples, whereas the 1- and 2-factor models had poor fit. The higher order model also showed relatively poor fit across samples, suggesting it is not representative of the relationship between subscale factors and a general self-compassion factor. The bifactor model, however, had acceptable fit in the student, community, and meditator samples. Although fit was suboptimal in the clinical sample, results suggested an overall self-compassion factor could still be interpreted with some confidence. Moreover, estimates suggested a general self-compassion factor accounted for at least 90% of the reliable variance in SCS scores across samples, and item factor loadings and intercepts were equivalent across samples. Results suggest that a total SCS score can be used as an overall mesure of self-compassion.     

When Gender Stereotypes Get Male Adolescents into Trouble: A Longitudinal Study on Gender Conformity Pressure as a Predictor of School Misconduct

Sex Roles - School misconduct is a threat to educational careers and learning. The present study sheds light on why male adolescents in particular are prone to school misconduct. Qualitative...     

Task set determines the amount of crowding

The present study deals with the question of how crowding effects, which are interactions among adjacent features or characters, emerges automatically or by so-called higher level controlled processing. Two experiments are presented comparing performances during detecting, localizing, and identifying a flanked target in same strings when the target was defined on the basis of either its form or its category. Detection and localization performances were better for form- relative to category-defined targets whereas the reverse was observed for identification performance. This shows that the interacting information is indeed high level in that it is affected by task settings like the defining target feature and the observers’ task set. The results suggest that crowding effects do not emerge due to processes depending on the parameters of stimulus presentation, but due to processes activated by certain task sets.     

Helping to overcome intervention inertia in bystander’s dilemmas: Behavioral disinhibition can improve the greater good

Conventional wisdom holds that behavioral disinhibition has negative effects on what humans do. Behavioral disinhibition may indeed frequently have negative effects, but in the present paper we reveal some positive consequences as well: the disinhibition hypothesis proposed here states that people may feel inhibited to intervene in situations in which non-intervening bystanders are present and that, therefore, behavioral disinhibition may help to overcome the bystander effect. Findings presented here provide evidence supporting this prediction both inside and outside the psychology laboratory: in both real-life and controlled bystander situations, people were more likely and faster to provide help when (unrelated to the bystander situations) they had (vs. had not) been reminded about having acted with no inhibitions. These findings suggest that, in contrast with what various theories and worldviews dictate, behavioral disinhibition may have positive effects on helping behavior and hence can be conducive for the greater good.     

Questions versus statements: challenging an assumption about semantic illusions

In previous semantic-illusion research the tacit assumption has been that questions and statements-to-be-verified of similar semantic content lead to a similar proportion of semantic illusions. This assumption was made despite the fact that questions are thought to have different processing demands from those of statements. This paper presents empirical evidence that questions tend to lead to more semantic illusions than do statements-to-be-verified. Two experiments were carried out to provide a direct comparison between the semantic-illusion rates for statements and for questions. In Experiment 1, open-ended questions led to significantly more semantic illusions than did true/false statements. Experiment 2 replicated this effect using multiple-choice response options in the question condition. It is concluded that the syntactic form of a sentence affects the way in which semantic information is processed, and the implications of the findings are discussed.     

Interfaith Spiritual Care: A Systematic Review

Journal of Religion and Health - Although knowledge on spiritual care provision in an interfaith context is essential for addressing the diversity of patients’ religious and spiritual needs,...     

Selbsthilfegruppen im Rahmen stationärer psychotherapeutischer Behandlungen

Psychosomatic in-patient treatment applies a combination of various methods in order to facilitate learning by insight and corrective emotional experiences in a therapeutic community. The establishment of a self-help group on the ward can be a useful complementary element in such a comprehensive approach. However, empirical research on this specific topic does not yet exist. Based on clinical experience, necessary preconditions as well as the pros and cons of integrating self-help into professional treatment are described. The assessment of 850 patients in a clinic for psychosomatic medicine and psychotherapy concerning a self-help group on the ward are presented. Relationships between patients’ evaluation of the self-help group and various other variables as well as the overall treatment effect were studied. Empirical data provide evidence of a differential effect of the self-help group on the ward: the majority of the patients experienced the self-help group as useful. Whether the patient is able to benefit from group therapy seems to be an intermediate variable and the therapists’ attitude towards self-help groups also seems to play an important role.