Parenting and Family Stress Treatment Outcomes in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD): An Empirical Analysis in the MTA Study

Parenting and family stress treatment outcomes in the MTA study were examined. Male and female (579), 7–9-year-old children with combined type Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), were recruited at six sites around the United States and Canada, and randomly assigned to one of four groups: intensive, multi-faceted behavior therapy program alone (Beh); carefully titrated and monitored medication management strategy alone (MedMgt); a well-integrated combination of the two (Comb); or a community comparison group (CC). Treatment occurred over 14 months, and assessments were taken at baseline, 3, 9, and 14 months. Parenting behavior and family stress were assessed using parent-report and child-report inventories. Results showed that Beh alone, MedMgt alone, and Comb produced significantly greater decreases in a parent-rated measure of negative parenting, Negative/Ineffective Discipline, than did standard community treatment. The three MTA treatments did not differ significantly from each other on this domain. No differences were noted among the four groups on positive parenting or on family stress variables. Results are discussed in terms of the theoretical and empirically documented importance of negative parenting in the symptoms, comorbidities and long-term outcomes of ADHD.     

Contents Volume 100

Volume Contents

Contents Volume 100     

Postural stability and hand preference as constraints on one-handed catching performance in children

Effects of postural state and hand preference as constraints on 1-handed catching performance were investigated in different ability groups of children aged 9-10 years. On the basis of pretest data, the authors classified 48 participants into groups of good, intermediate, and poor catchers (n = 16 in each) and asked them to perform 1-handed catches with their preferred and nonpreferred hands while standing and sitting. The good catchers' performance was not affected by the imposed postural constraints but did improve when they used the preferred hand. A similar effect of hand preference was evident in the intermediate and poor catchers, but there was also an effect of postural constraint. Independent of hand preference, intermediate catchers' performance while seated improved significantly compared with that during standing. For poor catchers, there was an interaction between hand preference and posture; significant improvement was evident only when they used the preferred hand in the sitting condition. The finding that manipulation of posture and hand preference affected performance outcomes indicates that perceptual skill is not the only influence on catching performance in children. Manipulation of those key constraints may facilitate the acquisition of catching skill, but more research is needed to determine the permanence of those effects.     

Conceptualizing control in social cognition: how executive functioning modulates the expression of automatic stereotyping

Two studies investigated the role of executive control in moderating the relationship between automatic stereotype activation and behavioral responses. Race bias in weapon identification was used to measure stereotyping, and a process dissociation procedure was used to measure automatic and controlled components of performance. In Experiment 1, the controlled component was shown to correlate with general attention control and race-specific motivations to control prejudice. Across multiple measures, automatic race bias was more likely to be expressed as behavioral discrimination among individuals with poor executive control. Experiment 2 found the same relationship between automatic and controlled components of behavior when predicting impressions of a Black individual. Executive control is discussed in the context of other control strategies in influential dual-process models of stereotyping.     

An illustration of multilevel factor analysis

The factor analysis of repeated measures psychiatric data presents interesting challenges for researchers in terms of identifying the latent structure of an assessment instrument. Specifically, repeated measures contain both within and between individual sources of variance. Although a number of techniques exist for separating out these 2 sources of variance, all are problematic. Recently, researchers have proposed that exploratory multilevel factor analysis (MFA) be used to appropriately analyze the latent structure of repeated measures data. The chief objective of this report is to provide a didactic step-by-step guide on how MFA may be applied to psychiatric data. In the discussion, we describe difficulties associated with MFA and consider challenges in factor analyzing life event appraisals in psychiatric samples.     

Eye movements and word skipping during reading revisited

The authors examined word skipping in reading in 2 experiments. In Experiment 1, skipping rates were higher for a preview of a predictable word than for a visually similar nonword, indicating there is full recognition in parafoveal vision. In Experiment 2, foveal load was manipulated by varying the frequency of the word preceding either a 3-letter target word or a misspelled preview. There was again a higher skipping rate for a correct preview and a lower skipping rate when there was a high foveal load, but there was no interaction, and the pattern of effects in fixation times was the same as in the skipping data. Experiment 2 also showed significant skipping of nonwords similar to the target word, indicating skipping based on partial information.     

Letter-by-letter acquired dyslexia is due to the serial encoding of letters

Letter-by-letter acquired dyslexia (pure alexia) is assumed to be related to the serial encoding of letters, but the evidence for this assumption is somewhat indirect. Here, we demonstrate that the deficit is indeed due to serial encoding by comparing the performance of a letter-by-letter dyslexic reader with the performance of normal readers who were forced to read letter by letter; the data patterns are remarkably similar.     

Schizophrenia and deliberate self-harm: a systematic review of risk factors

Deliberate self-harm (DSH) is a strong predictor of suicide in schizophrenia. The aim of this review was to identify risk factors for DSH in schizophrenia. This systematic review of the international literature examined cohort and case-control studies of patients with schizophrenia or related diagnoses that reported DSH as an outcome. Studies were identified by searching electronic databases and reference lists, and by consulting international experts. Fourteen studies met the eligibility criteria. Of the 29 variables examined by two or more studies, five (past or recent suicidal ideation, previous DSH, past depressive episode, drug abuse or dependence, and higher mean number of psychiatric admissions) were associated with an increased risk of DSH, and one (unemployment) was associated with a reduced risk. Schizophrenic patients with these risk factors need careful follow-up and monitoring, with treatment of any associated comorbid depression or drug abuse. Large, prospective studies of DSH in schizophrenia are needed to further define risk factors and to build on the findings of this review.