Body Dissatisfaction in College Women and Their Mothers: Cohort Effects, Developmental Effects, and the Influences of Body Size, Sexism, and the Thin Body Ideal

A study of body dissatisfaction, as measured by the Figure Rating Scale (Stunkard, Sorenson, & Schlusinger, 1983) and the Body Esteem Scale (Franzoi & Shields, 1984), in 75 college women and their mothers indicated that both daughters and mothers experienced body dissatisfaction. When body size was statistically controlled, either no difference was found between the groups or daughters were found to have greater body dissatisfaction than mothers. The results supported the hypotheses that (1) there are generational differences in body dissatisfaction, (2) both cohort and developmental effects contribute to these differences, and (3) that a developmental effect (mothers' greater body size) may obscure a cohort effect (daughters' greater exposure to the thin body ideal). Body dissatisfaction measures based on the mothers' retrospective ratings of how they felt at their daughters' age were consistent with these hypotheses. Relationships between body dissatisfaction and the Sociocultural Attitudes Toward Appearance Questionnaire (Heinberg, Thompson, & Stormer, 1995) were stronger and more frequent for daughters than for mothers and for the Internalization Scale than for the Awareness Scale. Relationships between the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (Glick & Fiske, 2001) and body dissatisfaction were stronger for mothers than for daughters and for Benevolent Sexism than for Hostile Sexism.     

Rationale and development of a general population well-being measure: Psychometric status of the GP-CORE in a student sample

This paper presents the rationale, development, and psychometric status of a non-clinical self-report measure for the general population (GP) - including students - derived from the Clinical Outcomes in Routine Evaluation-Outcome Measure (CORE-OM) and hence termed the GP-CORE. In contrast to the CORE-OM, the GP-CORE does not comprise items denoting high-intensity of presenting problems or risk and thereby increases its acceptability in a non-clinical population. Uniquely, over half the items in the GP-CORE are positively keyed. Analyses showed the GP-CORE to have good reliability, to distinguish between clinical and non-clinical populations, and have convergent validity against the full version. Norms for student populations are presented. It is suggested that the GP-CORE has considerable utility as a means of tapping the psychological well being of students and can then interface with counselling and mental health services using the CORE-OM.     

Time pressure and group performance: Exploring underlying processes in the Attentional Focus Model

The Attentional Focus Model (Karau & Kelly, 1992) predicts that time pressure should lead group members to focus on a restricted range of task-relevant cues and to adopt task completion as their major interaction objective. Although this prediction has been supported in several studies (e.g., Karau & Kelly, 1992; Kelly, Jackson, & Hutson-Comeaux, 1997; Kelly & Karau, 1999; Parks & Cowlin, 1995), the exact processes that underlie information restriction have not been specified. We propose that two processes are involved. Specifically, the restriction of information may occur because time pressure affects the way in which information is initially encoded or attended to before a group enters its decision-making phase, or because group members filter out what they judge to be less important information during group discussion and decision making. We assessed both of these processes within a decision-making experiment where time pressure was manipulated prior to learning information that would be used to perform a task. Recall of information learned prior to group discussion did not differ by time pressure condition, arguing against an encoding process. In contrast, interaction data demonstrated information restriction by group members, arguing for a filtering process. Thought listings collected 1 min into the group discussion in some groups also supported a filtering process, as did questionnaire data. Implications of these findings for the Attentional Focus Model and for effective group decision making are discussed.     

Race and gender of faces can be ignored

Past research indicates that faces can be more difficult to ignore than other types of stimuli. Given the important social and biological relevance of race and gender, the present study examined whether the processing of these facial characteristics is mandatory. Both unfamiliar and famous faces were assessed. Participants made speeded judgments about either the race (Experiment 1) or gender (Experiments 2–4) of a target name under varying levels of perceptual load, while ignoring a flanking distractor face that was either congruent or incongruent with the race/gender of the target name. In general, distractor–target congruency effects emerged when the perceptual load of the relevant task was low but not when the load was high, regardless of whether the distractor face was unfamiliar or famous. These findings suggest that face processing is not necessarily mandatory, and some aspects of faces can be ignored.     

Are Gender Differences in Self-Reported Rumination Explained by Women��s Stereotyping?

Although Response Styles Theory posits gender differences in ruminative thought related to depression, evidence of these differences resides largely in self-report data, leading us to hypothesize that stereotyping may influence women??s perceived rumination. In an online survey with 94 U.S. Midwestern college women and 74 men, the re-affirmed relationship between gender and rumination (such that women reported higher levels than men) was moderated by general stereotype acceptance and endorsement of traditional roles for women (benevolent sexism). Only for women were stereotype acceptance and benevolent sexism positively related to perceived rumination, suggesting that rumination may be reported most by women who believe it to be a gender-appropriate response and raising questions about the robustness of gender differences in actual rumination.     

Hearing Bad News

Personal reports of receiving bad news provide data that describes patients' comprehension, reflections, experienced emotions, and an interpretative commentary with the wisdom of hindsight. Analysis of autobiographical accounts of "hearing bad news" enables the identification of patterns of how patients found out diagnoses, buffering techniques used, and styles of receiving the news. I describe how patients grapple with the news, their somatic responses to hearing, and how they struggle and strive to accept what they are hearing. I discuss metaphors used within the languages of hearing bad news. Finally, I discuss implications for a change of focus in the breaking bad news research agenda, that is, from the physician's "performance" to a patient-focused agenda.     

The effects of binge MDMA on acquisition and reversal learning in a radial-arm maze task

The current study used the partially-baited radial-arm maze paradigm to study the effects of a single-treatment high-dose exposure ('binge') to MDMA (± 3,4-methylenedioxymethaphemtamine or 'Ecstasy') on memory task acquisition. Sprague-Dawley rats were administered a binge dose (4 × 10 mg/kg) of MDMA and their ability to subsequently acquire the radial-arm maze task was compared against saline controls. The MDMA-treated rats were significantly slower to learn the task and made more reference memory errors than the controls. Working memory function was found to be relatively unimpaired. Following a reversal of task rules the MDMA-treated rats were again significantly slower to acquire the appropriate rule despite having eventually achieved a similar level of overall performance as control rats. However evidence of drug tolerance was found when all rats were challenged with an acute low dose of MDMA (1 × 4.0 mg/kg) because the binge MDMA rats were relatively less impaired. Therefore, although binge treated MDMA rats were able to achieve very accurate performance equivalent to the controls they took significantly longer to do this and were less able to adapt their behavior to a change in task rules. In addition the binge treated MDMA rats displayed tolerance to acute MDMA exposure. These findings are consistent with the possibility that human Ecstasy users may show deficits in acquiring information and may experience deficits in cognitive flexibility as well as developing tolerance to the drug with repeated exposure.     

Relationships and Inflammation across the Lifespan: Social Developmental Pathways to Disease

There are well documented links between close relationships and physical health, such that those who have supportive close relationships have lower rates of morbidity and mortality compared to those who do not. Inflammation is one mechanism that may help to explain this link. Chronically high levels of inflammation predict disease. Across the lifespan, people who have supportive close relationships have lower levels of systemic inflammation compared to people who have cold, unsupportive, conflict-ridden relationships. Not only are current relationships associated with inflammation, but past relationships are as well. In this article, we will first review the literature linking current close relationships across the lifespan to inflammation. We will then explore recent work showing troubled past relationships also have lasting consequence on people's inflammatory levels. Finally, we will explore developmental pathways that may explain these findings.