Training with anxiety: short- and long-term effects on police officers’ shooting behavior under pressure

We investigated short- and long-term effects of training with anxiety on police officers’ shooting behavior under pressure. Using a pretest, posttest, and retention test design, 27 police officers executed a shooting exercise against an opponent that did (high anxiety) or did not (low anxiety) shoot back using colored soap cartridges. During the training sessions, the experimental group practiced with anxiety and the control group practiced without anxiety. At the pretest, anxiety had a negative effect on shot accuracy for both groups. At the posttest, shot accuracy of the experimental group no longer deteriorated under anxiety, while shot accuracy of the control group was still equally affected. At the retention test, 4 months after training, positive results for the experimental group remained present, indicating that training with anxiety may have positive short- and long-term effects on police officers’ shot accuracy under pressure. Additional analyses showed that these effects are potentially related to changes in visual attention on task-relevant information.     

A Validation Study of the Resilience Scale for Adolescents (READ)

In this study, the validity of the recently developed 28-item Resilience Scale for Adolescents (READ) was examined. Survey data from a representative sample of 6,723 Norwegian senior high school students between 18 and 20 years of age were used for this purpose. Validity and reliability were investigated by means of exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, correlations with other relevant variables, and internal consistency measures. The results supported the construct and convergent validity of the five factors of a modified 23-item version of the scale, which also yielded acceptable psychometric properties. The paper concludes that the modified READ is a valid measure assessing relevant resilience factors with relatively few items, thereby serving as a valuable tool in resilience and risk-factor research.     

Driving in dangerous territory: Complexity and road-characteristics influence attentional demand

Car driving related attentional demands fluctuate according to route complexity and are found to be highly associated with motor-vehicle collisions (MVCs). The purpose of the current study was to explore the inherent attentional demands of scenarios that approximate common crash configurations. Sixty drivers completed a series of 20 simulated driving scenarios incorporating either rear-end or crossing path situations. For each scenario, the complexity of the driving environment was systematically manipulated in terms of vehicle handling and information processing elements. The attentional demands of each scenario were assessed by means of a peripheral detection task (PDT) as well as through a subjective measure of overall difficulty. Our results showed a reduction in PDT performance at intersections where information processing is increased as well as when handling maneuvers behind a lead vehicle were required. The results point to the appropriateness of the PDT as a sensitive measure of cognitive workload. The implications of these findings for future research and safety initiatives are discussed.     

Does materialism predict racism? materialism as a distinctive social attitude and a predictor of prejudice

Previous research reported that Right‐Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) and Social Dominance Orientation (SDO) constitute the individual's ideological space and are strong dispositional determinants of racism. In the present study, materialism was examined as a third social attitude and a potential predictor of racism. In a student (N = 183) and heterogeneous adult sample (N = 176) analyses revealed that RWA, SDO and materialism constitute three separate dimensions and that each of them explains a unique part of the variance in racism. In addition, Structural Equation Modelling showed that the relationship between materialism and racism was largely mediated by selfish motives. In the discussion we go further into the role of materialism as a third social attitudinal dimension. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Expertise in pictorial perception: eye-movement patterns and visual memory in artists and laymen

In two sessions with free scanning and memory instructions, eye-movement patterns from nine artists were compared with those of nine artistically untrained participants viewing 16 pictures representing a selection of categories from ordinary scenes to abstraction: 12 pictures were made to accommodate an object-oriented viewing mode (selection of recognisable objects), and a pictorial viewing mode (selection of more structural features), and 4 were abstract. The artistically untrained participants showed preference for viewing human features and objects, while the artists spent more scanning time on structural/abstract features. A group by session interaction showed a change of viewing strategy in the artists, who viewed more objects and human features in the memory task session. A verbal test of recall memory showed no overall difference in the number of pictures remembered, but the number of correctly remembered pictorial features was significantly higher for artists than for the artistically untrained viewers, irrespective of picture type. No differences in fixation frequencies/durations were found between groups across sessions, but a significant task-dependent-group by session interaction of fixation frequency/duration showed that the artistically untrained participants demonstrated repetition effects in fewer, longer fixations with repeated viewing, while the opposite pattern obtained for the artists.     

The development of memory for own- and other-race faces

This study demonstrates that experience and development interact to influence the "cross-race effect." In a multination study (n=245), Caucasian children and adults of European ancestry living in the United States, Norway, or South Africa, as well as biracial (Caucasian-African American) children and adults living in the United States, were tested for recognition of Asian, African, and Caucasian faces. Regardless of national or biracial background, 8- to 10-year-olds, 12- to 14-year-olds, and adults recognized own-race faces more accurately than other-race faces, and did so to a similar extent, whereas 5- to 7-year-olds recognized all face types equally well. This same developmental pattern emerged for biracial children and adults. Thus, early meaningful exposure did not substantially alter the developmental trajectory. During young childhood, developmental influences on face processing operate on a system sufficiently plastic to preclude, under certain conditions, the cross-race effect.     

