Affective Well-Being in Retirement: The Influence of Values,Money, and Health Across Three Years

In this study, personal values, health, and financial status were investigated as determinants of affective well-being in a sample of 371 recent retirees across 3 years. Personal values, measured with the Portrait Value Questionnaire (Schwartz et al. in J Cross Cult Psychol 32:519–542, 2001), were hypothesized to show direct links to positive affect (PA) and negative affect (NA) as well as to moderate the association between financial and health status and affective well-being. Using structural equation modeling, higher PA was predicted by female gender, better finances, fewer illnesses, and higher self-transcendence (ST), openness to change (OC), and conservation values. Higher NA was predicted by female gender, lower finances, more illnesses, higher self-enhancement (SE) and lower OC values. SE and OC values also moderated the association between financial status and PA. Longitudinal analyses indicated a relatively stable pattern of associations across 3 years. While the impact of finances on affect was stable over time, the effects of health and values increased across 3 years.     

Positive mood + action = negative mood + inaction: effects of general action and inaction concepts on decisions and performance as a function of affect

General action and inaction concepts have been shown to produce broad, goal-mediated effects on cognitive and motor activity irrespective of the type of activity. The current research tested a model in which action and inaction goals interact with the valence of incidental moods to guide behavior. Over four experiments, participants' moods were manipulated to be positive (happy), neutral, or negative (angry or sad), and then general action, inaction, and neutral concepts were primed. In Experiment 1, action primes increased intellectual performance when participants experienced a positive (happy) or neutral mood, whereas inaction primes increased performance when participants experienced a negative (angry) mood. Including a control-prime condition, Experiments 2 and 3 replicated these results measuring the number of general interest articles participants were willing to read and participants' memory for pictures of celebrities. Experiment 4 replicated the results comparing happiness with sadness and suggested that the effect of the prime's adoption was automatic. Overall, the findings supported an interactive model by which action concepts and positive affect produce the same increases in active behavior as inaction concepts and negative affect.     

The lower subjective social status of neurotic individuals: multiple pathways through occupational prestige, income, and illness

Subjective social status seems to predict health outcomes, above and beyond the contribution of objective status. The present hypothesis was that neuroticism predicts subjective status and does so via the influence of neuroticism on objective status (i.e., education, occupation, and income), self-perceived illness, and greater negative affect. In turn, lower subjective status would be associated with more severe self-perceived illness. Older adults (N=341) shortly after retirement completed measures of neuroticism, attainment in education, occupation, and salary, and over 2 subsequent years, they completed measures of current subjective status, self-reported illness, and current negative affect. As hypothesized, greater neuroticism was associated with lower subjective status via lower objective status and more severe self-reported illness. However, current negative affect was not associated with subjective status, and subjective status did not predict future poorer subjective health.     

Psychometric properties of scales of professional competence and treatment by health personnel in outpatient hospital surgeries

The aim of this study was to analyze the psychometric properties of two scales that assess the perceived quality and patient satisfaction with outpatient surgery in the Health Service of Murcia. These scales assess the degree of Professional Competence (PC) and Personnel Treatment (PT). The scales were administered to a sample of 2017 users of outpatient surgery in the Health Service of Murcia during the years 2008 and 2009. Exploratory factor analysis indicates a unidimensional structure for each scale. Internal consistency was adequate: .68 for PC and .75 for PT. The correlation between the PC scale and patients' global satisfaction was positive and statistically significant. The correlation between the PT scale and patients' global satisfaction was also statistically significant. The scales have shown their utility to detect areas of improvement and to plan intervention strategies.     

Structural invariance of multiple intelligences, based on the level of execution

The independence of multiple intelligences (MI) of Gardner's theory has been debated since its conception. This article examines whether the one- factor structure of the MI theory tested in previous studies is invariant for low and high ability students. Two hundred ninety-four children (aged 5 to 7) participated in this study. A set of Gardner's Multiple Intelligence assessment tasks based on the Spectrum Project was used. To analyze the invariance of a general dimension of intelligence, the different models of behaviours were studied in samples of participants with different performance on the Spectrum Project tasks with Multi-Group Confirmatory Factor Analysis (MGCFA). Results suggest an absence of structural invariance in Gardner's tasks. Exploratory analyses suggest a three-factor structure for individuals with higher performance levels and a two-factor structure for individuals with lower performance levels.     

