If you want to know, consider asking: how likely is it that patients will hurt themselves in the future?

Although self-harming behavior is a common and costly problem for psychiatric inpatients released from the hospital, standardized tools that assess patients' risk for self-harm are rarely used in clinical settings. In this study of dually diagnosed psychiatric inpatients (N = 147), we assessed the utility of patients' self-perceptions of risk in predicting self-harm in the community. Patients' self-perceptions of risk predicted self-harm 8 weeks after discharge from the hospital (Lag 1; area under the curve [AUC] = 0.75). Self-perceptions of risk at the 8-week interview also predicted self-harm 2 months later (Lag 2; AUC = 0.72). Self-perceived risk added predictive utility above and beyond scores on a measure of depression and seemed to capture changes in risk state over time. The results suggest that inpatients can accurately perceive their own risk and therefore may be important collaborators in the risk management process.     

Current and Military‐Specific Gender Minority Stress Factors and Their Relationship with Suicide Ideation in Transgender Veterans

Research suggests the prevalence of suicide ideation and suicide attempts in the transgender veteran community may be upwards of 20 times higher than nontransgender veterans, who are known to be at increased risk than the general US population. This study aimed to understand the potential influence of external and internal minority stress experienced during and after military service on past‐year and recent suicide ideation in a sample of 201 transgender veterans. Nonparametric bootstrapping analyses indicated past‐year transgender‐specific discrimination and rejection (external minority stress) indirectly predicted frequency of both past‐year and past 2‐week suicide ideation through past‐year shame related to gender identity (internal minority stress). This result was significant when controlling for symptoms of depression and demographics. Similar patterns emerged when examining relationships among military external and internal minority stress on suicide outcomes. These results suggest that attempts to reduce both the experience and impact of minority stressors related to gender identity during and after military service may be an important avenue for suicide prevention.     

Beyond ‘nothing to hide’: When identity is key to privacy threat under surveillance

Privacy is psychologically important, vital for democracy, and in the era of ubiquitous and mobile surveillance technology, facing increasingly complex threats and challenges. Yet surveillance is often justified under a trope that one has ‘nothing to hide’. We conducted focus groups (N = 42) on topics of surveillance and privacy and using discursive analysis, identify the ideological assumptions and the positions that people adopt to make sense of their participation in a surveillance society. We find a premise that surveillance is increasingly inescapable, but this was only objected to when people reported feeling misrepresented, or where they had an inability to withhold aspects of their identities. The (in)visibility of the surveillance technology also complicated how surveillance is constructed. Those interested in engaging the public in debates about surveillance may be better served by highlighting the identity consequences of surveillance, rather than constructing surveillance as a generalised privacy threat.     

Glucocorticoids are required for extinction of predator stress-induced hyperarousal

Background

The role of glucocorticoids in extinction of traumatic memories has not been fully characterized despite its potential as a therapeutic target for acquired posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The predator stress paradigm allows us to determine whether glucocorticoids mediate the extinction of both context-dependent and context-independent fear memories.

Methods

Male C57BL/6J mice were exposed to a predator (cat) then repeatedly exposed to the predator stress context in the absence of the cat. Context-dependent (associative) fear memory was assessed as suppression of activity during re-exposure to the predator stress context without the cat (extinction trials). Context-independent fear (non-associative) was assessed seven days after extinction trials using measures of hyperarousal and anxiety-like behaviours in environments unlike the predator stress context. To assess the role of glucocorticoids, mice were injected with metyrapone (50 mg/kg) 90 min prior to extinction trials in predator stressed mice and context-dependent and context-independent fear memories were assessed. Finally, metyrapone-treated predator stressed mice were injected with corticosterone (5 or 10 mg/kg) immediately following extinction trials and context-dependent and context-independent fear memories were assessed.

Results

Repeated re-exposure to the predator stress context without the cat present extinguished context-dependent fear memory, and also reduced hyperarousal, a generalized, chronic PTSD-like symptom. We show that extinction of context-independent predator stress-induced hyperarousal is dependent on endogenous glucocorticoids during the extinction trials. Furthermore, the inhibition of extinction by metyrapone on startle amplitude was reduced by exogenous administration of corticosterone following extinction trials. Overall, these data implicate glucocorticoids in the extinction of hyperarousal, a core symptom of PTSD.     

Nonlinear,near photo-realistic caricatures using a parametric facial appearance model

A mathematical model previously developed for use in computer vision applications is presented as an empirical model for face space. The term appearance space is used to distinguish this from previous models. Appearance space is a linear vector space that is dimensionally optimal, enables us to model and describe any human facial appearance, and possesses characteristics that are plausible for the representation of psychological face space. Randomly sampling from a multivariate distribution for a location in appearance space produces entirely plausible faces, and manipulation of a small set of defining parameters enables the automatic generation of photo-realistic caricatures. The appearance space model leads us to the new concept of nonlinear caricatures, and we show that the accepted linear method for caricature is only a special case of a more general paradigm. Nonlinear methods are also viable, and we present examples of photographic quality caricatures, using a number of different transformation functions. Results of a simple experiment are presented that suggest that nonlinear transformations can accurately capture key aspects of the caricature effect. Finally, we discuss the relationship between appearance space, caricature, and facial distinctiveness. On the basis of our new theoretical framework, we suggest an experimental approach that can yield new evidence for the plausibility of face space and its ability to explain processes of recognition.     

The distinctiveness of the word-length effect

The authors report 2 experiments that compare the serial recall of pure lists of long words, pure lists of short words, and lists of long or short words containing just a single isolated word of a different length. In both experiments for pure lists, there was a substantial recall advantage for short words; the isolated words were recalled better than other words in the same list, and there was a reverse word-length effect: Isolated long words were recalled better than isolated short words. These results contradict models that seek to explain the word-length effect in terms of list-based accounts of rehearsal speed or in terms of item-based effects (such as difficulty of assembling items).