Cognition and native-language grammar: The organizational role of adjective-noun word order in information representation

In the present research, we investigated the influence of native-language adjective-noun word order on category accessibility for nouns and adjectives by comparing Portuguese speakers (in whose language nouns precede adjectives) with English speakers (in whose language adjectives precede nouns). In two studies, we presented participants with different numbers of verbal or pictorial stimuli, and subsequently they answered questions about noun- and adjective-conditioned frequencies. The results demonstrated a primacy effect of nativelanguage word order. Specifically, although both populations showed a speed advantage for noun-conditioned questions, this tendency was significantly stronger for Portuguese than for American participants. We discuss the important role of native-language syntax rules for the categorization and representation of information.     

Longitudinal Effects of Latino Parent Cultural Stress,Depressive Symptoms,and Family Functioning on Youth Emotional Well‐Being and Health Risk Behaviors

U.S. Latino parents can face cultural stressors in the form of acculturative stress, perceived discrimination, and a negative context of reception. It stands to reason that these cultural stressors may negatively impact Latino youth's emotional well‐being and health risk behaviors by increasing parents' depressive symptoms and compromising the overall functioning of the family. To test this possibility, we analyzed data from a six‐wave longitudinal study with 302 recently immigrated (<5 years in the United States) Latino parents (74% mothers, M_age = 41.09 years) and their adolescent children (47% female, M_age = 14.51 years). Results of a cross‐lagged analysis indicated that parent cultural stress predicted greater parent depressive symptoms (and not vice versa). Both parent cultural stress and depressive symptoms, in turn, predicted lower parent‐reported family functioning, which mediated the links from parent cultural stress and depressive symptoms to youth alcohol and cigarette use. Parent cultural stress also predicted lower youth‐reported family functioning, which mediated the link from parent cultural stress to youth self‐esteem. Finally, mediation analyses indicated that parent cultural stress predicted youth alcohol use by a way of parent depressive symptoms and parent‐reported family functioning. Our findings point to parent depressive symptoms and family functioning as key mediators in the links from parent cultural stress to youth emotional well‐being and health risk behaviors. We discuss implications for research and preventive interventions.     

Emergent verbal behavior and analogy: skinnerian and linguistic approaches

The production of verbal operants not previously taught is an important aspect of language productivity. For Skinner, new mands, tacts, and autoclitics result from the recombination of verbal operants. The relation between these mands, tacts, and autoclitics is what linguists call analogy, a grammatical pattern that serves as a foundation on which a speaker might emit new linguistic forms. Analogy appears in linguistics as a regularity principle that characterizes language and has been related to how languages change and also to creativity. The approaches of neogrammarians like Hermann Paul, as well as those of Jespersen and Bloomfield, appear to have influenced Skinner's understanding of verbal creativity. Generalization and stimulus equivalence are behavioral processes related to the generative grammatical behavior described in the analogy model. Linguistic forms and grammatical patterns described in analogy are part of the contingencies of reinforcement that produce generalization and stimulus equivalence. The analysis of verbal behavior needs linguistic analyses of the constituents of linguistic forms and their combination patterns.     

Maladaptive coping, adaptive coping, and depressive symptoms: Variations across age and depressive state

Rumination has consistently been found to be associated with the onset and duration of major depressive episodes. Little research, however, has examined factors that may weaken the association between maladaptive coping, such as rumination, and depressive symptoms. In three samples of participants, including 149 never-depressed adolescent girls, 41 never-depressed women, and 39 depressed women, we examined whether generally adaptive forms of coping interacted with generally maladaptive forms of coping to predict depressive symptoms. Age-appropriate measures of coping and depression were administered to participants in each sample. In never-depressed females, maladaptive coping/rumination were more strongly related to depressive symptoms in the presence of lower levels of adaptive coping. The relation between depression and maladaptive coping/rumination was weaker in the context of higher levels of adaptive coping. In contrast, for the depressed females, we found main effects for rumination and adaptive coping, with higher levels of rumination and lower levels of adaptive coping being associated with higher levels of depressive symptoms. The present findings highlight how adaptive coping and maladaptive coping, including rumination, differentially relate to each other and depressive symptoms depending on individuals' current depressive state.     

Trajectories of Oppositional Defiant Disorder Irritability Symptoms in Preschool Children

This study traces the developmental course of irritability symptoms in oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) from ages 3–5 and examines the psychopathological outcomes of the different trajectories at age 6. Method. A sample of 622 3-year-old preschoolers (311 were boys), followed up until age 6, was assessed yearly with a semi-structured diagnostic interview with parents and at age 6 with questionnaires answered by parents, teachers and children. Results. Growth-Mixture-Modeling yielded five trajectories of irritability levels for the whole sample (high-persistent 3.5 %, decreasing 3.8 %, increasing 2.6 %, low-persistent 44.1 % and null 46.0 %). Among the children who presented with ODD during preschool age, three trajectories of irritability symptoms resulted (high-persistent 31.9 %, decreasing 34.9 % and increasing 33.2 %). Null, low-persistent and decreasing irritability courses in the sample as a whole gave very similar discriminative capacity for children’s psychopathological state at age 6, while the increasing and high-persistent categories involved poorer clinical outcomes than the null course. For ODD children, the high-persistent and increasing trajectories of irritability predicted disruptive behavior disorders, comorbidity, high level of functional impairment, internalizing and externalizing problems and low anger control at age 6. Conclusions. Irritability identifies a subset of ODD children at high risk of poorer longitudinal psychopathological and functional outcomes. It might be clinically relevant to identify this subset of ODD children with a high number of irritability symptoms throughout development with a view to preventing comorbid and future adverse longitudinal outcomes.     

Social Competence and Child-to-Parent Violence: Analyzing the Role of the Emotional Intelligence,Social Attitudes,and Personal Values

This study examined some variables of the so-called social competence, such as the emotional intelligence, social attitudes, and personal values in adolescents who had committed a parent-abuse offense, analyzing whether there were some differences with respect to non-offender adolescents. The sample included 60 participants. From them, 30 were adolescents who had been charged with committing a parent-abuse offense and 30 were non-offender adolescents. Results revealed that parent-abuse offenders showed lower levels of emotional intelligence, more antisocial and less prosocial attitudes than non-offender adolescents, as well as higher scores in hedonism and power values.     

Group therapy with the multiply oppressed: Treating Latino,HIV-infected injecting drug users

The Latino community in New York City and across the country is disproportionally represented in the AIDS epidemic. This article explores the impact of multiply oppressed group membership on the psychotherapeutic group treatment of Latino, HIV-infected injecting drug users. The interaction of traditional Latino values with injecting drug user and seropositive identities is described. Clinical examples drawn from a bilingual group held in a methadone maintenance clinic in the South Bronx highlight how oppressed group memberships affect Yalom's curative factors.This article was written with the support of a Ryan White CARE Act Title I grant to Montefiore Medical Center through the City of New York, contract OHF-4165.