Performance schemata in dyadic competition and cooperation

We examined performance schemata in dyadic competitive and cooperative situations, that is, the ways people perceive the relationship between performance level, capacity level, and degree of motivation in situations in which two people confront or collaborate with one another. In Experiment 1, 104 participants judged the possible performance of Person A, whose ability and motivation levels were communicated, competing against Person B, whose ability and motivation levels were also communicated. When judging A's performance, participants seemed first to assess the difficulty of the task facing A and second to integrate information relative to A according to a rule with changing parameters already proposed by Surber (1981a, 1981b). In Experiment 2, 140 participants judged either the possible performance of Person A in a cooperative situation or the possible performance of the A-B team using the same material. Results showed that people judge A's performance or the team's performance using a very simple additive rule.     

Distance-Delivered Parent Training for Childhood Disruptive Behavior (Strongest Families™): a Randomized Controlled Trial and Economic Analysis

Disruptive behavior disorders are prevalent in youth, yet most children with disruptive behavior do not have access to timely, effective treatment. Distance-delivered service (e.g., via telephone, Internet) can overcome several barriers to care. This study tested the effectiveness of a 12-week parent training program, Strongest Families? Parenting the Active Child, delivered via written material, skill-based videos, and telephone coaching sessions, as compared to usual care in reducing child externalizing behavior. Participants were 172 primary caregivers of a 6- to 12-year-old (29% girls; M age?=?8.5 years) recruited from community children’s mental health clinics. Participants were randomized to either Strongest Families? or usual care and completed measures of child externalizing behavior, parenting practices, parent distress, and intervention services consumed at baseline and 5-, 10-, 16-, and 22-months post-baseline. Growth curve analysis showed significant reductions in externalizing behavior in both conditions over time. Improvements were significantly greater at 10 months in the Strongest Families? condition (d =?0.43). At 22 months, however, the differences were not significant and small in magnitude (d =??0.05). The intervention decreased inconsistent discipline significantly more than usual care. Parents in both conditions showed significant reductions in distress. We also conducted a cost-effectiveness analysis to assess the value for money of the Strongest Families? program versus usual care. Distance parent training is a promising way to increase access to, and reduce costs associated with, mental health care for families with a child with disruptive behavior.     

Pilot Evaluation of a University-Based Training in Trauma-Informed Services for Gang Intervention Workers

The purpose of this pilot study was to investigate the feasibility and efficacy of a course designed to bring trauma-informed practices into community-based intervention programming for gang-involved youth and families. There have been no formally evaluated trauma trainings for gang intervention workers to date. Thirty gang intervention workers completed a University-based course on trauma, which aimed to raise the level of knowledge regarding trauma exposure and its effects on youth, increase intervention workers’ confidence in their ability to identify and respond to posttraumatic stress reactions among clients, and build resilience among staff. Pre-post results revealed that participants significantly improved in their knowledge related to trauma and confidence in their ability to respond to trauma among clients. Participants also rated themselves significantly higher on these domains compared to gang intervention workers who did not take the course. Participants rated the course positively on dimensions that are associated with staff members’ willingness to implement evidence-based interventions following training. The findings indicate a number of important recommendations for supporting gang intervention workers and integrating trauma-informed practices into gang intervention services.     

Schizotypy and verbal memory in the adolescent general population

The following study examines the relationship between verbal memory deficits and schizotypal traits measured psychometrically from a non- clinical adolescent population. In this transversal analytical study participated 139 subjects. They were secondary school students, with ages ranging from 13 to 16 years old (mean= 14, 35; Sta.Dev.= 0, 548). After administrating the scales O-LIFE (psychometrical schizotypy), CVLT (verbal memory), and Letters and Numbers subtest of WAIS-III (working memory), data was analyzed utilizing Pearson correlations and mean comparison test. Results showed lack of relations between schizotypy measures and working memory. Nonetheless, some of the O-LIFE dimensions correlated with verbal memory. These findings support partly the literature reviewed. Yet, more work focused on schizotypy and cognitive deficits as risk factors are suggested.     

Amygdala activation during masked presentation of emotional faces predicts conscious detection of threat-related faces

It has been argued that critical functions of the human amygdala are to modulate the moment-to-moment vigilance level and to enhance the processing and the consolidation of memories of emotionally arousing material. In this functional magnetic resonance study, pictures of human faces bearing fearful, angry, and happy expressions were presented to nine healthy volunteers using a backward masking procedure based on neutral facial expression. Activation of the left and right amygdala in response to the masked fearful faces (compared to neutral faces) was significantly correlated with the number of fearful faces detected. In addition, right but not left amygdala activation in response to the masked angry faces was significantly related to the number of angry faces detected. The present findings underscore the role of the amygdala in the detection and consolidation of memory for marginally perceptible threatening facial expression.     

