Progression along the bipolar spectrum: a longitudinal study of predictors of conversion from bipolar spectrum conditions to bipolar I and II disorders

Little longitudinal research has examined progression to more severe bipolar disorders in individuals with "soft" bipolar spectrum conditions. We examine rates and predictors of progression to bipolar I and II diagnoses in a nonpatient sample of college-age participants (n = 201) with high General Behavior Inventory scores and childhood or adolescent onset of "soft" bipolar spectrum disorders followed longitudinally for 4.5 years from the Longitudinal Investigation of Bipolar Spectrum (LIBS) project. Of 57 individuals with initial cyclothymia or bipolar disorder not otherwise specified (BiNOS) diagnoses, 42.1% progressed to a bipolar II diagnosis and 10.5% progressed to a bipolar I diagnosis. Of 144 individuals with initial bipolar II diagnoses, 17.4% progressed to a bipolar I diagnosis. Consistent with hypotheses derived from the clinical literature and the Behavioral Approach System (BAS) model of bipolar disorder, and controlling for relevant variables (length of follow-up, initial depressive and hypomanic symptoms, treatment-seeking, and family history), high BAS sensitivity (especially BAS Fun Seeking) predicted a greater likelihood of progression to bipolar II disorder, whereas early age of onset and high impulsivity predicted a greater likelihood of progression to bipolar I (high BAS sensitivity and Fun-Seeking also predicted progression to bipolar I when family history was not controlled). The interaction of high BAS and high Behavioral Inhibition System (BIS) sensitivities also predicted greater likelihood of progression to bipolar I. We discuss implications of the findings for the bipolar spectrum concept, the BAS model of bipolar disorder, and early intervention efforts.     

Evidence for kinship information contained in the rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta) face

The ability to recognize kin is an important social skill for primates. Humans are adept at using facial similarity to recognize likely kin, and there is evidence that nonhuman primates are also able to use facial similarity to make judgments about kinship. However, if and how nonhuman primate faces actually contain kinship information remains unclear. To test whether there is objectively measurable facial similarity in related nonhuman primates, we compared facial measurements from related (paternal half-sisters) and unrelated adult female rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta). Facial measurements were first summarized into 5 factors using a principal component analysis. Differences in these factors between the faces of related macaques were compared with differences between the faces of random unrelated macaques and of age-matched unrelated macaques. The difference in facial measurements between related macaques was significantly smaller than the difference in facial measurements of either group of unrelated macaques, constituting an objective measure of facial similarity in macaque kin. These results indicate that kinship information is contained in the rhesus macaque face and suggest that nonhuman primates may rely in part on facial similarity to distinguish kin.     

Fairness at the collective level: a meta-analytic examination of the consequences and boundary conditions of organizational justice climate

This article uses meta-analytic methods (k = 38) to examine the relationship between organizational justice climate and unit-level effectiveness. Overall, our results suggest that the relationship between justice and effectiveness is significant (ρ = .40) when both constructs are construed at the collective level. Our results also indicate that distributive justice climate was most strongly linked with unit-level performance (e.g., productivity, customer satisfaction), whereas interactional justice was most strongly related to unit-level processes (e.g., organizational citizenship behavior, cohesion). We also show that a number of factors moderate this relationship, including justice climate strength, the level of referent in the justice measure, the hierarchical level of the unit, and how criteria are classified. We elaborate on these findings and attempt to provide a clearer direction for future research in this area.     

Reciprocal relations between recovery and work engagement: the moderating role of job stressors

In this paper, we examined the within-person relations between morning recovery level (i.e., feeling refreshed and replenished) and work engagement throughout the day, and between work engagement throughout the day and the subsequent recovery level at the end of the workday. We hypothesized that job stressors (situational constraints, job demands) moderate these relations. A diary study over 1 workweek with 2 measurement occasions per day (N = 111 persons) provided support for most of the hypotheses: Morning recovery level predicted work engagement, and work engagement predicted subsequent recovery level at the end of the workday after controlling for morning recovery level. As predicted, situational constraints attenuated these relations, but job demands did not. The results suggest that recovery translates into employee work engagement, and work engagement, in turn, prevents a loss in recovery level throughout the day, particularly when situational constraints are low. Situational constraints seem to interrupt the reciprocal processes between recovery level and work engagement.     

