Observations and Insights About Strengthening Our Soldiers (SOS)

The Special Issue (June 2011) of the Journal of Clinical Psychology in Medical Settings titled Strengthening Our Soldiers (SOS) and Their Families: Contemporary Psychological Advances Applied to Wartime Problems revealed the following important concerns: 1) Who is at risk for psychological sequelae during and following service in the U.S. military? 2) How to deliver the best treatment for our soldiers and veterans with PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injury and Pain? 3) How to train the trainers? and 4) What are the current priorities for service delivery, research and funding? Assessment strategies and tools are provided to assist in identification of suicidal ideation and behaviors, alcohol abuse in spouses, posttraumatic stress disorders, depression, brain injuries and post-concussion syndrome, as well as positive growth experiences. Empirically validated Cognitive Processing and Prolonged Exposure treatments are described as are the empirical results already in evidence in our military populations. The innovative use of Virtual Reality and Telehealth applications is demonstrated in both army and naval settings for preparing and reducing trauma in affected soldiers. The Functional and Occupational Rehabilitation Treatment (FORT) Program and its role in returning function to injured soldiers with musculoskeletal pain and motion restrictions, while also leading to reductions of anxiety, depression and use of medical services, is described. A critique about providing service-research for children’s reactions to their parent’s deployments and family functioning during separation and reintegration is provided. The need for theoretical-empirical approaches to understanding pain-behavior, anxiety dysregulation as it impacts the brain function and structure is provided by experts in pain, neuropsychology, brain circuitry and anxiety management of multiple traumas. This final paper in SOS provides commentary on SOS and describes possible future implications of current psychological knowledge related to military personnel and their families.     

“All You Need is Holt”—Is the Socio-cultural Phenomenon a Problem for a Neorealist Ecological Psychology?

The aim of this paper is to discuss Charles’s (2011) attempt to turn E.B. Holt’s theoretical approach into the only possible bridge to connect Gibsonian ecological psychology with social psychology. Criticism of Charles’s claims is carried out at four different conceptual levels: historiographical, logico-epistemological, methodological, and theoretical. From this critical perspective, Charles’s resort to Holt’s ideas is viewed as an effort to legitimate Charles’s own line of work. Moreover, far from being this the only possible approach to the subject, many other rich alternatives to the application of Gibsonian principles to the explanation of socio-cultural phenomena already exist. In fact, it is questionable whether Holt’s behavioral neorealism allows dealing with many of the most complex socio-cultural issues, particularly those related to purposive behavior and intersubjective contexts. In order to address these questions from a Holtian point of view, Charles is forced to make a number of argumentative leaps and epistemological transgressions. In the last analysis, his insistence on keeping to the Holtian stance leads him to lose sight of the Gibsonian framework and to modify the very nature of his object of study, the social phenomenon—which, along the lines of classic neorealist behaviorism, becomes reduced to a simple consideration of behavioral purposiveness.     

Evaluating expectations about negative emotional states of aggressive boys using Bayesian model selection

Researchers often have expectations about the research outcomes in regard to inequality constraints between, e.g., group means. Consider the example of researchers who investigated the effects of inducing a negative emotional state in aggressive boys. It was expected that highly aggressive boys would, on average, score higher on aggressive responses toward other peers than moderately aggressive boys, who would in turn score higher than nonaggressive boys. In most cases, null hypothesis testing is used to evaluate such hypotheses. We show, however, that hypotheses formulated using inequality constraints between the group means are generally not evaluated properly. The wrong hypotheses are tested, i.e.. the null hypothesis that group means are equal. In this article, we propose an innovative solution to these above-mentioned issues using Bayesian model selection, which we illustrate using a case study.     

Experimental study of the differential effects of playing versus watching violent video games on children's aggressive behavior

There is great concern about the effects of playing violent video games on aggressive behavior. The present experimental study was aimed at investigating the differential effects of actively playing vs. passively watching the same violent video game on subsequent aggressive behavior. Fifty-seven children aged 10-13 either played a violent video game (active violent condition), watched the same violent video game (passive violent condition), or played a non-violent video game (active non-violent condition). Aggression was measured through peer nominations of real-life aggressive incidents during a free play session at school. After the active participation of actually playing the violent video game, boys behaved more aggressively than did the boys in the passive game condition. For girls, game condition was not related to aggression. These findings indicate that, specifically for boys, playing a violent video game should lead to more aggression than watching television violence.     

