The Contributions of Child Behavioral Functioning and Parent Distress to Family Functioning in Pediatric Inflammatory Bowel Disease

The objective of this study was to examine the relative contributions of both parental and adolescent functioning to family functioning in adolescent patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) and their families. Participants were 45 adolescents (27 male, 18 female) 13-17?years old (M?=?15.41?years, SD?=?1.32) with IBD and their parents. Families completed measures of patient behavioral functioning and depression, parent distress and family functioning. Disease severity assessments were completed via data provided by patients' gastroenterologists. Results indicated that parent-reported patient behavioral problems accounted for a significant 26% of variance in family functioning. Post-hoc analysis revealed that externalizing behavior problems accounted for the majority of this variance compared to internalizing behavior problems. These results suggest that externalizing problems may have a more significant impact on these families than previous research indicates. Moreover, externalizing behaviors may significantly impact family adaptation and should be taken into consideration during routine clinical care. Further research is needed to replicate and expand upon these findings.     

Conceptual similarity promotes generalization of higher order fear learning

We tested the hypothesis that conceptual similarity promotes generalization of conditioned fear. Using a sensory preconditioning procedure, three groups of subjects learned an association between two cues that were conceptually similar, unrelated, or mismatched. Next, one of the cues was paired with a shock. The other cue was then reintroduced to test for fear generalization, as measured by the skin conductance response. Results showed enhanced fear generalization that correlated with trait anxiety levels in the group that learned an association between conceptually similar stimuli. These findings suggest that conceptual representations of conditional stimuli influence human fear learning processes.     

Gender specific requirement of GluR1 receptors in contextual conditioning but not spatial learning

The GluR1 subunit of the AMPA receptor is required for hippocampal-dependent memory formation, emotional learning and synaptic plasticity. Recent work has shown that GluR1-independent synaptic plasticity is mediated by nitric oxide. Nitric oxide activity is influenced by estrogen. It is unknown whether this gender-dependent effect conveys a gender dimorphic requirement of GluR1 for learning. This hypothesis was tested in two behavioral paradigms. In Experiment 1, the retention of contextual fear conditioning was impaired in male but not female GluR1 knockout mice. In Experiment 2, GluR1 knockout mice made significantly more arm entry errors during acquisition of a radial-arm watermaze task. This deficit was independent of gender. These results indicate that some forms of learning are gender dimorphic in GluR1 knockout mice. The results are discussed with reference to task and gender-specific interactions between GluR1 receptor intracellular signalling pathways.     

Differential item functioning of the Rosenberg Self‐Esteem Scale in the US and China: Measurement bias matters

Using an item‐response theory‐based approach (i.e. likelihood ratio test with an iterative procedure), we examined the equivalence of the Rosenberg Self‐Esteem Scale (RSES) in a sample of US and Chinese college students. Results from the differential item functioning (DIF) analysis showed that the RSES was not fully equivalent at the item level, as well as at the scale level. The two cultural groups did not use the scale comparably, with the US students showing more extreme responses than the Chinese students. Moreover, we evaluated the practical impact of DIF and found that cultural differences in average self‐esteem scores disappeared after the DIF was taken into account. In the present study, we discuss the implications of our findings for cross‐cultural research and provide suggestions for future studies using the RSES in China.     

Cognitive culture: theoretical and empirical insights into social learning strategies

Research into social learning (learning from others) has expanded significantly in recent years, not least because of productive interactions between theoretical and empirical approaches. This has been coupled with a new emphasis on learning strategies, which places social learning within a cognitive decision-making framework. Understanding when, how and why individuals learn from others is a significant challenge, but one that is critical to numerous fields in multiple academic disciplines, including the study of social cognition.     

The influence of athletic experience and kinematic information on skill-relevant affordance perception

Humans can perceive affordances both for themselves and for others, and affordance perception is a function of perceptual-motor experience involved in playing a sport. Two experiments investigated the enhanced affordance perception of athletes. In Experiment 1, basketball players and nonbasketball players provided perceptual reports for sports-relevant (maximum standing-reach and reach-with-jump heights) and non-sports-relevant (maximum sitting height) affordances for self and other. Basketball players were more accurate at perceiving maximum reach-with-jump for another person than were nonbasketball players, but were no better at perceiving maximum reach or sitting heights. Experiment 2 investigated the informational basis for this enhanced perceptual ability of basketball players by evaluating whether kinematics inform perceivers about action-scaled (e.g., force-production dependent), but not body-scaled (i.e., geometrically determined), affordances for others, and whether basketball experience enhances sensitivity to kinematic information. Only basketball players improved at perceiving an action-scaled affordance (maximum reach-with-jump), but not body-scaled affordances (maximum standing-reach and sit) with exposure to kinematic information, suggesting that action-scaled affordances may be specified by kinematic information to which athletes are already attuned by virtue of their sport experience.     

