Temperament and its Relationship to Autistic Symptoms in a High-Risk Infant Sib Cohort

The present study prospectively investigated early temperamental profiles and their associations with autistic symptoms in high-risk infants (N = 138) with an older sibling with autistic spectrum disorder (ASD) and low-risk infants (N = 73) with no family history of ASD. Children who were diagnosed with ASD at 36 months were distinguished from non-ASD sibs and controls by a temperament profile marked by lower positive affect, higher negative affect and difficulty controlling attention and behavior, which we labeled Effortful Emotion Regulation. This profile also distinguished the non-ASD sib group from the control group. Children with ASD were distinguished from both of the other two groups by a temperament profile of low Behavioral Approach (lower sensitivity to “social” reward cues). Low levels of Behavioral Approach were associated with a higher number of ASD symptoms, even after taking into account IQ, sex and group membership. Finally, a cluster analysis revealed two ASD subgroups distinguished by number of ASD symptoms, IQ, age of diagnosis and scores on the Behavioral Approach profile. These findings suggest that temperament may be a useful framework for understanding the emergence of ASD early in life.     

Neuropsychological mediators of the links among age, chronic illness, and everyday problem solving

Reductions in everyday problem solving (EPS) are often reported in older age, although the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. The authors examined the role of 2 variables predicted to mediate (neuropsychological abilities and health status) or moderate (health status) the relationship between age and EPS performance. Toward these ends, they compared EPS and neuropsychological performance in 50 functionally independent adults with chronic kidney disease (CKD) and 64 control participants matched on age and education. Both older age and CKD were associated with worse performance on measures of EPS and memory/executive abilities. Neuropsychological abilities were positively associated with EPS performance. In both the full sample and control participants only, memory/executive functioning mediated the association between presence of chronic illness and EPS. Furthermore, memory/executive functioning partially mediated the link between age and EPS. Findings indicate that relations among age, health status, and EPS are not straightforward. Although performance on neuropsychological measures appeared to underlie EPS declines in chronic illness, increasing age remained independently associated with reduced EPS. The authors discuss implications for models of adult developmental changes in everyday cognition.     

The Psychology of Voluntary Employee Turnover

ABSTRACT— Most research on voluntary turnover has focused on dissatisfaction-induced and rational decisionmaking processes, with some attention paid to external market influences. This focus leaves unexplained a large portion of the variance in why people choose to quit a job. Recently, however, researchers are considering the alternative ways that the turnover process is enacted, as well as what businesses can do to prevent turnover.     

Paul Wachtel was ahead of his time

We enthusiastically endorse Wachtel's prescience in sounding the alarm about his three concerns. We argue that although he detected these trends nearly 30 years ago, they were just beginning to take hold in 1980 and it is only recently that they have become the norms in our field. We describe several manifestations of these trends that could not have been anticipated.     

The contrasting impact of global and local object attributes on Kanizsa figure detection

Studies on the involvement of object completions in search for illusory figures have so far reported equivocal results. We have addressed this issue by investigating at which level object attributes in Kanizsa figures influence search. Employing a paradigm that investigated global and local attributes in the composition of distractors with relation to target composition, we report a selective involvement of multilevel processing upon detection. Four experiments demonstrate that global surface information, but not the surrounding global contour, determines the speed of Kanizsa figure detection. By contrast, local inducer information is encoded far less efficiently in search than processes computing the global object. Our conclusions are that surface filling-in acts as a major determinant of search, but depends on the relevance of the particular hierarchical level (local or global) coding the target.     

Parent Proneness to Shame and the Use of Psychological Control

We examined the link between parent proneness to shame and two forms of psychological control, overprotection and critical/rejecting behavior, in parents of preschoolers. Because shame is self-condemning, proneness to shame affects intrapersonal and interpersonal functioning. We hypothesized that parents’ emotion-regulatory responses to shame would increase the likelihood of psychological control: anxiety by leading to overprotection mediated by a worrisome approach to the child, and anger/hostility by leading to critical/rejecting parenting mediated by negative reactivity to the child. Participants were 198 mother-father pairs with a child 3.6 to 4.5 years of age. Overprotective and critical/rejecting parenting were assessed using both self and spouse reports of parenting practices. In addition, parents completed measures of proneness to shame, worrisome overconcern about the child, and negative reactivity to the child. Structural equation modeling yielded results that supported mediation by negative approach to the child for mothers’ and fathers’ critical/rejecting behavior. For fathers but not mothers, shame was indirectly associated with overprotective parenting through worrisome approach to the child. Parents’ proneness to shame may be an important factor leading to the use of psychological control.     

Family of origin characteristics as predictors of perfectionism

This study investigated perceptions of family of origin (parental style and family system characteristics) as predictors of dysfunctional and functional perfectionism (as measured by the Khawaja and Armstrong shortened Australian version of the Frost Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale) in a sample of 264 Australian first‐year Psychology students at University of Sydney. Regression analyses showed that dysfunctional perfectionism was predicted by extreme family enmeshment and by parenting styles that were highly authoritarian and high on psychological control. Functional perfectionism was also predicted by extreme family enmeshment and authoritarian parenting style, but not by high parental psychological control. An implication of these findings for counselling and remedial education programs for students working with dysfunctional perfectionist tendencies is that such programs need to include consideration of the possible influence of unhelpful controlling family processes that appear to be associated with the development of dysfunctional perfectionism.