Review of a Parent’s Influence on Pediatric Procedural Distress and Recovery

Understanding how parents influence their child’s medical procedures can inform future work to reduce pediatric procedural distress and improve recovery outcomes. Following a pediatric injury or illness diagnosis, the associated medical procedures can be potentially traumatic events that are often painful and distressing and can lead to the child experiencing long-term physical and psychological problems. Children under 6 years old are particularly at risk of illness or injury, yet their pain-related distress during medical procedures is often difficult to manage because of their young developmental level. Parents can also experience ongoing psychological distress following a child’s injury or illness diagnosis. The parent and parenting behavior is one of many risk factors for increased pediatric procedural distress. The impact of parents on pediatric procedural distress is an important yet not well-understood phenomenon. There is some evidence to indicate parents influence their child through their own psychological distress and through parenting behavior. This paper has three purposes: (1) review current empirical research on parent-related risk factors for distressing pediatric medical procedures, and longer-term recovery outcomes; (2) consider and develop existing theories to present a new model for understanding the parent–child distress relationship during medical procedures; and (3) review and make recommendations regarding current assessment tools and developing parenting behavior interventions for reducing pediatric procedural distress.     

Longitudinal associations between low morning cortisol in infancy and anger dysregulation in early childhood in a CPS‐referred sample

Children who experience early adversity are at increased risk for developing psychopathology, and dysfunction of the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal (HPA) axis is a possible mechanism conferring this risk. This study sought to characterize the association between morning cortisol during different developmental periods and deficits in children's emotion regulation, a core feature of many psychological disorders. Morning cortisol was collected at two time points (i.e., during infancy, M = 13.0 months old, and during early childhood, M = 36.8 months old) from 120 children with histories of child protective services (CPS) involvement. Children completed a lab visit during early childhood (M = 38.6 months old) that involved an observational measure of anger regulation. Results showed that low morning cortisol during infancy, but not early childhood, predicted increased anger dysregulation during early childhood. These results highlight the importance of developmental timing in assessing the effects of HPA axis functioning and suggest that low cortisol during infancy is a risk factor for later emotion regulation difficulties.     

The Box Task: A tool to design experiments for assessing visuospatial working memory

The present paper describes the Box Task, a paradigm for the computerized assessment of visuospatial working memory. In this task, hidden objects have to be searched by opening closed boxes that are shown at different locations on the computer screen. The set size (i.e., number of boxes that must be searched) can be varied and different error scores can be computed that measure specific working memory processes (i.e., the number of within-search and between-search errors). The Box Task also has a developer’s mode in which new stimulus displays can be designed for use in tailored experiments. The Box Task comes with a standard set of stimulus displays (including practice trials, as well as stimulus displays with 4, 6, and 8 boxes). The raw data can be analyzed easily and the results of individual participants can be aggregated into one spreadsheet for further statistical analyses.     

Executive Functions in Children and Adolescents with Turner Syndrome: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Turner syndrome (TS) is a genetic disorder, affecting 1/2500 to 1/3000 live female births, induced by partial or total deletion of one X chromosome. The neurocognitive profile of girls with TS is characterized by a normal Verbal IQ and weaknesses in visual-spatial, mathematics, and social cognitive domains. Executive functions (EFs) impairments have also been reported in these young patients. However, methodological differences across studies do not allow determination of which EFs are impaired and what is the magnitude of these impairments. The aim of this review was to clarify the EF profile of children and adolescents with TS. Sixteen samples, from thirteen studies, were included in the current meta-analysis. EFs measures used in these studies were classified into working memory, inhibitory control, cognitive flexibility, or higher-order EFs tasks in accordance with Diamond’s model, Annual Review of Psychology, 64, 135–168 (2013). Results confirmed that girls with TS had significant executive impairments with effect sizes varying from small (inhibitory control) to medium (cognitive flexibility) and large (working memory, higher-order EFs). Analyses by task revealed that cognitive inhibition may be more impaired than the other inhibitory control abilities. Heterogeneity across cognitive flexibility measures was also highlighted. Between-sample heterogeneity was observed for three tasks and the impact of participants’ characteristics on EFs was discussed. This meta-analysis confirms the necessity to assess, in patients living with TS, each EF by combining both visual and verbal tasks. Results also underline that, when studying girls with TS’ executive profile, it is important to explore the impact of moderator variables, such as IQ, parental socio-economic status, TS karyotype, psychiatric comorbidities, and hormonal treatment status.     

