Direct and indirect bully‐victims: differential psychosocial risk factors associated with adolescents involved in bullying and victimization

The present study examined psychosocial risk factors that differentiated direct and indirect bully‐victims from bullies, victims and uninvolved adolescents. A total of 7,290 (3,756 girls) students (ages 13–18 yr) from a region of Southern Ontario, Canada, completed a number of self‐report measures to determine the relation between direct and indirect bullying and victimization and several psychosocial risk factors, including normative beliefs about antisocial acts, angry‐externalizing coping, social anxiety, depression, self‐esteem, temperament, attachment, parental monitoring and peer relational problems. ANCOVA and logistic regression analyses indicated that indirect bully‐victims and victims were similar in demonstrating greater internalizing problems and peer relational problems than indirect bullies and uninvolved participants. Furthermore, adolescents involved in indirect bullying (bullies, bully‐victims) reported a higher level of normative beliefs legitimizing antisocial behaviour and less parental monitoring (males only) than indirect victims and uninvolved participants. Only normative beliefs legitimizing antisocial behaviour distinguished direct bully‐victims and bullies from victims and uninvolved adolescents. Results illuminate the distinct characteristics of direct and indirect bully‐victims; theoretical and clinical implications are discussed. Aggr. Behav. 32:551–569. 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Physiological and psychological reactivity in women with asthma: the effects of anxiety and menstrual cycle phase.

The relation between menstrual cycle timing, panic attacks, and diagnosis of asthma was explored in this study. Women with or without asthma and with or without a history of panic attacks engaged in a psychophysiological task during either the intermenstrual or premenstrual cycle phase and completed self-report measures of menstrual symptoms and attitudes, general psychological symptoms, and attitudes toward illness. No significant differences were identified for psychological or psychophysiological measures with menstrual cycle phase as a factor. However, women with both asthma and a history of panic attacks reported more general psychological distress than women in the other groups, and more state anxiety than controls. Women in the asthma, asthma and panic, and panic groups reported higher anxiety sensitivity than the control group. After listening to asthma-related scenes, women with asthma exhibited a decrease in peak expiratory air flow, and women with asthma and panic exhibited increased skin conductance response magnitude. Implications for the role of anxiety in lung function are discussed, as well as directions for future research with asthma and anxiety populations.     

Web-based experiments controlled by JavaScript: An example from probability learning

JavaScript programs can be used to control Web experiments. This technique is illustrated by an experiment that tested the effects of advice on performance in the classic probability-learning paradigm. Previous research reported that people tested via the Web or in the lab tended to match the probabilities of their responses to the probabilities that those responses would be reinforced. The optimal strategy, however, is to consistently choose the more frequent event; probability matching produces sub-optimal performance. We investigated manipulations we reasoned should improve performance. A horse race scenario in which participants predicted the winner in each of a series of races between two horses was compared with an abstract scenario used previously. Ten groups of learners received different amounts of advice, including all combinations of (1) explicit instructions concerning the optimal strategy, (2) explicit instructions concerning a monetary sum to maximize, and (3) accurate information concerning the probabilities of events. The results showed minimal effects of horse race versus abstract scenario. Both advice concerning the optimal strategy and probability information contributed significantly to performance in the task. This paper includes a brief tutorial on JavaScript, explaining with simple examples how to assemble a browser-based experiment.     

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder and Associated Functional Impairments During Pregnancy: Some Consequences of Violence Against Women

Despite the high prevalence of violence in the lives of women of reproductive age, and the adverse consequences posed to pregnant women suffering from PTSD, few studies have examined violence-related trauma and PTSD among pregnant women. A structured research interview was administered to a convenience sample of 85 prenatal care women to collect information regarding their experiences of violence victimization, PTSD symptoms related to violence-related traumatic events, and whether these symptoms impaired various aspects of the women's daily functioning. Results indicated that 69% of the women experienced a violent traumatic event, with the majority of events occurring before the current pregnancy and being perpetrated by the women's intimate partners. The traumatized women evidenced high levels of PTSD symptoms during pregnancy, with 58% of the women meeting criteria for a PTSD diagnosis. Moreover, many of the women with PTSD symptoms reported that the symptoms adversely affected aspects of their daily functioning.     

Substance Use Research with Indigenous Communities: Exploring and Extending Foundational Principles of Community Psychology

Many Indigenous communities are concerned with substance use (SU) problems and eager to advance effective solutions for their prevention and treatment. Yet these communities also are concerned about the perpetuation of colonizing, disorder‐focused, stigmatizing approaches to mental health, and social narratives related to SU problems. Foundational principles of community psychology—ecological perspectives, empowerment, sociocultural competence, community inclusion and partnership, and reflective practice—provide useful frameworks for informing ethical community‐based research pertaining to SU problems conducted with and by Indigenous communities. These principles are explored and extended for Indigenous community contexts through themes generated from seven collaborative studies focused on understanding, preventing, and treating SU problems. These studies are generated from research teams working with Indigenous communities across the United States and Canada—inclusive of urban, rural, and reservation/reserve populations as well as adult and youth participants. Shared themes indicate that Indigenous SU research reflects community psychology principles, as an outgrowth of research agendas and processes that are increasingly guided by Indigenous communities. At the same time, this research challenges these principles in important ways pertaining to Indigenous–settler relations and Indigenous‐specific considerations. We discuss these challenges and recommend greater synergy between community psychology and Indigenous research.     

The attenuating effect of mortality salience on dishonest behavior

People are easily tempted to engage in dishonest behavior when an incentive is given and when full anonymity is provided. In the present work, we investigated existential threat as a motivational factor that might reduce dishonest behavior. Research based on terror management theory has found that mortality salience increases the motivation to fulfill salient values of one’s cultural worldview. Assuming the concept of honesty is important to human societies, we hypothesized that mortality salience will reduce dishonest behavior when the concept of honesty is salient. In two experiments, we assessed dishonesty under full anonymity by applying a die-under-the-cup paradigm with the expected value serving as a stochastic baseline for honest behavior. Both experiments provided support for our hypothesis. Given an incentive to cheat, when the concept of honesty was cognitively activated by a word-search puzzle (Study 1) or by the name of the dice game (i.e., “honest game”; Study 2), mortality salient participants showed not only less dishonest behavior but actually honest behavior.

     

Genetic Modulation of Neurocognitive Development in Cancer Patients throughout the Lifespan: a Systematic Review

Neuropsychology Review - The rise in cancer survival rates has raised concerns about the long-term adverse effects of cancer treatment, including neurocognitive impairment. Neurocognitive deficits...     

Predicting the Personal Appeal of Marketing Images Using Computational Methods

Images play a central role in digital marketing. They attract attention, trigger emotions, and shape consumers’ first impressions of products and brands. We propose that the shift from one‐to‐many mass communication to highly personalized one‐to‐one communication requires an understanding of image appeal at a personal level. Instead of asking “How appealing is this image?” we ask “How appealing is this image to this particular consumer?” Using the well‐established five‐factor model of personality, we apply machine learning algorithms to predict an image's personality appeal—the personality of consumers to which the image appeals most—from a set of 89 automatically extracted image features (Study 1). We subsequently apply the same algorithm on new images to predict consequential outcomes from the fit between consumer and image personality. We show that image‐person fit adds incremental predictive power over the images’ general appeal when predicting (a) consumers’ liking of new images (Study 2) and (b) consumers’ attitudes and purchase intentions (Study 3).