The academic outcomes of working memory and metacognitive strategy training in children: A double‐blind randomized controlled trial

Working memory training has been shown to improve performance on untrained working memory tasks in typically developing children, at least when compared to non‐adaptive training; however, there is little evidence that it improves academic outcomes. The lack of transfer to academic outcomes may be because children are only learning skills and strategies in a very narrow context, which they are unable to apply to other tasks. Metacognitive strategy interventions, which promote metacognitive awareness and teach children general strategies that can be used on a variety of tasks, may be a crucial missing link in this regard. In this double‐blind randomized controlled trial, 95 typically developing children aged 9–14 years were allocated to three cognitive training programmes that were conducted daily after‐school. One group received Cogmed working memory training, another group received concurrent Cogmed and metacognitive strategy training, and the control group received adaptive visual search training, which better controls for expectancy and motivation than non‐adaptive training. Children were assessed on four working memory tasks, reading comprehension, and mathematical reasoning before, immediately after, and 3 months after training. Working memory training improved working memory and mathematical reasoning relative to the control group. The improvements in working memory were maintained 3 months later, and these were significantly greater for the group that received metacognitive strategy training, compared to working memory training alone. Working memory training is a potentially effective educational intervention when provided in addition to school; however, future research will need to investigate ways to maintain academic improvements long term and to optimize metacognitive strategy training to promote far‐transfer. A video abstract of this article can be viewed at https://youtu.be/-7MML48ZFgw     

Affectivity and the distinction between minimal and narrative self

Continental Philosophy Review - In the contemporary phenomenological literature it has been argued that it is possible to distinguish between two forms of selfhood: the “minimal” and...     

Marital interaction of agoraphobic women: a controlled,behavioral observation study

Married couples with a female agoraphobic spouse (n = 22) were compared with demographically similar community control couples (n = 21) on self-report and observational measures of marital interaction. Consistent with hypotheses, husbands of agoraphobic women were more critical of their wives than were control husbands, and clinical couples were less likely to engage in positive problem solution than control couples. Contrary to hypothesis, clinical husbands were not less supportive than control husbands. Where general measures of marital distress were concerned, clinical couples, relative to control couples, evinced more distress by self-report, by their higher rate of negative nonverbal behavior, and by their longer sequences of negative exchanges.     

Locus of inhibition in the masked priming of response alternatives

Masked prime stimuli presented immediately before target stimuli in a choice reaction task give rise to behavioral costs when the primes and the target stimuli are mapped to the same response and result in benefits when they are mapped to opposite responses. Researchers assume that this negative compatibility effect reflects inhibitory processes in the control of perceptuomotor links. The authors investigated whether the inhibition operates at the level of abstract central codes or at effector-specific motor stages. In 2 experiments (N = 8 participants in each), left or right hand or foot responses were required to target stimuli that were preceded by masked arrow primes mapped to the same response side as the target stimuli in compatible trials and to the opposite response side in incompatible trials; the primes were irrelevant in neutral trials. In Experiment 1, when the masked primes determined both response side and modality, there was no transfer of negative compatibility effects across response modalities. That finding is inconsistent with a central abstract locus of inhibition and suggests that inhibition operates at effector-specific motor stages. In Experiment 2, primes conveyed only response side information but left response modality uncertain, and negative compatibility effects were elicited for both hand and foot responses, suggesting that partially informative masked primes can trigger a parallel activation and subsequent inhibition of response processes within separate effector systems.     

Ego development and the ethics of care and justice: the relations among them revisited

This study examined the links among ego development and the ethics of care and justice in 144 Norwegian men and women, 15 to 48 years old, taking into consideration age, sex, education, and verbal intelligence. As expected, the relationship between Loevinger's model of ego development and care-based moral reasoning as measured with Skoe's Ethic of Care Interview (ECI) was significantly stronger than the one between ego development and justice as measured with Rest's Defining Issues Test (DIT). Both ethics correlated significantly with verbal ability. Analyses showed that beyond its overlap with verbal intelligence, the variance shared between the ECI and ego development was substantial. By contrast, when verbal intelligence was controlled, the DIT was not significantly related to ego development or to the care ethic.     

