Cross-species referential signalling events in domestic dogs (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Canis familiaris</Emphasis>)

Referential gestures are used by a signaller to draw a recipient’s attention to a specific object, individual or event in the environment. These gestures have received much research attention in relation to human and non-human primates with great apes being shown to possess impressive gestural repertoires. Domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) meanwhile provide an ideal non-primate candidate for investigating referential signalling due to their unique relationship with humans that centres on non-verbal communication with frequent interaction. Here we observed 37 pet dogs in their own homes. Owners recorded 242 videos containing 47 potential referential gesture events. We analysed those recordings to reveal evidence of 19 referential gestures performed by domestic dogs during everyday communicative bouts with humans, showing that the gestures conform to the five features of referential signalling. Our study exposes impressive gesturing abilities in a non-primate mammal; especially when viewed in the context of the cross-species rather than intraspecific communication.     

Personality Process-Structure Duality: Reply to Two Commentaries

In two commentaries, Kostromina and Grishina (2018) and Mironenko (2018) offered constructive thoughts and questions in response to an article by Giordano (2018, Culture & Psychology, 23, 502–518) on the merits of an approach to understanding individual personality that focuses on the processes rather than structures of personality. In this reply, the authors seek to clarify some of the points made in the original article. The authors also describe a personality process-structure duality, whereby personality is conceptualized in terms of processes or structures based on the methods used to study it. If the goal is to understand the dynamic and emergent properties of individual personality, the authors continue to argue for the merits of a process-centric approach and the avoidance of structural thinking.     

Culture and diverging views of social events

The authors compared East Asians' and Americans' views of everyday social events. Research suggests that Americans tend to focus more on the self and to have a greater sense of personal agency than East Asians. The authors assessed whether, compared to East Asians, Americans emphasize main characters even when events do not involve the self and whether they see more agency or intentionality in actions, even when the actions are not their own. Whether East Asians would observe more emotions in everyday scenarios than would Americans also was investigated. In Study 1, Chinese and Americans read alleged diary entries of another person. Americans did focus more on main characters and on characters' intentionality. Study 2 replicated these results comparing Taiwanese and Americans on free recall of events concerning the self and of narratives and videos concerning others. Study 2 also found that Taiwanese made more comments about the emotional states of characters.     

The influence of selection test type on applicant reactions to employment testing

The impact of employment selection devices on the reactions of simulated applicants was investigated. In Study 1, 141 subjects were “failed” on either a biographical inventory, a cognitive ability test, a trainability test or a work sample test. Subjects rejected on the basis of biographical inventory scores perceived the test as less difficult, coped more adaptively, and had better moods than subjects tested with the other instruments. The biographical inventory was also seen as more fakable, but less amenable to improvement through feedback or training than the other devices. We hypothesized that differences among tests in cognitive demand is a primary cause of differences in applicant reaction. In Study 2 (N=151) the comparison of the effects of two biographical inventories to two cognitive ability tests supported our hypothesis, and replicated the findings of Study 1 across failure and success conditions.     

Savoring interventions for mothers of young children: Mechanisms linking relational savoring and personal savoring to reflective functioning

Parenting interventions can improve parenting outcomes, with widespread implications for children's developmental trajectories. Relational savoring (RS) is a brief attachment-based intervention with high potential for dissemination. Here we examine data from a recent intervention trial in order to isolate the mechanisms by which savoring predicts reflective functioning (RF) at treatment follow-up through an examination of the content of savoring sessions (specificity, positivity, connectedness, safe haven/secure base, self-focus, child-focus). Mothers (N = 147, M_age = 30.84 years, SD_age = 5.13; Race: 67.3% White/Caucasian, 12.9% other or declined to state; 10.9% biracial/multiracial, 5.4% Asian, 1.4% Native American/Alaska Native, 2.0% Black/African American; Ethnicity: 41.5% Latina) of toddlers (M_age = 20.96 months, SD_age = 2.50; 53.5% female) were randomized to four sessions of RS or personal savoring (PS). Both RS and PS predicted higher RF, but through different means. RS was indirectly associated with higher RF through greater connectedness and specificity of savoring content, while PS was indirectly associated with higher RF through greater self-focus in savoring content. We discuss the implications of these findings for treatment development and for our understanding of the emotional experience of mothers of toddlers.     

