Relevance of the listener’s motor system in recalling phrases enacted by the speaker

Memory for series of action phrases improves in listeners when speakers accompany each phrase with congruent gestures compared to when speakers stay still. Studies reveal that the listeners’ motor system, at encoding, plays a crucial role in this enactment effect. We present two experiments on gesture observation, which explored the role of the listeners’ motor system at recall. The participants listened to the phrases uttered by a speaker in two conditions in each experiment. In the gesture condition, the speaker uttered the phrases with accompanying congruent gestures, and in the no-gesture condition, the speaker stayed still while uttering the phrases. The participants were then invited, in both conditions of the experiments, to perform a motor task while recalling the phrases proffered by the speaker. The results revealed that the advantage of observing gestures on memory disappears if the listeners move at recall arms and hands (same motor effectors moved by the speaker, Experiment 1a), but not when the listeners move legs and feet (different motor effectors from those moved by the speaker, Experiment 1b). The results suggest that the listeners’ motor system is involved not only during the encoding of action phrases uttered by a speaker but also when recalling these phrases during retrieval.     

The effects of retention intervals on self- and proxy reports of purchases

Two studies explored underlying differences between self- and proxy reports and determining whether proxy reporters process and retrieve information the same way self-reporters do. In both studies, participants recorded their own and a target person's incidental purchases for two weeks and then returned, either immediately or one-week after the diary-keeping period, for two recall tests. These tests pertained to self-and proxy purchases. The reported items were scored against the recorded ones. In Study 1, the data indicate that proxies tend to recall more typical events than do self-reporters immediately following the diary-keeping period. However, after a delay of one week, both proxy and self-reporters tended to report typical items. These findings suggest that, at least initially, self- and proxy reporters process the information differently but that after one week they process it similarly. Study 2 employed a method that was identical to that of Study 1 except that participants were given a recognition test. The verbal protocols from the recognition test indicate that participants used different strategies to determine who made the purchase. Whereas participants focused on perceptual details surrounding the event when identifying their own purchases, proxies engaged in various strategies to identify their spouses' purchases.     

Psychoanalytic psychotherapy and student counselling

This paper explores the experience of a psychotherapist working in a university counselling service, indicating the contribution I think a psychoanalytic orientation can make to this kind of work. The exposed ‘coal face’ nature of the work is illustrated, and some of the psychotherapeutic implications of working within a large organisation discussed. There is an exploration of institutional dynamics which bear directly upon the psychotherapist, in terms of what it is possible to provide, and of professional self-preservation and self-esteem. Analysis of the uses made of the counselling service is seen as a contribution towards enabling the service to represent properly itself and its concerns within the institution.     

The Imagination Library Program: Increasing Parental Reading Through Book Distribution

Research has established a connection between print exposure and reading skills. The authors examined the impact of book access on print exposure via a monthly book distribution program. At 10 months of implementation, 170 families enrolled in the Imagination Library Program in Syracuse, New York responded to a survey. Results indicated that length of enrollment was associated with frequency of child-directed reading and story discussion, even when controlling for child age, gender, income, parental education, race, parental nation of birth, and primary language spoken at home. Consequently, the authors conceptualize such programs as catalysts for developing early literacy skills by increasing child-directed reading.     

Exploring the meaning of participation in a community art project: A case study on the Seeming project

In Australia, community art has drawn significant research attention in regard to its potential as a community development strategy. Despite the fact that researchers have presented evidence for the positive developmental outcomes of participation in community art projects, a gap remains in understanding how and why people's participation in a community art project can lead to those positive outcomes. This research explored the meaning of participation in a community art project from the vantage point of the people who experience it. Ten participants were interviewed about their participation in a community art project (The Seeming) held in Bendigo, Australia. Following thematic analyses we identified three themes of how participants viewed their participation in a community arts project. These themes included giving voice to the silenced, creation of social connections and challenging and reproducing stereotypes. Participation means coming together and the findings highlight the potential of community arts projects for promoting the creation of new relationships and new stories about community. However, there are also problematic stories about self and others that were not deconstructed. It is argued that the settings in which different groups join can be meaningfully extended if there is an explicit concern with consciousness raising and deconstruction of normative stories. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Age Differences and Similarities in Identity Distress Following the Katrina Disaster: Theoretical and Applied Implications of Erikson��s Theory

This study examined predictions from Erikson??s lifespan developmental theory in the context of severe disaster exposure. Relationships among traumatic stress exposure, age, identity distress, and posttraumatic stress (PTS) symptoms were explored among 401 individuals (age 18?C86, mean = 32.83, SD = 14.1 years) exposed to Hurricane Katrina. Traumatic exposure experiences were related to identity distress ratings, but results suggested that the association was a function of PTS symptoms. Identity distress was negatively correlated with age, but the association between identity distress and age was moderated by the level of PTS symptoms. Identity distress was associated with PTS symptoms even while controlling for general psychological symptoms. The utility of the identity distress construct and theoretical implications for identity research in the wake of disaster are discussed.     