Participating in politics resembles physical activity: general action patterns in international archives, United States archives, and experiments

A series of studies examined whether political participation can emerge from general patterns of indiscriminate activity. In the first two studies, general action tendencies were measured by combining national and state-level indicators of high activity (e.g., impulsiveness, pace of life, and physical activity) from international and U.S. data. This action-tendency index positively correlated with a measure of political participation that consisted of voting behaviors and participation in political demonstrations. The following two experimental studies indicated that participants exposed to action words (e.g., go, move) had stronger intentions to vote in an upcoming election and volunteered more time to make phone calls on behalf of a university policy than participants exposed to inaction words did (e.g., relax, stop). These studies suggest that political participation can be predicted from general tendencies toward activity present at the national and state levels, as well as from verbal prompts suggestive of activity.     

Future-oriented emotions in the prediction of binge-drinking intention and expectation: the role of anticipated and anticipatory emotions

The Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) offers a parsimonious explanation of purposive behavior, but in the study of healthy and risk behaviors its sufficiency may be questioned. Working with binge-drinking, a very common risk behavior in Spanish undergraduate students, we used two strategies for improving predictions from TPB: using behavioral intention (BI) and behavioral expectation (BE) as proximal antecedents of behaviors and adding as new predictors two future-oriented emotions (anticipated and anticipatory). Hierarchical regression analyses show that while anticipated emotions improved TPB explanations of BI, anticipatory emotions improved the explanations of BE. The present results show the influence of future emotions in the prediction of behavioral intention and behavioral expectation.     

Validation study of the Questionnaire on School Maladjustment Problems (QSMP)

The aim of this study was to analyze the exploratory and confirmatory structure, as well as other psychometric properties, of the Cuestionario de Problemas de Convivencia Escolar (CPCE; in Spanish, the Questionnaire on School Maladjustment Problems [QSMP]), using a sample of Spanish adolescents. The instrument was administered to 60 secondary education teachers (53.4% females and 46.6% males) between the ages of 28 and 54 years (M= 41.2, SD= 11.5), who evaluated a total of 857 adolescent students. The first-order exploratory factor analysis identified 7 factors, explaining a total variance of 62%. A second-order factor analysis yielded three dimensions that explain 84% of the variance. A confirmatory factor analysis was subsequently performed in order to reduce the number of factors obtained in the exploratory analysis as well as the number of items. Lastly, we present the results of reliability, internal consistency, and validity indices. These results and their implications for future research and for the practice of educational guidance and intervention are discussed in the conclusions.     

Child and adolescent development: common mental disorders according to age and gender

Despite the increase in the incidence and prevalence rates of children and adolescents' mental disorders, there are few works performed with large and representative samples of children and adolescents with psychopathological symptoms. The present work analyses 588 participants referred by first care pediatricians to a specialized unit for children and adolescents' mental health. As a result of the study, a statistically significant relation was found between age and diagnosis: a larger incidence of behavioral disorders, communication disorders, elimination disorders, pervasive developmental disorders, impulse-control disorders from 0 to 5 years; behavioral disorders and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) were more common from 6 to 11 years, behavioral and anxiety disorders were more likely at 12 to 15 years; and, lastly, behavioral disorders were more prevalent from 16 to 18 years. With respect to gender, there was a significant relationship with diagnosis: boys had more behavioral disorders, whereas girl had more anxiety disorders. To conclude, a relationship between mental disorders and developmental achievements could be indicated in the younger group. Additionally, externalizing disorders in boys and internalizing ones n girls were more prevalent across all ages.     

The socialization of sex-differentiated skills and academic performance: A mediational model

Using a multifactorial model, sex differences in academic performance were examined in a sample of 347 elementary school children. As expected, girls' academic performance averaged higher than boys'. Path analysis confirmed initial hypotheses that girls' advantage is partially due to their characteristic of greater responsiveness to social cues and compliance with adult direction. This advantage was partially offset in this model by boys' greater visual-spatial skill, which also was a predictor of academic success. Access to stereotypic masculine toys and activities at home was, for both sexes, a predictor of children's visual-spatial ability. As expected, socioeconomic variables, including mothers' occupation and fathers' level of education, also influenced the environmental, social, and cognitive factors predicting academic success. These results indicate that boys' and girls' differential development of specific cognitive and social skills may play an important role in establishing sex differences in academic performance.