Psychological factors predicting stress symptoms: metacognition, thought control, and varieties of worry

This study tested predictions of the metacognitive model of post-traumatic stress disorder (Wells, 2000) concerning relationships between stress symptoms and maladaptive control of thoughts. We tested the hypothesis that the tendency to use worry as a means of controlling thoughts will be positively predictive of stress symptoms. In doing so, overlaps with symptomatic worry, stress symptoms, and stress exposure at time 1 was controlled. One hundred and ten (110) college students were assessed twice, over a three-month period. Consistent with predictions, use of worry as a thought control strategy made a significant and independent contribution to the prediction of stress symptoms. The findings provide further support for Wells' metacognitive model of stress reactions.     

Social class and the experience of work-family conflict during the transition to adulthood

The challenges of juggling work and family responsibilities are well known, but there has been little attention to the distinctive work and family experiences of young adults. This chapter explores how class affects young adults' exposure to work-family conflicts and the strategies they use to manage their work and family responsibilities. Using data from a recent cohort of young adults, we find class and gender variations in work and family roles and work-family conflict. Early family formation, coupled with poor working conditions, lead those with lower educational attainments to experience more years of family-to-work interference. In contrast, young adults with more education have more work-to-family interference, and this is especially true for college-educated women.     

Information Distortion and Voting Choices: The Origins and Effects of Factual Beliefs in Initiative Elections

To account for voter decision making in initiative elections, we integrate theory and research on public opinion, misinformation, and motivated reasoning. Heuristic and motivated reasoning literatures suggest that voters' preexisting values interact with political sophistication such that politically knowledgeable voters develop systematically distorted empirical beliefs relevant to the initiatives on their ballots. These beliefs, in turn, can predict voting preferences even after controlling for underlying values, regardless of one's political sophistication. These hypotheses were tested using a 2003 voter survey conducted prior to a statewide initiative election that repealed a workplace safety regulation. Results showed that only those voters knowledgeable of key endorsements had initiative-specific beliefs that lined up with their underlying antiregulation values. Also, voters' empirical beliefs had an effect on initiative support even after controlling for prior values, and political sophistication did not moderate this effect.     

Change in metacognitions predicts outcome in obsessive–compulsive disorder patients undergoing treatment with exposure and response prevention

Wells' (Wells, A. (1997). Cognitive therapy of anxiety disorders: a practice manual and conceptual guide. Chichester, UK: Wiley) metacognitive model of obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD) predicts that metacognitions must change in order for psychological treatment to be effective. The aim of this study was to explore: (1) if metacognitions change in patients undergoing exposure treatment for OCD; (2) to determine the extent to which cognitive and metacognitive change predicts symptom improvement and recovery. The sample consisted of 83 outpatients with a diagnosis of OCD who completed exposure and response prevention treatment. The Yale–Brown Obsessive–Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS), the Metacognitions Questionnaire (MCQ-30) and the Obsessive Beliefs Questionnaire (OBQ-44) were administered before treatment, after treatment, and at 12-month follow-up. Treatment resulted in significant changes in symptoms, metacognition score, responsibility and perfectionism. Regression analysis using post-treatment Y-BOCS as the dependent variable indicated that when the overlap between predictors was controlled for, only changes in metacognition were significant. Changes in metacognitions explained 22% of the variance in symptoms at post-treatment when controlling for pre-treatment symptoms and changes in mood. A further regression revealed that two MCQ-30 subscales made individual contributions. The patients had significantly higher scores compared to community controls on the MCQ-30. Patients who achieved clinical significant change had lower scores on the MCQ-30 compared to patients who did not change. The results did not change significantly from post-treatment to follow-up assessment. These findings provide further support for the importance of metacognitions in treating OCD.     