Psychometric Properties of the O’Kelly Women’s Belief Scales

Wolfe and Naimark (Using rational-emotive therapy effectively. Plenum, New York, 265–301, 1991) claim that women, through sex-role stereotyping, may develop sex-role beliefs that are not helpful. However, there is a dearth of research in this area with one of the major problems being the lack of an instrument to measure such sex-role beliefs. To date the Bem Sex Role Inventory has been the main instrument used to measure gender schema. As it has been criticised extensively, a new instrument to measure gender schema was proposed. The O’Kelly Women’s Belief Scales was therefore developed within a rational-emotive behaviour therapy framework, reflecting the belief processes of demandingness, awfulising, low frustration tolerance and negative self rating. Following the development of the scale, questionnaires were sent to 2,562 women working at a large, multi-site, teaching hospital. Data from the 974 respondents resulted in the development of five subscales of the O’Kelly Women’s Belief Scales: General Traditional Beliefs, Demands, Awfulising, Low Frustration Tolerance and Negative Self Rating. Each of these subscales loaded on one factor and had high internal consistency. The scales were shown to have test–retest reliability and concurrent, divergent and construct validity.     

Measuring social problem solving using the Spanish version for Hispanics of the Social Problem Solving Inventory-Revised

This study investigated the internal consistency, factor structure, and concurrent validity of the Social Problem Solving Inventory-Spanish Version for Hispanics (SPSI-R-Hispanic), a translation of the Social Problem Solving Inventory-Revised (SPSI-R; D'Zurilla, Nezu & Maydeu-Olivares, 2002), in a North American sample of 325 Spanish speaking Hispanics. The scales of the SPSI-R-Hispanic demonstrated good internal consistency reliability. The hypothesized factor model of the SPSI-R provided a good fit to the data. SPSI-R-Hispanic scores demonstrated concurrent validity in a multiple regression analysis, explaining 32% of incremental variability in psychological well-being scores. Gender differences were replicated, where men had higher positive problem orientation and rational problem solving scores and women had higher negative problem orientation scores.     

Does Needs Satisfaction Matter for Psychological and Subjective Wellbeing in Developing Countries: A Mixed-Methods Illustration from Bangladesh and Thailand

The paper uses qualitative and quantitative data collected by the Wellbeing in Developing Countries ESRC research group in Bangladesh and Thailand to explore the extent to which objective need deprivation predicts subjective and psychological wellbeing, controlling for location, socio-economic status, and gender. The regression analysis is triangulated with qualitative analysis of three illustrative case studies to explore why people experiencing great need deprivation nevertheless report high subjective and psychological wellbeing and propose factors that might support their resilience. The paper reports perhaps unsurprisingly that need deprivation was lower in Thailand than Bangladesh, and subjective and psychological wellbeing higher, with the exception of life satisfaction which was higher in Bangladesh. While goal attainment was significantly associated with affect and life satisfaction in both countries, in Thailand life satisfaction and goal attainment were negatively correlated (−.334), so the more goals respondents felt they had attained, the less satisfied they were. These apparent anomalies are explored further using data from the case studies. The findings confirm that although measures of subjective and psychological wellbeing are correlated, they are not substitutable. For example, subjective wellbeing, especially positive affect, is more influenced by need deprivation than psychological wellbeing, while psychological wellbeing is more influenced by demographic factors, especially in Thailand. Finally, the paper discusses whether the distinct relationships of subjective and psychological wellbeing with need deprivation and income have any implications for policymakers.     

The relative contribution of scene context and target features to visual search in scenes

Many experiments have shown that knowing a targets visual features improves search performance over knowing the target name. Other experiments have shown that scene context can facilitate object search in natural scenes. In this study, we investigated how scene context and target features affect search performance. We examined two possible sources of information from scene context—the scenes gist and the visual details of the scene—and how they potentially interact with target-feature information. Prior to commencing search, participants were shown a scene and a target cue depicting either a picture or the category name (or no-information control). Using eye movement measures, we investigated how the target features and scene context influenced two components of search: early attentional guidance processes and later verification processes involved in the identification of the target. We found that both scene context and target features improved guidance, but that target features also improved speed of target recognition. Furthermore, we found that a scenes visual details played an important role in improving guidance, much more so than did the scenes gist alone.