Cross-fertilization versus transmission: Recommendations for developing a bidirectional approach to psychotherapy dissemination research

Psychotherapy researchers are increasingly engaged in collaborations with clinical practitioners and mental health administrators. Each party brings its own perspectives, values, and agendas to bear in these encounters. Viable research—practice collaborations depend on understanding and negotiating some of the tensions in these relationships. In this article, we discuss the contexts that prevail for various participants in a psychotherapy dissemination study as well as the values, goals, costs, and benefits related to research participation. This article is a collaboration among the researchers, mental health administrators, therapists, and clients involved in an ongoing treatment dissemination study. Our recommendations for research—practice collaborations are based on our experiences and dialogues over the course of this study.     

Recognition memory for tactile sequences.

In three experiments participants were required to compare the similarity in item order for two temporally separated sequences of tactile stimuli presented to the fingers of the hand. Between-sequence articulatory suppression but not tactile interference impaired recognition accuracy (Experiment 1), and the null effect of tactile interference was not due to the second tactile sequence overwriting the sensory record of the first sequence (Experiment 2). Experiment 3 showed that compared to a condition where the second sequence was presented in the tactile modality only, recognition was enhanced when the second sequence was seen presented either to the hand or on a diagrammatic representation of a hand. A final experiment showed that the effects of Experiment 1 were replicated when the underside of the forearm was used for stimulus presentation, suggesting that the data are not idiosyncratic to the first method of presentation. The pattern of results suggests memory for a sequence of tactile stimuli involves the deployment of strategies utilising a combination of verbal rehearsal and visuo-spatial recoding rather than relying solely on the retention of sensory traces. This is taken to reflect limitations in both the capacity and duration of tactile sensory memory.     

Mapping Attitude Formation as a Function of Information Input: Online Processing Models of Attitude Formation

Consistent with calls for a dynamical social psychology (Jacoby et al., 1987; Nowak, Lewenstein, & Vallacher, 1994), attitude formation was studied using a recently developed, computer‐based simulation technique termed Higher Order Cognitive Tracing (see Jacoby et al., 1994). Participants’ attitudes toward 12 different products in 3 product categories were investigated as a function of incremental information input. As opposed to traditional memory‐based models of attitude formation, the study explored online processing models. Results indicate that the impact of information tends to decrease the later in the sequence that information is accessed. In addition, new information that is affectively inconsistent with prior information tends to have a greater impact on attitudes than information that is affectively redundant. This effect is more pronounced earlier rather than later in the sequence of information acquisition. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

Spiritual Development Across the Adult Life Course: Findings from a Longitudinal Study

Longitudinal data spanning early (30s) and older (late 60s/mid-70s) adulthood were used to study spiritual development across the adult life course in a sample of men and women belonging to a younger (born 1928/29) and an older (born 1920/21) age cohort. All participants, irrespective of gender and cohort, increased significantly in spirituality between late middle (mid-50s/early 60s) and older adulthood. Members of the younger cohort increased in spirituality throughout the adult life cycle. In the second half of adulthood, women increased more rapidly in spirituality than men. Spiritual involvement in older age was predicted by religious involvement and personality characteristics in early adulthood and subsequent experiences of negative life events.     

Immigrant concentration and educational attainment: Evidence from US data

Ninety-five percent of the 30 million foreign-born persons living in the United States reside in a metropolitan area, and more than one half reside in just six gateway cities. We investigate whether less-educated immigrants tend to settle in large urban communities of their compatriots. Based on statistical analysis we find a negative relationship between the level of education and the size of immigrant population for the immigrants born in China, India, Philippines, Korea, El Salvador, Cuba, and Mexico. The relationship is strongest for Chinese, with a decrease of 2.7 years in average educational attainment for each tenfold increase in the size of immigrant community. Generally, this relationship is stronger for the immigrants from Asia and Latin America and nonexistent or mixed for immigrants from Europe and Canada.     

The development of face and location processing: an fMRI study

Although a few developmental fMRI studies have shed some light on the neurological development of either object or spatial processing we still know very little about the development of the ‘what’ and ‘where’ processing systems. The present study is the first to address this issue by comparing, concurrently and within the same behavioral paradigm, patterns of functional activation for face processing and location processing in 12 children (10–12 years old) and 16 adults. For both tasks this study found a developmental shift from a more distributed pattern of activation in children to a more focused pattern of activation in adults. Furthermore, the type of developmental redistribution of activation in children varied depending on the task. The present findings have important implications for theories of visuospatial development. They suggest that the neural systems involved in face and location processing may undergo development and fine‐tuning well into late childhood.     

Perceived rationality,morality, and power of social choice as a function of interdependence structure and social value orientation

The present study examines how individuals with different social value orientations (i.e. prosocial, individualistic, and competitive) construe the rationality, morality, and power of choices in four distinct interdependence structures which systematically differ in the motives that could underlie the most prosocial or least aggressive choice: (a) altruism only, (b) altruism and cooperation, (c) altruism, cooperation, and individualism, and (d) altruism, cooperation, individualism, and competition. Results revealed that rationality ratings, and to a lesser degree morality and power ratings, increased most when the motives that could underlie a choice were part of the perceiver's social value orientation. Overall, the pattern of rationality ratings provided reasonable support for the Goal Prescribes Rationality Principle. Ratings of morality and power suggested a corresponding Goal Prescribes Morality/Power Principle (for prosocials and individualists), but revealed only mixed support for the Might Over Morality Hypothesis. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Ingroup identification moderates stereotype change in reaction to ingroup deviance

An experiment (N = 98) investigated the moderating effect of ingroup identification on reactions to deviant ingroup members. We measured psychology students' level of identification with the group ‘psychologists’ and presented them with information about either a normative or deviant psychologist. Participants completed an ingroup stereotype measure either before or after reading about and evaluating the target psychologist. High identifiers expressed a more positive stereotype of the ingroup after, compared to before, reading about a deviant ingroup member. High identifiers also expressed a more positive stereotype of the ingroup after reading about a deviant than after reading about a normative ingroup member. By contrast, low identifiers' stereotype judgements were relatively unaffected by the target information. The target evaluation ratings indicate that high identifiers were more positive than low identifiers towards the normative ingroup member, but were more negative than low identifiers towards the deviant. The results point to the greater motivational demands on high identifiers to maintain a positive image of the group. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The “True” Romantic: Benevolent Sexism and Paternalistic Chivalry

Previous research has shown that individuals high in benevolent sexism positively evaluate women who conform to traditional gender roles (e.g., Glick, Diebold, Bailey-Warner, & Zhu, 1997). In the current study, male and female participants completed the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (Glick & Fiske, 1996) and a new measure of paternalistic chivalry, that is, attitudes that are both courteous and considerate to women but place restrictions on behavior considered appropriate for women during courtship. Consistent with our hypotheses, benevolent sexism was significantly positively related to paternalistic chivalry. Hostile sexism and participant sex were unrelated to paternalistic chivalry.