Sex-Dimorphic Color Preference in Children with Gender Identity Disorder: A Comparison to Clinical and Community Controls

The present study was designed to assess sex-dimorphic color preferences in children with gender identity disorder (47 boys, 18 girls), clinical controls (65 boys, 35 girls), and community controls (65 boys, 35 girls). The mean age of the children was 7.63 years (range?=?3–12 years). Children were shown a hexagon-shaped display of 144 colors extracted from PowerPoint?. Each child was asked to choose his or her three favorite colors (Trials 1–3) by pointing to them, naming them, and then to provide a justification for each choice. From the entire array, children labeled a total of 11 different colors: black, blue, brown, gray, green, orange, pink, purple, red, white, and yellow. For three of the colors (blue, pink/purple, and red), there was evidence for normative sex differences in color preference, and, for the colors blue and pink/purple, the gender-referred children showed inverted patterns of color preference. For the color blue, luminance values showed that the gender-referred boys and control girls preferred lighter shades, whereas the gender-referred girls and control boys preferred darker shades. Qualitative analysis indicated that gender-specific justifications were uncommon, even for the sex-dimorphic colors. Gender-referred children showed inverted gender-stereotyped color preferences, which are likely related to their more general pattern of cross-gender identification. Principles of gender-differentiated development derived from gender-schema theory are used to explain the group differences in color preferences.     

Marriage—and its alternatives: An Anglican perspective,yesterday and today

This article looks first at how the institution of marriage has been, and currently is, understood by Anglican Christians, with a particular focus on the Church of England. It contrasts the ‘older’ understanding of marriage, as expressed in the Book of Common Prayer, with more contemporary liturgies. It then seeks to explore whether this clear development during the last 100 years in the understanding of marriage means that there is scope for opening up discussion about alternatives to marriage such as intentional singleness, cohabitation and same-sex relationships. Particular attention is given to the discussion at the Lambeth Conference of Anglican bishops, meeting in 1998, and to a key Church of England report, Issues in Human Sexuality.     

The Surveyability of Mathematical Proof: A Historical Perspective

This paper rejoins the debate surrounding Thomas Tymockzko’s paper on the surveyability of proof, first published in the Journal of Philosophy, and makes the claim that by attending to certain broad features of modern conceptions of proof we may understand ways in which the debate surrounding the surveyability of proof has heretofore remained unduly circumscribed. Motivated by these historical reflections, I suggest a distinction between local and global surveyability which I believe has the promise to open up significant new advances in the philosophy of mathematics.     

The Development and Validation of the Health Proneness Questionnaire

This series of studies describes the development, validation and potential use of the Health Proneness Questionnaire (HPQ). Recent health, wellness and illness studies focus upon the dynamic interaction between psychological and physical well-being. This newly developed scale allows practitioners to quickly screen psychological characteristics related to health and a patient's perception of their quality of life. Participants were patients in university research clinics for vision problems. Through exploratory factor analysis three factors evolved related to the hypothesized psychological characteristics involved in health related quality of life: adaptability, self-efficacy and subjective well-being. In a confirmatory factor analysis, the best fit model yielded a higher-order health-proneness factor with the original three categories as sub-factors. Further criterion-related validity comparisons and discriminant and convergent validity studies indicated a psychometrically sound short survey for examining psychological characteristics of patients with mild chronic health conditions.     

Two Concepts of Intrinsic Value

Recent literature on intrinsic value contains a number of disputes about the nature of the concept. On the one hand, there are those who think states of affairs, such as states of pleasure or desire satisfaction, are the bearers of intrinsic value (“Mooreans”); on the other hand, there are those who think concrete objects, like people, are intrinsically valuable (“Kantians”). The contention of this paper is that there is not a single concept of intrinsic value about which Mooreans and Kantians have disagreed, but rather two distinct concepts. I state a number of principles about intrinsic value that have typically (though not universally) been held by Mooreans, all of which are typically denied by Kantians. I show that there are distinct theoretical roles for a concept of intrinsic value to play in a moral framework. When we notice these distinct theoretical roles, we should realize that there is room for two distinct concepts of intrinsic value within a single moral framework: one that accords with some or all of the Moorean principles, and one that does not.     

