The Role of Language Skill in Child Psychopathology: Implications for Intervention in the Early Years

In this narrative review, we suggest that children’s language skill should be targeted in clinical interventions for children with emotional and behavioral difficulties in the preschool years. We propose that language skill predicts childhood emotional and behavioral problems and this relationship may be mediated by children’s self-regulation and emotion understanding skills. In the first sections, we review recent high-quality longitudinal studies which together demonstrate that that children’s early language skill predicts: (1) emotional and behavioral problems, and this relationship is stronger than the reverse pattern; (2) self-regulation skill; this pattern may be stronger than the reverse pattern but moderated by child age. Findings also suggest that self-regulation skill mediates the relation between early language skill and children’s emotional and behavioral problems. There is insufficient evidence regarding the mediating role of emotion understanding. In subsequent sections, we review evidence demonstrating that: (1) particular kinds of developmentally targeted parent–child conversations play a vital role in the development of language skill, and (2) some current clinical interventions, directly or indirectly, have a beneficial impact on children’s vocabulary and narrative skills, but most approaches are ad hoc. Targeting language via parent–child conversation has the potential to improve the outcomes of current clinical interventions in the preschool years.     

Ethical Ambiguity in Science

Drawing on 171 in-depth interviews with physicists at universities in the United States and the UK, this study examines the narratives of 48 physicists to explain the concept of ethical ambiguity: the border where legitimate and illegitimate conduct is blurred. Researchers generally assume that scientists agree on what constitutes both egregious and more routine forms of misconduct in science. The results of this study show that scientists perceive many scenarios as ethically gray, rather than black and white. Three orientations to ethical ambiguity are considered—altruism, inconsequential outcomes, and preserving the status quo—that allow possibly questionable behavior to persist unchallenged. Each discursive strategy is rationalized as promoting the collective interest of science rather than addressing what is ethically correct or incorrect. The results of this study suggest that ethics training in science should focus not only on fabrication, falsification, and plagiarism and more routine forms of misconduct, but also on strategies for resolving ethically ambiguous scenarios where appropriate action may not be clear.     

Issues in engaging high-risk adolescent mothers in supportive work

This paper focuses on the identification of the factors associated with the productive and unproductive use of supportive and therapeutic services by high-risk teen parents. Referral and treatment data were analyzed and discussed, as were two case studies. The importance of family support and family relationships to the use of services is highlighted in both the statistical and clinical data. Treatment implications are discussed.     

Clinical interventions in parent-infant groups around issues related to separation-individuation

Parent-child groups as an educational method in a general hospital setting provide support for parents and an environment in which they can discuss their questions about their child's development. This paper illustrates the clinical use of parent-child groups as a means of early intervention in problems that become apparent during the Separation-Individuation stages of development. We present two case studies of mother-child pairs, who have been members of the group for 2 years. The first case is a bi-racial child whose mother is struggling to deal with the child's rapprochement stage behavior. Through the oral and anal stages, conflict has grown in their relationship due to the mother's way of viewing her child, as well as her own unresolved adolescent separation difficulties. The second case is an overprotective mother whose own pathology prevented her daughter from resolving her rapprochement crisis. Interventions by the leaders as well as the group's educational method help both mother-child pairs to resolve interpersonal conflict and to continue their essentially normal development.     

Improving Predictive Accuracy with a Combination of Human Intuition and Mechanical Decision Aids

This study examines the intuitive combination of human judgment and mechanical prediction under varied information conditions. As expected, mechanical prediction outperformed human intuition when based on the same information, but a combined approach was best when judges had access to relevant information not captured by the model (information asymmetry). The model was useful for differentiating between the event outcomes (improved slope), while eliminating the bias caused by base-rate neglect. Human intuition was useful for incorporating relevant information outside the scope of the model, resulting in improved slope and reduced judgment scatter. The addition of irrelevant information was detrimental to judgment accuracy, causing an increase in bias and a reduction in slope. These results provide insight intohowandwhencombining mechanical prediction and human intuition is likely to result in improved accuracy.     

EVALUATION OF AN INPATIENT PROGRAM AIMED AT PREPARING “HARD-TO-PLACE” CHRONICALLY MENTALLY ILL FOR THE COMMUNITY

A program designed to prepare long-stay “hard-to-place” psychiatric inpatients for successful community placement was evaluated. Fifteen patients in the Intensive Learning Center (ILC) program were assessed at 5- and 10-month intervals following baseline. In addition, their functioning was compared to a criterion related comparison group of 26 patients who had been transferred to community placements 18 months earlier. Two informant driven measures were used: The Rehabilitation Evaluation of Hall and Baker (REHAB), (Baker & Hall, 1988) and, Adaptive Behavior Scale (ABS), (Nihira, Foster, Shellhaas, & Leland, 1975). The results indicated significant improvement in the ILC patients adaptive functioning after 5 months, but this improvement was not consistently sustained at the 10 month follow-up. Comparisons between the ILC and community groups were made at 10 months and suggested considerable overlap in functioning between the two groups. The implications of the findings for program development and implementation as well as for discharge planning are discussed.     

The Experience of Leader-Led Peer Supervision: Genetic Counselors' Perspectives

As we proceed through our professional lives, it is essential that we challengeourselves in order to continue to develop our genetic counseling skills. Conferences, workshops,post-graduate courses, journal clubs, and involvement in professional organizations havebecome the traditional methods of continuing education for post-graduate geneticcounselors. While these forums address the need to stay updated on scientific orinformation-based topics, there is little available to counselors to promote growth incounseling skills. A group of Boston-based genetic counselors describe how their leader-ledsupervision group has established a setting to meet the needs of its members both forsupport and continued counseling training. We outline here the evolution of this group andhow it has become a valued part of our professional lives. We feel that the model of leader-ledpeer supervision holds great value in helping genetic counselors continue to enhancetheir interpersonal skills in a supportive, safe, and challenging environment. It is our hopethat others will elect to form similar groups in their own communities, thereby creating newopportunities for growth within the genetic counseling profession.     

Training AIDS and Anger Prevention Social Skills in At‐Risk Adolescents

Youth in alternative schools often engage in high rates of risk behaviors for AIDS and violence. This study included 42 youth, ages 13 to 18, from alternative schools in San Diego, CA, and tested the effectiveness of behavioral skills training based on the Behavioral‐Ecological Model. Two interventions were evaluated: one teaching condom use skills and the other teaching anger management skills. Changes in most skills were significant at postintervention but were not maintained at 6 months. Few risk‐related attitudes or behaviors improved at 6 months for either group.     

Some Potential Negative Social Consequences of Cigarette Smoking: Marketing Research in Reverse1

The effects of cigarette smoking on first impressions were examined in an interlocking series of studies. Provided college students evaluated peers who were neither extremely attractive nor unattractive, smoking typically reduced the positivity of evaluations regardless of participants' smoking. Targets photographed with smoking material were rated, for example, to be less considerate, calm, disciplined, honest, healthy, well-mannered, and happy than when smoking material was absent. Replication with apparently older participants evaluating college students did not reveal smoking to influence ratings strongly. Further replication did not reveal smoking material simply to influence college students' ratings of an attractive professional model. These results were compared with earlier studies of the effects of cigarette smoking on interpersonal evaluation and an educational unit for deterring smoking was discussed.