Psychopathy and COVID-19: Callousness,impulsivity, and motivational reasons for engaging in prevention behavior

Two direct replication studies were conducted to investigate the associations of psychopathic traits with engagement in COVID-19 prevention behavior and motivational reasons for engaging in such behavior. College undergraduate students completed two self-report measures of psychopathic traits based on the four-factor conceptualization of psychopathy (callous affect, manipulative tendency, erratic lifestyle, criminal tendency) and the triarchic conceptualization of psychopathy (meanness, disinhibition, boldness). Participants then reported the degree to which they engaged in COVID-19 prevention behavior currently and in the past, and reported their self-focused and other-focused motivational reasons for doing so. Results aggregated across both studies (N = 292) revealed that traits reflecting emotional callousness and impulsivity independently predicted lower levels of other-focused reasons for engaging in prevention behavior. Moreover, controlling for other-focused reasons appreciably reduced negative associations of emotional callousness and impulsivity with prevention behavior. The results provide insight into points of convergence in conceptualization and measurement of psychopathy from multiple theoretical perspectives and the importance of considering the impact of divisive personality traits on motivation to protect others during pandemics.     

Factor analysis of the cognitive-somatic anxiety questionnaire

The Cognitive-Somatic Anxiety Questionnaire (CSAQ; Schwartz, Davidson, & Goleman, 1978) is a brief self-report rating scale designed to differentiate between cognitive and somatic symptoms of anxiety. The CSAQ gained relatively widespread acceptance as a behavioral assessment instrument before much was known about its psychometric properties. Psychometric studies of the CSAQ (e.g., DeGood & Tait, 1987) have raised questions about the instrument's item content and subscale structure. The primary purpose of the present study was to determine whether the Cognitive and Somatic subscales correspond to the instrument's factorial structure in a clinically anxious population. The sample consisted of 120 nonpsychotic psychiatric inpatients. Factor analysis with oblique rotation accounted for 60% of the total variance and yielded four factors that do not conform to the Cognitive-Somatic subscale structure. The results challenge the validity of the CSAQ and suggest the need for an improved instrument capable of differentiating the multidimensional features of clinical anxiety.     

Relationships between the U.S. Secret Service and the behavioral and social sciences

The United States Secret Service is a federal law enforcement agency of the U.S. Department of the Treasury. The Secret Service investigates crimes related to U.S. currency, credit card fraud, forgery of government obligations, and other related violations. However, the Secret Service is perhaps best known for its protective and investigative responsibilities involving the President and Vice President of the United States, members of their immediate families, and visiting foreign dignitaries. During the past 22 years, concern for protective responsibilities has provoked occasional and sometimes fruitful dialogue between the Secret Service and members of the professional behavioral and social sciences communities. This article describes the evolution and future possibilities of that relationship by providing: (a) a brief history and overview of the Secret Service, focusing on its protective and investigative responsibilities, (b) an analysis of the recent contributions of the behavioral and social sciences to the Secret Service, and (c) an assessment of current and future directions to be taken in the professional behavioral sciences intramural and extramural research programs recently established by the Secret Service.     

Perception of dynamic information for vowels in syllable onsets and offsets

It has been demonstrated using the “silent-center” (SC) syllable paradigm that there is sufficient information in syllable onsets and offsets,taken together, to support accurate identification of vowels spoken in both citation-form syllables and syllables spoken in sentence context. Using edited natural speech stimuli, the present study examined the identification of American English vowels when increasing amounts of syllable onsetsalone or syllable offsetsalone were presented in their original sentence context. The stimuli were /d/-vowel-/d/ syllables spoken in a short carrier sentence by a male speaker. Listeners attempted to identify the vowels in experimental conditions that differed in the number of pitch periods presented and whether the pitch periods were from syllable onsets or syllable off-sets. In general, syllable onsets were more informative than syllable offsets, although neither onsets nor offsets alone specified vowel identity as well as onsets and offsets together (SC syllables). Vowels differed widely in ease of identification; the diphthongized long vowels /e/, /ae/, /o/ were especially difficult to identify from syllable offsets. Identification of vowels as “front” or “back” was accurate, even from short samples of the syllable; however, vowel "height" was quite difficult to determine, again, especially from syllable offsets. The results emphasize the perceptual importance of time-varying acoustic parameters, which are the direct consequence of the articulatory dynamics involved in producing syllables.     

