Dehumanizing but competent: The impact of gender,illness type,and emotional expressiveness on patient perceptions of doctors

This study is the first attempt to investigate men's and women's anticipated reactions to a consultation with a doctor holding either a dehumanizing or humanistic approach to patient treatment. Participants (N = 375) read a vignette depicting a doctor's treatment philosophy—emphasizing either the metaphor of the body as a machine (dehumanizing condition) or emphasizing individual humanness (humanizing condition). They then imagined consulting the doctor about a psychological or physical illness. Although, medical dehumanization had undesirable consequences, some men rated the dehumanizing doctor as more competent than the humanizing doctor. These were men who were (a) emotionally expressive and seeking help for a psychological illness, and (b) men low in emotional expressiveness seeking help for a physical illness.     

Profiles of emotion regulation: Understanding regulatory patterns and the implications for posttraumatic stress

Trauma survivors often experience posttraumatic stress (PTS) and report concurrent difficulties with emotion regulation (ER). Although individuals typically use multiple regulatory strategies to manage emotion, no studies yet examine the influence of a constellation of strategies on PTS in a community sample. We assessed six ER strategies and investigated whether specific profiles of ER (i.e. the typical pattern of regulation, determined by how often each strategy is used) were related to PTS. A hierarchical cluster analysis indicated that four distinct profiles were present: Adaptive Regulation, Active Regulation, Detached Regulation, and Maladaptive Regulation. Further analyses revealed that an individual's profile was not related to frequency of past trauma, but had the power to differentiate symptom severity for overall PTS and each symptom cluster of posttraumatic stress disorder. These findings highlight how profiles characterising multiple regulatory strategies offer a more complete understanding of the ways ER can account for PTS.     

Children's Uncertain Responses when Testifying about Alleged Sexual Abuse in Scottish Courts

This study examined the uncertain responses of 56 alleged sexual abuse victims, aged 5–17 years, testifying in Scottish criminal court trials. Don't know/remember ground rules were explained to 38% of the children and each child reported uncertainty in response to 15% of the questions on average. Uncertain responding was associated with expressions of resistance and confusion, questioning context (proportionally more regarding substantive than non‐substantive issues), question content (least to disclosure‐focused questions), utterance type (more to directives, particularly those posed by defense lawyers; more to recall‐based than recognition prompts), and age (children in mid‐adolescence were less likely to respond uncertainly than those who were either older or younger). There were no associations between expressions of uncertainty and ground rule administration, or with whether or not the question focused on central rather than peripheral details about the alleged crimes. Findings highlight concerns surrounding preparatory procedures to help witnesses, especially adolescents, indicate uncertainty when testifying. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Creating Supportive Environments for Children Who have had Exposure to Traumatic Events

The prevalence of trauma among young children and its impact on educational outcomes is gaining attention. It is probable that the needs of children who have experienced or been exposed to trauma have long gone unmet due to identification challenges and a lack of knowledge concerning best practices. For this study, qualitative interviews were conducted to gather perspectives of 14 community-based service providers who worked with children and families regarding trauma-related concerns. Each shared his or her perspectives on knowledge and skills early childhood education teachers need to support children who have experienced traumatic events and partner with their families. Research questions were: What should early childhood teachers know about (1) trauma experiences among young children; (2) the emotional and behavioral patterns of children who have experienced traumatic events; and (3) supporting the social and emotional well-being of children in the classroom setting, including partnering with families, who have experienced or been exposed to traumatic events? Participants indicated that teachers might not readily connect children’s behaviors and emotions to trauma. However, teachers can use approaches and strategies (e.g., being attuned and supporting positive social and emotional and communicative responses) that promote social and emotional well-being for children who experience trauma. Participants also noted that teachers can resist re-traumatization by making adaptations to social, physical, and temporal aspects of the classroom environment. Findings indicate that trauma-informed care might be viable in early childhood classroom settings. Implications for research are discussed.     

