The sexual dimorphic association of cardiorespiratory fitness to working memory in children

The present investigation examined the sexual dimorphic patterns of cardiorespiratory fitness to working memory in preadolescent children (age range: 7.7–10.9). Data were collected in three separate studies (Study 1: n = 97, 42 females; Study 2: n = 95, 45 females; Study 3: n = 84, 37 females). All participants completed a cardiorespiratory fitness assessment in addition to a specific measure of working memory (i.e. the operation span task, the n‐back task, or the Sternberg task). Results from all three samples revealed that higher cardiorespiratory fitness levels were associated with better working memory performance only for males with no such relation observed for females. In addition, the sexually dimorphic pattern was selective for the most challenging working memory conditions in each task. Together, these findings reveal new evidence that cardiorespiratory fitness is selectively related to better working memory performance for male children. This investigation provides additional insight into how interventions aimed at improving fitness may influence cognitive development differentially among preadolescent children.     

The relations of daily task accomplishment satisfaction with changes in affect: a multilevel study in nurses

Focusing on a sample of nurses, this investigation examined the relationships of daily task accomplishment satisfaction (for direct and indirect care tasks) with changes in positive and negative affect from preshift to postshift. Not accomplishing tasks to one's satisfaction was conceptualized as a daily workplace stressor that should increase daily negative affect and decrease daily positive affect from preshift to postshift. Further, because of the greater centrality of direct care nursing tasks to nursing work role identities (relative to indirect care tasks), we expected that task accomplishment satisfaction (or lack thereof) for these tasks would have stronger effects on changes in affect than would task accomplishment satisfaction for indirect care tasks. We also examined 2 person-level resources, collegial nurse-physician relations and psychological resilience, as moderators of the relationships among these daily variables, with the expectation that these resources would buffer the harmful effects of low task accomplishment satisfaction on nurse affect. Results supported almost all of the proposed effects, though the cross-level interactions were observed only for the effects of indirect care task accomplishment satisfaction on affect and not for direct care task accomplishment satisfaction on affect.     

Group Art Therapy With Incarcerated Women

Art therapy in groups with incarcerated individuals may be effective when participants are defensive and possess limited education. The authors provide procedures, techniques, and case examples from the New Beginnings program for working with women in a detention facility.     

A study of the science of taste: on the origins and influence of the core ideas

Our understanding of the sense of taste is largely based on research designed and interpreted in terms of the traditional four "basic" tastes: sweet, sour, salty, and bitter, and now a few more. This concept of basic tastes has no rational definition to test, and thus it has not been tested. As a demonstration, a preliminary attempt to test one common but arbitrary psychophysical definition of basic tastes is included in this article; that the basic tastes are unique in being able to account for other tastes. This definition was falsified in that other stimuli do about as well as the basic words and stimuli. To the extent that this finding might show analogies with other studies of receptor, neural, and psychophysical phenomena, the validity of the century-long literature of the science of taste based on a few "basics" is called into question. The possible origins, meaning, and influence of this concept are discussed. Tests of the model with control studies are suggested in all areas of taste related to basic tastes. As a stronger alternative to the basic tradition, the advantages of the across-fiber pattern model are discussed; it is based on a rational data-based hypothesis, and has survived attempts at falsification. Such "population coding" has found broad acceptance in many neural systems.     

Rule-based extrapolation: A continuing challenge for exemplar models

Erickson and Kruschke (1998, 2002) demonstrated that in rule-plus-exception categorization, people generalize category knowledge by extrapolating in a rule-like fashion, even when they are presented with a novel stimulus that is most similar to a known exception. Although exemplar models have been found to be deficient in explaining rule-based extrapolation, Rodrigues and Murre (2007) offered a variation of an exemplar model that was better able to account for such performance. Here, we present the results of a new rule-plus-exception experiment that yields rule-like extrapolation similar to that of previous experiments, and yet the data are not accounted for by Rodrigues and Murre's augmented exemplar model. Further, a hybrid rule-and-exemplar model is shown to better describe the data. Thus, we maintain that rule-plus-exception categorization continues to be a challenge for exemplar-only models.     

Stress-response-dampening effects of alcohol: attention as a mediator and moderator

The present study sought to characterize alcohol's stress-response-dampening (SRD) effects on multiple measures of stress and whether these effects are mediated by reductions in sustained attention and, further, whether baseline levels of sustained attention moderate SRD. One hundred six men consumed either an alcohol (0.70 g/kg) or a placebo beverage prior to learning that they would deliver a self-disclosing speech. Structural equation models controlling for multiple baseline periods indicated that alcohol directly reduced self-reported anxiety and skin conductance levels in response to the stressor. Alcohol's effect on reducing heart rate response, in contrast, was indirect and mediated by effects on prestress baseline. As hypothesized, differences in sustained attention partially mediated the effects of alcohol on skin conductance (but not heart rate or self-reported anxiety) and served as a moderator of alcohol's effects on skin conductance response. Findings are discussed in terms of theoretical links among alcohol consumption, specific cognitive abilities, and stress reactivity.     

Birth weight, Apgar scores, labor and delivery complications and prenatal characteristics of Southeast Asian adolescents and older mothers

The study population included 337 adolescents and 876 mothers who delivered live-born, singleton infants in the Maternity and Infant Care Program at the Minneapolis Health Department between 1980-1982. Whites and blacks on the average experienced menarche 1-2 years earlier than the Southeast Asians although age of first pregnancy was 2 years later for the Southeast Asians. In spite of the significantly later ages of entry into prenatal care, lower weight gains, and hematocrits among the Southeast Asians, compared to the white and black populations, overall height-weight status on admission compared favorably with whites and blacks. The virtual absence of alcohol and tobacco consumption among the Southeast Asians may in fact contribute to the generally favorable Apgar scores, length of gestation, and birth weights. The high frequencies of alcohol and tobacco consumption among white adolescents during pregnancy suggest the need for more intervention to discourage smoking in this population. Further, the potential adoption of these substances needs to be discouraged among the Southeast Asian adolescents. While 2-4% of the whites, blacks and Hmong adolescents experienced eclampsia, 1% of the older Hmong mothers and none of the other Southeast Asians experienced eclampsia. The most frequent complication for all groups was perineal laceration.