The Pathway Toward Clinical Self Confidence

This study was designed to determine the most common pathway toward the development of clinical self-confidence for therapists during the first year of client contact. Telephone interviews were conducted with 39 recent graduates of a master's level marriage and family therapy program. Subjects were asked to graph their development of clinical self-confidence over the first 12 months of their clinical experience. Results reveal a three-stage model of therapist development. The implications for training within each stage of development are identified with an emphasis on the role of the supervisor.     

Sociotropy,autonomy, and personality disorder criteria in psychiatric patients

Sociotropy and autonomy (Beck, 1983) are sets of beliefs, concerns, and behavioral tendencies that are proposed to create vulnerability to depression and other psychopathology and to influence its manifestation and treatment response. Other theoretical frameworks (Blatt, 1974) have made similar suggestions. We investigated the differential relations of sociotropy and autonomy to dimensional scores for each DSM-III-R personality disorder (PD) in a sample of 188 psychiatric patients, controlling for the other set of characteristics and for the other PDs. Histrionic and dependent PD traits were related specifically to sociotropy. Paranoid, schizoid, schizotypal, and passive-aggressive PD traits were related specifically to autonomy. Borderline, narcissistic, avoidant, and self-defeating PD traits were related significantly and about equally to both sociotropy and autonomy. Obsessive-compulsive PD traits were not related consistently to either. Results were mostly as predicted and suggest that sociotropy and autonomy may be useful constructs for understanding and treating PDs.     

Searching for Feminism: An Analysis of Community Psychology Literature Relevant to Women's Concerns

Articles published in both the American Journal of Community Psychology and Journal of Community Psychology, from their inception in 1973 through 1997, were content analyzed for women relevance, diversity, feminism, and historical change. Overall, 9.8% of the articles reviewed ($of1$N = 2,178) were considered women relevant, 4% recognized diversity among women, and 3% were considered feminist. There was an average yearly increase in women-relevant and feminist articles from 7.3 pre-1990 to 11.2 post-1990, and 1.6 pre-1990 to 4.6 post-1990, respectively. Overall, mental health and motherhood were the most addressed content areas. Among feminist articles, gender roles and violence against women were most salient. Race and SES were the most noted issues of diversity in both women-relevant and feminist articles. While an increase in feminist publications by both journals is promising, stereotypes of women and other oppressed groups continue to be perpetuated.     

Measuring attachment security via the Security Scale: Latent structure,invariance across mothers and fathers and convergent validity

The Security Scale (SS) is a widely used questionnaire measuring attachment towards mother and father in school-aged children. Whilst existing evidence supports concurrent and discriminant validity of the SS, its factorial structure remains largely underexplored. The current study examined the factorial structure of the SS, explored its measurement invariance across mother and father, and evaluated its convergent validity with the Coping Strategies Questionnaire in a sample of 149 Italian children aged 8–10 years. In statistical analyses, we accounted for the ordinal nature of the data and adopted an ad hoc bootstrap procedure for the estimation of measurement invariance. Results supported the factorial validity of the SS and the structural invariance of its underlying construct across parents. Evidence for convergent validity was also found. Overall, the Italian version of the SS is a promising tool to assess attachment in school-aged children.     

When and how less is more: reply to Tharp and Pickering

In DeCaro et al. [DeCaro, M. S., Thomas, R. D., & Beilock, S. L. (2008). Individual differences in category learning: Sometimes less working memory capacity is better than more. Cognition, 107, 284-294] we demonstrated that sometimes less working memory (WM) has its advantages. The lower individuals’ WM, the faster they achieved success on an information-integration (II) category learning task adopted from Waldron and Ashby [Waldron, E. M., & Ashby, F. G. (2001). The effects of concurrent task interference on category learning: Evidence for multiple category learning systems. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 8, 168-176]. We attributed this success to the inability of lower WM individuals to employ explicit learning strategies heavily reliant on executive control. This in turn, we hypothesized, might push lower WM individuals to readily adopt procedural-based strategies thought to lead to success on the II task. Tharp and Pickering [Tharp, I. J., & Pickering, A. D. (2009). A note on DeCaro, Thomas, and Beilock (2008): Further data demonstrate complexities in the assessment of information-integration category learning. Cognition] recently questioned whether the II category learning task DeCaro et al. used really reflects procedural learning. In an effort to investigate Tharp and Pickering’s assertions with respect to individual differences in WM, we replicate and extend our previous work, in part by modeling participants’ response strategies during learning. We once again reveal that lower WM individuals demonstrate earlier II learning than their higher WM counterparts. However, we also show that low WM individuals’ initial success is not because of procedural-based responding. Instead, individuals lower in WM capacity perseverate in using simple rule-based strategies that circumvent heavy demands on WM while producing above-chance accuracy.     

The Roles of Perceived Identity Compatibility and Social Support for Women in a Single-Sex STEM Program at a Co-educational University

Single-sex programs have been implemented in a variety of educational settings to help promote greater engagement of women in STEM fields. However, the mechanisms through which single-sex programs increase women??s engagement in STEM fields are unclear. Drawing from research in social and health psychology, we examined two theoretically-guided predictors of women??s sense of belonging in their STEM majors and belonging at the university: perceived identity compatibility between being a woman and being in a STEM field, and perceived social support. Participants were 65 racially, ethnically, and socioeconomically diverse women enrolled in a single-sex STEM program at a co-educational university in Northeastern United States. Participants completed online surveys before the start of their first year of college, and again at the beginning of their second year of college. Findings from multiple regression analyses support hypotheses that across STEM women??s first or transitional year of college, perceived identity compatibility, perceived support from close others, and perceived support from the single-sex program for STEM women were each independently associated with greater sense of belonging in their major. Additionally, perceived identity compatibility and perceived support from the single-sex program were associated with greater sense of belonging at the university. These findings suggest that perceived support from sources such as single-sex programs and perceived compatibility between one??s field and being female may sustain women pursuing training in nontraditional fields such as STEM. Continued investigation of these factors may elucidate the impact of single-sex programs and inform interventions to increase the retention of women in STEM.     

Sun,Wind, Rock and Metal: Attitudes toward Renewable and Non-renewable Energy Sources in the Context of Climate Change and Current Energy Debates

Current energy debates are often framed in terms of the extent to which energy sources may mitigate global climate change (GCC) and facilitate energy independence (EI). However, little is understood about whether and how attitudes towards GCC and EI influence attitudes toward energy sources. Our study included 277 undergraduate students enrolled in introductory psychology classes at a large, Southeastern university. As hypothesized, results from ordinal and binary logistic regression analyses revealed that the likelihood participants would support the use of solar, wind, coal or nuclear energy decreased as a function of their belief that an energy source contributed to GCC. The belief that an energy source contributed to EI increased participants’ likelihood of support. Results suggest that beliefs about GCC and EI are important to determining support for energy sources and will likely contribute to effective marketing strategies and efforts to implement more environmentally-sustainable behavior and energy policy.     

Sidestepping awkward encounters: avoidance as a response to outperformance‐related discomfort

When people believe that their higher performance poses a threat to another person, they may experience discomfort or concern that has been termed Sensitivity to being the Target of a Threatening Upward Comparison (STTUC). One way to reduce STTUC discomfort might be to avoid contact with the outperformed person, a possibility examined in three studies of undergraduates. In laboratory contexts, STTUC discomfort predicted reluctance to meet an outperformed peer (Study 1) and preference for a different partner in future competitions (Study 2). In Study 3, which focused on naturalistic outperformance situations, STTUC distress again predicted avoidance. Additionally, avoidance of contact predicted less satisfaction with outcomes, especially in relationships where people knew each other well.