Experiences of longing in Norwegian and Swedish 4- and 5-year-old children

Longing can be defined as a blend of the primary emotions of happiness and sadness. These primary emotions are experienced very early by children, and the meanings of the words happiness and sadness are also known by children early in their verbal development. To find out at what age children are able to understand and use the more developed concept of longing, the authors interviewed 74 preschoolers (4- and 5-year-olds) in Norway and Sweden about their experiences of longing. Chi-square analyses showed age and sex differences in knowledge of the concept, and some differences between categories of longing were also significant. Results showed that young children's ability to understand and use the concept of longing appears to be limited and that girls seem to mature earlier in this respect than boys do.     

Relationship between the rorschach and the MMPI-2 in a Swedish population: a replication study of the effects of first-factor related test-interaction styles

A sizeable amount of research literature has failed to demonstrate a stable relationship between self-report and the Rorschach (Exner, 1993). However, principal component first-factor related test-interaction style has been shown to moderate convergence. In this study 78 psychiatric patients completed the Rorschach and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2; Hathaway & McKinley, 1989). Practically no correlation was evident between the MMPI-2 and the Rorschach, measuring similar constructs, in all patients. Patients with similar test-interaction styles demonstrated positive intermethod correlations between both conceptually related and conceptually not directly related test indexes. The same scales were negatively correlated in patients with discordant test-interaction styles, and this difference between test-interaction style groups was significant. It is suggested that first-factor related test-interaction style moderates convergence. It is further suggested that test-interaction style moderates convergence between both conceptually related and conceptually not directly related measures of distress or psychopathology.     

When rejection stings: how self-esteem constrains relationship-enhancement processes

Three experiments examined how needs for acceptance might constrain low versus high self-esteem people's capacity to protect their relationships in the face of difficulties. The authors led participants to believe that their partner perceived a problem in their relationship. They then measured perceptions of the partner's acceptance, partner enhancement, and closeness. Low but not high self-esteem participants read too much into problems, seeing them as a sign that their partner's affections and commitment might be waning. They then derogated their partner and reduced closeness. Being less sensitive to rejection, however, high self-esteem participants affirmed their partner in the face of threat. Ironically, chronic needs for acceptance may result in low self-esteem people seeing signs of rejection where none exist, needlessly weakening attachments.     

Inter-rater and test-retest reliability of the Revised Diagnostic Interview for Borderlines

The baseline inter-rater reliability, test-retest reliability, follow-up inter-rater reliability, and follow-up longitudinal reliability (interrater reliability between generations of raters) of borderline symptoms and the diagnosis of borderline personality disorder (BPD) were assessed using the Revised Diagnostic Interview for Borderlines (DIB-R). Excellent kappa s (> .75) were found in each of these reliability substudies for the diagnosis of BPD itself. Excellent kappa s were also found in each of the three inter-rater reliability substudies for the vast majority of borderline symptoms assessed by the DIB-R. Test-retest reliability for these symptoms was somewhat lower but still very good. More specifically, one-third of the BPD symptoms assessed had a kappa in the excellent range and the remaining two-thirds had a kappa in the fair-good range (.57-.73). The dimensional reliability of BPD symptom areas was somewhat higher than for categorical measures of the subsyndromal phenomenology of BPD. More specifically, all five dimensional measures of borderline psychopathology had intraclass correlation coefficients in the excellent range for all four reliability substudies. Taken together, the results of this study suggest that both the borderline diagnosis and the symptoms of BPD can be diagnosed reliably when using the DIB-R. They also suggest that excellent reliability, once achieved, can be maintained over time for both the syndromal and subsyndromal phenomenology of BPD.     

Dependency,impulsivity, and self-harm: traits hypothesized to underlie the association between cluster B personality and substance use disorders

Cluster B personality disorders (PDs) (i.e., antisocial, borderline, histrionic, and narcissistic) typically show a high degree of comorbidity with substance use disorders (SUDs). Previous research suggests that the broad-based personality domains of Disinhibition and Negative Temperament/Neuroticism may be common factors to both types of disorders. Using a two-phase process (i.e., screening and follow-up), this study examined three lower-order personality traits (i.e., dependency, impulsivity, and self-harm) that fall within the Disinhibition and Neuroticism domains. The study evaluated the hypotheses that these traits (a) are related both to cluster B PDs and to SUDs; and (b) underlie the association between the two types of disorders. Results indicate that impulsivity and self-harm play a significant role in cluster B PDs and SUDs, as well as in their association with each other. However, dependency was not associated with either type of disorder. These results indicate that sets of individual traits can be of significant utility in understanding the comorbidity between PDs and SUDs.