Memory in traumatic brain injury: The effects of injury severity and effort on the Wechsler Memory Scale‐III

This study examined the effects of traumatic brain injury (TBI) on Wechsler Memory Scale‐III (WMS‐III) performance. Since poor effort potentially contaminates results, effort was explicitly assessed and controlled using two well‐validated cognitive validity indicators, the Portland Digit Recognition Test (PDRT) and Reliable Digit Span (RDS). Participants were 44 mild TBI patients with good effort, 48 mild TBI patients with poor effort, and 40 moderate–severe TBI patients with good effort. A dose–response relationship between injury severity and WMS‐III performance was demonstrated. Effect size calculations showed that the good effort mild TBI patients did not differ from normal (average Cohen's d= 0.07) while moderate–severe TBI had a moderate effect on WMS‐III scores (average Cohen's d=?0.52). Consistent with previous literature, the moderate–severe TBI group scored the lowest on WMS‐III Visual indices. Effort had a larger effect than injury severity on WMS‐III scores (average Cohen's d=?1.27). Clinical implications of these findings are discussed.     

Interpreting Self-Directed Search profiles: Validity of the “Rule of Eight”

Based on the standard error of measurement, Holland (1985) suggested the “rule of eight” for determining the meaningfulness of differences between two summary scores on the Self Directed Search. The present study empirically examined the rule's validity for practice. The participants were 2397 (1497 females and 900 males) undergraduate students enrolled in the exploratory major at a large Midwestern university. The results strongly supported the interpretive rule of eight. For those participants who scored a primary-code distinction of eight or more points, the hit rate was 55% with a kappa of .38. This compared to a hit rate of 40% with a kappa of .21 for those participants with less than eight-point distinction between their top two scores. The authors also discuss the practical implications for interpreting SDS results using the “rule of eight.”     

Extending the challenge-hindrance model of occupational stress: The role of appraisal

Interest regarding the challenge-hindrance occupational stress model has increased in recent years, however its theoretical foundation has not been tested. Drawing from the transactional theory of stress, this study tests the assumptions made in past research (1) that workload and responsibility are appraised as challenges and role ambiguity and role conflict are appraised as hindrances, and (2) that these appraisals mediate the relationship between these stressors and outcomes (i.e., strains, job dissatisfaction, and turnover intentions). For a sample of 479 employees, we found that although workload, role ambiguity, and role conflict could be appraised primarily as challenges or hindrances, they could also simultaneously be perceived as being both to varying degrees. Support was also found for a model in which primary appraisal partially mediated the stressor-outcome relationship.     

Psychometric properties of the mobility inventory for agoraphobia: convergent, discriminant, and criterion-related validity

Aims of this study were (a) to summarize the psychometric literature on the Mobility Inventory for Agoraphobia (MIA), (b) to examine the convergent and discriminant validity of the MIA's Avoidance Alone and Avoidance Accompanied rating scales relative to clinical severity ratings of anxiety disorders from the Anxiety Disorders Interview Schedule (ADIS), and (c) to establish a cutoff score indicative of interviewers’ diagnosis of agoraphobia for the Avoidance Alone scale. A meta-analytic synthesis of 10 published studies yielded positive evidence for internal consistency and convergent and discriminant validity of the scales. Participants in the present study were 129 people with a diagnosis of panic disorder. Internal consistency was excellent for this sample, α = .95 for AAC and .96 for AAL. When the MIA scales were correlated with interviewer ratings, evidence for convergent and discriminant validity for AAL was strong (convergent r with agoraphobia severity ratings = .63 vs. discriminant rs of .10–.29 for other anxiety disorders) and more modest but still positive for AAC (.54 vs. .01–.37). Receiver operating curve analysis indicated that the optimal operating point for AAL as an indicator of ADIS agoraphobia diagnosis was 1.61, which yielded sensitivity of .87 and specificity of .73.