Integrative Complexity of 41 U.S. Presidents

Although U.S. presidents are one of the most studied groups of political figures and integrative complexity is one of the most widely used constructs in political psychology, no study to date has fully examined the integrative complexity of all U.S. presidents. The present study helps fill in that gap by scoring 41 U.S. presidents' first four State of the Union speeches for integrative complexity and then comparing these scores with a large range of available situational and personality variables. Results suggest a tendency for presidents' integrative complexity to be higher at the beginning of their first term and drop at the end. This pattern was pronounced for presidents who eventually won reelection to a second term and was markedly different for presidents who tried to gain reelection but lost. Additional analyses suggested that presidents' overall integrative complexity scores were in part accounted for by chronic differences between presidents' complexity levels. Further analyses revealed that this overall integrative complexity score was positively correlated to a set of interpersonal traits (friendliness, affiliation motive, extraversion, and wittiness) and negatively correlated with inflexibility. Discussion centers upon the causes and consequences of presidential complexity.     

Meta-analysis of the relationship between risk perception and health behavior: the example of vaccination.

BACKGROUND: Risk perceptions are central to many health behavior theories. However, the relationship between risk perceptions and behavior, muddied by instances of inappropriate assessment and analysis, often looks weak. METHOD: A meta-analysis of eligible studies assessing the bivariate association between adult vaccination and perceived likelihood, susceptibility, or severity was conducted. RESULTS: Thirty-four studies met inclusion criteria (N = 15,988). Risk likelihood (pooled r = .26), susceptibility (pooled r = .24), and severity (pooled r = .16) significantly predicted vaccination behavior. The risk perception-behavior relationship was larger for studies that were prospective, had higher quality risk measures, or had unskewed risk or behavior measures. CONCLUSIONS: The consistent relationships between risk perceptions and behavior, larger than suggested by prior meta-analyses, suggest that risk perceptions are rightly placed as core concepts in theories of health behavior.     

Working hard and working smart: motivation and ability during typical and maximum performance

The distinction between what people can do (maximum performance) and what they will do (typical performance) has received considerable theoretical but scant empirical attention in industrial-organizational psychology. This study of 138 participants performing an Internet-search task offers an initial test and verification of P. R. Sackett, S. Zedeck, and L. Fogli's (1988) model of typical versus maximum performance: Motivation--in the form of direction, level, and persistence of effort exerted--rose significantly under the maximum performance condition. Consequently, the correlation between motivation--in the form of direction and level of effort--and performance diminished, whereas the correlation between ability--in the form of declarative knowledge and procedural skills--and performance increased under the maximum performance condition. Overall, results confirm the general propositions of the model. Implications for the generalizability of these findings, theory, practice, and directions for future studies of typical and maximum performance are discussed.     

Children's metacognitive judgments in an eyewitness identification task

Two experiments examined children's metacognitive monitoring of recognition judgments within an eyewitness identification paradigm. A confidence-accuracy (CA) calibration approach was used to examine patterns of calibration, over-/underconfidence, and resolution. In Experiment 1, children (n=619, mean age=11 years 10 months) and adults (n=600) viewed a simulated crime and attempted two separate identifications from 8-person target-present or target-absent lineups given lineup instructions that manipulated witnesses choosing patterns by varying the degree of social pressure. For choosers, but not nonchoosers, meaningful CA relations were observed for adults but not for children. Experiment 2 tested a guided hypothesis disconfirmation manipulation designed to improve the realism of children's metacognitive judgments. Children (N=796, mean age=11 years 11 months) in experimental and control conditions viewed a crime and attempted two separate identifications. The manipulation had minimal impact on the CA relation for choosers and nonchoosers. In contrast to adults, children's identification confidence provides no useful guide for investigators about the likely guilt or innocence of a suspect. These experiments revealed limitations in children's metacognitive monitoring processes that have not been apparent in previous research on recall and recognition with younger children.     

Medical disorder,harm, and damage

Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics - Jerome Wakefield’s harmful dysfunction analysis (HDA) of medical disorder is an influential hybrid of naturalist and normative theories. In order to...     

