A Critical Examination of the Reliability and Validity of a Gender Role Attitude Scale in Flanders (Belgium): What Lessons Can be Learned?

Western societies have shifted toward more egalitarian gender role attitudes (GRA). Quantitative research on GRA has been critiqued for not having kept up with societal changes in GRA. GRA scales are claimed to lack discriminative power and not fully capture the diversity within non-traditional attitudes. The present study gives an overview of the theoretical critiques with regard to GRA scales and empirically assesses these critiques. A typical example of a GRA scale measuring adolescents’ GRA in Flanders (Belgium) is used to test the scale’s quality across three waves of surveys completed by 4063 early secondary school students. Our analysis identifies the drawbacks of this particular scale. First, a ceiling effect was found, with most respondents being egalitarian. Second, the representativeness of roles inquired about is restricted; relevant societal domains are not questioned and most roles are only questioned for one gender. Third, a gender-binary approach is dominant. Finally, our results confirm that adolescents demonstrate ambivalent feelings toward balancing female employment and motherhood; although paid employment is encouraged, childcare is prioritized. We recommend that other researchers critically examine the usability and quality of GRA scales in today’s society. Using outdated GRA scales might conceal the ambivalence that adolescents feel due to new gender inequities. Also, investing in structures and regulations supporting the work-family balance is key in further promoting gender equity.     

Online communication, compulsive Internet use, and psychosocial well-being among adolescents: a longitudinal study

The present study investigated the relationships between adolescents' online communication and compulsive Internet use, depression, and loneliness. The study had a 2-wave longitudinal design with an interval of 6 months. The sample consisted of 663 students, 318 male and 345 female, ages 12 to 15 years. Questionnaires were administered in a classroom setting. The results showed that instant messenger use and chatting in chat rooms were positively related to compulsive Internet use 6 months later. Moreover, in agreement with the well-known HomeNet study (R. Kraut et al., 1998), instant messenger use was positively associated with depression 6 months later. Finally, loneliness was negatively related to instant messenger use 6 months later.     

Exposure to slim images in mass media: television commercials as reminders of restriction in restrained eaters

OBJECTIVE: The aim of the present study was to explore the effects of exposure to slim images and diet-related products in commercials on actual food intake in relation to dietary restraint. DESIGN: An experimental design was used, in which food intake was measured in 124 female students who watched either a sad or a neutral movie on television, which was interrupted by either commercials featuring slim models and diet products, or neutral commercials. Subsequently, participants filled out questionnaires on dietary restraint and any tendency toward overeating. MAIN OUTCOME VARIABLE: Intake of snack food while watching television. RESULTS: It was found that highly restrained students exposed to commercials with slim models and diet-related products ate less food, whereas less restrained eaters ate slightly more after seeing these commercials. CONCLUSION: The findings suggest that restrained eaters confronted with diet products and slim images when watching television will be reminded of their restricted eating behavior and eat less. The present study provides support for the reinhibition theory of slim media images.     

Susceptibility for thin ideal media and eating styles

This study examined the relations between susceptibility for thin ideal media and restrained, emotional and external eating, directly and indirectly through body dissatisfaction. Thin ideal media susceptibility, body dissatisfaction and eating styles were measured in a sample of 163 female students. Structural equation modelling was used for analyses, controlling for BMI. Higher susceptibility for thin ideal media was directly related to higher scores on all eating styles, and indirectly related to higher restrained and emotional eating through elevated levels of body dissatisfaction. So, thin ideal media susceptibility was not only related to restraint through body dissatisfaction, but also directly. Emotional eaters might be more vulnerable for negative affect, whereas external eaters might be more sensitive to external cues in general.     

Illusions of Parental Control: Parenting and Smoking Onset in Dutch and Swedish Adolescents1

Parental control is assumed to be associated with smoking onset: Parents who exert control on their children and monitor their children's behavior are less likely to have children who start to smoke. However, the empirical evidence for this assumption is mostly from cross‐sectional studies. The present research examined the prospective associations between parental control and smoking onset among Dutch and Swedish adolescents and their parents. Findings revealed nonsignificant links between general parental control and smoking onset in both samples, and no link between smoking‐specific parental control and smoking onset in the Dutch sample, thereby questioning the assumption that parental control prevents adolescent smoking onset.     

Quantitative experimentelle Untersuchungen über die Korrelation seelischer Tätigkeiten und Erlebnisse zur Sudoration

Zusammenfassung Bei der Wasserabgabe durch die Haut wird eine Perspiratio sensibilis von einer Perspiratio insensibilis unterschieden. Erstere wird in eine Secretio in sensu strictiori und eine Sudoratio differenziert. Letzterer neu geprägte Terminus technicus wird für den Vorgang der Schweißausstoßung vorgeschlagen.Weiter wird eine Methode zur unmittelbaren Beobachtung der Sudoration beschrieben. Mit ihr werden die physiologischen Korrelate psychischer Zustände und Vorgänge, die experimentell provoziert werden, gemessen und registriert. Zur Beobachtung kommen Gefühle stark lust- oder unlustbetonten Charakters, angenehme und unangenehme Überraschungen, Vergegenwärtigungen unangenehm gefühlsbetonter Vorstellungen und Situationen, ängstliche Erwartungen, geistige Arbeitsspannungen und Erwartungsspannungen. Eine diesen seelischen Tätigkeiten und Erlebnissen parallel verlaufende Sudoration verschiedener Intensität kann einwandfrei nachgewiesen werden.     

Loneliness and the social monitoring system: Emotion recognition and eye gaze in a real‐life conversation

Based on the belongingness regulation theory (Gardner et al., 2005, Pers. Soc. Psychol. Bull., 31, 1549), this study focuses on the relationship between loneliness and social monitoring. Specifically, we examined whether loneliness relates to performance on three emotion recognition tasks and whether lonely individuals show increased gazing towards their conversation partner's faces in a real‐life conversation. Study 1 examined 170 college students (M_age = 19.26; SD = 1.21) who completed an emotion recognition task with dynamic stimuli (morph task) and a micro(‐emotion) expression recognition task. Study 2 examined 130 college students (M_age = 19.33; SD = 2.00) who completed the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test and who had a conversation with an unfamiliar peer while their gaze direction was videotaped. In both studies, loneliness was measured using the UCLA Loneliness Scale version 3 (Russell, 1996, J. Pers. Assess., 66, 20). The results showed that loneliness was unrelated to emotion recognition on all emotion recognition tasks, but that it was related to increased gaze towards their conversation partner's faces. Implications for the belongingness regulation system of lonely individuals are discussed.     

Biopower,Normalization, and HPV: A Foucauldian Analysis of the HPV Vaccine Controversy

This article utilizes the Foucauldian concepts of biopower and normalization to give an analysis of the debate surrounding the controversial administration of the HPV vaccine to adolescents. My intention is not to solve the problem, rather to utilize a Foucauldian framework to bring various facets of the issue to light, specifically the way the vaccine contributes to strategies of power in reference to how young adults develop within relationships of power. To begin, the article provides an overview of the Foucauldian concepts of biopower and normalization, including how these two strategies of power were present in the administration of the smallpox vaccine in the 19th century. Next, information about HPV and the history of the current controversy in the United States is presented. Lastly, the article presents an analysis of the strategies of biopower and normalization present in the debate on HPV, including an emphasis on how the vaccination is similar to, and different from, 19th century smallpox vaccination. It also explores the way that mechanisms of disease control affect and are affected by individual subjects, in this case, adolescents.