In Defence of State Directed Enhancement

This article considers the ways in which a liberal society ought to view the potential to cognitively or physically enhance children. At present, the dominant approach in the literature is to leave this decision to parents. I suggest that the parental choice approach is often inadequate and fails to account properly for the interests of children and wider society in enhancement decisions. Instead I suggest that the state should play a greater role in determining when, and how, to enhance. To make this case, I compare the case of enhancement with existing practices of education, an area in which the state already plays a significant role. Finally I suggest that some concerns with a statist approach are not as serious as has been argued.     

Comorbid Substance Use and Anxiety Disorders in Adolescents

To explore the coexistence of substance use disorders and anxiety disorders in adolescents, we assessed adolescents presenting for treatment to an inpatient substance abuse treatment facility (SUH), an inpatient psychiatric treatment facility (IPH), and a community-based psychiatric facility (CMHC) for comorbid substance use and psychiatric diagnoses. Thirty subjects from each facility (N=90) were interviewed using the revised Child Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia (K-SADS) and the Structured Clinical Interview DSM-III-R (SCID-R) for substance use diagnoses. Overall, comorbidity (anxiety and substance use disorders) prevalence was 67% (20/30) of adolescents in the SUH group, 33% (10/30) of the CMHC adolescents, and 33% (10/30) of the IPH adolescents. Alcohol and marijuana were the most frequently abused substances. Anxiety disorders commonly coexist with substance use disorders in adolescents. Early identification and treatment of anxiety disorders may in fact prevent substance abuse in this population.     

Dichotic ear preferences of stuttering children and adults.

39 stutterers and 39 normal speakers indicated their ear preferences for dichotically presented words and digits. A single response mode for both dichotic words and digits was selected to study speech perception. Stutterers showed significantly less of the normal right-ear preference for dichotic words and digits than non-stutterers. The proportion of stutterers who failed to demonstrate a right-ear preference for dichotic words was significantly greater than for non-stutterers. 18% of the stutterers and none of the non-stutterers showed reversed or a left-ear preference for dichotic digits. Although non-stuttering children and adults performed alike on the dichotic tasks, the right-ear dichotic-words scores of stuttering children were significantly smaller than those of adult stutterers. The results are related to an early notion that stuttering may be related to mixed dominance and recent evidence showing that large percentages of older stuttering children show spontaneous remission of stuttering.     

Quantitative relations between avoidance behavior and pituitary-adrenal cortical activity

The rate at which monkeys pressed a lever and avoided shocks was manipulated in several ways. Measurements were also made of their plasma levels of 17-hydroxycorticosteroids. The rate at which the animals pressed the lever and the frequency with which they received shocks were both implicated as determiners of the steroid levels.     

Temporal dynamics of need satisfaction and need frustration. Two sides of the same coin?

We study the dynamics of need satisfaction and need frustration by examining how need satisfaction and need frustration change over time and how these changes relate to changes in motivation. To investigate this, volunteers were assessed daily during a delineated activity, resulting in a total sample of 77 volunteers and 467 completed daily diaries. Bayesian confirmatory factor analysis on the within-person level confirmed a bifactor solution: autonomy, competence, and relatedness were distinguished by three specific factors, but the majority of variance was explained by two strongly correlated (need satisfaction and need frustration) factors. The strong correlation between need satisfaction and need frustration further translated in the development of their relationship over time. That is, Bayesian latent growth curve modelling revealed a simultaneous, yet opposite, growth curve. Contrary to our expectations, neither of them could be related to behavioural internalization or externalization. These results imply that, at the within-person level, momentary need satisfaction and frustration are difficult to distinguish, and affecting one may automatically affect the other. Also, the relationships within the self-determination framework, such as the proposed link between need satisfaction and behavioural internalization may be better reframed with attention to the time-frame in which they occur.     

Materialism,Spending, and Affect: An Event-Sampling Study of Marketplace Behavior and Its Affective Costs

Research on materialism has burgeoned in the last two decades, yet little is known about how people higher versus lower in this consumer values orientation differ in their day-to-day spending habits and in their emotional reactions to spending on purchases. The present study used an event-sampling method over a 3-week period to address these questions in a community adult sample. Results showed that over the course of the sampling period, high materialists made more discretionary purchases and spent more money on necessity purchases than did those lower in materialism, even though their incomes did not differ. Despite higher levels of spending, high materialists experienced a “letdown” after spending, as they reported more post-purchase unpleasant affect than did low materialists. This result was not moderated by level of dispositional unpleasant affect, purchase type, or purchase amounts.