The Mentoring Relationship Challenges Scale: The impact of mentoring stage, type, and gender

The current study investigated the role of relational challenges as reported by 309 protégés in various stages and types of mentoring relationships. The Mentoring Relationship Challenges Scale (MRCS) was newly constructed using the results of an earlier qualitative study (Ensher & Murphy, 2005). The scale measured three factors of relational challenges which were: Demonstrating Commitment and Resilience, Measuring Up to a Mentor's Standards, and Career Goal and Risk Orientation. The results demonstrated that with respect to mentoring stages, those protégés in the beginning stages of their relationships reported experiencing significantly fewer challenges related to Demonstrating Commitment and Resilience than those in the mature or ending stages of the relationship. Also, it was found that the type of mentoring relationship (traditional, step-ahead, or peer) affected the prevalence of the three types of challenges. Protégés in peer relationships reported significantly fewer of all three types of challenges than those in step-ahead or traditional relationships. However, contrary to predictions, there were no significant differences found between those in informal versus those in formal mentoring relationships. As expected, protégé and mentor gender interacted significantly. Female protégés reported experiencing significantly fewer challenges related to the factor of Measuring Up to a Mentor's Standards, than did male protégés. Also, female protégés reported experiencing a significantly higher degree of relational challenges related to Career Goal and Risk Orientation from their male mentors than from their female mentors. Finally, after controlling for perceptions of career and psychosocial support for protégés in traditional mentoring relationships, two of the three relational challenges factors remained significant and explained a significant amount of variance in overall satisfaction with the mentoring relationship. This suggests that relational challenges, at least for traditional mentoring relationships, serve as an important mechanism to impact overall relationship satisfaction.     

Effects of acute psychosocial stress exposure on endocrine and affective reactivity in college students differing in the 5-HTTLPR genotype and trait neuroticism

Enhanced stress vulnerability has been implicated in the pathogenesis of affective disorders. Although both genetic (5-HTTLPR) and cognitive (neuroticism) factors are known to increase stress vulnerability, no experimental study has investigated the interaction between these two factors on psychobiological reactivity following acute stress exposure. This study used a balanced experimental design to examine the interaction between the 5-HTTLPR genotype and trait neuroticism in neuroendocrine and affective stress responses. From a large group of 771 students, 48 carriers of the short/short (S/S) allele and 48 carriers of the long/long (L/L) allele with the lowest and the highest neuroticism scores (77 females, 19 males; mean age?±?SD: 20.6?±?2 years) were selected and exposed to an acute psychosocial stressor. Mood was assessed before and after the stressor, and salivary cortisol concentrations were measured before and at 20, 30, and 60?min after stressor onset. Acute stress increased salivary cortisol concentration regardless of either 5-HTTLPR genotype or neuroticism, but it caused a less profound negative mood change in L/L compared to S/S-allele carriers with the lowest neuroticism scores. The 5-HTTLPR genotype influences affective reactivity to acute stress conditional upon neuroticism, improving resilience to acute stress in L/L-allele carriers if they do not already possess high cognitive-affective (neuroticism) vulnerability.     

Some effort for some: further evidence that scalar implicatures are effortful

Under the assumption of the principle of cooperation (Grice, 1989), a statement such as "some eels are fish" is thought to be false since it contains less information than is considered sufficient. However, the statement is logically sound since the meaning of "some" is compatible with "all". Currently, the primary interpretation of such underinformative statements remains subject to debate. According to Levinson (2000), the pragmatic "some but not all" interpretation is the default interpretation, while others (e.g., Sperber & Wilson, 1995) argue that this pragmatic interpretation only comes to the fore when relevant within the context and is thus considered secondary to the logical "some and perhaps all" interpretation. In this study, three factors that may influence the answer pattern are studied: task load, working memory capacity, and repetition of the statements. In Experiment 1, we used a secondary task paradigm to manipulate the cognitive load under which a number of underinformative statements had to be judged. We observed that for participants with a rather limited working memory span it is harder to reach a pragmatic interpretation under cognitive load. In Experiment 2, we manipulated the repetition of the statements. We observed that with a higher number of filler statements, participants produced fewer consistent answer patterns. This study provides further evidence against the automaticity of the pragmatic interpretation: It shows that the pragmatic interpretation requires more cognitive effort than the logical interpretation and that increasing the number of filler statements inhibits the development of a response strategy.     

