Comparing educational interventions: Correcting misperceived norms improves college students' mental health attitudes

This research targeted potential psychological contributors to college students' low levels of help‐seeking for mental distress using a field experiment. Researchers randomly assigned 520 undergraduates to 15‐min interventions: a novel, theory‐driven social norms intervention correcting misperceived distress, stigma, and help‐seeking norms; a general education intervention increasing mental health awareness; and a stress management active control condition. The norms intervention instilled more accurate perceptions of mental health norms and temporarily reduced perceived public stigma compared to other conditions. The norms and general education interventions improved attitudes toward seeking help for mental distress for at least 2 months, relative to the control. Effects on help‐seeking behavior were not observed in this timeframe. This research elucidates the robustness of brief social psychological mental health interventions on college campuses.     

Maternal responsiveness and search for hidden objects and contingency learning by infants

The relationship between maternal responsiveness and infant cognition was examined during two activities: the search for hidden objects and the learning of a contingency rule. Thirty-four mother–infant dyads were observed in a laboratory setting when the infants were 11 months old. The experimental session included three phases: a search for hidden objects (Piagetian tasks), the learning of a contingency rule on a touch screen, and a mother–infant play session using a standardised toy. The results indicated a link between performances in the search and contingency tasks. Moreover, infants who succeeded in both tasks had mothers who displayed higher responsiveness score. The findings are discussed in terms of the infant's detection of relevant stimulus information. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Reliability and Validity of Three Measures of Multicultural Competency

The purpose of this study was to examine the reliability and validity of 3 measures of multicultural competency, the Multicultural Counseling Awareness Scale: Form B (MCAS), the Multicultural Awareness‐Knowledge‐and‐Skills Survey (MAKSS), and the Survey of Graduate Students' Experiences with Diversity (GSEDS). Data were collected from 120 master's‐level students from counseling programs accredited by the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs or the equivalent. The findings generally support the psychometric soundness of these surveys, with some important exceptions. Guidelines for their use and directions for additional research are provided.     

The Psychology Graduate Applicant’s Portal (www.psychgrad.org)

Applying to graduate school in psychology can be an intimidating process. Many obstacles must be overcome, such as applying to a program appropriate to the specific applicant, getting good GRE scores, submitting a clear and well-written statement of purpose, and obtaining letters of recommendation, to name just a few. Much information is available to assist applicants in these tasks, but finding this information can cause problems even for experienced Internet users. The goal of this project is to create an easily accessible Web clearing house of information on applying to graduate school in psychology. This Web site, called the Psychology Graduate Applicant’s Portal (or PsychGrad.org), contains targeted links to other Web pages with valuable information, book recommendations on the application process, polls to measure issues important to the graduate applicants, site-unique advice on graduate programs, a message board to exchange information and experiences, and other information relevant to the application process.     

Enhancing learning through strategy instruction and group interaction: is active generation of elaborations critical?

We examined strategic intervention when learners were actively engaged in group discussion to assess the impact of peer interaction. In addition, memory performance was compared between students who generated or evaluated elaborations when using the elaborative interrogation strategy, as well as between a supported strategy where learners were provided with explanatory elaborations and a self‐study condition. Introductory psychology students (N=263) in groups of 3 to 5 members studied sixty facts about familiar and unfamiliar animals. Overall, the potency of elaborative interrogation was confirmed regardless of whether students studied interactively or independently. The contribution of group members in facilitating knowledge when the group was able to share sophisticated strategic information also was highlighted. Most critically, when background knowledge was sufficient to promote connections between existing and new material, it was the active generation of elaborations that maximized learning. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Does maintenance of colour categories rely on language? Evidence to the contrary from a case of semantic dementia

Recent neuropsychological evidence, supporting a strong version of Whorfian principles of linguistic relativity, has reinvigorated debate about the role of language in colour categorisation. This paper questions the methodology used in this research and uses a novel approach to examine the unique contribution of language to categorisation behaviour. Results of three investigations are reported. The first required development of objective measures of category coherence and consistency to clarify questions about healthy control performance on the freesorting colour categorisation task used in previous studies. Between-participant consistency was found to be only moderate and the number of colour categories generated was found to vary markedly between individuals. The second study involved longitudinal neuropsychological examination of a patient whose colour categorisation strategy was monitored in the context of a progressive decline in language due to semantic dementia. Performance on measures of category coherence and consistency was found to be relatively stable over time despite a profound decline in the patient's colour language. In a final investigation we demonstrated that, for both the patient and controls, between- and within-participant consistency were higher than expected by (a) random sorting and (b) sorting perceptually similar chips together. These findings indicate that the maintenance of colour categorisation need not depend on language.     

Processing spatial-temporal information in recent-onset schizophrenia: the study of short-term memory and its susceptibility to distraction

Memory impairment is a core feature in schizophrenia (SZ). The aim of this study was to investigate short-term memory (STM) and its sensitivity to distraction with visual-spatial material. This study comprised 23 recent-onset SZ patients and 23 healthy controls. The degree of disruption upon recall from interleaving irrelevant items within a sequence of to-be-remembered items-the sandwich effect [Hitch, G. J. (1975). The role of attention in visual and auditory suffix effects. Memory and Cognition, 3, 501-505]-was examined. STM performance, whether in the presence or absence of distraction, was poorer and markedly more vulnerable to disruption in SZ. Our results suggest that processing spatial information in STM is susceptible to interference in SZ.     

Social dominance in preschool classrooms

The authors examined preschoolers' aggressive and cooperative behaviors and their associations with social dominance. First and as predicted, directly observed aggressive interactions decreased across the school year, and same-sex aggression occurred more frequently than cross-sex aggression. Next, the authors examined the relation between aggression and reconciliation, cooperation, and social display variables. Teacher ratings of children's aggression related to observed aggression but not to observed "wins" of aggressive bouts. Instead, wins were related to cooperation and display variables. Finally, they examined the relative power of wins and cooperation in predicting 2 measures of social dominance. After age was controlled, wins alone predicted teacher-rated social dominance. Results are discussed in terms of different forms of competition and how school ethos affects these forms.