Executive functioning profiles from the BRIEF across pediatric medical disorders: Age and diagnosis factors

The objective of the study was to compare executive functioning (EF) profiles across several pediatric medical conditions and explore the influence of age of diagnosis and evaluation. A retrospective, cross-sectional study of 734 children aged 5 to 18 years was conducted across five medical groups (brain tumor, leukemia [ALL], epilepsy [EPI], neurofibromatosis type 1 [NF1], and ornithine transcarbamylase deficiency [OTC-D]), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) controls, and matched healthy controls. We compared groups across the scales of a parent-completed Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Functioning (BRIEF) using a repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA). Separate ANOVAs were conducted to look at age factors. The results showed that the ADHD group differed from all other groups and had the highest level of reported EF problems. The NF1 and OTC-D groups differed significantly from the healthy comparison group for overall EF problems, while the EPI and cancer groups did not. Working memory was the most elevated scale across medical groups, followed by plan/organize. Children with medical disorders were two to four times more likely than healthy controls to have clinically significant problems in several EF domains. There was a main effect for age at diagnosis and age at evaluation. A subset of children with medical disorders were found to have parent-reported EF difficulties, with particular vulnerability noted in working memory and organizational/planning skills. This has relevance for the development of interventions that may be helpful across disorders. Children with particular diagnoses and earlier age of diagnosis and evaluation had greater reported EF problems.     

Failure‐to‐thrive is associated with disorganized infant–mother attachment and unresolved maternal attachment

This study provides further evidence for the co‐occurrence of atypical patterns of attachment and failure‐to‐thrive (FTT). Eighty‐three children with FTT and 130 normally growing comparison children were seen in Ainsworth's Strange Situation at ages 11 to 32 months. These subjects were highly diverse with respect to social, economic, and ethnic characteristics. Children with FTT were significantly less likely to show secure and more likely to show anxious, disorganized attachments than normally growing comparisons: only 34% of FTTs were secure, while 46% showed disorganized attachments. In contrast, 66% of comparisons were secure and 16% were disorganized. In addition, a subsample of 59 mothers (23 FTT and 36 comparison) were interviewed with the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI). Mothers of FTTs were more than twice as likely as comparisons (65% versus 22%) to use discourse indicating unresolved loss or trauma. Similarly, mothers of FTTs were less likely to show autonomous (secure) discourse than mothers of well‐nourished children (13% versus 58%). There were no differences in infant or adult attachment classifications between organic and nonorganic FTT groups, further discrediting this as a psychologically meaningful distinction. These results support the notion that disturbed patterns of attachment are common in FTT, regardless of the etiology of growth failure. The findings suggest that evaluations and treatments of FTT should address psychological, as well as medical problems in these families. © 2000 Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health.     

Dominance and age-related changes in the play fighting of intact and post-weaning castrated male rats (Rattus norvegicus)

The play fighting behaviour of male rats (Rattus norvegicus) castrated at weaning was compared to that of intact controls during the juvenile and post-pubertal phases of development. Following puberty, both the castrated and intact animals exhibited an age-related change in their play fighting; the frequency of initiating play fighting decreased and juvenile patterns of playful defense were replaced by more adult-like patterns. As these changes occurred even in the absence of the pubertal surge of gonadal hormones, they were more likely to result from the organizational effects of gonadal hormones in the perinatal period than the activational effects of these hormones at puberty. Although the castrated animals exhibited the age-related changes in behaviour, they did not exhibit the asymmetries in play associated with dominance relationships. As demonstrated in previous studies, in pairs of intact rats, the animal that attacks the most and uses more juvenile defenses during play fighting and weighs the least is typically the subordinate. In the castrates, asymmetries in weight and playful defense are not related to play frequency, indicating the absence of a dominance relationship. Although the characteristic changes in male play fighting at puberty are independent of the activational effects of gonadal hormones, dominance relationships and their associated changes in play fighting are dependent on these hormones. Therefore, in the perinatal period gonadal hormones most likely organize the age-related changes in play behaviour, whereas post-pubertally gonadal hormones activate dominance relationships and thus, indirectly modify play fighting by affecting dominance-associated assymetries in behaviour. © 1996 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