Work–nonwork boundary management profiles: A person-centered approach

The goal of this paper is to advance the measurement and theory of work–nonwork boundary management styles. Boundary management styles are defined as the approaches individuals use to demarcate boundaries and attend to work and family and other nonwork roles, given identity centralities and perceived boundary control. We argue that research should be augmented with a person-centered approach, which examines how psychological measures are integrated into configurations. Integrating role and boundary theories, we identify three main characteristics of work-nonwork boundary management: (1) cross-role interruption behaviors (work to nonwork, and nonwork to work interruptions); (2) identity centrality of work and family roles, and (3) perceived control of boundaries. Using a variable-centered approach, we refined and validated these measures to create an assessment (Work–Life Indicator) that captured boundary management profiles. The profiles reflect how interruption behaviors, identity centralities, and boundary control interrelate to cluster into profiles, a set of psychological characteristics organized into a pattern of work–nonwork boundary functioning. We identify boundary management profiles and examine their relationships to key work-family outcomes. Regardless of the level and direction of interruption behaviors and centrality of work–family identities, we found that low control boundary management profiles (reactors, job warriors) tended to experience more negative work and family outcomes than did high control profiles (fusion lovers, dividers, family guardians, eclectics).     

Assessment of Knowledge Gains in Proactive Training for Postvention

This paper describes the development of a knowledge measure for the evaluation of a proactive training program for suicide postvention and analyses of its psychometric properties. The 25-item true–false knowledge test was administered before and after each of 12 training sessions; a total of 205 school personnel participated in the training and evaluation. Participants showed significant improvement in overall test scores and on several individual items following the training. Analyses suggested that the measure has construct validity, and that it taps a single underlying dimension. Strengths and weaknesses of the measure, and measurement issues in program evaluation are discussed.     

‘Our Moslem sisters‘: Women of Greater Syria in the eyes of American protestant missionary women

From the mid‐twentieth century, American Protestant missionary women played a role in attempting to reach their ‘Moslem sisters’ in Greater Syria through the various missionary institutions established in the region. This article examines part of the encounter between these two groups of women — particularly the murky and often ironic nature of the exchange, and how primarily single, Protestant American women focused much of their efforts on training young Arab Muslim women to be good wives and mothers. American Protestant missionary women, in assuming they were ‘uplifting’ the status of Middle Eastern women, were in most respects involved in an attempt to modernize the domestic dimension of the latter's identity and imprint upon it a particular cultural stamp.     

Photographs as retrieval cues for children

The aim of this study was to evaluate photographs as an alternative type of retrieval aid suitable for pre-school children. Fifty-seven children (age 3;7–6;8 years) participated in a fishing game. Ten days later the children were questioned about the situation under three conditions: group 1 was interviewed only with a context-reinstatement instruction. Group 2 additionally received photos relevant to the game as well as distractor items. Group 3 received both of these aids and was trained in the use of photos. In the photo groups more correct details were remembered compared to the control group. Accuracy in both photo groups was also enhanced by props. These results show that multiple-choice photos combined with a reinstate context instruction are an effective retrieval aid for young children. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The Development of Aggression in 18 to 48 Month Old Children of Alcoholic Parents

This study examined the development of aggressive and oppositional behavior among alcoholic and nonalcoholic families using latent growth modeling. The sample consisted of 226 families assessed at 18, 24, 36, and 48 months of child age. Results indicated that children in families with nonalcoholic parents had the lowest levels of aggressive behavior at all time points compared to children with one or more alcoholic parents. Children in families with two alcoholic parents did not exhibit normative decreases in aggressive behavior from 3 to 4 years of age compared to nonalcoholic families. However, this association was no longer significant once a cumulative family risk score was added to the model. Children in families with high cumulative risk scores, reflective of high parental depression, antisocial behavior, negative affect during play, difficult child temperament, marital conflict, fathers’ education, and hours spent in child care, had higher levels of aggression at 18 months than children in low risk families. These associations were moderated by child gender. Boys had higher levels of aggressive behavior at all ages than girls, regardless of group status. Cumulative risk was predictive of higher levels of initial aggressive behavior in both girls and boys. However, boys with two alcoholic parents had significantly less of a decline in aggression from 36 to 48 months compared to boys in the nonalcoholic group.     

Effects of Race, Gender, Perceived Similarity, and Contact on Mentor Relationships

This study examined the effects of similarity, both actual (race and gender) and perceived, and amount of contact between mentor and protégé on the quality of mentor relationships. Mentor relationship quality was measured by liking, satisfaction, intended retention, and degree of psychosocial and instrumental functions experienced by the protégé. The participants were 104 summer intern protégés and their volunteer staff mentors employed at a large West coast media organization. Protégés were randomly assigned to one of two types of mentor pairings—same and different race mentors. Results indicate that liking, satisfaction, and contact with mentor were higher when protégés’ perceived themselves to be more similar to their mentors. Actual race pairing was related to protégés’ perceptions of the amount of career support and to mentors’ liking of protégés.