Are math readiness and personality predictive of first-year retention in engineering?

On the basis of J. G. Borkowski, L. K. Chan, and N. Muthukrishna's model of academic success (2000), the present authors hypothesized that freshman retention in an engineering program would be related to not only basic aptitude but also affective factors. Participants were 129 college freshmen with engineering as their stated major. Aptitude was measured by SAT verbal and math scores, high school grade-point average (GPA), and an assessment of calculus readiness. Affective factors were assessed by the NEO-Five Factor Inventory (FFI; P. I. Costa & R. R. McCrae, 2007), and the Nowicki-Duke Locus of Control (LOC) scale (S. Nowicki & M. Duke, 1974). A binary logistic regression analysis found that calculus readiness and high school GPA were predictive of retention. Scores on the Neuroticism and Openness subscales from the NEO-FFI and LOC were correlated with retention status, but Openness was the only affective factor with a significant unique effect in the binary logistic regression. Results of the study lend modest support to Borkowski's model.     

A daily diary investigation of self-reported alcohol-related direct and indirect aggression

Research supports the relationship between alcohol use and direct aggression, however, scant research has examined the association between alcohol use and indirectly aggressive behavior. Further, extant research has relied on retrospective reporting of behaviors, which may be subject to recall bias. The daily diary methodology enables the assessment of both the between- and within-subject variation, as well as reduces the likelihood of biased reporting. Consequently, the current study utilized a daily diary design to examine (a) associations between daily alcohol use and alcohol-related aggressive behaviors (i.e., direct and indirect); and (b) the co-occurrence of alcohol-related direct and indirect aggression. Participants were 105 (80% female) college student drinkers. Students completed baseline questionnaires and up to 14 consecutive, daily surveys regarding their previous day alcohol use, alcohol-related direct aggression, and alcohol-related indirect aggression. Findings revealed that alcohol use was associated with same day alcohol-related direct and indirect aggression, after controlling for baseline alcohol use. Self-reported alcohol-related direct aggression was more likely to occur on days in which self-reported alcohol-related indirect aggression occurred, after controlling for dispositional aggression, trait self-control, and baseline alcohol use. Results of the study suggest that, similar to alcohol-related direct aggression, alcohol use is associated with an increased likelihood of alcohol-related indirect aggression. Further, the co-occurrence of alcohol-related indirect and direct aggression supports that individuals may be engaging in multiple types of aggressive behaviors. Findings extend previous cross-sectional and qualitative research suggesting that indirect aggression may co-occur, perhaps increasing in severity.     

What is this thing called frequency?

When researchers are interested in the influence of long-term knowledge on performance, printed word frequency is typically the variable of choice. Despite this preference, we know little about what frequency norms measure. They ostensibly index how often and how recently words are experienced, but words appear in context, so frequency potentially reflects an influence of connections with other words. This paper presents the results of a large free association study as well as the results of experiments designed to evaluate the hypothesis that common words have stronger connections to other words. The norms indicate that common words tend to be more concrete but they do not appear to have more associates, stronger associates, or more connections among their associates. Two extralist cued recall experiments showed that, with other attributes being equal, high- and low-frequency words were equally effective as test cues. These results suggest that frequency does not achieve its effects because of stronger or greater numbers of connections to other words, as implied in SAM. Other results indicated that common words have more connections from other words, including their associates, and that free association provides a valid index of associative strength.     

Coping, Conflictual Social Interactions, Social Support, and Mood Among HIV-Infected Persons

This study considers the interrelationships among coping, conflictual social interactions, and social support, as well as their combined associations with positive and negative mood. Research has shown that each of these variables affects adjustment to stressful circumstances. Few studies, however, examine this full set of variables simultaneously. One hundred forty HIV-infected persons completed a questionnaire containing measures of coping, social support, conflictual social interactions, and positive and negative mood. Factor analyses showed that perceived social support and conflictual social interactions formed separate factors and were not strongly related. Compared to perceived social support, social conflict was more strongly related to coping behaviors, especially to social isolation, anger, and wishful thinking. Conflictual social interactions were more strongly related to negative mood than was perceived social support. Coping by withdrawing socially was significantly related to less positive and greater negative mood. The findings point to the importance of simultaneously considering coping, supportive relationships, and conflictual relationships in studies of adjustment to chronic illness. In particular, a dynamic may occur in which conflictual social interactions and social isolation aggravate each other and result in escalating psychological distress.     

TPL—KATS-card sort: A tool for assessing structural knowledge

The study of how individuals organize knowledge has been a popular endeavor for several decades. As a result, techniques have been developed to assess how individuals represent and organize knowledge internally. Although several conceptual knowledge elicitation methods have been developed and used to assess the organization of knowledge, their use is often labor intensive and time consuming. Presented here is a software tool that was developed to reduce the problems associated with manually administering the conceptual knowledge elicitation technique, or card sorting. The TPL—KATS-card sort software not only simplifies the administration of the task, but also adds features to the card-sorting task such as media insertion, time stamping, and instructorless administration. In the present article, an introduction to the card-sorting technique is provided, the new software tool is described, and the advantages of the software are detailed.     

Perception-action coupling during bimanual coordination: the role of visual perception in the coalition of constraints that govern bimanual action

Constraints pertaining to interlimb coordination have been studied extensively in the past decades. In this debate, F. Mechsner (2004) has taken a provocative position by putting primary emphasis on perceptual principles that mediate coordinative stability. Whereas the present authors agree that the role of perceptual principles is of critical importance during coordination, they take issue with Mechsner's extreme position and with the evidence forwarded to support a purely perceptual-cognitive approach to bimanual coordination. More specifically, the authors emphasize that current knowledge about brain function argues against a dualism between perception and action, criticize the presented evidence that posture manipulations during coordination provide decisive evidence against motoric and muscular constraints, and report on potential pitfalls associated with the use of visual transformation procedures to support complex coordination patterns.     

Optimising Exposure for Children and Adolescents with Anxiety,OCD and PTSD: A Systematic Review

Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review - Cognitive behavioural therapy is an effective treatment for anxiety disorders in children and young people; however, many do not benefit. Behavioural...     

Disgust,creatureliness and the accessibility of death‐related thoughts

From an existential terror management theory perspective, disgusting stimuli are threatening to human beings because they make salient people's vulnerability to death. Two studies were designed to assess this proposition by measuring implicit death‐related ideation after individuals were presented with stimuli that either were or were not disgusting, under conditions in which the similarities of humans to other animals or the uniquely human aspects of people were made salient. In Study 1, in which rather extreme disgust‐eliciting pictures were used, disgusting stimuli led to higher death‐thought accessibility than neutral pictures regardless of whether or not participants had previously been primed with similarities between humans and other animals. In Study 2, in which milder verbal disgust‐eliciting stimuli were used, disgusting stimuli led to heightened death‐thought accessibility only when human‐animal similarities were first primed. Implications for the regulation and humanization of the human body and its functions are discussed. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.