Brief Counseling for Alcohol Misuse Among Trauma Patients: Two Interventions and Influence of Baseline Use

This study examined whether baseline trauma patient characteristics and randomized participation in 1 of 2 brief interventions predicted changes in alcohol use at 6 months postintervention. Higher total Alcohol Use Disorders Identification Test (AUDIT) scores predicted greater changes, and specific AUDIT items were significant predictors.     

Development of the Diabetes Self-Care Efficacy Scale

The present study elaborates the conceptualization and process of development of a scale for assessing diabetes self-care efficacy (DSCE) in patients of diabetes, type 1 and type 2. Health maintenance in chronic illness as diabetes is dependent on performing several key self-care behaviours. The present study discusses two parts—Part I elaborates the qualitative exploration of the research construct through semi-structured interview of diabetic patients. It included 25 diabetic patients, Type-I (n?=?5) and Type-II (n?=?20). Part II discusses the quantitative research methods. The sample consisted of 233 diabetic patients, Type-1 (n?=?39) and Type-2 (n?=?194), who were randomly selected from diabetes and endocrine outpatient department (OPD) of a hospital in, Kolkata, India. Following an exploratory approach employing Principal Component Analysis (PCA), three components were yielded that accounted for approximately 60% of explained variance. Cronbach’s alpha was established at 0.89 indicating satisfactory internal reliability. The components were identified as component 1, “Beliefs about physical exercise regimen” (BPE), component 2, “Beliefs about food and insulin administration and medication recommendations” (FMR) and component 3, “Beliefs about learning and following from others” (LFO). To test the obtained factor structure of the proposed DSCE scale, a confirmatory analysis was performed to help validate the 3-factor, 15-item DSCE scale. The scale is first one of its kind to be proposed and developed in an Indian diabetes context and can prove useful in other settings. Study findings have implications for use in hospital setup and for development of intervention programs in dealing with diabetes patient population.     

Will Victims Become Aggressors or Vice Versa? A Cross-Lagged Analysis of School Aggression

Peer aggression and victimization are ubiquitous phenomena in schools which warrant the attention of educators and researchers. The high connection between aggression and victimization behooves researchers to look into how the comorbidity of them develops over time. The present study investigated the associations between aggression and victimization over 3 years in early adolescence and whether these associations are moderated by gender and teacher support. Participants were 567 Grade 7, 8 and 9 students (49.38% girls) from 3 schools in Hong Kong. Over the course of study, they were asked to fill in a set of questionnaires that consisted of items related to peer aggression, victimization, and teacher support at 5 time points. Four models of cross-lagged relations between peer aggression and victimization were tested. The results supported a reciprocal model of peer aggression and victimization for both boys and girls although girls engaged in less peer aggression and victimization than boys. Further analyses also revealed that teacher support acted as a suppressor of the reciprocal relations. The present study sheds lights on intervention strategies that may remediate peer aggression and victimization in schools.     

Other‐Centric Reasoning

This article considers question‐begging's opposite fallacy. Instead of relying on my beliefs for my premises when I should be using my adversary's beliefs, I rely on my adversary's beliefs when I should rely on my own. Just as question‐begging emerges from egocentrism, its opposite emerges from other‐centrism. Stepping into the other person's shoes is an effective strategy for understanding him. But you must return to your own shoes when forming your beliefs. Evidence is agent centered. Other‐centric reasoning is most striking when both parties partake simultaneously. We are then treated to the spectacle of each side using the other's premises to establish its conclusion. These remarkable debates arise regularly when there is open disagreement about whether a right‐conferring relationship has ended. Those who contend the relationship is abrogated will be tempted to stand on the rights persistently credited to them by their adversary.