An anxiety-induced bias in the perception of a bistable point-light walker

Human sensitivity for social cues is exquisite, as illustrated by the ease with which simplified point-light movements invoke social and emotional responses. Compared to faces, these biological motion stimuli only recently started to be used to explore questions regarding social cognition and anxiety. We presented human point-light walkers that could be perceived as facing towards or facing away from the observer, and tested whether participants with high social anxiety would perceive these bistable stimuli differently, because this type of stimuli has particular relevance for them. The results showed that observers with high social anxiety tended to see walkers as facing away more frequently than those with low social anxiety. This may mean that high socially anxious observers are biased towards the more positive perceptual alternative because they are motivated to protect themselves against threatening social experiences, but we also explore alternative explanations. The findings are in line with the evidence for a positivity bias in perception, also called wishful seeing, but in contrast with the attentional negativity bias often found in social anxiety. We discuss reasons for this divergence and possible limitations of the current study.     

South African Adolescents' Career Development through the Lens of the Systems Theory Framework: An Exploratory Study

Adolescent career development has predominantly been studied in the context of middle class Eurocentric cultures and there have been calls for greater attention to the career development of non-dominant and disadvantaged groups. Further, there have been calls to explore career development in terms of its context and process. In this regard, the need for research measures and approaches sensitive to adolescents and particular cultures has been recognised. This is particularly the case in South African career psychology. The present study used a qualitative career assessment instrument, My System of Career Influences, to explore influences on the career development of disadvantaged South African adolescents living in a children's home. Consistent with previous international and national studies, parents were shown to be an important influence. Unlike previous studies, the influence of working overseas was also identified as an important influence. The MSCI was shown to be effective in providing insight into both the context and process of career development and as a research instrument that may be used with adolescents. Recommendations for future research are made.     

Children's Loss of Agency under Extreme Adversity

This study explores the notion of children's agency in situations of extreme adversity. The child participants (n=117) live in the midst of the HIV/AIDS pandemic; extreme poverty; and systemic educational malfunction. Four focus group interviews were conducted with the children to explore their experiences of potential barriers to education. The findings indicated that contextual factors had a profoundly negative impact on the children, with their agentive capacity being severely compromised through their exposure to multiple, complex layers of risk. There was very little evidence to suggest that children retain any sense of their own agency in such adversity. This has implications for their resilience and for the development of policy and intervention strategies that may meet these children's needs.     

Psychosocial Effects of Conditions of Military Deployment

Deployment may lead the soldiers to dichotomise their profession and their family life, resulting in unwanted effects on family or career. Effects on reintegration and functioning within family are considered. Reunions may be characterized by perceived negative reception and consequences could spill over to children as parents attempt to equivocate their differences. Risks exist for fragmentation of the family system or divorce. Social support may serve to buffer families with members on deployment.     

To adjust or not adjust: Nonparametric effect sizes,confidence intervals,and real-world meaning

ObjectivesThe main objectives of this article are to: (a) investigate if there are any meaningful differences between adjusted and unadjusted effect sizes (b) compare the outcomes from parametric and non-parametric effect sizes to determine if the potential differences might influence the interpretation of results, (c) discuss the importance of reporting confidence intervals in research, and discuss how to interpret effect sizes in terms of practical real-world meaning.DesignReview.MethodA review of how to estimate and interpret various effect sizes was conducted. Hypothetical examples were then used to exemplify the issues stated in the objectives.ResultsThe results from the hypothetical research designs showed that: (a) there is a substantial difference between adjusted and non-adjusted effect sizes especially in studies with small sample sizes, and (b) there are differences in outcomes between the parametric and non-parametric effect size formulas that may affect interpretations of results.ConclusionsThe different hypothetical examples in this article clearly demonstrate the importance of treating data in ways that minimize potential biases and the central issues of how to discuss the meaningfulness of effect sizes in research.     

The Rationality of Ultimate Concern: Moral Exemplars,Theological Ethics,and the Science of Moral Cognition

This paper argues that consideration of moral exemplars may provide a means for integrating insights across philosophical ethics, theological ethics, and the scientific study of moral cognition. Key to this endeavor is an understanding of the relation of cognition and emotion in ethical decision-making, a relation that is usually understood to be oppositional but which in proper circumstances may be understood to be quite the opposite. Indeed, a distinctive feature of moral exemplarity may consist in the ability to properly integrate the emotions into the moral life, and reference to and imitation of exemplars may involve a referencing and imitating of the emotions of the exemplar.     

Instituting heteronormative belief in the law: the case of California's Proposition 22

This paper is based on ethnography of the ‘worship time’ at ‘Breakfree’ Church, a Pentecostal congregation in suburban Perth. I begin by exploring the ritualistic ways in which music is used to catalyse an ecstatic experience. Making use of the metaphor of ‘break free’, borrowed from a popular worship song, I demonstrate that music is used in deliberate ways to assist people in leaving behind the profane and encountering the sacred. Drawing on the thought of theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher and philosopher Paul Ricoeur, I explore the ways music facilitates and symbolises this experience. I demonstrate that for church members, the ecstatic divine-human encounter is the centre of their church worship and the antidote to difficult experiences such as grief or illness.     

Reconceptualizing Cultivation: Implications for Testing Relationships Between Fiction Exposure and Self-Reported Alcohol Use Evaluations

ABSTRACT

This article responds to calls for conceptual clarification in the media effects domain by providing a definition for attitudinal cultivation effects. Our definition contains 5 core characteristics: the (a) linear effects of (b) repeated media exposure on (c) the evaluation as given by memory associations (d) strengthened by and (e) valenced in line with those media messages. We reason that, when accepting this definition, the cultivation hypothesis predicts effects of repeated media use on evaluations to primarily occur at the level of gut evaluations given by automatically activated memory associations. Corroborating this logic for the effects of alcohol use portrayals in television fiction, we find the relationship between fiction exposure and self-reported alcohol use evaluations to be (a) moderated by speed of expressing those evaluations and (b) mediated by responses to self-reports tapping into gut feelings. The implications of these findings for future media effects studies are discussed.     

Reduced Reliance on Optimal Facial Information for Identity Recognition in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Previous research into face processing in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) has revealed atypical biases toward particular facial information during identity recognition. Specifically, a focus on features (or high spatial frequencies [HSFs]) has been reported for both face and nonface processing in ASD. The current study investigated the development of spatial frequency biases in face recognition in children and adolescents with and without ASD, using nonverbal mental age to assess changes in biases over developmental time. Using this measure, the control group showed a gradual specialization over time toward middle spatial frequencies (MSFs), which are thought to provide the optimal information for face recognition in adults. By contrast, individuals with ASD did not show a bias to one spatial frequency band at any stage of development. These data suggest that the “midband bias” emerges through increasing face-specific experience and that atypical face recognition performance may be related to reduced specialization toward optimal spatial frequencies in ASD.