Transformation of Adolescent Peer Relations in the Social Media Context: Part 2—Application to Peer Group Processes and Future Directions for Research

As social media use becomes increasingly widespread among adolescents, research in this area has accumulated rapidly. Researchers have shown a growing interest in the impact of social media on adolescents’ peer experiences, including the ways that the social media context shapes a variety of peer relations constructs. This paper represents Part 2 of a two-part theoretical review. In this review, we offer a new model for understanding the transformative role of social media in adolescents’ peer experiences, with the goal of stimulating future empirical work that is grounded in theory. The transformation framework suggests that the features of the social media context transform adolescents’ peer experiences by changing their frequency or immediacy, amplifying demands, altering their qualitative nature, and/or offering new opportunities for compensatory or novel behaviors. In the current paper, we consider the ways that social media may transform peer relations constructs that often occur at the group level. Our review focuses on three key constructs: peer victimization, peer status, and peer influence. We selectively review and highlight existing evidence for the transformation of these domains through social media. In addition, we discuss methodological considerations and key conceptual principles for future work. The current framework offers a new theoretical perspective through which peer relations researchers may consider adolescent social media use.     

Delay knowledge and trial set count modulate use of proactive versus reactive control: A meta-analytic review

The AX-continuous performance task (AX-CPT) and dot pattern expectancy (DPX) are the predominant cognitive paradigms used to assess the relative utilization of proactive versus reactive cognitive control. Experimental parameters vary widely between studies and systematically between different modalities (i.e., fMRI vs. EEG) with unknown consequences for the implementation of control. This meta-analytic review systematically surveyed these bodies of literature (k = 43, 73 data points) to resolve how cue–probe delay knowledge, delay length, and trial set count modulate the preferential use of proactive versus reactive control. In healthy young adults, delay knowledge and increasing trial set count each bias participants toward greater proactive control. Further, the interaction of delay knowledge and trial set count accounts for ~40% of variability in proactive/reactive control performance. As trial count varies reliably between experimental modalities, it is critical to understand how these parameters activate distinct cognitive processes and tap into different neural mechanisms for control. Subgroup analyses revealed important distinctions from our results in healthy young adults. Healthy, slightly older adults (ages 30–45 years) performed more reactively compared to healthy young adults. In addition, participants with schizophrenia showed evidence of more proactive control as trial set count increased. In light of this meta-analytic review, we conclude that delay knowledge and trial set length are important parameters to account for in the assessment of proactive versus reactive control. More broadly, this metaregression provides strong evidence that cognitive control becomes more reactive when timing demands are not known, and that both healthy persons and persons with schizophrenia shift toward proactive control with increasing repetitions of a task set.     

The Influence of Sex Information on Gender Word Processing

Three different tasks (word repetition, lexical decision, and gender decision) were designed to explore the impact of the sex clues (sex of the speaker, sex of the addressee) and the type of gender (semantic, arbitrary) on the processing of isolated Spanish gendered words. The findings showed that the grammatical gender feature was accessed when no mandatory attentional focus was required. In addition, the results indicated that the participants organize information according to their own sex role, which provides more salience to the words that match in grammatical gender with their own sex role representation, even when the gender assignment is arbitrary. Finally, the sex of the speaker biased the lexical access and the grammatical gender selection, serving as a semantic prime when the two dimensions have a congruent relationship. Furthermore, the masculine form serves as the generic gender representing both male and female figures.     

“To Name or Not to Name: That is the Question”: The Role of Response Inhibition in Reading

Reading is a complex process that includes the integration of information about letters (graphemes) and sounds (phonemes). In many circumstances, such as noisy environments, response inhibition is an additional factor that plays a marked role in successful oral reading. Response inhibition can take the form of task relevant inhibition (i.e., foils in a go/no-go task) and task irrelevant inhibition (i.e., distractor information). Here we investigated task relevant inhibition by having participants (N?=?30) take part in two tasks: go/no-go naming with nonwords foils (GNG-NW) and go/no-go naming with pseudohomophones foils (GNG-PH). Also, we investigated the addition of task irrelevant inhibition by having participants (N?=?28) take part in two tasks: GNG-NW?+?information masking and GNG-PH?+?information masking. We provide evidence that during a task relevant inhibition task, sub-word sound level information can be successfully inhibited, as evidenced by comparable response times for regular words and exception words, provided the foils do not contain familiar sound-based information (GNG-NW). In contrast, regular words were read aloud faster than exception words in a GNG-PH task, indicating that sub-word level interference occurs when the foils contain familiar sound-based information. The addition of task irrelevant inhibition (i.e., information masking at the phoneme level), served to increase response time overall, but did not impact the pattern of response times between regular words and exception words. Together these findings provide useful information regarding the role of response inhibition in word recognition and may be useful in computational models of word recognition and future work may benefit from accounting for the effects outlined in this paper.     

Frame Reflection Lab: a Playful Method for Frame Reflection on Synthetic Biology

Synthetic biology is an emerging technology that asks for inclusive reflection on how people frame the field. To unravel how we can facilitate such reflection, this study evaluates the Frame Reflection Lab (FRL). Building upon playfulness design principles, the FRL comprises a workshop with video-narratives and co-creative group exercises. We studied how the FRL facilitated frame reflection by organizing workshops with various student groups. Analysis of 12 group conversations and 158 mini-exit surveys yielded patterns in first-order reflection (problem analysis and solution finding in reflection on the development of synthetic biology as a field) as well as patterns in second-order reflection (reflection on values and assumptions underlying the first-order reflection). Also patterns in participants’ (re)framing of synthetic biology could be induced; participants’ viewpoints converged to some extent, yet with openness to individual viewpoint differences. Although the FRL method fortified the reflection processes of participants, the narratives and the workshop’s flexible format could inhibit the reflection too. Therefore, we advise designers of future frame reflection methods to apply stronger conversational facilitation and narratives of slightly mysterious yet identifiable narrators, in case e.g. video-narratives are created and used to scaffold the reflection process. Nevertheless, we argue that the use of a playful frame reflection method like the FRL could function well as (1) a step to precede more application-specific deliberation or decision-making on synthetic biology and as (2) a method for the collection of contemporary citizen viewpoints plus rationales underlying these, for the further (societally) responsible development of the emerging field.     

Naturalistic outcome of case formulation-driven cognitive-behavior therapy for anxious depressed outpatients

This article describes a case formulation-driven approach to the treatment of anxious depressed outpatients and presents naturalistic outcome data evaluating its effectiveness. Fifty-eight patients who received case formulation-driven cognitive-behavior therapy (CBT) in a private practice setting were studied. All received individual CBT guided by a case formulation and weekly outcome monitoring; in addition, 40 patients received adjunct therapies, including pharmacotherapy, which were added as indicated by the case formulation and the results of weekly outcome monitoring. Patients treated with case formulation-driven CBT showed statistically and clinically significant changes in anxiety and depression that were generally comparable to those reported in published randomized controlled trials of empirically supported therapies (ESTs) for single mood and anxiety disorders. Findings support the proposal that anxious depressed patients who have multiple comorbidities and require multiple therapies can benefit from empirically supported treatments guided by a case formulation and weekly outcome monitoring.