Children's understanding of the earth in a multicultural community: mental models or fragments of knowledge?

Children's understanding of properties of the earth was investigated by interviewing Asian and white British classmates aged 4?8 years (N = 167). Two issues were explored: whether they held mental models of the earth ( Vosniadou & Brewer, 1992 ) or instead had fragmented knowledge ( di Sessa, 1988 ); and the influence of the children's different cultural backgrounds. Children selected from a set of plastic models and answered forced‐choice questions. Using this methodology, there were no significant differences in the overall performance of Asian and white children after language skills were partialled out. Even young children showed an emerging knowledge of some properties of the earth, but the distributions of their combinations of responses provided no evidence that they had mental models. Instead, these distributions closely resembled those that would be expected if children's knowledge in this domain were fragmented. Possible reasons for the differences between these findings and those of previous research are discussed.     

Transdiagnostic internet treatment for anxiety and depression: a randomised controlled trial

Disorder-specific cognitive behavioural therapy programs delivered over the internet (iCBT) with clinician guidance are effective at treating specific anxiety disorders and depression. The present study examined the efficacy of a transdiagnostic iCBT protocol to treat three anxiety disorders and/or depression within the same program (the Wellbeing Program). Seventy-seven individuals with a principal diagnosis of major depression, generalised anxiety disorder, panic disorder, and/or social phobia were randomly assigned to a Treatment or Waitlist Control group. Treatment consisted of CBT-based online educational lessons and homework assignments, weekly email or telephone contact from a clinical psychologist, access to a moderated online discussion forum, and automated emails. Eighty one percent of Treatment group participants completed all 8 lessons within the 10 week program. Post-treatment data were collected from 34/37 Treatment group and 35/37 Control group participants, and 3-month follow-up data were collected from 32/37 Treatment group participants. Relative to Controls, Treatment group participants reported significantly reduced symptoms of anxiety and depression as measured by the Depression Anxiety and Stress Scales-21 item, Patient Health Questionnaire-9 item, and Generalised Anxiety Disorder-7 item scales, with corresponding between-groups effect sizes (Cohen’s d) at post treatment of.56,.58, and.52, respectively. The clinician spent a mean time of 84.76 min (SD = 50.37) per person over the program. Participants rated the procedure as highly acceptable, and gains were sustained at follow-up. These results provide preliminary support for the efficacy of transdiagnostic iCBT in the treatment of anxiety and depressive disorders.     

The influence of individual versus aggregate social comparison and the presence of others on self-evaluations

In 5 studies, the authors investigated the effects of comparison with an individual versus comparison with the statistical average on self-evaluations of performance and ability. In Studies 1 and 2, participants took a test of lie detection ability and were provided with the average score and the score of an individual coactor. Both types of feedback significantly affected self-evaluations of performance, but only comparison with the coactor significantly affected self-evaluations of ability. Studies 3 and 4 demonstrated that the presence of a coactor moderated the effect of aggregate social comparison on self-evaluations of ability. The results provide preliminary support for the contention that minimizing the impact of comparison with the average is a self-serving strategy that is facilitated by the presence of others.     

Negative affectivity and drug use in adolescent boys: moderating and mediating mechanisms

This investigation examined variables that might qualify or detail the widely accepted relation between negative affectivity and drug use in adolescent boys. In Study 1, 311 boys (15-17 years old) completed inventories of negative affectivity, positive affectivity, constraint, delinquency, peer delinquency, and drug use. Negative affectivity was positively related to drug use, but only for individuals exhibiting high peer delinquency or low constraint. Study 2 examined mechanisms for this relation by following up 143 of the participants at ages 17-20 years. Delinquency and peer delinquency mediated the relation between negative affectivity and later drug use. These findings suggest that the relation between negative affectivity and drug use is best understood within the context of other drug use risk factors.     

Job crafting,leader autonomy support,and passion for work: Testing a model in Australia and China

Motivation and Emotion - Building on the dualistic model of passion Vallerand (The psychology of passion: A dualistic model. Oxford University Press, New York, 2015), we examined a hypothesized...     

The Benefits of Belief: the Place of Spirituality and Religiosity in the CD-RISC

Applied Research in Quality of Life - The belief-as-benefit hypothesis holds that spirituality and religiosity strengthen resilience and increase personal well-being. This spiritually-based account...     

Fixed-target efficient search has logarithmic efficiency with and without eye movements

Stage 1 processing in visual search (e.g., efficient search) has long been thought to be unaffected by factors such as set size or lure–distractor similarity (or at least to be only minimally affected). Recent research from Buetti, Cronin, Madison, Wang, and Lleras (Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 145, 672–707, 2016) showed that in efficient visual search with a fixed target, reaction times increase logarithmically as a function of set size and, further, that the slope of these logarithmic functions is modulated by target–distractor similarity. This has led to the proposal that the cognitive architecture of Stage 1 processing is parallel, of unlimited capacity, and exhaustive in nature. Such an architecture produces reaction time functions that increase logarithmically with set size (as opposed to being unaffected by it). However, in the previous studies, eye movements were not monitored. It is thus possible that the logarithmicity of the reaction time functions emerged simply as an artifact of eye movements rather than as a reflection of the underlying cognitive architecture. Here we ruled out the possibility that eye movements resulted in the observed logarithmic functions, by asking participants to keep their eyes at fixation while completing fixed-target efficient visual search tasks. The logarithmic RT functions still emerged even when participants were not allowed to make eye movements, thus providing further support for our proposal. Additionally, we found that search efficiency is slightly improved when eye movements are restricted and lure–target similarity is relatively high.