The New Meaning of MS.: Single, But Too Old for Miss

We examined understanding of the title Ms ., in college students and individuals surveyed via the Internet. Participants were asked to define Ms. and other titles, and rate the likely marital status and age of those using the titles. While some participants indicated that Ms. was a title for women of any marital status, a common alternative definition of Ms. was a title for unmarried women. Younger participants (those under 20) were significantly more likely to use this definition. We also asked what title women preferred for themselves. Older unmarried women were more likely to prefer Ms. as their own title than were younger unmarried women, while married women overwhelmingly preferred the use of Mrs . Perhaps this is why many younger people assume that Ms. is a title for unmarried women too old to use Miss .     

Are we aware of the external factors that influence our food intake?

OBJECTIVES: This research examines the extent to which people accurately report some of the external influences on their food intake. DESIGN: In two studies, specific factors (the presence and behavior of others) were manipulated in order to influence the amount of food that individuals consumed. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The main outcomes of interest were participants' spontaneously generated explanations for their food intake (Study 1; n = 122), and their ratings of the importance of several potential determinants of food intake (Study 2; n = 75). RESULTS: In Study 1, there was high concordance between the amounts eaten by members of a dyad, but very few participants indicated that they were influenced by their partner's behavior; they instead identified hunger and taste as the primary determinants of intake. Study 2 showed that participants' intake was strongly influenced by the behavior of others, but people rated taste and hunger as much more important influences on their intake. CONCLUSIONS: If external environmental factors influence people's food intake without their awareness or acknowledgment, then maintaining a healthy diet can be a challenge, with long-term consequences for health and well-being.     

The Narrative Arc of TATs: Introduction to the JPA Special Section on Thematic Apperceptive Techniques

The past decade has seen important developments in thematic apperceptive techniques (TATs), with the creation of new card sets having alternate pictures representing different cultures, new scoring systems becoming available, and increasing international communication of these achievements. However, continuing impediments to the development of a validational literature include lingering mistaken assumptions about the nature of story data, ongoing debates about appropriate psychometric evaluation, and continuing questions about how stimuli and scoring systems should be conceptualized and interpreted. Negotiating the publication system can impede some potential authors. Excellent work on TATs with children is not well known in the adult-focused journals. The labor burden of meeting increasingly sophisticated publication standards might be a barrier to assessors focused on clinical practice. Accumulating a focused evidence base is challenging given the diversity of criterion variables for which TATs have been used. Research on TATs by clinicians can span the science–practice gap, but the narrative arc can be a dramatic one. The articles in this special section on TATs represent important conceptual, methodological, and substantive innovations.     

Clergy Burnout: A Comparison Study with Other Helping Professions

Clergy experience a large number of stressors in their work, including role overload and emotional labor. Although studies have found high rates of depression in clergy, the degree of work-related burnout in clergy compared to other occupations is unknown. The widely used Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) measures three aspects of burnout: emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and personal accomplishment. We sought studies using comparable versions of the MBI for clergy; for social workers, counselors, and teachers because of those occupations’ emotional intensity and labor; and for police and emergency personnel because of the unpredictability and stress-related physiological arousal in those occupations. We found a total of 84 studies and compared the ranges of burnout scores between the studies of clergy, each additional occupation, and MBI published mean norms. Compared to U.S. norms, clergy exhibited moderate rates of burnout. Across the three kinds of burnout, clergy scores were relatively better than those of police and emergency personnel, similar to those of social workers and teachers, and worse than those of counselors. Clergy may benefit from burnout prevention strategies used by counselors. The moderate levels of burnout found for clergy, despite the numerous stressors associated with their occupation, suggest that clergy generally cope well and may be models to study. Overall, there is room for improvement in burnout for all professions, especially police and emergency personnel. It is important to remember the variation within any profession, including clergy, and prevent and address burnout for those in need.     

Attention and memory biases toward body-related images among restrained eaters

This study examined biases in attention and memory toward body-related images among restrained (n = 31) and unrestrained (n = 29) eaters. Attentional allocation to images of thin and overweight bodies during a visual search task was measured by tracking participants’ eyegaze. This task was followed by a recognition test assessing participants’ memory for those images. Restrained and unrestrained eaters allocated more attention to body-related images than to control images, but there was no difference in attentional allocation between the two groups. Restrained eaters showed better recognition of body-related images that they had previously seen during the visual search task. Finally, increased attention was associated with better recognition of body-related images for both restrained and unrestrained eaters, but restrained eaters had better overall recognition regardless of the level of attention. These findings suggest that restrained eaters may have more organized strategies for processing body-related information than do unrestrained eaters.     

Tracking talking: dual task costs of planning and producing speech for young versus older adults

A digital pursuit rotor was used to monitor speech planning and production costs by time-locking tracking performance to the auditory wave form produced as young and older adults were describing someone they admire. The speech sample and time-locked tracking record were segmented at utterance boundaries and multilevel modeling was used to determine how utterance-level predictors such as utterance duration or sentence grammatical complexity and person-level predictors such as speaker age or working memory capacity predicted tracking performance. Three models evaluated the costs of speech planning, the costs of speech production, and the costs of speech output monitoring. The results suggest that planning and producing propositionally dense utterances is more costly for older adults and that older adults experience increased costs as a result of having produced a long, informative, or rapid utterance.     

Accuracy in estimating the body weight of self and others: Impact of dietary restraint and BMI

We examined the accuracy of people's estimates of their own body weight and of the body weight of other people. Female undergraduates (n = 132) self-reported their weight, were weighed by the experimenter, and completed a measure of dietary restraint. Participants also viewed 10 photographs of women ranging from underweight to obese and estimated their body weight. Individuals high in dietary restraint underestimated their own weight to a greater extent than those low in dietary restraint, but this effect was accounted for by individual differences in BMI: heavier participants underestimated their weight to a greater extent than leaner participants. Participants also underestimated the weight of heavier targets to a greater extent than they did leaner targets, but the degree of inaccuracy was not related to participants’ dietary restraint or BMI. These findings support the hypothesis that inaccuracies in self-reported weight reflect deliberate misreporting rather than a cognitive or perceptual bias.