Retraction Note: Unexpected events disrupt visuomotor working memory and increase guessing

Psychonomic Bulletin & Review - The authors are retracting this article (Finzi et al., 2018) because after publication they discovered a mistake in the behavioral analysis.     

The Link: An Alternative Educational Program in the Netherlands to Reengage School-Refusing Adolescents With Schooling

Facets of school life affect the development and maintenance of school refusal (SR). These facets will warrant attention during intervention for SR. This paper considers a range of school-related factors associated with SR, grouped according to five domains of school climate. It also describes school-based interventions for SR in the form of alternative educational programs (AEPs). The paper then presents the Link, an AEP for Dutch adolescents with SR. The Link offers an educational setting that addresses school-related factors associated with SR. After participation in the Link, adolescents are helped to return to a more typical educational setting. Based on a review of 30 case files, we provide an account of adolescents who have participated in the Link. Often, these adolescents displayed chronic and severe SR, met criteria for anxiety or depressive disorders, and were diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder. The Link process is illustrated via a case vignette. Thereafter, the role of AEPs in the treatment of SR is discussed.     

Exchange schedules in token economies: A preliminary investigation of second‐order schedule effects

Basic research shows that token‐production and exchange‐production schedules in token economies affect each other as second‐order schedules (i.e., the exchange‐production schedule's requirements affect responding toward the token‐production schedule). This relationship has not been investigated with children in academic settings despite the widespread use of token economies in this context. This study compared the effects of fixed‐ratio (FR) and variable‐ratio (VR) exchange‐production schedules of equal ratios (2, 5, and 10) on responding toward an FR 1 token‐production schedule with a child diagnosed with autism. A concurrent chains assessment was also conducted to assess the participant's relative preference for FR and VR exchange‐production schedule arrangements within her typical discrete trial training. Results showed no difference in response rate between the two schedule types. However, the concurrent chains assessment revealed an exclusive preference for the VR arrangement.     

Reweighing the Ethical Tradeoffs in the Involuntary Hospitalization of Suicidal Patients

Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the United States and the second cause of death among those ages 15–24 years. The current standard of care for suicidality management often involves an involuntary hospitalization deemed necessary by the attending psychiatrist. The purpose of this article is to reexamine the ethical tradeoffs inherent in the current practice of involuntary psychiatric hospitalization for suicidal patients, calling attention to the often-neglected harms inherent in this practice and proposing a path for future research. With accumulating evidence of the harms inherent in civil commitment, we propose that the relative value of this intervention needs to be reevaluated and more efficacious alternatives researched. Three arguments are presented: (1) that inadequate attention has been given to the harms resulting from the use of coercion and the loss of autonomy, (2) that inadequate evidence exists that involuntary hospitalization is an effective method to reduce deaths by suicide, and (3) that some suicidal patients may benefit more from therapeutic interventions that maximize and support autonomy and personal responsibility. Considering this evidence, we argue for a policy that limits the coercive hospitalization of suicidal individuals to those who lack decision-making capacity.     

Analyzing Job Analysis Data Using Mixture Rasch Models

An important piece of validity evidence to support the use of credentialing exams comes from performing a job analysis of the profession. One common job analysis method is the task inventory method, where people working in the field are surveyed using rating scales about the tasks thought necessary to safely and competently perform the job. This article describes how mixture Rasch models can be used to analyze these data, and how results from these analyses can help to identify whether different groups of people may be responding to job tasks differently. Three examples from different credentialing programs illustrate scenarios that can be found when applying mixture Rasch models to job analysis data. Discussion of what these results may imply for the development of credentialing exams and other analyses of job analysis data is provided.     

A comparison of different investigative interviewing techniques in generating differential recall enhancement and detecting deception

This study compared the Stepwise Interview, Cognitive Interview, and Reality Interview in detecting deception with inmates. The dependent measures were the amount of unique details provided during the free narrative and mnemonics and the number of words provided during the free narrative and mnemonics of each interview. The Stepwise Interview generated 58.3% accuracy, the Cognitive Interview generated 70.0% accuracy, and the Reality Interview generated 93.3% accuracy. The different tasks of these interviews increased the differences between honest and deceptive statements and therefore, increased the accuracy in detection of deception. Differential recall enhancement is used to explain the findings.     

Recall cues interfere with retrieval from visuospatial working memory

Visuospatial working memory allows us to hold multiple visual objects over short delays. It is typically tested by presenting an array of objects, then after a delay showing a ‘probe’ indicating which memory item to recall or reproduce by adjusting a target feature. However, recent studies demonstrate that information at the time of probe can disrupt recall. Here, in three experiments we test whether traditional memory probes, which contain features that compete with the feature to be recalled, may themselves interfere with performance. We asked participants to report the direction of one of the several coloured arrows in memory, based on its colour. First, we demonstrate that recall is better when the probe is initially just a coloured dot, rather than a coloured arrow which has to be adjusted to match orientation memory, consistent with interference from features of the probe itself. Second, this interference is present even when a mask follows the memory array, suggesting that the interference does not work by degrading immediate or iconic memory. Finally, when items are shown sequentially, the first and last items are invulnerable to probe interference. Our findings support recent theories of associative recall, in which probes reactivate features in WM, retrieving information by pattern completion.     

The Griffith empathy measure needs to be revised with attention to item coding direction: A reply to Dadds (2018)

The Griffith empathy measure (GEM; Dadds et al., 2008, Child Psychiatry and Human Development, 39, 111) needs to be revisited through further factor analytic and interpretational work. Studies using it in the manner proposed by Dadds et al., to make strong claims distinguishing between cognitive and affective empathy in children, are likely to be inaccurate or misleading (e.g., Georgiou, Kimonis, & Fanti, 2018, European Journal of Developmental Psychology, 1). It is quite likely, though, that the GEM's value can be dramatically enhanced if it is effectively revised and re-conceptualised.     

Documenting the multisensory and ephemeral: Navajo Chantway singers and the troubles of a “science” of ceremonialism

Even as American ethnology in the late‐nineteenth century continued to accumulate data about indigenous groups for comparative study, the surgeon‐turned‐ethnographer Washington Matthews found standardized documentary methods constricting, unable to reflect the complexity of a community's spiritual practices. Through studies of Navajo Indians in the 1880s and 90s, Matthews experimented with documentation techniques to capture the multisensorial and ephemeral elements of Navajo healing ceremonialism, such as the design of sandpaintings that were later destroyed as the rites concluded. Investigating his ethnographic strategies and his relationships with Navajo knowledge stewards, this article charts Matthews’ emerging conviction in social immersion and bonding with indigenous informants, tenets that predated the rise of cultural relativism in anthropology. The article argues that his experience among and tutelage from Navajo medicine “singers” reshaped Matthews’ documentary practices to emphasize the irreducibility of cultural facets to tabular columns, raising doubts about then‐dominant theories of social evolution.