Behavioral Approach System (BAS) Sensitivity and Bipolar Spectrum Disorders: A Retrospective and Concurrent Behavioral High-Risk Design

In this article, we tested the vulnerability hypothesis of the behavioral approach system (BAS) hypersensitivity model of bipolar disorders. We examined whether self-reported BAS sensitivity predicts lifetime bipolar spectrum diagnoses as well as symptoms and personality characteristics associated with bipolar disorder using a retrospective and concurrent behavioral high-risk design. Participants with high (HBAS; n=28) or moderate (MBAS; n=24) BAS sensitivity were selected and given a lifetime psychiatric diagnostic interview and self-report measures of proneness to bipolar symptoms, current symptoms, and personality characteristics relevant to bipolarity. HBAS participants were significantly and substantially more likely to have a lifetime bipolar spectrum disorder diagnosis than were MBAS participants, but did not differ from MBAS participants in their likelihood of a unipolar depression diagnosis. Also, the HBAS group exhibited higher impulsivity and proneness to hypomanic symptoms than the MBAS group, and BAS-reward responsiveness predicted hypomanic personality characteristics. Finally, high behavioral inhibition system (BIS) sensitivity was associated with proneness to and current depressive symptoms.

Constructing a past in infancy: a neuro-developmental account

The ability to recall the past is fundamental yet until relatively recently, infants were assumed to lack the capacity. Contrary to this perspective, non-verbal tests indicate that developments in recall are well underway by late in the first year of life; by the end of the second year, long-term recall is reliable and robust. New research combining electrophysiological and behavioral measures is identifying the loci of age-related changes: they are attributed to more effective and efficient encoding, consolidation and storage processes associated with developments in the temporal-cortical network that subserves recall. The emerging framework, which applies to episodic and autobiographical memory, highlights the essential developmental continuities in memory from infancy onwards and sheds new light on the phenomenon of childhood amnesia.     

Development of multisensory spatial integration and perception in humans

Previous studies have shown that adults respond faster and more reliably to bimodal compared to unimodal localization cues. The current study investigated for the first time the development of audiovisual (A-V) integration in spatial localization behavior in infants between 1 and 10 months of age. We observed infants' head and eye movements in response to auditory, visual, or both kinds of stimuli presented either 25 degrees or 45 degrees to the right or left of midline. Infants under 8 months of age intermittently showed response latencies significantly faster toward audiovisual targets than toward either auditory or visual targets alone They did so, however, without exhibiting a reliable violation of the Race Model, suggesting that probability summation alone could explain the faster bimodal response. In contrast, infants between 8 and 10 months of age exhibited bimodal response latencies significantly faster than unimodal latencies for both eccentricity conditions and their latencies violated the Race Model at 25 degrees eccentricity. In addition to this main finding, we found age-dependent eccentricity and modality effects on response latencies. Together, these findings suggest that audiovisual integration emerges late in the first year of life and are consistent with neurophysiological findings from multisensory sites in the superior colliculus of infant monkeys showing that multisensory enhancement of responsiveness is not present at birth but emerges later in life.     

Relative impact of young adult personality disorders on subsequent quality of life: findings of a community-based longitudinal study

Little is known about long-term prognostic implications of personality disorder (PD) for quality of life (QOL) in the young adult population not selected for psychiatric treatment. The purpose of this study was to determine the association of PDs with QOL assessed after an 11-year interval. PDs were assessed in 1991-1994 at mean age 22, and indicators of QOL were assessed in 2001-2004 at mean age 33 based on a community sample of 588 young adults. Findings indicated that any PD, or a cluster A, B, or C PD each were independently associated with elevated impairment in overall QOL after adjusting for demographic variables, co-occurring Axis I disorder, and physical illness, and PDs in other clusters. Cluster B PD had a greatest adverse impact on QOL. Symptoms of antisocial, borderline, and schizotypal PD symptoms were independently associated with significant reductions in QOL; avoidant, paranoid, and dependent PD symptoms were associated with smaller reductions, not reaching statistical significance. Symptoms of other individual PDs were not associated with reduced QOL. PDs in young adults in the community have an enduring and adverse impact on subsequent QOL that cannot be attributed to physical illness or Axis I psychiatric disorder.