The effects of exposure to feminist ideology on women's body image

Body image disturbance has become a common problem among women and there is a need to focus on creating empirically supported treatments. Psychoeducational interventions have reduced body image dissatisfaction, but their impact is limited because they do not offer women adaptive methods of interpreting the many appearance-related messages they receive. This study examined if exposure to a feminist perspective may provide alternative interpretations of cultural messages, thereby increasing body image satisfaction. Participants were randomly assigned to a feminist or psychoeducational intervention, or a control group. Exposure to the feminist condition resulted in increased self-identification as a feminist and greater appearance satisfaction, and changes in feminist identity were related to positive changes in body image. The findings indicate that exposure to feminist theories may serve as an effective intervention strategy.     

A Video Recall Study of In‐session Changes in Sentiment Override

This study examines in‐session changes in sentiment override over the first three sessions of couple therapy. Couples viewed a video recording of therapy sessions immediately after each of the first three sessions and continuously rated their level of sentiment override. Ninety‐eight changes were randomly chosen for analysis. Three talk turns prior to each change was coded using the Family Relational Communication Control Coding System. Results show that changes in sentiment override occur frequently. Repeated incidents of communication control were related to negative change in sentiment override for females. Repeated incidents of being left out of the conversation were related to negative changes in sentiment override for females and positive changes for males.     

‘We’ve shared a lifetime with one another’: using reflective visual/verbal journals to develop graduate student relationships

The success of graduate students relies on factors beyond mere cognitive ability, with fostering peer and professional relationships as definitive influences on achievement. Research shows that positive faculty/student relationships are a significant factor in the success of graduate students and that art-making is an effective way to encourage the reflective thinking needed to nurture these relationships. In this article, we examine the relationship between arts informed pedagogy, specifically the use of a visual/verbal journal, and the formation of graduate relationships. The majority of the students in this collaborative inquiry entered their doctoral program at the same time the research class began and all engaged in an artfully imagined introduction to qualitative research course.     

Infants’ ability to associate motion paths with object kinds

The goal of the present research was to examine whether infants associate different paths of motion with animate beings and inanimate objects. An infant-controlled habituation procedure was used to examine 10–20-month-old infants’ ability to associate a non-linear motion path (jumping) with animals and a linear (rebounding) motion path with vehicles (Experiment 1) and furniture (Experiment 2). During the habituation phase, infants saw a dog jumping over a barrier and either a vehicle or a piece of furniture rebounding off the barrier. In the test phase, infants looked longer when another inanimate object jumped rather than rebounded, but showed no such differential looking in the case of another animate object. The ability to restrict the animate motion path of jumping to animate beings was present by 10 months of age. The present findings support the hypothesis that motion path is associated with the animate–inanimate distinction early in infancy.     

Looking forward to helping: The effects of prospection on prosocial intentions and behavior

Three experiments were conducted to further examine how prospection (i.e., thinking about the future) fosters prosociality. In Study 1 (n = 238), participants who wrote about the future expressed significantly stronger prosocial intentions than people who wrote about the past. In a similar study (n = 87), participants who wrote about the future were significantly more likely to behave prosocially than those who wrote about the past. In Study 3 (n = 203), mediational analyses revealed that prospection and optimism each predicted positive affect, which then predicted stronger prosocial intentions. These findings extend previous work by demonstrating that prospection enhances general prosocial intentions, that this effect extends to prosocial behavior, and that the effect is partially mediated by positive affect.     

Brain bases of English morphological processing: A comparison between Chinese-English,Spanish-English bilingual,and English monolingual children

How do early bilingual experiences influence children's neural architecture for word processing? Dual language acquisition can yield common influences that may be shared across different bilingual groups, as well as language-specific influences stemming from a given language pairing. To investigate these effects, we examined bilingual English speakers of Chinese or Spanish, and English monolinguals, all raised in the US (N = 152, ages 5–10). Children completed an English morphological word processing task during fNIRS neuroimaging. The findings revealed both language-specific and shared bilingual effects. The language-specific effects were that Chinese and Spanish bilinguals showed principled differences in their neural organization for English lexical morphology. The common bilingual effects shared by the two groups were that in both bilingual groups, increased home language proficiency was associated with stronger left superior temporal gyrus (STG) activation when processing the English word structures that are most dissimilar from the home language. The findings inform theories of language and brain development during the key periods of neural reorganization for learning to read by illuminating experience-based plasticity in linguistically diverse learners.     

Motivated or Demotivated to Be Creative: The Role of Self‐Regulatory Focus in Transformational and Transactional Leadership Processes

Numerous studies have recognised the importance of transformational leadership style for encouraging employees’ creativity. Self‐regulation studies have highlighted the influence of a promotion focus on employees’ creative behaviours. Yet both leadership and self‐regulation theories have paid less attention to the role transactional leadership style and situational prevention regulatory focus may play in affecting employees’ creativity. In this article we present a theoretical model which examines transformational and transactional leadership styles and both promotion and prevention situational self‐regulatory focus (SRF). The model suggests that while transformational leadership promotes creativity, at least partially by enhancing follower's situational promotion SRF, transactional leadership style (transactional active) is aligned with followers’ prevention situational SRF, which is associated with leaders’ hindering of followers’ creativity. Findings from two studies, an experimental study (N = 189) and a field study (N = 343 employees and 75 managers), support this model, showing that the relationship between different types of leadership and creativity are more complex than previously regarded. The theoretical and practical implications are discussed.     

Highlighting the Way Forward: A Review of Community Mental Health Research and Practice Published in AJCP and JCP

Articles published in the two most prominent journals of community psychology in North America, the American Journal of Community Psychology (AJCP) and Journal of Community Psychology (JCP), provide a clear indicator of trends in community research and practice. An examination of community psychology's history and scholarship suggests that the field has reduced its emphasis on promoting mental health, well‐being, and liberation of individuals with serious mental illnesses over the past several decades. To further investigate this claim, the current review presents an analysis of articles relevant to community mental health (N = 307) published in the American Journal of Community Psychology (AJCP) and Journal of Community Psychology (JCP) from 1973 to 2015. The review focuses on article characteristics (e.g., type of article and methods employed), author characteristics, topic areas, and theoretical frameworks. Results document a downward trend in published articles from the mid‐1980s to mid‐2000s, with a substantial increase in published work between 2006 and 2015. A majority of articles were empirical and employed quantitative methods. The most frequent topic area was community mental health centers and services (n = 49), but the past three decades demonstrate a clear shift away from mental health service provision to address pressing social issues that impact community mental health, particularly homelessness (n = 42) and community integration of adults with serious mental illnesses (n = 40). Findings reflect both the past and present state of community psychology and suggest promising directions for re‐engaging with community mental health and fostering well‐being, inclusion, and liberation of adults experiencing serious mental health challenges.