Assessment of Identity and Quality of Life in Diabetic and Renal Transplant Adolescents in Comparison to Healthy Adolescents

Identity development represents a central task of adolescence. Identity achievement is characterized by a coherent sense of who one is following a period of exploration and can help navigate the challenges of adulthood. This study examined identity within a quality of life (QOL) context in 85 adolescents with a renal transplant or with Type 1 diabetes in comparison to 90 healthy controls. Results revealed significant differences in ideological identity, with patients showing higher levels of diffusion and controls showing higher levels of foreclosure. No differences with respect to interpersonal identity, QOL, perceived control over the QOL domains, and perceived opportunities for growth and development were found. Future research should assess identity and QOL over a longer period of time to determine whether differences between chronically ill and healthy young adults can be detected.     

The real meaning of constructivism

Personal construct theory has a focus on constructs rather than elements, as can be clearly seen in the corollaries proposed by George Kelly. Yet, in the operationalization of his fundamental postulate, namely the repertory grid technique, there is an equal focus on both constructs and elements. Here we examine the relative contributions to variation in the grid data of both elements and constructs and use the intraclass correlation to examine this in several data sets. It is shown that in many instances, elements contribute more to the variation in grid data, irrespective of whether elements and constructs are supplied or elicited, or whether the ratings are made construct by construct or element by element. Implications of this for both the theory and practice are discussed.     

ON TESTING THE COMMONALITY OF CONSTRUCTS IN SUPPLIED GRIDS

The repertory grid technique has long been the empirical tool of choice for research based on personal construct theory (Kelly, 1955). In some situations, respondents are asked to evaluate a set of elements with respect to a fixed or supplied repertoire of constructs, and an assumption is made that respondents will employ these constructs similarly. This situation is thus equivalent to the semantic differential technique. In the repertory grid context it is justified through the commonality of construing corollary of personal construct theory. This is an assumption that can be tested, although it seems to have attracted little attention in the past. Here a criterion for commonality of a construct is proposed, namely that of the data conforming to a unidimensional scaling model, and a simple method of testing this is illustrated.     

Rhythm and Semiotic Structures of Long-Term Ambivalence in the Dialogical Self: Eating Disorder and Recovery Voices

Ambivalence in the dialogical self is conceptualized as resistance to change. The cyclic processes that characterize ambivalence are seen to maintain a balance between opposing voices, producing dynamic stability in the self-system. What has not been incorporated in the study of ambivalence so far is consideration of structural levels from which the opposing voices are speaking. This prompted the present case study of long-term eating disorder ambivalence, which joins a consideration of semiotic system structure with process. In interviews with a young woman conducted over a three-year period, cyclic processes of eating disorder and recovery voices were pervasive, yet structural analysis of the subsystems and their transactions suggested that change was actually occurring in this presumably change-resistant system, pointing to a need for reconceptualizing ambivalent systems in relation to development.     

Visual distraction increases the detection of an unexpected object in inattentional blindness

Distraction is typically thought to be detrimental to performance and concentration, and stimuli are classified as “distractions” if they take attention away from a primary task. However it has been shown that, under certain circumstances, distractors can also improve task performance. The current study extends this literature by exploring the role of a single discrete transient visual distracting event in increasing attention to an unexpected visual object in an inattentional blindness (IB) paradigm. Experiment 1 investigated the impact of a 48 ms visual distraction stimulus on rates of IB; a second experiment used a shortened, 16 ms visual distracting event. Both the long 48 ms and brief 16 ms distractors significantly reduced overall IB rates, by approximately 50% compared to a no distractor condition. Moreover, this reduction in IB is obtained independent of whether the visual distracting event was noted by the observer. Our findings demonstrate that a single discrete visual distraction can improve the detectability of an unexpected object in an IB task. Implications for theories of distributed attention in such tasks are discussed.     

A longitudinal intergenerational analysis of executive functions during early childhood

Despite the importance of executive function (EF) in both clinical and educational contexts, the aetiology of individual differences in early childhood EF remains poorly understood. This study provides the first longitudinal intergenerational analysis of mother–child EF associations during early childhood. A group of children and their mothers (n = 62) completed age‐appropriate EF tasks. Mother and child EFs were modestly correlated by 24 months of age, and this association was stable through 48 months. Importantly, maternal–child EF associations were still robust after controlling for verbal ability (potential indicator of verbal/crystallized intelligence) and maternal education (correlate of socio‐economic status and verbal intelligence). Potential implications of these findings as well as underlying mechanisms of the maternal–child EF association (gene–environment interplay) are discussed.     

Time and temperature a reply to Green and Simpson

The arguments are examined that reanalysis of the data in Bell (1975) leads to a rejection of his conclusions. The author maintains that the specific hypothesis that a metabolic pacemaker controls time estimation is not supported by his data.