Supportives Monitoring in der Psychotherapie

Supportive monitoring (SM) is presented as a new intervention concept for the disease management of mental disorders. Following an introductory clarification of terms some related concepts will be outlined and potential strengths of SM will be identified. An application of SM will be introduced that was recently developed for an individualized disease management for patients with recurrent depression. The article closes with a discussion about the challenges for research and practice regarding the development and implementation of SM.     

Controlling the unconscious: attentional task sets modulate subliminal semantic and visuomotor processes differentially

Are unconscious processes susceptible to attentional influences? In two subliminal priming experiments, we investigated whether task sets differentially modulate the sensitivity of unconscious processing pathways. We developed a novel procedure for masked semantic priming of words (Experiment 1) and masked visuomotor priming of geometrical shapes (Experiment 2). Before presentation of the masked prime, participants performed an induction task in which they attended to either semantic or perceptual object features designed to activate a semantic or perceptual task set, respectively. Behavioral and electrophysiological effects showed that the induction tasks differentially modulated subliminal priming: Semantic priming, which involves access to conceptual meaning, was found after the semantic induction task but not after the perceptual induction task. Visuomotor priming was observed after the perceptual induction task but not after the semantic induction task. These results demonstrate that unconscious cognition is influenced by attentional control. Unconscious processes in perceptual and semantic processing streams are coordinated congruently with higher-level action goals.     

Psychometric properties of an insomnia-specific measure of worry: the Anxiety and Preoccupation about Sleep Questionnaire

The aim of this study was to examine the psychometric properties of the Anxiety and Preoccupation about Sleep Questionnaire (APSQ), with a focus on factorial validity and internal consistency as well as discriminative, convergent, and association with sleep parameters and daytime impairment. Among a randomly selected sample from the general population (N = 5,000), 2,333 participants completed a survey on nighttime symptoms, daytime symptoms, health outcomes, and psychological processes. The study sample consisted of 1800 participants who did not fulfill criteria for another sleep disorder than insomnia. A two-factor solution, accounting for 70.7% of the variance, was extracted from the 10 APSQ items. One six-item factor determined worries about the consequences of poor sleep (α = .91); the second factor, with four items, assessed worries about the uncontrollability of sleep (α = .86). The two factors were significantly intercorrelated (ρ = .65) and significantly associated with the total APSQ (ρs = .97 and .76, respectively). The APSQ and the two subscales showed discriminant validity between three sleep status groups (normal sleep, poor sleep, and insomnia disorder; R(2) = .33-.41). The APSQ and the subscales demonstrated convergent validity with measures on cognitive arousal, sleep-related beliefs, anxiety, and depression. They also were significantly correlated with sleep parameters and daytime impairment. The findings suggest that the APSQ is a psychometrically sound instrument for assessing worry in insomnia.     

Two (or three) is one too many: testing the flexibility of contextual cueing with multiple target locations

Visual search for a target object is facilitated when the object is repeatedly presented within an invariant context of surrounding items ("contextual cueing"; Chun & Jiang, Cognitive Psychology, 36, 28-71, 1998). The present study investigated whether such invariant contexts can cue more than one target location. In a series of three experiments, we showed that contextual cueing is significantly reduced when invariant contexts are paired with two rather than one possible target location, whereas no contextual cueing occurs with three distinct target locations. Closer data inspection revealed that one "dominant" target always exhibited substantially more contextual cueing than did the other, "minor" target(s), which caused negative contextual-cueing effects. However, minor targets could benefit from the invariant context when they were spatially close to the dominant target. In sum, our experiments suggest that contextual cueing can guide visual attention to a spatially limited region of the display, only enhancing the detection of targets presented inside that region.     

Eye movements during mental rotation of nonmirrored and mirrored three-dimensional abstract objects

Eye movements were recorded while participants (N = 56) rotated mirrored and nonmirrored abstract, three-dimensional object pairs into different orientations to assess whether there were oculomotoric differences in fixation switches between mirrored and nonmirrored objects and how an object's plane and depth angle affected visual processing. Compared to other studies, especially depth rotation tasks were responsible for a difference in the sum of fixation switches. This difference seemed to be caused by an increase in incongruent fixation switches, while congruent ones remained stable. Theoretical and practical implications of findings are discussed.     

