How informed is online informed consent?

We examined participants' reading and recall of informed consent documents presented via paper or computer. Within each presentation medium, we presented the document as a continuous or paginated document to simulate common computer and paper presentation formats. Participants took slightly longer to read paginated and computer informed consent documents and recalled slightly more information from the paginated documents. We concluded that obtaining informed consent online is not substantially different than obtaining it via paper presentation. We also provide suggestions for improving informed consent--in both face-to-face and online experiments.     

The effectiveness of a brief psychological intervention on court-referred and self-referred aggressive drivers

This study tested the efficacy of a cognitive-behavioral psychological intervention (CBT) targeting aggressive driving behaviors within both a court-referred (N=20) and a self-referred community (N=8) sample as compared to a symptom monitoring (SM) only control condition. Treatment outcome was assessed through the use of daily driving diaries, standard psychological tests, and a global rating of change scale. The CBT treatment condition improved more than the SM condition as assessed through the daily driving diaries. Although the court-referred and self-referred samples showed equivalent improvement on the driving diaries, the self-referred group improved more on measures of general anger. Standardized measures of driving anger, state anxiety and measures of general anger indicated significant change in the expected direction. Aggressive drivers who met criteria for Intermittent Explosive Disorder (IED) showed a trend to improve less than non-IED aggressive drivers. Treatment gains were maintained at the 2-month follow-up point.     

Young Children's Knowledge of the Representational Function of Pictorial Symbols: Development Across the Preschool Years in Three Cultures

Three- to 5-year-old children's knowledge that pictures have a representational function for others was investigated using a pictorial false-belief task. In Study 1, children passed the task at around 4 years old, and performance was correlated with standard false-belief and pictorial symbol tasks. In Study 2, the performance of children from two cultural settings who had very little exposure to pictures during the first 3 years (Peru, India) was contrasted with that of children from Canada. Performance was better in the Canadian than Peruvian and Indian samples on the picture false-belief task and drawing tasks but not on the standard false-belief measure. In all settings, children passed drawing and standard false-belief tasks either concurrently with, or prior to, passing the picture false-belief task. The findings suggest that children's explicit knowledge of the representational function of pictorial symbols matures in the late preschool years and develops more rapidly in cultures that strongly promote the symbolic use of pictures early in life.     

Confidence Intervals for the Probability of Superiority Effect Size Measure and the Area Under a Receiver Operating Characteristic Curve

It is good scientific practice to the report an appropriate estimate of effect size and a confidence interval (CI) to indicate the precision with which a population effect was estimated. For comparisons of 2 independent groups, a probability-based effect size estimator (A) that is equal to the area under a receiver operating characteristic curve and closely related to the popular Wilcoxon-Mann-Whitney nonparametric statistical tests has many appealing properties (e.g., easy to understand, robust to violations of parametric assumptions, insensitive to outliers). We performed a simulation study to compare 9 analytic and 3 empirical (bootstrap) methods for constructing a CI for A that can yield very different CIs for the same data. The experimental design crossed 6 factors to yield a total of 324 cells representing challenging but realistic data conditions. Results were examined using several criteria, with emphasis placed on the extent to which observed CI coverage probabilities approximated nominal levels. Based on the simulation study results, the bias-corrected and accelerated bootstrap method is recommended for constructing a CI for the A statistic; bootstrap methods also provided the least biased and most accurate standard error of A. An empirical illustration examining score differences on a citation-based index of scholarly impact across faculty at low-ranked versus high-ranked research universities underscores the importance of choosing an appropriate CI method.     

Adults' Efficacy and Control Beliefs Regarding Memory and Aging: Separating General from Personal Beliefs

This study examined beliefs about memory in 307 18-93 year-old community-dwelling adults. Two new questionnaires, the General Beliefs about Memory (GBMI) and the Personal Beliefs about Memory (PBMI) Instruments, were used to compare and contrast beliefs about memory in the general population of adults from beliefs about one's own memory. Both questionnaires used a graphic rating scale format to obtain more refined responses. The GBMI showed that, on average, all age groups perceived the average adult as experiencing curvilinear decline over the adult life span for multiple aspects of memory, with the greatest changes believed to occur after age 40. Beliefs about different specific types of memory were consistent with lay beliefs and with empirical results regarding aging and memory (e.g., memory for names was perceived to decline more rapidly than memory for faces). In contrast to earlier studies, small but significant age differences between young, middle-aged, and older respondents regarding beliefs about rates of memory aging were identified. Results for the PBMI indicated that personal beliefs were strongly related to, but distinct from, general beliefs. Older adults believed themselves to be lower in memory efficacy, to have declined more than younger adults, and to have less personal control over memory, as in earlier research.     

A concise review of the correspondence between the traditional functional analysis and alternative assessment formats

The functional assessment of challenging behavior (e.g., self-injurious behavior) has evolved over many years of research and practice. This concise review summarizes the positive predictive value, negative predictive value, accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity of common procedural adaptations reported to improve functional assessment safety and efficiency. We conclude with suggestions for clinicians and researchers.