Ethnic Match and Treatment Outcomes for Child and Adolescent Mental Health Center Clients

This study investigated the effects of client ethnicity and client‐counselor ethnic match on treatment outcomes (i.e., GAF‐difference [from the Global Assessment of Functioning Axis V rating of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, fourth edition, American Psychiatric Association, 1994] and client visitation) of 1,946 child and adolescent community mental health center clients. After controlling for 7 other variables, no differences were observed after adjustment among client ethnicities, age groups, or ethnic match on the GAF‐difference dependent measure. Ethnically matched African American child and adolescent clients had fewer mental health visits than did their nonmatched counterparts. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

Paternal Psychiatric Symptoms and Maladaptive Paternal Behavior in the Home During the Child Rearing Years

Data from the Children in the Community Study, a community-based longitudinal study were used to investigate associations between paternal psychiatric disorders and child-rearing behaviors. Paternal psychiatric symptoms and behavior in the home were assessed among 782 families during the childhood and adolescence of the offspring. Paternal anxiety, disruptive, mood, personality, and substance use disorders were independently associated with specific types of maladaptive paternal behavior in the home during the child-rearing years after paternal age, education, income, co-occurring paternal psychiatric symptoms, offspring age, sex, intelligence, temperament, and psychiatric symptoms were controlled statistically. Paternal psychiatric disorders that were present by mean offspring age 14 were associated with elevated risk for maladaptive paternal behavior in the home at mean age offspring 16, after prior maladaptive paternal behavior was controlled statistically. These findings suggest that paternal psychiatric disorder may be an important determinant of maladaptive paternal behavior in the home during the child-rearing years. Improved recognition and treatment of paternal psychiatric disorders may help to reduce the amount of maladaptive parenting behavior that many children and adolescents might otherwise be likely to experience.     

Healthy and chronically‐ill children's generalisation of illness to biological and non‐biological categories

Using children's naïve theory of biology as a framework, this study investigated children's developing understanding of illness by examining their generalisation of illness to biological and non‐biological categories. In addition to differences associated with age, the children's health status was investigated for any possible linkwith their understanding. Healthy and chronically‐ill children, aged 4–11 years, were randomly assigned to one of three conditions, according to which exemplar (child, dog or duck) was described as suffering from an imaginary illness. Using a card‐sorting technique, the children assessed whether each entity out of 30 entities (five representatives in each of six categories: humans, mammals, non‐mammals, birds, plants and artifacts) could be afflicted by that illness. The children's generalisations indicated a grasp of the distinctiveness of the various categories, although they seemed less certain about the biological status of plants. Furthermore, the type of exemplar on which the children had been taught influenced their responses. However, the children's reasoning appeared unaffected by their health status and largely unaffected by age or gender. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hierarchy of interactive functions in father‐mother‐baby three‐way games

In developmental research, the family has mainly been studied through dyadic interaction. Three‐way interactions have received less attention, partly because of their complexity. This difficulty may be overcome by distinguishing between four hierarchically embedded functions in three‐way interactions: (1) participation (inclusion of all participants), (2) organization (partners keeping to their roles), (3) focalization (sharing a common focus) and (4) affective contact (being in tune). We document this hierarchical model on a sample of 80 families observed in the Lausanne Trilogue Play situation across four different sites. Hierarchy between functions was demonstrated by means of Guttman scalability coefficient. Given the importance of the child's development in a threesome, the pertinence of this model for family assessment is discussed. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Body image and cystic fibrosis: a critical review

A slight frame and poor appetite are common among patients with cystic fibrosis (CF) yet healthy body weight has been related to a better prognosis. A review of studies exploring body image (BI) among adults and adolescents with CF was conducted. Seven electronic databases were searched for potential papers. They located 128 references, of which 24 were read in full and 12 included in the review. Accepted papers suggested females with CF had a better BI compared to males, but this could compromise survival, given their preference for a low body weight. Males may be more motivated to adhere to nutritional advice because they favor a larger form. Practitioners should broach the topic of BI at clinic appointments to ensure this does not have a detrimental impact on self-management, although more research is required to guide professionals in this task.     

