The role of relational information in contingent capture

On the contingent capture account, top-down attentional control settings restrict involuntary attentional capture to items that match the features of the search target. Attention capture is involuntary, but contingent on goals and intentions. The observation that only target-similar items can capture attention has usually been taken to show that the content of the attentional control settings consists of specific feature values. In contrast, the present study demonstrates that the top-down target template can include information about the relationship between the target and nontarget features (e.g., redder, darker, larger). Several spatial cuing experiments show that a singleton cue that is less similar to the target but that shares the same relational property that distinguishes targets from nontargets can capture attention to the same extent as cues that are similar to the target. Moreover, less similar cues can even capture attention more than cues that are identical to the target when they are relationally better than identical cues. The implications for current theories of attentional capture and attentional guidance are discussed.     

Personality and depression: a validation study of the Depressive Experience Questionnaire

This study investigated the validity of Blatt's model of depression as indicated by his operational measure of its constructs via the Depressive Experiences Questionnaire (DEQ; Blatt, D'Afflitti, & Quinlan, 1976). Hypothesized relations between the two relevant scales of the DEQ and Tellegen's (1982) Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire, (MPQ) were examined, Participants consisted of 195 women, including 67 hospitalized unipolar depressives, 77 never-hospitalized unipolar depressives, and 51 nonpsychiatric controls. Overall, the results partially supported the validity of the DEQ even though all participants were women and prior studies have indicated the DEQ's greater discriminative validity for men than for women. However, several of the most strongly predicted relations, such as between DEQ Self-Criticism and MPQ Achievement were not confirmed. Coherent, significant relations between scales of the two measures remained after partialling out the effects of severity of depression.     

Balint groups. A psychoanalytic critique

The author refers to two examples taken from the work of Balint groups in arguing that the social environment of the several participants is an integral component of what the group must reflect on. The notion of a group process dealing with "pure" cases is ideology. The author relates his argument to Parin's comments about "social critique in the interpretive process".     

Fears about Seeking Therapeutic Help: The Effect of Sex of Subject, Sex of Professional, and Title of Professional

96 subjects were asked to imagine that they had gone to their GP for help with an emotional problem. The subjects were further asked to imagine that the GP had referred them to either a male or female counsellor, clinical psychologist or psychiatrist. Whilst in role, subjects were asked to rate their concern about 15 possible fears of therapy, and to indicate their preference for a male or female therapist. There was little support for the hypothesis that female subjects would have lower fear ratings than male subjects. Equivocal support was found for the hypothesis that there would be an overall preference for female therapists. Results partially supported the hypothesis that fear ratings would be highest with respect to psychiatrists; the interaction of the sex of subject and the title of professional variables indicated that this was particularly so when the psychiatrist was female. The implications for counselling are briefly discussed, with regard to preparing clients for therapy.     

Attentional filtering of transients allows for a recovery from change blindness

Previous reports suggest that introducing distracting visual transients during a change-detection task can result in change blindness. In four experiments, we found that presenting the distracting transients repeatedly prior to the change produces a recovery from change blindness. This recovery from change blindness is not due solely to low-level neural adaptation of transient detectors, but instead seems to be based on attentional filtering of the distracting transient signals. This attentional filtering can be object-based rather than location-based. In addition, we found that the ability to achieve this attentional filtering depends critically on presenting the to-be-ignored transient signals prior to the time of the change.     

Women Experiencing Intimate Partner Violence: Effects of Confiding in Religious Leaders

IPV is the most challenging mental health problem facing clergy. Abused women (n = 476), most of whom are Christians living at home (not in shelters), sought assistance from domestic violence centers. Data obtained from questionnaires demonstrated that confiding in clergy predicts higher self-esteem and reduces the impact of lack of social support on self-esteem, self-efficacy, and life satisfaction. Compassionate clergy counseling can have a positive influence on psychological outcomes of women in abusive relationships.     

How do women experience myocardial infarction? A qualitative exploration of illness perceptions, adjustment and coping

While UK Department of Health policy recognizes the importance of secondary prevention and rehabilitation following a cardiac event, there still appears a dearth of research addressing women's needs. This study aimed to explore adjustment in terms of women's perception of their cardiac event, impact on relationships and coping strategies employed. Five women suffering first time MI were interviewed, using a semi-structured format and were telephoned 2 months later. Data were analysed using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. Perceptions included: Making Sense of the Event, Cognitive and Emotional Responses and Self-beliefs. Relationships issues were: Others' Reactions and Change in Relationships and Roles. Cognitive and Behavioural strategies and Support from others (including cardiac rehabilitation) formed coping strategies. For most participants, the event was unexpected evoking uncertainty and later, emotions extending beyond the more widely accepted depression and anxiety. Women tended to minimize severity of symptoms and impact of event (perhaps as a way of coping and protecting others), displaying a strong sense of optimism and hope that life would soon return to "normal". However, it appeared this was difficult to maintain and the experience seemed to challenge relationships and roles. The findings suggest recommendations for further research with possible implications for clinical practice.     

Bayesian hierarchical response time modelling—A tutorial

Response time modelling is developing rapidly in the field of psychometrics, and its use is growing in psychology. In most applications, component models for response times are modelled jointly with component models for responses, thereby stabilizing estimation of item response theory model parameters and enabling research on a variety of novel substantive research questions. Bayesian estimation techniques facilitate estimation of response time models. Implementations of these models in standard statistical software, however, are still sparse. In this accessible tutorial, we discuss one of the most common response time models—the lognormal response time model—embedded in the hierarchical framework by van der Linden (2007). We provide detailed guidance on how to specify and estimate this model in a Bayesian hierarchical context. One of the strengths of the presented model is its flexibility, which makes it possible to adapt and extend the model according to researchers' needs and hypotheses on response behaviour. We illustrate this based on three recent model extensions: (a) application to non-cognitive data incorporating the distance-difficulty hypothesis, (b) modelling conditional dependencies between response times and responses, and (c) identifying differences in response behaviour via mixture modelling. This tutorial aims to provide a better understanding of the use and utility of response time models, showcases how these models can easily be adapted and extended, and contributes to a growing need for these models to answer novel substantive research questions in both non-cognitive and cognitive contexts.