Warmth and Contingency and Their Relationship to Maternal Attitudes Toward Parenting

In this study, the authors addressed the question of whether maternal parenting behaviors in terms of sensitivity, warmth, and contingency with respect to small infants were equally represented in attitudes toward parenting. Sixty mothers from central Germany with middle-class socioeconomic backgrounds were videotaped with their 1st born 3-month-old infant in a free-play and a caregiving episode in their home. The different maternal parenting components were behaviorally analyzed. Maternal attitudes toward parenting were assessed with self-report measures. The results showed that behavioral sensitivity was significantly associated with attitudes related to contingency, whereas behavioral warmth and contingency were not associated with maternal attitudes. The authors interpreted differential associations as a reflection of intuitive and explicit parenting strategies, with only sensitivity being explicitly represented.     

Company Norms Affect Which Traits are Preferred in Job Candidates and May Cause Employment Discrimination

This study investigated a possible mechanism behind employment discrimination. Participants completed a recruitment task where emphasis on cohesion (employees should “fit in”) versus fairness (everybody should be treated equally) was manipulated by describing the norms of a fictitious company differently. There was a comparatively stronger preference in the cohesion condition for traits and interview questions related to social competence (e.g., friendliness, gregariousness, empathy). Furthermore, participants in the cohesion condition primarily pictured socially competent employees, whereas those in the fairness condition primarily pictured employees possessing productivity-related characteristics (e.g., education, experience, and talent). The norm effect was moderated by participants’ awareness of the applicants’ ethnicity. When expecting applicants with foreign backgrounds, participants in the cohesion condition showed increased preference for selection methods related to social competence. Implications for recruitment practices are discussed.     

Need for Cognition and Cognitive Performance From a Cross-Cultural Perspective: Examples of Academic Success and Solving Anagrams

The cross-cultural validity of the Need for Cognition Scale and its relationship with cognitive performance were investigated in two studies. In the first study, the relationships between the scale and university entrance scores, course grades, study skills, and social desirability were examined. Using the short form of the Turkish version of the Need for Cognition Scale (S. Gülgöz & C. J. Sadowski, 1995) no correlation with academic performance was found but there was significant correlation with a study skills scale and a social desirability scale created for this study. When regression analysis was used to predict grade point average, the Need for Cognition Scale was a significant predictor. In the second study, participants low or high in need for cognition solved multiple-solution anagrams. The instructions preceding the task set the participants' expectations regarding task difficulty. An interaction between expectation and need for cognition indicated that participants with low need for cognition performed worse when they expected difficult problems. Results of the two studies showed that need for cognition has cross-cultural validity and that its effect on cognitive performance was mediated by other variables.     

Occupational Choices for People with Psychiatric Disabilities: Comparing Attendees and Non-Attendees at Community-Based Day Centers

Research has shown that people with psychiatric disabilities who attend a day center rate their satisfaction with daily occupations equally in comparison with non-attendees. The current study investigates which occupations the target group performs and also differences in occupational choices between attendees and non-attendees. Reported occupations were analyzed with content analysis. Day center attendees reported more productive occupations, while non-attendees reported more recreational occupations and a greater breadth of occupations. This implies that non-attendees might compensate a lack of work-like occupations at a day center with satisfying recreational occupations. The results can guide development of psychiatric occupational-based rehabilitation.     

Crafts as Leisure-Based Coping: Craft Makers’ Descriptions of Their Stress-Reducing Activity

The goal of this study was to explore how crafts help women, who do crafting as a leisure activity, cope with stress. This qualitative study is based on the narratives of 15 textile craft makers aged 27–57 who were reporting stress in work and non-work settings. The participants reported that their crafting varied depending on the specific life circumstances they encountered. The analysis revealed that crafts provided recreation, satisfaction, optimism, positive relationships, and support as well as helped participants to cope with negative feelings. Crafts served as a leisure-coping resource and a leisure-based coping strategy.     

Influence of attentional focus on skilled motor performance: Performance decrement under unfamiliar focus conditions

Recent studies have demonstrated that the direction of attentional focus exerts a substantial influence on motor performance. We argue that in well-learned skills, this variable might be confounded with athletes’ familiarity with focus conditions. We studied the effect of familiarity and the direction of attentional focus on performance in two experiments using 2 (familiarity) × 2 (direction) within-subject designs. A significant main effect of familiarity—that is, better performance under familiar compared with unfamiliar focus conditions—confirmed the influence of familiarity on motor performance. Results are consistent with existing concepts, but lead to different consequences when applied to sport and exercise.     

Daily Occupations and Adaptation to Daily Life Described by Women Suffering from Borderline Personality Disorder

Clients suffering from Borderline Personality Disorder have significant impairments in relation to health. Despite this, their occupational status is rarely described. The aim of this study was to examine how women with Borderline Personality Disorder describe their daily occupations and adaptation to daily life. The study included nine participants. The data were collected using a semi-structured interview and were analyzed using content analysis.

Theme: Having few organized daily activities and poor personal causation prevent changes in adaptation to daily life. Two categories: performance and self-image, and four subcategories: competent or incompetent to perform, positive self-image, and lack of self-image were identified.     

„Es waren ja fast alle weggegangen“

The complex and partly disputed history of German psychoanalysis during the Third Reich has been thoroughly investigated to date. There are various stages of historical analysis which are distinguished by differing discourses that are presented as part of this work. The first stage of historical analysis was characterized by conflicts within the German psychoanalytical societies and marked by two antagonistic narratives about the transformation of German psychoanalysis during the Third Reich. This study investigated which discourses on the history of German psychoanalysis were integrated into the professional biographies of the first generation of post-war psychoanalysts. In this study 23 narrative interviews were conducted with psychoanalysts who where born before 1st January 1937 focusing on the professional biography and the results were analyzed. The interviewees stressed the ‘damage’ to German psychoanalysis in general and on their training in particular. The ‘damage’ was described as an uncontrollable result of National Socialism and the structural and theoretical changes that were connected to it whereby its effects continued to impact on post-war psychoanalysis. Especially the discourses of the first stage of historical analysis appear to have been integrated into professional biographies and are still having an impact on the interpretation of history for the post-war generation to this day. The history of psychoanalysis is presented as a narrative of ‘rescue’ or ‘liquidation’ of psychoanalysis during the Third Reich depending on the professional identity of the psychoanalysts.