Randomized controlled trial of a brief problem-orientation intervention for suicidal ideation

Empirical evaluations suggest that problem orientation, the initial reaction to problems, differentiates suicidal youth from nonchnical controls and nonideating psychiatric controls. One promising area for intervention with suicidal youth relates to enhancing this specific coping skill. Nonclinical participants (N = 110) with active suicidal ideation were randomly assigned to receive a brief problem-orientation intervention or a control procedure. The current study evaluated the benefits of a brief prevention intervention based on the Problem-Solving Therapy model. Exposure to a brief video intervention regarding problem solving and coping skills was sufficient to elicit significant decreases in suicidal ideation and depression, but the intervention did not elicit improvements in problem orientation or other problem-solving abilities. These findings provide preliminary support for a brief, video-based problem-solving and coping skills module. However, considerable work in developing secondary prevention interventions remains.     

Human biological and nonbiological point-light movements: Creation and validation of the dataset

Human action perception is so powerful that people can identify movement efficiently in the absence of pictorial information, such as in point-light displays. Interest is growing in this type of stimulus for research in neuroscience. This interest stems from the advantage of separating the component of pure human action kinematics from other pictorial information, such as facial expression and muscle contraction. Although several groups have previously developed datasets of human point-light actions, due to the lack of datasets composed of daily actions with short durations, we developed 20 biological and 40 control (scrambled) point-light movements by using the technique of recording people wearing reflector patches. The videos are about 1 s long. Subsequently, we performed a judgment task in which 100 participants (50 male and 50 female) evaluated each video according to three categories: human action resemblance, performed action, and gender of actor. We present the mean scores of each evaluation for each video, and further propose a selection of the most suitable videos to be used as human point-light action displays and scrambled point-light displays for control. Finally, we discuss our findings on the gender attributions of the point-light displays.     

Five Dimensions of Faith and Spiritually of Older African American Women Transitioning Out of Homelessness

Background Homelessness among older African American women is emerging as a serious social problem. The increasing cost of living, diminishing community resources, and shrinking retirement benefits, as well as reduced social services are resulting in greater numbers of older minority women becoming homeless. Aims This investigation explores the relevance of faith and spirituality to an advocacy assessment designed to help participants resolve issues that operate as barriers to their leaving and staying out of homelessness. Methods A substudy of a larger research and development project was undertaken, in which qualitative interview methods were used to illuminate the role of faith and spirituality resources in the lives of 84 older homeless African American women. Comparative thematic analysis of illustrative cases was undertaken to better understand the role of faith and spirituality in the women’s lives and in how they used faith and spirituality in coping with homelessness. Findings Five dimensions of faith and spirituality, (a) identity and beliefs; (b) affiliation and membership; (c) involvement; (d) practices; and (e) benefits, served as promising resources in understanding life spaces of homeless minority women and identified promising advocacy strategies. Two cases describe the realities of homelessness for older minority women endeavoring to transition out of homelessness and illustrate how faith and spirituality can buffer stress, facilitate coping, and sustain motivation. Conclusions How older homeless African American women use their faith and spiritual resources to cope with demands of homelessness, challenges of transition, and recovery from the multiple traumas resulting from being homeless makes the assessment of faith and spirituality an important part of the advocacy process.     

Mobile phone mood charting for adolescents

Mobile phones may provide a useful and engaging platform for supporting therapeutic services working with adolescents. This paper examines the potential benefits of the mobile phone for self-charting moods in comparison to existing methods in current practice. The paper describes a mobile phone application designed by the authors which allows adolescents to record moods on their personal mobile phones. The authors propose that a personal mobile device is more suitable for adolescents than other devices. A pilot study with a non-clinical adolescent group in schools comparing a mobile and a paper diary is presented, along with discussion and analysis of the results. The main finding of the study was that compliance was significantly higher on mobile phones than paper, and the task was not found to be any more difficult to complete using mobile phones than with paper charts. A number of salient issues requiring further research are also identified.     

Learning in a task of complex auditory streaming and identification

Adult humans were studied for improvements in their ability to segregate natural whole speech in background noise, in 6 test sessions spaced with a very wide range of inter-session interval (ISI) ranging from minutes to weeks apart so as to examine the effect of this parameter on initial (early) and late components of perceptual learning. Improvements were found even with spacings of 3 weeks between the punctate task sessions. All subjects showed similar total learning amounts but there were sex- and ISI-dependent differences in learning patterns, which we indexed by dividing the overall exponentially-decreasing learning pattern into an early phase between the first two sessions and a later phase between the second and sixth sessions. Males tested at all ISIs and females tested at short (2, 5 and 15 min) and long (1–21 days) ISIs showed small amounts of early-phase learning and large amounts of late-phase learning. However, females tested at intermediate (30 min and 1 h) ISIs showed only early learning, i.e., faster learning given that the total learning was the same. This sex- and ISI-specific deviant pattern could be changed to the standard pattern by interposing an overnight interruption that included sleep amongst test sessions. Thus, improvement in this complex auditory streaming and identification task can occur even with very brief and widely-spaced exposure, generally through a standard pattern of slower overall learning, but also through a sex- and ISI-specific deviant pattern of very rapid early learning which can be modulated by interposed delay unlike the standard pattern.     

Is personal growth initiative associated with later life satisfaction in Chinese college students? A 15‐week prospective analysis

Personal growth initiative (PGI) is presumed to foster positive change leading to positive psychological adjustment. Accordingly, in this study we examined PGI as a predictor of life satisfaction 15 weeks later in a sample of 152 Chinese college students. Time 1 PGI was found to explain a significant amount of unique variance in Time 2 life satisfaction, even after controlling for Time 1 life satisfaction and Time 2 PGI. Specifically, (lower) intentional behavior and planfulness at baseline emerged as significant predictors of later life satisfaction. No evidence was found indicating that life satisfaction at Time 1 accounted for any significant amount of unique variance in PGI processes at Time 2, after controlling for baseline PGI processes and concurrent life satisfaction. Overall, the present findings are the first to demonstrate the importance of PGI as a prospective predictor of positive psychological adjustment in adults.     

Emergency Department Youth Patients With Suicidal Ideation or Attempts: Predicting Suicide Attempts Through 18 Months of Follow‐Up

This prospective study of suicidal emergency department (ED) patients (ages 10–18) examined the timing, cumulative probability, and predictors of suicide attempts through 18 months of follow‐up. The cumulative probability of attempts was as follows: .15 at 6 months, .22 at 1 year, and .24 by 18 months. One attempt was fatal, yielding a death rate of .006. Significant predictors of suicide attempt risk included a suicide attempt at ED presentation (vs. suicidal ideation only), nonsuicidal self‐injurious behavior, and low levels of delinquent symptoms. Results underscore the importance of both prior suicide attempts and nonsuicidal self‐harm as risk indicators for future and potentially lethal suicide attempts.