The effect of a supervisory development program on leadership style

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of a supervisory development program on leadership style, conceptualized as the amount of consideration and structure demonstrated by supervisors. One hundred male supervisors of a government railways department were randomly selected and then assigned randomly to either receive training (n=50) or not to be trained (n=50). The program was a 22-week residential course, training participants in human relations and structuring skills. Measures of the supervisors' consideration and structure were obtained from 100 male subordinates of the supervisors 4 weeks prior to, and 2 months after, training. At pre- and post-test, supervisors in the experimental and control groups rated the amount of consideration and structure they felt they should use. Analysis of variance with significant interaction effects revealed that the training program enhanced self and subordinate-rated consideration and structure.     

Contrasting jail diversion and in-jail services for mental illness and substance abuse: do they serve the same clients?

Baseline data from a study of jail diversion services and in-jail behavioral health services were used to examine the differences in clients served by these two models of responding to people with co-occurring mental health and substance abuse problems in the criminal justice system. Clients of the diversion service had more acute psychiatric symptoms and were more likely to have a diagnosis of psychosis NOS. Clients of the in-jail service were more likely to have been on probation or parole in the past and to have received substance abuse treatment. Different service models may attract and serve different populations of clients. Diversion services may cast a wider net that includes clients who may not have otherwise been involved in forensic services.     

Psychoanalysis: a dysfunctional family?

The discussion opens with an account of the author's mother's bizarre family in which a strong, charismatic grandmother maintained absolute control over her large family by encouraging a neurotic dependence in them through daily reports of their complaints.
Getting interested in psychoanalysis in an effort to understand the dynamics of this dysfunctional family, the author, a biographer, turned to the study of Melanie Klein, becoming entranced by her ideas. Her research also revealed how Klein had discouraged her followers from developing ideas that diverged in any way from her own. Her portrait of the pioneer analyst provoked intense indignation. A similar pattern of absolute loyalty to his person and theories was to be found in Freud's Secret Committee, formed primarily as a means of getting rid of Jung who had been showing disturbing signs of independence. When Ferenczi and Rank began to pursue independent lines of enquiry in their work, they too were thought to be undermining the foundations of classical psychoanalysis.
Finally, the author concludes that though there have been sorry incidents in psychoanalysis, we should be mature enough to accept both the contributions of the early pioneers and the realizations that new ideas must be permitted to evolve.     

A Twin and Family Study of the Association Between Immune System Dysfunction and Dyslexia Using Blood Serum Immunoassay and Survey Data

We conducted a study of the association between developmental reading disability (DRD) and immune disorders (ID) using both survey and immunoassay data in two separate samples of families. One sample was made up of twins and their parents and was ascertained through a population-based sampling scheme. The other sample was a set of extended pedigrees selected for apparent autosomal dominant transmission of DRD. We failed to find an association between DRD and ID in either sample, regardless of the method used to assess immune system function. Even though our twin sample provided evidence that both DRD and immune conditions were significantly heritable, there was no evidence for a genetic correlation between ID and DRD nor was there any clear indication that a special subgroup of individuals may be comorbid for these conditions because of genetic reasons. How these negative findings can be reconciled with the developmental hypothesis of Geschwind, Behan, Galaburda, and colleagues, and how they may relate to the gene locus influencing DRD that has been recently located in the HLA region of the short arm of chromosome 6 is discussed.     

Gender attitudes in children

This study investigated children's gender attitudes as a function of the sex, age, and race of the child as well as a geographical SES factor. Two attitudes were measured: gender pride (attributing positive characteristics to a child of the same sex) and gender prejudice (attributing negative characteristics to a child of the other sex). Results indicated that all children tended to select children of the same sex for the positive attributes, but that both boys and girls selected boys for the negative attributes. Although all sex pride scores decreased with age, this effect was most pronounced for girls from an upper-lower-class urban environment.The write-up of this article was supported by our current National Institute of Mental Health Grant No. 1R01MH29417-01, Principal Investigator, Dr. Phyllis A. Katz.     

