Outcomes of systemic/strategic team consultation: I. Overview and one-month results

This is the first in a series of reports on an experimental, small-sample study of systemic/strategic team consultations. This report describes a "Milan-informed" method of team consultation for resolving therapy impasses. It then focuses on the initial one-month outcomes from the larger 3-year project. Eleven therapists were asked to select two ongoing cases matched for difficulty. While all cases continued in regular therapy, one of each therapist's cases was also selected at random to participate in a systemic/strategic, five-part team consultation. Analyses of one-month follow-up data showed that clients who participated in the team consultation were more likely to achieve their main and overall treatment goals than clients who received only regular therapy (p's less than .05, eta2 as a measure of effect size ranging from 32% to 41%). The strong findings of this initial study encourage more widespread use of team consultations as a context for treatment, training, and research.     

Is there atypical handedness in schizophrenia?

Ninety-three schizophrenic patients and 105 normal controls were tested in a single session on an 8-item repeat-administration handedness test. The schizophrenic group, in contrast to the normal controls, showed a shift in the distribution away from right-handedness, which was due to an increase in the proportion of mixed-handers. Additional analyses revealed that the increase in mixed-handedness was largely due to an increase of within-item variability in the schizophrenic group, which we refer to as ambiguous handedness. Nearly 20% of the schizophrenic patients were inconsistent on 3 or more items compared with 3.8% of the normal controls. This increased incidence of atypical handedness is discussed within the context of disorders of attention and neurodevelopment.     

Family Communication in Inherited Cardiovascular Conditions in Ireland

Over 100,000 individuals living in Ireland carry a mutated gene for an inherited cardiac condition (ICC), most of which demonstrate an autosomal dominant pattern of inheritance. First-degree relatives of individuals with these mutations are at a 50 % risk of being a carrier: disclosing genetic information to family members can be complex. This study explored how families living in Ireland communicate genetic information about ICCs and looked at the challenges of communicating information, factors that may affect communication and what influence this had on family relationships. Face to face interviews were conducted with nine participants using an approved topic guide and results analysed using thematic analysis. The participants disclosed that responsibility to future generations, gender, proximity and lack of contact all played a role in family communication. The media was cited as a source of information about genetic information and knowledge of genetic information tended to have a positive effect on families. Results from this study indicate that individuals are willing to inform family members, particularly when there are children and grandchildren at risk, and different strategies are utilised. Furthermore, understanding of genetics is partially regulated not only by their families, but by the way society handles information. Therefore, genetic health professionals should take into account the familial influence on individuals and their decision to attend genetic services, and also that of the media.     

Predictive Genetic Testing and Alternatives to Face to Face Results Disclosure: A Retrospective Review of Patients Preference for Alternative Modes of BRCA 1 and 2 Results Disclosure in the Republic of Ireland

The traditional model of providing cancer predictive testing services is changing. Many genetic centres are now offering a choice to patients in how they receive their results instead of the typical face-to-face disclosure. In view of this shift in practice and the increasing demand on the ROI cancer predictive testing service, a 2 year retrospective study on patient preference in how to receive a Breast Cancer (BRCA) predictive result was carried out. Results showed that 71.7 % of respondents would have liked to have the option of obtaining their results by telephone or by letter. However, when asked about their actual experience of BRCA predictive results disclosure 40.6 % did still value the face-to-face contact, while 44.9 % would still have preferred to receive results by either post or telephone. No significant difference was found between males and females (p?>?0.05) and those who tested negative or positive for the BRCA mutation (p?>?0.05) in wanting a choice in how their results were disclosed. While the majority expressed a wish to have a choice in how to receive their results, it is important not to underestimate the value of a face-to-face encounter in these circumstances.     

Prospective memory and frontal lobe function

The study sought to examine the role of frontal lobe functioning in focal prospective memory (PM) performance and its relation to PM deficit in older adults. PM and working memory (WM) differences were studied in younger aged (n = 21), older aged (n = 20), and frontal injury (n = 14) groups. An event-based focal PM task was employed and three measures of WM were administered. The younger aged group differed from the other two groups in showing significantly higher scores on PM and on one of the WM measures, but there were no differences at a statistically significant level between the older aged group and the frontal injury groups on any of the memory measures. There were, however, some differences in correlations with a WM measure between groups. It is concluded that there are similarities and differences in the deficits in PM between older adults and patients with frontal lobe injury on focal as well as nonfocal PM tasks.     

From Stigmatized Immigrants to Radical Right Voting: A Multilevel Study on the Role of Threat and Contact

This study examines the interplay between presence of stigmatized immigrants, threat, and intergroup contact that underlies radical right voting (voting propensity and actual district‐level vote results). On the one hand, low‐status immigrants are often stigmatized and depicted as threats. Thus, presence of stigmatized immigrants should heighten threat perceptions, thereby increasing radical right voting. On the other hand, as positive contact with stigmatized immigrants is known to reduce anti‐immigrant prejudice, it should also attenuate radical right voting. As predicted, multilevel path analyses with the Swiss Election Studies 2011 data (N = 1,736 respondents in 136 districts) revealed that the proportion of stigmatized immigrants (from former Yugoslavia and Albania) in districts heightened perceived threat. Threat perceptions, in turn, increased propensity to vote for the Swiss People's Party, the major radical right party. In contrast, experiencing positive, everyday contact with former Yugoslav and Albanian immigrants reduced voting propensity through attenuated threat perceptions. Contact and threat perceptions were also related to the actual vote through voting propensity.     

Who Is to Blame? Official Discourse and Ethnic Diversity Attitudes During the 2011 Riots in England

In 2011, the killing of a Black man by a police officer triggered violent riots across England. In a context where ethnic minorities are rarely openly blamed, we examined the lens through which the events were interpreted in the official discourses of the British Prime Minister. A thematic content analysis (Study 1) revealed that, without explicitly blaming ethnic minorities, the discourses built on antagonistic normative references opposing a virtuous majority to threatening minorities. Then, based on online survey data of self‐declared Londoners (N = 223) during the riots, we analyzed (Study 2) how agreement with the discourses related to individuals’ ethnocentrism and their understanding of the causes underlying the events. Results of regression analyses showed how agreement with the discourses related to blaming ethnic diversity for the riots and to higher ethnocentrism, especially among individuals least likely to discriminate against minorities (i.e., low in social dominance orientation). Agreement with the discourses was also linked to reduced blame of authorities. To conclude, we discuss the mobilization potential of political discourses on ingroup virtue and outgroup threat.     

Collaborative Inhibition and Semantic Recall: Improving Collaboration Through Computer‐mediated Communication

Two experiments investigated the recall of nominal and collaborating groups to test the following hypotheses: (i) semantic memory, as well as episodic memory, is disrupted by collaborative recall and (ii) both episodic and semantic recall will be greater in groups collaborating via computer‐mediated communication (CMC) than groups collaborating face to face. Experiment 1 investigated different collaborative constellations (nominal, face to face and parallel CMC) in a series of episodic and semantic word recall tasks. In Experiment 2, collaborative groups (nominal, face to face, parallel CMC and cyclic CMC) completed a Scrabble task in which they were required to generate words from a set of 12 letters. Both experiments demonstrated that collaborative inhibition was present in semantic recall. Parallel CMC improved recall by comparison with face‐to‐face collaboration in both experiments, whereas cyclic CMC did not. The underlying causes of collaborative inhibitory effects and the potential for reducing them with CMC are discussed.Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.