The influences of tropical climate on imagined walking time

This study investigated the effects of a Tropical Climate (TC) on actual and imagined walking times. Participants had to execute and imagine walking 3 distances with or without a 10-kg weight in either a TC or an Air Conditioning (AC) condition. The motor imagery quality was evaluated by computing the isochrony index. The results revealed that movement times were shorter for imagined walking than for actual walking and increased with the distance of the paths in both cases. By contrast, the effect of the load increased actual walking times for the 10- and 15-meter distances without affecting imagined walking times. Importantly, the isochrony index was negatively affected by the increase in load and distance and the effects of distance were amplified in a TC. These findings showed that the environmental climate in which motor imagery arises can modulate the subject’s ability to build up the temporal characteristics of simulated actions.     

The Development of a Short Form of an Irrational/Rational Beliefs Scale

Journal of Rational-Emotive & Cognitive-Behavior Therapy - This study developed a short form of the Attitudes and Beliefs Scale-2 (ABS-2), a measure of Ellis’s irrational and rational...     

Thriving and Adapting: Resilience,Sense of Community,and Syndemics among Young Black Gay and Bisexual Men

We examined resilience associated with the avoidance of psychosocial health conditions (i.e., syndemics) that increase vulnerability for HIV among young Black gay and bisexual men. We used analytic induction to compare a sample of 23 men who showed no evidence of syndemic conditions to a sample of 23 men who experienced syndemic conditions. The men who avoided syndemics reported supportive relationships with people who helped them to develop a strong sense of identity, provided them with opportunities to give back to their communities, and promoted positive norms about health. In contrast, the men experiencing syndemic conditions described numerous instances of trauma and oppression that infringed upon their desire to form positive relationships. Among these men, experiences of oppression were associated with shame, identity incongruence, social isolation, relational disconnection, mistrust of men, and expectations of further marginalization. We examined participants’ experiences through the framework of the psychosocial sense of community. Results of this study provide evidence for using strength‐based intervention strategies to prevent syndemic conditions. Findings suggest that to attenuate socio‐structural barriers to health and comorbid psychosocial health concerns, interventions must address young men's social isolation and promote positive identity and sense of community.     

What is the Meaning of Greening? Cultural Analysis of a Southern Baptist Environmental Text

Scholars and journalists alike interpreted “A Southern Baptist Declaration on the Environment and Climate Change”, a document released in 2008 by a group of American Southern Baptists, as evidence that American evangelicals were becoming increasingly concerned about the environment. Using the tools of textual analysis, I show that this was not the only interpretation of the document at play. While journalists and scholars understood the Declaration as addressing the need to halt climate change, for a group of key Southern Baptist signatories, the document expressed a need for Southern Baptists to engage more actively in the public environmental discourse, lest they relinquish this domain to secular and liberal voices. Critically, the latter group viewed the Declaration as compatible with climate scepticism. My analysis shows how cultural context informs climate change attitudes, while also suggesting socio-historical factors—particularly evangelicals’ embattled mentality—that may support climate change scepticism in Southern Baptist circles.     

Sex is power belief and women’s mental health: The mediating roles of self-objectification and sexual subjectivity

Sex is power belief (SIPB) positively relates to self-objectification. This research aims at expanding this finding. We propose that SIPB involves an instrumental view of one’s own body (i.e., self-objectification) that leads women to experience the negative consequences classically associated with self-objectification. We further suggest that SIPB positively relates to sexual subjectivity—multidimensional sexual self-perceptions and positive sexual experiences—and that such relation counterbalances some of the negative effects of SIPB. We examine the effect of SIPB on women’s negative eating attitudes and sexual satisfaction, and test the mediating roles of self-objectification and sexual subjectivity in three studies (N1 = 121, N2 = 296, N3 = 320). Results supported our predictions that beliefs in one’s sexual power lead both to negative (via self-objectification) and positive (via sexual subjectivity) consequences for women’s mental health. The discussion focuses on the potential consequences of SIPB at both individual and collective levels.     

Face averages and multiple images in a live matching task

We know from previous research that unfamiliar face matching (determining whether two simultaneously presented images show the same person or not) is very error-prone. A small number of studies in laboratory settings have shown that the use of multiple images or a face average, rather than a single image, can improve face matching performance. Here, we tested 1,999 participants using four-image arrays and face averages in two separate live matching tasks. Matching a single image to a live person resulted in numerous errors (79.9% accuracy across both experiments), and neither multiple images (82.4% accuracy) nor face averages (76.9% accuracy) improved performance. These results are important when considering possible alterations which could be made to photo-ID. Although multiple images and face averages have produced measurable improvements in performance in recent laboratory studies, they do not produce benefits in a real-world live face matching context.     

Toward accurate inferences of response class membership

In their review of synthesis within the functional analysis (FA) literature, Slaton and Hanley (2018) reported that most synthesized contingency analyses have included multiple topographies of problem behavior in the reinforcement contingency class. This leaves the question of whether one, some, or all forms of problem behavior are sensitive to the synthesized reinforcement contingencies in published analyses. To address this ambiguity, all topographies of problem behavior that were reported by caregivers to co-occur with the most concerning problem behavior were analyzed for 10 participants. We implemented extinction across one or more forms of problem behavior to determine whether all forms reported to co-occur were sensitive to the same synthesized reinforcement contingency. For nine of 10 participants, the most concerning topographies were sensitive to the same synthesized reinforcement contingencies as the less concerning topographies (results were inconclusive for one). Implications for inferring response class membership from single analyses are discussed.     

When and How Different Motives Can Drive Motivated Political Reasoning

It is commonly assumed that the effectiveness of political messages depends on people's motivations. Yet, studies of politically motivated reasoning typically only consider what partisans generally might want to believe and do not separately examine the different types of motives that likely underlie these wants. The present research explores the roles of distinct types of motives in politically motivated thinking and identifies the conditions under which motivated reasoners are persuaded by political messages. Results of an experiment with a large, representative sample of Republicans show that manipulations inducing motivations for either (1) forming accurate impressions, (2) affirming moral values, or (3) affirming group identity each increased beliefs in and intentions to combat human-induced climate change, but only when also paired with political messages that are congruent with the induced motivation. We also find no evidence of a backlash effect even when individuals are provided with clearly uncongenial information and a motivation to reject it. Overall, our findings make clear that understanding when and why motivated political reasoning occurs requires a more complete understanding of both which motivations might be active among a group of partisans and how these motivations resonate with the messaging they receive.