Catching up with wonderful women: The women‐are‐wonderful effect is smaller in more gender egalitarian societies

Inequalities between men and women are common and well‐documented. Objective indexes show that men are better positioned than women in societal hierarchies—there is no single country in the world without a gender gap. In contrast, researchers have found that the women‐are‐wonderful effect—that women are evaluated more positively than men overall—is also common. Cross‐cultural studies on gender equality reveal that the more gender egalitarian the society is, the less prevalent explicit gender stereotypes are. Yet, because self‐reported gender stereotypes may differ from implicit attitudes towards each gender, we reanalysed data collected across 44 cultures, and (a) confirmed that societal gender egalitarianism reduces the women‐are‐wonderful effect when it is measured more implicitly (i.e. rating the personality of men and women presented in images) and (b) documented that the social perception of men benefits more from gender egalitarianism than that of women.     

The Ant and the Grasshopper: Adolescents’ Time Perspective,Satisfaction with Life and the Mediating Role of Hope

The present study examined the predictive role played by the three time perspective’s dimensions (Present-Hedonistic, Present-Fatalistic and Future) on the satisfaction with life and the mediational role of hope in adolescence, using cross-sectional data. Participants were 675 adolescents (333 males and 342 females), with a mean age of 17.4 years (SD = .84). Adolescents lived in Rome and its surroundings regions and attended the 3th or the 4th year of high school. A structural equation modeling was used. The results shown that Present-Hedonistic predicts directly and indirectly (through agency) the life satisfaction; Future and Present-Fatalistic predicts indirectly (through agency) the life satisfaction; the Present-Hedonistic and Future predicted the pathway, but it does not seem to play a role of mediator. This model is the same for males and females. These results offers new useful guidance to adolescents’ counsellors and educators that should endeavor to increase the hope of both Present and Future oriented adolescents.     

Stress-induced salivary cortisol secretion during hypobaric hypoxia challenge and in vivo urinary thromboxane production in healthy male subjects

Few studies have assessed the effects of stress on in vivo platelet activation. In the present study, hypobaric hypoxia induced by rapid decompression during high-altitude simulated flight in a hypobaric chamber was used to evaluate the effects of environmental stress on salivary cortisol and urinary thromboxane metabolite (TXM) excretion, a noninvasive marker of in vivo platelet function. Twenty-one male aviators (mean ± SD age = 36 ± 7 years) experiencing hypoxia by removing their oxygen mask for 4-5 min during a simulated flight to 25,000 ft (7,620 m; pO(2) = 59.17 mmHg) and a matched control group of thirteen flying instructors wearing oxygen masks during the challenge, were studied. Hypobaric hypoxia induced a transient significant increase (P < 0.001) in the aviators' salivary cortisol concentration; the overall pattern of diurnal cortisol fluctuation was maintained in both groups. Urinary TXM showed a significant ～30% reduction (P < 0.01) after the chamber session in aviators exposed to hypobaric hypoxia, but not in controls. A significant inverse correlation was found between salivary cortisol and urinary TXM in aviators (r = - 0.64, P = 0.0015). Salivary cortisol was a significant predictor (P < 0.001) for urinary TXM concentrations in aviators. In conclusion, here we observed that an acute stress-induced salivary cortisol increase was associated with reduced urinary thromboxane biosynthesis, providing the first indirect evidence for an inhibitory effect of acute stress on in vivo platelet function.     

Prospective Memory Impairment in Mild Cognitive Impairment: An Analytical Review

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a heterogeneous condition characterized by the presence in an otherwise healthy elderly individual of cognitive deficits involving specific domains in the absence of significant functional impairments. Reports indicate that prospective memory (PM), that is, the ability to remember to execute delayed intentions, is impaired in individuals with MCI. The present review discusses the current debate in the literature on PM functioning in MCI by focusing on the relationship between prospective retrieval and retrospective memory functioning. Analysis of the reported evidence revealed that both the prospective component and the retrospective component of PM can be impaired in MCI. Declarative memory dysfunction may account for the retrospective memory impairment, while either reduced executive abilities or a deficit of reflexive mechanisms could explain the prospective component impairment.     

