Division of Labor: Procedural Learning in Teacher-led Small Groups

This article presents an observational study of teacher-student interaction in fourth-grade small group sessions introducing an algorithm for solving remainder divisions. The groups are segregated by arithmetic achievement. Teacher and student input is analyzed with reference to a cognitive analysis of the task. A quantitative analysis compares amounts of teacher and student input at specific, cognitively significant points in procedures across groups. This analysis shows that there are qualitative differences both in solution strategies that evolve in the course of the lesson and in the extent to which the teacher-student interaction focuses on two "critical constraints" that are central to acquisition of this procedure. A subsequent analysis of transcribed protocols from the small group sessions discloses interactional mechanisms that can account for these differences. Much of the teacher's input is characterized as an unpacking of the necessary procedure by calling in subprocedures which take the students' responses as arguments and by specifying subprocedures lower down in the goal hierarchy when students failed to produce adequate responses. The interactive mechanisms combine with students' background knowledge to result in the group differences detected in the quantitative analysis.     

Military Influence Tactics: Lessons Learned in Iraq and Afghanistan

When deployed U.S. soldiers attempt to influence the attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors of civilians, success can save lives and failure can be deadly. Survey data from 228 military personnel with deployment experience to Iraq and Afghanistan revealed that in a challenging wartime environment, empathy, respect, prior relationships, and familiarity with influence targets predicted success in cross-cultural influence attempts. Influence techniques involving resources and positive feelings were used more commonly in relatively successful influence attempts; negative tactics were used more commonly in unsuccessful attempts.     

On his brother's blindness

This commentary is slightly different from previous ones in that the clinical work presented took place some 20 years ago. This gave an opportunity, for those commentators who wished to, to take up how they think the work of a child psychotherapist might have changed in the intervening years.     

Processing ordinality and quantity: ERP evidence of separate mechanisms

We report an event-related potential (ERP) experiment of ordinal processing exploring the relationship between ordinal and numerical information.     

Deeper attentional masking by lateral objects in children with autism

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is often associated with a detail-oriented perception and overselective attention in visual tasks, such as visual search and crowding. These results were obtained manipulating exclusively the spatial properties of the stimuli: few is known about the spatio-temporal dynamics of visual processing in ASD. In this study we employed an attentional masking (AM) paradigm comparing children with ASD and IQ-matched typically developing (TD) controls. The AM effect refers to an impaired identification of a target followed by a competitive masking object at different proximities in space and time. We found that ASD and TD groups did not differ in the AM effect provoked by the competitive object displayed in the same position of the target. In contrast, children with ASD showed a deeper and prolonged interference than the TD group when the masking object was displayed in the lateral position. These psychophysical results suggest that the inefficient attentional selection in ASD depends on the spatio-temporal interaction between competitive visual objects. These evidence are discussed in the light of the ASD altered neural connectivity hypothesis and the reentrant theory of perception.     

Women Inmate Substance Abusers’ Reactivity to Visual Alcohol, Cigarette, Marijuana, and Crack-Cocaine Cues: Approach and Avoidance as Separate Dimensions of Reactivity

Despite the growing recognition for multidimensional assessments of cue-elicited craving, few studies have attempted to measure multiple response domains associated with craving. The present study evaluated the Ambivalence Model of Craving (Breiner et al. Alcohol Research and Health 23:197–206, 1999; Stritzke et al. 2007) using a unique cue reactivity methodology designed to capture both the desire to use (approach inclination) and desire to not consume (avoidance inclination) in a clinical sample of incarcerated female substance abusers. Participants were 155 incarcerated women who were participating in or waiting to begin participation in a nine-month drug treatment program. Results indicated that all four substance cue-types (alcohol, cigarette, marijuana, and crack cocaine) had good reliability and showed high specificity. Also, the validity of measuring approach and avoidance as separate dimensions was supported, as demonstrated by meaningful clinical distinctions between groups evincing different reactivity patterns and incremental prediction of avoidance inclinations on measures of stages of change readiness. Taken together, results continue to highlight the importance of measuring both approach and avoidance inclinations in the study of cue-elicited craving.     

Penn State Worry Questionnaire: Findings Form Normative and Clinical Samples in Denmark

Anxiety disorders are among the most prevalent psychiatric disturbances in childhood. None-the-less, they often go unrecognized and untreated, which puts the child at risk for developing additional difficulties, such as academic difficulties, depression, and substance abuse. Further knowledge and valid assessment tools are essential to identify at-risk children. The present study investigates (i) the factor structure of the Penn State Worry Questionnaire for Children (PSWQ-C) using a large Danish community sample (N?=?933), and (ii) its treatment sensitivity in clinically anxious children (N?=?30) treated with cognitive behavioral therapy. Results from the community sample replicated previous findings supporting the strong psychometric properties of the PSWQ-C, and yielded Danish norms and clinical cut-offs for the measure. Clinically anxious children with a generalized anxiety disorder (GAD; N?=?10) diagnosis reported significantly higher levels of worry than anxious children without GAD (N?=?20). At post treatment, worry levels in children with GAD but not in anxious children without GAD were normalized. Findings regarding worry in the community sample are discussed in light of normal child development. Implications for the use of the PSWQ-C as a useful and important tool in clinical assessment by psychiatrists and psychologists in their treatment of anxious children and adolescents are also discussed.     

Poor Readers but Compelled to Read: Stroop Effects in Developmental Dyslexia

We studied a group of 24 children with dyslexia in second to fifth primary school grades by using a discrete-trial computerized version of the Stroop Color-Word Test. Since the classic Stroop effect depends on the interference of reading with color naming, one would expect these children to show no interference or, at least, less interference than normal readers. Children with dyslexia showed, however, a Stroop effect larger than normal readers of the same age. This suggests that reading, although difficult and slow, is an inescapable step that precedes naming both in poor and in normal readers.     

Shell games,information, and counterfactuals

Cohen and Meskin 2006 Cohen, Jonathan and Aaron, Meskin. 2006. An Objective Counterfactual Theory of Information. Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 84: 333–352. [Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar] have recently proposed a novel counterfactual account of information. I argue that it is a step down from its intended target, namely Dretske's 1981 Dretske, Fred. 1981. Knowledge and the Flow of Information, Cambridge Mass: MIT Press.  [Google Scholar] theory of information. Thinking of the information carried by signals in terms of counterfactuals leads to falsely diagnosing bona fide instances of information transmission as not being instances of information transmission at all, with major loss of explanatory power.     

Attentional bias and emotional reactivity as predictors and moderators of behavioral treatment for social phobia

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is a well-established treatment for anxiety disorders, and evidence is accruing for the effectiveness of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). Little is known about factors that relate to treatment outcome overall (predictors), or who will thrive in each treatment (moderators). The goal of the current project was to test attentional bias and negative emotional reactivity as moderators and predictors of treatment outcome in a randomized controlled trial comparing CBT and ACT for social phobia. Forty-six patients received 12 sessions of CBT or ACT and were assessed for self-reported and clinician-rated symptoms at baseline, post treatment, 6, and 12 months. Attentional bias significantly moderated the relationship between treatment group and outcome with patients slow to disengage from threatening stimuli showing greater clinician-rated symptom reduction in CBT than in ACT. Negative emotional reactivity, but not positive emotional reactivity, was a significant overall predictor with patients high in negative emotional reactivity showing the greatest self-reported symptom reduction.