Self‐management of varied responding in three students with autism

One of the aspects of autism that is often held up as a hallmark of the disorder is a desire for sameness. Students with autism often show a marked lack of variability in language and play skills. The same behavioral patterns are repeated perseveratively, rather than attempting new patterns. In the current study, students diagnosed with autism were taught to self‐manage varied responding. Using a multiple baseline design, three children with autism were taught to self‐monitor and then to self‐manage in order to increase variability in play and social language. All three students demonstrated marked increases in variability during self‐management phases. These gains were maintained at one month follow‐up. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The super-ordinate nature of the psychopathy checklist-revised

Psychopathy, while perhaps the earliest and most recognized personality disorder, is the subject of intense debate about its nature and measurement. The most recent proposal on its structural nature suggests that it is a multifaceted construct, made up of at least four dimensions reflecting Interpersonal, Affective, Lifestyle, and Antisocial anomalies (Hare & Neumann, 2005, 2006). These dimensions are significantly interrelated, suggesting that they are indicators for a super-ordinate factor. The nature of this higher-order factor may reflect the unifying feature which comprehensively defines the disorder. To examine this super-factor, the current study used several very large data sets of male (N = 4865) and female (N = 1099) offenders, and forensic psychiatric patients (N = 965), who were assessed with the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; Hare, 2003). Structural equation modeling results indicated that the four first-order factor dimensions could be explained by a single second-order cohesive super-factor.     

Anxiety moderates the interplay between cognitive and affective processing

Evidence suggests that focus of attention and cognitive load may each affect emotional processing and that individual differences in anxiety moderate such effects. We examined (a) fear-potentiated startle (FPS) under threat-focused (TF), low-load/alternative-set (LL/AS), and high-load/alternative-set (HL/AS) conditions and (b) the moderating effect of trait anxiety on FPS across these conditions. As predicted, redirecting attentional focus away from threat cues and increasing cognitive load reduced FPS. However, the moderating effects of anxiety were specific to the LL/AS condition. Whereas FPS was comparable for high-anxiety and low-anxiety subjects in the TF and HL/AS conditions, FPS was significantly greater for high-anxiety than for low-anxiety subjects in the LL/AS condition. These results suggest that affective processing requires attentional resources and that exaggerated threat processing in anxious individuals relates to direction of attention rather than emotional reactivity per se.     

Learning your way around town: how virtual taxicab drivers learn to use both layout and landmark information

By having subjects drive a virtual taxicab through a computer-rendered town, we examined how landmark and layout information interact during spatial navigation. Subject-drivers searched for passengers, and then attempted to take the most efficient route to the requested destinations (one of several target stores). Experiment 1 demonstrated that subjects rapidly learn to find direct paths from random pickup locations to target stores. Experiment 2 varied the degree to which landmark and layout cues were preserved across two successively learned towns. When spatial layout was preserved, transfer was low if only target stores were altered, and high if both target stores and surrounding buildings were altered, even though in the latter case all local views were changed. This suggests that subjects can rapidly acquire a survey representation based on the spatial layout of the town and independent of local views, but that subjects will rely on local views when present, and are harmed when associations between previously learned landmarks are disrupted. We propose that spatial navigation reflects a hierarchical system in which either layout or landmark information is sufficient for orienting and wayfinding; however, when these types of cues conflict, landmarks are preferentially used.     

Narcissism and Cardiovascular Reactivity to Rejection Imagery1

This study examined the interactive effects of imagined rejection and narcissism on cardiovascular reactivity (CVR). Participants completed measures of overt narcissism (Narcissistic Personality Inventory, NPI; Raskin & Hall, 1979 ), overt–covert narcissism ( Margolis & Thomas, 1980 ), and trait self‐esteem. They then imagined 2 scenarios culminating in either interpersonal acceptance or rejection. Systolic (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP) and heart rate (HR) were assessed before, during, and after the imagery. Overt–covert narcissism was positively associated with task increases in SBP and DBP and recovery elevation of HR following rejection, but not acceptance. Similar effects on SBP were found for the Entitlement/Exploitativeness dimension of the NPI. Lower self‐esteem predicted greater task increases in SBP, DBP, and HR across conditions. Implications for health are discussed.     

Infants’ listening in multitalker environments: Effect of the number of background talkers

Infants are often spoken to in the presence of background sounds, including speech from other talkers. In the present study, we compared 5- and 8.5-month-olds’ abilities to recognize their own names in the context of three different types of background speech: that of a single talker, multitalker babble, and that of a single talker played backward. Infants recognized their names at a 10-dB signal-to-noise ratio in the multiple-voice condition but not in the single-voice (nonreversed) condition, a pattern opposite to that of typical adult performance. Infants similarly failed to recognize their names when the background talker’s voice was reversed—that is, unintelligible, but with speech-like acoustic properties. These data suggest that infants may have difficulty segregating the components of different speech streams when those streams are acoustically too similar. Alternatively, infants’ attention may be drawn to the time-varying acoustic properties associated with a single talker’s speech, causing difficulties when a single talker is the competing sound.     

Development and initial reliability and validity of a new measure of distorted maternal representations: The Mother–Infant Relationship Scale

Distorted maternal representations (DMRs)—mother's ideas, understanding, and feelings about the infant—shape early interaction and the emerging relationship. Distorted interactions reportedly affect infant attachment and socioemotional development and may be associated with maternal early adversity and trauma. Limited measures are available that could be used as screening tools of DMRs. The aims of this study were to (a) describe the development of the Mother–Infant Relationship Scale (MIRS) and (b) to evaluate its psychometric properties. The development and validation of the MIRS closely followed standard guidelines for the development of psychometric tests. Psychometric properties were examined across two samples: 78 adult psychiatric patients with features of borderline personality and 86 individuals from a nonclinical sample (N = 164). The scale demonstrated excellent internal consistency (Cronbach's α = .91) for the clinical sample and adequate internal consistency (.78) for the nonclinical sample, excellent test-retest reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient = .81), and good concurrent validity with an observational (Pearson's correlation coefficients = −.35 to −.54) and a representational measure (.53). Factor analysis revealed three components: DMRs specific to (a) maternal hostility/rejection of the infant, (b) issues about parenting/attachment, and (c) anxiety/helplessness about infant care. Findings suggest that the MIRS is a reliable and valid screening tool of DMRs. Potential uses in clinical and research settings are discussed.