Using a Training-of-Trainers Approach and Proactive Technical Assistance to Bring Evidence Based Programs to Scale: An Operationalization of the Interactive Systems Framework’s Support System

Bringing evidence based programs to scale was a major initial impetus for the development of the Interactive Systems Framework for Dissemination and Implementation (ISF). The ISF demonstrates the importance of the Support System in facilitating the uptake of innovations in the community (the Delivery System). Two strategies that members of the Support System commonly use are training‐of‐trainers (TOT) models and technical assistance (TA). In this article, we focus on the role of the Support System in bringing evidence‐based programs (EBPs) to scale in the Delivery System using a case example, with special attention on two strategies employed by Support Systems—training‐of‐trainers (TOT) and proactive technical assistance. We then report on findings from a case example from the Promoting Science Based Approaches to Teen Pregnancy Prevention project that furthers our conceptualization of these strategies and the evidence base for them. We also report on the limitations in the literature regarding research on TOTs and proactive TA and provide suggestions for future research on TOTs and proactive TA that will enhance the science and practice of support in the ISF. Special Issue: Advances in Bridging Research and Practice Using the Interactive System Framework for Dissemination and Implementation; Guest Editors: Abraham Wandersman, Paul Flaspohler, Catherine A. Lesesne, Richard Puddy; Action Editor: Emilie Phillips Smith     

Community perception: the ability to assess the safety of unfamiliar neighborhoods and respond adaptively

When entering an unfamiliar neighborhood, adaptive social decisions are dependent on an accurate assessment of the local safety. Studies of cities have shown that the maintenance of physical structures is correlated with the strength of ties between neighbors, which in turn is responsible for the crime level. Thus it should be theoretically possible to intuit neighborhood safety through the physical structures alone. Here we test whether people have this capacity for judging urban neighborhoods with 3 studies in which individuals observed photographs of unfamiliar neighborhoods in Binghamton, New York. Each study was facilitated by data collected during previous studies performed by the Binghamton Neighborhood Project studies. In the 1st study, observer ratings on neighborhood social quality agreed highly with reports by those living there. In the 2nd, a separate sample of participants played an economic game with adolescent residents from pictured neighborhoods. Players exhibited a lower level of trust toward adolescents from neighborhoods whose residents report lesser social quality. In the 3rd study, the maintenance of physical structures and the presence of businesses explained nearly all variation between neighborhoods in observer ratings (89%), whereas the specific features influencing play in Study 2 remained inconclusive. These and other results suggest that people use the general upkeep of physical structures when making wholesale judgments of neighborhoods, reflecting a adaptation for group living that has strong implications for the role of upkeep in urban environments.     

Birds of a feather sit together: physical similarity predicts seating choice

Across four studies, people sat (or reported they would sit) closer to physically similar others. Study 1 revealed significant aggregation in seating patterns on two easily observed characteristics: glasses wearing and sex. Study 2 replicated this finding with a wider variety of physical traits: race, sex, glasses wearing, hair length, and hair color. The overall tendency for people to sit beside physically similar others remained significant when controlling for sex and race, suggesting people aggregate on physical dimensions other than broad social categories. Study 3 conceptually replicated these results in a laboratory setting. The more physically similar participants were to a confederate, the closer they sat before an anticipated interaction when controlling for sex, race, and attractiveness similarity. In Study 4, overall physical similarity and glasses wearing similarity predicted self-reported seating distance. These effects were mediated by perceived attitudinal similarity. Liking and inferred acceptance also received support as mediators for glasses wearing similarity.     

Long-term facilitation of return: A response-retrieval effect

The present study used a target–target procedure to examine the extent to which perceptual and response factors contribute to inhibition of return (IOR) in a visual discrimination task. When the target was perceptually identical to the previous target and the required response was the same, facilitation was observed for both standard and long-term target–target stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs). When the color of the previous target differed from that of the current target but the response remained the same, facilitation was reduced in both the standard SOA and long-term SOA conditions. Finally, IOR was observed for both standard and long-term SOAs only in the condition in which there was a change in response. This pattern of inhibition and facilitation provides new evidence that the responses previously associated with a location play an important role in the ability to respond to a stimulus. We interpret this finding as consistent with a framework in which the involuntary retrieval of bound stimulus–response episodes contributes to response compatibility effects in visual stimulus discrimination.     

Observing a client's grieving process: bringing logical positivism into qualitative grief counselling research

This positional paper originates from our need as researcher/practitioners to establish a meaningful epistemological framework for research into bereaved people's journey through loss and grief over time. We describe how the field of grief research has a long and established biological basis, in keeping with a positivist epistemology. However, there has been a diminution of the influence of logical positivism in twenty-first-century counselling research. We argue that in grief counselling research, naturalistic observation of the grieving process within a logical positivist paradigm, remains a valid and valuable construct. We posit an observational protocol for the grief counselling process which minimises the intrusion of research method into the therapeutic process. We offer this as a means of conducting qualitative research within a bereavement counselling service. Further, we suggest that the development of an observational protocol for a client's grieving process has potential implications for developing good practice in grief work.     