Forcing and the Universe of Sets: Must We Lose Insight?

Journal of Philosophical Logic - A central area of current philosophical debate in the foundations of mathematics concerns whether or not there is a single, maximal, universe of set theory....     

Mindfulness and Acceptance-Based Group Therapy for Social Anxiety Disorder: An Open Trial

Mindfulness and Acceptance-Based Group Therapy (MAGT) for Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD) is based largely on Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT; Hayes et al., 1999), with enhanced mindfulness mostly from Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT; Segal et al., 2002). The purpose of this study was to assess the feasibility and initial effectiveness of MAGT for the treatment of SAD. Forty-two SAD patients were invited to take part in an open trial of MAGT. Participants completed measures of social anxiety, mindfulness and acceptance, depression, and rumination at pretreatment, midtreatment (6 weeks), posttreatment (12 weeks), and at a 3-month follow-up session. Twenty-nine participants completed the treatment and these participants reported that the treatment was helpful. Effect sizes for treatment completers ranged from 1.00 to 1.17 for the social anxiety symptom measures at follow-up. Intent-to-treat analyses revealed significant reductions in social anxiety, depression, and rumination and significant increases in mindfulness and acceptance, with effect sizes ranging from .65 to .76 on the social anxiety measures. This study demonstrates that MAGT is feasible and acceptable to SAD patients and provides further support for the use of mindfulness and acceptance-based interventions for the treatment of SAD.     

Christian Engagement with Public Bioethics in Britain: The Case of Human Admixed Embryos

This paper offers an assessment of the prospects for Christianengagement with public bioethical debates in a contemporaryBritish context. One recent example, the debate provoked byproposed legislation for research involving human admixed embryos,is examined briefly. It is argued that this debate has someproblematic features that are characteristic of public ethicaldebates in this context. Next, a proposal is offered as to howsuch bioethical questions may be approached from within a Christiantheological tradition (specifically, a Reformed Protestant tradition).This proposed approach makes use of four "diagnostic questions"to assess whether technological proposals and practices suchas the creation of human admixed embryos can be consistent withthe distinctive Christian narrative of creation, sin, salvationthrough Christ, and promised future hope. The final sectionoffers some reflections on how Christians and churches mightengage, on the basis of this theological approach, with publicethical debates such as the one about admixed embryos.     

Effects of retrieval practice on conceptual explicit and implicit consumer memory

Two experiments are reported that investigate the effects of retrieval practice on explicit and implicit memory for brand names. In Experiment 1, participants were exposed to a set of brand names pertaining to a range of product categories. Following this, participants practiced retrieving a subset of the brands before taking an explicit or implicit test for the brands. The explicit test, required recall of the brands in response to product category cues. The implicit test required the generation of the first brand names that came to mind. In both tests, prior retrieval produced retrieval‐induced forgetting of the non‐practiced brands. Experiment 2 replicated this effect under conditions designed to reduce explicit contamination. In addition, Experiment 2 found that increasing the amount of retrieval practice also increased the magnitude of retrieval‐induced forgetting on the explicit but not the implicit test. Implications for advertising and marketing are considered. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Tracking the R‐to‐K shift: Changes in memory awareness across repeated tests

Participants studied lists of rare words and their definitions (e.g. the fleshy area at the base of the thumb = thenar). They were then given recognition tests in which they were shown the definitions and asked to identify the target from a choice of four. Participants categorised each decision as a remember, know, familiar or guess response and rated their confidence on a seven‐point scale. Recognition tests were administered 5 minutes, 4 weeks, 8 weeks and 6 months after study. Remember responses dominated recognition on the first test but decreased on subsequent tests, whereas know response increased across successive tests. Familiar and guess responses peaked on the second test and then declined. Remember and know responses were associated with higher levels of accuracy and confidence than familiar and guess responses. The findings are consistent with the remember‐to‐know (R‐to‐K) shift and show the trajectory of changes in memory awareness across repeated tests. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.