Acquisition of social referencing via discrimination training in infants

This experiment investigated social referencing as a form of discriminative learning in which maternal facial expressions signaled the consequences of the infant's behavior in an ambiguous context. Eleven 4- and 5-month-old infants and their mothers participated in a discrimination-training procedure using an ABAB design. Different consequences followed infants' reaching toward an unfamiliar object depending on the particular maternal facial expression. During the training phases, a joyful facial expression signaled positive reinforcement for the infant reaching for an ambiguous object, whereas a fearful expression signaled aversive stimulation for the same response. Baseline and extinction conditions were implemented as controls. Mothers' expressions acquired control over infants' approach behavior for all participants. All participants ceased to show discriminated responding during the extinction phase. The results suggest that 4- and 5-month-old infants can learn social referencing via discrimination training.     

‘Too black or not black enough’: Social identity complexity in the political rhetoric of Barack Obama

The election of the first African‐American President of the United States, Barack Obama, has been widely recognised as an extraordinary milestone in the history of the United States and indeed the world. With the use of a discursive psychological approach combined with central theoretical principles derived from social identity and self‐categorisation theories, this paper analyses a corpus of speeches Obama delivered during his candidacy for president to examine how he attended to and managed his social identity in his political discourse. Building on a social identity model of leadership, we examine specifically how Obama mobilises political support and social identification by building an identity for himself as a prototypical representative of the American people, notwithstanding the protracted public debate within both the White and Black American communities that had questioned and contested Obama's identity. Moreover, we demonstrate how Obama managed the dilemmas around his identity by actively crafting an in‐group identity that was oriented to an increasingly socially diverse America—a diversity that he himself exemplified and embodied as a leader. As an ‘entrepreneur’ of identity, Obama's rhetorical project was to position himself as an exceptional leader, whose very difference was represented as ‘living proof’ of the widely shared collective values that constitute the ‘American Dream’. Drawing on social identity complexity theory, we suggest that by providing more inclusive and complex categories of civic and national identity, Obama's presidency has the potential to radically transform what it means to be a prototypical in‐group member in America. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Using a Training-of-Trainers Approach and Proactive Technical Assistance to Bring Evidence Based Programs to Scale: An Operationalization of the Interactive Systems Framework’s Support System

Bringing evidence based programs to scale was a major initial impetus for the development of the Interactive Systems Framework for Dissemination and Implementation (ISF). The ISF demonstrates the importance of the Support System in facilitating the uptake of innovations in the community (the Delivery System). Two strategies that members of the Support System commonly use are training‐of‐trainers (TOT) models and technical assistance (TA). In this article, we focus on the role of the Support System in bringing evidence‐based programs (EBPs) to scale in the Delivery System using a case example, with special attention on two strategies employed by Support Systems—training‐of‐trainers (TOT) and proactive technical assistance. We then report on findings from a case example from the Promoting Science Based Approaches to Teen Pregnancy Prevention project that furthers our conceptualization of these strategies and the evidence base for them. We also report on the limitations in the literature regarding research on TOTs and proactive TA and provide suggestions for future research on TOTs and proactive TA that will enhance the science and practice of support in the ISF. Special Issue: Advances in Bridging Research and Practice Using the Interactive System Framework for Dissemination and Implementation; Guest Editors: Abraham Wandersman, Paul Flaspohler, Catherine A. Lesesne, Richard Puddy; Action Editor: Emilie Phillips Smith     

An integrated approach to delivering exposure-based treatment for symptoms of PTSD and depression in OIF/OEF veterans: preliminary findings

Combat-exposed military personnel from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan report high rates of PTSD and associated psychiatric problems. A formidable body of research supports exposure therapy as a front-line intervention for PTSD; however, relative to studies of civilians, fewer investigations have evaluated the effectiveness of exposure therapy using military samples. Specifically, barriers to care (e.g., stigma associated with receiving mental health services ) may compromise utilization of evidence-based psychotherapy. As such, researchers have argued that veterans with PTSD may require an integrated and innovative approach to the delivery of exposure techniques. This paper presents the rationale for and preliminary data from an ongoing clinical trial that compares the home-based telehealth (HBT) application of a brief, behavioral treatment (Behavioral Activation and Therapeutic Exposure; BA-TE) for veterans with PTSD to the standard, in-person application of the same treatment. Forty OIF/OEF veterans with PTSD and MDD were consented, enrolled, and randomized to condition (BA-TE in-person, or BA-TE HBT) and symptoms of anxiety and depression were assessed at pre- and posttreatment. Participants in both conditions experienced reductions in depression, anxiety, and PTSD symptoms between pre- and posttreatment, suggesting that HBT application of an integrated PTSD treatment may be feasible and effective.     

