Psychopathology subtypes and symptom correlates among former prisoners of war

Psychopathology and symptom patterns were studied in 60 former prisoners-of-war (POWs) by administering standardized tests including the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), an adjustment problem checklist, and a structured clinical interview. Most POWs showed marked psychological impairment, but modal profile analysis identified two prototypic MMPI patterns, which differed in pervasiveness and type of psychopathology. Profile subtypes were defined by unique clusters of clinical symptoms and differed in confinement stress severity. The typology of symptoms argues against a homogeneous conceptualization of stress-induced disorders and suggests the need for definition of the severity and subtype of stress phenomena and individual difference factors in responding to trauma.     

Wavelength generalization and discrimination in the pigeon

This three-part study describes wavelength generalization gradients around a series of training wavelengths ranging from 480 to 645 om. Luminance was controlled for the pigeon’s spectral sensitivity. The response measure was probability of keypecking during a 2-sec stimulus presentation. Both an extinction procedure, where stimulus wavelengths occurred in 15-nm steps, and a maintained discrimination procedure, where step size was 2 to 4 nm, were used to obtain gradients. During a portion of the maintained discrimination procedure, new luminances were introduced, so that the effect of luminance level on gradient slope could be examined. Comparison of the resulting functions across training wavelengths revealed: (1) consistent differences in gradient slope in different spectral regions and (2) an increase in slope with luminance increase. The findings are related to recent electroretinographic wavelength contrast data and to psychophysical measures of wavelength discriminability.     

Effects of active student response during error correction on the acquisition and maintenance of geography facts by elementary students with learning disabilities

An alternating treatments design was used to compare the effects of Active Student Response (ASR) error correction and No Response (NR) error correction during instruction of the capitals of states and countries. Three students with learning disabilities were provided one-to-one daily instruction on four sets of 14 unknown capitals (7 ASR capitals and 7 NR capitals). Student errors during instruction on ASR capitals were immediately followed by the teacher stating the capital and the student repeating it (an active student response). Errors on NR capitals were immediately followed by the teacher stating the capital while the student visually attended to a geography card with the correct capital handwritten on it (an on-task response). During instruction each of the three students correctly stated more capitals taught with ASR instruction than he or she stated with NR error correction. Results of same-day and next-day tests show that all three students learned more capitals with ASR error correction than with NR error correction The students also correctly stated more ASR error correction capitals on 1-week maintenance tests.     

Psychotherapy with families of psychosomatic patients

Paradigmatic complexes in family psychotherapy have been indicating a revolutionary change and the creation of new paradigms for the past thirty years. Starting with the application of the general systems theory and the development of those concepts that have been emerging regarding psychosomatic illnesses we discuss the epistemological confusion created, the methodological problems and the dissociation between theory and practice. We suggest a double process of investigation of the family structure using a knowledge of the basic attitudes and the development of a psychotherapy programme within the family of the psychosomatic patient.     

Orientation-invariant transfer of training in the identification of rotated natural objects

The effects of stimulus orientation on naming were examined in two experiments in which subjects identified line drawings of natural objects following practice with the objects at the same or different orientations. Half the rotated objects were viewed in the orientation that matched the earlier presentations, and half were viewed at an orientation that mismatched the earlier presentations. Systematic effects of orientation on naming time were found during the early presentations. These effects were reduced during later presentations, and the size of this reduction did not depend on the orientation in which the object had been seen originally. The results are consistent with a dual-systems model of object identification in which initially large effects of disorientation are the result of a normalization process such as mental rotation, and in which attenuation of the effects is due to a shift from the normalization system to a feature/part-based     

A review of patient outcomes in pharmacological studies from the psychiatric literature, 1966–1993

A literature search was conducted on studies of new drugs used with patients with schizophrenia reported by U.S. and non-U.S. researchers from 1966–1993, yielding 41 U.S., and a total of 24 other non-U.S. studies, among them 11 British studies. Results of the U.S. and non-U.S. studies were pooled separately and compared. Among several comparable conditions discussed, the lack of any data on suicides in the U.S. studies was observed. For a second statistical analysis of suicide rates ‘person-years’ were calculated to adjust for differing washout durations. The results obtained include findings that the percentage of patients relapsing in U.S. studies was slightly lower (37.9%) than in non-U.S. studies (46%); the percentage of patients dropping out in U.S. studies (10.5%) was higher than in non-U.S. studies (7.6%); known location of dropout patients in U.S. studies was 1.7%, compared to 2.6% in non-U.S. studies. The most interesting finding was that no suicides were reported in U.S. studies, compared to 0.6% of patients reported in British studies. Some U.S. studies used ‘challenge doses’, such as amphetamines or L-dopa; no non-U.S. studies reported their use. Compared to U.S. studies, those by non-U.S., and particularly British, researchers appeared to report adverse events in their studies. ‘Challenge’ drugs were not used; suicides were reported. It is estimated that the probability that no patients suicided who participated in the U.S. is small—one in 500.