Setting the stage for children’s participation in worship practices

How children participate in worship practices is largely determined by adults. Adults set the stage; they shape the physical environment and determine the subject matter. Adults design the format for children’s participation in various forms of worship and the roles adults perform influence the interactions with children. Many different intentions inform these design choices and roles: Intentions revolving around faith, liturgy, community, and experience. The way adults shape worship with children points to the significance of spirituality. When adults perform directing roles, children’s spirituality can find a point of reference in stories and traditions while adults themselves gain from the process of translation this involves. When adults facilitate exploration, this nourishes both children’s and adults’ spirituality. Finally, when adults and children participate in worship practices together, it may contribute to a sense of community in which faith can be lived and shared.     

Evaluating the Impact of Careless Responding on Aggregated-Scores: To Filter Unmotivated Examinees or Not?

When examinees' test-taking motivation is questionable, practitioners must determine whether careless responding is of practical concern and if so, decide on the best approach to filter such responses. As there has been insufficient research on these topics, the objectives of this study were to: a) evaluate the degree of underestimation in the true mean when careless responses are present, and b) compare the effectiveness of two filtering procedures in purifying biased aggregated-scores. Results demonstrated that: a) the true mean was underestimated by around 0.20 SDs if the total amount of careless responses exceeded 6.25%, 12.5%, and 12.5% for easy, moderately difficult, and difficult tests, respectively, and b) listwise deleting data from unmotivated examinees artificially inflated the true mean by as much as .42 SDs when ability was related to careless responding. Findings from this study have implications for when and how practitioners should handle careless responses for group-based low-stakes assessments.     

Accounting for Dependence: Relative Consilience as a Correction Factor in Cumulative Case Arguments

I propose a measure of dependence that relates a set of items of evidence to an hypothesis H and to H's negation. I dub this measure relative consilience (RC) and propose a method for using it as a correction factor for dependence among items of evidence. Using RC, I examine collusion and testimonial independence, the value of diverse evidence, and the strengthening of otherwise weak or non-existent cases. RC provides a valuable tool for formal epistemologists interested in analyzing cumulative case arguments.     

Longitudinal stability of temperamental exuberance and social-emotional outcomes in early childhood

The goals of the current study were to investigate the stability of temperamental exuberance across infancy and toddlerhood and to examine the associations between exuberance and social-emotional outcomes in early childhood. The sample consisted of 291 4-month-olds followed at 9, 24, and 36 months and again at 5 years of age. Behavioral measures of exuberance were collected at 9, 24, and 36 months. At 36 months, frontal electroencephalogram (EEG) asymmetry was assessed. At 5 years, maternal reports of temperament and behavior problems were collected, as were observational measures of social behavior during an interaction with an unfamiliar peer in the laboratory. Latent profile analysis revealed a high, stable exuberance profile that was associated with greater ratings of 5-year externalizing behavior and surgency, as well as observed disruptive behavior and social competence with unfamiliar peers. These associations were particularly true for children who displayed left frontal EEG asymmetry. Multiple factors supported an approach bias for exuberant temperament but did not differentiate between adaptive and maladaptive social-emotional outcomes at 5 years of age.     

Depressive symptoms in early marriage: predictions from relationship confidence and negative marital interaction.

The authors proposed a model of depressive symptoms in early marriage in which relationship confidence, defined as perceived couple-level efficacy to manage conflicts and maintain a healthy relationship, mediates the effect of negative marital interactions on depressive symptoms. The model was tested in a sample of 139 couples assessed prior to marriage and 1 year later. As predicted, relationship confidence demonstrated simple negative associations with negative marital interaction and depressive symptoms for all participants. Longitudinal path analyses supported the mediational model for women only. In women but not men, negative marital interaction indirectly had an impact on depressive symptoms through the mediator of relationship confidence. Findings suggest that relationship confidence may be important to understanding links between marital distress and depressive symptoms, especially in women.     

Examining and Predicting Under‐the‐Table Payments for Health Care in Albania: An Application of the Theory of Planned Behavior1

The World Bank and the Albanian Ministry of Health report that the majority of Albanian citizens make illegal, under‐the‐table payments for health care. Qualitative studies have identified some factors associated with these informal payments, but the problem has not been systematically examined using established theoretical models. The purpose of this study was to examine and predict under‐the‐table payments using the theory of planned behavior (TPB). Self‐administered surveys were completed by 222 Albanian citizens. The constructs of the theory explained 34% of the variance in intentions to make under‐the‐table payments, with attitude toward the behavior making the strongest contribution. Using the TPB to examine the practice of making under‐the‐table payments has indicated specific areas that can be targeted by policy interventions.     

Output order in immediate serial recall

In two experiments, we examined the effect of output order in immediate serial recall (ISR). In Experiment 1, three groups of participants saw lists of eight words and wrote down the words in the rows corresponding to their serial positions in an eight-row response grid. One group was precued to respond in forward order, a second group was precued to respond in any order, and a third group was postcued for response order. There were significant effects of output order, but not of cue type. Relative to the forward output order, the free output order led to enhanced recency and diminished primacy, with superior performance for words output early in recall. These results were replicated in Experiment 2 using six-item lists, which further suggests that output order plays an important role in the primacy effect in ISR and that the recency items are most highly accessible at recall.     

Words, hemispheres, and processing mechanisms: A response to Marsolek and Deason (2007)

Ellis, Ansorge and Lavidor (2007) [Ellis, A.W., Ansorge, L., & Lavidor, M. (2007). Words, hemispheres, and dissociable subsystems: The effects of exposure duration, case alternation, priming and continuity of form on word recognition in the left and right visual fields. Brain and Language, 103, 292–303.] presented three experiments investigating the effects of exposure duration and format (normal vs mixed or alternating case) on the recognition of words presented in the left and right visual fields. The experiments were conducted within the framework of ‘dissociable neural subsystems theory’ developed by Marsolek and colleagues. Marsolek and Deason (2007) [Marsolek, C.J. & Deason, R.G. (2007). Hemispheric asymmetries in visual word-form processing: Progress, conflict, and evaluating theories. Brain and Language, 103, 304–307.] offer some reflections on our paper, including alternative interpretations of some of our findings. We respond to those reflections in this reply.