Resiliency,Self-Regulation,and Reemployment After Job Loss

This study investigated self-regulation and resiliency in one's search for reemployment. Although trait-based approaches are central to many resiliency conceptualizations, recent research has found that self-regulation (affective, behavioral, and cognitive) contributes to predicting resiliency-related outcomes. We hypothesized that self-regulation would incrementally predict reemployment process outcomes, specifically the job search outcomes of psychological well-being, job search self-efficacy, and job search clarity. Results indicated that, over and above resiliency traits, behavioral and cognitive self-regulation incrementally predicted well-being and job search clarity, and cognitive self-regulation incrementally predicted job search self-efficacy. Implications for theory and continued research on resiliency in reemployment are discussed.     

A randomized trial of a representational intervention to decrease cancer pain (RIDcancerPain).

OBJECTIVE: Based on theories regarding cognitive representations of illness and processes of conceptual change, a representational intervention to decrease cancer pain (RIDcancerPain) was developed and its efficacy tested. DESIGN: A two-group RCT (RIDcancerPain versus control) with outcome and mediating variables assessed at baseline (T1) and 1 and 2 months later (T2 and T3). Subjects were 176 adults with pain related to metastatic cancer. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Outcome variables were two pain severity measures (BPI and TPQM), pain interference with life, and overall quality of life. Mediating variables were attitudinal barriers to pain management and coping (medication use). RESULTS: One hundred and fifty subjects completed the study. Subjects in RIDcancerPain (T1-T2 and T1-T3) showed greater decreases in Barrier scores than those in control. Subjects in RIDcancerPain (T1-T3) showed greater decreases in pain severity than those in control. Change in Barriers scores mediated the effect of RIDcancerPain on pain severity. CONCLUSION: RIDcancerPain was efficacious with respect to some outcomes. Further work is needed to strengthen it.     

Improvements to Suicide Prevention Training for Prison Staff in England and Wales

Suicide prevention training for the prison service in England and Wales has been criticized. STORM is a package emphasizing the practice and review of interactions with suicidal persons and was evaluated in a pilot study for use in prisons. Trainees completed questionnaires immediately before and after training and at 6 to 8 months follow‐up. Training significantly improved attitudes, knowledge, and confidence, and improvements were maintained at follow‐up. Satisfaction with training was very high. STORM was successfully adapted for prison settings, and showed good effects among staff trained. It should be provided to the wider prison estate, with regular refresher training.     

Varieties of Binocular Interaction in Human Vision

Binocular processing was investigated using a quantitative, process-oriented metatheory of response times. The analyses are not confined to particular distributional assumptions or specific models. Upper and lower performance boundaries for probability summation in parallel processing are defined and compared with observed distributions of reaction times using a variety of dichoptic stimuli. Performance that exceeds the upper bound strongly suggests faciliatory convergence between the two eyes (binocular channel summation). Performance below the lower bound suggests that inputs to the two eyes are processed serially. The results indicate that binocular channel summation in subjects with normal stereo vision requires targets of the same luminance polarity (paired increments or decrements) in corresponding retinal locations. When corresponding retinal locations are stimulated with opposing luminance polarities (increment to one eye, decrement to the other), performance is consistent with probability summation, indicating that parallel ON and OFF pathways remain segregated at least to the level of binocular fusion. Further analyses of data from a stereo-blind observer suggests serial processing of binocular inputs.     

Acquisition of a non-vocal ‘language’ by aphasic children

Alphasic children with serious language deficits were taught to communicate via a system of visual symbols originally devised by David Premack (1969) for use with chimpanzees. The subjects, lacking normal language, readily learned to express several language functions in this way (word, sentence, class-concept, question, negation). The linguistic status of ‘Premackese’ is questioned, and it is suggested that it is better viewed as a communication system. It may, therefore, be that the aphasic children lack some specifically linguistic ability.     

How are pictures registered in memory?

Three experiments tested the hypothesis that pictorial memory is much less dependent on rehearsal than is verbal memory. Experiment I examined incidental learning since this is assumed to reflect learning with little or no rehearsal. Following a classification task, intentional and incidental learning for pictures and for words was compared. The superiority of pictorial memory was especially marked in incidental learning. Experiment II showed that this result was not due to differences in the amount of processing required to classify pictures and words. RTs to classify words and pictures did not differ, and incidental learning was again superior for pictures. In Experiment III rehearsal opportunity was restricted by a concurrent task during presentation of word and picture lists, and the decrement was very much greater for word learning than for picture learning. It was concluded that manipulation of rehearsal opportunity has relatively little effect on pictorial memory.