Age-related differentiation of cognitive abilities in ages 3–7

One important issue in the study of individual differences in cognitive abilities has been the question whether abilities tend to become more differentiated with increasing age. The present study examines age-related differentiation in the structure of cognitive abilities among children 3–7 years of age, using data from the recently undertaken Swedish standardisation of the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence-Revised. A confirmatory factor analytic modelling approach is applied. Models of different factor structure are built, evaluated and tested against empirical data using the LISREL 8 and the Mplus2 programs run under the STREAMS modelling environment. The results provide support for the notion that cognitive abilities show increasing differentiation with increasing age.     

A Note in Defence of Ratificationism

Andy Egan argues that neither evidential nor causal decision theory gives the intuitively right recommendation in the cases The Smoking Lesion, The Psychopath Button, and The Three-Option Smoking Lesion. Furthermore, Egan argues that we cannot avoid these problems by any kind of ratificationism. This paper develops a new version of ratificationism that gives the right recommendations. Thus, the new proposal has an advantage over evidential and casual decision theory and standard ratificationist evidential decision theory.     

Working Memory Mediates Increased Negative Affect and Suicidal Ideation in Childhood Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder

Children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are at greater risk for suicidal ideation and suicide attempts compared to those without ADHD. Increased risk is at least partially attributable to a subset of children with ADHD and comorbid depression or disruptive behavior disorders; however, the early predictors and mechanisms driving increased risk are not well understood. Here, we investigate the contributions of two candidate mechanisms for increased suicidal ideation in children with ADHD: executive function and negative affect. 623 clinically well-characterized, community-recruited children classified by research criteria as ADHD (n = 388) or typically-developing controls (n = 253) participated. Parent-report on the Temperament in Middle Childhood Questionnaire provided a measure of negative affectivity. Children completed laboratory tasks to measure response inhibition and working memory. Suicidal ideation was evaluated by parent report during a semi-structured interview and child responses on the Children’s Depression Inventory. Compared to typically developing controls, children with ADHD had higher rates of suicidal ideation, more negative affect, slower stop signal reaction times, and weaker working memory. Statistical path-model analyses confirmed the hypothesis that weaker working memory in ADHD statistically mediated increased negative affect. Weaker working memory also mediated and increased suicidal ideation in these cross sectional data. Findings were not attributable to comorbid disruptive behavioral disorders. Poor response inhibition did not reliably mediate negative affect or suicidal ideation. Impairment in working memory is an important early risk factor for suicidal ideation in children with ADHD, and may help in identifying children for prevention and early intervention efforts.     

Bentham’s binary form of maximizing utilitarianism

Jeremy Bentham is often interpreted as defending a satisficing, rather than maximizing, version of utilitarianism, where an act is right as long as it produces more pleasure than pain. This lack of maximization is surprising given Bentham’s maximizing slogan ‘the greatest happiness of the greatest number’. Against the satisficing interpretation, I argue that Bentham consistently defends a maximizing version of utilitarianism, where an act’s consequences are compared to those of not performing the act. I show that following this version of utilitarianism requires that one realizes the greatest happiness for all affected individuals.     

Overlapping and Distinct Cognitive Impairments in Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity and Autism Spectrum Disorder without Intellectual Disability

Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are commonly comorbid, share genetic liability, and often exhibit overlapping cognitive impairments. Clarification of shared and distinct cognitive effects while considering comorbid symptoms across disorders has been lacking. In the current study, children ages 7–15 years assigned to three diagnostic groups:ADHD (n?=?509), ASD (n?=?97), and controls (n?=?301) completed measures spanning the cognitive domains of attention/arousal, working memory, set-shifting, inhibition, and response variability. Specific processes contributing to response variability were examined using a drift diffusion model, which separately quantified drift rate (i.e., efficiency of information processing), boundary separation (i.e., speed-accuracy trade-offs), and non-decision time. Children with ADHD and ASD were impaired on attention/arousal, processing speed, working memory, and response inhibition, but did not differ from controls on measures of delayed reward discounting, set-shifting, or interference control. Overall, impairments in the ASD group were not attributable to ADHD symptoms using either continuous symptom measures or latent categorical grouping approaches. Similarly, impairments in the ADHD group were not attributable to ASD symptoms. When specific RT parameters were considered, children with ADHD and ASD shared impairments in drift rate. However, children with ASD were uniquely characterized by a wider boundary separation. Findings suggest a combination of overlapping and unique patterns of cognitive impairment for children with ASD as compared to those with ADHD, particularly when the processes underlying reaction time measures are considered separately.     

Diplomacy and Psychology: Psychological Contributions to International Negotiations,Conflict Prevention,and World Peace

Psychological science has the potential to contribute to international diplomacy, and thereby indirectly to the prevention of conflicts between and within states that may escalate to wars. In this introduction of the Special Issue on Diplomacy and Psychology, different varieties of diplomacy are first briefly introduced. Then follows an enumeration of areas of psychological research that show the greatest promise of being directly or indirectly relevant to diplomacy. These research areas include judgement and decision making in negotiations and social dilemmas, social justice, intergroup conflicts, and intercultural processes. An additional area is research on environmental policy making, whose important role needs to be better recognized in international diplomacy. Overviews are also given of the articles included in the Special Issue.     

Work environment and health in different types of temporary jobs

The aim of the study was to compare and analyse differences in work conditions and health between workers in permanent and temporary employment. The study group consisted of a representative, stratified sample of the Swedish working population (n = 2767). The data support the main hypothesis of the study, i.e., that temporary employed differ from permanent employed in control over their working life. With some exceptions, there were clear differences between these two categories with respect to a number of variables that can be regarded as central to both the individual's success at work and protection against job loss and exclusion from working life. Health differences were in favour of the permanent employed. There were also considerable differences between different sub-groups of temporary employees of such amplitude and consistency that they formed a distinct centre-periphery structure.     

Working conditions predicting interpersonal relationship problems at work

Interpersonal relationships have been shown to be an important component of the psychosocial work environment that may affect health, job satisfaction, and productivity. The question whether interpersonal relationships at work are influenced by other psychosocial working conditions such as demands and control has not been studied. The aim of the present study is to investigate if high work demands and aspects of low work control could predict three indicators of detrimental interpersonal relationships at work. In a representative Swedish cohort study, data were obtained in two waves three years apart from 4049 participants, who did not change their jobs between the waves. These data were analysed by multiple logistic regression analyses. Odds ratios adjusted for possible confounders and negative interpersonal relationships at base-line showed that high demands predicted serious conflict and exclusion by co-workers. Low skill discretion predicted exclusion by co-workers. It is argued that these prospective findings are of relevance to interventions targeting troublesome and detrimental interpersonal relationships at work and that the findings can be important in understanding the development of work-related mental ill-health.     

Mobbing at work and the development of post-traumatic stress disorders

Abstract

Psychosocial research on mobbing is currently being carried out in a number of countries, mainly in Europe. Mobbing is defined as an extreme social stressor at workplaces. In this article, its serious mental and psychosomatic health consequences are demonstrated and discussed. A factor analysis of symptom statistics collected through answers from a study representative of the entire Swedish workforce showed post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) as the plausible diagnosis. In addition, 64 patients subjected to mobbing at their work places are diagnosed with the co-operation of a rehabilitation clinic specializing in the treatment of chrome PTSD. The statistical analysis of these 64 diagnoses shows a severe degree of PTSD, with mental effects fully comparable with PTSD from war or prison camp experiences.