Investigating cognitive transfer within the framework of music practice: genetic pleiotropy rather than causality

The idea of far transfer effects in the cognitive sciences has received much attention in recent years. One domain where far transfer effects have frequently been reported is music education, with the prevailing idea that music practice entails an increase in cognitive ability (IQ). While cross‐sectional studies consistently find significant associations between music practice and IQ, randomized controlled trials, however, report mixed results. An alternative to the hypothesis of cognitive transfer effects is that some underlying factors, such as shared genes, influence practice behaviour and IQ causing associations on the phenotypic level. Here we explored the hypothesis of far transfer within the framework of music practice. A co‐twin control design combined with classical twin‐modelling based on a sample of more than 10,500 twins was used to explore causal associations between music practice and IQ as well as underlying genetic and environmental influences. As expected, phenotypic associations were moderate (r = 0.11 and r = 0.10 for males and females, respectively). However, the relationship disappeared when controlling for genetic and shared environmental influences using the co‐twin control method, indicating that a highly practiced twin did not have higher IQ than the untrained co‐twin. In line with that finding, the relationship between practice and IQ was mostly due to shared genetic influences. Findings strongly suggest that associations between music practice and IQ in the general population are non‐causal in nature. The implications of the present findings for research on plasticity, modularity, and transfer are discussed.     

Incremental Validity of Teacher and Parent Symptom and Impairment Ratings when Screening for Mental Health Difficulties

Although universal screening for mental health difficulties is increasingly recognized as a way to identify children who are at risk and provide early intervention, little research exists to inform decisions about screening, such as the choice of informants and the type of information collected. The present study examined the incremental validity of teacher- and parent-rated (primarily mothers) symptoms and impairment in a non-referred sample of early elementary school children (n = 320, 49 % boys, ages 6 to 9) in terms of predicting impairment as rated by a different teacher 1 year later. Teacher-rated symptoms and impairment and parent-rated impairment were each unique predictors of later impairment; however, parent-rated symptoms did not contribute to the prediction of later impairment above and beyond these other indicators. The results indicate that, when screening for mental health difficulties in the school system, impairment ratings collected across settings add useful information, but it may not be necessary to use parent symptom ratings when teacher symptom ratings are available.     

Integrating fieldwork into employment counseling for methadone‐treatment patients

An innovative employment counseling model, Customized Employment Supports, was developed for methadone‐treatment patients, a population with historically low employment rates. The effectiveness of a key component of the model, “vocational fieldwork,” the delivery of services in the community rather than only within the clinic, was assessed through a quasi‐experimental study of the first 55 patients receiving the model in 2 clinics. Employment outcomes after 6 months were compared between patients who received vocational fieldwork (n = 18) and those who did not (n = 37). Logistic regression analysis demonstrated that patients receiving vocational fieldwork had significantly better outcomes for competitive work, informal work, and any paid work.     

Multisource Feedback and Leaders' Goal Performance: Moderating effects of rating purpose,rater perspective,and performance dimension

The main purposes of this study are to examine whether multisource feedback ratings predict leaders' organizational goal performance, and whether the relationships are consistent across the two rating purposes (developmental, administrative), two leadership dimensions behaviors (Consideration, Initiating Structure), and three rating perspectives (supervisor, self, and ‘other’ raters, i.e., peers and subordinates). Leaders (n=396) in a large organization in the transportation industry participated in two multisource feedback programs, the first for developmental purposes and the second 8 months later for administrative purposes. Approximately 1 month later, they were rated by their supervisor on their effectiveness in attaining five organizational performance goals (financial, safety, customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, diversity). Results revealed that both developmental ratings and administrative ratings uniquely predicted leaders' goal performance. However, both leadership dimension and rater perspective moderated these relationships. Leadership behaviors associated with Consideration were stronger predictors of goal performance for supervisor ratings, whereas behaviors associated with Initiating Structure were stronger predictors of goal performance for self and other ratings.     

Forget about equality.

Justice is widely thought to consist in equality. For many theorists, the central question has been: Equality of what? The author argues that the ideal of equality distorts practical reasoning and has deeply counterintuitive implications. Moreover, an alternative view of distributive justice can give a better account of what egalitarians should care about than can any of the competing ideals of equality.     

Managed care: how economic incentive reforms went wrong

In its response to pressures to rationalize health care resource allocation, the American health care system has embraced managed care without concurrent comprehensive health care reform, either in the form of the centralized tax-based systems found in Europe and Canada or that of the Clinton reform plan. What survives is managed care without managed competition, employer mandates, or universal access. Two problems inherent in the incentive structure of managed care plans developed in the absence of comprehensive health care reform work against the public interest. First, sacrifices in terms of medical innovation and quality of care may not be offset by greater equity in the distribution of health care. Second, such managed care plans fail to address the need for long-term accountability.     

Assessing Growth in a Diagnostic Classification Model Framework

A common assessment research design is the single-group pre-test/post-test design in which examinees are administered an assessment before instruction and then another assessment after instruction. In this type of study, the primary objective is to measure growth in examinees, individually and collectively. In an item response theory (IRT) framework, longitudinal IRT models can be used to assess growth in examinee ability over time. In a diagnostic classification model (DCM) framework, assessing growth translates to measuring changes in attribute mastery status over time, thereby providing a categorical, criterion-referenced interpretation of growth. This study introduces the Transition Diagnostic Classification Model (TDCM), which combines latent transition analysis with the log-linear cognitive diagnosis model to provide methodology for analyzing growth in a general DCM framework. Simulation study results indicate that the proposed model is flexible, provides accurate and reliable classifications, and is quite robust to violations to measurement invariance over time. The TDCM is used to analyze pre-test/post-test data from a diagnostic mathematics assessment.     

Bioethics as politics: the limits of moral expertise

The increasing reliance upon, and perhaps the growing public and professional skepticism about, the special expertise of bioethicists suggests the need to consider the limits of moral expertise. For all the talk about method in bioethics, we, bioethicists, are still rather far off the mark in understanding what we are doing, even when we may be going about what we are doing fairly well. Quite often, what is most fundamentally at stake, but equally often insufficiently acknowledged, are inherently political, essentially contested visions of the most compelling and attractive forms of life for individuals and social organization. The current situation in bioethics parallels similar debates in eighteenth-century jurisprudence, especially Jeremy Bentham's withering critique of the prevalent forms of judicial argument and his own, equally unsuccessful, attempt to develop a decision-making procedure in ethics that would operate on a plane above politics. The risk, both then and now, is that we will fail to appreciate the wide range of reasonable disagreement that will remain past the point of extended reflection and discussion.