The Benefits of the Learn to Think Program for Preschoolers’ Creativity: An Explorative Study

This paper presents the Learn to Think preschool (LTT-P) program for promoting creativity in preschoolers and reviews its potential benefits. LTT-P was designed within the framework of the successful LTT creativity program for older students and both were developed to fit the Chinese education system. To assess the potential benefits of LTT-P, a quasi-experimental pretest-posttest control group study was conducted in a preschool in an urban region in the northwest of China, involving 68 middle level and 87 senior level children. The Lines and Circles subtests of the Torrance Test of Creative Thinking were used to examine the development of children's creativity on the dimensions fluency, originality, and elaboration between pretest and posttest. The results suggest that the LTT-P program has the potential to promote young children's creative thinking, especially with regard to the aspects of originality and elaboration. The results for fluency are less clear. To the best of our knowledge, LTT-P is the first program, grounded in a structured learning theory and sound curriculum framework, to support children's creativity development in Chinese early childhood education.     

The Mehrabian Achieving Tendency Scale (MATS): Reliability, validity and relationship to demographic characteristics

The Mehrabian Achieving Tendency Scale (MATS) assesses individual motivational characteristics that are associated with achievement (Mehrabian, 1993; 1994-1995). A survey of 130 males and 218 females was conducted to examine psychometric properties of the MATS in a sample of Australians between 18 and 75 years of age. MATS scores attained high reliabilities and were similar to American samples. MATS scores were positively and significantly correlated with the Schwartz Value Survey (1992) achievement values but were not correlated with benevolence values. The MATS had a single factor structure but marked differences in item loading patterns when compared with Mehrabian and Blum (1996). Education and occupation were significantly associated with variations in MATS but gender and age were not.     

Contextual fear conditioning predicts subsequent avoidance behaviour in a virtual reality environment

Avoidance behaviour is a crucial component of fear and is importantly involved in the maintenance of anxiety disorders. Presumably, fear conditioning leads to avoidance of the feared object or context. A virtual reality contextual fear conditioning paradigm was used to investigate the association between explicit conditioning effects and subsequent avoidance behaviour. Mild electric shocks were administered in one context (anxiety context), but never in a second context (safety context). Subsequent avoidance behaviour was assessed by asking participants to choose two out of three contexts (a neutral context was added) to visit again. Participants avoided the anxiety context, but did not prefer the safety over the neutral context. Participants with substantial conditioning effects, as reflected in differential valence, arousal and anxiety ratings, avoided the anxiety context but not the safety context. In sum, we demonstrated an association between context conditioning effects on an explicit level and later avoidance behaviour.     

Factors Associated with Support for Adolescent Access to Contraception Among Mexican Catholic Parents

Journal of Religion and Health - We used a nationally representative survey of 2186 Mexican Catholic parents to assess two outcomes: support for adolescent access to modern contraception and...     

A Case Study of Participatory Action Research in a Public New England Middle School: Empowerment, Constraints and Challenges

PAR recognizes teachers and students as co-creators in a learning process that builds self-efficacy essential to long-term educational success. In enabling contexts, PAR projects also allow teachers to critically deconstruct societal power, examine how these dynamics are reproduced in the classroom, and work against the silencing of student voices. This case study describes the process of implementing an inquiry-based PAR model into a formal urban middle school program intended to reduce drop out rates. The anthropologist/researchers employed participant observation, interviews, and review of student work to explore the dynamics, challenges, and constraints confronted during the process. The intervention demonstrated the gap between practice and theory in a middle school environment marked by well-defined hierarchies and roles as well as high-stakes testing.