Children's engagement in antidepressive activities

The relationship between depressive symptomatology and engagement in activities designed to cope with depression was examined among 42 children (8 to 14 years old), their parents, and 167 college students. The Beck Depression Inventory and Children's Depression Inventory were used to assess depression in adults and children, and adult and child forms of Rippere's (1977) Antidepressive Activity Questionnaire were employed to assess the frequency of engagement in and helpfulness of antidepressive activities. For children, depression was more strongly correlated with the helpfulness of than with the frequency of engagement in antidepressive activities; for adults, depression was more strongly related to the frequency than to the helpfulness of antidepressive activities. Girls reported that antidepressive activities were more helpful in combating depression than did boys; women engaged more frequently in antidepressive activities and found such activities more helpful in alleviating depression than did men. Little similarity was observed between the antidepressive activities of children and their parents.     

Self-consciousness, outcome expectancy, and persistence

A study investigated persistence as a function of two variables: the disposition to be self-attentive (called private self-consciousness) and outcome feedback on a prior task that was described as closely related to the target task. More specifically, subjects first completed a concealed-figures test and were told that their performances were either very good or very poor. The second test, which ostensibly measured the same abilities, was an insolvable design problem that is commonly used to measure persistence. Feedback concerning prior outcomes had a direct influence on expectancies for the second task, but persistence on that task was a joint function of feedback and self-consciousness. That is, favorable feedback led to greater persistence than did unfavorable feedback, but only among subjects high in self-consciousness. This finding replicates and extends the results of several previous studies. Discussion centers on the relationship between the present research and an earlier experiment which yielded apparently different results.     

Anticipation of future interaction and the bystander effect

Previous research suggests that people are slower to offer help in an emergency when there are other witnesses than when there are not. This finding has come to be known as the bystander effect. In research that has demonstrated this effect, however, the other witnesses were invariably anonymous others who had no relationship with the subject and with whom the subject probably did not expect to interact again. The present research examined the hypothesis that the expectation of participating in subsequent face-to-face interaction with other bystanders would cause the bystander effect to be minimized. Female college students were led to believe either that they would have no personal contact with the other participants in an ostensible group discussion, or that the participants would be involved in a later face-to-face discussion session. Each subject then participated in what she believed to be an anonymous discussion via intercoms, involving either one person or five persons beside herself. During this period, an ostensible co-subject experienced a choking fit. Help was offered more quickly among subjects who expected future interaction than among those who did not. In the no future interaction condition, latencies to help were longer in six-member than in two-member groups, but the comparable difference, although in the same direction, was not reliable among subjects who expected interaction. Presence of male “co-subjects” in an exploratory condition failed to inhibit helping. Discussion centers on the broader implications of the findings.     

Predicting successful completion of an aftercare program following treatment for alcoholism: the role of dispositional optimism

In this study we investigated several variables as potential predictors of success in completing a transition program after treatment for alcoholism. Subjects were 54 men who had completed a 30-day treatment program and who were subsequently admitted to a 90-day inpatient aftercare program. The outcome measure was successful completion of this latter program. Predictor variables were dispositional optimism, hassles, uplifts, and several demographic variables. Optimism was positively associated with successful outcome. The simple association between uplifts and outcome also approached significance, but in the opposite to expected direction. Discriminant analyses used both of these variables, as well as age and education level, as predictors of successful outcome. There was no evidence of a role for hassles. Discussion centers on the importance of dispositional optimism as a predictor of successful adaptation in a variety of behavioral domains.     

Why does self-reference promote incidental encoding?

