An initial investigation of baseline respiratory sinus arrhythmia as a moderator of treatment outcome for young children born premature with externalizing behavior problems

The aim of the current study was to examine the moderating effect of baseline respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) on Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT), a behavioral parent-training intervention, for young children born premature. In this pilot randomized controlled trial, 28 young children (mean age of 37.79 months), who were born <37 weeks gestation and presented with elevated externalizing behavior problems, were randomly assigned to an immediate treatment or waitlist control group. RSA, which provides an approximate marker of individual differences in cardiac vagal tone, was measured during a baseline period. Past research has generally shown that higher levels of baseline RSA correlate with various positive psychological states (e.g., empathy, sustained attention), whereas lower levels of baseline RSA correlate with less optimal psychological states (e.g., higher externalizing behavior problems). Results indicated that baseline RSA significantly interacted with treatment condition in predicting changes in child disruptive behavior. Specifically, low levels of baseline RSA were associated with greater improvements in child disruptive behavior following PCIT. While acknowledging the caveats of measuring and interpreting RSA and the need to include a sympathetic-linked cardiac measure in future research, these findings provide preliminary evidence that children with lower capacity for emotion regulation receive even greater treatment gains. Future research should also examine the moderating effect of RSA in larger samples and explore the potential mediating role of RSA on behavioral parenting interventions.     

Reading acquisition enhances an early visual process of contour integration

The acquisition of reading has an extensive impact on the developing brain and leads to enhanced abilities in phonological processing and visual letter perception. Could this expertise also extend to early visual abilities outside the reading domain? Here we studied the performance of illiterate, ex‐illiterate and literate adults closely matched in age, socioeconomic and cultural characteristics, on a contour integration task known to depend on early visual processing. Stimuli consisted of a closed egg‐shaped contour made of disconnected Gabor patches, within a background of randomly oriented Gabor stimuli. Subjects had to decide whether the egg was pointing left or right. Difficulty was varied by jittering the orientation of the Gabor patches forming the contour. Contour integration performance was lower in illiterates than in both ex‐illiterate and literate controls. We argue that this difference in contour perception must reflect a genuine difference in visual function. According to this view, the intensive perceptual training that accompanies reading acquisition also improves early visual abilities, suggesting that the impact of literacy on the visual system is more widespread than originally proposed.     

Narrative innovation in life design counseling: The case of Ryan

The main aim of this research is to study the patterns of narrative change in a case of life design counseling (LDC). The innovative moments coding system (IMCS) was used to conduct an intensive analysis of the career counseling sessions. This coding system is grounded in a narrative conception of the self, and suggests that narrative change results from the elaboration and development of narrative exceptions to a client's core problematic self-narrative. The results supports the adequacy of the IMCS to the study of change in career counseling and reveal that the intervention promotes a pattern of change characterized by three types of innovative moments: action, reflection, and protest. The results are discussed taking into account their implications for career counseling theory, research and practice.     

The Effect of Color on the Production of Responses to Rorschach Cards VIII,IX, and X in Age Groups of 11–12 and 15–16 Years

The effect of color on the production of responses to the Rorschach task has been considered by investigators from 2 different positions: (a) that color has little effect on the production of responses, and (b) that color increases the number of responses. Some previous results found by the current investigators have supported the first position for the last 3 fully colored Rorschach cards (VIII, IX, and X), in children from 5 to 12 years old. Other studies of ours, however, have confirmed the second position for these same cards with a group of young adults 17 to 23 years old. As there was no increase of responses up to age 12, for this study we hypothesized a developmental effect in adolescence such that there would be an increase in the production of responses to the colored Rorschach cards at the age of 15 to 16 years, and this is what the results indicate. From a pragmatic standpoint, these results imply a revision of interpretive meaning for the Color and Affective Ratio variables in children's protocols. Our results also indicate that color cannot be regarded as a means of expression of affect at age 11 to 12 like it will be from age 15 to 16 and on.     

