Visuospatial competency, handedness, and cerebral dominance

The present study addressed the question of Levy's (1974, Psychobiological implications of bilateral assymetry. In S. Dimond &; J. G. Beaumont, Hemispheric function in the human brain, NY: Halstead. Pp. 121–183.) proposal that left handers would have lowered spatial skills relative to verbal skills. In the first part of the study, performance on the PMA (visuospatial subtest) and WAIS Block Design subtest were compared between right and left handed high school and college samples. No support could be found for deficient visuo-spatial performance in the left handers. In the second part of the experiment, no relative impairment of visuospatial skills was found when subjects were classified into predicted speech dominance groups on the basis of a dichotic listening task and/or a visual half-field task. An extreme groups comparison of the most left dominant and most right dominant groups again yielded no significant differences in visuo-spatial performance. Finally, the relationship between degree of speech lateralization and visuo-spatial skills was examined. Only partial support for differences in cerebral organization for speech in left handers was found in the college sample.     

内田─克雷佩林心理测验在我国的试用研究

对１５２２名大、中学生进行内田—克雷佩林心理测验的结果表明：该测验是一种跨文化的心理测量工具,具有较好的信度和效度。还对内田—克雷凤林心理的测验的特点做了剖析,并为进一步的研究提出了建议。     

Must a hermeneutical psychoanalysis exclude science?

The work on this article was made possible in part by a grant to all three authors from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (410-91-0422) and a St. Paul University research award. All three authors contributed equally to the text. An earlier version of this article was presented at the Division of Psychoanalysis of the American Psychological Association annual meeting, August 1990. We are grateful to James Pambrun, Ph.D., Ted O'Grady, and Bertram P. Karon, Ph.D. for their advice and encouragement. Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Paul Rigby, St. Paul University, 223 Main St. E., Ottawa, Ont, Canada K1S 1C4.     

分离遗传与环境对儿童发展的影响：介绍一个新颖的研究方法

本文介绍一个可以用于研究遗传与环境互动的新颖方法。此研究收集了上千个4~10岁儿童的数据。这些儿童的出生都借助于不同的辅助受孕技术（Assisted Reproductive Technologies）,包括试管婴儿、精子捐赠、卵子捐赠、胚胎捐赠及代孕技术。本项目通过妇科（助孕）医院收集被试的行为数据,包括家庭互动、养育方式、父母婚姻质量、家庭成员的心理健康及经济状况等。本文选择性地介绍一些分析的结果,以彰显这种设计在分离遗传和产前产后环境对儿童发展的贡献。首先,我们比较了“助孕”儿童与“自然孕”儿童在父母冲突、父母对子女敌意以及儿童抑郁症状之间关系的异同。其次,我们比较了这两组儿童在父母抑郁症状、家庭关系质量以及儿童抑郁症状之间关系的异同。再次,本文介绍了这一可分离遗传与环境因素的研究设计。最后,我们讨论了这一设计对发展心理病干预及预防的意义     

Selective Attention and Anxiety: A Perspective on Developmental Issues and the Causal Status

A plethora of studies on selective information processing in anxiety have been carried out over the past two decades. One of the most robust findings is that anxiety is associated with selective attention (SA) for threatening information. The rationale of research into SA is that it is assumed to play a vital role in the maintenance, and even in the etiology of anxiety disorders. It is the aim of this paper to explicate on the validity of this assumption. There is ample evidence that anxiety enhances SA. Although there is a lack of studies on the effect of SA on anxiety, there is now some evidence that SA increases the level of anxiety. This leads us to conclude that SA is not a by-product of anxiety only. Hence, the suggestion that SA plays a role in the maintenance of anxiety disorders seems to be justified. Studies on SA in children suggest that if SA plays any role at all in the development of anxiety disorders, it is not the SA in itself that is a vulnerability factor, but the continuation of this SA. Individuals who develop an anxiety disorder could have difficulty learning to inhibit this SA. Considering the finding that SA increases the level of anxiety, the authors suggest that anxiety in childhood causes failure to inhibit SA, which in turn enhances the vulnerability to anxiety disorder in adulthood.     

