Reported exposure and emotional reactivity to daily stressors: the roles of adult age and global perceived stress

A central goal of daily stress research is to identify resilience and vulnerability factors associated with exposure and reactivity to daily stressors. The present study examined how age differences and global perceptions of stress relate to exposure and emotional reactivity to daily stressors. Sixty-seven younger (M age = 20) and 116 older (M age = 80) adults completed a daily stress diary and measures of positive and negative affect on 6 days over a 14-day period. Participants also completed a measure of global perceived stress. Results revealed that reported exposure to daily stressors is reduced in old age but that emotional reactivity to daily stressors did not differ between younger and older adults. Global perceived stress was associated with greater reported exposure to daily stressors in older adults and greater stress-related increases in negative affect in younger adults. Furthermore, across days on which daily stressors were reported, intraindividual variability in the number and severity of stressors reported was associated with increased negative affect, but only among younger adults.     

Examining the Clinical Efficacy of Core Transformation: A Randomized Clinical Trial

This randomized clinical trial with a sample of adults (N = 129) from India explored the effects of a single core‐transformation session on symptom experience and psychological growth. The results over the total 8‐week study period indicated significant, moderate overall effect sizes (ds = 0.63 and 0.52) for symptom experience, emotional stability, affect balance, global well‐being, and purpose in life. Implications for research and clinical practice are discussed.     

The relationship of momentary anger and impulsivity to bulimic behavior

Past research has suggested that negative affect may be a causal factor for eating disordered behaviors. More specifically, research has shown that anger appears to be one aspect of negative affect that is particularly relevant in bulimic patients. Previous studies have also shown that the relationship between negative affect and eating disordered behaviors may partially depend upon personality variables such as impulsivity. The present study examined whether the relationship between anger and eating disordered behaviors is moderated by impulsivity. Subjects completed an ecological momentary assessment (EMA) protocol for an average of 2 weeks. Findings revealed that overall antecedent anger level and the variability of antecedent anger predicted binge-eating episodes and that these relationships were moderated by participants' level of impulsivity. These findings suggest that personality variables impact the way that anger and eating behaviors relate. They also suggest that the variability of antecedent anger may be a fruitful avenue for future research for those interested in causal variables associated with bulimia nervosa.     

Serial position effects in short-term visual memory: A SIMPLE explanation?

A version of Sternberg's (1966) short-term visual memory recognition paradigm with pictures of unfamiliar faces as stimuli was used in three experiments to assess the applicability of the distinctiveness-based SIMPLE model proposed by Brown, Neath, and Chater (2002). Initial simulations indicated that the amount of recency predicted increased as the parameter measuring the psychological distinctiveness of the stimulus material (c) increased and that the amount of primacy was dependent on the extent of proactive interference from previously presented stimuli. The data from Experiment 1, in which memory lists of four and five faces varying in visual similarity were used, confirmed the predicted extended recency effect. However, changes in visual similarity were not found to produce changes in c. In Experiments 2 and 3, the conditions that influence the magnitude of c were explored. These revealed that both the familiarity of the stimulus class before testing and changes in familiarity, due to perceptual learning, influenced distinctiveness, as indexed by the parameter c. Overall, the empirical data from all three experiments were well fit by SIMPLE.     

The role of adolescent IQ and gender in the use of cognitive support for remembering in aging

The purpose of this study was to examine the role of adolescent IQ (AIQ) and gender in older adults' ability to use cognitive support to enhance memory. Subjects were 269 mid-1940s graduates of the same high school. Adolescent IQ scores were gathered from archives, and subjects' memory for words was tested with tasks that provided increasing cognitive support. Overall, subjects benefited from support; women recalled more words than men; and persons with a high AIQ remembered more words than persons with a lower AIQ. However, while all subjects showed gains from cognitive support, men with a lower AIQ performed worse than men with a high AIQ. Women's performance was not dependent on their AIQ. Analysis of qualitative memory indicators suggested that women and persons with a high AIQ had better encoding and retrieval operations. Men with a lower AIQ appear to be particularly vulnerable to memory deficits in aging. This may be due to low "cognitive reserve" or generally poorer episodic memory function.     

A multitrait-multimethod validation of the Implicit Association Test: implicit and explicit attitudes are related but distinct constructs

Recent theoretical and methodological innovations suggest a distinction between implicit and explicit evaluations. We applied Campbell and Fiske's (1959) classic multitrait-multimethod design precepts to test the construct validity of implicit attitudes as measured by the Implicit Association Test (IAT). Participants (N = 287) were measured on both self-report and IAT for up to seven attitude domains. Through a sequence of latent-variable structural models, systematic method variance was distinguished from attitude variance, and a correlated two-factors-per-attitude model (implicit and explicit factors) was superior to a single-factor-per-attitude specification. That is, despite sometimes strong relations between implicit and explicit attitude factors, collapsing their indicators into a single attitude factor resulted in relatively inferior model fit. We conclude that these implicit and explicit measures assess related but distinct attitude constructs. This provides a basis for, but does not distinguish between, dual-process and dual-representation theories that account for the distinctions between constructs.     

Early social attention impairments in autism: social orienting, joint attention, and attention to distress

This study investigated social attention impairments in autism (social orienting, joint attention, and attention to another's distress) and their relations to language ability. Three- to four-year-old children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD; n = 72), 3- to 4-year-old developmentally delayed children (n = 34), and 12- to 46-month-old typically developing children (n = 39), matched on mental age, were compared on measures of social orienting, joint attention, and attention to another's distress. Children with autism performed significantly worse than the comparison groups in all of these domains. Combined impairments in joint attention and social orienting were found to best distinguish young children with ASD from those without ASD. Structural equation modeling indicated that joint attention was the best predictor of concurrent language ability. Social orienting and attention to distress were indirectly related to language through their relations with joint attention. These results help to clarify the nature of social attention impairments in autism, offer clues to developmental mechanisms, and suggest targets for early intervention.     

Development of prehension between 5 and 10 years of age: distance scaling, grip aperture, and sight of the hand

The authors investigated whether 5- to 10-year-old children (N = 75) differ from adults (N = 12) in the developmental course of distance scaling and the adaptations to the inability to see the hand during prehension movements. The children reached under a surface and grasped and lifted an object suspended through it. All children scaled velocity appropriately for movement distance, both with and without sight of the hand. However, 5- to 6-year-old children did not increase grip aperture with increased distance, whereas older children and adults did. The older children and adults spent longer after peak deceleration when they could not see the hand, and maximum grip aperture (MGA) was larger, providing an increased safety margin. Children aged 5 to 6 spent the same amount of time between peak deceleration and grasp, whether or not they could see the hand, and they failed to increase MGA when they could not see the hand. Prehension in the younger children differed from that of older children in two ways: The younger children did not integrate reach and grasp over different distances and did not use visual information about hand position to optimize accuracy.     

Factors associated with college student intent to engage in community service

Many universities in the United States highlight service as an integral component to their mission. Additionally, a growing pedagogical focus highlights the importance of community service as an integral component of student development. The current study was an investigation of the factors associated with college student intentions to engage in volunteer community service. University students (N = 403) at a comprehensive university located in the southern plains completed an anonymous Web-based questionnaire to assess community service attitudes and intentions. Subsequent to testing for statistical assumptions, results from multiple regression analysis suggest that a sense of community connectedness, cost and benefit considerations, and the seriousness of community needs are significant variables in explaining variance in the intent to engage in community service.     

Volume Contents

Volume Contents

Volume Contents