Attributional Style, Self-Esteem, and Human Immunodeficiency Virus: A Test of the Hopelessness and Self-Esteem Theories of Depression

Research on the hopelessness and self-esteem theories of depression (Abramson, Metalsky, & Alloy, 1989; Metalsky, Joiner, Hardin, & Abramson, 1993) suggests that HIV-infected persons with depressotypic attributional style (AS) and low self-esteem (SE) may be at risk for onset of a syndrome referred to as hopelessness depression (HD). In a prospective study conducted to test these theories, measures of anxiety and depression, AS, and SE were administered to 85 HIV+ and 43 HIV– men; symptoms were reassessed 6 months later. Results indicated that: (1) The interaction of AS, SE, and HIV status predicted change in HD symptoms, but not overall depression or anxiety symptoms; (2) HIV+ men with depressotypic AS and high SE had increased HD symptom levels while other men with high SE had decreased HD symptom levels; (3) HD symptoms remained stable over the 6-month interval among men with low SE; and (4) High SE predicted decreases in anxiety symptoms among HIV– men, but not among HIV+ men. Contrary to the study hypothesis, these findings suggest that among individuals with life-threatening illnesses such as HIV infection, those with depressotypic AS and high SE may be at highest risk for onset of HD.     

Ruminative coping and post-event processing in social anxiety

Cognitive models of social anxiety implicate various factors in the initiation and maintenance of socially anxious states, including anticipatory processing, self-focused attention and post-event processing. The present study focused on post-event processing, which is a post-mortem analysis following a social event that is described as ruminative in nature and serves to maintain social anxiety. Participants (N=112; 64 women, 48 men) were presented with vignettes that involved making mistakes in public and were instructed to record their thoughts to allow for the examination of the content of post-event processing. Ruminative coping and distraction were assessed via self-report. Results indicated that participants high in social anxiety (n=55) were more likely to ruminate and less likely to distract when faced with socially anxious stressors compared to those low in social anxiety (n=57). Further, as hypothesized, participants high in social anxiety recorded more negative thoughts and more upward counterfactual thoughts ('if only' type thoughts on how things could have been better; associated with negative affect) compared to those low in social anxiety. These results are discussed in terms of cognitive models of social anxiety.     

Global processing speed as a mediator of developmental changes in children's auditory memory span

This study examined the role of global processing speed in mediating age increases in auditory memory span in 5- to 13-year-olds. Children were tested on measures of memory span, processing speed, single-word speech rate, phonological sensitivity, and vocabulary. Structural equation modeling supported a model in which age-associated increases in processing speed predicted the availability of long-term memory phonological representations for redintegration processes. The availability of long-term phonological representations, in turn, explained variance in memory span. Maximum speech rate did not predict independent variance in memory span.     

Nonverbal behavior and the vertical dimension of social relations: a meta-analysis

The vertical dimension of interpersonal relations (relating to dominance, power, and status) was examined in association with nonverbal behaviors that included facial behavior, gaze, interpersonal distance, body movement, touch, vocal behaviors, posed encoding skill, and others. Results were separately summarized for people's beliefs (perceptions) about the relation of verticality to nonverbal behavior and for actual relations between verticality and nonverbal behavior. Beliefs/perceptions were stronger and much more prevalent than were actual verticality effects. Perceived and actual relations were positively correlated across behaviors. Heterogeneity was great, suggesting that verticality is not a psychologically uniform construct in regard to nonverbal behavior. Finally, comparison of the verticality effects to those that have been documented for gender in relation to nonverbal behavior revealed only a limited degree of parallelism.     

