When to intervene and take a stand: Evaluating bystander roles in intergroup name-calling contexts

Children (n = 121, M = 9.86 years, SD = 0.64) and adolescents (n = 101, M = 12.84 years, SD = 0.69) evaluated proactive and passive bystander behaviour to intergroup name-calling (N = 222, 54% female). Scenarios depicted ingroup perpetrators and outgroup victims who were from a stigmatized group (ethnicity) or a non-stigmatized group (school affiliation), with bystanders depicted as being proactive (intervening to help) or passive (failing to challenge the aggression), counter to their own group's norm. Children and adolescents personally evaluated proactive bystanders more favourably than passive bystanders. However, adolescents, more than children, expected their peers to be more positive about proactive bystanders than passive bystanders in the stigmatized context. Results are discussed in terms of the complexities of bystander decisions and implications for anti-bullying interventions.     

Dimensions of Pediatric Procedural Distress: Children's Anxiety and Pain During Immunizations

The purpose of this study was to isolate and compare children's procedural anxiety and pain. The study was conducted in a school-based pediatric health clinic with 39 fourth graders receiving 3 injection vaccinations over a 6-month period. Child and nurse ratings and an observational scale assessed anxiety and pain. Results suggest that anxiety and pain are highly correlated, however self-report and an observational measure discriminate between these constructs. Self-report and observational measurement indicated more pediatric pain than anxiety, whereas nurse reports did not indicate differences between children's pain and anxiety.     

Total number of MMPI-2 clinical scale elevations predicts premature termination after controlling for intake symptom severity and personality disorder diagnosis

Premature termination of therapy by patients is a common phenomenon that can be deleterious to treatment outcome for patients and also negatively affect therapists, treatment centers, and research programs. Therefore, a method of identifying patients at risk for premature termination could have widespread benefits. This study investigated whether patients’ MMPI-2 profiles, including clinical scale elevations and Negative Treatment Indicator (TRT) scores, could predict premature termination in an outpatient sample, controlling for personality disorder diagnosis and symptom severity at intake. Results indicated that while TRT scores were not incrementally predictive of premature termination, the total number of clinical scale elevations was significantly incrementally predictive of dropout. Clinical implications are discussed.     

Individual differences in proactive interference in verbal and visuospatial working memory

Proactive interference (PI) has been shown to affect working memory (WM) span as well as the predictive utility of WM span measures. However, most of the research on PI has been conducted using verbal memory items, and much less is known about the role of PI in the visuospatial domain. In order to further explore this issue, the present study used a within-subjects manipulation of PI that alternated clusters of trials with verbal and visuospatial to-be-remembered items. Although PI was shown to build and release across trials similarly in the two domains, important differences also were observed. The ability of verbal WM to predict performance on a measure of fluid intelligence was significantly affected by the amount of PI present, consistent with past research, but this proved not to be the case for visuospatial WM. Further, individuals’ susceptibility to PI in one domain was relatively independent of their susceptibility in the other domain, suggesting that, contrary to some theories of executive function, individual differences in PI susceptibility may not be domain-general.     

Breast Cancer Risk Assessment at the Time of Screening Mammography: Perceptions and Clinical Management Outcomes for Women at High Risk

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the utility of a breast cancer risk assessment (BCRA) at the time of screening mammogram. Women whose BCRA indicated a high risk for cancer received a letter with instructions for breast health care and genetic counseling if appropriate. After 6 months this group received surveys to evaluate their risk perception and their recall of, and compliance with, recommendations. We also explored the impact of other variables such as a recommendation for genetic counseling and physician communication with the women. After the BCRA, the majority of high risk women reported no change in their perceived risk of cancer. A woman’s perceived risk of cancer after a BCRA was significantly associated with her recall of recommendations for breast health care, but not with compliance. A recommendation for genetic counseling was not significantly related to women’s perceived risk of cancer after the BCRA. Ten percent of women who should have obtained genetic counseling actually completed an appointment. Women who discussed their BCRA results with their physicians were more compliant with a six month breast exam with a doctor (53% vs 17%, p = 0.018). Overall, women felt that the BCRA was helpful and did not cause undue stress or anxiety. Although the cohort’s compliance with recommendations was suboptimal, physicians’ interactions with their patients may have a positive influence on their compliance.     

