Evaluating a brief prevention program for improving marital conflict in community families.

Marital conflict is related to well-being in children and adults (E. M. Cummings & P. T. Davies, 2002). Marital conflict is likely most effectively ameliorated before it becomes clinically significant. However, families without significant problems may be unwilling to participate in couples therapies or other lengthy or intensive interventions. Responding to this gap, the authors developed a 4-session psychoeducational program about marital conflict for community families. Couples with children 4-8 years of age were randomly blocked into 1 of 3 groups: (1) a parent-only group (n = 24), (2) a parent-child group (n = 33), or (3) a self-study group (n = 33). Pre- and posttest and 6-month and 1-year assessments were conducted. This report evaluates (a) whether participation in a psychoeducational program for parents improved marital conflict, especially concerning ways of expressing disagreements, and (b) whether changes in marital conflict subsequently improved marital satisfaction, parenting, and child adjustment. Greater constructive and less destructive marital conflict was observed at all assessments for treatment groups, and these changes were linked with improvements in other family processes. The findings support the promise of brief, psychoeducational programs for improving marital conflict for community samples.     

Risky drinking in college changes as fraternity/sorority affiliation changes: a person-environment perspective.

This study aimed to resolve the direction of the relation between Greek affiliation and substance use by taking advantage of the quasi-experimental nature of change in college fraternity/sorority affiliation. Precollege individual differences and college substance use were examined as a function of time-varying Greek status to characterize self-selection (by which heavy substance users opt into Greek systems) and socialization (by which Greek systems foster heavy substance use). Prospective data on continuously enrolled college students (N=2,376), assessed at precollege and in the first 6 semesters of college, were used. Latent class analysis indicated 4 discrete groups of status: constant Greek members (30%), constant nonmembers (64%), late joiners (2%), and droppers (4%). Random coefficient models demonstrated disaffiliation with Greek systems is associated with decreases in risky drinking and alcohol-conducive environmental factors (peer norms and alcohol availability), whereas affiliation is associated with increases, indicating Greek socialization via sociocognitive and physical environments. Future Greeks differed from nonmembers in diverse individual characteristics and heavier substance use at precollege, suggesting multiple selection paths into Greek systems. Findings suggest a reciprocal relation between Greek environment and individuals in determining the trajectories of college drinking and heterogeneity in drinking as functions of changes in Greek affiliation.     

Factors influencing the temporal relationship between alcohol consumption and experiences with aggression among college women.

The authors assessed temporal relationships among alcohol use, aggression, and mood using daily data from 179 college women. Participants called an interactive voice response system over an 8-week period. The odds of experiencing verbal, sexual, and physical aggression (odd ratios = 2.25, 19.44, and 11.84, respectively) were significantly higher on heavy drinking days (M = 7.46 drinks) compared to nondrinking days. Both a history of victimization and greater psychological symptom severity influenced the odds of involvement in verbal aggression. The odds of alcohol consumption were 3 times higher during the 24 hr following verbal aggression compared with days in which verbal aggression did not occur. On the day immediately following involvement in either verbal or physical aggression, positive mood decreased and negative mood increased. During the week (2-7 days) following sexual aggression, women's positive mood was decreased. These findings reinforce the need for interventions aimed at reducing heavy episodic drinking on college campuses.     

The Teaching Alliance Inventory: Evaluating the student-instructor relationship in clinical and counselling psychology training

The Teaching Alliance Inventory (TAI) was developed to measure the quality of the student-instructor relationship in graduate clinical and counselling psychology classrooms. Based on Bordin's (1983) original concept of the alliance as fundamental to the change process in psychotherapy, we developed the TAI to measure aspects of the classroom relationship that may be fundamental to learning essential skills of counselling and clinical psychology. Factor analysis revealed six subscales, four representing interpersonal variables not evaluated in traditional teaching effectiveness measures. We demonstrated internal consistency and split-half reliability with a large sample of graduate students and described evidence for the scale's face validity and content validity. Construct validity was supported by significant correlations between the TAI and its subscales with an established measure of teaching effectives and its logically related subscales (SEEQ; Marsh, 1987 Marsh, HW. 1987. Students’ evaluations of university teaching: Research findings, methodological issues, and directions for future research. International Journal of Educational Research, 11(Whole Issue 3): 253–288.  [Google Scholar]). The TAI may supplement traditional assessments of instructor quality by providing feedback regarding interpersonal impact in the classroom.     

