Emotion,controllability and orientation towards stress as correlates of children’s coping with interpersonal stress

Guided by the motivational theory of coping (Skinner and Zimmer-Gembeck in Ann Rev Psychol 58:119–144. doi:10.1146/annurev.psych.58.110405.085705, 2007), we investigated children’s anticipated coping with three different stressful events (bullying, parental argument, parent–child verbal conflict), and examined whether their reliance on challenge coping responses versus threat coping responses could be accounted for by emotional reactions (including feelings of sadness, anger and fear), perceived controllability, and orientation or interest in the stressor. In addition, we examined parents’ reports of their children’s temperamental traits as correlates of coping. In random order followed by a positive stimulus, children (N = 206, age 8–12 years) watched each of the three stressful events, and reported their emotions, perceived control, orientation and coping after each one. As anticipated, results indicated that controllability was associated with more challenge coping (a composite of adaptive/approach coping responses such as problem solving and support seeking) and less threat coping (a composite of maladaptive/withdrawal coping responses such as helplessness and escape). In general, feelings of sadness were more strongly associated with challenge coping, whereas fear and anger especially related to more threat coping. Greater orientation towards the stressor was particularly predictive of more challenge coping, but also was associated with more threat coping in response to parent stressors. These associations were significant, even after controlling for temperament (negative reactivity, task persistence, withdrawal, and activity), which was generally unrelated to children’s coping. Other combinations of coping responses were also examined.     

Exposure to graphic warning labels on cigarette packages: Effects on implicit and explicit attitudes towards smoking among young adults

Objective: To test the effect of exposure to the US Food and Drug Administration’s proposed graphic images with text warning statements for cigarette packages on implicit and explicit attitudes towards smoking.

Design and methods: A two-session web-based study was conducted with 2192 young adults 18–25-years-old. During session one, demographics, smoking behaviour, and baseline implicit and explicit attitudes were assessed. Session two, completed on average 18 days later, contained random assignment to viewing one of three sets of cigarette packages, graphic images with text warnings, text warnings only, or current US Surgeon General’s text warnings. Participants then completed post-exposure measures of implicit and explicit attitudes. ANCOVAs tested the effect of condition on the outcomes, controlling for baseline attitudes.

Results: Smokers who viewed packages with graphic images plus text warnings demonstrated more negative implicit attitudes compared to smokers in the other conditions (p = .004). For the entire sample, explicit attitudes were more negative for those who viewed graphic images plus text warnings compared to those who viewed current US Surgeon General’s text warnings (p = .014), but there was no difference compared to those who viewed text-only warnings.

Conclusion: Graphic health warnings on cigarette packages can influence young adult smokers’ implicit attitudes towards smoking.     

Can we link emotional eating with the emotion regulation skills of adolescents?

Objective: A recent cross-sectional study showed that maternal rejection is associated with emotional eating of obese youngsters seeking treatment, and that this relation is mediated by maladaptive emotion regulation (ER) of the youngsters. We wanted to build on this study and investigate the relation between parental rejection, maladaptive ER and emotional eating in a community sample using longitudinal data.

Design: Participants were 81 youngsters between the ages of 10 and 16 years. Participants completed questionnaires assessing maternal and paternal rejection, ER strategies and emotional eating, at two time moments (M = 71 days between time moments). Latent change models were used to estimate level and change of each variable.

Results: Results showed that the levels of maternal rejection, maladaptive ER and emotional eating were related. The indirect effect of the level of maternal rejection on the level of emotional eating through the level of maladaptive ER was marginally significant. On average, maternal rejection showed no change over time, whereas the other variables decreased. The changes in the variables were not related.

Conclusion: The findings highlight the importance of assessing the emotional bond between mother and youngster and the ER of youngsters with an emotional eating style.     

Mother–Daughter Relationship Quality and Body Image in Preadolescent Girls

Research suggests that mothers may play a role in girls’ body image development. The “interactive” hypothesis specifies that qualities of the mother–daughter relationship, as opposed to maternal modeling alone, predict daughter’s body image. We sought to understand how maternal relationship quality, from the perception of both daughters and mothers, was associated with preadolescent girls’ body image. The relationship between mother–daughter relationship quality and daughters’ body image was examined in 152 girls (ages 8–12) and their mothers. Mothers and daughters primarily identified as non-Hispanic white or Hispanic. Hierarchical linear regression analyses indicated that daughters’ perception of mother–daughter relationship quality was associated with daughters’ body esteem and body dissatisfaction, adding a small, but significant, amount of variance above the larger effect of child z-BMI and age. In contrast, maternal perception of mother–daughter relationship quality was not associated with any child body image measures. Young girls who perceived their relationships with their mothers more positively had healthier body images. Although effect sizes were relatively small and the cross-sectional design precludes conclusions regarding causality, these results support the “interactive” model of body image development whereby the characteristics of the mother–daughter relationship (as perceived by the daughter) are related to body image. Our findings support the notion that daughters’ perceptions of strong mother–daughter relationships are associated with healthy child body image, and fall in line with family-based prevention efforts that attempt to enhance parent–child relationships.     

