Disaster Impact Across Cultural Groups: Comparison of Whites, African Americans, and Latinos

The current study extends knowledge regarding the differential impact of natural disasters among White, African American, and Latino survivors of Hurricane Ike through its use of a large, regional sample recruited via representative sampling procedures to examine the associations between cultural identification and disaster impact, including loss, damage, and negative mental health outcomes. Consistent with previous research, results indicated disparities between cultural groups with regard to disaster exposure. Additionally, type of disaster impact was differentially associated with PTSD and depression status dependent on cultural group. Specifically, the extent of personal disaster exposure, property damage, and loss of services made significant contributions to PTSD status among White survivors. African-Americans were more likely than White and Latino Ike survivors to endorse post-disaster PTSD and depression and endorsement of depression was predicted by severity of property damage. With respect to Latino respondents, only the extent of personal disaster exposure significantly contributed to both PTSD and depression status. Implications of the current findings are discussed with regard to future disaster preparedness and response efforts and the implementation and evaluation of community-based disaster resources.     

Nicknames of notorious American twentieth‐century deviants: The decline of the folk hero syndrome

This report examines the public use of personal nicknames for notorious American Twentieth Century Deviants. The analysis documents the frequency of nicknames by decade in the twentieth century, the category of the deviant act committed by the person nicknamed, and the connotations of the nicknames. The relationship between the use of nicknames for deviants, and deviants as folk heroes is explored. The data indicate that the public use of personal nicknames for deviants peaks in the 1920's and 1930's and has been declining ever since. This phenomenon parallels the decline in American's belief in the “rags to riches” type of folk hero.     

Cue competition effects in the planarian

The learning abilities of planarian worms (Dugesia tigrina) were assessed by using a number of Pavlovian conditioning paradigms. Experiment 1 showed that planaria were susceptible to basic conditioning in that they readily developed a conditioned response to a change in ambient luminance when it was consistently paired with an electric shock over a number of trials. In Experiment 2, the change in luminance was presented in a compound with a vibration stimulus during conditioning. Subsequent tests revealed poor conditioning of the elements compared with control groups in which the animals were conditioned in the presence of the elements alone, an instance of overshadowing. In Experiment 3, pre-training of one of the elements before compound conditioning resulted in blocking of learning about the other element. These results add to other studies that have reported cue competition effects in animal species belonging to different phyla (chordate, mollusk, arthropod), suggesting that learning in these phyla could be ruled by similar principles. The results are discussed adopting an evolutionary-comparative approach.     

When soft voices die: auditory verbal hallucinations and a four letter word (love)

Understandings of auditory verbal hallucinations (also referred to as “hearing voices”), and help for people distressed by them, are dominated by a biomedical framework. Yet, many people who have sought help for the distress and/or impairment caused by hearing voices express dissatisfaction with treatment solely within this framework, highlighting the need for a more rounded, biopsychosocial-spiritual approach. This paper examines the neglected role of a fundamental part of human experience, love, in the experience of hearing voices. First, we argue a lack of love is likely to play a causal role in voice-hearing experiences. Second, we demonstrate that a lack of love is central to the distress and dysfunction often caused by hearing voices. Finally, we show that love plays a core role in recovery. Given this centrality of love, we argue that an interdisciplinary approach to hearing voices involving the mind sciences and theology/religion may be fruitful. The relevance of this for psychotherapeutic interventions for people who hear voices is discussed.     

Stroop Interference,Practice, and Aging

We report two experiments that investigate practice effects on Stroop color-word interference in older and younger adults. Both experiments employed a computerized, single-item version of the Stroop task with a voice response, and both involved practice over hundreds of trials. Both experiments showed generally similar practice patterns, including a practice-related reduction in the size of the color-word interference effect. However, the older group continued to show a larger interference effect throughout practice. These findings indicate that older adults show the same trend in practice-related improvement on the Stroop task as younger adults.     

A geometrical analysis of the unfolding model: General solutions

Given the complete setR of rank orders obtained from any configuration ofn stimulus points inr dimensions in accordance with the unfolding model, a configuration from which just these orders may be derived will be described as a solution forR. The space is assumed to be Euclidean. Necessary and sufficient conditions are derived for a configuration to be a solution forR. The geometrical constraints which are necessary and sufficient to determine the subset of pairs of orders and opposites contained inR are also identified and constitute the constraint system for the ordinal vector model. The relationship between the two models is discussed.     

Effect of eye movements on backward masking and perceived location

A typical trial of this masking experiment involves, in quick succession, presentation of five letters, evocation of an eye movement, and presentation of a spatially localized mask, either a visual-pattern mask or a metacontrast ring. The effect of the mask is to sappress the report of the letter that stimulates the same retinal location, even though the mask appears to cover or surround the letter whose position in real space it shares. Masking is. however, weaker when the eyes move than when they do not. An auxiliary experiment suggests that the spatial aspects of observable (reportable by S) stimulus persistence are unaffected by eye movements, and therefore that observable persistence differs from that susceptible to masking.