What ends a worry bout? An analysis of changes in mood and stop rule use across the catastrophising interview task

This paper reports the results of two experiments designed to test predictions from the mood-as-input hypothesis about the factors that contribute to the ending of a worry bout. Experiment 1 looked at changes in self-reported mood across a catastrophising interview task. Experiment 2 investigated whether there were any changes in stop rule deployment between the beginning and end of a catastrophising interview task. Experiment 1 demonstrated that worriers tended to show increases in negative mood and decreases in positive mood over the course of catastrophising. In Experiment 2, participants exhibited a significant shift away from endorsing the use of 'as many as can' stop rules and a significant increasing tendency to endorse the use of 'feel like continuing' stop rules over the course of catastrophising. These results suggest that worriers exhibit increases in negative mood across the worry bout, but shift from the use of 'as many as can' to 'feel like continuing' stop rules. Mood-as-input hypothesis predicts that if high worriers ask the question "do I feel like continuing?" in the context of increasing negative mood, this will imply that the activity is no longer enjoyable or profitable and should be terminated. The results are discussed in the context of mood-as-input accounts of pathological worrying and the therapeutic implications of these findings are reviewed.     

Exploring the factors affecting child and adolescent psychotherapists' and counsellors' decision‐making in clinical work with parents

This study examined interventions with parents/carers in child and adolescent counselling and psychotherapy (CAP). The aim was to investigate clinicians' rationale behind their decision to work with parents and what types of interventions they use. Furthermore, the nature of clinicians' core training with regard to interventions with parents was investigated. The study used both quantitative data and qualitative textual data from an online survey of 110 CAP clinicians. There was significant agreement, regardless of previous training or level of experience, that clinical work with parents in CAP is beneficial, but little consensus for a rationale or model for best practice. There was a relationship between training, theoretical orientation and whether CAPs felt competent to work with parents. Unexpectedly, a significant number (83%) of integrative practitioners said that there had been ‘little’ to ‘none at all’ focus on working with parents on their core training course. Other unforeseen findings were in the domain of working outside generally accepted boundaries for CAP, with a notable number of clinicians making home visits—24.1% with parents alone and 38.9% with parent and child together—along with 47.2% using phone calls and/or email for coaching and support with parents. Many clinicians were candid about their sense of a lack of competence in working with parents, even though at least half were senior, experienced clinicians. A number of these practitioners made specific reference to the wish for further specialist training, with many asking for signposting to where further training could be obtained.     

The challenges and experiences of psychotherapists working remotely during the coronavirus* pandemic

The experiences and challenges of psychotherapists working remotely during the coronavirus pandemic were explored using a mixed‐methods approach. An online survey completed by 335 psychotherapists produced both quantitative and qualitative data with the latter being subject to a reflexive thematic analysis. Large numbers of therapists were using video‐link platforms and the telephone to conduct client sessions. A majority of therapists felt challenged by remote working, with reduced interpersonal cues, feelings of isolation and fatigue, and technical issues frequently cited concerns. At the same time, most therapists considered that remote working had been effective and that clients were comfortable with the process. Two‐thirds of therapists indicated that remote working would now become core business for them. The great majority of therapists thought that remote working skills should be part of formal therapy trainings.     

Impact of Worry on Career Thoughts,Career Decision State,and Cognitive Information Processing Skills

Sixty-nine Amazon Mechanical Turk workers completed the Penn State Worry Questionnaire (Berle et al., 2011), the Career Thoughts Inventory (Sampson et al., 1996a), and the Career State Inventory (Leierer et al., 2017). Worry was significantly correlated with negative career thinking and its dimensions of decision-making confusion and commitment anxiety, with readiness and its dimensions of clarity and certainty, and with the self-assessed cognitive information processing skills of self-knowledge, options knowledge, decision-making, and executive processing. Worry was also found to predict the degree of readiness for career decision-making, negative career thinking, and cognitive information processing requisite skills.     

Carol Graham – Annotated Biography for ARQOL

Applied Research in Quality of Life -     

The Nature and Disvalue of Injury

This paper explicates a conception of injury as right-violation, which allows us to distinguish between setbacks to interests that should, and should not, be the concern of theories of justice. It begins by introducing a hybrid theory of rights, grounded in (a) the mobilisation of our moral equality to (b) protect our most important interests, and shows how violations of rights are the concern of justice, while setbacks where one of the twin grounds of rights is defeated are not. It then looks more closely at the substantive moral components of injury, namely harm—damage to one’s interests—and wrong—disrespect for one’s moral equality. It argues that, on the hybrid conception of rights, harm and wrong are individually necessary and jointly sufficient components of injury, and the disvalue of neither is reducible to the other—in particular, it is a mistake to construe the disrespect identified by wrong as another damaged interest. Finally, it distinguishes between the public and private dimensions of harm and wrong, and makes some preliminary suggestions as to whether the remedy for these different dimensions should lie in criminal, distributive, or corrective justice.     

Cognitive architectures: Research issues and challenges

In this paper, we examine the motivations for research on cognitive architectures and review some candidates that have been explored in the literature. After this, we consider the capabilities that a cognitive architecture should support, some properties that it should exhibit related to representation, organization, performance, and learning, and some criteria for evaluating such architectures at the systems level. In closing, we discuss some open issues that should drive future research in this important area.     

Explaining Gender Differences in Responses to Supportive Messages: Two Tests of a Dual-Process Approach

We propose a comprehensive explanation for gender differences in responses to supportive communication grounded in a dual-process theory of communication outcomes. Two studies confirmed consistent gender differences in responses by US college students to supportive communication and assessed the mediating effects of an ability factor (cognitive complexity) and two motivational factors (expressive and instrumental orientations) on situation elaboration and message evaluation. Study 1 focused on everyday comforting contexts (N?=?318), whereas Study 2 focused on bereavement (N?=?103). Both studies found that cognitive complexity mediated gender differences in situation elaboration and further found that cognitive complexity and expressive orientation collectively mediated gender differences in evaluative responses to supportive messages. Theoretical and pragmatic implications of the results are discussed.     

Introducing humanistic group counselling for somatisation in a primary care practice: Preliminary findings

Can group counselling help patients who present with symptoms that cannot be explained medically? Preliminary results of working with one such group are reported. Six patients in a primary care practice were offered weekly sessions for half a year. The findings suggest that the patients attended all group sessions. The patients reported experiences known to be related to group counselling, and when the group ended, patient reports show that the severity of their problems was reduced significantly (p<.001). Furthermore, during the six months after the group ended patients significantly (p<.025) reduced their visits to their general practitioners. These results seem to call for wider use of humanistic group counselling with somatising patients and further research into the impact of such form of counselling.