Understanding Psychopathology: Melding Behavior Genetics, Personality, and Quantitative Psychology to Develop an Empirically Based Model

ABSTRACT— Research on psychopathology is at a historical crossroads. New technologies offer the promise of lasting advances in our understanding of the causes of human psychological suffering. Making the best use of these technologies, however, requires an empirically accurate model of psychopathology. Much current research is framed by the model of psychopathology portrayed in current versions of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ( DSM ; American Psychiatric Association, 2000 ). Although the modern DSM s have been fundamental in advancing psychopathology research, recent research also challenges some assumptions made in the DSM —for example, the assumption that all forms of psychopathology are well conceived of as discrete categories. Psychological science has a critical role to play in working through the implications of this research and the challenges it presents. In particular, behavior-genetic, personality, and quantitative-psychological research perspectives can be melded to inform the development of an empirically based model of psychopathology that would constitute an evolution of the DSM .     

The principle of liberty and legal representation of posterity

This paper considers a guardianship model for the legal representation of future generations. According to this model, national and international courts should be given the competence to appoint guardians for future generations, if agents who care about the welfare of posterity apply for the creation of a guardianship in relation to a dispute that can be resolved by the application of law. This reform would grant guardians of future people legal standing or locus standi before courts, that is, the right to bring an action before a court of law for adjudication. Although the guardianship model faces several difficult theoretical and practical problems pertaining to the representation of different near and distant future generations, it is argued that this model – and certain other legal norms intended to protect future basic needs – can be justified on the basis of the principle of liberty.     

The Impact of Mother Support and Natural Mentoring on the Depressive Symptoms of Black Youth

Research indicates both natural mentoring and family factors such as parental support are beneficial for the psychological wellbeing of youth. Despite the existing evidence on the benefits of natural mentoring and parental support, there has been little evidence that considers the simultaneous influence of these factors on the depressive symptoms among Black youth. Guided by Keller’s systemic model of mentoring, we investigated the influence of mother support and the characteristics of natural mentoring relationships on depressive symptoms among Black youth. We used nationally representative data of Black youth from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (N?=?2344). The findings indicate that both mentor bonding and mother support were significant predictors of depressive symptoms among Black youth. However, mother support was positively associated with depressive symptoms and mentor bonding was negatively associated with depressive symptoms. The findings highlight the importance of natural mentors in the lives of Black youth and suggest they may be useful in alleviating depressive symptoms.

     

The Yale Children''s Inventory—A screening tool for attention deficits and related disorders. Normative data for boys

Norwegian populated-based normative data on the Yale Children's Inventory (YCI) were provided for boys. All parents of boys aged 8 through 11 years in the county of Hammerfest received the YCI, and 77% responded. Mean scores on the YCI scales attention, activity, tractability, and fine motor were significantly lower in the Norwegian sample compared to the US normative data. Factor analysis of the 40 scale items yielded factors that corresponded generally well to the YCI scale constructs derived from US samples. We conclude that the scale constructs of the YCI seem to be transferable across these two cultures, but that restandardization is warranted. Further research is needed to establish cut-off values for clinical screening purposes. The Yale Children's Inventory has the potential to become a valuable screening tool for behavioral problems at school-age.     

A Defense of the Objective/Subjective Moral Ought Distinction

In this paper, I motivate and defend the distinction between an objective and a subjective moral sense of “ought.” I begin by looking at the standard way the distinction is motivated, namely by appealing to relatively simple cases where an agent does something she thinks is best, but her action has a tragic outcome. I argue that these cases fail to do the job—the intuitions they elicit can be explained without having to distinguish between different senses of “ought.” However, these cases are on the right track—I argue that more sophisticated versions of the cases provide strong motivation for the distinction. I then discuss two important problems for the distinction: the “which ‘ought’ is more important?” problem, and the “annoying profusion of ‘oughts’” problem. I argue that each of these problems can be solved in several different ways.     

Counteractive Self-Control

ABSTRACT— We propose a self-control analysis of the role of availability in valuation. We explored the hypothesis that, when temptation becomes available, counteractive self-control processes render it less valuable. We found evidence for devaluation of available temptation among gym users before they choose to forgo an unhealthy snack rather than after they make their choice (Study 1), and among students evaluating leisure activities when their decision to enroll in an uninteresting class is reversible rather than irreversible (Study 2).     

Say it with flowers! An fMRI study of object mediated communication

Human communicational interaction can be mediated by a host of expressive means from words in a natural language to gestures and material symbols. Given the proper contextual setting even an everyday object can gain a mediating function in a communicational situation. In this study we used event-related fMRI to study the brain activity caused by everyday material objects when they are perceived as signals. We found that comprehension of material signals activates bilaterally areas of the ventral stream and pars triangularis of the inferior frontal cortex, that is, areas traditionally associated with verbal language and semantics. In addition, we found that right-hemisphere inferior frontal cortex is recruited as a function of the increasing unconventionality of communicative objects. Together these findings support an interpretation of the traditional language areas as playing a more general role across modalities in relation to communicational mediation of social semantic meaning.     

Passive-aggressive (negativistic) personality disorder: a population-based twin study

The objective of this study was to investigate the familial aggregation of passive aggressive personality disorder (PAPD), and explore issues regarding PAPD raised by the DSM-IV Personality Disorder Work Group. Two thousand seven hundred and ninety-four Norwegian twins from the population-based Norwegian Institute of Public Health Twin Panel were interviewed with the Structured Interview for DSM-IV Personality (SIDP-IV). Because of the rarity of the twins meeting full diagnostic criteria for PAPD a dimensional representation of the disorder was used for the analyses. Overlap with other axis II disorders was assessed by polychoric correlations, while familial aggregation was explored by structural equation twin models. Overlap was highest with paranoid (r = 0.52) and borderline personality disorder (r = 0.53), and lowest with schizoid (r = 0.26). Significant familial aggregation was found for PAPD. The twin correlations and parameter estimates in the full model indicated genetic and shared environmental effects for females, and only shared environmental effects for males, but the prevalence of endorsed PAPD criteria in this community sample was too low to permit us to conclude with confidence regarding the relative influence of genetic and shared environmental factors on the familial aggregation of PAPD.     

Memory for media: investigation of false memories for negatively and positively charged public events

Despite a large body of false memory research, little has addressed the potential influence of an event's emotional content on susceptibility to false recollections. The Paradoxical Negative Emotion (PNE) hypothesis predicts that negative emotion generally facilitates memory but also heightens susceptibility to false memories. Participants were asked whether they could recall 20 "widely publicised" public events (half fictitious) ranging in emotional valence, with or without visual cues. Participants recalled a greater number of true negative events (M=3.31/5) than true positive (M=2.61/5) events. Nearly everyone (95%) came to recall at least one false event (M=2.15 false events recalled). Further, more than twice as many participants recalled any false negative (90%) compared to false positive (41.7%) events. Negative events, in general, were associated with more detailed memories and false negative event memories were more detailed than false positive event memories. Higher dissociation scores were associated with false recollections of negative events, specifically.