Improving School Readiness in Preschoolers with Behavior Problems: Results from a Summer Treatment Program

To examine a) the feasibility of delivering a summer treatment program for pre-kindergarteners (STP-PreK) with externalizing behavior problems (EBP) and b) the extent to which the STP-PreK was effective in improving children’s school readiness outcomes. Participants for this study included 30 preschool children (77 % boys; Mean age?=?5.33 years; 77 % Hispanic background) with at-risk or clinically elevated levels of EBP. The STP-PreK was held at an early education center and ran for 8-weeks (M-F, 8 a.m.–5 p.m.) during the summer between preschool and kindergarten. In addition to a behavioral modification system and comprehensive school readiness curriculum, a social-emotional curriculum was also embedded within the STP-PreK to target children’s self-regulation skills (SR). Children’s pre- and post-school readiness outcomes included a standardized school readiness assessment as well as parental report of EBP, adaptive functioning, and overall readiness for kindergarten. SR skills were measured via a standardized executive functioning task, two frustration tasks, and parental report of children’s emotion regulation, and executive functioning. The STP-PreK was well received by parents as evidenced by high attendance and satisfaction ratings. Additionally, all school readiness outcomes (both parent and observational tasks) significantly improved after the intervention (Cohen’s d effect sizes ranged from 0.47 to 2.22) with all effects, except parental report of emotion regulation, being maintained at a 6-month follow-up. These findings highlight the feasibility and utility of delivering an early intervention summer program that can successfully target multiple aspects of children’s school readiness, including behavioral, social-emotional/self-regulation, and academics.     

Science and the Art of Healing: A Contribution to the History of Life Science

In conventional medicine, healing is effected mainly by treating the symptoms of the physical body disease, while in mind–body medicine the cure is performed by the mind itself (thoughts and emotions). In fact, the holographic mind theory claims that the mind could be either the healer or the slayer. Thus, this article is a contribution toward a more in-depth study of this theme of conventional medicine versus mind–body medicine, particularly to understand the gifts of quantum physics to life science and the art of healing, so that we might find an integrative medicine model (a holistic approach to health) that could explain some “incurable” diseases.     

Moral emotions and the envisaging of mitigating circumstances for wrongdoing

Anger may be more responsive than disgust to mitigating circumstances in judgements of wrongdoing. We tested this hypothesis in two studies where we had participants envision circumstances that could serve to mitigate an otherwise wrongful act. In Study 1, participants provided moral judgements, and ratings of anger and disgust, to a number of transgressions involving either harm or bodily purity. They were then asked to imagine and report whether there might be any circumstances that would make it all right to perform the act. Across transgression type, and controlling for covariance between anger and disgust, levels of anger were found to negatively predict the envisioning of mitigating circumstances for wrongdoing, while disgust was unrelated. Study 2 replicated and extended these findings to less serious transgressions, using a continuous measure of mitigating circumstances, and demonstrated the impact of anger independent of deontological commitments. These findings highlight the differential relationship that anger and disgust have with the ability to envision mitigating factors.     

New frontiers in psychoanalysis – in our international community

The paper discusses what the author calls “The seduction by the father”. It would occur when, in the Oedipus complex, the father reverses his role: instead of being the one who castrates, he seduces. Seduction here is understood in the sense that he does not act as the one who imposes limits to the child. Consequently the child can not project his hostile impulses onto the father.

Based on clinical data, the Author says that, in the male child, the seduction by the father hampers the transformation of the two Oedipal attitudes towards the father into identifications. The consequences of this fact upon the construction of the “nostalgia of the father's protection” are discussed, so as the transformation of this father into the symbolic father.     

Commitment, enjoyment and motivation in young soccer competitive players

Building upon Deci's and Ryan (1985) Self-determination theory as well as the sportive behavioral correlates of the model of Commitment (Scanlan et al., 1976), this study tries to establish the relationship between motivation and commitment in youth sport. For this purpose 454 young competitive soccer players answered the Sport Motivation Scale (SMS) and the Sport Commitment Questionnaire (SCQ) during the regular season. The SMS measures the three dimensions of the Motivational continuum (the Amotivation, the Extrinsic Motivation and the Intrinsic Motivation). The SCQ measures the Sportive Commitment and its composing factors such as the Enjoyment, the Alternatives to the sport, and the Social Pressure. Our findings provided a clear pattern of the influence of motivation in sport enjoyment and commitment, outlining the positive contribution of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation to enjoyment and commitment. Amotivation, contributes positively to alternatives to sport and negatively to enjoyment and commitment, It should be noted that extrinsic motivation has a higher contribution to enjoyment whereas intrinsic motivation has a higher contribution to commitment.