Confirming,Validating, and Norming the Factor Structure of Systemic Therapy Inventory of Change Initial and Intersession

Progress or feedback research tracks and feeds back client progress data throughout the course of psychotherapy. In the effort to empirically ground psychotherapeutic practice, feedback research is both a complement and alternative to empirically supported manualized treatments. Evidence suggests that tracking and feeding back progress data with individual or nonsystemic feedback systems improves outcomes in individual and couple therapy. The research reported in this article pertains to the STIC^® (Systemic Therapy Inventory of Change)—the first client‐report feedback system designed to empirically assess and track change within client systems from multisystemic and multidimensional perspectives in individual, couple, and family therapy. Clients complete the STIC Initial before the first session and the shorter STIC Intersession before every subsequent session. This study tested and its results supported the hypothesized factor structure of the six scales that comprise both STIC forms in a clinical outpatient sample and in a normal, random representative sample of the U.S. population. This study also tested the STIC's concurrent validity and found that its 6 scales and 40 of its 41 subscales differentiated the clinical and normal samples. Lastly, the study derived clinical cut‐offs for each scale and subscale to determine whether and how much a client's score falls in the normal or clinical range. Beyond supporting the factorial and concurrent validity of both STIC forms, this research supported the reliabilities of the six scales (Omega_hierarchical) as well as the reliabilities of most subscales (alpha and rate–rerate). This article delineates clinical implications and directions for future research.     

Eliminating recency with self‐review: the case of auditors' ‘going concern’ judgments

This paper examines the use of self‐review to debias recency. Recency is found in the ‘going concern’ judgments of staff auditors, but is successfully eliminated by the auditor's use of a simple self‐review technique that would be extremely easy to implement in audit practice. Auditors who self‐review are also less inclined to make audit report choices that are inconsistent with their going concern judgments. These results are important because the judgments of staff auditors often determine the type and extent of documentation in audit workpapers and serve as preliminary inputs for senior auditors' judgments and choices. If staff auditors' judgments are affected by recency, the impact of this bias may be impounded in the ultimate judgments and choices of senior auditors. Since biased judgments can expose auditors to significant costs involving extended audit procedures, legal liability and diminished reputation, simple debiasing techniques that reduce this exposure are valuable. The paper also explores some future research needs and other important issues concerning judgment debiasing in applied professional settings. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The ongoing silencing of women in families: an analysis and rethinking of premenstrual syndrome and therapy

Traditionally, explanations for premenstrual symptomatology have focused on the individual woman as the site of difficulties, and as the sole target of intervention. In contrast, from the perspective of a material-discursive-intrapsychic model, this paper will focus on the ways in which 'PMS' is experienced, constructed and dealt with in family relationships. Drawing on in-depth narrative interviews conducted with women with moderate to severe premenstrual symptoms, it is argued that 'PMS' is closely tied to relationship difficulties and responsibilities; familial expectations and attributions for women's behaviour provide a discursive context for behaviour and emotions to be positioned as 'PMS'; and that the ongoing self-silencing and pathologization of women's emotions in families are key attributes of 'PMS'. This suggests that a consideration of relationship issues should be central to any assessment or intervention for premenstrual symptoms, and conversely, that attention should be given to premenstrual exacerbation of relationship difficulties in family or couples therapy.     

Depression and HIV infection: impact on immune function and disease progression

Can psychological factors, such as depression, affect human immunodeficiency virus progression? HIV infection is viewed as a chronic illness in which those infected often confront a number of emotional challenges and physical health and disease-related issues. Over the past 20 years, there has been increasing evidence that depression and other mood-related disturbances are commonly observed among HIV-positive individuals. There is also mounting data showing that depressive symptoms might further impact upon specific elements of immune system functioning and influence quality of life and health status. This paper will highlight studies examining the prevalence of depression during HIV infection and review some of the evidence examining the impact of depressive symptoms on immune function and HIV disease progression.     

Use of cognitive question testing methodologies in participant action research: implementing the Three-Step Test-Interview Method in Indian county

This study describes the use of cognitive question testing methods to pretest a Web-based questionnaire designed to gather information from American Indian and Alaska Native (AI/AN) youth between the ages of 18 and 25. The questionnaire included items related to risk and resiliency factors as well as potentially sensitive topics of victimization and delinquency. Question testing was completed with a sample of 15 youth living in three different regions of the United States. The Three Step Test Interview Method was modified to collect information related to interface usability, cognitive response, and cultural interpretation of survey items. Data collected from the question testing process resulted in questionnaire changes that included query wording, the inclusion and exclusion of survey items based on cultural input, the reordering and rendering of survey items, and improvements in interface usability. Implications for survey research with the AI/AN youth population are discussed.     

Eye movements and the perceptual span in silent and oral reading

Previous research has examined parafoveal processing during silent reading, but little is known about the role of these processes in oral reading. Given that masking parafoveal information slows down silent reading, we asked whether a similar effect also occurs in oral reading. To investigate the role of parafoveal processing in silent and oral reading, we manipulated the parafoveal information available to readers by changing the size of a gaze-contingent moving window. Participants read silently and orally in a one-word window and a three-word window condition as we monitored their eye movements. The lack of parafoveal information slowed reading speed in both oral and silent reading. However, the effects of parafoveal information were larger in silent reading than in oral reading, because of different effects of preview information on both when the eyes move and how often. Parafoveal information benefitted silent reading for faster readers more than for slower readers.