Perceptions of Dating Violence Following a Sexualor Nonsexual Betrayal of Trust: Effects of Gender, Sexism, Acceptance of Rape Myths, and Vengeance Motivation

College womens (N = 220) and mens (N = 208) perceptions of violence following a betrayal by a romantic partner were studied in an independent groups design that varied gender of the participant, type of betrayal (sexual or nonsexual), and gender of the betrayed individual. Participants read one of four brief vignettes in which the betrayed person slapped his/her partner and made his/her lip bleed. Justification of this action was rated on 10 items. Factor analysis of these items indicated the presence of three factors for men and four for women. Both men and women indicated that hitting the partner, getting even, and being angry were more justifiable following a sexual betrayal. The hitting of a male partner by a betrayed woman was perceived as more justified than the hitting of a female partner by a betrayed man. In absolute terms, hitting and getting even by both women and men were generally viewed as unjustifiable, whereas being angry was viewed as justifiable. For both women and men, scores on the Vengeance Scale (Stuckless & Goranson, 1992) and Rape Myth Acceptance Scale (Lonsway & Fitzgerald, 1995) were related to getting even. For men, the Hostile Sexism Scale (Glick & Fiske, 2001) was related to getting even or being angry and breaking up. Results indicated that perceptions of reactions to betrayal are related to type of betrayal and to the dispositional characteristics of the perceiver.     

Is Workplace Harassment Hazardous to Your Health?

We examined cross-sectional and lagged effects of sexual harassment (SH) and generalized workplace harassment (GWH) on incidence of self-reported illness, injury, or assault in a sample of over 1,500 university employees. SH and GWH, but not other job stressors, were related to increased odds of illness, injury, or assault. This was true when SH, GWH, and illness, injury, or assault were measured at the same time point, as well as when SH and GWH were measured in year prior to illness, injury, or assault.The data presented here are part of an ongoing longitudinal study of workplace harassment conducted at the Department of Psychiatry of the University of Illinois at Chicago. This research was supported by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (grants AA09989 and AA13332). Portions of this paper were presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, April 2004, Chicago, Illinois. The data were collected by the Survey Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Chicago.     

Serial recall and presentation schedule: a micro-analysis of local distinctiveness

According to temporal distinctiveness theories, items that are temporally isolated from their neighbours during presentation are more distinct and thus are recalled better. Event-based theories, which deny that elapsed time plays a role at encoding, explain isolation effects by assuming that temporal isolation provides extra time for rehearsal or consolidation of encoding. The two classes of theories can be differentiated by examining the symmetry of isolation effects: Event-based accounts predict that performance should be affected only by pauses following item presentation (because they allow time for rehearsal or consolidation), whereas distinctiveness predicts that items should also benefit from preceding pauses. The first experiment manipulated inter-item intervals and showed an effect of intervals following but not preceding presentation, in line with event-based accounts. The second experiment showed that the effect of following interval was abolished by articulatory suppression. The data are consistent with event-based theories but can be handled by time-based distinctiveness models if they allow for additional encoding during inter-item pauses.     

Developing a Community Science Research Agenda for Building Community Capacity for Effective Preventive Interventions

Research has shown that prevention programming can improve community health when implemented well. There are examples of successful prevention in local communities, however many continue to face significant challenges, demonstrating a gap between science and practice. Common strategies within the United States to address this gap are available (e.g., trainings), but lack outcomes. Building community capacity to implement high quality prevention can help communities achieve positive health outcomes, thereby narrowing the gap. While there is ample research on the efficacy of evidence-based programs, there is little on how to improve community capacity to improve prevention quality. In order to narrow the gap, a new model of research—one based in Community Science—is suggested that improves the latest theoretical understanding of community capacity and evaluates technologies designed to enhance it. In this article, we describe this model and suggest a research agenda that can lead to improved outcomes at the local level.     

Modeling task switching without switching tasks: a short-term priming account of explicitly cued performance

Switch costs in task switching are commonly attributed to an executive control process of task-set reconfiguration, particularly in studies involving the explicit task-cuing procedure. The authors propose an alternative account of explicitly cued performance that is based on 2 mechanisms: priming of cue encoding from residual activation of cues in short-term memory and compound cue retrieval of responses from long-term memory. Their short-term priming account explains the repeated cue encoding benefit, switch cost, reduction in switch cost with preparation time, and other effects. The authors develop a mathematical model of their priming account and fit it to data from 3 experiments, demonstrating that a set of basic psychological processes can produce several effects--including putative switch costs--without switching tasks.