Met expectations: The effects of expected and delivered inducements on employee satisfaction

Interpretation of existing theory and research on met expectations is problematic due to ambiguous conceptualization of the met expectations hypothesis and limitations imposed by the measurement strategies typically employed in this domain (i.e. difference scores and direct retrospective measures). In this longitudinal study, we sought to overcome these problems by using an alternative methodology to conduct a more comprehensive test of the met expectations hypothesis based on Warr's (1987) Vitamin Model and on research in related fields (e.g. person–environment fit). Polynomial regression and response surface analyses were used to examine how employee satisfaction is related to unmet, met, and exceeded expectations concerning two distinct types of inducements analogous to vitamins A (skill development opportunities) and E (support, compensation). Respondents included 342 limited term employees. Consistent with previous research, our results indicated that unmet expectations of any sort were associated with decreased satisfaction. However, contrary to common interpretations of the extant literature, our results also indicated that met expectations were not always associated with high levels of satisfaction and that exceeded expectations were, in the case of skill development, negatively associated with satisfaction. These findings suggest a need to broaden existing met expectations theory and to refine common organizational practices.     

Televised sexual content and parental mediation: Influences on adolescent sexuality

Little research has been conducted to examine the influence of exposure to televised sexual content on adolescent sexuality or how parental intervention may reduce negative effects of viewing such content. This study uses self-report data from 1,012 adolescents to investigate the relations among exposure to sexually suggestive programming, parental mediation strategies, and three types of adolescent sexuality outcomes: participation in oral sex and sexual intercourse, future intentions to engage in these behaviors, and sex expectancies. As predicted, exposure to sexual content was associated with an increased likelihood of engaging in sexual behaviors, increased intentions to do so in the future, and more positive sex expectancies. Often, parental mediation strategies were a significant factor in moderating these potential media influences.     

Facial Composite Production by Eyewitnesses

ABSTRACT— The creation of facial images by eyewitnesses using composite-production systems can be important for the investigation of crimes when the identity of the perpetrator is at issue. Despite technological advances, research indicates that composite-production systems produce poor likenesses of intended faces, even familiar faces. Furthermore, producing a composite appears to harm later recognition performance. Although morphing composites from multiple witnesses helps, likeness is still limited. The problem might stem from a mismatch between how faces are represented in memory (holistically) and how composite systems attempt to retrieve the memories (at the feature level). New methods of face recall involving judgments of whole faces hold greater promise.     

Identity as a moderator of gender differences in the emotional closeness of emerging adults' same- and cross-sex friendships

Closeness is an integral aspect of friendships, and males and females differ in their closeness experiences within these relationships. However, identity development and friendship type (e.g., same-sex versus cross-sex friendships) may moderate these gender differences. In an attempt to clarify the relationships among gender, identity, and friendship closeness, the current study examined gender and identity associations with reported emotional closeness in emerging adults' same- and cross-sex friendships. Responses from 181 college undergraduates (89 males and 92 females) indicated similar levels of emotional closeness reported for same- and cross-sex friendships. Results also indicated overall identity commitment and friendship identity commitment associations with same-sex friendship closeness. Examination of closeness reports for cross-sex friends revealed a significant association with overall identity commitment for emerging adult males. A significant association was not indicated for emerging adult females. The associations between identity and emotional closeness in same-sex friendships and male cross-sex friendships support previous studies that report differences in the role of these relationships for emerging adult males and females. Findings are discussed in terms of understanding the gender and identity differences in emerging adults' reports of friendship closeness.     

Intrusive images and memories in major depression

Individuals with current major depression were interviewed to investigate the prevalence of distressing intrusive mental imagery among depressed patients and study the phenomenology of these intrusions. Of the 39 currently depressed patients, 17 experienced some form of repetitive intrusive imagery (i.e., either an intrusive memory or image), with intrusive memories being more common than images. The intrusive imagery was experienced as highly uncontrollable and interfered significantly with patients' everyday lives. The intrusions were experienced with a sense of 'nowness', as well as physical and emotional re-experiencing. Despite high levels of re-experiencing, levels of dissociation were very low. The intrusive imagery was in some patients part of a wider network of key defining autobiographical memories, consistent with the idea that it is likely to play a significant role in maintaining the patient's depressive mood. Interventions targeting these intrusions could potentially result in a positive shift in depressed mood.