Infant-mother attachment can be improved through group intervention: a preliminary evaluation in Spain in a non-randomized controlled trial

The quality of infant-mother attachment has been linked to competence in different domains of child development. Research indicates that early intervention can enhance the quality of infant-mother attachment, though its efficacy in a group format has yet to be evaluated. The current study is aimed at examining the usefulness of a group intervention in enhancing infant-mother attachment. An intervention aimed at addressing aspects such as maternal responsivity, sensitivity and childrearing behaviour was developed by the researchers and experienced psychologists. The intervention spanned a period of 14 months starting from the third quarter of pregnancy. The intervention was evaluated among 24 mothers from the Basque region of Spain. The sample consisted of children of both genders in a similar proportion: 45.8% were boys and 54.2% were girls. The children in this sample were full-term born and did not present symptoms of any serious pre- or postnatal complications. The intervention had a statistically non-significant medium effect. Infants whose mothers had received the intervention showed higher rates of secure attachment compared to children from the control group, as assessed by the Strange Situation observation procedure. A potentially significant confounding variable, maternal attachment, was balanced across the intervention and comparison groups. We can tentatively point out that a group intervention may enhance the quality of infant-mother attachment. Nevertheless, because the study design was not randomized, the results of this study remain preliminary and need replication in a full randomized controlled trial designed study.     

Bidirectional links in the network of multiplication facts

In three experiments, we tested the hypothesis that activation of multiplication operand nodes (e.g., 3 and 8) can occur through presentation of their product (e.g., 24). In Experiments 1 and 2 we found activation of the operands when the product was presented as a cue in a number-matching task. In Experiment 3, activation also occurred in a parity-matching task, where the product (24) was not relevant to the parity matching on its operands (3 and 8). We concluded that bidirectional links exist among the operands and their product for multiplication problems and these links can be activated in a purely stimulus-driven manner. We suggest this may constitute the basis for the solution of simple divisions by mediation through the complementary multiplication facts.     

Short-Term Memory Deficits Are Not Uniform in Down and Williams Syndromes

Neuropsychological investigation of the development of the mnesic function in mental retardation has primarily focused on evaluating short-term memory (STM). Studies have often documented a reduced verbal short-term memory span in individuals with mental retardation and with Down syndrome in particular, compared to groups of mental age-matched controls. However, recent evidence suggests that verbal short-term memory is not equally impaired in all individuals with mental retardation. Findings in children with Williams syndrome are particularly relevant in this regard. Also, data concerning STM for visual information suggest that visual-object and visual-spatial working memory may be differently compromised in people with mental retardation. In particular, individuals with Williams syndrome exhibit specific difficulties in visual-spatial but not in visual-object working memory tasks compared to typically-developing children matched for mental age. Instead, people with Down syndrome show reduced performance in both visual-spatial and visual-object tests. Taken together, these results reinforce the view that intellectual disability is not a unitary condition characterized by homogeneous slowness of cognitive development but a variety of conditions in which some cognitive functions may be more disrupted than others. The finding that the working memory deficit in individuals with Williams and Down syndrome may be qualitatively differentiated also supports the hypothesis that it is not simply a manifestation of general cognitive impairment but, rather, the expression of a specific deficit of a discrete cognitive ability.     

Number magnitude orients attention, but not against one’s will

Recent evidence has shown that uninformative numbers can trigger attention shifts congruent with the spatial representation of number magnitude (Fischer, Castel, Dodd, & Pratt, 2003). In the present study, three spatial-cuing experiments whose aim was to qualify the automaticity of this numbermediated orienting are described. Experiment 1 replicated the phenomenon, showing that uninformative numbers can evoke orienting in a simple detection task. In Experiment 2, target location was random, but the participants were encouraged to shift attention to the left in response to large numbers and to the right in response to small numbers. No evidence for strong automaticity was observed, since the participants’ performance was better when left-side targets were preceded by large numbers than when they were preceded by small numbers and vice versa. Experiment 3 corroborated this pattern by comparing gaze- and number-mediated cuing under conditions of real counterpredictiveness. The results indicate that unlike gaze-driven orienting, number-mediated orienting is not obligatory.