A client-server technology solution for a multicenter research database

As researchers take advantage of advances in computer and related technologies, the amount of data has increased dramatically. Recent developments in database management systems (DBMS) such as client-server database technology provide the necessary tools for merging and managing data from various fields of study, as well as, various locations. This emerging technology allows the distribution of processing and data storage operations to a variety of computer plat-forms, thereby maximizing efficiency and flexibility. A DBMS that uses client-server technology is described.     

Depressed patients with dysfunctional families: description and course of illness.

Sixty-eight depressed patients were subdivided according to their family's level of family functioning into functional and dysfunctional groups. Patients from dysfunctional families did not differ from those from functional families on measures of severity of depression, chronicity of depression, depression subtypes, other nonaffective psychiatric diagnoses, history of depression, or neuroendocrine functioning. Patients from dysfunctional families did have significantly higher levels of neuroticism. A 12-month follow-up of these patients indicated that depressed patients with dysfunctional families had a significantly poorer course of illness, as manifested by higher levels of depression, lower levels of overall adjustment, and a lower proportion of recovered patients. Thus, impaired family functioning appears to be an important prognostic factor in major depression.     

Manipulation of visual mental images in children and adults.

Recently, there has been a debate on whether visual patterns can be transformed and reinterpreted in mental imagery. In the present study, task demands and age of subjects were manipulated to see whether children and adults were able to discover a novel visual pattern after transforming a mental image. Two tasks, called combination and subtraction, were devised. They consist of either compounding or taking away parts of images to discover a new construal. Results indicate that not only adults, but also children aged 6 and 10, are able to transform a mental image so as to yield another image with a different interpretation. Task demands had a greater effect on children than adults, consistent with the suggestion that the ease of manipulating mental images is a function of the efficiency of control processes.     

Verbal recoding of visual stimuli impairs mentalimagetransformations

Two experiments were carried out to test the hypothesis that verbal recoding of visual stimuli in short-term memory influences long-term memory encoding and impairs subsequent mental image operations. Easy and difficult-to-name stimuli were used. When rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise, each stimulus revealed a new pattern consisting of two capital letters joined together. In both experiments, subjects first learned a short series of stimuli and were then asked to rotate mental images of the stimuli in order to detect the hidden letters. In Experiment 1, articulatory suppression was used to prevent subjects from subvocal rehearsal when learning the stimuli, whereas in Experiment 2, verbal labels were presented with each stimulus during learning to encourage a reliance on the verbal code. As predicted, performance in the imagery task was significantly improved by suppression when the stimuli were easy to name (Experiment 1) but was severely disrupted by labeling when the stimuli were difficult to name (Experiment 2). We concluded that verbal recoding of stimuli in short-term memory during learning disrupts the ability to generate veridical mental images from long-term memory.     

Duration of auditory sensory memory in parents of children with SLI: a mismatch negativity study

In a previous behavioral study, we showed that parents of children with SLI had a subclinical deficit in phonological short-term memory. Here, we tested the hypothesis that they also have a deficit in nonverbal auditory sensory memory. We measured auditory sensory memory using a paradigm involving an electrophysiological component called the mismatch negativity (MMN). The MMN is a measure of the brain's ability to detect a difference between a frequent standard stimulus (1000 Hz tone) and a rare deviant one (1200 Hz tone). Memory effects were assessed by varying the inter-stimulus interval (ISI) between the standard and deviant. We predicted that parents of children with SLI would have a smaller MMN than parents of typically developing children at a long ISI (3000 ms), but not at a short one (800 ms). This was broadly confirmed. However, individual differences in MMN amplitude did not correlate with measures of phonological short-term memory. Attenuation of MMN amplitude at the longer ISI thus did not provide unambiguous support for the hypothesis of a reduced auditory sensory memory in parents of affected children. We conclude by reviewing possible explanations for the observed group effects.     

Neurocognitive mechanisms of anxiety: an integrative account

Anxiety can be hugely disruptive to everyday life. Anxious individuals show increased attentional capture by potential signs of danger, and interpret expressions, comments and events in a negative manner. These cognitive biases have been widely explored in human anxiety research. By contrast, animal models have focused upon the mechanisms underlying acquisition and extinction of conditioned fear, guiding exposure-based therapies for anxiety disorders. Recent neuroimaging studies of conditioned fear, attention to threat and interpretation of emotionally ambiguous stimuli indicate common amygdala-prefrontal circuitry underlying these processes, and suggest that the balance of activity within this circuitry is altered in anxiety, creating a bias towards threat-related responses. This provides a focus for future translational research, and targeted pharmacological and cognitive interventions.     

Secondary school pupils’ views of their school peer counselling for bullying service

Pupils (n=99) from two secondary schools in the UK were interviewed to investigate their views and experiences of the peer counselling for bullying service set up in their school. They were asked about various things concerning (1) the characteristics of the service and service providers that they valued and (2) their reasons for not using the service. Overall, a majority of participants reported a willingness to use this type of service and they identified numerous characteristics that they valued, including peer counsellors with good listening skills who were trustworthy and maintained confidentiality. A noteworthy proportion of participants also wanted the service to provide advice on solving bullying‐related problems. Some barriers to using the service were also identified, including fear of being stigmatised. Responses offered by girls and boys, and by users and non‐users of the service, were compared and several significant differences emerged. The results are discussed in terms of the implications for adults who run this type of service and the peer counsellors who deliver it.     

Self-Disclosure and the Therapeutic Frame: Concerns for Novice Practitioners

Under the influence of the intersubjective or relational perspective, guidelines for establishing the therapeutic frame in psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy are undergoing modification. Therapeutic interventions such as disclosing subjective reactions have a sound theoretical basis, but they must be executed judiciously within a context of general neutrality, anonymity, and abstinence. Novice practitioners ought not attempt the more difficult relational interventions until they have acquired experience and security in the basic tenets of psychoanalytic practice, including how to maintain the traditional therapeutic frame. Inexperience in knowing when and under what circumstances to attempt self-disclosure of therapist affect, and insecurity in examining one's countertransference, have the potential to exacerbate enactments and entanglements for beginning therapists, as is illustrated in a case example.     

Systematic review of the psychometric properties of transphobia scales

Introduction: Prejudice and discrimination against transgender individuals (i.e., transphobia) is pervasive and has been shown to have pernicious effects on the physical (e.g., substance abuse and other self-harm behaviors) and psychological (e.g., depression and suicidal ideation) well-being of those targeted.

Aims: To date, a review of the psychometric properties of scales assessing transphobia has not been conducted; this gap compromises researchers' ability to make informed measurement decisions.

Methods: In the current study, 61 articles that contained 83 scales were identified, and their adherence to best practices in psychometric testing was evaluated.

Results: Most of the transphobia scales included in the current review did not provide sufficient information about item generation and refinement, scale dimensionality, scale score reliability, or validity. Each scale was entered into a table and was ranked on the basis of its total score. A score of 1 was issued for each psychometric feature that adhered to best practice guidelines, with total scores ranging from 0 to 5 (i.e., higher scores denote greater psychometric soundness).

Discussion: Properties of the reviewed scales are summarized and recommendations are made for future transphobia scale development and validation. The measures that emerged as possessing the highest scores and, subsequently, the greatest utility are identified.