Assessment of adolescent body perception: Development and characterization of a novel tool for morphing images of adolescent bodies

We developed a computer-based method of distorting adolescent body images, which incorporates the covariation between body parts found during growth and sexual maturation. An adolescent body-shape database (AdoBSD) and adolescent body morphing tool (AdoBMT) are described; the AdoBSD comprises real (n=320) and morphed (n approximately 41,000) images (front and side view) of 160 adolescents (9-17 years). We used a point distribution model, based upon principal components analysis, to characterize the covariation between predefined body tag-points manually positioned on the body images and to morph the body images in a realistic manner. Eight principal components (PCs) were found to characterize 96.3% of the covariation between body tag-point. Application of the PCs to the body images resulted in the manipulation of body parts including shoulder width, waist, hip, belly, thigh and calf sizes. The AdoBMT and AdoBSD may be used to investigate changes in body perception during adolescence, and the role of body perception in adolescent obesity and eating disorders. The AdoBSD is available to the research community (www.brainbody.nottingham.ac.uk).     

Joint Physical Custody and Adolescents’ Life Satisfaction in 37 North American and European Countries

Joint physical custody, a parental care arrangement in which a child lives with each parent about equally after separation or divorce, is an increasingly common phenomenon in many Western countries. Although attention from family scholars, practitioners, and law professionals is growing, there are hardly any numbers on the prevalence of joint physical custody (JPC). Moreover, studies using large‐scale representative data on the effects of JPC for children’s well‐being are still rare. The data for this study come from Health Behaviour in School‐Aged Children (HBSC), a representative cross‐national survey of adolescents in 37 European and North American countries that was conducted in 2002, 2006, and 2010 and included information on students at the ages of 11, 13, and 15 years (N = 92,886). First, results revealed that symmetrical JPC after family dissolution is still very rare in the majority of countries (5% or less), but reaches 10–20% in some countries. Second, adolescents’ life satisfaction in nonintact families is higher in symmetric JPC arrangements than in asymmetric care arrangements. However, after controlling for children and family characteristics, the differences disappear. Thus, it is not the symmetric JPC arrangement that induces adolescents’ higher life satisfaction, but rather the children and family characteristics that are associated with the choice of such a custody arrangement by separated or divorced parents.     

Mental time travel for self and other in three- and four-year-old children

Humans possess the unique ability to mentally travel backward in time to re-experience past events (i.e., episodic memory) and forward in time to pre-experience future events (i.e., episodic foresight). Although originally viewed as different cognitive skills, they are now both viewed as components of the episodic memory system. Recently, it has been suggested that the episodic system may allow us to not only pre-experience and predict our own future but also that of another person. In the current study, we investigate this possibility by examining the ability of three- and four-year-old children to plan for their own future and for that of another person. We found that both three- and four-year-old children performed equally, when planning for their own future or when planning for the experimenter's future. These data are consistent with the finding that planning for someone else's future recruits the same neural structures that are used when planning for one's own future.     

Effects of Alprazolam on Complex Human Functioning1

Benzodiazepines can reduce anxiety, can have favorable effects upon sleep, and may diminish problems that interfere with patients' quality of life. On the other hand, these drugs can generate transient anterograde amnesia and may diminish aspects of task performance. Research on the impact of alprazolam and other “tranquilizing” drugs has generally focused on tasks that remain below the complex efforts of managerial or professional personnel. Alprazolam-induced reduction of anxiety under challenging conditions might aid complex task performance, yet anterograde amnesia might interfere. In the present research, managers participated in validated complex simulation tasks. In a double-blind, dual crossover design, placebo, 0.5 mg, or 1.0 mg alprazolam was administered on 2 occasions during the task day. Drug treatment diminished performance on measures that require sequential actions but improved performance on measures less subject to short term memory but more determined by long-term style of functioning. Thus, depending on task requirements, positive or negative alteration of performance might occur.     

Cognitive dedifferentiation in eidetics and synaesthesia: hunting for the ghost once more

Both synaesthesia and eidetics have a common characteristic of cognitive dedifferentiation. Synaesthesia (e.g. colour-hearing) entails the dedifferentiation of the sensory modalities, while eidetic imagery entails the dedifferentiation of imagery and perception. One can profitably gain by investigating both within the same study. Moreover, some of the same issues have arisen in these, hitherto, separate research literatures. This behoves a common framework for analysis and investigation. We applied a technique previously used for identifying child eidetikers, for screening the adult population, looking at both phenomena in the same sample. After screening, we selected a total of twenty-nine individuals for controlled testing of both phenomena and their variants (structural eidetic imagery, typographic eidetic imagery, colour-hearing synaesthesia, colour-mood synaesthesia). Our participants also completed a number of questionnaires of relevance (absorption, dissociation, and hallucination). We found that the personality trait of absorption underlies the commonality of experience tapped by both typographic and structural eidetic imagery. Furthermore, the latter phenomena were found to have a common pseudohallucinatory experiential base. For subjects scoring relatively high on the absorption scale, there is a negative correlation between structural eidetic imagery and colour-mood synaesthetic differentiation, replicating to a degree results reported earlier.     

Children's and Parents’ Well‐Being in Joint Physical Custody: A Literature Review

Joint physical custody (JPC), a parental care arrangement in which a child lives with each parent for at least 25–50% of the time after separation or divorce, is increasingly common in many Western societies. This is a major shift from the standard of sole physical custody, with mostly mothers providing primary childcare after a parental separation or divorce. The increasing share of separated or divorced parents who practice JPC, which in some countries, US states, and regions reaches 30% and more, results from increasing gender equality due to mothers participating considerably in the labor force and fathers being actively involved in their children's daily lives. This review focuses on the effects of JPC on children's and parents’ well‐being, based on 40 studies from North America, Australia, and Europe published between 2007 and 2018. In sum, there is empirical evidence from different countries that suggests that JPC arrangements can have positive effects on the well‐being of children and of parents. However, the existing studies are conceptually, methodologically, and contextually very heterogeneous. In addition, self‐selected highly educated parents with a high socio‐economic status, a low conflict level, and children between the ages of 6–15 practicing JPC dominate the samples. Thus, the risks and benefits of JPC are not clear yet and are heavily debated by advocates and academics. The review concludes with suggestions for future research.     

Phase-difference haploscope using only one shutter disk

A simplified version of a phase-difference haploscope to dissociate visual input to the two eyes is described. The unit requires only one motor and shutter disk. This reduces synchronization difficulties found in versions requiring more than one motor.     

Teachability of Reflective Processes in Written Composition

Reflective thought, as sustained in writing, is attributed to two-way communication between a content problem space and a rhetorical problem space. An instructional experiment involving sixth-graders aimed at helping them sustain such a two-way process independently, in place of the more typical one-way process of generating content and writing it out. Instruction included modeling of thinking aloud, both by instructors and students, use of cues to stimulate self-questioning during planning monologues, and direct strategy instruction emphasizing dialectical synthesis of conflicting ideas. Increased numbers of reflective statements in thinking-aloud protocols and rated reflectiveness of compositions indicate gains were made at the level of reflection on individual ideas.