Revisiting the Local Impact of Community Indicators Projects: Sustainable Seattle as Prophet in Its Own Land

Sustainable Seattle’s Indicators of Sustainable Community project was the first of its kind and remains one of the best known attempts by a community group to measure a wide range of what it values most about local quality of life and sustainability. The great irony in the organization’s notoriety, however, is that S2’s reputation grows with distance from its home in Seattle. National and international recognition has come to S2 much more easily than uptake and implementation of the project, its method, or its recommendations at home in Seattle and King County. This article, based on case study research, provides a closer examination of this received wisdom about the limited local impact of Sustainable Seattle by foregrounding the local legacy of this first generation indicators project in the form of nine different indicator projects that have succeeded the S2 project. All of these projects bear some connection to S2 and can be shown to constitute second, third and fourth generation indicator projects in terms of organizational structure, indicator framework, and approach to mobilizing awareness and policy and behavioural change. This article also offers lessons from indicator projects in the Seattle area about the appeal of an indicators-based approach generally, and the various Seattle models in particular, from the perspective of different key policy actor groups. In sum, the research presented in this article contributes to filling the gap in the community indicators literature with regard to the policy impacts of community indicator projects in their localities and directions for increasing the effectiveness of projects from the perspectives of different indicator organizations and policy actor groups.     

Structured personality test item characteristics and validity

Using the structured personality test item as the unit of analysis, the purpose of this research was to evaluate the relationship between validity and a variety of other test item parameters. Of particular interest was the relationship of test item criterion validity to negative keying and to negative wording. By drawing a distinction between negative keying and negative wording it was demonstrated that the use of balanced scales to control acquiescence need not result in a reduction in item criterion validity. Whereas the use of negative wording has in the past reduced validity, data demonstrated that positively worded, negatively keyed items did not. In addition, results indicated that clear, moderately short, relevant test items tended to be the most empirically valid.     

Estimating rates of chronic fatigue syndrome from a community-based sample: A pilot study

Most of the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) epidemiological studies have relied on physicians who refer patients having at least 6 months of chronic fatigue and other symptoms. However, there are a number of potential problems when using this method to derive prevalence statistics. For example, some individuals with CFS might not have the economic resources to access medical care. Other individuals with CFS might be reluctant to use medical personnel, particularly if they have encountered physicians skeptical of the authenticity of their illness. In addition, physicians that are skeptical of the existence of CFS might not identify cases. In the present pilot study, a random community sample (N=1,031) was interviewed by telephone in order to identify and comprehensively evaluate individuals with symptoms of CFS and those who self-report having CFS. Different definitions of CFS were employed, and higher rates (0.2%) of CFS were found than in previous studies. Methodological benefits in using more rigorous epidemiological methods when estimating CFS prevalence rates are discussed. The authors appreciate the generous financial support of the CFIDS Association and Minnan, Inc. We also are grateful for many helpful suggestions provided by Judith A. Richman, William McCready, Wendell Richmond, and Stephen E. Goldston. Finally, we are very thankful to the many undergraduate volunteers who helped us complete this study, and they include Cheryl Stenzel, Georgina DeLa Torre, Vickie Chrisos, Don Banik, Hillary Loeb, Leslie Ramesack, Ellen Diamond, Rob Bleeker, Gib Garza III, Mindy Silverstein, Kadip Sen, Meredith Lombrazo, Brian Miller, Caroline Marsden, Lorraine Whitmore, Stan Gayot, Karen Costakis, and Dave Sobotka.     

The Impact of Gender on Productivity and Satisfaction Among Medical School Psychologists

The impact of gender on productivity and satisfaction was examined among a random sample of 293 psychologists employed as faculty members in medical schools. Forty-one percent of the respondents were female. Males were older than females, had worked in a medical school longer, had higher academic ranks, held more administrative positions, were more likely to be tenured, and earned higher salaries. When years of employment as a psychologist were statistically controlled, there were no gender differences in productivity, as measured by publications, presentations, and grant awards; however, gender differences in salary remained. Females were less satisfied than males with regard to salary, promotion opportunities, and overall respect. Results are discussed within the context of the changing gender composition within psychology and the changing demands within the health care system.     

