Intimacy and Complicated Grief among Chinese Elders Having Lost their Spouses: Mediating Role of Meaning Making

This study aims to investigate the mediating role of meaning making in the relationship between intimacy and complicated grief among bereaved elders. A sample of 352 bereaved elders in rural China participated in the study. Both the linear and quadratic effects of meaning making illustrated a model that mediated the effect of intimacy on complicated grief. Essentially, findings revealed that only high levels of meaning making predicted low levels of complicated grief. This study thereby supplements existing research about meaning-making theory.     

Visual Similarity of Words Alone Can Modulate Hemispheric Lateralization in Visual Word Recognition: Evidence From Modeling Chinese Character Recognition

In Chinese orthography, the most common character structure consists of a semantic radical on the left and a phonetic radical on the right (SP characters); the minority, opposite arrangement also exists (PS characters). Recent studies showed that SP character processing is more left hemisphere (LH) lateralized than PS character processing. Nevertheless, it remains unclear whether this is due to phonetic radical position or character type frequency. Through computational modeling with artificial lexicons, in which we implement a theory of hemispheric asymmetry in perception but do not assume phonological processing being LH lateralized, we show that the difference in character type frequency alone is sufficient to exhibit the effect that the dominant type has a stronger LH lateralization than the minority type. This effect is due to higher visual similarity among characters in the dominant type than the minority type, demonstrating the modulation of visual similarity of words on hemispheric lateralization.     

Psychometric Evaluation of the Spiritual Transcendence Scale in a Chinese Sample: Is There Factorial Invariance Across Gender,Occupation, and Religion?

This study investigated the reliability and validity of the widely used 23-item Spiritual Transcendence Scale and tested whether there was factorial invariance of the scale by demographic variables such as gender, occupation, and religion in a large Chinese sample (n = 1,894). Exploratory factor analysis with a random subsample supported the original 3-factor structure (prayer fulfillment, universality, and connectedness) in a revised 16-item scale. Confirmatory factor analysis suggested that a 15-item model provided a good fit to the data of the remaining subsample. The scale had alpha reliabilities ranging from .64 to .92 in the exploratory factor analysis and .60 to .92 in the confirmatory factor analysis. Subsequent factorial invariance tests indicated that the scale was invariant across gender and occupation but not religion. Evidence of construct validity was equivocal. Additional empirical studies should be conducted to evaluate the psychometric properties of the scale in other culturally and religiously diverse settings.     

Cycloheximide blocks the retention of maternal experience in postpartum rats

Two studies were done to determine the effects of cycloheximide (CYX), a protein synthesis inhibitor, on maternal experience effects in rats. In the first study eight groups received a 2-h maternal experience 36 h after cesarean (c)-section and two groups received no post c-section experience. Among the experienced groups, two received icv injections of CYX or saline (SAL) 30 min before the maternal experience, two received CYX or SAL 10 min after the experience, and two received the injections 24 h after the experience. One inexperienced group received CYX and the other received SAL 36 h after c-section. Tests for maternal behavior occurred 10 days after c-section. CYX was not able to block or disrupt the "acquisition" or expression of ongoing maternal behavior during the 2-h experience phase. However, CYX was able to block the long-term "retention" of a 2-h maternal experience if the drug was present during or immediately after the experience, prior to "consolidation." The second study investigated the effects of CYX administered immediately after the maternal experience on the expression and retention of maternal behavior 4 and 6 days after c-section, to determine whether the hormonally mediated short-onset latencies of the 4-day group would be blocked by CYX. Eight groups of animals were tested for maternal behavior. Four were tested 4 days after c-section and four were tested 6 days after c-section. Within each of these groups two were experienced and two inexperienced; within each experience condition one group received CYX and one received SAL. Day 4 groups exhibited shorter onset latencies than Day 6 groups. There was also a CYX-SAL difference in maternal onset latencies among experienced Day 6 groups but not among Day 4 groups. These data indicate that the blocking effects of CYX can be seen only when hormonal priming of maternal behavior is no longer in evidence.     

殊化信任与泛化信任在人际信任行为路径模型中的作用

该研究探讨不同社会情景下,泛化信任、殊化信任以及可信任性知觉等对信任行为起作用的理论模型。223名工人被试平均年龄24岁。用结构方程模型中的路径分析验证该模型,结果表明,各种拟合指标十分理想。三种交往情景下的人际信任路径模型之间的异同主要表现在：（1）殊化信任在所有情景下对信任行为都有直接而显著的作用;（2）泛化信任则只在与熟人和陌生人交往时才起作用;（3）与目标人物的关系越疏远,对他们作出信任行为时所需要的心理资源也越多。     

Helping processes in a mutual aid organization for persons with emotional disturbance.

To date, the notion of helpfulness of group processes has been equivocal in research on self-help groups. This article argues that findings drawn from the participants' subjective appraisals of helpfulness carry meanings different from those drawn from the correlational approach. In a mutual aid organization serving adults with mental health problems, the study found that, whereas universality, self-disclosure, and instillation of hope were the most valued processes, support and catharsis were the strongest correlates of benefits of participation. The authors propose a two-level hierarchy that distinguishes sustaining and beneficial factors. Different sets of factors should constitute the focus of facilitation at different stages of group development.     

Organ donation and culture: a comparison of Asian American and European American beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors

The well-known gap between organ-donor supply and demand in the United States is particularly acute for Asian Americans. Lower participation in organ donation programs by Asian Americans has been hypothesized as one explanation for this observation. This study finds that, relative to European Americans, Asian Americans hold more negative attitudes toward and participate less frequently in a large, urban organ-donor program. The study also hypothesizes and tests possible reasons for subcultural differences in attitudes toward donation. Two cultural belief constructs hypothesized to more strongly predict Asian American attitudes and behaviors appear to impact both groups equally. Reasons for these results along with public policy implications and future research directions are discussed.     

Cyberostracism: effects of being ignored over the Internet

Ostracism is such a widely used and powerful tactic that the authors tested whether people would be affected by it even under remote and artificial circumstances. In Study 1, 1,486 participants from 62 countries accessed the authors' on-line experiment on the Internet. They were asked to use mental visualization while playing a virtual tossing game with two others (who were actually computer generated and controlled). Despite the minimal nature of their experience, the more participants were ostracized, the more they reported feeling bad, having less control, and losing a sense of belonging. In Study 2, ostracized participants were more likely to conform on a subsequent task. The results are discussed in terms of supporting K. D. Williams's (1997) need threat theory of ostracism.     

Development of the Multi-Trait Personality Inventory (MTPI): comparison among four Chinese populations.

Anemic approach was adopted to develop a culture-specific instrument for the assessment of Chinese personality. The Multi-Trial Personality Inventory (MTPI) was administered to 1,673 men and 944 women in four major Chinese populations. It was found that Chinese in mainland China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the United States possess some common traits deeply rooted in the Chinese culture characterized by Confucian thoughts (e.g., self-discipline and moderation) and some additional traits nurtured by their respective environments. Consequently, findings of this study lent support to the hypothesis that, in spite of superficial discontinuities, there are basic continuities in the personality traits of mainland and overseas Chinese. The cross-cultural differences in personality were examined from a political-social perspective and also explained with a cultural-ecological model. In the development of the MTPI, a new methodology that relies on forming factor-consistent clusters was employed to deal successfully with the problem of complex factor space.