Improving responding to questioning using a brief retrieval training

This research examined the effect of a brief training procedure for enhancing responding to questions about witnessed events. The training was based in research on metacognition and memory, and emphasized: attending to questions, searching for multiple responses, and weighing confidence in and considering the source of responses. In the main study, adult participants viewed a video of a burglary and after a 25 min delay half received the training. All participants were then asked answerable and unanswerable questions about the video. The training resulted in fewer errors and more rejections to unanswerable questions. Analysis of response diagnosticity indicated that responses made by the trained group were more likely to be correct responses to answerable questions. A second study showed that these findings were not due to awareness of the presence of unanswerable questions. The procedure has potential as a supplement when questioning is pursued.     

Measurement variability in infant and maternal behavioral assessment

Evaluations of methodological assessments sometimes show similar, sometimes different patterns of findings reflective of different approaches to the same problem. In this study, frequencies of behaviors of infants and mothers in two cultures based on continuous coding were compared with frequencies based on time-sampling, and resulting patterns of findings were evaluated. Time-sampling and continuous coding give different estimates of absolute frequency of typical infant and maternal behaviors between individuals and between cultural groups. However, time-sampling adequately preserves the relative ranking of infant and mother behaviors among individuals and between cultural groups. If research is concerned with the relative standing of individuals and/or groups on frequency of infant or maternal behavior, then (under specified circumstances) time-sampling and continuous coding yield comparable results.     

Psychometric Properties and Norms of the Family Needs Scale

We studied 205 low-income families, using the Family Needs Scale (FNS). Factor analysis of the FNS data resulted on a 7-factor solution with high internal consistency within the various subscales. We provide normative scores based on the factor structure of the FNS. A total of 53 parents completed the FNS on two occasions with an average of four weeks between these two ratings. In general, the test-retest reliabilities were low to moderate. A total of 61 pairs of parents independently rated their families with the FNS. Again, agreement between raters was low to moderate. Several factors that may have detracted from better test-retest and interrater reliability were identified. Our data point to the need for more psychometric studies with the FNS.     

The effects of dropping in‐situation safety behaviors in the treatment of social phobia

Over the past years, important advances in the cognitive–behavioral treatment of social phobia have taken place. There is wide evidence that demonstrates exposure is an effective treatment for social phobia. However, some research has noticed that exposure has limitations in treating this disorder. In clinical practice we find patients who do not achieve marked reductions in anxiety using this technique. One of the mechanisms that can be involved is the use of in‐situation safety behaviors, which patients use to prevent the feared consequences in social situations. The aim of this study is to present a single case study where we compare the improvement achieved using exposure alone versus exposure dropping in‐situation safety behaviors. The social phobic patient improved significantly when exposure was combined with the drop of in‐situation safety behaviors. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A Transcultural Integrative Model for Ethical Decision Making in Counseling

The Transcultural Integrative Ethical Decision‐Making Model in counseling addresses the need for including cultural factors in the process of ethical dilemma resolution. This transcultural model incorporates state‐of‐the‐art concepts from multicultural theory into an ethical decision‐making model that is adapted primarily from the Integrative Model developed by V. M. Tarvydas (1998). When appropriate, this transcultural model includes aspects of other ethical resolution models, such as R. R. Cottone's (2001) Social Constructivist Model and A. H. Davis's (1997) Collaborative Model. The proposed model is presented in a step‐by‐step, linear format that can be used by counselors facing ethical dilemmas in a variety of settings and with different cultural groups.     

Artificial intelligence for the measurement of vocal stereotypy

Both researchers and practitioners often rely on direct observation to measure and monitor behavior. When these behaviors are too complex or numerous to be measured in vivo, relying on direct observation using human observers increases the amount of resources required to conduct research and to monitor the effects of interventions in practice. To address this issue, we conducted a proof of concept examining whether artificial intelligence could measure vocal stereotypy in individuals with autism. More specifically, we used an artificial neural network with over 1,500 minutes of audio data from 8 different individuals to train and test models to measure vocal stereotypy. Our results showed that the artificial neural network performed adequately (i.e., session-by-session correlation near or above .80 with a human observer) in measuring engagement in vocal stereotypy for 6 of 8 participants. Additional research is needed to further improve the generalizability of the approach.