The Development of Physical Aggression from Toddlerhood to Pre-Adolescence: A Nation Wide Longitudinal Study of Canadian Children

The objectives of the study were to model the developmental trajectories of physical aggression (PA) from toddlerhood to pre-adolescence and to identify risk factors that distinguish typical (normative) from atypical developmental patterns. Ten cohorts of approximately 1,000 children (n = 10,658) drawn form a nationally representative (Canadian) sample were followed over 6 years. Using a group based trajectory approach, we identified three groups of children with distinct developmental trajectories between 2 and 11 years of age. One third of the children (31.1%) followed a low desisting trajectory, reflected in infrequent use of PA in toddlerhood and virtually no PA by pre-adolescence. The majority of children (52.2%) followed a moderate desisting trajectory, reflected in occasional use of PA in toddlerhood and infrequent use by pre-adolescence. One sixth of the children (16.6%) followed a high stable trajectory of PA. Multivariate logistic regression indicated that children in the high PA trajectory group were more likely to be boys (OR: 1.67; CI: 1.5–1.87), from low income families (OR: 1.4; CI; 1.27–1.67), from families where the mother had not completed high school (OR: 1.20; CI: 1.05–1.38) and who reported using hostile/ineffective parenting strategies (OR: 1.16; CI: 1.14–1.18). In sum, the results indicate that the typical developmental pattern of PA was one of occasional and declining use over time. However, about one sixth of children, mostly boys from disadvantaged families, exhibited an atypical developmental pattern reflected in more frequent and stable use of PA. The results suggest that most children learned relatively well to inhibit PA by the end of childhood and that a minority failed to do so. Family risks traditionally found to be associated with antisocial behaviors during adolescence appear to interfere with the socialization of PA during early and middle childhood.     

Evaluation of an inference-based approach to treating obsessive-compulsive disorder

This study evaluated an inference-based approach (IBA) to the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) by comparing its efficacy with a treatment based on the cognitive appraisal model (CAM) and exposure and response prevention (ERP). IBA considers initial intrusions in OCD (e.g. "Maybe the door is open", "My hands could be dirty") as idiosyncratic inferences about possible states of affairs arrived at through inductive reasoning. In IBA such primary inferences represent the starting point of obsessional doubt, and the reasoning maintaining the doubt forms the focus for therapy. This is unlike CAM, which regards appraisals of intrusions as the maintaining factors in OCD. Fifty-four OCD participants, of whom 44 completed, were randomly allocated to CAM, ERP or IBA. After 20 weeks of treatment all groups showed a significant reduction in scores on the Yale-Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS) and the Padua Inventory. Participants with high levels of obsessional conviction showed greater benefit from IBA than CAM. Appraisals of intrusions changed in all treatment conditions. Strength of primary inference was not correlated with symptom measures except in the case of strong obsessional conviction. Strength of primary inference correlated significantly with the Y-BOCS insight item. Treatment matching for high and low conviction levels to IBA and CAM, respectively, may optimize therapy outcome.     

Reactive and proactive aggression: predictions to physical violence in different contexts and moderating effects of parental monitoring and caregiving behavior

This study aimed at (a) comparing the links of proactive and reactive aggression at 13 years of age to delinquency-related violence and dating violence at ages 16 and 17, and (b) examining the moderating effects of parental supervision, and mother's and father's warmth and caregiving behaviors on these links. Based on a sample of 525 Caucasian boys, the results showed that proactive aggression uniquely predicted delinquency-related violence, whereas reactive aggression uniquely predicted later dating violence. The relation between proactive aggression and delinquency-related violence, however, was moderated by parental supervision. The relation between reactive aggression and dating violence was moderated by mother's warmth and caregiving behavior. The implications of the findings for the theoretical and practical distinction between proactive and reactive aggression are discussed.     

Learning lyrics: To sing or not to sing?

According to common practice and oral tradition, learning verbal materials through song should facilitate word recall. In the present study, we provide evidence against this belief. In Experiment 1, 36 university students, half of them musicians, learned an unfamiliar song in three conditions. In the sung-sung condition, the song to be learned was sung, and the response was sung too. In the sung-spoken condition, the response was spoken. In the divided-spoken condition, the presented lyrics (accompanied by music) and the response were both spoken. Superior word recall in the sung-sung condition was predicted. However, fewer words were recalled when singing than when speaking. Furthermore, the mode of presentation, whether sung or spoken, had no influence on lyric recall, in either short- or long-term recall. In Experiment 2, singing was assessed with and without words. Altogether, the results indicate that the text and the melody of a song have separate representations in memory, making singing a dual task to perform, at least in the first steps of learning. Interestingly, musical training had little impact on performance, suggesting that vocal learning is a basic and widespread skill.     

