Enhancing Initial Parental Engagement in Interventions for Parents of Young Children: A Systematic Review of Experimental Studies

Low rates of participation in parenting interventions may undermine their effectiveness. Although a wide range of strategies to engage parents in interventions are described in the literature, little is known about which engagement strategies are most effective in enhancing parental engagement. This systematic review explores effective engagement strategies to encourage initial parental engagement (recruitment, enrolment, and first attendance) in parenting interventions for parents of children aged 2–8 years old. This review was conducted based on the guidelines of the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions (Higgins and Green 2011) and the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis (Moher et al. 2009). Electronic systematic searches from January 1996 to August 2017 were conducted in PsycINFO, Scopus, ProQuest Social Sciences Journals, CINAHL, and PubMed databases. Eight studies met the inclusion criteria representing 1952 parents from four different countries. Of the engagement strategies tested in included studies (monetary incentive, setting, testimonial, advertisement, and engagement package), three strategies (advertisement, incentive, and engagement package) showed a significant effect on a stage of engagement, but none across stages. The low methodological quality of the selected studies limits their generalisability and thus provides limited evidence regarding effective engagement strategies to increase recruitment, enrolment, and first attendance rates in parenting interventions. There is a need for further, more methodologically rigorous, research evidence regarding how to engage parents more effectively in the early stages of parenting interventions.     

Construct and concurrent validity of the Cambridge neuropsychological automated tests in Portuguese older adults without neuropsychiatric diagnoses and with Alzheimer’s disease dementia

We aimed to analyze the construct and concurrent validity of the Rapid Visual Information Processing (RVP), Paired Associates Learning (PAL), Reaction Time (RTI), and Spatial Working Memory (SWM) tests from the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB®). Inclusion criteria were checked in a first session. The CANTAB and additional pencil-and-paper tests were administered within 1 week. The participants (aged 69–96 years) were 137 Portuguese adults without neuropsychiatric diagnoses and 37 adults with mild-to-moderate Alzheimer’s disease dementia. Comparisons were made between the CANTAB tests and between these tests and the Rey Complex Figure Test (RCFT), Verbal Fluency (VF) test, and some Wechsler Memory Scale-III and Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-III subtests. Most intra-test correlations were stronger than the CANTAB inter-test correlations. The RVP correlated more with VF animals (.44), the PAL with RCFT immediate recall (–.52), the RTI with RVP mean latency (.42), and the SWM with Spatial Span backward (–.39).     

Poststimulation time interval-dependent effects of motor cortex anodal tDCS on reaction-time task performance

Anodal transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) induces long-term potentiation-like plasticity, which is associated with long-lasting effects on different cognitive, emotional, and motor performances. Specifically, tDCS applied over the motor cortex is considered to improve reaction time in simple and complex tasks. The timing of tDCS relative to task performance could determine the efficacy of tDCS to modulate performance. The aim of this study was to compare the effects of a single session of anodal tDCS (1.5 mA, for 15 min) applied over the left primary motor cortex (M1) versus sham stimulation on performance of a go/no-go simple reaction-time task carried out at three different time points after tDCS—namely, 0, 30, or 60 min after stimulation. Performance zero min after anodal tDCS was improved during the whole course of the task. Performance 30 min after anodal tDCS was improved only in the last block of the reaction-time task. Performance 60 min after anodal tDCS was not significantly different throughout the entire task. These findings suggest that the motor cortex excitability changes induced by tDCS can improve motor responses, and these effects critically depend on the time interval between stimulation and task performance.     

Psychometric properties of the Social Skills Questionnaire: Portuguese adaptation of the student form (grades 7 to 12)

The present study aims to analyze the psychometric properties of the student form (Grades 7 to 12) of the Social Skills Questionnaire authored by Gresham and Elliott (1990), on a sample of Portuguese adolescents. Participants included 573 students, both female and male, aged 14 to 19. Reliability was assessed through Cronbach's alpha and was .87 for the total scale, ranging from.58 to .72 for the subscales. A confirmatory factor analysis revealed that the main adjustment indices presented unexpected values. A principal components analysis indicated that several items of the cooperation subscale correlated with other factors. Adequate adjustment indices were found when cooperation was removed from the model. Semantic dualities due to cultural factors and difficulties assuming the cooperation dimension as an independent dimension might explain the results observed. The reorganization of the SSQ offers a reliable and valid instrument for research within the Portuguese population.     

Third International Conference on Spatial Cognition: “Dynamics in Spatial Interactions”. Rome - Perugia, Italy: September 12th–15th 2006. www.icsc2006.org - committee@icsc2006.org

Call for Papers

Third International Conference on Spatial Cognition: “Dynamics in Spatial Interactions”. Rome - Perugia, Italy: September 12th–15th 2006. www.icsc2006.org - committee@icsc2006.org     

Effects of manipulating valence and arousal components of mood on specificity of autobiographical memory

An important cognitive deficit in clinical depression is the inability to be specific in recalling personal memories, a phenomenon coined "overgeneral memory" by Williams and Broadbent. Although there is general consensus that overgeneral memory is not state-dependent, most of the evidence originates from studies of this effect in clinical populations. The two components of mood, valence and arousal, were manipulated to examine their influence on memory specificity in a nonclinical sample of university undergraduate students. In Exp. 1, a Velten procedure was used to induce elated, depressed, or neutral mood states. No difference was found in autobiographical memory specificity among the three groups. In Exp. 2, high and low arousal states were induced through physical exercise. A low arousal state resulted in an increased proportion of overgeneral memories, suggesting that this memory phenomenon may be influenced by the arousal component of mood.     

Individual characteristics and career exploration in adolescence

The effects of gender, age and school grade on several career exploration dimensions measured by the Career Exploration Survey were investigated. Subjects were high school students facing an imminent career decision. Regression analyses indicated that sex and grade-level were the most significant and prevailing individual characteristics related to the adolescents' career exploration behaviours, reactions and beliefs. Implications for career exploration interventions are discussed.