Physical activity status of academic professors during their early career transition: an application of the theory of planned behavior

Life-transitions (e.g. parenthood) have been linked to physical inactivity, yet the topic requires further exploration. In this study, we evaluated changes in the physical activity (PA) of adults during their early career transition using retrospective analysis and the theory of planned behavior. Recruitment from January to March 2010 yielded a random sample of 267 assistant professors, ages 25-44, employed within the last five years. Repeated measures analysis of variance (RM ANOVA) concluded that PA declined across the transition (d?=?0.36-0.43) and was further attenuated by marriage, work hours, and parenthood status. Discriminant function analysis (DFA) identified specific behavioral and control correlates about PA enjoyment, limited time, inconsistent schedule, work demands, and job pressures to distinguish between those who remained active from those who did not across the transition. PA interventions administered prior to career transitions may be needed to prevent physical inactivity.     

THE EFFECTS OF FIXED-TIME REINFORCEMENT SCHEDULES ON FUNCTIONAL RESPONSE CLASSES: A TRANSLATIONAL STUDY

Research on functional response classes has applied significance because less severe forms of problem behavior have been found to co‐occur with more severe forms. In addition, the most severe forms of problem behavior are sometimes targeted for intervention without monitoring other less severe forms. In such cases, it is unknown whether and how untreated forms of problem behavior covary with the targeted behaviors. The present study employed a translational procedure (with button presses as the target behavior) to investigate response covariation under noncontingent reinforcement with typically developing preschoolers. The results indicated that noncontingent reinforcement was generally effective in decreasing all response class members when only one member was targeted.     

EFFECTS OF PREFERENCE AND REINFORCER VARIATION ON WITHIN-SESSION PATTERNS OF RESPONDING

We examined correspondence between preference assessment outcome and within‐session patterns of responding in one subject with autism. Responding maintained by a single highly preferred item resulted in a greater total number of responses, a slower decline in within‐session response rates, and a greater proportion of short interresponse times compared to responding maintained by varied moderately preferred (MP) stimuli. Presenting varied MP stimuli within the same session produced greater levels and more sustained responding than presenting those same stimuli individually.     

Explaining the justice-performance relationship: trust as exchange deepener or trust as uncertainty reducer?

Past research has revealed significant relationships between organizational justice dimensions and job performance, and trust is thought to be one mediator of those relationships. However, trust has been positioned in justice theorizing in 2 different ways, either as an indicator of the depth of an exchange relationship or as a variable that reflects levels of work-related uncertainty. Moreover, trust scholars distinguish between multiple forms of trust, including affect- and cognition-based trust, and it remains unclear which form is most relevant to justice effects. To explore these issues, we built and tested a more comprehensive model of trust mediation in which procedural, interpersonal, and distributive justice predicted affect- and cognition-based trust, with those trust forms predicting both exchange- and uncertainty-based mechanisms. The results of a field study in a hospital system revealed that the trust variables did indeed mediate the relationships between the organizational justice dimensions and job performance, with affect-based trust driving exchange-based mediation and cognition-based trust driving uncertainty-based mediation.     

Hope predicts positive functional role outcomes in acute rehabilitation populations

Purpose/Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine the association between facilitating psychological variables and functional rehabilitation outcomes following acute medical rehabilitation. Research Method/Design: Using a longitudinal design and correlational and regression analyses, we studied 174 adults who were participating in inpatient rehabilitation for acute spinal cord dysfunction, stroke, amputation, or orthopedic surgery recovery. All participants completed the Hope Scale, Positive and Negative Affect Schedule, and Functional Independence Measure (FIM) during the first days of their inpatient stay, and then were contacted 3 months after discharge to complete the Craig Hospital Assessment and Reporting Technique (CHART) and FIM. Results: Hope accounted for a statistically significant amount of the variance in the prediction of functional role participation at 3 months postdischarge (as measured by the CHART) above and beyond the variance accounted for by demographic and severity variables. In contrast, positive affect was not found to contribute to the prediction of functional role participation, and neither hope nor positive affect contributed to the prediction of functional skill level (FIM). Conclusions/Implications: The results indicate that positive psychological variables present during the rehabilitation stay, such as hopefulness, may contribute to the prediction of functional outcomes after discharge in rehabilitation populations. These findings suggest that incorporating interventions that enhance hope and build on the individual's psychological strengths may be useful to improve participation outcomes following acute medical rehabilitation. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

The “pure-study” learning curve: The learning curve without cumulative testing

The customary assumption in the study of human learning using alternating study and test trials is that learning occurs during study trials and that test trials are useful only to measure learning. In fact, tests seem to play little role in the development of learning, because the learning curve is similar even when the number of test trials varies widely (Tulving, Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior 6:175-184, 1967). However, this outcome seems odd, because other research has shown that testing fosters greater long-term learning than does studying. We report three experiments addressing whether tests affect the shape of the learning curve. In two of the experiments, we examined this issue by varying the number of spaced study trials in a sequence and examining performance on only a single test trial at the end of the series (a "pure-study" learning curve). We compared these pure-study learning curves to standard learning curves and found that the standard curves increase more rapidly and reach a higher level in both free recall (Exp. 1) and paired-associate learning (Exp. 2). In Experiment 3, we provided additional study trials in the "pure-study" condition to determine whether the standard (study-test) condition would prove superior to a study-study condition. The standard condition still produced better retention on both immediate and delayed tests. Our experiments show that test trials play an important role in the development of learning using both free-recall (Exps. 1 and 3) and paired-associate (Exp. 2) procedures. Theories of learning have emphasized processes that occur during study, but our results show that processes engaged during tests are also critical.     