Distressing Relationships,Anger, and Stress Amplification in a Sample of Young Adult African Americans

This study examined the impact of relationship distress in a sample of 637 African American young adults from the Family and Community Health Study. Using data from privately collected, in-depth interviews, we assessed how distress in nonmarital romantic partnerships and best friendships influence anger. While social support researchers have examined the stress buffering influence of supportive relationships, we utilized the principle of negative potency to test the stress amplification effect of relationship distress through an assessment of stressful life events and racial discrimination. Our analysis showed that distress in relationships was associated with anger, while the presence of these relationships was not. Support for the stress amplification hypothesis was found as men and women who experience intense racial discrimination coupled with a more hostile best friend had elevated levels of anger. Gender differences were also evident and discussed.     

Relationships,Environment, and the Brain: How Emerging Research is Changing What We Know about the Impact of Families on Human Development

Recent research is providing family therapists with new information about the complex interaction between an individual's biological makeup and his/her social and physical environment. Family and social relationships, particularly during sensitive periods early in life, can affect a child's biological foundation. Additionally, stress during the early years can have a lasting effect on an individual's physical and mental health and contribute to the onset of severe mental illness. Community programs have been developed to intervene early with families who have an at‐risk child to prevent or minimize the onset of mental illness including providing partnerships with at‐risk mothers of infants to shape attachment relationships. Programs are also developing individual and family interventions to prevent the onset of psychosis. Practicing family therapists can incorporate emerging neuroscience and early intervention research and leverage the growing base of community programs to enhance the effectiveness and sustainability of mental health outcomes for clients. Additionally, family therapy education programs should broaden student training to incorporate the growing body of information about how family relationships affect individual mental health development.     

“Leaving it to God” Religion and Spirituality among Filipina Immigrant Breast Cancer Survivors

Many Filipinos have a powerful adherence to Catholicism. However, little is known about spirituality and religious involvement of Filipina Americans who have been diagnosed with breast cancer. Ten (n = 10) in-depth qualitative interviews with Filipina immigrant breast cancer survivors identified prayer to be the most common religious practice, followed by prayers by others and spiritual support from the Catholic Church. These findings can help clinicians and researchers understand the role of spirituality and religion in providing comfort and support for Filipina immigrant breast cancer patient as they face the stress of diagnosis and treatment.     

They’ve lost control: reflections on skill

In this paper, I submit that it is the controlled part of skilled action, that is, that part of an action that accounts for the exact, nuanced ways in which a skilled performer modifies, adjusts and guides her performance for which an adequate, philosophical theory of skill must account. I will argue that neither Jason Stanley nor Hubert Dreyfus have an adequate account of control. Further, and perhaps surprisingly, I will argue that both Stanley and Dreyfus relinquish an account of control for precisely the same reason: each reduce control to a passive, mechanistic, automatic process, which then prevents them from producing a substantive account of how controlled processes can be characterized by seemingly intelligent features and integrated with personal-level states. I will end by introducing three different kinds of control, which are constitutive of skilled action: strategic control, selective, top–down, automatic attention, and motor control. It will become clear that Dreyfus cannot account for any of these three kinds of control while Stanley has difficulty tackling the two latter kinds.     

Action observation produces motor resonance in Parkinson's disease

Observation of movement activates the observer's own motor system, influencing the performance of actions and facilitating social interaction. This motor resonance is demonstrated behaviourally through visuomotor priming, whereby response latencies are influenced by the compatibility between an intended action and an observed (task‐irrelevant) action. The impact of movement disorders such as Parkinson's disease (PD) on motor resonance is unclear, as previous studies of visuomotor priming have not separated imitative compatibility (specific to human movement) from general stimulus‐response compatibility effects. We examined visuomotor priming in 23 participants with mild‐to‐moderate PD and 24 healthy older adults, using a task that pitted imitative compatibility against general stimulus‐response compatibility. Participants made a key press after observing a task‐irrelevant moving human finger or rectangle that was either compatible or incompatible with their response. Imitative compatibility effects, rather than general stimulus‐response compatibility effects, were found specifically for the human finger. Moreover, imitative compatibility effects did not differ between groups, indicating intact motor resonance in the PD group. These findings constitute the first unambiguous demonstration of imitative priming in both PD and healthy ageing, and have implications for therapeutic techniques to facilitate action, as well as the understanding of social cognition in PD.