Emotional reactions to ethnic minorities

The present study investigated the role of emotion in the area of intergroup relations. Results showed three ways in which emotions are relevant when Dutch autochthonous people are confronted with members of the three major ethnic minorities in The Netherlands: Surinamers and immigrant workers from Turkey and Morocco. First, four categories of emotions could be identified which appeared to be strongly associated with ethnic attitude-positive mood, anxiety, irritation and concern-each related to a specific kind of action readiness. Second, the influence which proximity of an ethnic group appeared to have on ethnic attitude could be explained by the specific kind of emotional experience related to different levels of proximity. The third way in which emotions appeared to be relevant was their ability to differentiate between the qualitative aspects of various forms of ethnic contact. With Surinamers, more personal forms of contact were associated with an increase in positive mood and a decrease in anxiety, irritation and concern. But for Turks and Moroccans, who can be considered to be in more basic respects culturally dissimilar from the Dutch, only negative aspects of close contact were found. The correspondence of the results with several research findings in the field of intergroup relations, is extensively discussed.     

The Importance of Written Information Packages in Support of Case-Finding Within Families at Risk for Inherited High Cholesterol

Inherited High Cholesterol is treatable, but highly underdiagnosed. To detect undiagnosed blood relatives at a presymptomatic stage, in the Netherlands written information packages are available to facilitate family communication. To investigate the role of those packages in the detection of carriers, we conducted a qualitative evaluation (plus-minus method combined with semistructured interviews with index patients and relatives). Our data suggest that interviewees approved the family approach for finding carriers, although reluctantly. The packages aided family disclosure by reducing hesitation. However, index patients only informed first-degree relatives and generally communicated the risk only once. This may be due to the cultural context and a limited understanding of genetics. For relatives the packages served as a cue to action and as a legitimation to gain access to a diagnostic cholesterol test. Despite the value of these written materials, they should not be used as the only communication between index patient and relatives.     

Do obsessional beliefs discriminate OCD without tic patients from OCD with tic and Tourette's syndrome patients?

There is considerable overlap in symptomatology between Tourette's syndrome (TS) and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Increased rates of tics are found in OCD and up to 60% obsessive-compulsive symptoms in TS. However, in OCD obsessive-compulsive symptoms are more often anxiety-related and, as a consequence, aimed at anxiety-reduction, whereas in TS these symptoms are more stimulus-bound. Therefore, it is of clinical interest to study whether these phenomenological differences are reflected in differences between dysfunctional cognitions accompanying OC symptoms in OCD with or without tics and TS. Current cognitive theory of OCD ascertains that specific dysfunctional beliefs are important in the etiology and maintenance of OCD. To assess these beliefs, the obsessive-compulsive beliefs questionnaire-87 (OBQ-87) has been developed. In the present study, OBQ-87 scores of OCD patients without tics, OCD with tics, and TS (without OCD) patients were compared to those of normal controls. Results: OCD without tic patients exhibited higher OBQ-87 scores than TS patients. No differences were found between OCD with or without tic patients on any of the OBQ-87 subscales. These results suggest that: (1) dysfunctional beliefs have no discriminative power with respect to OCD with or without tic patients; (2) the direct relationship between types of OC symptoms and specific dysfunctional beliefs is questionable. Therefore, one can doubt the specificity of cognitive theory of OCD to explain specific OC behavior.     

The Miandad effect reconsidered: analysis of Pakistan's cricket performance 1952 to 2005

In 2004 Abbasi and Khan reported an enduring influence of a 1986 Pakistani landmark victory in cricket over India on subsequent matches up to 2003. The present study reconsidered the significance and the specificity of this phenomenon, denoted as the "Miandad effect." All 659 Pakistani cricket encounters with India and other frequently played opponents up to 2005 which yielded a winning team were included in the analysis. The increase in matches won by Pakistan over India in the post-1986 period was statistically not significant. Changes in match performance against other frequently played nations, namely, increases against England and the West Indies as well as decreases against Australia and Sri Lanka, were larger than the one seen with India. Apparently, the Miandad effect neither generalized to all recurrently encountered opponents, nor was specific to India.     

Comparability, reliability, and practice effects on alternate forms of the Digit Symbol Substitution and Symbol Digit Modalities tests

The present study examined the comparability of 4 alternate forms of the Digit Symbol Substitution test and the Symbol Digit Modalities (written) test, including the original versions. Male contact-sport athletes (N = 112) were assessed on 1 of the 4 forms of each test. Reasonable alternate form comparability was demonstrated through establishing normality of form distributions and conducting pairwise form comparisons of means, variability, and intraclass correlations. Nonetheless, alternate forms are likely an insufficient means of controlling practice in speeded measures at brief (1-2 weeks) retest intervals. Reliable change indices demonstrated that practice must be accounted for in individual retesting.     

Moral psychology of nursing robots: Exploring the role of robots in dilemmas of patient autonomy

Artificial intelligences (AIs) are widely used in tasks ranging from transportation to healthcare and military, but it is not yet known how people prefer them to act in ethically difficult situations. In five studies (an anthropological field study, n = 30, and four experiments, total n = 2150), we presented people with vignettes where a human or an advanced robot nurse is ordered by a doctor to forcefully medicate an unwilling patient. Participants were more accepting of a human nurse's than a robot nurse's forceful medication of the patient, and more accepting of (human or robot) nurses who respected patient autonomy rather than those that followed the orders to forcefully medicate (Study 2). The findings were robust against the perceived competence of the robot (Study 3), moral luck (whether the patient lived or died afterwards; Study 4), and command chain effects (Study 5; fully automated supervision or not). Thus, people prefer robots capable of disobeying orders in favour of abstract moral principles like valuing personal autonomy. Our studies fit in a new era in research, where moral psychological phenomena no longer reflect only interactions between people, but between people and autonomous AIs.     

Emotional Reactions to People With AIDS

Using survey data of a Dutch national sample, the present paper examines how people's willingness to engage in personal contact with persons with AIDS (PWAs) is influenced by different emotional reactions to PWAs. Results indicate that each of the three measured emotional reactions to PWAs (fear, irritation, and pity) independently predicts subjects' readiness to have personal contact with PWAs. Disconfirming the often assumed relationship between "homophobia" and fear of PWAs, it was found that attitudes toward homosexuals are unrelated to fear of PWAs. Instead, these attitudes are associated with emotions of a more aggressive nature (irritation). Risk perception seems to be related to the emotions of fear and irritation, whereas responsibility attribution seems to be negatively associated with pity.