The recovering female alcoholic: A family affair

Supported by a review of relevant literature and a case study, the author argues that family therapy intervention enhances the likelihood of a female alcoholic's positive prognosis. With a basis in systems theory, family therapy views the family as a system and, hence, perceives the alcoholism as a symptom of that family. A profile of the female alcoholic, how her drinking affects her family, and the role that family therapy plays in the recovery process are examined.     

The role of fairness orientation and supervisor attributions in absence disciplinary decisions

The present study investigated the role of the work value of fairness and attributions regarding the causes of absence in supervisor disciplinary decisions. It was hypothesized that supervisors who valued fairness, and those who made internal attributions regarding the cause of a particular absence incident, render more severe disciplinary decisions than supervisors who value fairness less, and who make external attributions. Furthermore, it was hypothesized that the degree to which supervisors valued fairness moderates the relationship between external attributions and the severity of disciplinary decisions. Using a policy capturing approach, results were consistent with predictions. Implications of the results for research and practice are discussed.     

The modification of auditory hallucinations

The ABAB withdrawal design was used to document the effectiveness of a behavioral treatment package in reducing the duration of auditory hallucinations of a chronically mentally ill inpatient. Results revealed clear functional control of the treatment package over the occurrence of the subject's auditory hallucinations during a 2-hr time period.     

New directions for the education of clinical psychologists: The primary care setting,the VA's PRIME program,and the in-depth generalist model

As part of this special issue on psychology in primary care settings, we describe the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA's) new approach to education for practice in the primary care setting and we concurrently address some general issues related to the education of clinical psychologists for practice in this setting. In this article we argue that the primary care psychologist, in parallel with the generalist in medicine, must have a strong generic background in clinical psychology in order to gain the broad range of clinical skills necessary to function effectively as an in-depth generalist (IDG) who is capable of addressing the variety of psychological issues that emerge in the primary care setting. The IDG model of professional practice, which we believe is best suited for primary care/managed care settings, requires extensive training in generic clinical skills and increased time devoted to its implementation at both the predoctoral and the postdoctoral levels.     

Quantitative measurement of observed workload in the analysis of aircrew performance

A methodology for the quantitative evaluation of observed workload was proposed. The model was designed to provide point estimations of observed workload at any time during the performance of a set of tasks. The model was also designed to provide information about the task-scheduling strategies used to complete a set of tasks. The proposed model was then tested with data from a full mission flight simulation. The model predictions correlated significantly with expert ratings of workload management made during the flight simulation. The model was also able to distinguish between low- and high-performing aircrews when performance was based on the number of errors made during flight simulations.     

Vibrotactile pattern discrimination and communality at several body sites

In a series of experiments, the effects of spatial layout on vibrotactile pattern perception were explored by testing the ability to discriminate between two sequentially presented patterns that share active elements in the same spatial locations. Two-dimensional displays were used in order to examine the functional relationship between discrimination performance and patterncommunality, defined as the sharing elements, on different body sites. Accuracy of discrimination judgments was inversely proportional to communality, regardless of the number of pattern elements. For compact arrays fitted to the finger, palm, and thigh, the effects of communality appeared equivalent. The similarity between finger and thigh functions is remarkable, considering the dramatic differences between these sites in receptor components and structure. When these data were compared with those from arrays with distributed contactors, performance was substantially better with well-separated pattern elements. Such findings help to explicate how information from apposed patterns can best be delivered to the skin through tactile communication systems.     

Are microsaccades responsible for the gap effect?

Extinguishing a fixation point shortly before, or concurrently with, the onset of a peripheral visual target reduces the latency of saccades to that target. Saslow (1967) hypothesized that thisgap effect might occur because fixation point offsets reduce the incidence of corrective microsaccades with an associated saccadic refractory period. In the present study, a robust gap effect was obtained. However, using a Purkinje image eyetracker with 1 arcmin of resolution, we found that fixation point offsets had no effect on the occurrence of microsaccades and that the occurrence of microsaccades had no impact on the magnitude of the gap effect. Microsaccades therefore do not appear to play any part in the production of the gap effect.     

A behavioral link between the oculomotor and cardiovascular systems

Although the eyes and the heart serve very different purposes, each receives autonomic innervation. Capitalizing on recent theoretical and technological innovations in the understanding and assessment of oculomotor and cardiovascular behavior, three experiments measured behavioral covariation between the oculomotor and cardiovascular systems. Measures of dark focus and dark vergence indexed oculomotor tone, and the spectral decomposition of variations in heart rate indexed cardiovascular control mechanisms. In Experiment 1, individual differences in cardiovascular parameters could predict individuals’ dark vergence (R²=.806) but not their dark focus (R²=.404). In Experiment 2, the same parameters were measured from subjects who experience either panic attacks (n=11) or blood phobia (n=9). Heart rate was positively correlated with dark vergence and the two subject groups were separable based on both oculomotor and cardiovascular variables. Using a within-subjects approach, Experiment 3 found that both dark vergence and dark focus tended to be nearer during sympathetic dominance of the heart than during parasympathetic dominance, within-subjects variations in cardiovascular parameters could predict dark focus, and between-subjects variations in interbeat intervals could predict dark vergence. Shared patterns of autonomic activation may be responsible for this eye-heart link.