Evaluation of the effectiveness of a prison-based drug treatment

The present study evaluated the effectiveness of a drug-free unit (DFU) in reducing the use of substances by incarcerated adult offenders, and to analyze changes in the addiction severity index, motivation, and personality caused by the program. This is an external evaluation, with an ex post facto design with repeated measures. Eighty-seven prisoners from the DFU were evaluated during the first year of residence in the program. Most are young men, polydrug addicts and mainly serving sentences for public health crimes and property offenses. There is need of psychiatric treatment at the baseline, with 85% comorbid personality disorders. Motivation for treatment is low, and remains stable over 12 month's duration of the study. The DFU was found to have a significant effect in reducing the use of drugs by offenders and to improve the drug and family composite scores, also reducing scores on personality scales. However, it fails to change medical and psychiatric scores, so that the need for intervention in these areas is underscored.     

Common patterns of prediction of literacy development in different alphabetic orthographies

Previous studies have shown that phoneme awareness, letter-sound knowledge, rapid automatized naming (RAN), and verbal memory span are reliable correlates of learning to read in English. However, the extent to which these different predictors have the same relative importance in different languages remains uncertain. In this article, we present the results from a 10-month longitudinal study that began just before or soon after the start of formal literacy instruction in four languages (English, Spanish, Slovak, and Czech). Longitudinal path analyses showed that phoneme awareness, letter-sound knowledge, and RAN (but not verbal memory span) measured at the onset of literacy instruction were reliable predictors, with similar relative importance, of later reading and spelling skills across the four languages. These data support the suggestion that in all alphabetic orthographies, phoneme awareness, letter-sound knowledge, and RAN may tap cognitive processes that are important for learning to read.     

Eating habits, physical activity, consumption of substances and eating disorders in adolescents

The aim of this study was to evaluate the differences between adolescents with a high or low risk of developing an eating disorder (ED) in different health behaviors (eating habits, physical activity and the consumption of substances) per gender. The EAT-40 and the Inventory of Behavioral Health in Scholars were applied to 2142 middle school students from Alicante (Spain), of whom 52.8% were girls and 47.2% were boys, with an average age of 13.92 years old (Sd = 1.34). Results indicated that girls with a high risk of developing an ED consumed fewer meals, ate fewer unhealthy foods, followed more diets and paid more attention to nutritional components. Furthermore, they also performed more physical activity with the objective of losing weight, and consumed more tobacco, alcohol and medicines. Boys at high risk of developing an ED followed more diets and paid more attention to nutritional components. For boys, no more differences were found. These results suggest that any program directed at the prevention of ED should not only include nutritional education, but should also seek to promote regular physical activity with objectives other than weight loss or the burning of calories.     

Powerless people don't yell but tell: The effects of social power on direct and indirect expression of anger

Expressing anger can engender desired change, but it can also backfire. In the present research we examined how power shapes the expression of anger. In Study 1, we found that powerless individuals were less inclined to express their anger directly but more inclined to express it indirectly by sharing it with others. Powerless participants’ reluctance to express anger directly was mediated by negative social appraisals. In Study 2, we replicated the effect of power on direct anger expression in a situation in which participants had actual power (or not). Anger was evoked in the laboratory using an ecologically valid procedure, and participants were given an opportunity to express anger. Study 3 showed that powerless participants expected direct anger expression to arouse more anger than fear in the target, whereas the opposite was true for indirect anger expression. Powerful participants always expected to elicit more fear than anger in the target.     

AD/HD Symptoms and Conduct Problems: Similarities and Differences in Maternal Perceptions

Several theories attempt to explain the high co-occurrence of Attention Deficit/ Hyperactivity Disorder (AD/HD) and Conduct Problems (CP). A strong possibility is that AD/HD behaviours lead to the development of CP, due to family coercive interaction patterns, maintained through parental false beliefs regarding child problem behaviour. We compared maternal perceptions about AD/HD behaviors and CP, and the possible reactions elicited by such behaviours. The sample consisted of 317 mothers of boys and girls aged 4–6. Four versions of The Parental Account of the Causes of Childhood Problems Questionnaire were used, in which a vignette was ascribed to either a boy or a girl displaying some of the major AD/HD behaviours or CP. The results showed that CP were perceived as significantly more severe than AD/HD behaviours. Moreover, AD/HD behaviours were attributed to biological causes more often than CP, and less strict rearing practices were chosen for AD/HD symptoms. Our findings provide evidence that mothers usually perceive AD/HD behaviours and CP as separate entities and may behave accordingly with their children.     