Personality and Legislative Politics: The Big Five Trait Dimensions Among U.S. State Legislators

The impact of personality traits on people's attitudes and behaviors is widely recognized, yet systematic attention to personality in large‐N research on elected officials has been rare. Among psychologists, five‐factor frameworks that focus on openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and emotional stability have gained tremendous prominence in the past two decades. Applications of these frameworks to the study of mass political behavior have been highly fruitful, but corresponding applications in the study of legislators have been rare. In an effort to assess the utility of a Big Five approach in the study of legislative politics, this article addresses three questions: whether elected officials will be willing to provide personality self‐assessments, whether any data they do provide will exhibit meaningful variance, and whether the Big Five trait dimensions will correspond with patterns in respondents' attitudes and behaviors. These questions are addressed using data from members of the state legislatures in Arizona, Connecticut, and Maine. Results provide considerable grounds for optimism regarding the likely utility of more extensive applications of the Big Five in research on elected officials.     

Effects of experienced disgust on habituation during repeated exposure to threat-relevant stimuli in blood-injection-injury phobia

Despite growing evidence implicating disgust in the etiology of blood-injection-injury (BII) phobia, the relevance of disgust for exposure-based treatment of BII phobia remains largely unknown. Individuals with BII phobia were randomly assigned to a disgust (view vomit videos) or neutral activation (view waterfall videos) condition. They were then exposed to 14 videotaped blood draws, during which fear and disgust levels were repeatedly assessed. Participants then engaged in a behavioral avoidance test (BAT) consisting of exposure to threat-relevant stimuli. Examination of outcome comparing the identical first and last blood-draw clips revealed that fear and disgust toward blood draws was significantly reduced in both groups. Disgust levels were also found to be more intense for the video stimuli relative to fear levels whereas the opposite was true for BAT stimuli. Contrary to predictions, the disgust induction did not enhance reductions in negative responses to the target video or reduce behavioral avoidance. Growth curve analyses did show that individuals with BII phobia exposed to the disgust induction showed greater initial fear levels during repeated exposure than those in the neutral condition. However, this effect was not consistently observed across different analytic approaches. Changes in fear during exposure were also found to be independent of changes in disgust but not vice versa, and greater initial fear levels during repeated exposure to threat was associated with fear and disgust levels during the BAT. The implications of these findings for conceptualizing the role of disgust in etiology and treatment of BII phobia are discussed.     

From racial discrimination to risky sex: prospective relations involving peers and parents

This study investigated how early experience with racial discrimination affected the subsequent risky sexual behaviors of a diverse sample of African American youths (N = 745). The analyses focused on 3 risk-promoting factors thought to mediate the hypothesized discrimination → risky sex relation: negative affect, affiliation with deviant peers, and favorable attitudes toward risky sex. In addition, attentive parenting was examined as a protective factor. Analyses using structural equation modeling revealed that youths who perceived more racial discrimination at age 10 or 11 were engaging in more sexual risk taking at age 18 or 19. This relation was mediated by the hypothesized risk-promoting factors via pathways that were consistent with our conceptual model. Results also indicated a prospective reciprocal relation between parenting and children's deviant affiliations: deviant peer affiliations at age 10 or 11 predicted more attentive parenting behaviors by the parents; this response from the parents, in turn, predicted relatively fewer deviant affiliations when the youths were 15 or 16. Study findings are discussed in terms of their relevance to the disproportionately high rates of sexually transmitted infections among African Americans.     

Cross-modality correspondence between pitch and spatial location modulates attentional orienting

The brain constantly integrates incoming signals across the senses to form a cohesive view of the world. Most studies on multisensory integration concern the roles of spatial and temporal parameters. However, recent findings suggest cross-modal correspondences (eg high-pitched sounds associated with bright, small objects located high up) also affect multisensory integration. Here, we focus on the association between auditory pitch and spatial location. Surprisingly little is known about the cognitive and perceptual roots of this phenomenon, despite its long use in ergonomic design. In a series of experiments, we explore how this cross-modal mapping affects the allocation of attention with an attentional cuing paradigm. Our results demonstrate that high and low tones induce attention shifts to upper or lower locations, depending on pitch height. Furthermore, this pitch-induced cuing effect is susceptible to contextual manipulations and volitional control. These findings suggest the cross-modal interaction between pitch and location originates from an attentional level rather than from response mapping alone. The flexible contextual mapping between pitch and location, as well as its susceptibility to top-down control, suggests the pitch-induced cuing effect is primarily mediated by cognitive processes after initial sensory encoding and occurs at a relatively late stage of voluntary attention orienting.