Culturally Sensitive Dementia Caregiving Models and Clinical Practice

Family caregiving for individuals with dementia is an increasingly complex issue that affects the caregivers' and care recipients' physical, mental, and emotional health. This article presents 3 key culturally sensitive caregiver models along with clinical interventions relevant for mental health counseling professionals.     

“What support would you find helpful?” The relationship between treatment expectations,therapeutic engagement,and clinical outcomes in parent–infant psychotherapy

The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of pretreatment expectations on clinical outcomes and engagement in Parent–Infant Psychotherapy (PIP). Sixty-one mothers who were experiencing mental health difficulties and who were receiving PIP with their young infants participated in the study. A mixed-methodology was used to examine participants’ expectations through transformation content analysis of pretreatment interviews; recurring themes were classified and quantified. Further statistical analyses explored relationships between the quantified themes of parental expectations and clinical outcomes and engagement in treatment. No significant correlation was found between expectations and engagement. One of the six clinical outcomes significantly correlated with parental expectations. Improved reflective functioning (RF) was predicted by participants describing expectations of wanting to improve their parent–infant relationship through the treatment, and expressing concerns about discussing their past experiences. These two expectations predicted improvements in RF independently and when combined. These results indicate that PIP may be more effective for some mothers than others and that assessing future clients’ expectations before beginning PIP may be beneficial.     

Bias and Bias Remediation in Creative Problem-Solving: Managing Biases through Forecasting

Although scholars have identified many variables that contribute to creative problem-solving, less attention has been given to variables that might lead to failure in creative problem-solving. One set of variables that might lead to poor performance in creative problem-solving efforts may be found in various decision biases. In this study, the impact of simple and complex decision biases on the production of original, high-quality, and elegant solutions to a creative problem-solving task was examined in a sample of 227 undergraduates attending a large southwestern university. In addition, the value of forecasting instruction as a technique for reducing these decision biases was examined. It was found that both simple and complex decisions biases resulted in problem solutions of lower originality, quality, and elegance. Training in viable forecasting strategies resulted in the production of higher quality problem solutions. The implications of these findings for improving creative problem-solving performance are discussed.     

Analysis of an Alcohol Use Prevention Program for Undergraduate Students

The authors analyzed data from an online alcohol abuse prevention test. Results showed no statistically significant difference between students charged with university alcohol‐related offenses and those who had not been charged. Implications for counselors and suggestions for future research are discussed.     

The Relative Effects of Abstract Versus Concrete Processing on Proactivity in Depression

Low levels of proactivity are characteristic of individuals with depression. Two studies were conducted to compare the relative effects of abstract versus concrete processing on proactivity in high dysphoric individuals. In Study 1, participants read information about an upcoming research study and were then randomly allocated to a writing task that induced them to think about participating in that study in either an abstract (e.g., Why you would participate in the study?; n = 25) or concrete (e.g., How you will participate in the study?; n = 25) way. Participants were then asked to indicate whether they would sign up to the study. As expected, more participants indicated that they would take part in the study in the concrete condition (76%) than in the abstract condition (36%). In Study 2, high dysphoric participants were asked to identify their ideal part-time job and were then randomly allocated to a writing task that induced them to think about applying for the job in an abstract (n = 26) or concrete (n = 25) way. There was no difference between conditions in self-reported intentions of proactivity. However, significantly more participants in the concrete condition opted to look at an employment assistance website and returned to the lab to collect a job application package. Overall, these findings suggest that abstract processing could contribute to low levels of proactivity in depression, and that facilitating the use of concrete processing could help to alleviate this problem. Our results also point to the need for greater conceptual clarification of the distinction between concrete processing about proactive behavior and implementation intentions (identifying specific steps for completing an action/goal).     

Temperament as Risk and Protective Factors in Obesogenic Eating: Relations Among Parent Temperament,Child Temperament,and Child Food Preference and Eating

Children’s food preferences and eating behaviors have implications for their health and weight status, serving as risk or protective factors for obesity. Although parent and child factors influence children’s eating, few studies have examined parent and child temperament simultaneously in relation to child food preference and eating behaviors. The authors addressed this research gap. Participants were 115 ethnically diverse children between 4 and 6?years old and their parents. Measures included parental temperament traits, parental anxiety, child temperament traits, and child food preference and eating behaviors observed using a laboratory procedure. Results show that children preferred candies over grapes, and that aspects of both child and adult temperament were related to child eating behaviors. Child surgency was linked to eating more candies, while child effortful control was linked to eating more grapes. Parent effortful control was related to children’s preference toward grapes. No relations were found between child eating behaviors and child or parent negative affectivity and parental anxiety. Overall, findings suggest that highly impulsive and poorly self-regulated children may be at risk for obesogenic eating habits.     

Gleaning Information for Cognitive Operations from Don’t Know Responses in Cognitive and Noncognitive Assessments

The Don’t Know (DK) response – taking the form of an omitted response or not-reached at the end of a cognitive test, or explicitly presented as a response option in a social survey – contains important information that is often overlooked. Direct psychometric modeling efforts for DK responses are few and far between. In this article, the linear logistic test model (LLTM) is proposed for delineating the impacts of cognitive operations for a test that contains DK responses. We assume that the DK response is a valid response. The assumption is reasonable for many situations, including low-stakes cognitive tests and attitudinal assessments. By extracting information embedded in the DK response, the method shows how DK can inform the latent construct of interest and the cognitive operations underlying the response to stimuli. Using a proven recoding scheme, the LLTM could be implemented through commonly used programs such as PROC GLIMMIX. Two simulation experiments to evaluate how well the parameters can be recovered were conducted. In addition, two real data examples, from a noncognitive test of health belief assessment and a cognitive test of knowledge in diabetes, are also presented as case studies to illustrate the LLTM for DK response.     

Attaining landmark status: Rumelhart and McClelland's PDP Volumes and the Connectionist Paradigm

In 1986, David Rumelhart and James McClelland published their two‐volume work, Parallel distributed processing: Explorations in microcognition, Volume 1: Foundations and Volume 2: Psychological and biological models. These volumes soon become classic texts in both connectionism, specifically, and in the cognitive science field more generally. Drawing on oral histories, book reviews, translations, citation records, and close textual analysis, this paper analyzes how and why they attained landmark status. It argues that McClelland and Rumelhart's volumes became classics largely as a result of a confluence of rhetorical factors. Specifically, the PDP Volumes appeared at a kairotic moment in the history of connectionism, publishing dynamics that facilitated their circulation played an important role, and the volumes were ambiguous about the relationship between model and brain in a manner that enabled them to address an expansive audience. In so doing, this paper offers insight into both the history of cognitive science and rhetoric's role in establishing classic texts.