Leading Military Teams to Think and Feel: Exploring the Relations Between Leadership,Soldiers' Cognitive and Affective Processes,and Team Effectiveness

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between leadership and military teams' affective and cognitive processes and the subsequent links between these processes and team effectiveness. Soldiers (N = 148) from 32 teams completed questionnaires assessing these variables. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to analyze the data. Transformational leadership was positively associated with cognitive and affective processes, but only active management-by-exception leadership was related to negative affect. Neither form of management-by-exception leadership related to cognitive processes. Positive affect, negative affect, and cognitive processes were all related to team viability. Finally, some mediation effects were observed. Implications of the results for developing leadership in military teams are drawn.     

Understanding countertransference and object relations in the process of nursing drug-dependent patients

In psychiatric nursing, transference and countertransference dynamics are generally ignored. This paper is an attempt to examine how the transference and countertransference dynamics influenced the nurse-patient relationships on an in-patient drug-dependency unit, and how an understanding of transference was found to be helpful.     

Marital Estrangement,Positive Affect,and Locus of Control Among Spouses of Workaholics and Spouses of Nonworkaholics: A National Study

This study compared a sample of spouses of workaholics and spouses of nonworkaholics on ratings of marital estrangement, positive feelings toward husband, and locus of control. A random national sample of 326 participants drawn from the membership list of the American Counseling Association was surveyed. Spouses of workaholics reported greater marital estrangement and less positive affect towards husbands and higher external locus of control than spouses of nonworkaholics. These findings were the first empirical results to corroborate clinical and case study reports. Clinical implications of these findings are also presented.     

Clinical strategies to promote compliance

Abstract

This article focuses on the need for effective client management throughout the therapeutic process. The appropriate and astute use of clinical strategies can promote client compliance with treatment and counteract the possibility of client dissatisfactions and ethical/legal complaints. This article offers a systemic explanation of compliance, identifies five major clinical strategies to foster treatment adherence, and discusses the need for clinical judgments that fulfill ethical/legal obligations while promoting quality care.     

Student Healthcare Clinicians' Illness Narratives: Professional Identity Development and Relational Practice

ABSTRACT

In this qualitative, grounded theory study we examine how the intersection of self-reflection, illness narratives and perceived messages of professional identity inform care provided by medical, nursing, and medical family therapy students to patients and families. We discovered four common challenges students faced navigating personal experiences of illness and connecting to patients: 1) discrepancies between ideal and lived experiences, 2) challenges of healthcare work and culture, 3) navigating power and hierarchy, and 4) developing a shell of privacy. Discussion and implications include interdisciplinary training and collaboration and the unique role of medical family therapists in healthcare.     

The Social Spotlight Increases Blindness to Change Blindness

The results of research on change blindness and the spotlight effect suggest that (a) others are unlikely to notice changes in our appearance and (b) we are likely to overestimate the extent to which others notice changes in our appearance. However, little research has directly addressed the latter possibility. In Study 1, target persons overestimated the extent to which observers noticed a change in their sweatshirt. In Study 2, observers who followed the target persons throughout the study overestimated the extent to which other observers noticed the change in the target persons' sweatshirt, but target persons' overestimations were significantly higher. The results suggest that the spotlight effect increases blindness to change blindness.     

Introducing Spirituality into Psychiatric Care

Spirituality is important to many psychiatric patients, and these patients may be moved toward recovery more effectively if their spiritual needs are addressed in treatment. This, however, is rarely given expression in the psychiatric services of teaching hospitals. In order to develop this potential area of improved care, we (1) evaluated the differential attitudes of patients and psychiatric trainees toward the value of spirituality in the recovery process, (2) established a program of group meetings conducted by psychiatric residents and staff where patients can discuss how to draw on their spirituality in coping with their problems, and (3) established related training experiences for psychiatric residents. The results and implications of these three initiatives are presented.     

Computerized adaptive assessment of personality disorder: introducing the CAT-PD project

Assessment of personality disorders (PD) has been hindered by reliance on the problematic categorical model embodied in the most recent Diagnostic and Statistical Model of Mental Disorders (DSM), lack of consensus among alternative dimensional models, and inefficient measurement methods. This article describes the rationale for and early results from a multiyear study funded by the National Institute of Mental Health that was designed to develop an integrative and comprehensive model and efficient measure of PD trait dimensions. To accomplish these goals, we are in the midst of a 5-phase project to develop and validate the model and measure. The results of Phase 1 of the project--which was focused on developing the PD traits to be assessed and the initial item pool--resulted in a candidate list of 59 PD traits and an initial item pool of 2,589 items. Data collection and structural analyses in community and patient samples will inform the ultimate structure of the measure, and computerized adaptive testing will permit efficient measurement of the resultant traits. The resultant Computerized Adaptive Test of Personality Disorder (CAT-PD) will be well positioned as a measure of the proposed DSM-5 PD traits. Implications for both applied and basic personality research are discussed.     

Visceral fit: While in a visceral state, associated states of the world seem more likely

We propose that visceral states can influence beliefs through "visceral fit": People will judge states of the world associated with their current visceral experience as more likely. We found that warmth influenced belief in global warming (Studies 1-3) and that thirst impacted forecasts of drought and desertification (Study 5). These effects emerged in a naturalistic setting (Study 1) and in experimental lab settings (Studies 2, 3, and 5). Studies 2-6 distinguished between 3 mechanistic accounts: temperature as information (Studies 2 and 3), conceptual accessibility (Studies 4 and 5), and fluency of simulation (Studies 6a and 6b). Studies 2 and 3 ruled out the temperature as information account. Feeling warm enhanced belief in global warming even when temperature was manipulated in an uninformative indoor setting, when participants' attention was first directed to the indoor temperature, and when participants' belief about the current outdoor temperature was statistically controlled. Studies 4 and 5 ruled out conceptual accessibility as the key mediator: Priming the corresponding concepts did not produce analogous effects on judgment. Studies 6a and 6b used a causal chain design and found support for a "simulational fluency" account. Participants experiencing the visceral state of warmth constructed more fluent mental representations of hot (vs. cold) outdoor images, and those who were led to construe the same hot outdoor images more fluently believed more in global warming. Together, the results suggest that visceral states can influence one's beliefs by making matching states of the world easier to simulate and therefore seem more likely.     

Support for a two-factor model of impulsivity and hazardous substance use in British and Australian young adults

Multiple lines of evidence suggest impulsivity comprises two distinct components relevant to substance misuse. Reward drive reflects sensitivity to rewarding stimuli and subsequent approach motivation. Rash impulsiveness reflects the ability to inhibit such approach behavior in light of negative consequences. However, several studies suggest the latter trait to be a more robust predictor. This begs the question as to whether a less parsimonious two-factor model is necessary. This study employed structural equation modeling to compare the fit of one- and two-factor impulsivity models to alcohol and drug use data provided by British (n = 183) and Australian (n = 271) young adults. Results consistently supported the two-factor model and its cross-cultural consistency, with rash impulsiveness being the more robust predictor.