An assessment of a community's mental health needs

Summary This study tested the potential utility of social indicators and survey data in the prediction of community mental health sevice utilization and construction of a model of community need. The results showed that both kinds of data are strongly associated with rates of usage across census tracts within the community. The social indicator data appeared to describe the social forces acting with various segments of the community. The strength of these forces were unevenly distributed, and disadvantaged areas were most likely to have higher rates of mental health center utilization rates, although to a lesser extent than the social indicators. The two sets of data were highly convergent and both were seen as useful to planning of mental health sevices. The social indicators appeared to identify best where to look in the community for high-risk populations, while the survey data showed what to look for as mental health problems for the people of a given locale.The authors contributed equally to this research. They wish to acknowledge the assistance and encouragement of Dennis McSharry, Director of Research and Evaluation, Granite Community Mental Health Center.     

Effects of methylphenidate alone and in combination with behavior modification procedures on the behavior and academic performance of hyperactive children

Twenty hyperactive 6- to 9-year-old children of normal intelligence were studied in a half-day laboratory classroom in a 2-week period baseline-treatment-reversal design for behavior modification. Under double-blind conditions half the children were placed on .3 mg/kg of Ritalin and half on placebo for the entire program. The classroom program consisted of a group period with immediate reinforcement possible, and an individual time period without immediate reinforcement possible. Behavior modification caused a significant decrease in nonattending, out-of-seat, inappropriate vocalizing and inappropriate peer interaction behavior in the group period. Fidgeting, a nontargeted behavior, was not significantly decreased during this period but did signficantly decrease as a result of medication. No other drug effects occurred during this period. During the individual period, the results were essentially reversed. There were no significant behavior modification effects observed. Significant reductions resulted from medication in all behaviors except out-of-seat and fidgeting. Behavior modification alone significantly affected the two academic measures. No significant effects were seen on the Conners Abbreviated Teacher Rating Scale. No significant interactions were noted between medication and behavior modification.This study was supported by a grant from the Health Services and Mental Health Administration, Maternal and Child Health Service Project 920. Special thanks are due to Judy Racheleu, Charles Cunningham, Christopher P. S. Williams, Dan Lee, Russell Barkley, Ross Danielson, Sally Gray, Don Slyman, and Linda Shambeck.     

Gifted Females: Are We Meeting Their Counseling Needs?

Academically talented females are likely to aspire to achieve far less than their male cohorts, particularly in the areas of mathematics and science. Several socioculural factors have been identified that create the special problems of the gifted female. The implications of these factors for developing appropriate counseling strategies for intellectually gifted females are discussed.     

Attitudes toward rape: Gender and ethnic differences across Asian and Caucasian college students

Previous research has demonstrated that males have a greater tendency to hold erroneous beliefs about rape than females. However, limited cross-cultural studies, particularly of Asians, have been done in this area. The present investigation examined attitudes toward rape victims and belief in rape myths across 302 Asian and Caucasian college students. Subjects were recruited from two college campuses in Orange County, California, and were from predominantly middle-income backgrounds. None of the Caucasian students and a minority (36.25%) of the Asian subjects identified their particular ethnic group(s) of origin. Of the Asian subjects who specified their ethnicity, the majority were of Southeast Asian and Pacific Islander descent. Results indicated significant differences across ethnicity and gender. Asians were more likely to endorse negative attitudes toward rape victims and greater belief in rape myths than their Caucasian counterparts; males endorsed greater negativity toward rape victims and more acceptance of rape myths than did females. Asian subjects who endorsed greater acculturation (Western affiliation) differed significantly from low acculturated subjects on all dependent variables. Results are discussed in regard to cross-cultural differences and gender. Culturally sensitive rape awareness outreach targeting potentially high risk groups, such as Asian college students, is encouraged.This study was in part supported through an Affirmative Action Grant awarded to the first author by the Affirmative Action Faculty Development Program, California State University, Fullerton. Findings of the study were previously presented at the Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, August 1994, Los Angeles, California. The authors wish to thank the undergraduate and graduate research assistants who served as experimenters.     

