The Emotion Regulation Index for Children and Adolescents (ERICA): A Psychometric Investigation

There is increased recognition of the importance of children learning how to regulate emotions in a functional and adaptive manner for healthy psychological development. However, there is a paucity of tools for assessing emotion regulation during the middle childhood and adolescent years. This study reports on the psychometric evaluation of the 16-item self-report Emotion Regulation Index for Children and Adolescents (ERICA) involving a sample of 1,389 (768 girls, 621 boys) Australian children and adolescents aged 9 to 16 years. Convergent validity for the ERICA is reported with measures of self-conscious emotions (shame, guilt), empathy, childhood depressive symptomatology, and the perceived parenting dimensions of Care and Overprotection. Construct validity assessment using Principal Components Analysis and Confirmatory Factor Analysis yielded three factors: (1) Emotional Control, (2) Emotional Self-Awareness, and (3) Situational Responsiveness. The ERICA was also found to have good internal consistency and to be relatively stable over a four week test-retest period and to be sensitive to age and sex differences. It is concluded that the ERICA is a psychometrically sound measure for the assessment of the identified key aspects of emotion regulation in children and adolescents.     

The dialogical self in a cultural contact zone: Exploring the perceived ‘cultural correction’ function of schooling

This paper discusses a qualitative study that explores the impact the development of a cultural contact zone has upon identity processes in the Dialogical Self. The analysis draws upon interviews with Irish nationals, immigrants and asylum seekers in a new cultural contact zone. The findings illustrate uncertainty experienced as a result of immigration, suggesting that the development of the contact zone caused cultural discontinuity. The individuals' uncertainty for their cultural identities' future viability demanded the development of identity strategies to maintain continuity with their perceived cultural future, where they were faced with cultural others. Identity repositionings and a strategy to maintain continuity will be explored in the current paper. The Irish and asylum seeker participants' unprompted focus on schooling will be explored as a continuity strategy. The participants constructed schooling as a tool for the ‘cultural correction’ of migrant children and a means for the assimilation of migrants into the Irish community. The paper discusses the function of this strategy for the two groups, and the theoretical integration of cultural level processes in the theory of the Dialogical Self. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The distinction between intuition and guessing in the SRT task generation: A reply to Norman and Price

We (Fu, Dienes, & Fu, 2010) investigated the extent to which people could generate sequences of responses based on knowledge acquired from the Serial Reaction Time task, depending on whether it felt subjectively like the response was based on pure guessing, intuition, conscious rules or memories. Norman and Price (2010) argued that in the context of our task, intuition responses were the same as guessing responses. In reply, we argue that not only do subjects apparently claim to be experiencing different phenomenologies when saying intuition versus guess, but also intuition and guess responses are associated with different behaviors. We found that people could control the knowledge when generating responses felt to be based on intuition but not those felt to be pure guessing. We present further evidence here that triplets associated with intuition but not guessing were also processed fluently.     

Anxiety and Depression in Brazilian Orthopaedics Inpatients: A Cross Sectional Study with a Clinical Sample Comparison

There are few studies on the development of anxiety and depression in orthopaedics and trauma (O&T) inpatients. We designed a cross-sectional study aimed at comparing the prevalence of depression and anxiety in 100 O&T inpatients and 100 clinical inpatients in the same hospital. O&T patients were divided into subgroups: trauma and non-trauma (arthroplasty, tumour, and infection sub grouping). We measured anxiety and depression by the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale and co-morbidities by the Charlson age-adjusted comorbidity index (CCI). For the trauma subgroup, AO/OTA fracture classification and Gustillo and Anderson grade of open fractures classification was applied. The prevalence of anxiety and depression was 35% and 28%, respectively for the clinical sample, and 44% and 33% for the O&T sample. Compared with the clinical sample, anxiety scores were higher in the O&T sample (p = .047), and in arthroplasty (p = .020) and trauma subgroups (p = .031). In the O&T sample, high CCI scores were associated with high anxiety scores (p = .033).     

