Relationships between digit ratio (2D:4D) and sex-typed play behavior in pre-school children

Juvenile play shows sex differences in animals and humans. Animal studies and a recent study in humans suggest that testosterone exposure during early development plays a key role. Here we report on the relationship between children’s sex-typed play behavior and digit ratio (2D:4D), a putative negative correlate of prenatal testosterone. 2D:4D and sex-typed play behavior as assessed by parents were negatively correlated in a sample of 83 pre-school boys but not in a sample of 93 girls. This finding lends some support to the ideas that early testosterone has a masculinising effect upon sex-typed play behavior in humans and that 2D:4D is a valuable tool for studying effects of early testosterone on human behavior.     

Evaluation of the 113Online Suicide Prevention Crisis Chat Service: Outcomes,Helper Behaviors and Comparison to Telephone Hotlines

Recognizing the importance of digital communication, major suicide prevention helplines have started offering crisis intervention by chat. To date there is little evidence supporting the effectiveness of crisis chat services. To evaluate the reach and outcomes of the 113Online volunteer‐operated crisis chat service, 526 crisis chat logs were studied, replicating the use of measures that were developed to study telephone crisis calls. Reaching a relatively young population of predominantly females with severe suicidality and (mental) health problems, chat outcomes for this group were found to be comparable to those found for crisis calls to U.S. Lifeline Centers in 2003–2004, with similar but not identical associations with specific helpers' styles and attitudes. Our findings support a positive effect of the 113Online chat service, to be enhanced by practice standards addressing an apparent lack of focus on the central issue of suicidality during chats, as well as by the development of best practices specific for online crisis intervention.     

Beyond the two-strategy model of skilled spelling: Effects of consistency, grain size, and orthographic redundancy

Most models of spelling assume that people rely on two procedures when engaging in spelling: a lexical look-up procedure that retrieves spellings in their entirety, and a nonlexical procedure that constructs spellings with a set of phoneme-grapheme rules. In the present research, we investigated whether larger sized subsyllabic relationships also play a role in spelling, and how they compare to small-sized phoneme-grapheme relationships. In addition, we investigated whether purely orthographic units can explain some of the variance typically attributed to the mapping between sound and spelling. To do this, we ran five spelling experiments, two using real words and three using nonwords. Results from the experiments showed that there were independent contributions of both phoneme-grapheme and larger sized subsyllabic sound-spelling relationships, although the effect of phoneme-grapheme-sized relationships was always stronger and more reliable than larger sized subsyllabic sound-spelling relationships. Purely orthographic effects were also shown to affect word spelling, but no significant effects were found with nonword spelling. Together, the results support the hypothesis that a major constraint on spelling comes from phoneme-grapheme-sized relationships.     

Validation of the DynaPort MiniMod during sleep: a pilot study

To measure activity during sleep, polysomnography and actigraphy are often used. The DynaPort MiniMod measures movement intensity and body position day and night. The goal was to examine the validity of the DynaPort MiniMod in assessing physical activity and body posture during sleep. In Study A, 10 healthy participants slept with the DynaPort MiniMod and the Actiwatch for one night. In Study B, 8 participants suspected of having Obstructive Sleep Apnoea Syndrome slept for one night with the DynaPort MiniMod and underwent complete polysomnography as part of the typical care protocol. In Study A, there was a significant moderate correlation (r = .70) between the movement scores of the Actiwatch and the DynaPort MiniMod. In Study B, a high intraclass correlation (r = .84) between body posture scores of the DynaPort MiniMod and the polysomnography position sensor was observed. The DynaPort MiniMod is a valid measurement device for physical activity during sleep.