Classification of situations specific to field and behaviour: The context of aggressive interactions in schools

Based on a social psychological concept of aggression, in which the processes of definition and judgement of acts of behaviour are credited with central meaning, the situational context of aggressive interactions was systematized for a specific field (school). It is assumed that the particular circumstances of a situation provide information for the interpretation of a particular action, and that this interpretation varies depending on these circumstances. In the following study, norm deviation, intent and injury, are used as central criteria for judging on action as aggressive in order to establish a taxonomy of social situations, presented as verbal scenarios, that is both field-and behaviour-specific. 686 school children aged between 13 and 19 years participated in this study. By using a multivariate analysis procedure, groups of situations were identified in which similar judgements of a particular action emerged. Both typical judgement patterns and corresponding situation characteristics were used in the interpretation of the resulting situation taxonomy.     

Secondary-task effects on sequence learning

With a repeated sequence of stimuli, performance in a serial reaction-time task improves more than with a random sequence. The difference has been taken as a measure of implicit sequence learning. Implicit sequence learning is impaired when a secondary task is added to the serial RT task. In the first experiment, secondary-task effects on different types of sequences were studied to test the hypothesis that the learning of unique sequences (where each sequence element has a unique relation to the following one) is not impaired by the secondary task, while the learning of ambiguous sequences is. The sequences were random up to a certain order of sequential dependencies, where they became deterministic. Contrary to the hypothesis, secondary-task effects on the learning of unique sequences were as strong or stronger than such effects on the learning of ambiguous sequences. In the second experiment a hybrid sequence (with unique as well as ambiguous transitions) was used with different secondary tasks. A visuo-spatial and a verbal memory task did not interfere with the learning of the sequence, but interference was observed with an auditory go/no-go task in which high- and low-pitched tones were presented after each manual response and a foot pedal had to be pressed in response to high-pitched tones. Thus, interference seems to be specific to certain secondary tasks and may be related to memory processes (but most likely not to visuo-spatial and verbal memory) or to the organization of sequences, consistent with previous suggestions.     

Muster früher Traumatisierung und die Effekte stationärer Psychotherapie

Early traumatic experiences of neglect, physical and sexual abuse in adult patients undergoing inpatient psychotherapeutic treatment were retrospectively assessed. Associations between these three forms of trauma and with patient gender were analyzed. The effects of early traumatization in general, gender and patterns of specific experiences on the symptom level, level of everyday functioning and treatment outcome were also investigated. A total of 191 patients in a psychosomatic psychotherapy ward of a university hospital were assessed using standardized questionnaires on sociodemographic and clinical variables on admission and at discharge. The type and extent of early traumatization before the age of 18 years were estimated after the initial interview from standardized reports of the therapists. The results indicate that the probability of being exposed to one of the traumatic experiences under study are not independent of each other. Furthermore, female patients were victims of sexual abuse and neglect more often than males. Compared to non-traumatized patients, trauma victims exhibited more psychological symptoms in the symptom checklist 90 revised (SCL-90-R) and a lower level of functioning according to the global assessment of functioning (GAF) but achieved a comparable relative benefit from treatment. Sexual abuse (SCL-90-R and GAF) and neglect (SCL-90-R only) affected the levels of impairment on admission and at discharge in a similar way; however, only weak evidence for differential effects of trauma patterns on therapy outcomes was found. Methodological limitations of the present approach and implications for the design of inpatient psychotherapeutic interventions in adult patients with early traumatic experiences are discussed.     

Spatial learning in the holeboard impairs an early phase of long-term potentiation in the rat hippocampal CA1-region

Long-term potentiation (LTP) and depression (LTD) are considered as cellular models for learning and memory. We studied the impact of holeboard training on LTP in the rat CA1 hippocampal region. In 7-week-old Wistar rats a recording electrode was chronically implanted into the hippocampal pyramidal cell layer of the CA1 of the right hemisphere and a stimulation electrode into the contralateral CA3 region.Two groups of animals received a spatial holeboard training of 10 or 15 trials over 2 days on a fixed pattern of baited holes. The last trial was performed 15 min after a primed burst stimulation of the contralateral CA3, which resulted in LTP in the ipsilateral CA1. A pseudo-trained group that received a 10 trial training with changing patterns of baited holes after each trial and a group that remained in the recording chambers during the experiments served as controls. Experimental rats significantly improved their spatial performance with increasing numbers of trials, indicated by decreasing times to pick up all food pellets and by decreasing numbers of reference memory errors. A learning-related impairment of CA1-LTP measured in both the population-spike amplitude as well as the fEPSP could be noted. These results show that specific (pattern-training), but not unspecific (pseudo-training) spatial information processing prior to electrical stimulation can severely affect LTP in hippocampal area CA1.     