The level and nature of autistic intelligence

Autistics are presumed to be characterized by cognitive impairment, and their cognitive strengths (e.g., in Block Design performance) are frequently interpreted as low-level by-products of high-level deficits, not as direct manifestations of intelligence. Recent attempts to identify the neuroanatomical and neurofunctional signature of autism have been positioned on this universal, but untested, assumption. We therefore assessed a broad sample of 38 autistic children on the preeminent test of fluid intelligence, Raven's Progressive Matrices. Their scores were, on average, 30 percentile points, and in some cases more than 70 percentile points, higher than their scores on the Wechsler scales of intelligence. Typically developing control children showed no such discrepancy, and a similar contrast was observed when a sample of autistic adults was compared with a sample of nonautistic adults. We conclude that intelligence has been underestimated in autistics.     

School social climate and teachers’ perceptions of classroom behavior problems: a 10 year longitudinal and multilevel study

Using longitudinal and cross-sectional data, the present research sought to identify school social climate predictors of teachers’ perceptions of classroom behavior problems. The social climate and classroom behavior in 107 public and private French speaking Canadian high schools was evaluated by 1399 teachers. The present analysis is unique in its ability to control for school differences in the enrollment of students with a history of problem behavior. As hypothesized, between-school variation in the proportion of students with histories of disruptive problems predicted high school classroom behavior problems. Moreover, when controlling for these between-school differences, concurrently measured school-level variables (type of school, location of school, and academic emphasis) are found to be significant predictors of classroom behavior problems. The theoretical and practical implications of the present findings are examined and recommendations are made for future research.     

ERPs associated with visual duration discriminations in prefrontal and parietal cortex

An event-related potentials (ERP) study was undertaken to examine the role of prefrontal and parietal association cortices on selective attention and short-term memory functions in a duration discrimination task. Subjects performed better when discriminating the first stimulus relative to the second and not the reverse. Two contingent negative variations (CNV) were obtained for each stimulus duration at prefrontal regions, as well as two P300s at parietal regions. The CNV(S1) component recorded during the first stimulus (S1) appeared to be involved in selective attention at bilateral sites, while the P300(S1) component in the left hemisphere may be implicated in retaining it. The CNV(S2) wave, displayed during the second stimulus (S2), at bilateral sites and the right-sided P300(S2) wave seem to be implicated in working memory. The results indicate that recorded activity at prefrontal and parietal association cortices is tightly linked to task parameters and behavioral performances.     

An examination of the role of perceived support and employee commitment in employee-customer encounters

The authors examined the relationships between perceived organizational support, organizational commitment, commitment to customers, and service quality in a fast-food firm. The research design matched customer responses with individual employees' attitudes, making this study a true test of the service provider-customer encounter. On the basis of a sample of matched employee-customer data (N = 133), hierarchical linear modeling analyses revealed that perceived organizational support had both a unit-level and an employee-level effect on 1 dimension of service quality: helping behavior. Contrary to affective organizational commitment, affective commitment to customers enhanced service quality. The 2 sub-dimensions of continuance commitment to the organization--perceived high sacrifice and perceived lack of alternatives--exerted effects opposite in sign: The former fostered service quality, whereas the latter reduced it. The implications of these findings are discussed within the context of research on employee-customer encounters.     

The effect of visual threat on spatial attention to touch

Viewing a threatening stimulus can bias visual attention toward that location. Such effects have typically been investigated only in the visual modality, despite the fact that many threatening stimuli are most dangerous when close to or in contact with the body. Recent multisensory research indicates that a neutral visual stimulus, such as a light flash, can lead to a tactile attention shift towards a nearby body part. Here, we investigated whether the threat value of a visual stimulus modulates its effect on attention to touch. Participants made speeded discrimination responses about tactile stimuli presented to one or other hand, preceded by a picture cue (snake, spider, flower or mushroom) presented close to the same or the opposite hand. Pictures of snakes led to a significantly greater tactile attentional facilitation effect than did non-threatening pictures of flowers and mushrooms. Furthermore, there was a correlation between self-reported fear of snakes and spiders and the magnitude of early facilitation following cues of that type. These findings demonstrate that the attentional bias towards threat extends to the tactile modality and indicate that perceived threat value can modulate the cross-modal effect that a visual cue has on attention to touch.