Psychopathology Following Interpersonal Violence: A Comparison of Risk Factors in Older and Younger Adults

A randomly selected sample of 549 women age 55 years and older and 2,669 women age 18–34 years was interviewed via telephone to determine prevalences of physical and sexual assault, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptomatology, and depression. Prevalences of sexual and physical assaults were lower in older compared to younger women. In addition, given a trauma, prevalences and proportionate risk of posttraumatic psychopathology and depression were also lower for older, relative to younger women. Specifically, multivariate analyses revealed that sexual assault predicted only PTSD avoidance in older adults, but all forms of PTSD symptomatology and depression in younger adult women. Similarly, physical assault predicted only PTSD re-experiencing symptoms in older women, but all forms of PTSD symptoms and depression in younger women. Self-reported health status was not associated with any increased risk of psychopathology, and low income predicted increased avoidance and depression only in younger women.     

Leadership and the management of conflicts in diverse groups: Why acknowledging versus neglecting subgroup identity matters

Past research suggests that reactions to an authority's decision are most influenced by treatment quality when individuals value their relationship with the authority and the group s/he represents. The present experiments examine how institutional recognition of self‐relevant identities (implicit in Study 1 and explicit in Study 2) affects the relationship between treatment quality and reactions to the delivery of a negative outcome by an outgroup authority. The overall pattern of results suggests that treatment quality affects reactions to the decision only when the common identity shared with the authority and a subgroup identity that distinguishes one from the authority are both recognized. Possible mechanisms for the observed effect are discussed along with implications for the dual identity approach to conflict resolution. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Modeling certainty equivalents for imprecise gambles

We present results from two experiments on the relative importance of, and subjects' differential sensitivity to, vagueness on both probabilities and outcomes. Subjects in these studies made certainty equivalent (CE) judgments for precise and vague gambles. In the first study subjects responded to gain gambles only; in the second they judged both gain and loss gambles. Model-free analyses of the results indicate (a) a higher concern for the precision of the outcomes than that of the probabilities, (b) vagueness seeking for positive outcomes and (c) vagueness avoidance for negative outcomes and (d) no strong modal attitude toward vagueness on the probability dimension. The greater salience of the outcomes can be explained by the nature of the response mode (CEs). The reflection of attitudes towards outcome vagueness in the two domains can be explained by the distinct goals of the DMs in the two cases, which cause them to focus on the highest (most desirable) possible gain or the largest (most dreaded) conceivable loss. We propose and fit a new model of decision making with vaguely specified attributes that generalize the Prospect Theory model for the precise case. The new generalized model combines the two submodels (preference among precise lotteries and effects of vagueness) and allows estimation of the vagueness parameters. These estimated parameters are consistent with, and confirm, the patterns uncovered by the qualitative analysis.     

Bulimic symptoms and body image dissatisfaction in college women: more affected by climate or race?

The authors examined bulimic symptoms and body image dissatisfaction (BID) in a sample of college women. No differences were found in comparisons of bulimic symptoms or BID between Southern and Northern White women, and both groups reported similar levels of awareness and internalization of sociocultural aesthetic standards of appearance. Southeastern Black women reported (a) significantly lower levels of bulimic symptoms in comparison with White women from the North and (b) lower levels of BID in comparison with White women from both Southern and Northern regions. Further, Southeastern Black women were significantly less likely to be aware of and endorse mainstream standards of appearance in comparison with both groups of White women. Findings support the hypothesis that having a positive body image and less susceptibility to mainstream aesthetic standards of appearance may reduce the risk of eating disorder pathology in Black women.     

What Makes A Hero? The Impact of Integrity on Admiration and Interpersonal Judgment

Principled and expedient ideologies affect self-regulation and guide people along divergent ethical paths. A more principled ideology, indicative of higher claimed integrity, involves a greater personal commitment to ethical beliefs, standards, and self-schemas that facilitate positive social activities and help resist the temptation of illicit activities. Two studies showed that differences in reported integrity are related to people's preferences for and judgments of others. Those higher in integrity spontaneously described their heroes as more principled, honest, spiritual, and benevolently oriented toward others (Study 1). In addition, integrity was related to people's evaluations of characters who made ethical or unethical career decisions (Study 2). The judgments of those higher in integrity were greatly influenced by whether or not the decision was ethical but were largely unaffected by the consequences (career success or failure), whereas those lower in integrity were less influenced by whether the decision was ethical and more influenced by the career consequences.     

Cells,circuits, and choices: Social influences on perceptual decision making

Making decisions is an integral part of everyday life. Social psychologists have demonstrated in many studies that humans’ decisions are frequently and strongly influenced by the opinions of others—even in simple perceptual decisions, where, for example, participants have to judge what an image looks like. However, because the effect of other people’s opinions on decision making has remained largely unaddressed by the neuroimaging and neurophysiology literature, we are only beginning to understand how social influence is integrated into the decision-making process. We put forward the thesis that by probing the neurophysiology of social influence with perceptual decisionmaking tasks similar to those used in the seminal work of Asch (1952, 1956), this gap could be remedied. Perceptual paradigms are already widely used to probe neuronal mechanisms of decision making in nonhuman primates. There is also increasing evidence about how nonhuman primates’ behavior is influenced by observing conspecifics. The high spatial and temporal resolution of neurophysiological recordings in awake monkeys could provide insight into where and how social influence modulates decision making, and thus should enable us to develop detailed functional models of the neural mechanisms that support the integration of social influence into the decision-making process.