A feminist naturalized philosophy of science

Building on developments in feminist science scholarship and the philosophy of science, I advocate two methodological principles as elements of a naturalized philosophy of science. One principle incorporates a holistic account of evidence inclusive of claims and theories informed by and/or expressive of politics and non-constitutive values; the second takes communities, rather than individual scientists, to be the primary loci of scientific knowledge. I use case studies to demonstrate that these methodological principles satisfy three criteria for naturalization accepted in naturalized philosophy of science, and allow for the differential assessment of episodes in which values and sociopolitical factors inform, or contribute to the adoption of, theories for which there is sufficient evidential warrant — and episodes in which such factors inform, or contribute to the adoption of, theories for which there is not. I contend that in terms of their empirical and normative import, these principles constitute a further naturalization of the philosophy of science.I am grateful to Richmond Campbell, Ingvar Johansson, Hildur Kalman, Peter Machamer, James Maffie, Jack Nelson, Elizabeth Potter, Phyllis Rooney, Joseph Rouse, and Nancy Tuana for constructive criticisms of earlier drafts. An earlier version was presented to the Nordiskt Nätverk för Feministisk Epistemologioch Feministisk Vetenskapsteorito, and the Institutionen för Filosfi och Vetenskapsteorito at Umeå Universitet, in October 1994. I am grateful to members of these audiences for challenging and insightful criticisms.     

Inhibitory processes in auditory selective attention: Evidence of location-based and frequency-based inhibition of return

The possibility that there is an inhibitory component to auditory covert orienting was addressed. Each trial consisted of a cue followed by a target, and listeners were required to detect, localize, or identify the frequency of the target. At 150-msec stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA), performance was best when stimuli sounded from the same location or were of the same frequency. However, at 750-msec SOA, performance was best when stimuli differed in location or were of different frequencies. These results document the existence of both location-based and frequency-based auditory inhibition of return.     

GENERALIZED IMITATION AND RESPONSE-CLASS FORMATION IN CHILDREN WITH AUTISM

An experimental analysis of imitation was conducted to examine the influence of response topography on generalization of imitation across three response types. Four children with autism were presented with both reinforced training trials and nonreinforced probe trials of models from vocal, toy-play, and pantomime response types. The probe trials were used to examine generalization within each response type. A multiple baseline design was used to analyze percentage of matching and nonmatching responses to models across response types. This study, the first to analyze imitative response classes in children with autism, showed that imitation generalized from reinforced training models to nonreinforced probe models within a response type, but it did not generalize across response types. Thus, functional response classes determined by topographical boundaries were exhibited within generalized imitation.     

Social Values, Conformity, and Dress

This study examined the influence of social values on the importance of various clothing features. A model is hypothesized in which social values lead to differing needs for group identification, affiliation, and conformity, which influence clothing feature importance. In general, social values are associated with a high need for affiliation and group identification, conformity, and a greater emphasis on both the utilitarian and the display aspects of clothing (style and brand name).     

What Is the Buzz About Iconicity? How Iconicity in Caregiver Speech Supports Children's Word Learning

One cue that may facilitate children's word learning is iconicity, or the correspondence between a word's form and meaning. Some have even proposed that iconicity in the early lexicon may serve to help children learn how to learn words, supporting the acquisition of even noniconic, or arbitrary, word–referent associations. However, this proposal remains untested. Here, we investigate the iconicity of caregivers’ speech to young children during a naturalistic free-play session with novel stimuli and ask whether the iconicity of caregivers’ speech facilitates children's learning of the noniconic novel names of those stimuli. Thirty-four 1.5-2-year-olds (19 girls; half monolingual English learners and half bilingual English-Spanish learners) participated in a naturalistic free-play task with their caregivers followed by a test of word-referent retention. We found that caregivers’ use of iconicity, particularly in utterances in which they named the novel stimuli, was associated with the likelihood that children learned that novel name. This result held even when controlling for other factors associated with word learning, such as the concreteness and frequency of words in caregiver speech. Together, the results demonstrate that iconicity not only can serve to help children identify the referent of novel words (as in previous research) but can also support their ability to retain even noniconic word-referent mappings.     

The hard work of doing nothing: Accounting for inhibitory costs during multiple action control

Performing many actions at the same time is usually associated with performance costs. However, recent eye-tracking evidence indicates that under specific conditions, inhibiting a secondary response can be more costly than executing it, resulting in dual-action benefits. Here, we show that performance gains due to the absence of inhibitory control demands in dual-action trials are not limited to saccades as a response modality. In our study, participants had to react to a visually presented directional word by either reading the stimulus aloud (vocal modality), pressing the corresponding arrow key on a keyboard (manual modality), or both. Crucially, manual error rates were significantly lower when participants had to respond with both a button press and naming than when they had to respond with naming only. More specifically, in vocal-only conditions we observed a significant percentage of false-positive manual responses, suggesting difficulties with inhibiting an unwarranted manual action. Thus, our results indicate that difficulties associated with single- (vs. dual-) action control are a stable, domain-general phenomenon that likely arises whenever execution-related demands are accompanied by substantial additional inhibitory control demands.