Confidence ratings in speech perception research: Evaluation of an efficient technique for discrimination testing

Discriminability of voice onset time was determined for four naive Ss in order to evaluate the relative efficiency of a testing procedure which utilized confidence ratings along with the conventional oddity task. Ss rated their judgments on oddity trials as “very very sure,” “somewhat sure,” or “just guessing.” Each S’s discrimination scores were given weights according to his ratings, yielding functions that were compared with those computed using unweighted percent correct scores. The confidence-rating technique produced readily interpretable results with about one-third as many judgments as are needed when the conventional procedure is used. Possible problems with the interpretation of the functions and the generalizability of the technique are discussed.     

The relationship between perception and production of /w/, /r/, and /l/ by three-year-old children

Twenty-one normally developing 3-year-old children were tested on two approximant consonant contrasts, rake-lake and wake-rake, and a control contrast, wake-bake. Perception was assessed in a two-choice picture identification paradigm; stimuli were (1) natural and computer synthesized “clear cases” of the minimal pairs, and (2) synthetic stimulus series which interpolated on acoustic dimensions that differentiate the minimal pairs. As a group, the children showed very accurate perception of the minimal pairs. Performance on the synthetic series yielded consistent identification of the endpoint stimuli and monotonic functions with abrupt crossovers at the phoneme boundary. Children who did not yet articulate /r/ and /l/ appropriately showed somewhat less consistent perception than children who produced all phonemes correctly.     

Perception of synthetic nasal consonants in initial and final syllable position

Identification and discrimination of synthesized syllable-initial and syllable-final nasal consonants (/mæ-næ-ηæ/ and æm-æn-æη) by adult American subjects were assessed to determine (1) whether place-of-articulation contrasts in nasals, cued only by second and third formant transition variations, were perceived categorically, and (2) if linguistic experience affected_ the perception of this acoustic dimension. In two experiments, subjects produced consistent identification functions with sharp boundaries between familiar phoneme categories. Corresponding discrimination functions showed “peaks” of relatively accurate perception for cross-category comparison pairs, indicating categorical perception. Identification consistency and discrimination accuracy were inferior for the/n/-/η/ contrast in the unfamiliar (and phonologically inappropriate) syllable-initial condition compared to the familiar syllable-final condition. No such difference was found in identification and discrimination of the acoustically comparable oral stop consonant contrast/d/-/g/in syllable-initial and syllable-final position. These results provide evidence that perception of linguistically relevant acoustic dimensions by adults is constrained, at least in part, by their familiarity with those acoustic (and phonetic) contrasts in specific phonological contexts.     

Twilight of the idols? pluralism and mystical <Emphasis Type="Italic">praxis</Emphasis> in Islam

In this article, we discuss the current trend of authoritarianism in the Islamic world, especially as embodied in the institution of taqlîd, whereby a lay person blindly follows a religious scholar. We will compare this to the mystical tradition of Ibn ‘Arabî as well as the early esoteric Shî’ite tradition, where a much more “rebellious” type of Islam was offered and provided purviews of pluralism and universalism that challenge authoritarian closures of interpretation in relationship with God. By way of further comparison, we will also attend to the writings of some liberal and pluralistic thinkers in the Muslim world.

Maintaining cheerfulness in the midst of a gloomy task, fraught with immeasurable responsibility, is no small feat; and yet what is needed more than cheerfulness? -Nietzsche Twilight of the Idols

     

Predictive validity of the CognitiveVs. Somatic Anxiety Distinction

The purpose of this study was to test the predictive validity of an instrument, The Cognitive-Somatic Anxiety Questionnaire (CSAQ), which purports to measure separately cognitive and somatic anxiety. Twelve subjects with either predominantly cognitive or somatic anxiety received a treatment that matched their predominant anxiety mode (“matched”), and twelve received a treatment which addressed the secondary anxiety mode (“mismatched”). After five sessions, the “matched” subjects reported significantly fewer anxiety symptoms than the “mismatched” subjects. The results support the predictive validity of the CSAQ, and suggest that anxiety may not be a unidimensional phenomenon. The implications of these results for clinical practice are discussed.