From stimulus-driven to appraisal-driven attention: Towards differential effects of goal relevance and goal relatedness on attention?

The Component Process Model posits that attention is appraisal-driven rather than stimulus-driven and that the appraisal of relevance is of critical importance in such a mechanism. This means that any stimulus can attract attention or not depending on how relevant it is appraised. This hypothesis was tested in an implicit border similarity judgement task, in which thirsty participants were presented with bottles and vases that were respectively very relevant and weakly relevant to their goal to quench their thirst. These stimuli were also presented to quenched participants for whom none of the stimuli was relevant. The findings support the idea that our attention is more likely to be appraisal-driven than stimulus-driven, since bottles produced an attentional interference in thirsty participants only. It was also observed that, even if vases were judged weakly relevant by thirsty participants, they produced an attentional interference compared to empty stimuli, which was not the case in the quenched participants group. The concept of goal relatedness was proposed as an explanation for this result, and methodological implications were also discussed.     

Religiosity is an Important Part of Coping with Grief in Pregnancy After a Traumatic Second Trimester Loss

Women (n = 15) who were pregnant after a traumatic late pregnancy loss (termination because of fetal death or serious anomalies) completed psychometric screening tests and scales, including the Perinatal Grief Scale (PGS), the Impact of Event Scale (IES), the Duke Depression Inventory (DDI), the Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD), and the Hoge Scale for Intrinsic Religiosity (IR). Despite a mean elapsed time since the prior loss of 27 (range, 7–47) months, half (7/15, 47%) of the combined groups had high levels of grief on the PGS. Multiple positive scores on psychometric tests were frequent: Sixty percent (9/15) had high scores on the PGS Active Grief subscale or on the IES. Forty percent (6/15) had a high score on the DDI, and 17% (3/15) on the GAD. IR scores significantly and negatively correlated with scores on the Despair subscale of the PGS. The results from this pilot study suggest that high levels of grief and PTS symptoms are significant problems for pregnant women who have suffered late loss of a wanted pregnancy. Religiosity may play an important part in maternal coping during these stressful pregnancies.     

Are leader stereotypes masculine? A meta-analysis of three research paradigms

This meta-analysis examined the extent to which stereotypes of leaders are culturally masculine. The primary studies fit into 1 of 3 paradigms: (a) In Schein's (1973) think manager-think male paradigm, 40 studies with 51 effect sizes compared the similarity of male and leader stereotypes and the similarity of female and leader stereotypes; (b) in Powell and Butterfield's (1979) agency-communion paradigm, 22 studies with 47 effect sizes compared stereotypes of leaders' agency and communion; and (c) in Shinar's (1975) masculinity-femininity paradigm, 7 studies with 101 effect sizes represented stereotypes of leadership-related occupations on a single masculinity-femininity dimension. Analyses implemented appropriate random and mixed effects models. All 3 paradigms demonstrated overall masculinity of leader stereotypes: (a) In the think manager-think male paradigm, intraclass correlation = .25 for the women-leaders similarity and intraclass correlation = .62 for the men-leaders similarity; (b) in the agency-communion paradigm, g = 1.55, indicating greater agency than communion; and (c) in the masculinity-femininity paradigm, g = 0.92, indicating greater masculinity than the androgynous scale midpoint. Subgroup and meta-regression analyses indicated that this masculine construal of leadership has decreased over time and was greater for male than female research participants. In addition, stereotypes portrayed leaders as less masculine in educational organizations than in other domains and in moderate- than in high-status leader roles. This article considers the relation of these findings to Eagly and Karau's (2002) role congruity theory, which proposed contextual influences on the incongruity between stereotypes of women and leaders. The implications for prejudice against women leaders are also considered.     

