Infants learn about objects from statistics and people

In laboratory experiments, infants are sensitive to patterns of visual features that co-occur (e.g., Fiser & Aslin, 2002). Once infants learn the statistical regularities, however, what do they do with that knowledge? Moreover, which patterns do infants learn in the cluttered world outside of the laboratory? Across 4 experiments, we show that 9-month-olds use this sensitivity to make inferences about object properties. In Experiment 1, 9-month-old infants expected co-occurring visual features to remain fused (i.e., infants looked longer when co-occurring features split apart than when they stayed together). Forming such expectations can help identify integral object parts for object individuation, recognition, and categorization. In Experiment 2, we increased the task difficulty by presenting the test stimuli simultaneously with a different spatial layout from the familiarization trials to provide a more ecologically valid condition. Infants did not make similar inferences in this more distracting test condition. However, Experiment 3 showed that a social cue did allow inferences in this more difficult test condition, and Experiment 4 showed that social cues helped infants choose patterns among distractor patterns during learning as well as during test. These findings suggest that infants can use feature co-occurrence to learn about objects and that social cues shape such foundational learning in distraction-filled environments.     

A dimensional approach to maternal attachment state of mind: relations to maternal sensitivity and maternal autonomy support

The aim of this study was to examine the developmental significance of the newly developed dimensional approach to attachment state of mind by investigating its capacity to predict individual differences in the quality of two caregiving behaviors-maternal sensitivity and maternal autonomy support-that are linked to numerous important child outcomes. Seventy-one upper-middle-class, predominantly French-speaking and Caucasian dyads participated in 3 home visits (34 girls). The Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) was administered when the infants were 8 months old, maternal sensitivity was assessed when they were 12 months old, and maternal autonomy support was assessed at 15 months. The results revealed that, above and beyond SES, maternal sensitivity was negatively related to the dismissing dimension of the AAI, whereas maternal autonomy support was negatively linked to the preoccupied/unresolved dimension. In contrast, the traditional AAI categories were not significantly linked to parenting. These results speak to the relevance of using a continuous approach to attachment state of mind when predicting individual differences in specific caregiving behaviors.     

The effect of a career development programme based on the Hope-Action Theory: Hope to Work for refugees in British Columbia

The purpose of this study was to assess the proximal and distal outcomes of a career development training programme for refugees that was developed based on the Hope-Action Theory (HAT). Adopting an experimental design, proximal outcomes such as self-efficacy, hope-action competencies, job search clarity, and career adaptability were assessed three times; and distal outcomes including employment status, job-seeking activities, career growth, hopeful career state, work engagement, and job satisfaction were assessed once at nine months. We used a two-way mixed effects analysis of covariance and a serial mediation analysis. The programme was effective in developing hope-action competencies, general self-efficacy, and job search clarity. The experimental group participants exhibited higher hopeful career state and work engagement. A serial mediation model of the HAT-based intervention predicting job satisfaction was found. Limitations and future directions are discussed.     

Remorse in psychotic violent offenders: An overvalued idea?

Expressing remorse – or not – appears to influence criminal justice outcomes, but preliminary exploration of both judicial and psychological concepts suggests they lack clarity. We asked the following questions: does psychosis impair capacity for, or expression of, remorse for a homicide or other serious harm to others? Is failure to express remorse for an offence associated with recidivism? We conducted systematic reviews of empirical literature on remorse for serious violence while psychotic, and on relationships between remorse and reoffending regardless of mental state. No articles on remorse for homicide or other serious violence while psychotic were identified. There is weak evidence that lack of remorse is associated with reoffending generally, but nothing specific to psychosis. The literature is strong enough to support a case for research into valid measurement of remorse for offending, associations of such measures with recidivism, and whether a change in remorse can be effected – or matters. It is not strong enough to support reliance on perceptions of the presence or absence of remorse as a basis for judicial decisions.     

Forum on teaching Asian religions in the American South

This series of three essays by educators from Georgia, Texas, and Alabama examines teaching Asian Religions in the American South. Through reflection on individual experience, each essay offers concrete strategies for the classroom that can be utilized by fellow educators working in the American South, but can also inform pedagogy in other North American regions. Introducing the idea of the “imagined student,” Esaki discusses teaching African American students and tailoring Asian religions courses towards their interests by producing positive buy‐in, while also acknowledging their potential isolation from White peers interested in similar topics. Mikles builds on Esaki's idea of the imagined student to discuss her own experience teaching Mexican and Vietnamese American students in Texas, while presenting specific strategies to overcome preconceived educator bias about students in Southern classrooms. Battaglia closes out the series by suggesting the use of a phenomenological approach for students to sympathetically enter into an Asian religious worldview. She offers specific exercises that can help students unpack their own assumptions – their “invisible backpack” – and approach Asian religions on their own terms.     

