Unable to be a Human Being in Front of Other People: A Qualitative Study of Self-Isolation Among People Living with HIV/AIDS in China

In China, acute stigma accompanying an HIV diagnosis can lead to self-isolation. In a cultural setting where family relationships are highly valued and contribute critically to well-being, such self-isolation can thwart HIV self-management and engagement in medical care, and so heighten risk for health disparities. To understand this phenomenon, we conducted individual in-depth interviews with 34 persons living with HIV/AIDS (PLwHA) in Shanghai and Beijing. Inductive content analysis revealed a range of forms of self-isolation motivation, beliefs, and behaviors influenced by: 1) internalized stigma and desire to avoid discrimination; 2) HIV-related factors such as HIV knowledge and disease progression; and 3) familial factors such as a sense of responsibility and family members’ reactions. Based on a proposed framework centering on dialectical family influences (whereby PLwHA are pushed away from, yet pulled toward the family fold), implications for provision of multidisciplinary care in medical settings are considered, including culturally appropriate strategies to decrease health disparities.     

An Examination of Satisfaction With My Supervisor and Organizational Commitment

This paper reports an examination of the relationship between satisfaction with one's supervisor and organizational commitment type based on data collected from nonmanagerial employees. The results show that moral and alienative forms of commitment were related to employees' satisfaction with their supervisors and that calculative commitment was not related. Supervisor behaviors related to moral commitment include consistency of behavior toward subordinates, showing concern for career progress, backing up employees with other managers, and employees' satisfaction with the supervisor's technical competence. Supervisor behaviors related to alienative commitment include the way one's supervisor treats an individual when he or she makes a mistake, the way the supervisor shows concern for one's career progress, and the way one's job responsibilities are defined.     

How does reading direction modulate perceptual asymmetry effects?

Left-side bias effects refer to a bias towards the left side of the stimulus/space in perceptual/visuospatial judgments, and are argued to reflect dominance of right hemisphere processing. It remains unclear whether reading direction can also account for the bias effect. Previous studies comparing readers of languages read from left to right with those read from right to left (e.g., French vs. Hebrew) have obtained inconsistent results. As a language that can be read from left to right or from right to left, Chinese provides a unique opportunity for a within-culture examination of reading direction effects. Chinese participants performed a perceptual judgment task (with both face and Chinese character stimuli; Experiment 1) and two visuospatial attention tasks (the greyscales and line bisection tasks; Experiment 2) once before and once after a reading task, in which they read Chinese passages either from left to right or from right to left for about 20 min. After reading from right to left, participants showed significantly reduced left-side bias in Chinese character perceptual judgments but not in the other three tasks. This effect suggests that the role of reading direction on different forms of left-side bias may differ, and its modulation may be stimulus-specific.     

Examining the impact of gender on the factor structure of the Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Revised

Research on the factor structure of psychopathy has yielded mixed results, supporting anywhere from one to three factors. Additionally, most of this research has used all-male samples, and the possibility of structural invariance across gender has not been examined. Using a mixed-gender sample of 360 undergraduates, the factor structure of the Psychopathic Personality Inventory-Revised was examined using confirmatory factor analysis and multiple group analysis. One-, two-, and three-factor models were tested and compared with each other. When males and females were combined, none of the three models provided adequate fit to the data. Multiple group analyses revealed partial invariance across gender for all three models. Model comparison criteria supported use of both the one- and two-factor models, taking into account variable factor structure across gender. The importance of considering structural differences based on biological sex when assessing psychopathic traits is discussed.     

Comparing standardized coefficients in structural equation modeling: a model reparameterization approach

We propose a two-stage method for comparing standardized coefficients in structural equation modeling (SEM). At stage 1, we transform the original model of interest into the standardized model by model reparameterization, so that the model parameters appearing in the standardized model are equivalent to the standardized parameters of the original model. At stage 2, we impose appropriate linear equality constraints on the standardized model and use a likelihood ratio test to make statistical inferences about the equality of standardized coefficients. Unlike other existing methods for comparing standardized coefficients, the proposed method does not require specific modeling features (e.g., specification of nonlinear constraints), which are available only in certain SEM software programs. Moreover, this method allows researchers to compare two or more standardized coefficients simultaneously in a standard and convenient way. Three real examples are given to illustrate the proposed method, using EQS, a popular SEM software program. Results show that the proposed method performs satisfactorily for testing the equality of standardized coefficients.     