The negative consequences of threat: a functional magnetic resonance imaging investigation of the neural mechanisms underlying women's underperformance in math

This study used functional magnetic resonance imaging to identify the neural structures associated with women's underperformance on math tasks. Although women in a control condition recruited neural networks that are associated with mathematical learning (i.e., angular gyrus, left parietal and prefrontal cortex), women who were reminded of gender stereotypes about math ability did not recruit these regions, and instead revealed heightened activation in a neural region associated with social and emotional processing (ventral anterior cingulate cortex).     

Misery is not miserly: sad and self-focused individuals spend more

Misery is not miserly: Sadness increases the amount of money that decision makers give up to acquire a commodity. The present research investigated when and why the misery-is-not-miserly effect occurs. Drawing on William James's concept of the material self, we tested a model specifying relationships among sadness, self-focus, and the amount of money that decision makers spend. Consistent with our Jamesian hypothesis, results demonstrated that the misery-is-not-miserly effect occurs only when self-focus is high. That is, self-focus moderates the effect of sadness on spending. Moreover, mediational analyses revealed that, at sufficiently high levels, self-focus mediates (explains) the relationship between sadness and spending. Because the study used real commodities and real money, the results hold implications for everyday decisions, as well as implications for the development of theory. For example, economic theories of spending may benefit from incorporating psychological theories -- specifically, theories of emotion and the self -- into their models.     

Social feedback to infants' babbling facilitates rapid phonological learning

Infants' prelinguistic vocalizations are rarely considered relevant for communicative development. As a result, there are few studies of mechanisms underlying developmental changes in prelinguistic vocal production. Here we report the first evidence that caregivers' speech to babbling infants provides crucial, real-time guidance to the development of prelinguistic vocalizations. Mothers of 9.5-month-old infants were instructed to provide models of vocal production timed to be either contingent or noncontingent on their infants' babbling. Infants given contingent feedback rapidly restructured their babbling, incorporating phonological patterns from caregivers' speech, but infants given noncontingent feedback did not. The new vocalizations of the infants in the contingent condition shared phonological form but not phonetic content with their mothers' speech. Thus, prelinguistic infants learned new vocal forms by discovering phonological patterns in their mothers' contingent speech and then generalizing from these patterns.     

Rates of Non-Suicidal Self-Injury: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of Exposure

Research on the social influences associated with rates of non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is scarce and limited to studies of contagion within inpatient and residential treatment settings. Using an archival dataset that included 1,965 college students, the current study examined whether exposure to acts of NSSI and/or suicidal behavior in others was associated with increased rates of NSSI. Results supported hypotheses in that participants who knew someone who had engaged in NSSI only, or knew someone who engaged in both NSSI and suicidal behavior were more likely to have engaged in NSSI compared to those not exposed. The findings provide preliminary, albeit indirect, evidence of the potential for social modeling to influence rates of NSSI within college students. Directions for future studies are offered.     

Elucidating the neural correlates of egoistic and moralistic self-enhancement

Self-enhancement is the biasing of one’s view of oneself in a positive direction. The brain correlates of self-enhancement remain unclear though it has been reported that the medial prefrontal cortex (MPFC) may be important for producing self-enhancing responses. Previous studies have not examined whether the neural correlates of self-enhancement depend on the particular domain in which individuals are enhancing themselves. Both moralistic and egoistic words were presented to participants while transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) was applied to the MPFC, precuneus or in a sham orientation. Participants were asked to make decisions as to the words describing themselves, some of which were positive and some of which were negative. It was found the MPFC TMS significantly disrupted egoistic self-enhancement when TMS was delivered to the MPFC. Judgments involving moralistic words were not influenced by TMS. These data provide further evidence that MPFC is involved in self-enhancement, and that the role of MPFC may be selective in this regard.