Effects of Language of Implementation on Functional Analysis Outcomes

This study evaluated the influence of language of implementation on functional analysis outcomes for a child with a severe intellectual disability from a Spanish-speaking home. Challenging behavior was assessed during 5-min sessions under 4 conditions; attention, play-verbal, play-nonverbal, and demand and across 2 phases; implementation in English versus Spanish. The highest levels of challenging behavior occurred during the attention and demand conditions of the English phases. These results suggest that the language of implementation may influence the overall levels of challenging behavior within functional analysis conditions.     

Mother and infant coordinate heart rhythms through episodes of interaction synchrony

Animal studies demonstrated the powerful impact of maternal-infant social contact on the infant's physiological systems, yet the online effects of social interactions on the human infant's physiology remain poorly understood. Mothers and their 3-month old infants were observed during face-to-face interactions while cardiac output was collected from mother and child. Micro-analysis of the partners’ behavior marked episodes of gaze, affect, and vocal synchrony. Time-series analysis showed that mother and infant coordinate heart rhythms within lags of less than 1 s. Bootstrapping analysis indicated that the concordance between maternal and infant biological rhythms increased significantly during episodes of affect and vocal synchrony compared to non-synchronous moments. Humans, like other mammals, can impact the physiological processes of the attachment partner through the coordination of visuo-affective social signals.     

Psychosoziale Versorgung von Krebspatienten

Objectives

The aim of this study was to determine rates of psychooncological care for cancer inpatients and outpatients under routine conditions in a large University hospital. The percentage of patients who received care was analyzed and compared with self-rated and expert rated supportive care needs.

Methods

The percentage of inpatients who received psychooncological care was calculated by comparing the number of cancer patients treated at the hospital as documented by the local tumor registry (n=1,979) with the number of patients treated by a psychooncologist in that hospital as documented by the hospital??s psychooncological consultation liaison service. The percentage of outpatients who received psychooncological care was calculated by comparing the number of incident cancer cases as documented by the local tumor registry (n=5,886) with the number of patients who received at least one consultation at the local tumor counseling centre. Supportive care needs were estimated by analyzing data of a prospective patient survey in the same hospital (n=1,803) using the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale and single items to determine social burden and the wish for emotional support.

Results

The results showed that 11% of inpatients and outpatients (n=234 and n=638, respectively) received psychooncological care. Social care needs were prevalent in 37% and psychological care needs in 52% of the patients during the stay in hospital and in 42% (social and psychological) 6 months later. Of the patients 41% expressed the need to see a social worker and 29% to see a psychologist. Large differences were found between patients with different tumor entities.

Conclusion

Psychooncological care delivered to cancer patients under routine conditions was below the actual rate required as estimated by screening instruments and as expressed by the patients.     

Pr?diktoren tumorassoziierter Fatigue

Fatigue is a serious cancer-related syndrome reported by cancer patients during and after treatment. Especially the impact of chronic fatigue on quality of life is substantial. The aim of this study was to identify predictors of fatigue after finishing treatment from an early stage of the cancer treatment. A sample of 551 cancer patients with heterogeneous diagnoses completed questionnaires assessing fatigue, psychological and psychosomatic data plus treatment data. The patients were recruited from an acute care hospital (t1) and the participants completed the questionnaire 2?C2.5 years after treatment (t2). Regression analysis showed that the strongest predictor of later fatigue was fatigue during the therapy. Other impact factors are radiotherapy and pain. The results suggest that the diagnosis and treatment of acute fatigue should be carried out at an early stage of cancer treatment to prevent chronic fatigue. Suitable diagnostic methods and treatment options will be presented.     

Catching of balls unexpectedly thrown or fired by cannon

Although learned actions can be automatically elicited in response to expected stimuli for which they have been prepared, little is known about whether learned actions can be automatically initiated by unexpected stimuli. Responses of unwitting participants to balls unexpectedly thrown by an experimenter (n=10) or propelled by a hidden ball cannon (n=22) were recorded by motion capture. Experience of ball catching correlated negatively with hand movement distance, indicating most responses were defensive, but successful catches were made in response to both thrown and fired balls. Although reaction time was faster in response to fired balls, interception was more frequent in response to thrown balls, indicating that movement cues by the thrower facilitated unexpected ball catching. The latency to begin a catching action by the only successful catcher of an unexpectedly fired ball was 296 msec. Given current knowledge of reaction time tasks and latencies of neural substrates of conscious perception and deliberation, it is probable that there was insufficient time available for conscious preparation of catch attempts. Ball catching may represent an example of a learned response which can be rapidly and unconsciously initiated without contextual priming or expectation of the stimulus.     