Weak ventral striatal responses to monetary outcomes predict an unwillingness to resist cigarette smoking

As a group, cigarette smokers exhibit blunted subjective, behavioral, and neurobiological responses to nondrug incentives and rewards, relative to nonsmokers. Findings from recent studies suggest, however, that there are large individual differences in the devaluation of nondrug rewards among smokers. Moreover, this variability appears to have significant clinical implications, since reduced sensitivity to nondrug rewards is associated with poorer smoking cessation outcomes. Currently, little is known about the neurobiological mechanisms that underlie these individual differences in the responsiveness to nondrug rewards. Here, we tested the hypothesis that individual variability in reward devaluation among smokers is linked to the functioning of the striatum. Specifically, functional magnetic resonance imaging was used to examine variability in the neural response to monetary outcomes in nicotine-deprived smokers anticipating an opportunity to smoke—circumstances found to heighten the devaluation of nondrug rewards by smokers in prior work. We also investigated whether individual differences in reward-related brain activity in those expecting to have access to cigarettes were associated with the degree to which the same individuals subsequently were willing to resist smoking in order to earn additional money. Our key finding was that deprived smokers who exhibited the weakest response to rewards (i.e., monetary gains) in the ventral striatum were least willing to refrain from smoking for monetary reinforcement. These results provide evidence that outcome-related signals in the ventral striatum serve as a marker for clinically meaningful individual differences in reward-motivated behavior among nicotine-deprived smokers.     

Dilution, not load, affects distractor processing

Lavie and Tsal (1994) proposed that spare attentional capacity is allocated involuntarily to the processing of irrelevant stimuli, thereby enabling interference. Under this view, when task demands increase, spare capacity should decrease and distractor interference should decrease. In support, Lavie and Cox (1997) found that increasing perceptual load by increasing search set size decreased interference from an irrelevant distractor. In three experiments, we manipulated the cue set size (number of cued locations) independently of the display set size (number of letters presented). Increasing the display set size reduced distractor interference regardless of whether the additional letters were relevant to the task. In contrast, increasing the cue set size increased distractor interference. Both findings are inconsistent with the load explanation, but are consistent with a proposed two-stage dilution account.     

Synchrony effects in automatic and controlled retrieval

Using a speeded retrieval procedure, we investigated time-of-day effects in automatic and controlled retrieval. Morning-type adults were tested at either peak (early morning) or off-peak (late afternoon) times on a speeded implicit (Experiment 1) or explicit (Experiment 2) stem completion task. In Experiment 1, retrieval strategies were identified by changes in response speed between a practice phase with rapid retrieval and an implicit memory test phase. Performance based on controlled retrieval (shown by slowdown participants) showed more priming at peak than at off-peak times of day, a finding confirmed in Experiment 2, in which the participants were given intentional retrieval instructions when the materials switched. In contrast, performance based on automatic retrieval (shown by nonslowdown participants) did not differ across peak and off-peak times. The finding suggests a robust synchrony effect in controlled retrieval, but not in automatic retrieval, which does not appear to vary across the day.     

The relative contributions of subjective and objective measures of body shape and size to body image and disordered eating in women

This research explored the relative contributions of subjective perceptions of body weight and body shape/proportion, as well as objective measures of body mass index (BMI) and waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) to disordered eating, exercise involvement, and body image. One hundred and fifty-eight female university students completed questionnaires and provided body measurements for this study. Although an interaction between BMI and WHR was found for some measures (i.e., Eating Disorder Examination Questionnaire total and subscale scores), results indicated that BMI was consistently the better objective predictor of disordered eating and body image. Subjective perceptions of body weight and, to a lesser extent, body shape, were found to account for the greatest proportion of variance in the dependent measures (disordered eating, body esteem, and body dissatisfaction). Overall, these results offer more support for sociocultural theories emphasizing the importance of thinness for women, than evolutionary theories emphasizing the role of WHR.     

The Relation of Lifetime Cognitive Activity and Lifetime Access to Resources to Late-life Cognitive Function in Older African Americans

ABSTRACT

Research in older Caucasians has demonstrated that cognitive activity is related to cognitive function in late adulthood. Knowledge of this association is limited in older minority populations. We examined the relation of cognitive activity and access to cognitive resources, with cognitive function in a group of 108 older African Americans. We constructed two scales to measure the frequency of cognitive activity and the presence of resources that promote cognitive activity during early and late life. Both measures had high internal consistency and the cognitive activity scale had adequate temporal stability over a 4-week interval. In analyses that controlled for age and education, more frequent lifetime cognitive activity was related to current cognitive function, but lifetime cognitive resources only approached significance. The results suggest that both measures are psychometrically sound in a minority population and that lifetime cognitive activity may contribute to current cognitive function in African Americans.