Emotionally controlled decision-making and a gene variant related to serotonin synthesis in women with borderline personality disorder

The Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) was used to examine (i) social decision-making in women with borderline personality disorder (BPD), and (ii) the relationship between impaired decision-making and the tryptophan hydroxylase-1 (TPH-1) gene, involved in serotonin synthesis. Forty-two women with BPD and a history of suicide attempts were genotyped, and the frequency of a TPH-1 haplotype previously uniquely associated with BPD was calculated. The BPD group scored significantly lower than a control group in the IGT. Furthermore, the TPH-1 haplotype displayed a significantly higher frequency in BPD participants with impaired decision making, compared to BPD participants with normal scores. These findings suggest that impaired decision-making as determined by the IGT is a feature of BPD and may be (i) associated with serotonin dysfunction, and (ii) possibly relevant for suicidal behavior.     

Separating ability from need: clarifying the dimensional structure of the Need for Closure Scale

The validity of the Need for Closure Scale (NFCS) has recently been debated in the research literature. In the present study, it is argued that the traditional Decisiveness scale primarily taps ability content instead of the hypothesized motivational need; therefore, new items that explicitly probe the need for quick and unambiguous answers were developed. It was shown that these need items form a reliable scale (Study 1); were predictive of the seizing process over and beyond ability, whereas the old Decisiveness scale was not (Study 2); and were sensitive to experimentally manipulated levels of task motivation (Study 3). Finally, a reassembled NFCS with the new items replacing the traditional Decisiveness items showed superior fit as a unidimensional model. In the Discussion, it is argued that the specific position of Decisiveness is due to its particular operationalization, not to its theoretical status.     

Decomposing coronary-prone behavior: Dimensions of type a behavior in the Videotaped Structured Interview

This study examined the factorial structure of data generated in the Videotaped Structured Interview for assessment of Type A behavior. Based on the literature, it was argued that there are at least three distinct concepts of Type A behavior, focused on competitiveness and pressured drive, speech characteristics, and hostility, respectively. These three concepts were clearly represented among the factors from factor analyses based on data from 282 subjects. Three factors represented speech and psychomotor characteristics, where the first reflected interactions between subject and interviewer (e.g., response latency, interruptions), the second tempo of speech (accelerating, dysrhythmic and rapid speech), and the third oral gestures (e.g., expiratory sighs). Hostility was reflected in two factors, one defined by emotional intensity (e.g., anger when recalling paat event) and the other hostility expressed towards the interviewer. Pressured drive dominated a content factor reflecting self-awareness of Type A behavior. Finally, there was one factor related to psychomotor tension. Through further factor and item analyses, it was possible to combine these factors into three homogeneous and moderately intercorrelated subscales of Type A behavior reflecting Hostility, Speech Characteristics, and Self-Awareness of Type A behavior. These scales showed good interrater agreement and stability over two years. The Self-Awareness Scale was highly correlated with self-report measures of Type A behavior. The Hostility Scale, on the other hand, was moderately related to measures of Type A behavior, anger and hostility, but was unrelated to anxiety. The Speech Characteristic Scale, finally, was virtually unrelated to psychometric measures.     

Childhood amnesia and distinctions between forms of memory: A comment on Wood, Brown, and Felton

Recently, Wood and his colleagues (1989) presented a case of childhood amnesia as evidence against the distinction between declarative and procedural memory that has sometimes been applied to human amnesia. Their argument was based on the observation that their patient showed some progress in school over the years, i.e., acquired some declarative knowledge, despite severely impaired day-to-day memory ability. We briefly review their case, together with a carefully studied second case of childhood amnesia not mentioned by Wood et al. Their argument is wrong in several ways. First, the utility of the declarative/procedural distinction for amnesia, or the utility of any other distinction between memory systems, depends on whether or not one kind of memory is impaired selectively, not on the severity of the impairment. In particular there is no requirement that one kind of memory be totally absent. Second, they have not provided the data necessary to support their argument; namely, data showing that the amount of declarative knowledge accumulated during years in school was better than would have been expected given the capacity for moment-to-moment or day-to-day memory. Indeed, the patient's moment-to-moment memory ability is better than represented, and the patient's progress in school was abnormally slow. Third, it is not clear that academic achievement scores provide a direct measure of declarative memory abilities (skill learning and recovery of function may also have contributed). We conclude that the evidence from childhood amnesia is fully consistent with the proposal that amnesia reflects a selective impairment in the formation of long-term declarative memory.