From top to bottom: spatial shifts of attention caused by linguistic stimuli

Interacting with the world around us involves dealing with constant information input. Thus, humans must selectively filter and focus attention on relevant aspects for the current situation. The current study investigates orientations of attention after words that do not convey spatial information in their meaning (e.g. cloud, shoe). The current study minimizes both the linguistic demands by simply presenting task-irrelevant words and the visual processing demands by implementing a simple target detection task. According to automatic response biases in the motor domain (Lachmair et al. 2011), we hypothesized that words such as cloud produce attention shifts in the direction of the typical location of the word's referent in the world (e.g. cloud up in the sky). Indeed, target detection was facilitated if target location matched the typical location of the word's referent. These findings are strong evidence for the important role of space during language processing, showing that vertical attention is modulated even by task-irrelevant verbal cues.     

Gratitude: prompting behaviours that build relationships

The emotion gratitude is argued to play a pivotal role in building and maintaining social relationships. Evidence is accumulating that links gratitude to increases in relationship satisfaction. Yet, there is currently little evidence for how gratitude does this. The present paper provides experimental evidence of gratitude facilitating relationship-building behaviours. Study 1 provides evidence that gratitude promotes social affiliation, leading one to choose to spend time with a benefactor. Study 2 offers further evidence of gratitude's ability to strengthen relationships by showing that gratitude facilitates socially inclusive behaviours, preferentially towards one's benefactor, even when those actions come at a cost to oneself.     

A comparison of diversity, frequency, and severity self-reported offending scores among female offending youth

[Correction Notice: An Erratum for this article was reported in Vol 24(3) of Psychological Assessment (see record 2012-04601-001). The article contained a number of errors which are corrected in the erratum.] Despite general consensus over the value of measuring self-reported offending, discrepancies exist in methods of scoring self-reported offending and the length of the reference period over which offending is assessed. This analysis compared the concurrent interassociations and longitudinal predictive strength of diversity, frequency, and severity offending scores measured over the past 6 months and diversity and severity scores measured "ever" between assessments. For violent offending, different scorings were highly correlated and equally predictive of adulthood offending. For nonviolent offending, there was significant continuity in diversity and severity-weighted diversity scores over the transition to adulthood but not in nonviolent frequency or severity-weighted frequency scores. Results support the use of offending diversity scores rather than offending frequency scores and highlight the importance of examining nonviolent and violent offending as separate constructs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

Correction to oudekerk, erbacher, and reppucci (2012)

Reports an error in "A comparison of diversity, frequency, and severity self-reported offending scores among female offending youth" by Barbara A. Oudekerk, Monica K. Erbacher and N. Dickon Reppucci (Psychological Assessment, Advanced Online Publication, Jan 16, 2012, np). The article contained a number of errors which are corrected in the erratum. (The following abstract of the original article appeared in record 2012-00740-001.) Despite general consensus over the value of measuring self-reported offending, discrepancies exist in methods of scoring self-reported offending and the length of the reference period over which offending is assessed. This analysis compared the concurrent interassociations and longitudinal predictive strength of diversity, frequency, and severity offending scores measured over the past 6 months and diversity and severity scores measured "ever" between assessments. For violent offending, different scorings were highly correlated and equally predictive of adulthood offending. For nonviolent offending, there was significant continuity in diversity and severity-weighted diversity scores over the transition to adulthood but not in nonviolent frequency or severity-weighted frequency scores. Results support the use of offending diversity scores rather than offending frequency scores and highlight the importance of examining nonviolent and violent offending as separate constructs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

Parental Psychological Control and Childhood Anxiety: The Mediating Role of Perceived Lack of Control

Parental psychological control has been found to relate to the development of childhood anxiety; however, this relation has not been thoroughly examined. The purpose of this study was to understand the nature of the relation between parental psychological control and anxiety symptoms in children, as well as to understand whether this relation is mediated by children’s perceived control. Questionnaires were administered to children ages 8–11. Results indicated a significant relation between parental psychological control and child anxiety symptoms. Results further indicated that this relation was fully mediated by children’s perceptions of how much control they feel they have over events in their lives. These findings suggest that although parental psychological control and a child’s perceived control both contribute to the development of anxiety, it is possible that parental psychological control contributes to the development of anxiety by affecting a child’s perception of control.     

