The comparative efficacy of Milan family therapy for disturbed children and their families

This paper describes a study comparing the efficacy of Milan family therapy with that of other treatments routinely used in an out-patient child psychiatry department. Some 118 subjects were allocated on a random, prospective basis to one of two treatment groups, the Milan family therapy group or the other treatments group. The methods of assessment included semi-structured interviews, questionnaires, visual analogue scales and standardized therapy schedules. The results showed that whilst subjects in both treatment groups achieved comparable symptomatic improvement at the end of treatment and at six-month follow-up, the Milan approach produced more changes for family members other than the referred child as well as requiring less treatment time than the other treatments.     

Attachment and anger in an anxiety-provoking situation.

In this study, women were told they would engage in an anxiety-provoking activity. Women then waited with their dating partner for the activity to begin. During this 5-min "stress" period, each couple's interaction was videotaped unobtrusively. Each couple was then told that the woman would not have to do the stressful activity, and each couple was unobtrusively videotaped again during a 5-min "recovery" period. The behavior of both partners was then coded during both periods. The major results revealed that more-avoidant men displayed greater anger during the stress period, especially if their partners were more anxious or distressed or sought more support from them. More-avoidant women also displayed greater anger, particularly if they were highly anxious or distressed and received little support or encountered anger from their partners. During the recovery period, highly ambivalent women behaved more negatively toward their partners if they had been more anxious in the stress period or had sought more support from their partners. These results are discussed in terms of attachment theory.     

Age and the allocation of attention across the time course of word recognition.

Younger and older adults performed lexical decisions on ambiguous words, unambiguous words, and pseudowords, and simultaneously responded to an auditory probe presented at stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) of 90, 180, or 270 ms. For both age groups, lexical decisions and probe responses were faster for ambiguous words than for unambiguous words, and slowest for pseudowords. For the older adults, but not the younger adults, lexical decisions were slower when the probe was presented (the dual-task condition), compared with a control condition in which the lexical decision was performed alone. The older participants also showed slower tone-detection responses in the dual-task condition than when the tone was presented alone. For all participants, proportional tone-detection times (compared with tones in isolation) decreased with increasing SOA, but this decrease was less pronounced in the older group. Finally, the time between responses in the dual-task condition was longer for older than for younger adults. The results indicate that word meaning influences the allocation of attention similarly for younger and older adults, but that older adults suffer a cost and become disproportionately slower in processes related to response coordination and output.     

What makes responses prepotent for young children? Insights from the grass–snow task

Understanding how responses become prepotent is essential for understanding when inhibitory control is needed in everyday behaviour. We investigated prepotency in the grass–snow task—in which a child points to a green card when the experimenter says ‘snow’ and a white card when the experimenter says ‘grass’. Experiment 1 (n=48, mean age=3.5 years) investigated the response method effect—whether pointing is prepotent because it is habitual. Experiment 2 (n=60, mean age=3.5 years) investigated the response set effect—whether responses are prepotent because the child plans to make them in the task. Experiment 2 also provided evidence that children could remember the rules in the task. Experiment 3 (n=30, mean age=3.4 years) produced further evidence that children could remember these rules. We found no evidence for the response method and response set effects, suggesting that prepotency in the grass–snow task is more ‘stimulus‐driven’ than in tasks previously studied. The implications of our findings are discussed in relation to other developmental inhibitory tasks and to children's reliance on inhibitory control to regulate their everyday behaviour. Copyright © 2008 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Psychological Foundations of Trust

ABSTRACT— Trust lies at the foundation of nearly all major theories of interpersonal relationships. Despite its great theoretical importance, a limited amount of research has examined how and why trust develops, is maintained, and occasionally unravels in relationships. Following a brief overview of theoretical and empirical milestones in the interpersonal-trust literature, an integrative process model of trust in dyadic relationships is presented.     

The production of bimanual percussion in 12- to 24-month-old children

Bimanual coordination represents a complex self-organizing system that is subject to both internal and contextual constraints. Although there has been interest in examining bimanual development throughout the lifespan, few data exist relative to the bimanual activity of children between 1 and 4 years of age. The study reported here represents an initial effort to address this gap. Twenty-seven children who were either 12, 18 or 24 months old were videotaped while drumming with sticks on a plastic drum. Two independent observers recorded bout length as well as number and phase relation of movement cycles within bouts. Kinematic analysis provided more detailed information about the timing and form of children's activity. Results indicate that bimanual drumming becomes preferred over unimanual drumming by 2 years of age, that the proportions of different phase relations exhibited by children change between 1 and 2 years of age, and that the behavior appears to go through periods of stability and variability within this age range. These results are discussed in the context of the child's physical development and interactions with the environment during this period.     

Vitamins, minerals, and mood

In this article, the authors explore the breadth and depth of published research linking dietary vitamins and minerals (micronutrients) to mood. Since the 1920s, there have been many studies on individual vitamins (especially B vitamins and Vitamins C, D, and E), minerals (calcium, chromium, iron, magnesium, zinc, and selenium), and vitamin-like compounds (choline). Recent investigations with multi-ingredient formulas are especially promising. However, without a reasonable conceptual framework for understanding mechanisms by which micronutrients might influence mood, the published literature is too readily dismissed. Consequently, 4 explanatory models are presented, suggesting that mood symptoms may be expressions of inborn errors of metabolism, manifestations of deficient methylation reactions, alterations of gene expression by nutrient deficiency, and/or long-latency deficiency diseases. These models provide possible explanations for why micronutrient supplementation could ameliorate some mental symptoms.     

Effectiveness of Dialectical Behavior Therapy in a Community Mental Health Center

Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) has been shown to be effective in randomized controlled trials with women with borderline personality disorder and histories of chronic self-inflicted injury including suicide attempts. The present study is a pre-post replication of a comprehensive DBT program in a community mental health center for individuals who chronically injure themselves and/or have experienced multiple treatment failures. Twenty-four subjects were given the Treatment History Interview to obtain information regarding medically treated self-inflicted injuries and the use of crisis services. After 1 year of treatment, DBT showed a significant reduction in the number and severity of self-inflicted injuries, psychiatric-related emergency room visits, psychiatric inpatient admissions and days, and the number of crisis treatment systems engaged. Results are compared to benchmarks from 3 other clinical trials of DBT. While this pre-post comparison has threats to internal validity, it supports the feasibility of DBT when fully implemented in a community mental health clinic.     

The moral contents of anti‐atheist prejudice (and why atheists should care about it)

Anti‐atheist prejudice is pervasive worldwide. Past research indicates that this is driven by perceptions of atheist immorality, yet such perceptions have not been explored in detail. Using Moral Foundations Theory and samples of U.S. Christians, we investigated whether anti‐atheist prejudice is explained by atheists' perceived adherence to certain foundational moral values more than others. Study 1 participants completed measures of moral value endorsements from the perspective of a typical atheist. Study 2 participants read that either atheists or people in general strongly endorse one of five moral foundations. Anti‐atheist prejudice was consistently explained best by perceived atheist concern for values of caring/compassion rather than fairness/justice, loyalty, deferential respect, or purity/decency. Findings suggest that efforts to reduce anti‐atheist prejudice should emphasize atheists' capacity for kindness and caring.