Perceptions of treatment control moderate the daily association between negative affect and diabetes problems among adolescents with type 1 diabetes

Perceived control over diabetes may serve to buffer the relationship between adolescents’ experience of daily negative affect and daily problems with diabetes. In a daily diary study including 209 adolescents (ages 10.5–15.5) with type 1 diabetes, we examined how daily affect related to daily fluctuations in experience of diabetes problems, and whether perceptions of control moderated these daily associations. Using hierarchical linear modelling, we found that day-to-day experiences of negative affect were associated with more frequent daily diabetes problems. Perceptions of treatment control moderated associations between negative affect and number of problems; negative affect was more strongly associated with number of problems among teens perceiving lower versus higher treatment control over their illness. The same pattern of association was not apparent for personal control. Results suggest that perceived treatment control may help to buffer detrimental associations between negative affect and adolescents’ ability to successfully manage their diabetes.     

Laboratory Simulated Gambling: Risk Varies Across Participant-Stake Procedure

ABSTRACT. This study investigated whether risk taking on a laboratory gambling task differed depending on whether participants gambled with earned or experimenter-provided game credits. Participants made repeated choices between two options, one to wager game credits on a game that produced probabilistic gains and losses, and one to gain game credits with certainty. Choice was investigated across stake and no-stake conditions and condition order was counterbalanced across conditions. Risk taking was higher under stake than no-stake conditions, but only when stake conditions were experienced first. There was no effect on risk taking of the amount of the certain gain. Results are consistent with previous research showing that participant-stake procedures promote greater risk taking than procedures that allow participants to gamble with their own earnings, and also show that experience gambling with earned credits has an enduring effect on risk taking.     

The Effects of Dysphoria and Personality on Negative Self-Referent Attitudes and Perceptions of the Attitudes of Others

The cognitive model of depression posits that depressed individuals harbor more dysfunctional self-referent attitudes, but little is known about how depressed individuals perceive the attitudes and perceptions of others in their social arena. This study examined whether dysphoric individuals perceive others to hold equally negative attitudes about themselves, and whether such perceptions depend on sociotropic (i.e., highly invested in social approval and relationship success) and autonomous (i.e., highly invested in vocational or academic achievement and goal attainment) personality styles. A sample of undergraduate students (N = 197) was recruited, and after the assessment of their depression symptoms and personality style, participants read vignettes that described negative scenarios, and imagined that these scenarios occurred to themselves or the general university student. After reading each vignette, participants also rated their agreement with a number of statements that assessed dysfunctional attitudes. Results indicated that elevated dysphoria (i.e., showing signs of depression) scores were positively associated with dysfunctional self-referent attitudes. Further, moderational analyses examining the interaction of sociotropy and dysphoria did not support the hypothesis that individuals higher on dysphoria and sociotropy were less likely to perceive others as harboring negative attitudes about themselves in comparison to those with elevated dysphoria and lower levels of sociotropy. Last, individuals showing elevated dysphoria and higher scores on subdomains of autonomy were more likely to perceive others as exhibiting negative attitudes about themselves than those with low levels of the trait. These findings, their implications, and strengths and limitations of the current investigation are further discussed.     

Exploring the Relationship Between Religious Coping and Spirituality Among Three Types of Collegiate Substance Abuse

Religion and spirituality are protective factors against collegiate substance abuse; however, considering the variance among different types of drug abuse is important. We investigated religious coping and spirituality in relation to hazardous drinking, marijuana use, and psychostimulant use. Results indicated that positive religious coping and several dimensions of spirituality protect against hazardous drinking and marijuana use. Furthermore, differences in religious coping and spirituality may not exist between groups of psychostimulant users.     

Blessed be the Children: A Case–Control Study of Sexual Abusers in the Catholic Church

Individuals working in churches and other youth-serving institutions have a unique level of access to children, yet the problem of sexual abuse in institutional settings has received scant research attention. To address this gap, we analyzed data from a large sample of clergy (N = 1,121) and applied a social–ecological model of offending to identify risk factors for sexual abuse perpetration. Using a case–control study design that compared clergy sexual abusers with three control groups of clergy, this study focuses specifically on individual-, relationship-, and community-level factors associated with a higher risk of abuse in professional populations. Findings revealed that clergy sexual abusers tended to have more truncated pre-seminary dating histories, and that their dating and sexual partners were more likely to have been male than female. Self-reported sexual abuse history was associated with a greater likelihood of sexual abuse perpetration among clergy. Clergy abusers tended to be more involved with youth and adolescents in their ministries; however, they were observed to relate less well to youth and adolescents than their clergy counterparts. Given widespread changes in our cultural understanding of abuse as well as more specific changes in the organizational approach to seminary education, these differences underscore the role that youth-serving institutions and society can have in the primary prevention of child sexual abuse. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Futility in Chronic Anorexia Nervosa: A Concept Whose Time Has Not Yet Come

Comparatively little scholarly attention has been given to the question of futility in chronic psychiatric disorders, with the exception of a small body of work on so-called end-stage anorexia nervosa (AN). A review of this literature provides the background for a critical examination of whether the concept of futility has any clinically meaningful, ethically justifiable, and legally defensible application to AN. In this article, the arguments for and against futility judgments in AN are analyzed with special emphasis on determinations of capacity in this serious mental illness. Parallels between the futility disputes in medical and psychiatric disorders, where applicable, will be drawn to further illuminate whether or not the concept that continued psychiatric treatment for AN is ever truly futile.     

Child and Family Emotional Functioning: A Cross-National Examination of Families from China and the United States

Scant research has examined links between particular emotion socialization processes and child emotion functioning cross-nationally. In this study, we assessed a sample of 55 families from the United States (U.S.; 28 boys and 27 girls) and 49 families from China (27 boys and 22 girls) on family emotional expressiveness and children’s emotional experiences and regulation. Results indicated that children and families from the U.S. reported greater emotional expressiveness than their Chinese counterparts. Children from the U.S. also reported greater undercontrolled emotion than Chinese youth. Family expression of positive emotion was related to effortful emotion regulation in U.S. youth only, whereas family expression of negative emotion was associated with undercontrolled emotion for both U.S. and Chinese children. Our findings advance context-specific models of emotional development by illustrating similarities and differences in emotional functioning among U.S. and Chinese families. From a clinical perspective, the findings suggest that practitioners should consider the cultural variations of emotion communication within families when conducting both assessment and therapy.     

Review of State Medication Policies/Guidelines Regarding Psychotropic Medications in Public Schools

It is currently estimated that up to 6 million children take psychotropic medications for the treatment of mental health problems. The highest prevalence rates (50–76 %) are typically found among students with special needs, especially among those with ADHD and emotional disturbance. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 require medications be administered by schools whenever it is deemed necessary for the child to have access to educational services. However, these requirements do not extend to all students, nor do they provide guidance regarding the safest and most efficacious manner in which psychotropic medications should be administered. The authors reviewed existing state medication policies and guidelines to assess the level of guidance currently provided to school staff. Results showed the vast majority of states (48) provided guidance related to the administration of medications to students, with slightly fewer (44) states discussing required documentation procedures. Surprisingly, only 15 states addressed monitoring students for adverse side effects of medications, and even fewer (11) states specifically discussed psychotropic medication in their policies/guidelines. The vast majority (42) of states also addressed requirements for the safe and proper storage of medications, while slightly more than half of all states (31) provided any guidance regarding training of unlicensed personnel (e.g., secretaries) who frequently administer medications to students. The authors highlight several model guidelines/policies and review recommendations for best practice.