MAINTENANCE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE VOCABULARY AND THE SPACING EFFECT

Abstract— In a 9-year longitudinal investigation, 4 subjects learned and relearned 300 English-foreign language word pairs. Either 13 or 26 relearning sessions were administered at intervals of 14, 28, or 56 days. Retention was tested for 1, 2, 3, or 5 years after training terminated. The longer intersession intervals slowed down acquisition slightly, but this disadvantage during training was offset by substantially higher retention. Thirteen retraining sessions spaced at 56 days yielded retention comparable to 26 sessions spaced at 14 days. The retention benefit due to additional sessions was independent of the benefit due to spacing, and both variables facilitated retention of words regardless of difficulty level and of the consistency of retrieval during training. The benefits of spaced retrieval practice to long-term maintenance of access to academic knowledge areas are discussed.     

Mastery motivation in boys and girls: The role of intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation

This research tested the hypothesis that the importance of adult approval and feedback for females relative to males would render girls of elementary school age more likely to develop an extrinsic orientation in comparison to boys. Using S. Harter's Scale of Intrinsic versus Extrinsic Motivation [(1981), “A New Self-Report Scale of Intrinsic Versus Extrinsic Motivational Orientation in the Classroom: Motivational and Informational Components,” Developmental Psychology Vol. 17, pp. 300–312], the data supported this hypothesis. Because of the assumed differential importance of controlling feedback from adults for females relative to males, a second study examined girls' and boys' preference for challenge as a function of adult controlling feedback and children's motivational orientation. The pattern of data supported the hypothesis that girls relative to boys show differential preferences for challenge, depending on the presence of type of adult feedback and motivational orientation in girls.     

Cultural differences in young children's vulnerability to injuries: a risk and protection perspective.

Interview data from 100 lower income Hispanic and 50 White mothers from a nutritional service clinic extended prior research on cultural differences in the risk for unintentional pediatric injuries. Group differences were expected in reported injury incidence and in the prevalence and impact of contributing factors. As predicted, White mothers reported more injuries for a young child, and among Hispanic mothers, English language preference and use were associated with more reported injuries. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that risky behaviors, mother's judgment about child compliance, and stressful life events were better predictors of injuries than housing quality, but among Hispanics, the impact of certain factors (e.g. child temperament) was qualified by mother's acculturation level. Stress and child temperament explained injury differences between more- and less-acculturated Hispanic families but only partially accounted for differences between White mothers and less-acculturated Hispanics. Pediatric injury risk and protective factors seemed to operate in concert with cultural processes.     

Mechanisms and the Evidence Hierarchy

Evidence-based medicine (EBM) makes use of explicit procedures for grading evidence for causal claims. Normally, these procedures categorise evidence of correlation produced by statistical trials as better evidence for a causal claim than evidence of mechanisms produced by other methods. We argue, in contrast, that evidence of mechanisms needs to be viewed as complementary to, rather than inferior to, evidence of correlation. In this paper we first set out the case for treating evidence of mechanisms alongside evidence of correlation in explicit protocols for evaluating evidence. Next we provide case studies which exemplify the ways in which evidence of mechanisms complements evidence of correlation in practice. Finally, we put forward some general considerations as to how the two sorts of evidence can be more closely integrated by EBM.     

Dyadic Treatment,Reflective Functioning,and Videofeedback: Fostering Attachment with Families in the Foster Care System

The Building Blocks Program encourages parent-child bonding, attachment, and reflective functioning based on theories of nonverbal communication and mentalization. In the Building Blocks Program, young children who are in foster care or at risk of being in foster care are seen in dyadic sessions with their birth parents in a clinical setting. The parents come in with traumatic histories, including adverse childhood experiences, disrupted connections, mental illness, ongoing exposure to poverty and violence, and have little social support. The children have significant medical, emotional, and/or cognitive challenges. In this article, all aspects of the Building Blocks Program are described, including training for therapists, treatment for parents and children in supervised play/visitation sessions, Reflective Supervision with therapists in group and individual sessions, and the model of Nested Mentalization. Using video and videofeedback as a vehicle for positive change, therapists promote emotional healing and parent-child attachment. In Reflective Supervision, supervisors make every effort to understand the thoughts and feelings of the therapists. A holding environment is provided for the therapists who, in turn, hold the parent, who can then hold the child. Two cases are described that demonstrate the many layers of complexity in the Building Blocks model, and how the multifaceted levels of complicated systems are addressed.