Paternal Caregivers’ Parenting Practices and Psychological Functioning among African American Youth Living in Urban Public Housing

Structural factors associated with public housing contribute to living environments that expose families to adverse life events that may in turn directly impact parenting and youth outcomes. However, despite the growth in research on fathers, research on families in public housing has practically excluded fathers and the role fathers play in the well‐being of their adolescents. Using a sample of 660 African American adolescents recruited from public housing, we examined the relationship between paternal caregivers’ (i.e., fathers’ and father figures’) parenting practices and adolescents’ depressive symptoms, attitudes toward deviance, and self‐efficacy. Using a latent profile analysis (LPA), we confirmed a four‐class model of paternal parenting practices ranging from high to low levels of monitoring and encouragement. Results from a one‐way ANOVA indicated that paternal caregivers with high (compared to moderate) levels of encouragement and monitoring were associated with youth who reported less depressive symptoms, higher levels of self‐efficacy, and less favorable attitudes toward deviance. Discriminant analysis results indicated that approximately half of the sample were correctly classified into two paternal caregiver classes. The findings provide evidence that some of these caregivers engage in parenting practices that support youths’ psychological functioning. More research is needed to determine what accounts for the variability in levels of paternal encouragement and supervision, including environmental influences, particularly for paternal caregivers exhibiting moderate‐to‐low levels of paternal encouragement and monitoring.     

Subtle Motor Findings During Recovery from Pediatric Traumatic Brain Injury: A Preliminary Report

Pediatric traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a heterogeneous condition, varying in both severity and sequelae. The long-term motor deficits following severe TBI requiring inpatient rehabilitation are better established than those following milder forms of TBI. The authors examined motor performance 2 and 12 months postinjury in children without overt motor impairment using standard measures of upper limb function and the Physical and Neurological Examination for Subtle Signs (PANESS). The PANESS was sensitive to differences between children with TBI and uninjured children as well as to changes in children with TBI over time. These data suggest that subtle motor deficits are present after milder forms of TBI and, particularly those related to balance and gait, may persist even 12 months postinjury.     

Neuropsychological impairment as a consequence of football (soccer) play and football heading: a preliminary analysis and report on school students (13-16 years).

Footballers run the risk of incurring mild head injury from a variety of sources, including the intentional use of the head to play the ball, known as heading. This paper presents a preliminary exploratory analysis of data collected to examine whether cumulative incidence of mild head injury, or cumulative heading frequency, are related to neuropsychological functioning in male adolescent footballers. In a quasi-experimental cross-sectional design, neuropsychological test scores of school team footballers were compared with those of similarly aged rugby players and noncontact sport players. Cumulative mild head injury incidence was estimated using self-reports, and cumulative heading was estimated using a combination of observation and self-reports. No participants had sustained a head injury within 3 months of testing. There was no relationship between head injury and neuropsychological performance, and there were no decrements in either the footballers or the rugby players in comparison with the noncontact sport players. Within the footballers, cumulative heading did not predict any of the neuropsychological test scores. These findings indicate the absence of neuropsychological impairment arising due to cumulative mild head injury incidence, or cumulative heading. Although these null findings may be reassuring to players, parents, and football organizers, we stress that they are preliminary. Further data is being collected from the same populations to provide more reliable effect estimates.     

Opting out or denying discrimination? How the framework of free choice in American society influences perceptions of gender inequality

American women still confront workplace barriers (e.g., bias against mothers, inflexible policies) that hinder their advancement at the upper levels of organizations. However, most Americans fail to recognize that such gender barriers still exist. Focusing on mothers who have left the workforce, we propose that the prevalent American assumption that actions are a product of choice conceals workplace barriers by communicating that opportunities are equal and that behavior is free from contextual influence. Study 1 reveals that stay-at-home mothers who view their own workplace departure as an individual choice experience greater well-being but less often recognize workplace barriers and discrimination as a source of inequality than do mothers who do not view their workplace departure as an individual choice. Study 2 shows that merely exposing participants to a message that frames actions in terms of individual choice increases participants' belief that society provides equal opportunities and that gender discrimination no longer exists. By concealing the barriers that women still face in the workplace, this choice framework may hinder women's long-term advancement in society.     

Features,as well as space and time,guide object persistence

What role do surface features (e.g., color) play in the establishment and maintenance of episodic representations of objects (object files)? Mitroff and Alvarez (2007) showed that stimuli that were linked by a continuous spatiotemporal history yielded object-specific preview benefits—a standard index of object files—whereas stimuli linked only by shared surface features did not. Here, it is shown that abruptly changing the features of an object that has been established on the basis of spatiotemporal history can disrupt object-specific preview benefits (Experiments 1 and 2). Moreover, under some conditions, feature match alone can give rise to the preview benefits (Experiment 3). These results indicate that surface features, as well as spatiotemporal factors, play an important role in establishing and maintaining episodic object representations.     

The Effects of Images of African American Women in Hip Hop on Early Adolescents’ Attitudes Toward Physical Attractiveness and Interpersonal Relationships

This qualitative study was designed to identify African American early adolescents’ subjective meanings of African American women’s sexuality through an examination of Stephens & Phillips (2003) sexual images—the Diva, Gold Digger, Freak, Dyke, Gangster Bitch, Sister Savior, Earth Mother, and Baby Mama. These eight sexual images both inform and reflect beliefs about African American women’s physical attractiveness. Interpersonal relationship decision making processes also were influenced by these conceptual frameworks of African American women’s sexuality. Findings from this study are important given the tendency of previous researchers to ignore race and intraethnic variations in studies of beliefs about attitudes toward sexuality.     

Contracting, prompting, and reinforcing substance use disorder continuing care: a randomized clinical trial.

Although continuing care is strongly related to positive treatment outcomes for substance use disorder (SUD), participation rates are low and few effective interventions are available. In a randomized clinical trial with 150 participants (97% men), 75 graduates of a residential Veterans Affairs Medical Center SUD program who received an aftercare contract, attendance prompts, and reinforcers (CPR) were compared to 75 graduates who received standard treatment (STX). Among CPR participants, 55% completed at least 3 months of aftercare, compared to 36% in STX. Similarly, CPR participants remained in treatment longer than those in STX (5.5 vs. 4.4 months). Additionally, CPR participants were more likely to be abstinent compared to STX (57% vs. 37%) after 1 year. The CPR intervention offers a practical means to improve adherence among individuals in SUD treatment.     

Negative reactions to received spousal care: predictors and consequences of miscarried support.

This study focused on the negative reactions of older women with osteoarthritis to the receipt of instrumental support (i.e., physical assistance) from their husbands and the effects of such negative reactions on the women's psychological well-being and self-care. Applying a person-environment fit model, the authors predicted that women's negative reactions to spousal support would be determined by the fit between this support and the personal centrality (importance) of being functionally independent. Consistent with this prediction, women who received high levels of support from the husband and for whom being functionally independent was not highly central reacted less negatively to this support. More negative reactions to spousal support were related to greater concurrent depressive symptomatology and fewer self-care behaviors. In addition, negative reactions were predictive of the women's increased depressive symptomatology and decreased life satisfaction. Findings illustrate a useful theoretical approach to the examination of support from family caregivers.