“We want the world and we want it now”: Materialism,time perspectives and problem spending tendency of Chinese

Chinese consumers' spending has been expanding rapidly in the past decade, and along with it household and credit card debt. The present research collected evidence to triangulate the contention that materialism is positively related with Chinese's problem spending tendency (PST), and that present‐time‐perspective (PTP) and future‐time perspectives (FTP) interact systematically with materialism to affect PST. A survey of the general population in Macao, China (Study 1; N = 239) confirmed that materialism was positively correlated with PST. An interaction between materialism and PTP intensified the relationship, whereas an interaction with FTP weakened the relationship. Another survey with a sample of university students (Study 2; N = 223) again found positive relationships among PST, materialism, and PTP, as measured by temporal discount rate. But further exploration showed that PST was only related with temporal discounting among high materialists, but not among low materialists. Study 3 experimentally examined the causal effects of materialism and FTP on PST. When being primed of an orientation towards materialism (n = 33), the participants' planned consumption doubled that of the control group (n = 31). A FTP prime interacted with materialism prime and put a “damper” on participants' planned spending (n = 29), compared to their counterparts who were not primed of such a time perspective.     

Early Career Boot Camp: A Novel Mechanism for Enhancing Early Career Development for Psychologists in Academic Healthcare

The purpose of this article is to describe a pilot mentoring program for Early Career Psychologists (ECPs) working in Academic Health Centers (AHCs) and synthesize the lessons learned to contribute to future ECP and AHC career development training programs. The authors describe an early career development model, named the Early Career Boot Camp. This intensive experience was conducted as a workshop meant to build a supportive network and to provide mentorship and survival tools for working in AHCs. Four major components were addressed: professional effectiveness, clinical supervision, strategic career planning, and academic research. Nineteen attendees who were currently less than 5 years post completion of doctoral graduate programs in psychology participated in the program. The majority of boot camp components were rated as good to excellent, with no component receiving below average ratings. Of the components offered within the boot camp, mentoring and research activities were rated the strongest, followed by educational activities, challenges in AHCS, and promotion and tenure. The article describes the purpose, development, implementation, and assessment of the program in detail in an effort to provide an established outline for future organizations to utilize when mentoring ECPs.     

When local processing increases the appeal of healthy options

People often encounter self-control challenges in complex everyday environments in which objects that promote a given goal (e.g., to eat healthily) are mixed together with objects that obstruct that goal. For example, healthy and unhealthy food choices are often mixed together in restaurant menus. Because local processing facilitates attention to low-level details, we expect that it may play an important role in these complex situations. In the present studies, we test the hypothesis that local processing supports self-control when goal items and temptations are contextually paired. As predicted, our findings revealed that local processing (relative to global processing) increased evaluations of healthy items when those items were presented together with unhealthy items. As hypothesized, this effect of local processing only occurred when healthy and unhealthy foods were presented as complementary – not competing – options, suggesting that local processing may increase evaluations of healthy options by decreasing the extent to which individuals accept environmental cues that healthy and unhealthy foods belong together. These findings support recent research demonstrating that despite strong evidence of the advantages of global processing for self-control, local processing may also support self-control efforts in some important everyday situations.     

The “Hidden” Technology of Effective Parent Consultation: A Guided Participation Model for Promoting Change in Families

Parenting interventions based on social learning principles are amongst the most effective interventions available to prevent and manage social, emotional and behavioral problems in children and adolescents. The most successful programs employ active skills training methods (modeling, rehearsal, practice, feedback and homework) to teach new parenting skills. However, effective parent consultation also involves a broader range of interpersonal and process skills such as building a collaborative relationship, facilitating parent receptivity to new ideas or skills, managing within session resistance, and important micro skills associated with clinical tasks such as promoting parents self-regulation, independent problem solving and autonomy. This paper aims to articulate the “hidden” technology of effective parent consultation and identify implications for research on mechanisms of change in parenting interventions and practitioner training.     

Parental Mood,Parenting Style and Child Emotional and Behavioural Adjustment: Australia-Indonesia Cross-Cultural Study

Journal of Child and Family Studies - Extensive research, in Western countries, links parental mood and parenting styles with child outcomes including emotional and behavioural adjustment. However,...     

Contributions of Observed Parent Socialization of Coping and Skin Conductance Level Reactivity to Childhood Adjustment

This research examined the longitudinal association between parent socialization of coping and child adjustment, as well as the moderating role of children's skin conductance level reactivity (SCLR). Participants were a community sample of children (n = 64, M age = 9.02, 54.5% females, 93.2% Caucasian) and their parent(s). Parent coping suggestions were observed while their child engaged in a stressful challenge task, during which the child's SCLR, a measure of children's physiological reactivity to stress, was also measured. Parent(s) completed the Child Behavior Checklist (Achenbach & Rescorla, 2001) at baseline and a 6‐month follow‐up to assess internalizing and externalizing problems. Results revealed that secondary control engagement suggestions predicted fewer internalizing problems over time. In addition, disengagement suggestions predicted fewer externalizing problems over time among children with high SCLR. This study provides evidence that parent coping suggestions serve as a resource that protects youth from developing adjustment problems.