The speed of recognition of personally familiar faces

Despite the generally accepted notion that humans are very good and fast at recognising familiar individuals from their faces, the actual speed with which this fundamental brain function can be achieved remains largely unknown. Here, two groups of participants were required to respond by finger-lift when presented with either a photograph of a personally familiar face (classmate), or an unfamiliar one. This speeded manual go/no-go categorisation task revealed that personally familiar faces could be categorised as early as 380 ms after presentation, about 80 ms faster than unfamiliar faces. When response times were averaged across all 8 stimulus presentations, we found that minimum RTs for both familiar and unfamiliar face decisions were substantially lower (310 ms and 370 ms). Analyses confirmed that stimulus repetition enhanced the speed with which faces were categorised, irrespective of familiarity, and that repetition did not affect the observed benefit in RTS for familiar over unfamiliar faces. These data, representing the elapsed time from stimulus onset to motor output, put constraints on the time course of familiar face recognition in the human brain, which can be tracked more precisely by high temporal resolution electrophysiological measures.     

Gender-Related Traits as Predictors of Alcohol Use in Male German and Spanish University Students

This study examined instrumental (masculine stereotyped) and expressive (feminine stereotyped) personality traits and alcohol use among men from Germany and Spain. Participants were 161 male university students (76 German, M _age?=?23?years; 77 Spanish, M _age?=?22?years), who completed either a daytime or a nighttime drinking questionnaire, each including a Short Form of the Bem Sex Role Inventory. Poisson regression analyses with latent predictors were conducted. The trait factors and their interactions with nationality predicted daytime and nighttime alcohol use. The results add support to the assumption that alcohol use is associated with the construction of masculinity and that internalization of traditionally female attributes protects against health-risk behaviors such as alcohol consumption.     

Are people always more risk averse after disasters? Surveys after a heavy snow‐hit and a major earthquake in China in 2008

China suffered both a heavy snow‐hit and a major earthquake in 2008. To investigate the effects of disasters on risky decision making, opportunity samples were obtained by recruiting residents in both devastated and non‐devastated areas. In a survey (Study 1) conducted shortly after the heavy snow‐hit, we found that people were not always more risk averse after a disaster as previous studies had claimed and that they were inclined to approach an option with ‘low probability associated gain’ and to avoid an option with ‘low probability associated loss’. These findings were replicated in a consecutive survey (Study 2) conducted after the Wenchuan earthquake. It was further found that the popularity of both insurance and lottery, which presumably contributed to overweighing of small probabilities, was detected to have been enhanced with substantial exposure to the earthquake disaster. The implications of these findings for risk education and government policy making were discussed. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Effects of communication with non‐witnesses on eyewitnesses' recall correctness and meta‐cognitive realism

In forensic contexts it is common that witnesses retell and discuss the experienced event many times. It is of forensic importance to understand how this influences memory and meta‐memory. Eighty‐nine participants viewed a short film and were assigned to one of four conditions: (1) Laboratory discussion (five discussions of the event with a confederate), (2) Family discussion (five discussions of the event with a family member), (3) Retell (five retellings of the event) and (4) Control. Three weeks later participants gave an open free recall, and then 3 days later confidence judged the recalled information. The results showed significant differences between the four conditions on number of correct items, incorrect items, accuracy, confidence and calibration. The results suggest that discussion of an experienced event may reduce some of the beneficial memory and meta‐memory effects caused by mere retelling, but may have no great negative effects compared to a control condition. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Task formats and ambiguity aversion

This paper proposes that task format (choosing or rejecting) moderates the effect of ambiguity aversion. Specifically, an ambiguous option is more attractive in a choosing task than in a rejecting task compared with a risky option. The author performed three experiments to test the propositions. In the first experiment, participants showed less ambiguity aversion when they had to choose a preferred option (risky or ambiguous) compared with when they had to reject an option they preferred less. In the second experiment with a monetary incentive, participants had to form a cash‐equivalent estimate for both a risky gamble and an ambiguous gamble in a traditional Ellsberg scenario. The ambiguous option emerged as more attractive than the risky option in the choosing task compared with the rejecting task. The third experiment showed that the participants' decision rationale mediated the effect of the task format on choice. These three experiments support the proposition that task formats moderate the effect of ambiguity aversion. On the basis of the findings, the author provides suggestions for practice and further research. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.