Reinforcement of wheel running in BALB/c mice: role of motor activity and endogenous opioids

The authors investigated the effect of the opioid antagonist naloxone on wheel-running behavior in Balb/c mice. Naloxone delayed the acquisition of wheel-running behavior, but did not reduce the expression of this behavior once acquired. Delayed acquisition was not likely a result of reduced locomotor activity, as naloxone-treated mice did not exhibit reduced wheel running after the behavior was acquired, and they performed normally on the rotarod test. However, naloxone-blocked conditioned place preference for a novel compartment paired previously with wheel running, suggesting that naloxone may delay wheel-running acquisition by blocking the rewarding or reinforcing effects of the behavior. These results suggest that the endogenous opioid system mediates the initial reinforcing effects of wheel running that are important in acquisition of the behavior.     

Supervisors safety response: a multisample confirmatory factor analysis

Supervisors Safety Response (SSR) has been closely linked to workplace safety, and, as perceived by workers, it is considered to be one of the most influential issues with regard to employees compliance with safety behaviours. This study defines and tests a bifactorial and a monofactorial model of the SSR. Two facets of the SSR were measured: (a) supervisors response toward workers safe or unsafe behaviour and (b) supervisors safety attitudes and behaviours applied to their own work. In three samples of injured blue-collar workers ( N(1) = 110, N(2) = 123, N(3) = 104), multisample confirmatory factor analyses, using maximum likelihood estimation, were conducted to test both the bifactorial and the monofactorial model. Both models provide an overall good fit, but parsimony and the high correlation between factors in the bifactorial model support the monofactorial model. Attention is drawn to the measurement of the SSR as a diagnostic tool useful in selecting intervention goals, specifically integrating supervisors safety behaviour.     

Vestibular stimulation interferes with the dynamics of an internal representation of gravity

The remembered vanishing location of a moving target has been found to be displaced downward in the direction of gravity (representational gravity) and more so with increasing retention intervals, suggesting that the visual spatial updating recruits an internal model of gravity. Despite being consistently linked with gravity, few inquiries have been made about the role of vestibular information in these trends. Previous experiments with static tilting of observers’ bodies suggest that under conflicting cues between the idiotropic vector and vestibular signals, the dynamic drift in memory is reduced to a constant displacement along the body’s main axis. The present experiment aims to replicate and extend these outcomes while keeping the observers’ bodies unchanged in relation to physical gravity by varying the gravito-inertial acceleration using a short-radius centrifuge. Observers were shown, while accelerated to varying degrees, targets moving along several directions and were required to indicate the perceived vanishing location after a variable interval. Increases of the gravito-inertial force (up to 1.4G), orthogonal to the idiotropic vector, did not affect the direction of representational gravity, but significantly disrupted its time course. The role and functioning of an internal model of gravity for spatial perception and orientation are discussed in light of the results.     

An examination of the antecedents and moderator influences of climate strength

The authors tested 3 hypotheses regarding the antecedents and moderator influences of climate strength (CS; the degree of within-unit agreement of climate perceptions). The sample consisted of 197 work units. Social interaction among unit members showed positive, statistically significant correlations with CS in goals orientation and innovation climate. Work-unit leaders' informing behavior was positively correlated with CS in the 3 climate facets measured (i.e., support, goals orientation, and innovation). CS in innovation moderated the impact of work units' innovation climate on average satisfaction and commitment. CS in goals orientation moderated the influence of work units' goal orientation on average commitment. The moderator influences showed the expected direction: CS fostered the influence of work units' climate on the criterion variables.