The utility of the PAI and the MMPI-2 for discriminating PTSD, depression, and social phobia in trauma-exposed college students

This study investigated the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-Revised (MMPI-2; Butcher, Dahlstrom, Graham, Tellegen, & Kaemmer, 1989) and the Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI; Morey, 1991) with regard to each instrument's utility for discriminating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) from depression and social phobia in a sample of college students with mixed civilian trauma exposure. Participants were 90 trauma-exposed undergraduates (16 male, 74 female) classified into one of four groups: PTSD, depressive disorders, social phobia, and well-adjusted. For both the PAI and the MMPI-2, profile analysis revealed that the groups differed in the elevation and shape of their profiles. The PAI Traumatic Stress subscale demonstrated good discriminant validity.     

Social support networks among families of children with craniofacial anomalies

Investigated the social support available to families of children born with craniofacial anomalies and the perceived degree of satisfaction derived from these relationships. Thirty-six children (1 month to 5 years old) born with craniofacial deformities (FD) were matched by age and sex to 36 children with no significant physical or behavioral problems. The Social Support Questionnaire-Revised, the Revised Denver Developmental Screening Test, and a semistructured interview were administered. Results indicated that parents of FD children reported less available social support and were significantly less satisfied with their support. Parents of children who had more severe physical impairments and were rated as less attractive reported having less available and less satisfying social support. In particular, the social competence of the child was the most important predictor of parental social support. This result is interesting as the parents of FD children appeared to underreport the presence of behavioral-psychological problems in their children.     

Depression in aphasic patients: Frequency, severity, and clinical-pathological correlations

Twenty-five hospitalized nonfluent, fluent, and global aphasic patients who were several months past the onset of their illness were compared for presence and severity of depression based on four psychopathological measures. The nonfluent aphasic patients had both greater frequency and severity of depression than the other two groups. CT scans showed that the global aphasic patients had the largest lesion size (volumetric) and showed a strong correlation between lesion size and degree of depression. In contrast, patients with fluent aphasias showed an inverse correlation between severity of depression and lesion size; among the nonfluent aphasic patients there was no significant correlation. Depression appears to be common in this population of hospitalized aphasic patients with chronic illness and nonfluent patients are the most depressed group within this population. The increased frequency and severity of depression in the nonfluent patients did not appear to be related to their overall physical or cognitive impairment; two possible mechanisms are discussed.     

Number development in young children

This paper presents new data on children's acquisition of counting skills. Three aspects of counting were studied: the formation of the cardinality rule that the last number named during counting denotes the number of objects in an array, the mastery of the counting procedure or the coordination of ordered number names and objects counted, and the growth of the knowledge that x + 1 is greater than x. A model was outlined which posits the hierarchic integration of six number skills to account for the growth of the knowledge that x + 1 is greater than x and the development of number conservation. The six skills are: the cardinality rule, the counting procedure, acquisition of more x's, judgments of relative numerosity, pattern recognition of small numbers, and one-to-one correspondences.     

Arguments in the practical reasoning underlying constructed probability responses

Reasoning is an important cognitive activity in probability assessment, and one that has been understudied. This proposition motivates the paper's three general aims. First, based on research in rhetoric, we present a theoretical means of analyzing the arguments constructed during the reasoning that occurs in probability assessment. Second, from verbal protocol data, we establish that subjects constructed arguments in forming beliefs and assessing the associated probabilities. Third, we analyze the data for the structure of subject's arguments, including argument content and form. Subjects used a limited amount of relevant evidence and used a variety of argument forms that could be characterized by the nature of the knowledge that subjects brought to bear in forming the arguments. Subjects predominantly used causal reasoning, but also employed hierarchical category knowledge, resemblance relationships, and arguments from authority. These findings form a basis for expanding our accounts of probability assessment and for improving assessment practice.     

Attitude accessibility and biased information processing: The moderating role of self-monitoring

High and low self-monitors read and evaluated two studies relevant to the deterrent effects of the death penalty, one that supported its deterrent effects and one that did not. Low self-monitors’ evaluations of the studies were significantly related to the accessibility of their attitudes toward capital punishment. The more accessible their attitudes were, the more favorable, relatively, were their evaluations of the study that supported their personal attitudes toward capital punishment. In contrast, attitude accessibility was unrelated to high self-monitors’ relative evaluations. This research was supported by a Faculty Research Grant from Union College to the first author and by an Internal Educational Fund grant from Union College to the second author. We thank Alison King, Leslie Silver, and Alison Snyder for their help in data collection.