Some limitations of functional analyses: Treatment of problem behavior based on the study of alternative responses

Functional analyses is a viable approach to understanding important causes of problem behavior and to designing interventions. However, functions are not always possible to identify, and results of a functional analysis are sometimes hard to utilize: even when functions are detected, we do not necessarily know exactly how reinforcement of alternative behaviors must be arranged in order to be effective. Consequently, interventions must sometimes be based on additional tools. Research on alternate responses is concerned with variables that influence individual choices among responses, both aberrant and appropriate, and may provide such a tool, but to what extent? Basic and applied research on choice responding are reviewed, and implications for treatment are discussed. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Reasoning about complex probabilistic concepts in childhood

The competencies of children, particularly their understanding of the more complex probabilistic concepts, have not been thoroughly investigated. In the present study participants were required to choose the more likely of two events, a single event, and a joint event (conjunctive or disjunctive). It was predicted that the operation of the representativeness heuristic would result in erroneous judgements when children compared an unlikely component event with a likely-unlikely conjunction (the conjunction fallacy) and when a likely component event was compared to a likely-unlikely disjunction. The results supported the first prediction with both older children aged between 9 and 10 years and younger children aged between 4 and 5 committing the conjunction fallacy. However, the second prediction was not confirmed. It is proposed that the basis of representativeness judgements may differ between the conjunctive and disjunctive cases with absolute frequency information possibly playing a differential role.     

Virtual environments for motor rehabilitation: review.

In this paper, the current "state of the art" for virtual reality (VR) applications in the field of motor rehabilitation is reviewed. The paper begins with a brief overview of available equipment options. Next, a discussion of the scientific rationale for use of VR in motor rehabilitation is provided. Finally, the major portion of the paper describes the various VR systems that have been developed for use with patients, and the results of clinical studies reported to date in the literature. Areas covered include stroke rehabilitation (upper and lower extremity training, spatial and perceptual-motor training), acquired brain injury, Parkinson's disease, orthopedic rehabilitation, balance training, wheelchair mobility and functional activities of daily living training, and the newly developing field of telerehabilitation. Four major findings emerge from these studies: (1) people with disabilities appear capable of motor learning within virtual environments; (2) movements learned by people with disabilities in VR transfer to real world equivalent motor tasks in most cases, and in some cases even generalize to other untrained tasks; (3) in the few studies (n = 5) that have compared motor learning in real versus virtual environments, some advantage for VR training has been found in all cases; and (4) no occurrences of cybersickness in impaired populations have been reported to date in experiments where VR has been used to train motor abilities.     

The theory of "truth": how counterindustry campaigns affect smoking behavior among teens.

This study used structural equation modeling to test a theory-based model of the pathways by which exposure to the "truth" counterindustry media campaign influenced beliefs, attitudes, and smoking behavior in national random-digit-dial telephone surveys of 16,000 12- to 17-year-olds before, 8 months after, and 15 months after campaign launch. Consistent with concepts from the theory of reasoned action, youth in markets with higher levels of campaign exposure had more negative beliefs about tobacco industry practices and more negative attitudes toward the tobacco industry. Models also provided support for a social inoculation effect, because negative industry attitudes were associated with lower receptivity to protobacco advertising and with less progression along a continuum of smoking intentions and behavior.     

Integral Psychology: My Spiritually Based Guiding Metatheory of Counseling

This article explains the author's guiding theory of counseling based on her understanding and adaptation of K. Wilber's (2000b) integral psychology (IT). She discusses, from an IT perspective, how the psyche develops and changes and the role of counseling in change. She explains her particular resonance to IT, which she considers an inherently developmental, multicultural, systemic, and spiritual metatheory that brings order to the multiplicity of other counseling theories. The author hopes that readers will find in this article both a useful contribution to their own counseling perspectives and practices and a stimulus for further discourse regarding the infusion of spirituality into counseling.