Spatial working memory performance and fMRI activation interaction in abstinent adolescent marijuana users.

Previous studies have suggested neural disruption and reorganization in adult marijuana users. However, it remains unclear whether these effects persist in adolescents after 28 days of abstinence and, if they do, what Performance x Brain Response interactions occur. Adolescent marijuana users (n=17) and controls (n=17) aged 16-18 years were recruited from local schools. Functional magnetic resonance imaging data were collected after 28 days' monitored abstinence as participants performed a spatial working memory task. Marijuana users show Performance x Brain Response interactions in the bilateral temporal lobes, left anterior cingulate, left parahippocampal gyrus, and right thalamus (clusters >/=1358 microl; p<.05), although groups do not differ on behavioral measures of task performance. Marijuana users show differences in brain response to a spatial working memory task despite adequate performance, suggesting a different approach to the task via altered neural pathways.     

Parents' representations of their children: an exploratory study using the Osgood Semantic Differential Scales

The results of an exploratory national study carried out in Italy using Osgood's Semantic Differential Scales (Osgood, Suci, & Tannenbaum, 1957) with parents of 100 normal 6- to 11-yr.-old children in mainstream classrooms are reported. The aim was to devise a simple tool to be used to explore parents' perceptions of their children in this age group. Parents were asked to rate "my child" using some of Osgood's Semantic Differential Scales especially adapted for this study. Participants were 97 fathers and 100 mothers. Fathers were 32 to 57 years of age (M = 43.2, SD = 5.4), mothers were 29 to 49 years of age (M = 39.7, SD =4.4). In factor analysis four factors were identified: Activity, Evaluation, Emotions evoked by the child, Personality/Physical contact. Average factor scores were significantly different. There were no significant differences between fathers and mothers on the four factor scores. Children were more positively evaluated the younger they were.     

Adult attachment and preemptive defenses: converging evidence on the role of defensive exclusion at the level of encoding

The objective of this research was to determine whether the tendency of highly avoidant adults not to recall attachment-related information is best explained through defensive strategies that operate on encoding or retrieval processes. In Study 1 participants listened to an emotionally evocative recording and were given both explicit and implicit tests of their memory for the material. Compared to less avoidant people, highly avoidant people recalled fewer details from the recording and performed worse on an implicit test of their memory for the information. In Study 2 we manipulated people's motivation to retrieve information from memory by offering participants a monetary award for recall. Highly avoidant people recalled less information than less-avoidant people despite the monetary incentive. Taken together, these results suggest that the relative inability of avoidant adults to recall attachment-related information is due to the defensive exclusion of information at the time of encoding rather than the time of retrieval.     

Rorschach Comprehensive System data for two samples of nonpatient children from Italy: 75 aged 5-7 years and 148 aged 8-11 years

This project provides information on how nonpatient children perform on the Rorschach test, administered and scored following Exner's guidelines (1995). Lis, Parolin, Zennaro, and Mazzeschi (2001) previously reported initial data for 70 nonpatient children living in Italy who were administered this instrument by graduate and postgraduate students in a 2-year research course at the Psychotherapy School of the University of Padua between July 1998 and February 2001. The current study is an extension of that work and includes information on an additional 153 participants gathered between November 2002 and December 2006. The total number of participants includes 223 individuals, 75 5-7-year-old children in the first level of elementary school, and 148 8-11-year-old children in the second level of elementary school. Exclusion criteria are described, and interrater reliability statistics at the response level for scoring segments are reported using percent agreement and iota. Rorschach Comprehensive System (CS) findings are presented.     

Social Comparison and Information Transmission in the Work Context

In the workplace, people can experience various types of failure and frustrations resulting in spontaneous social comparisons with other colleagues who are more (upward comparison) or less (downward comparison) successful. Upward comparisons especially have been shown to increase envy toward the outperforming benchmark colleague, which could negatively affect social interaction with this colleague. In line with this, our results consistently show that upward comparisons are associated with higher levels of experienced envy, as well as with a lower transmission rate of high-quality information. By contrast, type of social comparison had no impact on the amount of transmitted low-quality, work-relevant information. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.     

Language comprehension and dominant hand motion simulation

In five experiments participants were presented with pairs of nouns and verbs. They were asked to decide whether the combinations made sense or not. Half of the participants responded "yes" with the dominant hand, half with the left hand. When pairs referred to manual and mouth actions, participants responded faster with the dominant than with the left hand with sensible sentences. When pairs referred to manual and foot actions the result was opposite. Results suggest that language processing activates an action simulation that is sensitive to both the effector involved and the goal expressed by the sentence.