Development and Validation of an Explicit Aggressive Beliefs and Attitudes Scale

This work outlines the development and validation of a new self-report measure that assesses explicit aggressive beliefs and attitudes within the normal adult population (using 7 samples, total N = 3,533). These explicit aggressive beliefs and attitudes are expected to reflect aggressive biases including hostile attribution, potency, retribution, victimization by powerful others, derogation of target, and social discounting. The resulting scale is reliable with a hierarchical 6-factor structure, and displays convergent and discriminant validity. Criterion-related validity studies indicate incremental effects over socially desirable response bias, related implicit and explicit aggression measures, and is predictive of self-reported and other-reported aggression-related behaviors.     

The counselling and psychotherapy profession in Canada: regulatory processes and current status

ABSTRACT

Like the Canadian landscape and culture, the status of professional regulation for counselling and psychotherapy is a mosaic reflecting the unique cultural, linguistic and contextual realities of Canada. Statutory regulation in Canada is constitutionally a provincial/territorial matter. In the past five years, a major movement towards professional regulation has emerged. The authors describe the variable status of regulation, focusing on three provinces: Quebec, Nova Scotia and Ontario. They explore the federal Agreement of Internal Trade, designed to facilitate inter-provincial/territorial mobility of regulated professionals. Finally, the authors summarise national research and development activities of the Canadian Counselling and Psychotherapy Association that enhance the pan-Canadian mobility of practitioners and support shared professional understandings. These activities range from bilingual, national validation of competencies, definitions, titles and scopes of practice to symposia and an entry-to-practice competency assessment.     

How psychological stress in the workplace influences presenteeism propensity: A test of the Demand–Control–Support model

The aim of this study is to examine the influence of the sources of psychological stress at work assumed by the Demand–Control–Support (DCS) model on presenteeism propensity. Research propositions are derived from the dynamic version of the Demand–Control model, to which we added the dimension of social support, which is part of the DCS model. Data were obtained from a large representative sample consisting of 1609 public and private sector workers living in the Canadian province of Québec, who responded to a questionnaire, administered using computer-assisted interviewing over a 3-month period in 2007–2008. The results indicate that the combination of low decision authority and high supervisor's support attenuates the positive relationship between job demands and presenteeism propensity within a 10-year time frame of exposure to a new job.     

Hand-use preference for reaching and object manipulation in 6- through 13-month-old infants

Validity, reliability, and stability of separate assessment of hand-use preferences for reaching, object manipulation, and complementary bimanual action were determined for 6 through 13 month-old male and female infants. Only hand-use preferences for complementary bimanual action varied with age. Females had more distinct hand-use preference than males but only for object manipulation. Comparison of hand-use preference among these different sensorimotor skills can provide a richer evaluation of infant handedness status required for systematic study of the development of neuropsychological functions during infancy.     

An analysis and synthesis of multiple correspondence analysis,optimal scaling,dual scaling,homogeneity analysis and other methods for quantifying categorical multivariate data

We discuss a variety of methods for quantifying categorical multivariate data. These methods have been proposed in many different countries, by many different authors, under many different names. In the first major section of the paper we analyze the many different methods and show that they all lead to the same equations for analyzing the same data. In the second major section of the paper we introduce the notion of a duality diagram, and use this diagram to synthesize the many superficially different methods into a single method.The ideas in this paper were worked out by the first author, with some suggestions provided by the second. The current version of this paper has evolved from three previous versions, the first two written by the first author.     

Restricting the field of view: perceptual and performance effects

Visual perception involves both the high acuity of foveal vision and the wide scope of overlapping peripheral information. The role of peripheral vision in competent performance of the adult visuomotor activities of walking, reaching, and forming a cognitive map of a room was examined using goggles which limited the scope of the normal field of view to 9 degrees, 14 degrees, 22 degrees, or 60 degrees. Each restriction of peripheral field information resulted in some perceptual and performance decrements, with the 9 degrees and 14 degrees restriction producing the most disturbance. In addition, bodily discomfort, dizziness, unsteadiness and disorientation, were reported as the subjects moved around with restricted fields of view.     

Age-related changes in aphasia type and stroke location

Two-hundred consecutive CT scans of patients with an infarction in the territory of the middle cerebral artery (MCA) were examined for evaluation of a possible relationship between age and stroke location. Two distinct procedures, one evaluating the incidence of four areas within the MCA territory and the other measuring some quantified parameters, were used. Statistical studies failed to show any significant correlation between these parameters and the age of patients. These results lead to refute previous claims that semiological changes in aphasia type with age in stroke patients may be due to a posterior shift of cerebral infarcts with age.     

Sense mode and coupling in a vigilance task

Usarmymedical Research Laboratory, Fort Knox, Kentucky This investigation examined the performance of 36 Ss on three 90-min vigilance tasks. As time on task increased, there was a significant decrease in number of detections and false responses and a corresponding significant increase in response latency. The consistent rank order relationship between stimulus conditions suggests that there were uniform trends among these conventional response measures. There was a significant decline in sensitivity (d′) lor the closely coupled tasks, regardless of the sense mode involved. However, d′ remained fairly stable for the loosely coupled visual task. The significant increase in criterion values(β) suggest that Ss adopt a more conservative mode of responding with increasing time on task. Further, these data indicate that a lack of control of coupling effects, rather than sense mode specificity, may have confounded the interpretation of prior research on visualand auditory tasks.     

A comparison of auditory monitoring performance in blind subjects with that of sighted subjects in light and dark

Two experiments were performed in which blind Ss, sighted Ss working in the dark, and sighted Ss working in the light were compared as to their efficiency on an auditory watchkeeping task. Absolute and differential auditory thresholds were measured in both experiments, and in the second experiment the groups also underwent a signal detection session under alerted conditions. There was some inconsistency as to relative performance of the sighted groups, but in both experiments the blind Ss were superior on the auditory watchkeeping task as to signals detected and effective sensitivity (d’). 1 This difference was not attributable to a difference in auditory sensitivity or to a criterion adopted for     

Effects of signal to noise variability over repeated sessions in an auditory vigilance task

Subjects listened to a sequence of Gaussian noise pulses of 0.5-sec duration, occurring at 2.5-sec intervals. Performance was compared under two conditions: One group detected the occurrence of a 1.8-dB increment in noise pulses; a second group detected the occurrence of increments of 1.3, 1.8, or 2.3 dB. All Ss performed for three 90-min sessions on different days The usual trends were noted for hits and false alarms. TSD indices, d’ and β were also derived. For both groups, it was found that d′ increased slightly over sessions and decreased almost negligibly during sessions, and criterion indices, β generally increased slightly both within and over sessions. Performance was generally comparable under the fixed- and mixed-signal conditions.