Why science cannot stand alone

In an era in which certain arenas of scientific research have become increasingly controversial, this article critically evaluates what it means to “believe in science.” Many scientists today seem to claim a sovereign right to no political interference under the rubric of freedom. This article questions such a notion, and explores the dominance of science and the silencing of moral voices by undertaking two brief investigations—the first into National Socialist Germany, which insisted that it was defined by “applied biology,” and the second into the world of contemporary American biomedicine. When all ethical barriers are eradicated, it seems that a will to power takes over—manifested in Nazi Germany’s vaunted scientific autonomy. In light of these sobering historical examples, this article reminds the reader that members of the public, including physicians, rightly deliberate about how to conscientiously order their lives together, and that part of that instrinsically political deliberation is to set limits to the ways medical science is applied and what scientists may do in pursuit of their goals.

Understanding dropout and prolonged engagement in adolescent competitive sport

Objectives: The purpose of this study is to gain understanding of training patterns and roles of significant others (i.e. coaches, parents, peers, and siblings) in adolescent swimmers’ sport participation patterns. Design: The developmental model of sport participation [Côté, J., Baker, J., & Abernethy, B. (2003). From play to practice: A developmental framework for the acquisition of expertise in team sport. In J. Starkes, & K. A. Ericsson (Eds.), Recent advances in research on sport expertise (pp. 89–114). Champaign, IL: Human Kinetics; Côté, J., & Fraser-Thomas, J. (2007). Youth involvement in sport. In P. R. E. Crocker (Ed.), Introduction to sport psychology: A Canadian perspective (pp. 266–294). Toronto: Pearson Prentice Hall] was used as a framework.Method: Ten dropout and 10 engaged swimmers, matched on key demographic variables participated in a semi-structured qualitative interview.Results: Groups had many similar experiences (e.g. early training, supportive and unsupportive coaches, involved parents). However, only dropouts spoke of early peak performances, limited one-on-one coaching, pressuring parents during adolescence, lack of swimming peers during adolescence, and sibling rivalries. In contrast, only engaged athletes spoke of clubs’ developmental philosophies, coaches’ and parents’ open communication, school friends’ support, and siblings’ general positive influences.Conclusions: Findings highlight the importance of appropriately structured programs and the fragility of athletes’ relationships with significant others during the adolescent years. Implications for sport programmers, coaches, and parents are discussed.     

The contribution of “cool” and “hot” components of decision-making in adolescence: Implications for developmental psychopathology

Impairments in either “cool” or “hot” processes may represent two pathways to deficient decision-making. Whereas cool processes are associated with cognitive and rational decisions, hot processes are associated with emotional, affective, and visceral processes. In this study, 168 boys were administered a card-playing task at ages 13 and 14 years to assess response perseveration. This task was designed to initially reward playing and gradually associate playing with punishment. Measures of subjective ordering (cool processes) and neuroticism (hot processes) at age 13 years were used to examine how these individual characteristics relate to perseveration over time. A decrease in perseveration from age 13 to 14 was associated with cool processes whereas hot processes were associated with response perseveration only over time. A complementary but simultaneous assessment of cool and hot processes, such as neuropsychological and personality tests, could facilitate treatment planning of children with behavioral problems.     

Students’ Perceptions of School Climate During the Middle School Years: Associations with Trajectories of Psychological and Behavioral Adjustment

A cross-domain latent growth curve model was used to examine the trajectories of change in student perceptions of four critical dimensions of school climate (i.e., teacher support, peer support, student autonomy in the classroom, and clarity and consistency in school rules and regulations) among 1,451 early adolescents from the beginning of sixth through the end of eighth grade; and the effects of such trajectories on the rate of change in psychological and behavioral adjustment. Findings indicated that all of the dimensions of perceived school climate declined over the 3 years of middle school. Furthermore, declines in each of the dimensions of perceived school climate were associated with declines over time in psychological and behavioral adjustment. Moreover, the direction of effects between each dimension of perceived school climate and psychological or behavioral adjustment were often unidirectional rather than bi-directional, underscoring the role of perceived school climate in the psychological and behavioral health of early adolescents. Gender and socioeconomic class differences in these patterns are noted.     

Role of age in relation between two kinds of abilities and performance in acquisition of new motor skill

Better understanding of age-related differences in skilled performance was the focus of analyses of cognitive-performance scores-relationships in acquisition of a new motor skill. 31 younger adults and 33 older adults were tested on both a cognitive and a psychomotor test. Then, they were asked to learn a juggling task over 12 sessions of 20 min. Analysis indicated age-related differences in the rate of learning. Acquisition by the younger adult group was significantly faster than that by the older adult group. This difference was also reflected in the relationship of cognition and performance for the two age groups. Motor execution for the older adults seemed to require more psychomotor ability, especially at the end of the learning sessions, and was dependent on cognitive control. This trend is consistent with the perspective that cognitive predictors of performance are related to age.     

Concurrent task performance enhances low-level visuomotor learning

Visuomotor association learning involves learning to make a motor response to an arbitrary visual stimulus. This learning is essential for visual search and discrimination performance and is reliant upon a well-defined neural circuit in the brain that includes the prefrontal cortex and the hippocampal formation. In the present study, we investigated the possible role of attentional processes during such learning using dual-task interference. A motor, verbal, or perceptual concurrent task was performed during the learning/training block of a simple visual discrimination task. Contrary to expectation, the dual-task groups showed improved learning and learning-dependent performance compared with untrained control and non-dual-task trained groups. A second experiment revealed that this effect did not appear to be due to increased arousal level; the inclusion of alerting tones during learning did not result in facilitation. These findings suggest that the engagement of attention, but not arousal, during the acquisition of a visuomotor association can facilitate this learning and its expression.