Understanding associations among family support,friend support,and psychological distress

Emotional support from family and friends is associated with lower psychological distress. This study examined whether genetic and environmental influences explain associations among family support, friend support, and psychological distress. Data were drawn from the Midlife Development in the United States (MIDUS) study and included 947 pairs of monozygotic (MZ), same‐sex dizygotic (DZ), and opposite‐sex DZ twins. Results showed that a genetic factor explains the relation between friend support and psychological distress, independent of family support. Alternatively, a nonshared environmental factor accounts for an association between family support, friend support, and psychological distress. Thus, heritable factors shape a distinct relation between friend support and psychological distress, but unique experiences contribute to a link between family support, friend support, and psychological distress.     

浅析阿尔贝特·施韦泽的医学伦理人格

阿尔贝特·施韦泽作为20世纪西方社会中极具影响力的人物，他所主张的敬畏生命的伦理思想固然值得我们今天学习研究、发扬光大，而他作为一名著名医学家，他传奇智慧的人生中所进行的一系列医学实践活动，更是展示了他热爱生命、热爱人类、热爱医学、富有理想、淡泊名利、甘于奉献医学的高尚医学伦理人格、炽热的医学伦理情怀，更值得我们当今每一位医务工作者和在校医学生敬仰、学习。     

The impact of violations on uncertainty and the consequences for attractiveness

This investigation aimed at extending past research on expectation violations by arguing that violations vary both in valance and in their influence on uncertainty and that the combination of valence and uncertainty states conjointly influences judgments of a violator's social attractiveness. In explaining the predicted variance in uncertainty following violations, a distinction is proposed between congruent violations (i.e., behaviors that are more intense instantiations of a previously displayed message) and incongruent violations (i.e., behaviors that are opposite in meaning from previously displayed messages). Five models for explaining violation effects are contrasted. Results (a) confirm that violations differ in their impact on uncertainty, (b) generally support the validity of the proposed distinction between congruent and incongruent violations, and show that the inclusion of uncertainty and valence in models of violation outcomes accounts for greater variance in social attraction than either one separately.     

Religious Life-Styles and Mental Health: A Follow-Up Study

This study is part of a longitudinal research project designed to discover more about the relations between religious involvement and mental health. It represents a 3-year follow-up on a group of religious young adults. Data were collected through semistructured interviews and by means of a psychological test battery. The results are discussed.     

When Ignorance Is Bliss The Role of Motivation to Reduce Uncertainty in Uncertainty Reduction Theory

Three studies were conducted with the goal to articulate and test models for integrating the concept of motivation to reduce uncertainty into the axiomatic structure of uncertainty reduction theory. Multiple models were considered, each model defining motivation to reduce uncertainty in a different way. Motivation to reduce uncertainty was defined as a scope condition (Model 2), as tolerance for uncertainty (Model 3), as a weighted function of uncertainty by its importance (Model 4), and as the difference between one's uncertainty level and one's tolerance for uncertainty (Models 5a and 5b). Each of these models was compared to the baseline model (Model 1) derived from the original presentation of the theory where level of uncertainty, by itself, serves as a determinant of various communication behaviors. Tests of these models in terms of their ability to predict information seeking and attraction reveal that none of the models provides a consistent integration of motivation to reduce uncertainty into uncertainty reduction theory. Rather, tolerance for uncertainty (Model 3) is one of three determinants of information seeking, while level of uncertainty (Model 1) is one of three determinants of attraction. This inability to integrate motivation to reduce uncertainty into uncertainty reduction theory can be attributed to the consistent failure to find support for deviance and incentive value as determinants of tolerance for uncertainty, the rejection of Axiom 3 in uncertainty reduction theory (which specifies a positive relationship between uncertainty and information seeking), and the rejection of Theorem 17 (which specifies a negative relationship between information seeking and liking).