Impact of a Father Figure’s Presence in the Household on Children’s Psychiatric Diagnoses and Functioning in Families at High Risk for Depression

The consequences of living in single-parent households on children’s wellbeing are well documented, but less is known about the impact of living in single-mother households among children with high familial risk for depression. Utilizing data from an ongoing three-generation study of high-risk families, this preliminary study examined a sample of 161 grandchildren of probands diagnosed with major depressive disorder, comparing those in single-parent households to those in dual-parent households with household status defined as the full-time presence of a resident male in the home. High-risk children were compared across households in terms of psychiatric diagnoses (measured by Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia for School-Age Children; K-SADS-PL) and global functioning (assessed by Global Assessment Scale, child version; C-GAS). Results indicated that high-risk children in single-parent households had 4.7 times greater odds for developing a mood disorder and had significantly lower mean C-GAS scores (p = 0.01) compared to those in dual-parent households. Differences remained significant when controlling for household income, child’s age, and either parent’s depression status. There were no significant differences between high-risk children across households when household status was instead defined as legal marital status. This study has several limitations: sample size was small, probands were recruited from a clinical population, and participants had not passed completely through the period of risk for adult psychiatric disorders. These findings point towards the importance of identifying and closely monitoring children at risk for depression, particularly if they reside in households without a resident father figure.     

Interpreting Survey Questions About Sexual Aggression in Cross-Cultural Research: A Qualitative Study with Young Adults from Nine European Countries

Examining equivalence in the interpretation of survey items on sexual assault by participants from different cultures is an important step toward building a valid international knowledge base about the prevalence of sexual aggression among young adults. Referring to the theoretical framework of contextualism, this study presents qualitative data from semi-structured interviews with 128 young adults from nine EU countries on their understanding of survey items from the Sexual Aggression and Victimization Scale (SAV-S). The measure had previously been used to collect quantitative data on the prevalence of sexual aggression perpetration and victimization in the same countries that had yielded substantial differences in the rates of victimization and perpetration between countries. Based on the methodological approach of a mixed research design, the current study was conducted as a follow-up to the quantitative study with a new sample to explore whether systematic differences in the interpretation of the survey items in the different countries might explain part of the variation in prevalence rates. The interviews showed that participants from the nine countries interpreted the items of the SAV-S in a similar way and as intended by the authors of the scale. Systematic differences between men and women in interpreting the survey items were revealed. Implications of the findings for conducting survey research on sexual aggression across cultures are discussed.     

The “Endura” of The Cathars’ Heresy: Medieval Concept of Ritual Euthanasia or Suicide?

The aim of the study is to explore the medieval concepts on the voluntary death of severely sick people, as they emerge through the endura (endurance) of the heresy of the Cathars in France (twelfth to fourteenth centuries). The endura was the prerequisite act of repentance that would allow the fallen soul to return to heaven. The endura was a necessary act of repentance, after the performance of a ceremonial purification of the soul (consolamentum), and consisted of the patients’ voluntary abstention from vital food. The consolamentum and endura could be performed in the final stage of a disease with the consent of the patients or their relatives. The role of the Cathar physician was only to determine the severity of the disease and the forthcoming death of the patient. The physician was not allowed to take steps that would deprive the life of the patient, and the performance of the ritual endura was duty of the spiritual leaders of the community. The modern ethical approach to this subject is dictated by the medieval belief on the salvation of the soul and tries to answer the question of whether the endura could be seen as a medieval concept of a ritual euthanasia or fell within the theological sin of suicide.     

‘I don't think racism is that bad any more’: Exploring the ‘end of racism’ discourse among students in English schools

In this paper, we present findings on lay constructions of racism from a focus group study (11 groups, n = 72) with a mixed sample of secondary‐school students in England. We show that racism was, on the whole, ‘othered’: It was located in other times, places, and people or was denied altogether. We show that this way of talking about racism had different uses depending on the identity stakes involved in different interactional contexts. Even in the cases where racism was constructed as common, participants worked hard to make an ‘irrefutable’ argument, which suggests that they were anticipating reputational damage by making a claim for the persistence of racism. We discuss these findings with regard to the different levels of analysis involved in constructions of racism (micro‐interactional, local and broader normative context) and with regard to an ‘end of racism’ discourse that appeared to provide the normative framework for participants' accounts.     

Does quality of sleep mediate the effect of depression on hopelessness?

The objectives of the study were to evaluate the relationship between sleep quality, depression, and hopelessness in advanced cancer patients and whether sleep quality mediated the effect of depression on hopelessness. The final sample consisted of 102 advanced cancer patients under palliative treatment. Patients completed the Greek Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index, a sleep quality instrument, the Greek Beck Depression Inventory for measuring depression, and finally the Beck Hopelessness Scale. Patients' performance status was assessed by their overall physical functioning, as defined by the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group. Depression was highly associated with hopelessness (r = .52, p<.001). Statistically significant associations were found between sleep quality with hopelessness (r = .37, p<.001), as well as with depression (r = .36, p<.001). Mediation analyses indicated that depression influenced hopelessness directly as well as indirectly by its effect on sleep quality. About 14.58% of the variation in hopelessness was explained by depression; 4% of the variance in hopelessness explained by depression was accounted for by the mediation pathway indicating that sleep quality mediated the relationship between depression and hopelessness. Similarly, in the reverse mediation analysis, depression mediated the relationship between sleep quality and hopelessness; 43% of the variation in hopelessness was explained by sleep quality. In conclusion, some of the effect of depression on hopelessness was mediated by sleep quality, but depression had a direct effect on hopelessness as well. Additionally, some of the effect of sleep quality on hopelessness was mediated by depression. The current findings are important because improving sleep quality by treating depression may contribute to decreased hopelessness scores and vice versa: Treating depression by improving sleep quality may also contribute to lower hopelessness scores.     

Lay discourses about Brexit and prejudice: “Ideological creativity” and its limits in Brexit debates

Much research on Brexit has studied whether the vote to leave the EU is a marker of growing prejudice. In this article, we study instead how the relationship between support for Brexit and prejudice is constructed, negotiated and contested in lay discourse. Our analysis of focus groups (N = 12) conducted prior to and following the EU referendum shows that support for Brexit was predominantly constructed as based on nationalism and anti-immigration prejudice, especially in Remain-supporting accounts. This prompted identity management strategies and counter-arguments by Leave supporters, such as providing alternative constructions of prejudice and racism; relating Brexit with “progressive” values; and presenting it as rational and economically sound. In our discussion, we draw attention to the “ideological creativity” that underpins these accounts and also reflect on the possibilities and constraints of developing alternative political narratives under conditions of political polarisation.     

Unattended exposure to components of speech sounds yields same benefits as explicit auditory training

Learning a second language as an adult is particularly effortful when new phonetic representations must be formed. Therefore the processes that allow learning of speech sounds are of great theoretical and practical interest. Here we examined whether perception of single formant transitions, that is, sound components critical in speech perception, can be enhanced through an implicit task-irrelevant learning procedure that has been shown to produce visual perceptual learning. The single-formant sounds were paired at subthreshold levels with the attended targets in an auditory identification task. Results showed that task-irrelevant learning occurred for the unattended stimuli. Surprisingly, the magnitude of this learning effect was similar to that following explicit training on auditory formant transition detection using discriminable stimuli in an adaptive procedure, whereas explicit training on the subthreshold stimuli produced no learning. These results suggest that in adults learning of speech parts can occur at least partially through implicit mechanisms.