Impulsive choice and pre‐exposure to delays: iv. effects of delay‐ and immediacy‐exposure training relative to maturational changes in impulsivity

Impulsive choice describes preference for smaller, sooner rewards over larger, later rewards. Excessive delay discounting (i.e., rapid devaluation of delayed rewards) underlies some impulsive choices, and is observed in many maladaptive behaviors (e.g., substance abuse, gambling). Interventions designed to reduce delay discounting may provide therapeutic gains. One such intervention provides rats with extended training with delayed reinforcers. When compared to a group given extended training with immediate reinforcers, delay‐exposed rats make significantly fewer impulsive choices. To what extent is this difference due to delay‐exposure training shifting preference toward self‐control or immediacy‐exposure training (the putative control group) shifting preference toward impulsivity? The current study compared the effects of delay‐ and immediacy‐exposure training to a no‐training control group and evaluated within‐subject changes in impulsive choice across 51 male Wistar rats. Delay‐exposed rats made significantly fewer impulsive choices than immediacy‐exposed and control rats. Between‐group differences in impulsive choice were not observed in the latter two groups. While delay‐exposed rats showed large, significant pre‐ to posttraining reductions in impulsive choice, immediacy‐exposed and control rats showed small reductions in impulsive choice. These results suggest that extended training with delayed reinforcers reduces impulsive choice, and that extended training with immediate reinforcers does not increase impulsive choice.     

Whatever happened to Kony2012? Understanding a global Internet phenomenon as an emergent social identity

Kony2012 was a viral Internet video that attracted unprecedented online interest in promoting a campaign to arrest the leader of an African militant group. The current research considers the social psychological bases of social media‐based collective action. In three cross‐sectional surveys (N = 304) collected before, on, and after the key action date of 20 April 2012, we consider the nature (opinion based or global) and function (emergent or transforming) of social identity in modern forms of social action. Multigroup structural equation modelling showed that Kony2012 action was best captured by an emergent opinion‐based social identity. Moreover, the same factors that predicted Kony2012 action generally also predicted engagement in new repertoires of protest (involving the use of social media) and an observable traditional socio‐political action (signing a letter to a government minister). The results suggest that there is no sharp dividing line between traditional and new forms of collective action and that both may be understood as valid expressions of collective selfhood. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Gay-Straight Alliances Vary on Dimensions of Youth Socializing and Advocacy: Factors Accounting for Individual and Setting-Level Differences

Gay‐Straight Alliances (GSAs) are school‐based youth settings that could promote health. Yet, GSAs have been treated as homogenous without attention to variability in how they operate or to how youth are involved in different capacities. Using a systems perspective, we considered two primary dimensions along which GSAs function to promote health: providing socializing and advocacy opportunities. Among 448 students in 48 GSAs who attended six regional conferences in Massachusetts (59.8 % LGBQ; 69.9 % White; 70.1 % cisgender female), we found substantial variation among GSAs and youth in levels of socializing and advocacy. GSAs were more distinct from one another on advocacy than socializing. Using multilevel modeling, we identified group and individual factors accounting for this variability. In the socializing model, youth and GSAs that did more socializing activities did more advocacy. In the advocacy model, youth who were more actively engaged in the GSA as well as GSAs whose youth collectively perceived greater school hostility and reported greater social justice efficacy did more advocacy. Findings suggest potential reasons why GSAs vary in how they function in ways ranging from internal provisions of support, to visibility raising, to collective social change. The findings are further relevant for settings supporting youth from other marginalized backgrounds and that include advocacy in their mission.     

Salience, relevance, and firing: a priority map for target selection

The salience map is a crucial concept for many theories of visual attention. On this map, each object in the scene competes for selection - the more conspicuous the object, the greater its representation, and the more likely it will be chosen. In recent years, the firing patterns of single neurons have been interpreted using this framework. Here, we review evidence showing that the expression of salience is remarkably similar across structures, remarkably different across tasks, and modified in important ways when the salient object is consistent with the goals of the participant. These observations have important ramifications for theories of attention. We conclude that priority--the combined representation of salience and relevance--best describes the firing properties of neurons.     

Does Availability of Mental Health Resources Prevent Recurrent Suicidal Behavior? An Ecological Analysis

This study examines whether availability of mental health resources in the county of residence is associated with subsequent suicidal behavior after a previous suicide attempt. Among 10,922 individuals who attempted suicide in Colorado between 1998 and 2002, residence in a county that offered a minimum safety-net of mental health services significantly reduced the risk of suicidal behavior for at least 1 year after the index attempt. Safety-net services included mental health treatment, crisis treatment, and case management. These results suggest one strategy for prevention of suicidal behavior that could inform state-level health policy development and resource allocation.     

An examination of learning processes during critical incident training: implications for the development of adaptable trainees

Three experiments are reported that examined the process by which trainees learn decision-making skills during a critical incident training program. Formal theories of category learning were used to identify two processes that may be responsible for the acquisition of decision-making skills: rule learning and exemplar learning. Experiments 1 and 2 used the process dissociation procedure (L. L. Jacoby, 1998) to evaluate the contribution of these processes to performance. The results suggest that trainees used a mixture of rule and exemplar learning. Furthermore, these learning processes were influenced by different aspects of training structure and design. The goal of Experiment 3 was to develop training techniques that enable trainees to use a rule adaptively. Trainees were tested on cases that represented exceptions to the rule. Unexpectedly, the results suggest that providing general instruction regarding the kinds of conditions in which a decision rule does not apply caused them to fixate on the specific conditions mentioned and impaired their ability to identify other conditions in which the rule might not apply. The theoretical, methodological, and practical implications of the results are discussed.     

Children's printed word database: Continuities and changes over time in children's early reading vocabulary

In this paper we introduce a comprehensive database of the vocabulary in reading materials used by 5 – 9 year old children in the UK. The database is available on‐line http:www.essex.ac.ukpsychologycpwd and allows researchers into early reading development the possibility of rigorous control over critical characteristics of experimental stimuli such as word frequency, regularity and length, frequency of grapheme‐phoneme correspondences, orthographic and phonological neighbourhoods etc. The on‐line database is also a resource that can be used by practitioners with interests in literacy development and literacy instruction. It can be used to obtain characteristics for a user‐generated list of words, or else to generate a list of words according to constraints specified by the user. Here we present an overview of the construction of the database, the materials entered into it, the survey of schools by which we obtained information about the books that were most likely to be used by children in each age group, and the search features available on the database website. We also discuss certain characteristics of the Vocabulary itself and compare these with those reported in an earlier non‐representative database reported in Stuart, Dixon, Masterson and Gray (2003). We then present a detailed analysis of the characteristics of Vocabulary in books used in the Reception year, against the background of recent recommendations for change in the early teaching of reading. Finally, we present data showing that the database is indeed already proving a useful resource for both practitioners and researchers.