Out with the old? The role of selective attention in retaining targets in partial report

In the partial-report task, subjects are asked to report only a portion of the items presented. Selective attention chooses which objects to represent in short-term memory (STM) on the basis of their relevance. Because STM is limited in capacity, one must sometimes choose which objects are removed from memory in light of new relevant information. We tested the hypothesis that the choices among newly presented information and old information in STM involve the same process—that both are acts of selective attention. We tested this hypothesis using a two-display partial-report procedure. In this procedure, subjects had to select and retain relevant letters (targets) from two sequentially presented displays. If selection in perception and retention in STM are the same process, then irrelevant letters (distractors) in the second display, which demanded attention because of their similarity to the targets, should have decreased target report from the first display. This effect was not obtained in any of four experiments. Thus, choosing objects to keep in STM is not the same process as choosing new objects to bring into STM.     

Aging and visual 3-D shape recognition from motion

Two experiments were conducted to evaluate the ability of younger and older adults to recognize 3-D object shape from patterns of optical motion. In Experiment 1, participants were required to identify dotted surfaces that rotated in depth (i.e., surface structure portrayed using the kinetic depth effect). The task difficulty was manipulated by limiting the surface point lifetimes within the stimulus apparent motion sequences. In Experiment 2, the participants identified solid, naturally shaped objects (replicas of bell peppers, Capsicum annuum) that were defined by occlusion boundary contours, patterns of specular highlights, or combined optical patterns containing both boundary contours and specular highlights. Significant and adverse effects of increased age were found in both experiments. Despite the fact that previous research has found that increases in age do not reduce solid shape discrimination, our current results indicated that the same conclusion does not hold for shape identification. We demonstrated that aging results in a reduction in the ability to visually recognize 3-D shape independent of how the 3-D structure is defined (motions of isolated points, deformations of smooth optical fields containing specular highlights, etc.).     

Social network composition and attitude strength: Exploring the dynamics within newly formed social networks

Recent evidence suggests that people who are embedded within attitudinally congruent social networks have stronger attitudes than those embedded in attitudinally diverse networks. The current research examines the causal processes responsible for this relation. Two studies capitalized on naturally occurring experiments whereby college students are quasi-randomly assigned to social contexts containing varying levels of attitudinal diversity. Replicating past research, individuals in attitudinally diverse social networks exhibited less resistance to attitude change and less attitude stability than those in more attitudinally congruent networks. Although there was evidence of attitude projection and selective network construction, neither of these processes could account for the relation between social network composition and attitude strength. These findings corroborate and extend previous results, reinforcing the notion that the social context in which people are embedded has important implications for the durability of their attitudes.     

Interactions Between Maternal Parenting and Children’s Early Disruptive Behavior: Bidirectional Associations across the Transition from Preschool to School Entry

This study was a prospective 2-year longitudinal investigation of associations between negative maternal parenting and disruptive child behavior across the preschool to school transition. Our main goals were to 1) determine the direction of association between early maternal negativity and child disruptive behaviors across this important developmental transition and 2) examine whether there would be different patterns of associations for boys and girls. Participants were 235 children (111 girls; T1; M = 37.7 months, T2; M = 63.4 months) and their mothers and teachers. Observational and multi-informant ratings of child disruptive behavior showed differential patterns of stability and associations with measures of parenting risk. Results indicated bidirectional and interactive contributions of externalizing behavior and negative parenting across time. Results also indicated that risk mechanisms operate similarly for both sexes. Findings support transactional models of disruptive child behavior that highlight the joint contributions of parents and children.     

Collective motivation beliefs of early adolescents working in small groups

This study examined collective efficacy, group cohesion, and group performance in 125 randomly assigned groups of older (mean age 13.45 years) and younger (mean age 11.41 years) early adolescents working on three cooperative tasks. Collective motivation significantly predicted performance, even after controlling for past performance and self-efficacy for the older but not the younger participants. For the older (but not the younger) participants, groups with high collective efficacy and group cohesion scored higher on performance tasks than groups with low collective efficacy and group cohesion. The results point to the emergence of collective motivation beliefs in early adolescence, consistent with theories of social and cognitive development. Implications for theory and suggestions for future research are discussed.