Development of a borderline personality disorder-relevant picture stimulus set

Individuals with borderline personality disorder (BPD) report erratic and poorly regulated emotional behavior. However, these abnormalities have not been confirmed in laboratory studies. This may be because the emotional stimuli employed have not been sufficiently relevant or evocative of psychological themes germane to BPD (e.g., threats to attachment). The aim of this study was to develop a picture stimulus set relevant to BPD that could be employed in research to examine emotion dysregulation thought to be central to BPD. Ninety pictures were initially selected from the International Affective Picture System that had putative interpersonal and social content across a range of pleasantness and intensity. The set was then rated by 19 clinical BPD research experts on two dimensions: How self-referential the picture would be to someone with BPD and the extent to which the picture represented an ideal-other to a prototypic BPD case. Two sets of pictures were generated for future research with BPD participants.     

Speeded induction under uncertainty: The influence of multiple categories and feature conjunctions

When people are uncertain about the category membership of an item (e.g., Is it a dog or a dingo?), research shows that they tend to rely only on the dominant or most likely category when making inductions (e.g., How likely is it to befriend me?). An exception has been reported using speeded induction judgments where participants appeared to use information from multiple categories to make inductions (Verde, Murphy, &; Ross, 2005). In two speeded induction studies, we found that participants tended to rely on the frequency with which features co-occurred when making feature predictions, independently of category membership. This pattern held whether categories were considered implicitly (Experiment 1) or explicitly (Experiment 2) prior to feature induction. The results converge with other recent work suggesting that people often rely on feature conjunction information, rather than category boundaries, when making inductions under uncertainty.     

Causal explanation improves judgment under uncertainty,but rarely in a Bayesian way

Three studies reexamined the claim that clarifying the causal origin of key statistics can increase normative performance on Bayesian problems involving judgment under uncertainty. Experiments 1 and 2 found that causal explanation did not increase the rate of normative solutions. However, certain types of causal explanation did lead to a reduction in the magnitude of errors in probability estimation. This effect was most pronounced when problem statistics were expressed in percentage formats. Experiment 3 used process-tracing methods to examine the impact of causal explanation of false positives on solution strategies. Changes in probability estimation following causal explanation were the result of a mixture of individual reasoning strategies, including non-Bayesian mechanisms, such as increased attention to explained statistics and approximations of subcomponents of Bayes’ rule. The results show that although causal explanation of statistics can affect the way that a problem is mentally represented, this does not necessarily lead to an increased rate of normative responding.     

Evidence of Absence: Abstract Metrical Structure in Speech Planning

Rhythmic structure in speech is characterized by sequences of stressed and unstressed syllables. A large body of literature suggests that speakers of English attempt to achieve rhythmic harmony by evenly distributing stressed syllables throughout prosodic phrases. The question remains as to how speakers plan metrical structure during speech production and whether it is planned independently of phonemes. To examine this, we designed a tongue twister task consisting of disyllabic word pairs with overlapping phonological segments and either matching or non-matching metrical structure. Results showed that speakers had more difficulty producing metrically regular word pairs, compared to irregular pairs; that is, word pairs with irregular meter had faster productions and fewer speech errors in this production task. This finding of metrical regularity inhibiting production is inconsistent with an abstract metrical structure that is planned independently of phonemes at the point of phonological encoding.     

Dimensions of Anxiety Sensitivity and Their Relationship to Nonclinical Panic

The goal of the present study was to examine the factor structure of the Anxiety Sensitivity Index (ASI; S. Reiss, R. A. Peterson, D M. Gursky, & R. J. McNally, 1986) and the replicability, reliability, and validity of its dimensions in a nonclinical sample. One-thousand-and-seventy-one undergraduate volunteers completed the ASI and a modified version of the Panic Attack Questionnaire (PAQ; G. R. Norton, J. Dorward, & B. J. Cox, 1986). A principal components analysis, using oblique rotation and parallel analysis, yielded three ASI dimensions that were highly consistent with those reported in previously published studies. Individuals classified as nonclinical panickers scored higher than nonpanickers on the Physical Concerns and Cognitive Concerns subscales of the ASI. Although spontaneous panic attacks were not significantly related to scores on any ASI scale, the occurrence of panic attacks in the past month was related to higher scores on the Cognitive Concerns subscale. The results are discussed in terms of cognitive theories of panic, and limitations of the present study and directions for future research are addressed.     

Shyness-environment interaction: A view from the shy side through auto-photography

It is proposed that shyness both induces and is induced by the perception of the environment This study of person-situation transaction used photographic images taken by shy and less shy subjects in response to the question, “Who are you?” A content analysis of the photographs showed that shy persons were less person-oriented, more aesthetically oriented, and showed a reduced range of orientations when compared to less shy persons The hierarchy of orientations for shy persons was aesthetic, people, self, and school, whereas for less shy persons it was people, self, aesthetic, and other persons Thus, the difference between shy and less shy persons is in the pattern of orientations rather than in orientations in and of themselves Moreover, one single difference between the groups, such as the lesser orientation toward people, does not justify the interpretation of shyness as a “people phobia”     

Feeling Economically Dependent on One's Job: Its Origins and Functions With Regard to Worker Well-Being

The origins and functions of feeling economically dependent on one's job were examined among a sample of 168 hospital workers. As predicted, economic dependency was found to be greater the more dependents workers have, the less money they earn from their jobs, the less other income they have in their family units, the more they adhere to an instrumental work orientation, and the less mobile they perceive themselves to be. Also as predicted, it was found that economic dependency fully mediated the relationship between 4 of the 5 antecedents (number of dependents, other income, instrumental values, and perceived mobility) and the subjective well-being of workers. Job-related income was observed to have both direct and indirect effects. Further, the relationship between economic dependency and subjective well-being was negative. These latter findings are discussed and implications drawn for the future use of the economic dependency construct.     

Impact of traumatic incidents on family-of-origin functioning: An empirical study

This pilot study was an attempt to empirically validate some of the clinical observations made about traumatic incidents and families in the literature. The study hypothesized that there would be a significant difference in family functioning between those subjects that reported feeling traumatized and those subjects that did not report feeling traumatized, there would be a significant difference in anxiety between the identified trauma group and the identified non-trauma group, and there would be a significant difference in the breadth of support systems between the two groups. The results indicated that there were significant differences between groups of individuals who were identified as traumatized or non-traumatized. The differences included family functioning, individual feelings of anxiety, and report of familial support systems. The findings of this study were congruent with and supportive of much clinical literature on families and traumatic incidents.