Preschoolers distribute scarce resources according to the moral valence of recipients' previous actions

Children aged 3 years and 4? years old watched a puppet, struggling to achieve goals, who was helped by a 2nd puppet and violently hindered by a 3rd. The children then distributed wooden biscuits between the helper and hinderer. In Experiment 1, when distributing a small odd number of biscuits, 4?-year-olds (N = 16) almost always gave more to the helper. Children verbally justified their unequal distributions by reference to the helper's prosocial behavior or the hinderer's antisocial behavior. In Experiment 2, when biscuits were more plentiful, 4?-year-olds (N = 16) usually gave equal numbers to helper and hinderer, indicating that 4?-year-olds usually preferred not to distribute unequally unless forced to by resource scarcity. Three-year-olds (N = 16 in Experiment 1, N = 20 in Experiment 3) gave more biscuits equally often to the helper and to the hinderer. In many cases, this was because they were confused as to the identities and actions of the puppets, possibly because they were shocked by the hinderer's actions. Two fundamental moral behaviors are therefore demonstrated in young preschoolers: indirect reciprocity of morally valenced acts and a preference for equality when distributing resources, although the cognitive bases for these behaviors remain unclear. These results join other recent studies in demonstrating that the seeds of complex moral understanding and behavior are found early in development.     

The development of abstract syntax: Evidence from structural priming and the lexical boost

Structural priming paradigms have been influential in shaping theories of adult sentence processing and theories of syntactic development. However, until recently there have been few attempts to provide an integrated account that explains both adult and developmental data. The aim of the present paper was to begin the process of integration by taking a developmental approach to structural priming. Using a dialog comprehension-to-production paradigm, we primed participants (3–4 year olds, 5–6 year olds and adults) with double object datives (Wendy gave Bob a dog) and prepositional datives (Wendy gave a dog to Bob). Half the participants heard the same verb in prime and target (e.g. gave–gave) and half heard a different verb (e.g. sent–gave). The results revealed substantial differences in the magnitude of priming across development. First, there was a small but significant abstract structural priming effect across all age groups, but this effect was larger in younger children than in older children and adults. Second, adding verb overlap between prime and target prompted a large, significant increase in the priming effect in adults (a lexical boost), a small, marginally significant increase in the older children and no increase in the youngest children. The results support the idea that abstract syntactic knowledge can develop independently of verb-specific frames. They also support the idea that different mechanisms may be needed to explain abstract structural priming and lexical priming, as predicted by the implicit learning account (Bock, K., & Griffin, Z. M. (2000). The persistence of structural priming: Transient activation or implicit learning? Journal of Experimental Psychology – General, 129(2), 177–192). Finally, the results illustrate the value of an integrative developmental approach to both theories of adult sentence processing and theories of syntax acquisition.     

Moving Knowledge into Action: Developing the Rapid Synthesis and Translation Process Within the Interactive Systems Framework

The Interactive Systems Framework (ISF) for Dissemination and Implementation presents an overall framework for translating knowledge into action. Each of its three systems requires further clarification and explanation to truly understand how to conduct this work. This article describes the development and initial application of the Rapid Synthesis and Translation Process (RSTP) using the exchange model of knowledge transfer in the context of one of the ISF systems: the Prevention Synthesis and Translation System (see [special issue “introduction” article] for a translation of the Wandersman et al. (Am J Community Psychol 41:3–4, 2008) article using the RSTP). This six‐step process, which was developed by and for the Division of Violence Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in collaboration with partners, serves as an example of how a federal agency can expedite the transfer of research knowledge to practitioners to prevent violence. While the RSTP itself represents one of the possible functions in the Prevention Synthesis and Translation System, the resulting products affect both prevention support and prevention delivery as well. Examples of how practitioner and researcher feedback were incorporated into the Rapid Synthesis and Translation Process are discussed. Special Issue: Advances in Bridging Research and Practice Using the Interactive System Framework for Dissemination and Implementation; Guest Editors: Abraham Wandersman, Paul Flaspohler, Catherine A. Lesesne, Richard Puddy; Action Editor: Emilie Phillips Smith     

Through the eyes of anxiety: Dissecting threat bias via emotional-binocular rivalry

An extensive body of research has demonstrated that anxious individuals abnormally process threat-related content. Yet, the manner in which clinical anxiety affects the selection of threatening signals and their maintenance within consciousness is yet to be explored. The present study used an emotional binocular rivalry (e-BR) procedure, in which pictures of faces depicting either fearful or neutral expressions competed with pictures of a house for conscious perception. We assumed that first- or cumulative-preferred perception of faces with fearful over neutral expression (i.e., initial or sustained threat bias, respectively) stand for preferential selection or maintenance of fear content in awareness, correspondingly. Unmedicated patients with social anxiety disorder (SAD) and panic disorder (PAD) were compared to healthy controls for threat-related perceptual biases in the e-BR. At first perception of face, both SAD and PAD patients showed a greater initial threat bias than healthy controls. In contrast, at cumulative dwell-time of face, patient groups demonstrated a diminished sustained threat bias relative to healthy controls, yet in a different manner. SAD patients showed a sustained threat bias, though it was smaller than in healthy controls. Furthermore, increased levels of reported anxiety among SAD patients were associated with enhanced sustained perception of neutral faces. PAD patients, on the other hand, showed no sustained threat bias and a diminished cumulative perception of fearful faces with increased levels of anxiety traits. These findings indicate that anxiety disorders commonly involve an initially enhanced selection of threat signals into awareness, followed by disorder-specific manifestation of diminished preferred maintenance of threat in awareness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).