“Equal access” without “establishing” religion: The necessity for assessing social perspective-taking skills and institutional atmosphere

We concur withMoshman (1990) that in public high schools there should be unimpeded religious freedom if an empirical assessment shows students have the proficiency to evaluate and freely choose religious systems and practices and to discern attempts by authorities to establish a religion. We differ with Moshman,however, regarding (a) the relative importance of a school's ethical, moral and political climate in influencing the exercise of free religious and political choice; (b) his focus on religious over political freedoms; (c) what kinds of proficiencies need to be assessed; (d) how to assess these proficiencies; (e) his claim that that the reasoning ability of high school and college students is similar; and (f) the manner in which decisions permitting religious clubs in high schools should be made. Reasoning proficiency must be assessed in high school, as well as post-high school, populations of students, teachers, and administrators using a social perspective-taking task with establishment of a religion content. A school's institutional atmosphere must be assessed.     

AN EVALUATION OF EVIDENCE‐BASED INTERVENTIONS TO INCREASE COMPLIANCE AMONG CHILDREN WITH AUTISM

We evaluated 4 evidence‐based interventions to increase compliance. Three children with autism who exhibited noncompliance when asked to relinquish a preferred toy were exposed sequentially to interventions that included a reduction in response effort, differential reinforcement, and guided compliance. Results indicated that effort reduction alone was ineffective and that each participant's compliance improved after exposure to a different intervention; these results highlight the need to individualize treatments for compliance.     

Statistical equating with measures of oral reading fluency

Recent research on curriculum-based measurement of oral reading fluency has revealed important issues in current passage development procedures, highlighting how dissimilar passages are problematic for monitoring student progress. The purpose of this paper is to describe statistical equating as an option for achieving equivalent scores across non-parallel reading passages. The psychometric and design properties of words-correct scores are examined, and the requirements of traditional equating methods are discussed. Simulated and empirical words-correct scores are used to demonstrate the steps in the equating process and the situations in which each method is most appropriate.     

Personal Genomic Testing as Part of the Complete Breast Cancer Risk Assessment: A Case Report

Patient access and utilization of personal genomic testing is becoming increasingly common. We present a case of a patient's personal genomic screening results leading to early detection of infiltrating breast ductal cell carcinoma via MRI scan. This case exemplifies the successful integration of personal genomic testing into the primary care setting, with the guidance and support of genetic counseling services. We discuss the scientific basis of the patient's genome scan results and risk assessment, and how this informed her decision-making and subsequent screening. We also expound upon the role of personal genomic testing as compared to other screening tests in the complete breast cancer risk assessment.     

Unique Ways in Which the Quality of Friendships Matter for Life Satisfaction

Journal of Happiness Studies - The quality of individuals’ social relationships consistently predicts greater well-being. But little is known about the relative importance of different...     

Skilled Observation and Change Blindness: A Comparison of Law Enforcement and Student Samples

Some evidence suggests that expertise and observational skills training can reduce attentional errors, such as change blindness. Laypeople typically assume that law enforcement officers possess acute observational skills, but no research to date has compared law enforcement and lay samples on their susceptibility to change blindness. In the present study, student and law enforcement samples completed a change blindness task and attempted to identify the target(s) from four line‐ups. Law enforcement officers and students were equally susceptible to change blindness regarding the switch in the target's identity, but students were more likely than officers to detect changes in the target's clothing. Students also performed better on the line‐up task, overall, than officers. Additionally, whereas students' confidence was positively correlated with identification accuracy under some circumstances, officers' confidence was either uncorrelated or negatively correlated with accuracy. We discuss the implications of these findings and suggest some factors accounting for law enforcement officers' relatively poor performance on these tasks. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Qualifizierung und Qualitätskontrolle in der forensischen Psychiatrie – die aktuelle Situation in der Schweiz

The practice of civil expert opinions in Switzerland is in a period of upheaval due to fundamental alterations regarding the legal foundations which were implemented on 1 January 2013. The new civil code displaces the authority to order measures which restrict people’s liberty based on an endangerment to themselves or third parties from a lay institution to a newly created expert committee. Moreover, patient’s rights are greatly enhanced. The subsequent consequences for expert opinion activities are not yet appraisable. The development in the practice of insurance legal expert opinion is influenced by new legal measures which aim at reducing the growing number of new disability retirements most notably due to psychiatric disorders. In contrast to the civil area there are already clearly defined standards for the insurance legal area which were established by the Swiss Society of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy in 2012. The legal foundations as well as the practice of expert opinions in the context of the Swiss civil and insurance law are comparable with the German situation but there are still some important differences related to the content and terminology. This paper outlines the current situation and recent developments in Switzerland as well as pointing out differences in comparison to Germany.