Caffeine as a performance-enhancing drug in rats: sex, dose, housing, and task considerations

Past animal studies of the performance-enhancing properties of stimulant drugs, such as caffeine, may have suffered from a number of procedural and ethical problems. For example. the housing condition of the animals was often not taken into consideration. As well, endurance tests, such as the forced swim task, sometimes involved ethically (and procedurally) questionable interference with natural swimming behaviour. Some of the manipulations, such as attaching a weight to the swimming animal's tail to increase the difficulty of the task and using mortality as a dependent variable, seem grotesque, even unnecessary. In this experiment, the performance-enhancing effects of caffeine in a modified forced swim task and a dominance task were evaluated using male and female rats as subjects (N=60), housed in either enriched or isolated environments. Analysis indicated that rats respond to caffeine as an interactive function of sex, housing, dose, and task characteristics. It was concluded that performance-enhancing properties of stimulant drugs may be the result of a complex interplay of variables, making simple generalizations questionable.     

The meaning of life (events) predicts changes in attachment security

Building on prior research, which has failed to find consistent effects of life events on change in self-reported adult attachment security over time, the present study tested the hypothesis that it is the meaning people attach to events, rather than the objective features of events, that is associated with changing levels of security. Participants engaged in an 8-week daily diary study, during which they completed daily self-report measures of attachment security, negative life events, perceptions of loss associated with events, and mood. Hierarchical linear modeling revealed that perceptions of greater interpersonal (but not achievement) loss associated with life events were significantly associated with greater insecurity on a day-to-day basis, even controlling for objective features of events and for mood. Trait levels of security did not moderate this association. Results are discussed with regard to social-cognitive models of attachment security and the utility of understanding the meaning of life events to understand how attachment models may be confirmed or disconfirmed.     

Predicting change in self-reported and interviewer-assessed adult attachment: tests of the individual difference and life stress models of attachment change

The study tested the key assumption of the individual difference model of adult attachment change: that people who have experienced certain vulnerability factors will be prone to change attachment styles because they have developed unclear models of self and others that render their attachment models unstable. This model was compared to a life stress model, which states that change occurs as an adaptation to new, interpersonally relevant life circumstances. Changes in self-reported and interviewer-assessed attachment were examined among 94 young adults who were followed over 1 year. Analyses yielded support for the individual difference model for change in both self-reported and interviewer-assessed attachment. The life stress model was supported for change in interviewer-assessed attachment only. Implications for differential change processes for self-reported versus interviewer-assessed aspects of adult attachment are discussed.     

Reinstatement of 2-year-olds' event memory using photographs

This experiment examined 24- and 30-month-olds' understanding of photographs as reminders using a deferred imitation paradigm. The 24- and 30-month-olds visited a laboratory playroom and observed an experimenter demonstrating novel activities. Upon returning after a retention interval, half of the children viewed photographs depicting the activities they had viewed during their first visits as reminders of the event, as well as photographs of activities they had never seen. Children in both the reminder and the no-reminder groups were then asked to complete the originally modelled activities as a test of recall. Results indicate that although 30-month-olds recalled more activities than did 24-month-olds, children in the reminder condition at both ages recalled more activities than children in the no-reminder control condition. Results are discussed in terms of the development of representational understanding and long-term recall in young children.     

Use of visual information in speech perception: evidence for a visual rate effect both with and without a McGurk effect

The McGurk effect, where an incongruent visual syllable influences identification of an auditory syllable, does not always occur, suggesting that perceivers sometimes fail to use relevant visual phonetic information. We tested whether another visual phonetic effect, which involves the influence of visual speaking rate on perceived voicing (Green & Miller, 1985), would occur in instances when the McGurk effect does not. In Experiment 1, we established this visual rate effect using auditory and visual stimuli matching in place of articulation, finding a shift in the voicing boundary along an auditory voice-onset-time continuum with fast versus slow visual speech tokens. In Experiment 2, we used auditory and visual stimuli differing in place of articulation and found a shift in the voicing boundary due to visual rate when the McGurk effect occurred and, more critically, when it did not. The latter finding indicates that phonetically relevant visual information is used in speech perception even when the McGurk effect does not occur, suggesting that the incidence of the McGurk effect underestimates the extent of audio-visual integration.     

Observed classroom behavior of children with ADHD: relationship to gender and comorbidity

Examined hypothesized gender and comorbidity differences in the observed classroom behavior of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The behavior of 403 boys and 99 girls with ADHD, ages 7–10, was compared (a) to observed, sex-specific classroom behavior norms, (b) by sex, and (c) by comorbid subgroups. Boys and girls with ADHD deviated significantly from classroom norms on 15/16 and 13/16 categories, respectively. Compared to comparison girls, girls with ADHD had relatively high rates of verbal aggression to children. Boys with ADHD engaged in more rule-breaking and externalizing behaviors than did girls with ADHD, but the sexes did not differ on more neutral, unobtrusive behaviors. The sex differences are consistent with notions of why girls with ADHD are identified and referred later than boys. Contrary to hypothesis, the presence of comorbid anxiety disorder (ANX) was not associated with behavioral suppression; yet, as hypothesized, children with a comorbid disruptive behavior disorder (DBD) had higher rates of rule-breaking, and impulsive and aggressive behavior, than did children with ADHD alone and those with ADHD+ANX. Elevated rates of ADHD behaviors were also observed in children with comorbid DBD, indicating that these behaviors are truly present and suggesting that reports of higher ADHD ratings in this subgroup are not simply a consequence of negative halo effects and rater biases.     

The color of two alphabets for a multilingual synesthete

Interviews with a multilingual synesthete (MLS), who experiences colored letters for Roman and Cyrillic alphabets and for digits, revealed stable synesthetic experiences over 2 1/2 - 5 years. Colors of Cyrillic letters were based on Roman letters. Four Stroop tests involving both types of letters showed that MLS was able to name print color faster if the colors matched her synesthetic colors, showing that synesthesia is automatic. Letter-naming times for blocks of color were slower than those of actual letters, supporting unidirectionality of synesthesia. Stroop tests with Roman, but not Cyrillic, letters showed MLS acquired new temporary letter-color pairings and her color-naming times for these were not different from those for her original synesthetic colors.     

On the need for structurally competent counselling and psychotherapy: Neoliberal ideology,disability and the psy disciplines

This article highlights and problematises the psy disciplines' articulations with neoliberalism, with a particular focus upon disability and upon counselling and psychotherapy. Recent years have witnessed burgeoning scholarly interest in the potential complicities of the psy professions in a neoliberal agenda of individualisation, pathologisation and responsibilisation of human suffering. Such complicities are, in state therapy settings, driven by a growing need for these professions to offer cost-effective, evidence-based interventions to secure funding in an increasingly competitive market. Whilst the entwining of neoliberal ideology with therapy practices may be innocuous for some, it is contended that disabled people may be at particular risk of harm. A case is then made for training and practice to foreground structural competency, an awareness of how therapy encounters and client concerns are shaped by socio-structural factors, including, but not limited to, politics and political ideology. This would require not only an appreciation of the sociopolitical context in which therapy unfolds and its indubitable shaping of subjectivities, but also greater recognition of disability as a source of social inequity and oppression, as opposed to an individual phenomenon. Moreover, structural competency would require theoretical and demographic diversity in training and practice, which, in turn, would necessitate identifying and addressing barriers to inclusion for disabled people. Points raised are deemed of particular importance given the emergence of long COVID.