Answering a question regarding a stimulus word can cause incidental encoding of the word itself. The thoroughness of the encoding depends in part upon what question is answered. For example, saying whether a word describes oneself causes a particularly high degree of incidental encoding. The study reported here investigated several variables that have been proposed as mediators of that effect. As in previous research, subjects completed an incidental-encoding and recall procedure. They then rated (a) the quality and degree of affect that they would experience if each stimulus word were to be applied to them, (b) the importance to them of the behavioral/psychological dimension implied by the stimulus word, and (c) the degree to which they saw themselves as distinctive on that dimension. As in previous studies, deciding whether a word described the self increased the likelihood of subsequent recall. There also was a highly significant interaction such that words judged to be applicable to self were recalled better than those judged not to be applicable. There was no evidence, however, of a mediational role for any other variable studied. Discussion centers on theoretical implications of the data.     

The Self-Consciousness Scale: A Revised Version for Use with General Populations1

Recent research suggests that some of the wording of the original Self-Consciousness Scale is too abstract for easy understanding by research participants who are not college students. This article presents a revised version of that scale, along with information regarding its psychometric properties. In general, the psychometric properties of the revised scale compare quite favorably to those of the original scale. It is suggested that the revised Self-Consciousness Scale be used whenever data are collected from populations other than college students.     

Functional neuroanatomy of spatial working memory in children

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to examine spatial working memory in 8- to 11-year-old children tested under three conditions. In the visual condition, children were asked to examine the location of a dot on a screen. In the motor condition, children were instructed to push a button that corresponded to the location of a dot presented on a screen. In the memory condition, children were asked to remember the location of a dot presented 1 or 2 trials previously. Subtracting the activation of the motor condition from the memory condition revealed activity in the dorsal aspects of the prefrontal cortex and in the posterior parietal and anterior cingulate cortex. These findings were also obtained in the analysis of the memory minus visual conditions except that motor cortex activation was also observed. These findings parallel those reported in comparable studies of adults and suggest that fMRI may be a useful means of examining function-structure relations in developmental populations.     

Two distinct emotional experiences in romantic relationships: effects of perceptions regarding approach of intimacy and avoidance of conflict

This study examined how perceived position and velocity regarding approach and avoidance in romantic relationships relate to affective experiences. The authors hypothesized that perceived progress toward intimacy would predict positive affect and that perceived movement toward conflict would predict anxious affect. Ninety-two romantic couples recorded perceived levels of, and perceived changes in, both intimacy and conflict twice daily throughout 10 consecutive days using electronic palm-top devices. Multilevel modeling demonstrated that perceived increase in intimacy related to positive affect above and beyond perceptions of intimacy, conflict, and changes in conflict, for both male and female partners. Perceived increase in conflict related to anxious affect above and beyond perceptions of conflict, intimacy, and changes in intimacy, but only among male partners. Findings support a dual-process view of these feelings in romantic relationships and suggest that increases in positive feelings in close relationships depend on enhancing intimacy rather than on decreasing conflict.     

Young children with autism show atypical brain responses to fearful versus neutral facial expressions of emotion

Evidence suggests that autism is associated with impaired emotion perception, but it is unknown how early such impairments are evident. Furthermore, most studies that have assessed emotion perception in children with autism have required verbal responses, making results difficult to interpret. This study utilized high-density event-related potentials (ERPs) to investigate whether 3-4-year-old children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) show differential brain activity to fear versus neutral facial expressions. It has been shown that normal infants as young as 7 months of age show differential brain responses to faces expressing different emotions. ERPs were recorded while children passively viewed photos of an unfamiliar woman posing a neutral and a prototypic fear expression. The sample consisted of 29 3-4-year-old children with ASD and 22 chronological age-matched children with typical development. Typically developing children exhibited a larger early negative component (N300) to the fear than to the neutral face. In contrast, children with ASD did not show the difference in amplitude of this early ERP component to the fear versus neutral face. For a later component, typically developing children exhibited a larger negative slow wave (NSW) to the fear than to the neutral face, whereas children with autism did not show a differential NSW to the two stimuli. In children with ASD, faster speed of early processing (i. e. N300 latency) of the fear face was associated with better performance on tasks assessing social attention (social orienting, joint attention and attention to distress). These data suggest that children with ASD, as young as 3 years of age, show a disordered pattern of neural responses to emotional stimuli.