Therapeutic progress and symptom elevation in treating dismissive attachment: A case study

A dismissive or avoidant attachment style can present clinical challenges in psychotherapy as the attachment style may interfere with the development of a constructive therapeutic alliance and impact the level of disclosure, expressions of distress, and risks for premature drop-out. This paper reports a naturalistic case study and offers an in-depth examination of a treatment with a client with dismissive attachment, including a detailed examination of relational interventions and countertransference struggles. Furthermore, this paper considers the notable differences between quantitative scores on a well-validated, practice-based clinical symptom inventory and the qualitative outcomes for this client to offer clinical and research implications in treatment with dismissive attachment.     

PTSD arousal and depression symptoms associated with increased right-sided parietal EEG asymmetry

Researchers have proposed that depression and particular types of anxiety are associated with unique patterns of regional brain activation. The authors examined the relationship among posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), anxiety, and depressive symptoms and frontal, temporal, and parietal EEG alpha asymmetry in female Vietnam War nurse veterans. The results indicate that PTSD arousal symptoms are associated with increased right-sided parietal activation. However, the combination of arousal, depression, and their interaction explain more than twice the variance in parietal asymmetry compared with arousal alone. The results support the contention that the association between anxiety and right-sided posterior activation is specific to the anxious arousal subtype. These findings underscore the importance of isolating, both theoretically and statistically, emotional subcomponents in studies of regional brain activation.     

Predicting rape events: The influence of intimate partner violence history,condom use resistance,and heavy drinking

Sexual aggression perpetration is a public health epidemic, and burgeoning research aims to delineate risk factors for individuals who perpetrate completed rape. The current study investigated physical and psychological intimate partner violence (IPV) history, coercive condom use resistance (CUR), and heavy episodic drinking (HED) as prospective risk factors for rape perpetration. Young adult men (N = 430) ages 21–30 completed background measures as well as follow‐up assessments regarding rape events perpetrated over the course of 3 months. Negative binomial regression with log link function was utilized to examine whether these risk factors interacted to prospectively predict completed rape. There was a significant interaction between physical IPV and HED predicting completed rape; men with high HED and greater physical IPV histories perpetrated more completed rapes during follow‐up than men with low HED at the same level of physical IPV. Moreover, psychological IPV and coercive CUR interacted to predict completed rape such that men with high coercive CUR and greater psychological IPV histories perpetrated more completed rapes throughout the follow‐up period than men with low coercive CUR at the same level of psychological IPV. Findings suggest targets for intervention efforts and highlight the need to understand the topography of different forms of aggression perpetration.     

Prospective memory,working memory,planning, and attention in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder: A comparative study

There is a need to study prospective memory (PM) and its relationship with aspects of frontal lobe functioning in schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. The study aims to investigate event‐based (EB) and time‐based (TB) PM functioning in the two groups, and its association with working memory, planning, and attention. A word categorisation task was developed to assess PM functioning among 90 participants (schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and a control group). Frontal lobe functioning was assessed using Tower of London, N‐Back test, and triads test. Mean comparisons revealed significantly higher impairment in TB PM in comparison to EB PM in both the clinical groups. Significant relationship between PM and frontal lobe impairment was found. Relationship between PM and frontal lobe deficits in the clinical groups emphasises the need to include its assessment at an early stage and to develop PM rehabilitation strategies to improve the quality of living.     

Incidental learning in a multisensory environment across childhood

Multisensory information has been shown to modulate attention in infants and facilitate learning in adults, by enhancing the amodal properties of a stimulus. However, it remains unclear whether this translates to learning in a multisensory environment across middle childhood, and particularly in the case of incidental learning. One hundred and eighty‐one children aged between 6 and 10 years participated in this study using a novel Multisensory Attention Learning Task (MALT). Participants were asked to respond to the presence of a target stimulus whilst ignoring distractors. Correct target selection resulted in the movement of the target exemplar to either the upper left or right screen quadrant, according to category membership. Category membership was defined either by visual‐only, auditory‐only or multisensory information. As early as 6 years of age, children demonstrated greater performance on the incidental categorization task following exposure to multisensory audiovisual cues compared to unisensory information. These findings provide important insight into the use of multisensory information in learning, and particularly on incidental category learning. Implications for the deployment of multisensory learning tasks within education across development will be discussed.