Rudd's Apology to the Stolen Generations: Challenging Self‐Sufficient Arguments in “Race” Discourse

While the public debate on whether to apologise to the Stolen Generations ended on 13 February, 2008, public opinion was still divided, reflected particularly in the arguments against apologising that were common in political and public discourse. We examine the ways in which differing arguments can be flexibly deployed and combined within a political context to not just resist, but also to support, an act of reparation for historical injustice. In particular, we consider how Rudd makes use of specific rhetorically self‐sufficient arguments to justify offering the apology; precisely the same arguments that had previously been used by political leaders and members of the public to oppose the apology. It is the use of such arguments in combination with each other and additional common tropes drawn from egalitarian and liberal discourse that allow for the building of a rhetorically powerful case for offering the apology. Rather than the traditional focus of such research on the ways in which racism is accomplished in talk, we suggest that Rudd's apology to the Stolen Generations can be seen as a practical tool‐kit for building an “anti‐racist” rhetoric in the context of Indigenous and non‐Indigenous relations in Australia.     

Young infants' eye movements over "natural" scenes and "experimental" scenes

Eye movements of 30 4-month-olds were tracked as infants viewed animals and vehicles in “natural” scenes and, for comparison, in homogeneous “experimental” scenes. Infants showed equivalent looking time preferences for natural and experimental scenes overall, but fixated natural scenes and objects in natural scenes more than experimental scenes and objects in experimental scenes and shifted fixations between objects and contexts more in natural than in experimental scenes. The findings show how infants treat objects and contexts in natural scenes and suggest that they treat more commonly used experimental scenes differently.     

What's mom got to do with it? Contributions of maternal executive function and caregiving to the development of executive function across early childhood

Executive functions (EFs; e.g. working memory, inhibitory control) are mediated by the prefrontal cortex and associated with optimal cognitive and socio‐emotional development. This study provides the first concurrent analysis of the relative contributions of maternal EF and caregiving to child EF. A group of children and their mothers (n = 62) completed age‐appropriate interaction (10, 24, 36 months) and EF tasks (child: 24, 36, and 48 months). Regression analyses revealed that by 36 months of age, maternal EF and negative caregiving behaviors accounted for unique variance in child EF, above and beyond maternal education and child verbal ability. These findings were confirmed when using an early child EF composite‐our most reliable measure of EF – and a similar pattern was found when controlling for stability in child EF. Furthermore, there was evidence that maternal EF had significant indirect effects on changes in child EF through maternal caregiving. At 24 months, EF was associated with maternal EF, but not negative caregiving behaviors. Taken together, these findings suggest that links between negative caregiving and child EF are increasingly manifested during early childhood. Although maternal EF and negative caregiving are related, they provide unique information about the development of child EF. A video abstract of this article can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPKXFbbrkps     

Sensing sociality in dogs: what may make an interactive robot social?

This study investigated whether dogs would engage in social interactions with an unfamiliar robot, utilize the communicative signals it provides and to examine whether the level of sociality shown by the robot affects the dogs’ performance. We hypothesized that dogs would react to the communicative signals of a robot more successfully if the robot showed interactive social behaviour in general (towards both humans and dogs) than if it behaved in a machinelike, asocial way. The experiment consisted of an interactive phase followed by a pointing session, both with a human and a robotic experimenter. In the interaction phase, dogs witnessed a 6-min interaction episode between the owner and a human experimenter and another 6-min interaction episode between the owner and the robot. Each interaction episode was followed by the pointing phase in which the human/robot experimenter indicated the location of hidden food by using pointing gestures (two-way choice test). The results showed that in the interaction phase, the dogs’ behaviour towards the robot was affected by the differential exposure. Dogs spent more time staying near the robot experimenter as compared to the human experimenter, with this difference being even more pronounced when the robot behaved socially. Similarly, dogs spent more time gazing at the head of the robot experimenter when the situation was social. Dogs achieved a significantly lower level of performance (finding the hidden food) with the pointing robot than with the pointing human; however, separate analysis of the robot sessions suggested that gestures of the socially behaving robot were easier for the dogs to comprehend than gestures of the asocially behaving robot. Thus, the level of sociality shown by the robot was not enough to elicit the same set of social behaviours from the dogs as was possible with humans, although sociality had a positive effect on dog–robot interactions.     

Impact of Sluggish Cognitive Tempo and Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder Symptoms on Adults’ Quality of Life

The symptoms of Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) have been linked to dysfunction in numerous life domains for both children and adults. As such, it is likely that individuals with these and other related symptoms (e.g., sluggish cognitive tempo, SCT) may also experience impaired quality of life. The current study examines the association between ADHD and SCT symptoms and quality of life (QOL) in a community sample of adults. Quality of life data collected from 983 participants (M age = 45.6 years) were analyzed primarily through a series of hierarchical multiple regressions employing SCT and ADHD symptom clusters, demographic, and anxiety and depression scale variables as predictors. Results generally supported the hypothesis that ADHD and SCT symptoms would negatively associate with QOL. Amongst the indicators, inattention and SCT emerged as the strongest predictors of low QOL. These findings underscore the negative impact of ADHD symptoms in adulthood, the independent contribution of SCT, and the importance of considering QOL in prospective research and intervention.