Meaning-Making in Delayed-Return Cultures: The Case of Personal Uncertainty

The large majority of humans nowadays live in cultures in which there is often a delay between the efforts they exert and the feedback they receive regarding the outcome of their efforts. As a result, individuals may experience uncertainty between their efforts and outcomes, leading them to pay special attention to uncertainty information. In particular, we propose that when people feel uncertain about themselves, this may be alarming to them as it may signal that their personal contract with their delayed-return culture may be in jeopardy. Therefore, under conditions of personal uncertainty, people are looking forward to events that bolster their cultural worldviews and detest events that violate these worldviews. We review research findings that show that personal uncertainty indeed has a special role in the social psychology of meaning-making and worldview defense, sometimes even yielding a better explanation of worldview defense reactions than terror management theory.     

Predicting compulsive Internet use: it's all about sex!

The objective of this research was to assess the predictive power of various Internet applications on the development of compulsive Internet use (CIU). The study has a two-wave longitudinal design with an interval of 1 year. The first measurement contained 447 adult heavy Internet users who used the Internet at least 16 h per week and had Internet access at home for at least 1 year. For the second measurement, all participants were invited again, of whom 229 responded. By means of an online questionnaire, the respondents were asked about the time spent on various Internet applications and CIU. On a cross-sectional basis, gaming and erotica seem the most important Internet applications related to CIU. On a longitudinal basis, spending a lot of time on erotica predicted an increase in CIU 1 year later. The addictive potential of the different applications varies; erotica appears to have the highest potential.     

Psychometric properties of the Highly Sensitive Child scale across developmental stage,gender, and country

Adolescents differ in their degree of Environmental Sensitivity, that is, the ability to perceive and process information about their environment. The present study aimed to investigate the psychometric properties of the Highly Sensitive Child scale (HSC), a self-report measure of Environmental Sensitivity, in two Belgian and UK samples with a total of 3056 adolescents. First, the factor structure, internal consistency, dimensionality, and construct validity of the HSC scale were examined. Second, measurement invariance of the HSC scale across developmental stage, gender, and country was tested. Results supported a bifactor model with a general sensitivity factor and three group factors: Ease of Excitation (EOE), Low Sensory Threshold (LST), and Aesthetic Sensitivity (AES). Cronbach’s alpha and McDonalds’s (hierarchical) omega indicated that the HSC scale is a reliable measure of Environmental Sensitivity, except for AES. Furthermore, AES was associated with different personality traits than EOE and LST. Second, the HSC scale was partially measurement invariant across developmental stage, gender, and country. The results provide important insights in the psychometrics of a first measurement of Environmental Sensitivity in early to late adolescents. Implications for further research are discussed.

     

Financial hardship and well-being: a cross-national comparison among the European self-employed

Based on data from the 2004 and 2010 European Social Survey, this multidisciplinary and cross-national comparative study investigates the relationship between financial hardship and subjective well-being among 9,755 self-employed individuals from 31 European countries. It also aims to identify potential mitigating factors in this relationship on both the individual and the country level. Multilevel regression analyses reveal a strong relationship between financial hardship and impaired well-being, explaining about 36% of variance in well-being between conditions (countries and time periods) and 8% of variance between individuals. In other words, economic conditions matter significantly. Additionally, education and social trust act as important buffering factors for individuals, and the relationship between financial hardship and impaired well-being is somewhat weaker for self-employed persons living in countries with a more supportive social policy in the form of unemployment allowance. Entrepreneurs can hence mitigate the consequences of financial hardship by protecting social resources, and policymakers can be advised to invest in education and social security.     

The Big Five and identification–contrast processes in social comparison in adjustment to cancer treatment

The present study examined the relationship between social comparison processes and the Big Five personality factors. In a sample of 112 patients with various forms of cancer it was found that Neuroticism was associated with a tendency to focus on the negative interpretation of social comparison information that expressed itself in identification with fellow patients who were doing worse. This identification process also seemed to mediate the (negative) relationship between Neuroticism and post‐treatment feelings of mastery and uncertainty. No relationship was found between Neuroticism and the tendency to contrast one's situation against the situation of others who are doing better. Unexpectedly, Extraversion was most strongly related to a tendency to contrast one's situation against the situation of fellow patients who are doing better. Agreeableness, Conscientiousness and Intellect/Autonomy were unrelated to social comparison. The therapeutical implications of the findings for cancer patients are discussed. Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.