Ecological influences in youth crisis shelters: Effects of social density and length of stay on youth problem behaviors

For 472 consecutive days we monitored the number of youths residing in a crisis shelter for adolescents, the average length of stay for the youths residing in the shelter on each day, and the number of problem behaviors occurring within the shelter on a daily basis. We analyzed these data using a combination of time series and logistic regression techniques to fit a model that would predict the occurrence of a problem behavior on any given day. After controlling for significant time trends in the data, our results indicate that both the number of youths in the shelter and the proportion of youths who have resided in the shelter longer than 14 days are significantly associated with a problem behavior occurring on any given day. The number of youths in the shelter and the probability of a problem behavior occurring correlated significantly. However, as the proportion of youths who resided in the shelter longer than 14 days increased, the probability of a problem behavior occurring decreased.     

Super's Career Stages and the Decision to Change Careers

This study examined Super's (1990) concept of recycling through the stages of adult career development in a sample of 226 Australian men and women who were approximately evenly distributed across the following four steps in the uptake of a second career: (a) contemplating a change, (b) choosing a new field, (c) implementing a change, and (d) change fully completed. A group of adults of similar age, gender, education, occupation, and career history who had no intention of switching careers was also included for comparison. Recycling predictions were supported by the finding that the three groups who were in the throes of career change displayed greater concern with Super's first (exploration) stage than the nonchanging control group. In addition, the two groups who were most intensely involved in the change process (choosing field and implementing) scored higher in exploration concern than the group whose career change was fully completed. Satisfaction also varied as a function of the participant's stage in the process of switching to a new career. Global satisfaction with the present job was highest in workers who had completed the change to a new career, but nonchangers were more satisfied than the three groups who were actively caught up in the change process. On the other hand, satisfaction with the overall pattern of career development was higher in the two stable groups (nonchangers and change-completed) than among the three groups still actively involved in making a change. Implications of these results for midlife career counseling were considered.     

Cognitive Science: What One Needs to Know

Cognitive science is a new paradigm that informs and involves several disciplines, including artificial intelligence, neuroscience, cognitive psychology, cognitive ethology, and the philosophy of mind. Cognitive science studies the mind as an information processor, with the computer often operating as a metaphor for the operations of the mind. Developments in the cognitive sciences stand to affect tremendously how we think of the mind and, consequently, how we think of theological and religious claims that concern the human subject. The unity of self, claims of human uniqueness, the relation of mind and body, human nature, and the personal agency of God are all areas of religious import in which the cognitive sciences need to be taken into account.     

Inherited predisposition to alcoholism: characteristics of sons of male alcoholics

Sons of male alcoholics (SOMAs) are at markedly heightened genetic risk for the development of alcohol abuse. Study of SOMAs could therefore conceivably increase the efficiency of research aimed at uncovering those heritable factors that predispose to alcoholism. SOMAs manifest observable behavioral, cognitive, and psychophysiological abnormalities while sober and react idiosyncratically to alcohol intoxication. They are most commonly described as conduct disordered and hyperactive, appear heir to a variety of deficits in verbal and abstract cognition, and perform more poorly in the academic environment. SOMAs are characterized by abnormal patterns of cued psychophysiological response, and appear more sensitive to the putatively reinforcing aspects of alcohol intoxication. Various methodological weaknesses permeate the relevant literature. Some straightforward improvements are suggested.     

The Beck Depression Inventory: item order and the impact of response sets

The lack of subtle content in the item groups of the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and the consistency in the ordering of the items from least to most pathological make this instrument unduly susceptible to either defensive or malingering response sets. Two experimental forms were developed for the BDI: a backwards version (a simple reversal of the order of items within each group) and a random-order version. These forms, together with the original item order, were given to college undergraduate women along with the Depression scale from the MMPI and the Burks-Martin Questionnaire covering recent life changes and current stressful situations. The random order BDI results in a significantly higher depression score than did either the original or backwards version. Correlations with the other instruments were comparable for all three forms. The random order of items within each set appears to break up a response set to endorse either the first or last item and is, therefore, recommended.     

Attitudes toward the childless spouse

Two studies assess attitudes toward the childless life-style. One study uses an unstructured response style in order to determine the motivation for and effects of the decision attributed to the person intending to be childless. The second study assesses the relationship between self-reported attitudes measures. The studies suggest the person selecting the childless life-style may be viewed by others as less well adjusted or misguided in this choice, which is inconsistent with the majority of published data on the childless spouse.     

Generality and topic specificity of cognitive styles

A multitrait-multimethod strategy was used to assess eight structural properties of cognition applied to several classes of objects by 88 university students in Boulder, Colorado, United States, and 80 university students in Kyoto and Otsu, Japan. Each cognitive style was found to display some degree of generality over object classes and also some degree of class specificity. It is concluded that cognitive style depends on the subject, the class of objects considered, and an interaction between the two.