Validation of Social Connectedness in Mainstream Society and the Ethnic Community Scales

This study examined the psychometric properties of the Social Connectedness in Mainstream Society (SCMN) and the Social Connectedness in the Ethnic Community (SCETH) Scales in two groups of ethnic minorities. We especially examined their theoretical/conceptual and empirical viability in relation to other established constructs of general social connectedness, acculturation, and enculturation. Analyses of two sets of survey data from 200 Mexican American students in California and 134 Asian international students in Minnesota supported (a) construct validity of the SCMN and the SCETH as related but distinct structures, (b) convergent and discriminant validity in relation to acculturation and enculturation, and (c) high reliability. The examination of incremental validity in predicting subjective well-being further supported their distinctive utility in addition to other established constructs of general social connectedness, acculturation, enculturation, ethnic identity, and other group orientation. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.     

Teaching Mindfulness for the Self-Care and Well-Being of Counselors-in-Training

ABSTRACT

The demands and expectations placed on counselors-in-training can make them susceptible to stress, burnout, and poor school-life balance. Therefore, counseling students could benefit from learning mindfulness techniques as self-care strategies that promote increased relaxation, coping, and stress prevention. This mixed-methods study examined graduate counseling students’ perceptions of mindfulness training to determine its impact on self-efficacy, mood, stress, and other areas of wellness. Participants reported enhanced relaxation, increased awareness of the need for self-care, better understanding of the connection between mindfulness and overall well-being, and an impact of mindfulness on other areas of their lives.     

Children's reasoning about evaluative feedback

Children's reasoning about the willingness of peers to convey accurate positive and negative performance feedback to others was investigated among a total of 179 6‐ to 11‐year‐olds from the USA and China. In Study 1, which was conducted in the USA only, participants responded that peers would be more likely to provide positive feedback than negative feedback, and this tendency was strongest among the younger children. In Study 2, the expectation that peers would preferentially disclose positive feedback was replicated among children from the USA, and was also seen among younger but not older children from China. Participants in all groups took the relationship between communication partners into account when predicting whether peers would express evaluative feedback. Results of open‐ended responses suggested cross‐cultural differences, including a greater emphasis by Chinese children on the implications of evaluative feedback for future performance, and reference by some older Chinese children to the possibility that positive feedback might make the recipient ‘too proud’.     

Counselling the (self?) diagnosed client: generative and reflective conversations

In this paper, we address the phenomenon of clients who present their concerns in the medicalised discourse of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders – Fifth Edition (DSM-5). We contextualise this phenomenon, highlighting how a ‘diagnose-and-treat’ logic increasingly pervades everyday understandings and informs people's efforts to make sense of their concerns. We relate these cultural ways of sense-making to discursive counselling practice, noting possibilities for circumventing ‘discursive capture’ through reflective and generative dialogues. We then turn to two common ways in which clients present their concerns in counselling: (1) arriving self-diagnosed or diagnosed by another professional and (2) as a family in which parents present a child as having a mental disorder. We suggest ways of moving beyond medicalised discourse via resourceful and critically reflective conversations with clients.     

Longitudinal Associations between Violence and Suicidality from Adolescence into Adulthood

The link between violence and suicide is well documented. Previous studies, however, largely rely on cross‐sectional designs or only consider violence as an antecedent of suicide. The purpose of the current study was to investigate the longitudinal relationship between violence and suicide from adolescence into young adulthood. Data were derived from Wave II (1995–1996), Wave III (2001–2002), and Wave IV (2007–2008) of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health (N = 8,966). We tested (2011–2013) a series of path analysis models in Mplus to determine the longitudinal associations between violence and suicidality. Results from the path analyses indicated that violence and suicidality mutually affect each other from adolescence into young adulthood. We found some evidence that the association between suicidality and violence was stronger for males compared to females, particularly in early and young adulthood. The current study confirms previous findings by demonstrating that violence is a risk factor for future suicide. We also extended the previous literature by demonstrating that a history of suicidality is associated with future risk for violence. Our findings highlight the importance of further integrating prevention efforts to reduce violence and suicidality during adolescence and early/young adulthood.