A double-blind,sham-controlled,trial of home-administered rhythmic 10-Hz median nerve stimulation for the reduction of tics,and suppression of the urge-to-tic,in individuals with Tourette syndrome and chronic tic disorder

Tourette syndrome (TS) and chronic tic disorder (CTD) are neurological disorders of childhood onset characterized by the occurrence of tics; repetitive, purposeless, movements or vocalizations of short duration which can occur many times throughout a day. Currently, effective treatment for tic disorders is an area of considerable unmet clinical need. We aimed to evaluate the efficacy of a home-administered neuromodulation treatment for tics involving the delivery of rhythmic pulse trains of median nerve stimulation (MNS) delivered via a wearable ‘watch-like’ device worn at the wrist. We conducted a UK-wide parallel double-blind sham-controlled trial for the reduction of tics in individuals with tic disorder. The device was programmed to deliver rhythmic (10 Hz) trains of low-intensity (1–19 mA) electrical stimulation to the median nerve for a pre-determined duration each day, and was intended to be used by each participant in their home once each day, 5 days each week, for a period of 4 weeks. Between 18th March 2022 and 26th September 2022, 135 participants (45 per group) were initially allocated, using stratified randomization, to one of the following groups; active stimulation; sham stimulation or to a waitlist (i.e. treatment as usual) control group. Recruited participants were individuals with confirmed or suspected TS/CTD aged 12 years of age or upward with moderate to severe tics. Researchers involved in the collection or processing of measurement outcomes and assessing the outcomes, as well as participants in the active and sham groups and their legal guardians were all blind to the group allocation. The primary outcome measure used to assess the ‘offline’ or treatment effect of stimulation was the Yale Global Tic Severity Scale–Total Tic Severity Score (YGTSS–TTSS) assessed at the conclusion of 4 weeks of stimulation. The primary outcome measure used to assess the ‘online’ effects of stimulation was tic frequency, measured as the number of tics per minute (TPM) observed, based upon blind analysis of daily video recordings obtained while stimulation was delivered. The results demonstrated that after 4-week stimulation, tic severity (YGTSS-TTSS) had reduced by 7.1 points (35 percentile reduction) for the active stimulation group compared to 2.13/2.11 points for the sham stimulation and waitlist control groups. The reduction in YGTSS–TTSS for the active stimulation group was substantially larger, clinically meaningful (effect size = .5) and statistically significant (p = .02) compared to both the sham stimulation and waitlist control groups, which did not differ from one another (effect size = −.03). Furthermore, blind analyses of video recordings demonstrated that tic frequency (tics per minute) reduced substantially (−15.6 TPM) during active stimulation compared to sham stimulation (−7.7 TPM). This difference represents a statistically significant (p < .03) and clinically meaningful reduction in tic frequency (>25 percentile reduction: effect size = .3). These findings indicate that home-administered rhythmic MNS delivered through a wearable wrist-worn device has the potential to be an effective community-based treatment for tic disorders.     

Hypertension differentially impacts cognition in men and women in early midlife

The current study aimed to understand how sex differences in the timing of hypertension onset contribute to early midlife risk for cognitive decline that may differ by sex and whether sex-dependent advantages in normotensive populations are influenced by the presence of hypertension. One hundred and ninety-five adults aged 45–55 from the New England Family Study underwent neuropsychological testing to assess attention, executive function, and memory. Physician-diagnosed hypertension status was self-reported via questionnaire. Mid-adulthood hypertension was associated with worse performance on measures of attention and memory, but the cognitive domains impacted varied by sex. Hypertension was associated with only attention in men, whereas in women it was associated with attention and associative and working memory. Sex differences in midlife cognitive performance found in normotensive adults were attenuated in those with hypertension. Our results underscore the importance of accounting for sex when assessing the impact of hypertension on midlife cognition that could be indicative of later decline and risk for cognitive impairment and dementia, given hypertension is an independent risk factor.     

Are moderate levels of stress particularly dangerous for relationship satisfaction? A conceptual replication of Tesser and Beach (1998)

The well-documented negative impact of daily stressors on relational well-being, juxtaposed with emerging evidence indicating that major stressors can have a positive impact on relational well-being, suggests that the association between stress and relational well-being may not be monotonic. Tesser and Beach originally raised this possibility in a 1998 study in which they found that the association between stress and individual well-being was linear, whereas the association with relational well-being was non-linear. The current study sought to conceptually replicate this study within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic by examining associations between stress and individual versus relational well-being, using a sample of 654 individuals who were in a committed relationship in the early weeks of the pandemic. Results were somewhat consistent with those of the original study: the association between stress and depression was linear, but the association between stress and relationship satisfaction was non-linear. However, the form of the association between stress and relationship satisfaction was different than observed in the original study. These results point toward the need to better understand how the severity of a stressor impacts relational outcomes, including the characteristics of stress that lead to stress spillover and the circumstances under which relational outcomes are resilient to high levels of stress.