Psychotherapy for Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorders

Individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs) present unique challenges for psychotherapists. Those with autism, Asperger’s Disorder and pervasive developmental disorder-not otherwise specified (PDD-NOS) show impairments in social communication and social relationships as well as unusual behavioral features that set them apart from peers. Further, individuals affected with autism spectrum disorders may experience anxiety, depression, obsessive–compulsive disorder and other psychiatric symptoms that can be distressing and, at times, disabling. At present, there is limited information regarding evidence-based approaches for addressing either core impairments of ASDs or associated conditions in a psychotherapy setting. Nevertheless, information about how persons with ASD experience their world and learn can provide clues about what interventions might be useful to assist them such that they can reach their fullest potential. From this standpoint, new or modified approaches to therapy can be tested and further refined to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the psychotherapeutic challenges and the most efficacious therapeutic approach to maximize functioning in this population.     

Religious Beliefs Affect Grieving After Pregnancy Loss

Religious beliefs and practices may aid in coping with bereavement and grief after pregnancy loss. Data from 103 women enrolled in the original Lehigh Valley Perinatal Loss Project, and who were followed-up for at least 1 year, were evaluated for the impact of initial religious practices and beliefs on the course and severity of grief. Religious practices corresponding to standard scales of religiosity and agreement with specific beliefs were rated by the women on a Likert scale of 1–5. Neither agreement with statements corresponding to extrinsic and intrinsic religiosity or to positive religious coping, nor frequency of religious service attendance was predictive of follow-up scores on the Perinatal Grief Scale. Religious struggle, agreement with statements classified as negative religious coping, and continued attachment to the baby were all associated with more severe grief.     

Children's understanding of belief as a normative concept

The variety of accounts of theory of mind development, arising from distinct theoretical perspectives, have focused on children's causal-explanatory views on the mind and have not developed accounts of children's normative judgments of the mental domain. This review maintains that such a focus is unfortunate and leaves our understanding of belief as a concept incomplete. First, by presenting an alternative framework that treats belief as a normative concept, this account discusses the central importance of children's understanding of epistemic justification and their appreciation of the normative significance of others’ reasons for belief. Next, this review of the relevant theory of mind literature proposes a new way of thinking about the findings of various domains in this field and gives particular attention to prior work on false belief, origins or sources of belief, and the distinctions between fantastical and epistemic states. On the basis of this review, it is concluded that in order to accurately assess the development of the concept of belief, further research is required on children's views of how beliefs ought to be formed, their evaluation of justified and unjustified believers, and the notions of duty or responsibility they associate with epistemic agents.     

Reducing cognitive complexity in a hypothetico-deductive reasoning task

The confusion/non-consequential thinking explanation proposed by Newstead, Girotto, and Legrenzi (1995) for poor performance on Wason's THOG problem (a hypothetico-deductive reasoning task) was examined in three experiments with 300 participants. In general, as the cognitive complexity of the problem and the possibility of non-consequential thinking were reduced, correct performance increased. Significant but weak facilitation (33-40% correct) was found in Experiment 1 for THOG classification instructions that did not include the indeterminate response option. Substantial facilitation (up to 75% correct) was obtained in Experiment 2 with O'Brien et al.'s (1990) one-other-THOG classification instruction. In Experiment 3, a revised version of O'Brien et al.'s pre-test problem format also led to substantial facilitation, even with the use of the standard three-choice THOG classification instruction. These findings are discussed in terms of Newstead et al.'s theoretical proposal and possible attentional factors.     

The role of specificity in the lexical encoding of participants

In addition to information about phonology, morphology and syntax, lexical entries contain semantic information about participants (e.g., Agent). However, the traditional criteria for determining how much participant information is lexically encoded have proved unreliable. We have proposed two semantic criteria (obligatoriness and selectivity) that jointly identify the participants that are lexically encoded in verbs. We tested whether one of these criteria, semantic selectivity, makes psychologically real distinctions between participant information that is lexically encoded and participant information that is not. We examined how readers integrated syntactically optional WH-constituents in filler-gap sentences when the participant information conveyed by the WH-filler was specific to a restricted class of verbs (i.e., source locations) and when it was not (i.e., event locations). Our results provide support for the role of specificity in the lexical encoding of participant information of syntactically optional constituents.