Vampires,Desire, Girls and God: <Emphasis Type="Italic">Twilight</Emphasis> and the Spiritualities of Adolescent Girls

Fantasy fiction long has been read for its capacity to narrate religious meanings and themes for young readers. Since its publication in 2005, Stephenie Meyer’s young adult series Twilight, in which an adolescent girl falls in love with a vampire, has become a pop culture phenomenon among U.S. teen girls. Although vampires usually represent dangerous desire, rarely have these creatures been treated as spiritually attractive figures. Using feminist perspectives on the psychology of gender and Christian feminist theology, this article offers a critical exploration of Twilight’s constructions of intimate relationships, supernatural masculinities, and girlhood, arguing that Twilight’s girl-appeal stems from its ability to tap into both the sexual and spiritual desires of girls.     

Gender differences in egalitarian behavior and attitudes in early childhood

It is axiomatic that human females are more egalitarian than males. However, surprisingly little empirical research exists that empirically assesses this stereotype. We created two studies designed to objectively examine egalitarian behavior in 3‐ to 5‐year‐old children. In Study 1 we compared the egalitarian behavior and attitudes of American girls versus boys by tabulating the extent to which each gender awarded the same number of stickers to, and liked to the same degree, two puppets. One puppet followed the child's instructions or actions while the other did not during a drawing task in which the child played the roles of leader and peer. In the peer role, girls exhibited more egalitarian behavior than boys. In Study 2, French‐Canadian children were shown two drawings by unknown peers—one messily and one neatly colored—, then asked to distribute stickers to each peer's drawing. Again, girls exhibited more egalitarian behavior than boys. Results suggest the origins of gender differences in egalitarian behavior occur early in life and merit further investigation.     

Sex and contextual effects on children's use of interference competition

Prior research with children and nonhuman animals suggests that females engage in interference competition, in which I individual reduces another's chances of gaining access to a resource, only when resources are scarce, whereas males use it more widely. This study was designed to compare males' and females' use of interference competition in games in which resources were scarce or plentiful. Forty groups of 4 same-sex children from kindergarten or Grade 4 played the 2 games on 2 days. Grade 4 girls used less interference competition when resources were plentiful than when they were scarce. Results are useful for generating a contextually based model of the development of sex differences in competitive behavior.     

The role of personality in task and relationship conflict

Two studies explored the extent to which dispositions influence the attributions individuals make about the type of conflict they experience. Traits from the Five-Factor Model of personality (FFM) were linked to the tendency to experience task-and relationship-oriented conflict. Results provide some support for the idea that individuals have stable tendencies in the attributions they make about their conflict experiences across time, partners, and situations. Agreeableness and openness were related to reports of relationship conflict at the individual level. However, the strongest effects of personality on conflict attributions were found in the analysis of dyads. This analysis revealed that partner levels of extraversion and conscientiousness were associated with individuals' tendencies to report relationship conflict. Moreover, mean levels of extraversion and conscientiousness in a pair were associated with reports of relationship conflict. Differences between partners in extraversion were associated with more frequent conflict and a greater likelihood of reporting task-related conflict. Implications of these findings with respect to the role of personality in interpersonal relationships are discussed. Finally, these studies provide confirmatory evidence that conflict attributions have a meaningful impact on relationship satisfaction.     

Preschoolers' inhibition in their home: relation to temperament

Researchers assessed 58 preschoolers' reactions to an unfamiliar person and unfamiliar objects in their familiar home environment. Children participated in a 30-min procedure designed to elicit behavioral inhibition, including (a) a free-play period with a stranger present, (b) a structured interaction with the stranger, and (c) uncertainty-eliciting tasks. Behaviors representing the child's reactions toward the mother, stranger, and novel objects were coded. Mothers completed a temperament scale. Preschoolers exhibited behaviors indicative of inhibition toward unfamiliar social and nonsocial stimuli; behaviors remained stable across increasingly intrusive episodes. The approach/withdrawal component of temperament was related to behavioral inhibition. Individual differences in mood did not appear to be related to differences in inhibition. Parent reported temperament was related to researcher-observed behaviors.