Stereotype threat impairs ability building: Effects on test preparation among women in science and technology

Stereotype threat is an uncomfortable psychological state that has been shown to impair cognitive ability test scores. It is an open question whether and in what ways it affects processes involved in learning and knowledge acquisition. This research examined whether stereotypes also interfere with test preparation among women in the domain of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Study 1 (N = 1058) revealed that people are aware of a stereotype portraying women as less proficient in STEM‐test preparation than men. Women's note‐taking activities were impaired under stereotype threat (Study 2, N = 40), particularly when domain identification was high (Study 3, N = 79). Moreover, stereotype threat impaired women's performance evaluating the notes of others (Study 4, N = 88). Our work thus shows that stereotype threat not only hinders stereotyped individuals' capacity to demonstrate their abilities but also impairs behaviors that develop them. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A behavioral study of distraction by vibrotactile novelty

Past research has demonstrated that the occurrence of unexpected task-irrelevant changes in the auditory or visual sensory channels captured attention in an obligatory fashion, hindering behavioral performance in ongoing auditory or visual categorization tasks and generating orientation and re-orientation electrophysiological responses. We report the first experiment extending the behavioral study of cross-modal distraction to tactile novelty. Using a vibrotactile-visual cross-modal oddball task and a bespoke hand-arm vibration device, we found that participants were significantly slower at categorizing the parity of visually presented digits following a rare and unexpected change in vibrotactile stimulation (novelty distraction), and that this effect extended to the subsequent trial (postnovelty distraction). These results are in line with past research on auditory and visual novelty and fit the proposition of common and amodal cognitive mechanisms for the involuntary detection of change.     

Recognizing dynamic scenes: influence of processing orientation

From face recognition studies, it is known that instructions are able to change processing orientation of stimuli, leading to an impairment of recognition performance. The present study examined instructional influences on the visual recognition of dynamic scenes. A global processing orientation without any instruction was assumed to lead to highest recognition performance, whereas instructions focusing participants' attention on certain characteristics of the event should lead to a local processing orientation with an impairment of visual recognition performance as a direct consequence. Since the pattern of results provided evidence for this hypothesis, theoretical contributions were discussed.     

Identification accuracy for single‐ and double‐perpetrator crimes: Does accomplice gender matter?

There is an important mismatch between empirical research on the accuracy of eyewitness identification and the real world of criminal investigation. Most research models single‐perpetrator crimes, but in the real world, most crimes involve multiple perpetrators. This study examined how the number of perpetrators affects eyewitness identification by manipulating the gender of accomplices. Observers viewed a video of a staged crime. The crime was committed by a male or female perpetrator, who was presented alone or with an accomplice of the same or the opposite gender. The observers were then asked to identify the perpetrators from target‐present or target‐absent line‐ups. The results revealed a double‐perpetrator disadvantage, which was manifested in reduced identification accuracy on target‐present line‐ups. Importantly, however, the gender of the perpetrator or the accomplice had no effect on this disadvantage. This double‐perpetrator disadvantage is attributed to the need to divide attention between two concurrent people, compared to single‐culprit crimes, rather than an impairment of visual encoding processes. The implications of these findings are discussed.     

Young people's topography of musical functions: Personal, social and cultural experiences with music across genders and six societies

How can we understand the uses of music in daily life? Music is a universal phenomenon but with significant interindividual and cultural variability. Listeners’ gender and cultural background may influence how and why music is used in daily life. This paper reports the first investigation of a holistic framework and a new measure of music functions (RESPECT‐music) across genders and six diverse cultural samples (students from Germany, Kenya, Mexico, New Zealand, Philippines, and Turkey). Two dimensions underlie the mental representation of music functions. First, music can be used for contemplation or affective functions. Second, music can serve intrapersonal, social, and sociocultural functions. Results reveal that gender differences occur for affective functions, indicating that female listeners use music more for affective functions, i.e., emotional expression, dancing, and cultural identity. Country differences are moderate for social functions (values, social bonding, dancing) and strongest for sociocultural function (cultural identity, family bonding, political attitudes). Cultural values, such as individualism–collectivism and secularism–traditionalism, can help explain cross‐cultural differences in the uses of music. Listeners from more collectivistic cultures use music more frequently for expressing values and cultural identity. Listeners from more secular and individualistic cultures like to dance more. Listeners from more traditional cultures use music more for expressing values and cultural identity, and they bond more frequently with their families over music. The two dimensions of musical functions seem systematically underpinned by listeners’ gender and cultural background. We discuss the uses of music as behavioral expressions of affective and contemplative as well as personal, social, and sociocultural aspects in terms of affect proneness and cultural values.