Scoring Depression on a Common Metric: A Comparison of EAP Estimation,Plausible Value Imputation,and Full Bayesian IRT Modeling

There are a growing number of item response theory (IRT) studies that calibrate different patient-reported outcome (PRO) measures, such as anxiety, depression, physical function, and pain, on common, instrument-independent metrics. In the case of depression, it has been reported that there are considerable mean score differences when scoring on a common metric from different, previously linked instruments. Ideally, those estimates should be the same. We investigated to what extent those differences are influenced by different scoring methods that take into account several levels of uncertainty, such as measurement error (through plausible value imputation) and item parameter uncertainty (through full Bayesian IRT modeling). Depression estimates from different instruments were more similar, and their corresponding confidence/credible intervals were larger when plausible value imputation or Bayesian modeling was used, compared to the direct use of expected a posteriori (EAP) estimates. Furthermore, we explored the use of Bayesian IRT models to update item parameters based on newly collected data.     

Madness strikes back

This commentary is concerned with the involvement of mental health service users in research. It will argue that research carried out by service users is one way of giving voice to a previously silenced group—the mad. It is one way in which ‘Madness Strikes Back’. The main theoretical model to be used is that of the early Foucault. I will not be concerned with what has become known as ‘Foucauldian discourse analysis’ since nowhere in Foucault's writing is there reference to conversation or talk. I will, however, be concerned with power as mental health service users are amongst the most disempowered of groups in all societies. I will also be concerned with Foucault's claim that, since the Enlightenment, madness has been positioned as the antithesis of reason, as ‘unreason’. This distinction can be argued to persist in the field of research. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

‘It's not racist. It's common sense’. A critical analysis of political discourse around asylum and immigration in the UK

This paper looks at a political speech given by the leader of the opposition party during the run up to the UK elections in 2005. Using this speech as a starting point, we attempt to trace the path of ‘racism’ within a text that makes explicit claims to being ‘not racist’. Drawing on a number of theoretical and methodological resources, this paper approaches the analysis by focusing on a number of conceptually heterogeneous elements that, in relation with each other, function to produce, re‐produce and stabilize ‘racism’. One of the difficulties commonly encountered in social psychological work, we would suggest, is that an explicit statement of allegiance to a particular methodological and theoretical tradition can also result in a restriction of theorization to a particular ‘level of analysis’. That is to say, a methodological process that constructs a pre‐given category, presets the criteria by which ‘racism’ can be identified and fixes the ‘level of analysis’ at which it can be studied risks ignoring the multiple points of contact at which ‘racism’ can be made visible or made to disappear. The concern here it that such a process can work to reinscribe the very ‘racisms’ we aim to disrupt. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Collective rationality in interactive decisions: evidence for team reasoning

Decision theory and game theory rest on a fundamental assumption that players seek to maximize their individual utilities, but in some interactive decisions it seems intuitively reasonable to aim to maximize the utility of the group of players as a whole. Such team reasoning requires collective preferences and a distinctive mode of reasoning from preferences to decisions. Findings from two experiments provide evidence for collective preferences and team reasoning. In lifelike vignettes (Experiment 1) and abstract games (Experiment 2) with certain structural properties, most players preferred team-reasoning strategies to strategies supporting unique Nash equilibria, although individually rational players should choose equilibrium strategies. These findings suggest that team reasoning predicts strategy choices more powerfully than orthodox game theory in some games.     

Evaluating the invariance of the factor structure of the EPQ-R-N among adolescents

We examined the factor structure of the Neuroticism scale of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ-R-N; S. B. G. Eysenck, Eysenck & Barrett, 1985) and its factor invariance across sex and racial/ethnic groups in a sample of 1,979 adolescents. Using confirmatory factor analyses, we compared a hierarchical model to previous models of the EPQ-R-N and to single-factor and 3-factor structures. The hierarchical factor structure in which a general factor coexists with 3 group factors (depression, social concerns, and worry) was superior to alternative models. The general factor accounted for more than 60% of the variance in EPQ-R-N total scores and was invariant across sex and ethnicity. The 3 group factors varied across ethnicity and sex. We discuss the implications of these findings for conceptualization and assessment of neuroticism using the EPQ-R-N.     

Where's the Religion? Distinguishing Faith‐Based from Secular Social Service Agencies

The charitable choice provision and President Bush's proposed Faith-Based and Community Initiative have spurred debates regarding government support of faith-based social service programs and their effectiveness. To address the issue of relative effectiveness, the logically prior question of what constitutes a faith-based agency and how they differ from secular providers must be answered. Utilizing data from a mailed survey, this study compares the organizational characteristics of faith-based and secular agencies that provide services to the homeless in Houston, Texas. Results indicate that the two agency types vary significantly across several dimensions including funding sources and preferences, decision-making tools, organizational culture, practices, leadership, and staffing characteristics. In addition, survey data and content analysis of mission statements reveal that 80 percent of faith-based agencies use religious imagery in some form of their "public face" to communicate their religiousness.     

The regulation of dependency in parent-child relationships

We propose that the insecurities about a close other’s regard that make it difficult for low self-esteem people to form satisfying romantic relationships also create difficulties in family relationships. Our study revealed that low self-esteem mothers and children felt less loved by one another than did high self-esteem mothers and children. These feelings of not being loved partially accounted for the tendency of low self-esteem children and mothers to be dissatisfied with their relationships. Ironically, however, low self-esteem children’s insecurities about how much their mothers loved them were not warranted by the strength of their mother’s love. Taken together, these findings suggest that the processes that regulate attachment to significant others extend to familial as well as romantic relationships.     

The relationship between short-term mentoring benefits and long-term mentor outcomes

Little is known about the short- and long-term benefits mentors gain from their mentoring relationships. This study examined the extent to which short-term proximal benefits reported by mentors (improved job performance, recognition by others, rewarding experience, and loyal base of support) predicted the long-term distal outcomes of mentor career success, work attitudes and behavioral intentions to mentor in the future. Mentors’ reports of short-term mentoring benefits significantly predicted their work attitudes and their intentions to mentor again in the future, but were unrelated to their career success. Upon closer inspection, short-term instrumental mentor benefits (improved job performance, recognition by others) were more important in predicting mentor work attitudes, whereas short-term relational mentor benefits (rewarding experience, loyal base of support) were more important in predicting intentions to mentor in the future. Implications for mentoring theory, future research, and practice are discussed.