Time-course of 5-HT6 receptor mRNA expression during memory consolidation and amnesia

Growing evidence indicates that antagonists of the 5-hydroxytryptamine (serotonin) receptor₆ (5-HT₆) improve memory and reverse amnesia although the mechanisms involved are poorly understood. Hence, in this paper RT-PCR was used to evaluate changes in mRNA expression of 5-HT₆ receptor in trained and untrained rats treated with the 5-HT₆ receptor antagonist SB-399885 and amnesic drugs scopolamine or dizocilpine. Changes in mRNA expression of 5-HT₆ receptor were investigated at different times in prefrontal cortex, hippocampus and striatum. Data indicated that memory in the Pavlovian/instrumental autoshaping task was a progressive process associated to reduced mRNA expression of 5-HT₆ receptor in the three structures examined. SB-399885 improved long-term memory at 48 h, while the muscarinic receptor antagonist scopolamine or the non-competitive NMDA receptor antagonist dizocilpine impaired it at 24 h. Autoshaping training and treatment with SB-399885 increased 5-HT₆ receptor mRNA expression in (maximum increase) prefrontal cortex and striatum, 24 or 48 h. The scopolamine-induced amnesia suppressed 5-HT₆ receptor mRNA expression while the dizocilpine-induced amnesia did not modify 5-HT₆ receptor mRNA expression. SB-399885 and scopolamine or dizocilpine were able to reestablish memory and 5-HT₆ receptor mRNA expression. These data confirmed previous memory evidence and of more interest is the observation that training, SB-399885 and amnesic drugs modulated 5-HT₆ receptor mRNA expression in prefrontal cortex, hippocampus and striatum. Further investigation in different memory tasks, times and amnesia models together with more complex control groups might provide further clues.     

SLV330, a cannabinoid CB1 receptor antagonist,ameliorates deficits in the T-maze,object recognition and Social Recognition Tasks in rodents

Cannabinoid CB₁ receptor (CB₁R) signaling has been suggested to play an important role in the regulation of memory and cognition. In the present study, our aim was to investigate whether the CB₁R antagonist SLV330 (doses ranging from 0.3 to 10 mg/kg, given orally, p.o.) could ameliorate impairments in distinct aspects of cognition using different disruption models in both mice and rats. Effects of SLV330 were tested on working memory deficits in the T-maze Continuous Alternation Task (T-CAT) in mice; episodic memory deficits in the Object Recognition Task (ORT) and Social Recognition Task (SRT) in rats. The acetylcholinesterase inhibitor (AChEI) donepezil (Aricept®, approved for symptomatic treatment of Alzheimer’s disease) and nicotine were used as reference compounds.SLV330 markedly improved aging and scopolamine-induced memory deficits in the T-CAT in mice with a lowest effective dose (LED) of 1 mg/kg p.o., while reversing the cognitive dysfunction induced by the N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) antagonist dizocilpine (MK-801) only at the middle dose of 3 mg/kg. In the ORT, we have found that combined administration of subthreshold doses of SLV330 (1 mg/kg, p.o.) and the AChEI donepezil (0.1 mg/kg, p.o.), that had no discernable effects on performance when given alone, enhanced memory performance in Wistar rats with deficits induced by the muscarinic antagonist scopolamine, suggestive of additive synergistic effects of SLV330 and donepezil on cognitive impairment. Finally, SLV330 was found to have cognition enhancing properties in a time delay paradigm in the SRT at a LED dose of 3 mg/kg (p.o.).In conclusion, the CB₁R antagonist SLV330 was found to clearly improve memory in several preclinical models for cognitive impairment.     

Historiography of psychology in Brazil: pioneer works, recent developments

The evolution of the historiography of psychology in Brazil is surveyed, to describe how the field has evolved from the seminal works of the pioneer, mostly self-taught, psychologists, to the now professional historians working from a variety of theoretical models and methods of inquiry. The first accounts of the history of psychology written by Brazilians and by foreigners are surveyed, as well as the recent works made by researchers linked to the Work Group on the History of Psychology of the Brazilian Association of Research and Graduate Education in Psychology and published in periodicals such as Memorandum and Mnemosine. The present historiography focuses mainly the relationship of psychological knowledge to specific social and cultural conditions, emphasizing themes such as women's participation in the construction of the field, the development of psychology as a science and as a profession in education and health, and the development of psychology as an expression of Brazilian culture and of the experience of resistance of local communities to domination. To reveal this process of identity construction, a cultural historiography is an important tool, coupled with methodological pluralism.     

Historiography of Czech psychology

The paper is aimed at presenting the development of the Czech historiography of psychology, which was strongly influenced by the political changes in Central and Eastern Europe. The authors deal with the historiography of psychology at the three universities offering an undergraduate program in psychology, located in Prague, Brno, and Olomouc, and at the Institute of Psychology of the Czech Academy of Sciences. Recent research, teaching, textbooks, and journal articles published in Czech and in foreign languages are showcased. The historiography of Czech psychotherapy is mentioned as a special thematic development. Contemporary problems and perspectives in the field of the history of psychology in the Czech Republic are discussed, sources of information are given.