Intimate and Relational Loneliness in Adolescence

Research on peer-related loneliness in adolescence has paid insufficient attention to the distinction between intimate loneliness (i.e., in a dyadic relationship with a friend) and relational loneliness (i.e., in the broader peer group). This study examined the correlations among a broad set of loneliness scales. A sample of adolescents from Belgium (n?=?282; 60% female) completed 8 subscales of 6 established loneliness measures. Results revealed high correlations among these measures. At the same time, confirmatory factor analysis revealed the two expected factors, reflecting intimate and relational loneliness. Furthermore, it was found that boys experienced on average more intimate loneliness than girls, and girls experienced on average more relational loneliness than boys. As different types of loneliness are related to problems in different domains, and adolescents may experience one type of loneliness but not the other, it is essential to know which loneliness measure taps into which type of loneliness. The present study not only provides evidence for the distinction between intimate and relational loneliness, but also shows which type is covered by which of six commonly used loneliness measures. Based on these findings, researchers can now make a more deliberate selection of scales for future research, and can better interpret and integrate findings from previous studies that used different loneliness measures.     

Emotionally engaged or feeling anxious and cynical? School experiences and links to school achievement among Finland-Swedish general and special education students

Social Psychology of Education - The aim of the study was to enhance understanding of how seventh graders vary in emotional engagement and experienced well-being at school in terms of anxiety and...     

Brain responses to lexical-semantic priming in children at-risk for dyslexia

Deviances in early event-related potential (ERP) components reflecting auditory and phonological processing are well-documented in children at familial risk for dyslexia. However, little is known about brain responses which index processing in other linguistic domains such as lexicon, semantics and syntax in this group. The present study investigated effects of lexical-semantic priming in 20- and 24-month-olds at-risk for dyslexia and typically developing controls in two ERP experiments. In both experiments an early component assumed to reflect facilitated lexical processing for primed words was enhanced in the at-risk group compared to the control group. Moreover, an N400-like response which was prominent in the control group was attenuated or absent in at-risk children. Results suggest that deficiencies in young children at-risk for dyslexia are not restricted to perceptual and lower-level phonological abilities, but also affect higher order linguistic skills such as lexical and semantic processing.     

Predicting Latent Class Scores for Subsequent Analysis

Latent class regression models relate covariates and latent constructs such as psychiatric disorders. Though full maximum likelihood estimation is available, estimation is often in three steps: (i) a latent class model is fitted without covariates; (ii) latent class scores are predicted; and (iii) the scores are regressed on covariates. We propose a new method for predicting class scores that, in contrast to posterior probability-based methods, yields consistent estimators of the parameters in the third step. Additionally, in simulation studies the new methodology exhibited only a minor loss of efficiency. Finally, the new and the posterior probability-based methods are compared in an analysis of mobility/exercise.     

Casuistic Reasoning in Expert Narratives on Healthy Eating

Individualisation of healthy eating is a broad tendency in Western culture and is becoming a popular ideal in nutrition science. Public perception of dietary knowledge is central to this individualisation and many experts now aim to present dietary knowledge in a way which relates to individual experience, as well as a casuistic style in which particular cases are discussed in relation to general, universal principles. Analysis of casuistic narrative styles in the public communication about healthy eating by experts makes explicit their flexible use of both particular cases and universal claims, in which clinical and personal cases are narratively employed by the experts to invite readers to personally consider dietary knowledge. Such casuistic narration by experts relates human agency and particular bodies to universal concepts in a way that has generative and critical functions with respect to dietary knowledge and understanding. The public articulation of clinical narratives by experts make salient the intersubjective emergence and accumulation of dietary knowledge between expert reasoning and lay understanding. Personal narratives have an essential role in presenting casuistic reasoning through experts’ personal lives and making their own bodies relevant to public communication about healthy eating. This emphasises the experts’ personal agency in relationship to common norms and general knowledge. Furthermore, both clinical and personal narratives are used by experts in their assessment of the shortcomings in public health messages. Experts’ casuistic narration thus does not merely construct credibility but has epistemic functions in constructing dietary knowledge tangible with respect to actual eating practices.     

Spontaneous focusing on numerosity as a domain-specific predictor of arithmetical skills

The aim of this 2 year longitudinal study was to explore whether children’s individual differences in spontaneous focusing on numerosity (SFON) in kindergarten predict arithmetical and reading skills 2 years later in school. Moreover, we investigated whether the positive relationship between SFON and mathematical skills is explained by children’s individual differences in spontaneous focusing on a non-numerical aspect. The participants were 139 Finnish-speaking children. The results show that SFON tendency in kindergarten is a significant domain-specific predictor of arithmetical skills, but not reading skills, assessed at the end of Grade 2. In addition, the relationship between SFON and number sequence skills in kindergarten is not explained by children’s individual differences in their focusing on a non-numerical aspect that is, spatial locations.     

Loneliness and solitude in adolescence: A confirmatory factor analysis of alternative models

The present study tested a four-factor model of adolescent loneliness and solitude that comprises peer-related loneliness, family loneliness, negative attitude toward solitude, and positive attitude toward solitude. Nine different instruments for a total of 14 scales and derivative subscales were completed by a sample of mid-adolescents (N = 534) from Grades 10 through 12 (aged 15–18 years) in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. As expected, the four-factor solution provided a better fit to the data than did alternative models that comprised just a single factor, or two and three factors. Use of the Loneliness and Aloneness Scale for Children and Adolescents (LACA) is recommended, because the instrument measures all four aspects of the model. Implications for current theories on adolescent loneliness and associated phenomena, such as adolescents’ attitude toward being on their own, are briefly discussed.     

Just a joke. Psychogenesis of humor in alcohol advertisements

This article asks what psychic functions humorous alcohol advertisements employ and how they are connected to the wider cultural meanings of alcohol. The material comprises 27 advertisements televised in Europe in 2013. The material is primarily examined using Freud’s ideas regarding the psychogenesis of jokes. Freud’s conceptions of humor provide in-depth point of views to understand how the advertisements address the viewer’s mind. We recognized three psychic processes: the pleasure of nonsense, recognition of the familiar, and liquidation of criticism. We argue that these are essential psychic activities which characterize the more or less unconscious functioning and content of humorous alcohol advertisements. The article suggests that the humorous strategies recall the infantile pleasure connected to playing with language. The humor in alcohol advertisements may also liquidate the critical attitudes toward drinking, enforce the process of denial of addiction and prohibit the reality-based reflection of alcohol use.