Some correlates of health locus of control among multicultural individuals

The relationship of locus of control to depression, anxiety, hostility, and physical health was assessed in a sample of multicultural college students (N = 162). Powerful Others Health Locus of Control was correlated with depression, anxiety, hostility, and recent physical symptoms while Chance Health Locus of Control (CHLC) was correlated with all of the above as well as chronic physical symptoms and major health problems. When controlling for a variety of health risk factors (viz., age, sex, body mass, exercise, smoking, salt, alcohol, and caffeine), only CHLC remained significant in the physical health models. Results support the cognitive model of mental health which emphasize the importance of adaptive beliefs. Specifically, they suggest that issues about control are related to negative affect and indicate that the often-cited relationship of an external locus of control to depression and anxiety also holds for hostility. The findings do not, however, support the view that anxiety and depression are associated with different types of external locus of control but rather suggest a unified set of locus of control beliefs underlying the three types of negative affect. In addition, evidence is provided for the external validity of the Multidimensional Health Locus of Control (MHLC) Scales with respect to mental health. Further, the results indicate that belief about one’s health may play a significant role in one’s physical health and that the health behavior model of the relationship between locus of control and physical health is insufficient to explain the relationship. As the Chance and Powerful Others MHLC scales were not related to health habits in this sample but were related to mental health (viz., depression, anxiety, and hostility), locus of control beliefs may be related to physical health via their relationship with mental health.     

G. Stanley Hall's Adolescence: A centennial reappraisal introduction

This article is an overview of the special issue "G. Stanley Hall's Adolescence: A Centennial Reappraisal." First, a brief biography of Hall is presented. Then each of the six articles in the special issue is summarized. Three of the articles are by historians and three are by psychologists, but all six articles integrate history and psychology.     

Preventing Depression Among Early Adolescents in the Primary Care Setting: A Randomized Controlled Study of the Penn Resiliency Program

This study evaluated the Penn Resiliency Program's effectiveness in preventing depression when delivered by therapists in a primary care setting. Two-hundred and seventy-one 11- and 12-year-olds, with elevated depressive symptoms, were randomized to PRP or usual care. Over the 2-year follow-up, PRP improved explanatory style for positive events. PRP's effects on depressive symptoms and explanatory style for negative events were moderated by sex, with girls benefiting more than boys. Stronger effects were seen in high-fidelity groups than low-fidelity groups. PRP did not significantly prevent depressive disorders but significantly prevented depression, anxiety, and adjustment disorders (when combined) among high-symptom participants. Findings are discussed in relation to previous PRP studies and research on the dissemination of psychological interventions. An erratum to this article is available at .     

Bias and learning in temporal binding: Intervals between actions and outcomes are compressed by prior bias

It has consistently been shown that agents judge the intervals between their actions and outcomes as compressed in time, an effect named intentional binding. In the present work, we investigated whether this effect is result of prior bias volunteers have about the timing of the consequences of their actions, or if it is due to learning that occurs during the experimental session. Volunteers made temporal estimates of the interval between their action and target onset (Action conditions), or between two events (No-Action conditions). Our results show that temporal estimates become shorter throughout each experimental block in both conditions. Moreover, we found that observers judged intervals between action and outcomes as shorter even in very early trials of each block. To quantify the decrease of temporal judgments in experimental blocks, exponential functions were fitted to participants’ temporal judgments. The fitted parameters suggest that observers had different prior biases as to intervals between events in which action was involved. These findings suggest that prior bias might play a more important role in this effect than calibration-type learning processes.     

Interoceptive ability predicts aversion to losses

Emotions have been proposed to inform risky decision-making through the influence of affective physiological responses on subjective value. The ability to perceive internal body states, or “interoception” may influence this relationship. Here, we examined whether interoception predicts participants' degree of loss aversion, which has been previously linked to choice-related arousal responses. Participants performed both a heartbeat-detection task indexing interoception and a risky monetary decision-making task, from which loss aversion, risk attitudes and choice consistency were parametrically measured. Interoceptive ability correlated selectively with loss aversion and was unrelated to the other value parameters. This finding suggests that specific and separable component processes underlying valuation are shaped not only by our physiological responses, as shown in previous findings, but also by our interoceptive access to such signals.     

The Effects of a Racist Act and Public Counter-Demonstrations on Race-Related Behavioral Intentions: A Natural Experiment

This study reports on a natural experiment that yielded information about the effects of a racist act and public counter-demonstrations on behavioral intentions. The conditions for this natural experiment arose when an act of racial hostility occurred at a small liberal-arts college in the northeastern United States. This event occurred approximately midway through data collection for a study comparing public and private behavioral intentions to donate money to African American interest groups. This coincidence afforded the opportunity to examine the effects of such events on members of the affected community. The results of this natural experiment show that both public and private expression of support for African American interest groups increased after the incident and ensuing demonstrations.