Development of the Measure of Adaptations for Pelvic Symptoms (MAPS): the Importance of Incorporating the Female Patient’s Voice

Women with pelvic floor disorders use many adaptations in an attempt to minimize symptoms and enhance the quality of their lives. Existing condition-specific measures fail to capture the extent or impact of these adaptive behaviors. The present paper seeks to extend the women’s health literature and expand the registry of available measures to assess pelvic floor disorders by: 1) documenting the steps taken in the development and initial validation of the Measure of Adaptations for Pelvic Symptoms (MAPS); and 2) describing the added value of incorporating the patient’s voice in the instrument development process through in-depth focus groups. The rigorous process used to develop the measure (i.e., literature review, clinical experts, anecdotal patient reports, telephone-administered pilot study, and focus groups with female patients) is described. Analysis of the focus group data yielded eight important adaptation themes used to further refine the MAPS: disclosure, seclusion, being prepared, planning, clothing considerations, sexuality, order and intensity, and outlook. Specifically, focus group participants confirmed the use of sanitary pads and limiting food and beverage consumption. Women did not endorse keeping a jar or commode nearby. Discussions yielded important modifications to items about restroom use, clothing preferences, “survival kits” and “informal” pessary use. Participants described social isolation and preparations for sexual relations that led to new items. This study confirmed the value of incorporating women’s voices in the questionnaire development process through in-depth focus groups. The process revealed important patient experiences and led to significant refinements of the final measure.     

Prototype Personality Diagnosis in Clinical Practice: A Viable Alternative for DSM-V and ICD-11

Several studies suggest that a prototype matching approach yields diagnoses of comparable validity to the more complex diagnostic algorithms outlined in DSM-IV. Furthermore, clinicians prefer prototype diagnosis of personality disorders (PDs) to the current categorical diagnostic system or alternative dimensional methods. An important extension of this work is to investigate the degree to which clinicians are able to make prototype diagnoses reliably. The aim of this study is to assess the inter-rater reliability of a prototype matching approach to personality diagnosis in clinical practice. Using prototypes derived empirically in prior research, outpatient clinicians diagnosed patients' personality after an initial evaluation period. External evaluators independently diagnosed the same patients after watching videotapes of the same clinical hours. Inter-rater reliability for prototype diagnosis was high, with a median r = .72. Cross-correlations between disorders were low, with a median r = .01. Clinicians and clinically trained independent observers can assess complex personality constellations with high reliability using a simple prototype matching procedure, even with prototypes that are relatively unfamiliar to them. In light of its demonstrated reliability, efficiency, and versatility, prototype diagnosis appears to be a viable system for DSM-V and ICD-11 with exceptional utility for research and clinical practice.     

Development of the Brain’s Functional Network Architecture

A full understanding of the development of the brain’s functional network architecture requires not only an understanding of developmental changes in neural processing in individual brain regions but also an understanding of changes in inter-regional interactions. Resting state functional connectivity MRI (rs-fcMRI) is increasingly being used to study functional interactions between brain regions in both adults and children. We briefly review methods used to study functional interactions and networks with rs-fcMRI and how these methods have been used to define developmental changes in network functional connectivity. The developmental rs-fcMRI studies to date have found two general properties. First, regional interactions change from being predominately anatomically local in children to interactions spanning longer cortical distances in young adults. Second, this developmental change in functional connectivity occurs, in general, via mechanisms of segregation of local regions and integration of distant regions into disparate subnetworks.     

Facilitation of learning spatial relations among locations by visual cues: generality across spatial configurations

Spatial pattern learning permits the learning of the location of objects in space relative to each other without reference to discrete visual landmarks or environmental geometry. In the present experiment, we investigated conditions that facilitate spatial pattern learning. Specifically, human participants searched in a real environment or interactive 3-D computer-generated virtual environment open-field search task for four hidden goal locations arranged in a diamond configuration located in a 5 × 5 matrix of raised bins. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three groups: Pattern Only, Landmark + Pattern, or Cues + Pattern. All participants experienced a Training phase followed by a Testing phase. Visual cues were coincident with the goal locations during Training only in the Cues + Pattern group whereas a single visual cue at a non-goal location maintained a consistent spatial relationship with the goal locations during Training only in the Landmark + Pattern group. All groups were then tested in the absence of visual cues. Results in both environments indicated that participants in all three groups learned the spatial configuration of goal locations. The presence of the visual cues during Training facilitated acquisition of the task for the Landmark + Pattern and Cues + Pattern groups compared to the Pattern Only group. During Testing the Landmark + Pattern and Cues + Pattern groups did not differ when their respective visual cues were removed. Furthermore, during Testing the performance of these two groups was superior to the Pattern Only group. Results generalize prior research to a different configuration of spatial locations, isolate spatial pattern learning as the process facilitated by visual cues, and indicate that the facilitation of learning spatial relations among locations by visual cues does not require coincident visual cues.