Top-down gain control in the auditory system: evidence from identification and discrimination experiments

The influence of intensity range in auditory identification and intensity discrimination experiments is well documented and is usually attributed to nonsensory factors. Recent studies, however, have suggested that the stimulus range effect might be sensory in origin. To test this notion, in one set of experiments, we had listeners identify the individual tones in a set. One baseline condition consisted of identifying four 1-kHz, low-intensity tones; the other consisted of identifying four 1-kHz, high-intensity tones. In the experimental conditions, these baseline tone sets were augmented by adding a fifth tone at either 1 or 5 kHz. Added 5-kHz tones had little effect on identification accuracy for the four baseline tones. When an added 1-kHz tone differed substantially in intensity from the four baseline tones, it adversely affected performance, with the addition of a high-intensity tone to a set of low-intensity tones having a more deleterious effect than the addition of a low-intensity tone to a set of high-intensity tones. These and further results, obtained in an exploration of this asymmetrical range effect in a third identification experiment and in two intensity-discrimination experiments, were consistent with the notion of a nonlinear amplifier under top-down control whose functions include protection against sensory overload from loud sounds. The identification data were well described by a signal-detection model using equal-variance Laplace distributions instead of the usual Gaussian distributions.     

Mental health services for African Americans: a cultural/racial perspective

African Americans have made consistent progress toward first-class citizenship since 1965. Nonetheless, mental health services for this population have been biased, incomplete, and deficient because similarities to European Americans have been emphasized whereas differences were largely ignored. This article addresses some differences, including cultural/racial identity and the cultural self, that affect assessment, psychiatric diagnoses, and psychotherapy or other interventions. An assessment-intervention model illustrates how cultural information can inform service delivery and improve services to African Americans. Cultural/racial perspectives on mental health in a multicultural society suggest innovations in the design of these services and access to them that can increase utilization by African Americans.     

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder in the Media

Scholars have long been concerned that mass media depictions of those with mental disorders foster stigma. Research is needed extricating how particular disorders are represented and perceived, such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). This article examines what images of obsessions and compulsions exist in the media, and how persons interpret these. It employs two methods: qualitative in-depth interviews and content analysis. Data indicate the media represents obsessions and compulsions in distinguishable ways that both reinforce and complicate common media stereotypes of those with mental disorders—fostering a stigma hierarchy and having contradictory effects on mental health literacy.     

The Kawa River Model: Applying Theory to Develop Interventions for Combat and Operational Stress Control

This article proposes the implementation of the occupational therapy Kawa (Japanese for river) model to promote “culturally relevant” client-centered care for combat and operational stress control services provided in the military context. Currently, the occupational therapy literature lacks a culturally sensitive approach to address the military service members’ experiences with combat and operational stress. A review of the Kawa model features are provided within a case study for a military service member affected by combat and operational stress. This theoretical article offers a pragmatic method for infusing occupational therapy theory to address the cultural aspects of military service members in recovery.     

Talking about Twisters: Relations between Mothers' and Children's Contributions to Conversations about a Devastating Tornado

Mother-child dyads who experienced a devastating tornado talked about the storm and about two affectively more positive or neutral events at each of two time points: 4 months and 10 months after the storm. The conversations were analyzed to determine whether mothers and/or children's contributions differed as a function of event type and whether there were concurrent and/or cross-lagged relations between mothers and children's contributions to the conversations. For both members of the dyads, contributions were similar (and correlated) across event types. Maternal narrative style related to children's levels of participation and to the amount of unique information the children contributed to the conversations, both concurrently and over time; cross-lagged relations were more robust for the tornado relative to the nontornado related events. The implications of the patterns for socialization models of autobiographical memory development are discussed.     

Six Constructs to Define Rorschach M: A Response

The experimental validity of six constructs, conceptualized to account for Rorschach M, was suggested by (a) step-wise regression analysis on scores from task definitions of each construct and M scores for 45 female subjects, and (b) task correlations with their M scores. Fantasy, time estimation, and intelligence were significantly related to M. Inadequacies of task definitions or initial conceptualization were suggested by the correlational data.     

Explorations of silence in the religious rituals of Buddhists and Quakers

This paper is a participant-observation-based study of one Quaker and three Buddhist groups. Using a sociological framework, it explores silence as actively practiced in religious ritual. It demonstrates the usefulness of employing multiple continuums to analyze practices, including a speech–silence continuum, a body movement–body stillness continuum, and a thinking–not thinking continuum. Even when silence is seen as active, it may be construed as functioning to turn people inward and away from each other. Instead, this paper demonstrates how silence for these groups is not necessarily socially isolating. For instance, participants not only learned, practiced, and reflected on silence together, but drew connections between the practice of silence and changes in everyday social interactions, including bringing compassion into these. Some persons referred to realizing a sense of interconnectedness in the silence akin to a Meadian fusion.     

Fear in Adolescent Dating Relationships

The aims of this study were to assess fearful and aversive aspects of dating relationships among teens and to examine those experiences by gender. We examined both survey data and cognitive interviews with teens to understand how teens experience their dating relationships and how they interpret the meaning of the items in a fear measure modified for use with teens. We found that fearful and aversive dating situations are common in adolescent dating relationships. As teens move along the continuum from friendships to romantic involvement, both boys and girls experience the aggressive and coercive behaviors that sometimes accompany these new emotional and interpersonal situations.