Parental enabling attitudes and locus of control of at-risk and honors students

Parental enabling attitudes and behavior interfere with the child's ability to take responsibility for his or her behavior. Enabling is expressed in overprotectiveness and manipulation in which parents insulate their children from unpleasant circumstances and from making mistakes. Unfortunately, these are the very situations in which most children learn self-control, independence, and strategies to correct aberrant behavior. Children of enabling parents often fail to learn that their actions have consequences. The Lynch Enabling Survey for Parents (LESP), a forty-item questionnaire designed to assess the enabling behavior of parents, was evaluated to establish its psychometric properties. In Experiment 1, 416 parents responded to the LESP. The instrument was determined to be reliable (rs = .84 and .92 for split-half and test-retest reliability, respectively) and valid. Factor analysis established four factors, assessing Direct Enabling Parent Involvement, Indirect Nonenabling Parent Involvement, Direct Nonenabling Parent Involvement, and Indirect Enabling Parent Involvement. In Experiment 2, the LESP and the Nowicki-Strickland Locus of Control Scale were used to assess the differences between ninth-grade at-risk and honors students and their parents. The responses of parents of at-risk students on the LESP were significantly more enabling than were the responses of the parents of honors students. At-risk and honors students were also significantly different in their locus of control. Lastly, there was a significant relationship between parents' LESP scores and their children's locus of control scores.     

Restraint and Cancellation: Multiple Inhibition Deficits in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder

We used variations of the stop signal task to study two components of motor response inhibition—the ability to withhold a strong response tendency (restraint) and the ability to cancel an ongoing action (cancellation)—in children with a diagnosis of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and in non-ADHD controls of similar age (ages 7–14 years). The goal was to determine if restraint and cancellation were related and if both were deficient in ADHD. The stop signal task involved a choice reaction time task (go task) which required a rapid response. The demand for inhibitory control was invoked through the presentation of a stop signal on a subset of go trials which required that the ongoing response be suspended. The stop signal was presented either concurrently with the go signal (restraint version) or after a variable delay (cancellation version). In Study 1, we compared ADHD and control children on the cancellation version of the stop task; in Study 2, we compared ADHD and controls on the restraint version. In Study 3, a subset of ADHD and control participants completed both tasks so that we could examine convergence of these dimensions of inhibition. Compared to control participants, ADHD participants showed a deficit both in the ability to cancel and to restrain a speeded motor response. Performance on the restraint version was significantly correlated with performance on the cancellation version in controls, but not in ADHD participants. We conclude that ADHD is associated with deficits in both restraint and cancellation subcomponents of inhibition.     

Coordinated interpersonal timing in the conversations of children who stutter and their mothers and fathers

Coordinated interpersonal timing (CIT) is a measure of "conversational congruence," or "attunement," and refers to the degree to which the temporal aspects of the vocal behaviors of co-conversationalists are correlated over the course of a conversation [Jasnow, M., & Feldstein, S. (1986). Adult-like temporal characteristics of mother-infant vocal interaction. Child Development, 57, 754-761]. In the present study, CIT was examined in a group of children who stutter (CWS), and a matched group of nonstuttering children (CWDNS; children who do not stutter), during conversations with either their mother or father recorded in two separate sessions (i.e., mother-child, father-child). Separate audio signals for both the child and parent (mother or father) were analyzed using AVTA software, which allowed for the quantification of sound and silence patterns in simultaneous speech. Squared cross-correlations (i.e., coefficients of CIT) for the durations of five vocal behavior states were obtained for each subject, through time series regression analysis using lag procedures. Vocal state behaviors within conversational turns included: vocalization, pauses, turn switching pauses, and interruptive and noninterruptive simultaneous speech. Results indicated that CWS and their parents showed mutual influence (i.e., CIT in both directions, child to parent and parent to child, or bi-directional influence) for more vocal state behaviors than did CWDNS and their parents. In addition, the CWS exhibited CIT with their parents for the durations of more vocal state behaviors than did the CWDNS (i.e., unidirectional influence). Findings suggest that children who stutter may be more easily influenced by the subtle timing aspects of conversation. Taken further, some of these children may perceive conversations with their parents as either challenging or difficult because of an element of unpredictability brought into conversations by the production of stuttering, the social skills of the child, and the nature of the parent-child relationship. Consequently, these children may be engaging in more pervasive coordination of the temporal characteristics of their speech to those of their conversational partner, as a mechanism by which to more effectively manage verbal interaction. EDUCATIONAL OBJECTIVES: After reading this paper, the learner will be able to: (1) describe the phenomenon of coordinated interpersonal timing (CIT); (2) summarize research findings in CIT as they apply to the verbal interactions of children and their parents; (3) summarize research findings in parent-stuttering child interaction, especially those related to the temporal aspects of both parent and child conversational speech, and (4) discuss the applicability of the findings from the present study to the treatment of childhood stuttering.     

Cramer's model of willingness to seek counseling: a structural equation model for counseling students

The author tested how well K. M. Cramer's model of willingness to seek counseling fit for master's level counseling students. Counseling students (N = 519) from across the United States completed a survey. Using structural equation modeling, the author found that Cramer's model fit with counseling students. Counseling students were most likely to report being willing to seek counseling if they had a positive attitude toward counseling, low level of self-concealment, high level of distress, and low social support.     

Fear and Avoidance: A Three-Day Investigation on the Impact of a Fear-Related Verbal-Rehearsal Task on a Behavior–Behavior Relation

The Psychological Record - Recent research suggests that fear and avoidance responding based on derived transformation of functions may be considered functionally independent. The current study...     

Performance in a substitution task and state anxiety following yoga in army recruits

140 men (M age = 30.3 yr., SD = 5.7) from the Indian army in north India participated in the study. They were naive to yoga and were assigned to yoga and breath awareness groups randomly, with 70 in each group. 20 healthy males of comparable age (M age = 33.7 yr., SD = 7.0) formed a comparison group. Their performance in a digit-letter substitution task and a state anxiety subscale was assessed immediately before and after two 45-min. sessions. The two groups of soldiers practiced either yoga or breath awareness. The comparison group listened to meditation music. Digit-letter substitution scores increased in both groups of army personnel and in the comparison group. State anxiety decreased after yoga and listening to meditation music, but not after breath awareness. This suggests that even in army personnel naive to yoga, a yoga-based intervention or listening to meditation music could reduce anxiety while increasing performance on an attention task.     

Influence of value predispositions,interpersonal contact,and mediated exposure on public attitudes toward homosexuals in Singapore

This national survey tracks changes in Singaporeans' attitudes toward lesbians and gay men (ATLG) and examines value predispositions, interpersonal contact, and mediated exposure as predictors of ATLG and acceptance of homosexuals. The study replicates and extends research done previously and addresses temporal shifts in values and views. Findings indicate that the relatively small positive change in ATLG from 2005 to 2010 was mainly due to values and demographic factors. The addition of several new predictive variables increased the variance explained for why people hold certain ATLG and their acceptance. Conformity to norms, intrinsic religiosity, Western orientation, interpersonal contact, and mediated exposure were significantly associated with both ATLG and acceptance of homosexuals. Perception of homosexuality as a choice was significantly associated with ATLG but not with acceptance of homosexuals. Asian orientation and extrinsic religiosity showed no significant association with either dependent variable. The findings are discussed in the context of a multicultural Asian society and future directions for research.