Couple resilience and life wellbeing in firefighters

The validity of the Couple Resilience Inventory was tested using 102 married or cohabiting firefighters. This instrument measures types of relationship behavior that often occur during stressful life events and that are expected to be associated with an ability to cope with employment in a stressful occupation. It includes scales measuring two nearly orthogonal dimensions, with one dimension pertaining to positive behavior and the other to negative. Firefighters completed an online questionnaire that included the Couple Resilience Inventory and measures of relationship satisfaction, exposure to traumatic events, and life wellbeing. In line with hypotheses, scales measuring positive and negative couple resilience were nearly orthogonal to each other, and distinct from a measure of relationship satisfaction, but both scales correlated positively with exposure to traumatic events, and both correlated in opposite directions with relationship satisfaction and life wellbeing. Results were consistent with the theoretical model and they supported instrument validity.     

Televised sexual content and parental mediation: Influences on adolescent sexuality

Little research has been conducted to examine the influence of exposure to televised sexual content on adolescent sexuality or how parental intervention may reduce negative effects of viewing such content. This study uses self-report data from 1,012 adolescents to investigate the relations among exposure to sexually suggestive programming, parental mediation strategies, and three types of adolescent sexuality outcomes: participation in oral sex and sexual intercourse, future intentions to engage in these behaviors, and sex expectancies. As predicted, exposure to sexual content was associated with an increased likelihood of engaging in sexual behaviors, increased intentions to do so in the future, and more positive sex expectancies. Often, parental mediation strategies were a significant factor in moderating these potential media influences.     

Met expectations: The effects of expected and delivered inducements on employee satisfaction

Interpretation of existing theory and research on met expectations is problematic due to ambiguous conceptualization of the met expectations hypothesis and limitations imposed by the measurement strategies typically employed in this domain (i.e. difference scores and direct retrospective measures). In this longitudinal study, we sought to overcome these problems by using an alternative methodology to conduct a more comprehensive test of the met expectations hypothesis based on Warr's (1987) Vitamin Model and on research in related fields (e.g. person–environment fit). Polynomial regression and response surface analyses were used to examine how employee satisfaction is related to unmet, met, and exceeded expectations concerning two distinct types of inducements analogous to vitamins A (skill development opportunities) and E (support, compensation). Respondents included 342 limited term employees. Consistent with previous research, our results indicated that unmet expectations of any sort were associated with decreased satisfaction. However, contrary to common interpretations of the extant literature, our results also indicated that met expectations were not always associated with high levels of satisfaction and that exceeded expectations were, in the case of skill development, negatively associated with satisfaction. These findings suggest a need to broaden existing met expectations theory and to refine common organizational practices.     

Lethal Stereotypes: Hair and Eye Color as Survival Characteristics During the Holocaust1

In spite of many false negatives and false positives quite familiar to the people of Nazi‐dominated Europe, dark hair and eyes were salient among the physical stereotypes of Jews that the Nazis promulgated along with psychosocial ones. Many narratives of the Holocaust refer to someone surviving because he or she “did not look Jewish,” and others being caught and killed because they did. A quantitative test of the validity and impact of this attribution showed that a higher proportion of Holocaust survivors than of a North American Jewish control group had light‐colored hair, eyes, or both during the relevant period. The paper discusses possible reasons why these were survival characteristics under the conditions of the Holocaust, the possible short‐ and long‐term effects of such selectivity, and implications for stereotyping in other situations of ethnic persecution and genocide.     

Social class and the experience of work-family conflict during the transition to adulthood

The challenges of juggling work and family responsibilities are well known, but there has been little attention to the distinctive work and family experiences of young adults. This chapter explores how class affects young adults' exposure to work-family conflicts and the strategies they use to manage their work and family responsibilities. Using data from a recent cohort of young adults, we find class and gender variations in work and family roles and work-family conflict. Early family formation, coupled with poor working conditions, lead those with lower educational attainments to experience more years of family-to-work interference. In contrast, young adults with more education have more work-to-family interference, and this is especially true for college-educated women.     

Developing suicide prevention programs for African American youth in African American churches

Suicide prevention programs for African American youth in African American churches may have broad appeal because: (1) the Black Church has a strong history of helping community members, regardless of church membership; (2) African Americans have the highest level of public and private religiousness; and (3) the church can help shape religious and cultural norms about mental health and help-seeking. The proposed gatekeeper model trains lay helpers and clergy to recognize the risk and protective factors for depression and suicide, to make referrals to the appropriate community mental health resources, and to deliver a community education curriculum. Potential barriers and suggestions for how to overcome these barriers are discussed.