An integrating approach to the study of burnout in university professors

The aim of this paper is to use an integrative approach to identify the main correlates and/or predictors at different levels (personal, psychosocial, occupational and outside the workplace) of the burnout dimensions. The sample consists of 813 university professors. Results from statistical analyses show that there are, indeed, both common and specific predictors for the different facets of the syndrome. Specifically, while social support and optimism are selected to confirm all manifestations of burnout, other factors (work hours per week, time in the profession, hardiness, Type A behavioural pattern, life events, daily hassles) do increase the emergence of differential profiles. Lastly, findings are discussed and the main conclusions are presented.     

The Impact of a Leader Model on High Dominant Women’s Self-Selection for Leadership

The present study examined how the gender of a leader model affected high dominant women’s decisions to become leaders when instructed to complete a masculine-typed task and paired with a man. One hundred ninety undergraduates at a university in the southeastern United States were paired according to Dominance scores and shown the task, which required a leader and a follower. Pairs were presented with either a female or male leader model. Independent observers recorded who became the leader. Results suggest that when high dominant women are presented with a female leader model, they are more likely to take on the leadership role in the presence of a male partner than when they are presented with a male leader model.     

Backward blocking: the role of within-compound associations and interference between cues trained apart

Most theoretical accounts of backward blocking place heavy stress on the necessity of the target cue having been trained in compound with the competing cue to produce a decrement in responding. Yet, other evidence suggests that a similar reduction in responding to the target cue can be observed when the outcome is later paired with a novel cue never trained in compound with the target cue (interference between cues trained apart). The present experiment shows that pairing another nonassociated cue with the same outcome may be sufficient to produce a decremental effect on the target cue, but the presence of a within-compound association between the target and the competing cue adds to this effect. Thus, both interference between cues trained apart and within-compound associations independently contribute to backward blocking.     

Female degus (Octodon degus) monitor their environment while foraging socially

Vigilance or scanning involves interruptions in foraging behavior when individuals lift their heads and conduct visual monitoring of the environment. Theoretical considerations assume that foraging with the "head down", and scanning ("head up") are mutually exclusive activities, such that foraging precludes vigilance. We tested this generalization in a socially foraging, small mammal model, the diurnal Chilean degu (Octodon degus). We studied spontaneous bouts of scanning of captive degus when foraging in pairs of female sibs and non-sibs. We examined the extent to which foraging (head down postures) and scanning (head up postures) were mutually exclusive in subjects exposed to none, partial, and complete lateral visual obstruction of their partners. In addition, we monitored the orientation of their bodies to examine the target of attention while foraging and scanning. Lastly, we examined the temporal occurrence of scanning events to assess the extent of scanning coordination, and whether this coordination is kin-biased. Visual obstruction had a significant influence on degu vigilance. Focal degus increased their quadrupedal and semi-erect scanning when foraging under a partially obstructed view of their partners. Degus oriented their bodies toward partners when foraging and scanning. Despite this, degus did not coordinate scanning bouts; instead, they scanned independently from one another. Relatedness among cage mates did not influence any aspect of degu behavior. Contrary to theoretical expectations, these results indicate that foraging and vigilance are not mutually exclusive, and that kinship per se does not influence scanning behavior and coordination.     

Broadcasting of violence on Spanish television: a quantitative panorama

A quantitative analysis of broadcasted violence by the main television (TV) channels transmitting for Madrid (Spain) was carried out using a novel method that randomly selects fragments of delimited duration from TV broadcasts. The device selects acts of aggression shown in those TV extracts, and classifies them according to their type. There was a high incidence of aggressive acts, especially physical (particularly leading to death), in TV fiction: films, serials and promos. The device also allowed examination of the prominence of aggression in children's programs, as well as showing minimal variation in the number of aggressive acts over screened time intervals. The pattern of the collected data suggests that the broadcasting of violence on TV emphasizes the conflicting elements of social reality, reproducing it in fiction, news reports and children's shows. Aggr. Behav. 32:137–145. 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

The consequences of a nurse's negative evaluation of a blood pressure reading. Implications for the etiology of white-coat hypertension

The aim of this study was to show how a nurses negative evaluation of a blood pressure (BP) reading can cause an increase in BP in the following reading. Twenty-five subjects with normal pressure who had been informed that they were to participate in an epidemiological BP study took part and they were divided into two groups. After taking the first BP reading, participants from the experimental group were informed that their pressure was normal but high for their age, whereas those in the control group were told that their pressure was normal for their age. The results showed that this comment caused a significant increase in the diastolic BP of the experimental group. The theoretical and clinical implications of this reaction are discussed in relation to the phenomenon known as White-Coat Hypertension from the perspective of the theory of incubation.