Musiktherapie bei chronisch-tonalem Tinnitus

Tinnitus therapy according to the Heidelberg model of music therapy integrates psychological strategies in order to manage the perception and approaches to tinnitus aimed at curing the underlying somatic disorder. The specific musical therapeutic interventions as well as the postulated specific effective factors are explained. Several multidisciplinary studies support the effectiveness of this form of therapy. The results indicate that the therapy is highly advantageous in terms of treatment duration, effectiveness, and follow-up stability compared to customary interventions. Furthermore, the results of brain imaging strongly suggest the usefulness of further investigations and discussion in the realm of neuronal modeling of chronic tinnitus.     

On the Costs of Nonclassical Logic

Solutions to semantic paradoxes often involve restrictions of classical logic for semantic vocabulary. In the paper we investigate the costs of these restrictions in a model case. In particular, we fix two systems of truth capturing the same conception of truth: (a variant) of the system KF of Feferman (The Journal of Symbolic Logic, 56, 1–49, 1991) formulated in classical logic, and (a variant of) the system PKF of Halbach and Horsten (The Journal of Symbolic Logic, 71, 677–712, 2006), formulated in basic De Morgan logic. The classical system is known to be much stronger than the nonclassical one. We assess the reasons for this asymmetry by showing that the truth theoretic principles of PKF cannot be blamed: PKF with induction restricted to non-semantic vocabulary coincides in fact with what the restricted version of KF proves true.     

Emotionally Focused Family Therapy and Play Therapy Techniques

Emotionally Focused Family Therapy provides a framework for understanding children's behaviors in terms of attachment needs of comfort and support. However, when working with young children, play therapy is often developmentally preferred over “talk therapy.” By integrating play therapy techniques within an Emotionally Focused Family Therapy theoretical framework, therapists can help parents understand and meet their child's needs for affection and comfort. This article will discuss how play therapy techniques can be integrated with an Emotionally Focused Family Therapy theoretical framework for work with young children and their families.     

Standard errors and confidence intervals in within-subjects designs: Generalizing Loftus and Masson (1994) and avoiding the biases of alternative accounts

Repeated measures designs are common in experimental psychology. Because of the correlational structure in these designs, the calculation and interpretation of confidence intervals is nontrivial. One solution was provided by Loftus and Masson (Psychonomic Bulletin & Review 1:476-490, 1994). This solution, although widely adopted, has the limitation of implying same-size confidence intervals for all factor levels, and therefore does not allow for the assessment of variance homogeneity assumptions (i.e., the circularity assumption, which is crucial for the repeated measures ANOVA). This limitation and the method's perceived complexity have sometimes led scientists to use a simplified variant, based on a per-subject normalization of the data (Bakeman & McArthur, Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers 28:584-589, 1996; Cousineau, Tutorials in Quantitative Methods for Psychology 1:42-45, 2005; Morey, Tutorials in Quantitative Methods for Psychology 4:61-64, 2008; Morrison & Weaver, Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers 27:52-56, 1995). We show that this normalization method leads to biased results and is uninformative with regard to circularity. Instead, we provide a simple, intuitive generalization of the Loftus and Masson method that allows for assessment of the circularity assumption.     

Tool-use in the brown bear (Ursus arctos)

This is the first report of tool-using behaviour in a wild brown bear (Ursus arctos). Whereas the use of tools is comparatively common among primates and has also been documented in several species of birds, fishes and invertebrates, tool-using behaviours have so far been observed in only four species of non-primate mammal. The observation was made and photographed while studying the behaviour of a subadult brown bear in south-eastern Alaska. The animal repeatedly picked up barnacle-encrusted rocks in shallow water, manipulated and re-oriented them in its forepaws, and used them to rub its neck and muzzle. The behaviour probably served to relieve irritated skin or to remove food-remains from the fur. Bears habitually rub against stationary objects and overturn rocks and boulders during foraging and such rubbing behaviour could have been transferred to a freely movable object to classify as tool-use. The bear exhibited considerable motor skills when manipulating the rocks, which clearly shows that these animals possess the advanced motor learning necessary for tool-use. Advanced spatial cognition and motor skills for object manipulation during feeding and tool-use provide a possible explanation for why bears have the largest brains relative to body size of all carnivores. Systematic research into the cognitive abilities of bears, both in captivity and in the wild, is clearly warranted to fully understand their motor-learning skills and physical intelligence related to tool-use and other object manipulation tasks.