Job burnout and depression: unraveling their temporal relationship and considering the role of physical activity

Job burnout and depression have been generally found to be correlated with one another. However, evidence regarding the job burnout-depression association is limited in that most studies are cross-sectional in nature. Moreover, little is known about factors that may influence the job burnout-depression association, other than individual or organizational factors (e.g., gender, supervisor support). The current study seeks to address these gaps by (a) unraveling the temporal relationship between job burnout and depression and (b) examining whether the job burnout-depression association may be contingent upon the degree to which employees engage in physical activity. On the basis of a full-panel 3-wave longitudinal design with a large sample of employees (N = 1,632), latent difference score modeling indicated that an increase in depression from Time 1 to Time 2 predicts an increase in job burnout from Time 2 to Time 3, and vice versa. In addition, physical activity attenuated these effects in a dose-response manner, so that the increase in job burnout and depression was strongest among employees who did not engage in physical activity and weakest to the point of nonsignificance among those engaging in high physical activity.     

Effects of three types of noncontingent auditory stimulation on vocal stereotypy in children with autism

We evaluated the effects of 3 types of noncontingent auditory stimulation (music, white noise, recordings of vocal stereotypy) on 2 children with autism who engaged in high rates of vocal stereotypy. For both participants, the music condition was the most effective in decreasing vocal stereotypy to near-zero levels, resulted in the highest parent social validity ratings, and was selected as most preferred in treatment preference evaluations.     

Effects of text messaged self-monitoring on class attendance and punctuality of at-risk college student athletes

This study examined the effects of text messaging class arrival to an academic counselor on the attendance and punctuality of 4 college student athletes. Each participant had a history of class tardiness and was considered to be at risk for academic failure. Class attendance and punctuality improved for all participants.     

Even simple forms of social learning rely on intention attribution in marmoset monkeys (Callithrix jacchus)

Intention attribution guides the cognitively most demanding forms of social learning, such as imitation, thereby scaffolding cumulative cultural evolution. However, it is not thought to be necessary for more basic forms of social learning. Here we present evidence that in marmoset monkeys (Callithrix jacchus) even most basic forms of social learning such as enhancement depend on intention attribution. Marmosets perceived the behavior of a conspecific and a conspecific-like robot, but not that of a moving black box, as goal directed. Their subsequent choice behavior was shaped by social facilitation and stimulus enhancement, that is, by very simple forms of social learning, but only when exposed to the conspecific and robot, which they previously had perceived as intentional agents. We discuss the implications of this finding for contemporary debates about social learning, including emulation learning and ghost control studies, the necessity of goal-directed copying for cumulative cultural evolution, and the limits of current classification systems of social learning for the evolution of social and asocial learning.     

Mapping novel labels to actions: how the rhythm of words guides infants' learning

We investigated the effect of lexical stress on 16-month-olds' ability to form associations between labels and paths of motion. Disyllabic English nouns tend to have a strong-weak (trochaic) stress pattern, and verbs tend to have a weak-strong (iambic) pattern. We explored whether infants would use word stress information to guide word-action associations during learning. Infants heard two novel words with either verb-like iambic stress or noun-like trochaic stress. Each word was paired with a single novel object performing one of two path actions and was tested using path-switch trials. Only infants in the iambic stress condition learned the association between the novel words and the path actions. To further investigate infants' difficulty in mapping the trochaic labels to the actions, we conducted an additional study in which infants were given an object switch task using the trochaic labels. In this case, infants were able to associate the trochaic labels with the objects, providing further support that infants use lexical stress to guide label-referent associations. This study demonstrates that by 16months, English-learning infants have developed a bias to expect disyllabic action labels to have iambic stress patterns, consistent with native language stress patterns.     

Social class differences in N400 indicate differences in spontaneous trait inference

An emerging literature indicates that dispositional bias in causal attribution of social behavior is weaker for people with working-class (vs. middle-class) backgrounds. However, it is unknown whether this difference is also present in spontaneous forms of trait inference. In the current work, American undergraduates were asked to merely memorize many pairings of a target face and a trait-implying behavior. In a subsequent lexical judgment task, after each face was presented as a fixation, either an implied trait or its antonym was given as a target. As expected, participants with college-educated parents (middle class) showed a strong N400 event-related potential component to the antonym (vs. the implied trait), suggesting spontaneous trait inference during the memorization phase. In contrast, those with high-school-educated parents (working class) showed no such effect. It is important to note that the N400 spontaneous trait inference effect was associated with perceived significance of dispositions in accounting for social behaviors.