Changes in teacher–student relationships

Background. Although teacher–student relationships lie at the heart of students’ schooling experience, fundamental questions regarding these relationships remain unanswered. Aims. This study investigates three related questions about these relationships: To what extent do they change from the beginning to the end of a school year? Are any emergent changes associated with shifts in students’ academic or motivational outcomes? Are certain ‘upstream’ factors associated with improvements or declines in teacher–student relationships? Sample. We investigate these questions with a sample of middle school students (N = 119) and their teachers (N = 30). Methods. Through a novel approach which accounts for both perspectives within teacher–student relationships, we assess these relationships at the beginning and end of the school year. Using multi-level models, we examine how changes in these relationships are associated with changes in students’ grades, homework completion rates, self-efficacy, and effort. In addition, we examine associations with two potential precursors to teacher–student relationships: students’ accuracy in taking their teachers’ perspective and their perceptions of similarity to their teachers. Results. We find that substantial changes occur in these relationships from the beginning to the end of the year; these changes are associated with shifts in important student outcomes; and changes in students’ social perspective taking accuracy and perceived similarity to their teachers correspond with changes in teacher–student relationships. Conclusions. Given the malleability of teacher–student relationships and their importance for key achievement and motivational outcomes, we advocate for researchers to conduct field experiments to inform how to improve these critical relationships.     

Increasing access to psychological therapies for people with psychosis: predictors of successful training

BackgroundCognitive behavioural therapy for psychosis (CBTp) is recommended for people with schizophrenia, but routine delivery remains limited. Obstacles to increasing access include inadequate training, organisational support and supervision, resulting in low levels of staff competence and confidence. This study is a preliminary evaluation of a CBTp training programme, designed to overcome these obstacles and to increase routine delivery of competent CBTp.MethodTraining outcomes for a pilot group and for the first three cohorts to complete training were analysed to identify predictors of successful completion and of therapy delivery after training.ResultsObjective competence was attained by 37 students (out of 58), who delivered therapy to over 160 service users. Successful completion was associated with previous CBT therapy experience. Delivery after one year was associated with working in a therapy rather than a care co-ordination role.ConclusionsThe programme succeeded in training therapists to deliver competent therapy. Our results suggest that preliminary training in CBT for other disorders may improve success rates in CBTp. Despite extensive service liaison, delivery remained problematic for care co-ordinators without role change and provision of dedicated time. The findings should inform future implementation strategies.     

Lightening the load: perceptual load impairs visual detection in typical adults but not in autism

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) research portrays a mixed picture of attentional abilities with demonstrations of enhancements (e.g., superior visual search) and deficits (e.g., higher distractibility). Here we test a potential resolution derived from the Load Theory of Attention (e.g., Lavie, 2005). In Load Theory, distractor processing depends on the perceptual load of the task and as such can only be eliminated under high load that engages full capacity. We hypothesize that ASD involves enhanced perceptual capacity, leading to the superior performance and increased distractor processing previously reported. Using a signal-detection paradigm, we test this directly and demonstrate that, under higher levels of load, perceptual sensitivity was reduced in typical adults but not in adults with ASD. These findings confirm our hypothesis and offer a promising solution to the previous discrepancies by suggesting that increased distractor processing in ASD results not from a filtering deficit but from enhanced perceptual capacity.     

Entitativity,identity, and the fulfilment of psychological needs

Social groups provide many benefits to the individual and some groups are better able to meet the needs of their group members. The current research examines the impact of perceived entitativity on the degree to which groups are able to fulfil the psychological needs of individual members. Participants listed ingroups based on the group typology of Lickel et al. (2000) and rated characteristics of the group, level of identification, and the degree to which the group met a series of needs. The results indicate that increased entitativity predicts greater perceived relative need fulfilment and that this effect is mediated by level of identification with the group. These results extend our understanding of the functions that different group types serve and the consequences of ingroup entitativity perceptions for the individual.     

The ideologically objectionable premise model: Predicting biased political judgments on the left and right

This paper introduces the ideologically objectionable premise model (IOPM), which predicts that biased political judgments will emerge on both the political left and right, but only when the premise of a judgment is not ideologically objectionable to the perceiver. The IOPM generates three hypothesized patterns of bias: biases among both those on the left and right, bias only among those on the right, and bias only among those on the left. These hypotheses were tested within the context of the dual process motivational model of ideological attitudes (DPM; Duckitt, 2001), which posits that right-wing authoritarianism (RWA) and social dominance orientation (SDO) are related but distinct ideological attitudes. Across two studies, all three IOPM hypotheses were tested and supported on the RWA ideological attitude dimension, and two of the three IOPM hypotheses were tested and supported on the SDO dimension. These findings indicate that the context of the judgment is an important determinant of whether biases emerge in political judgment.     

Dissociation, trauma, and the role of lived experience: toward a new conceptualization of voice hearing

Voice hearing (VH) is often regarded as pathognomic for schizophrenia. The purpose of this article is to review and integrate historical, clinical, epidemiological, and phenomenological evidence in order to suggest that VH may be more appropriately understood as a dissociative rather than a psychotic phenomenon. First, we discuss the lifetime prevalence of VH in the general population, which is estimated to range between 1% and 16% for adult nonclinical populations and 2% and 41% in healthy adolescent samples. Second, we demonstrate how the ubiquity of VH phenomenology, including variables like voice location, content, and frequency, limits its diagnostic and prognostic utility for differentiating psychotic from trauma-spectrum and nonclinical populations. Finally, we report on the empirical associations between VH, measures of dissociation, and trauma particularly (though not exclusively) childhood sexual abuse. There are 2 main conclusions from this review. First, we argue that available evidence suggests that VH experiences, including those in the context of psychotic disorders, can be most appropriately understood as dissociated or disowned components of the self (or self-other relationships) that result from trauma, loss, or other interpersonal stressors. Second, we provide a rationale for clinicians to use psychotherapeutic methods for integrating life events as precipitating and/or maintaining factors for distressing voices. Potential mechanisms for the relationship between trauma, dissociation, VH, and clinical diagnosis are described, including the relevance of literature from the field of attachment in providing a diathesis for dissociation. Suggestions for future research are also discussed.     

A reconsideration of Freud's essays on sexuality and their clinical implications

This paper considers some of the concisely presented material of the second of Freud's Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905a), on "Infantile Sexuality." The author puts forward the view that infantile sexuality may be thought of not simply as an immature stage that must be passed through, but also as a pool of psychic experiences upon which mature personality organization can continually draw, in dynamic oscillation among different mental positions. The link between infantile sexuality and the structuring of the psychic apparatus, discussed in the first and third of the Three Essays ("The Sexual Aberrations" and "The Transformations of Puberty"), raises questions that are still open to further research.