Voices of Experienced Meditators: The Impact of Meditation Practice on Intimate Relationships

Using a qualitative methodology, we explored advanced meditators’ understandings of the effect of the meditation traits on close relationships. Seven participants were interviewed. The meditative traits that the participants identified were (1) awareness of body sensations and emotions; (2) disidentification from emotions and thoughts; (3) acceptance of situations, oneself, and others; and (4) compassion and loving kindness for oneself and others. The relational effects of these traits were (1) less reactivity in relationships; (2) greater freedom and safety in relationships; and (3) a new understanding of the nature of connection between people, marked by unity, separation, intimacy and independence. Implications for further research and for clinical practice are proposed.     

Financial problems and psychological distress: Investigating reciprocal effects among business owners

Building on conservation of resources theory and the dynamic equilibrium model, this three‐wave longitudinal study among 260 Dutch agricultural business owners (1‐year time intervals) investigated reciprocal relationships between the financial situation of the business and psychological distress. Results of structural equation modelling analyses revealed a negative spiral of farm decline, in which psychological variables played a key role. Experiencing financial problems predicted psychological distress, and acted as a self‐fulfilling prophecy by strengthening intentions to quit the business, which predicted a deterioration of the objective financial situation of the business 1 year later. Moreover, farmers experiencing more psychological distress were more likely to get caught in this negative spiral than business owners with better mental health, because they experienced more financial problems, irrespective of their objective financial situation. Long‐term psychological distress rather than temporary fluctuations in distress levels accounted for this effect.     

How leaders stimulate employee learning: A leader–member exchange approach

This study investigated how leader–member exchange (LMX), goal setting, and feedback are related to employee engagement in learning activities. Two different mechanisms were proposed: a mediating mechanism holding that LMX elicits specific leader behaviours (i.e., goal setting and feedback) which would mediate the LMX‐learning relationship, and a moderating mechanism, holding that LMX would strengthen the effect of these leader behaviours. A sample of 1,112 employees from 7 organizations completed questionnaires that measured LMX, goal specificity, feedback, and self‐reports of employee engagement in learning activities. The 233 direct leaders of these employees completed questionnaires that measured goal difficulty and leader ratings of employee engagement in learning activities. Multi‐level analysis showed that goal difficulty and goal specificity mediated the relationship between LMX and employee engagement in learning activities, and that LMX moderated the relationship of goal difficulty with employee engagement in learning activities. With these findings, the present study contributes to the literatures on LMX, goal setting, and employee development.     

In the mood for adaptation: how affect regulates conflict-driven control

Cognitive conflict plays an important role in tuning cognitive control to the situation at hand. On the basis of earlier findings demonstrating emotional modulations of conflict processing, we predicted that affective states may adaptively regulate goal-directed behavior that is driven by conflict. We tested this hypothesis by measuring conflict-driven control adaptations following experimental induction of four different mood states that could be differentiated along the dimensions of arousal and pleasure. After mood states were induced, 91 subjects performed a flanker task, which provided a measure of conflict adaptation. As predicted, pleasure level affected conflict adaptation: Less pleasure was associated with more conflict-driven control. Arousal level did not influence conflict adaptation. This study suggests that affect adaptively regulates cognitive control. Implications for future research and psychopathology are discussed.     

A Brief Experimental Analysis of Reinforcer and Response Dimensions Related to Self-Control in an Outpatient Clinic

We conducted an assessment of self-control and impulsivity with 9 children referred to an outpatient clinic for impulsive, inattentive, and hyperactive behaviors. Each condition of the assessment consisted of a choice between 2 concurrently presented math or writing tasks, with 1 alternative reflecting impulsive responding and 1 alternative reflecting self-control. For the participants who demonstrated impulsive responding in 1 of 2 baseline conditions, we systematically varied reinforcer quality, delay to reinforcement, and response effort to evaluate the effects of these dimensions on the participants’ choices. Results of the assessment revealed that 3 participants displayed self-control responding, and 6 participants displayed impulsive responding during baseline conditions. Of the participants who displayed initial impulsivity, all showed self-control when 1 or more response or reinforcement dimensions were modified to bias responding within a brief multielement design. Results provide a unique application of concurrent schedules for conducting a brief assessment of impulsive responding in an outpatient clinical setting.     

SLV330, a cannabinoid CB1 receptor antagonist,ameliorates deficits in the T-maze,object recognition and Social Recognition Tasks in rodents

Cannabinoid CB₁ receptor (CB₁R) signaling has been suggested to play an important role in the regulation of memory and cognition. In the present study, our aim was to investigate whether the CB₁R antagonist SLV330 (doses ranging from 0.3 to 10 mg/kg, given orally, p.o.) could ameliorate impairments in distinct aspects of cognition using different disruption models in both mice and rats. Effects of SLV330 were tested on working memory deficits in the T-maze Continuous Alternation Task (T-CAT) in mice; episodic memory deficits in the Object Recognition Task (ORT) and Social Recognition Task (SRT) in rats. The acetylcholinesterase inhibitor (AChEI) donepezil (Aricept®, approved for symptomatic treatment of Alzheimer’s disease) and nicotine were used as reference compounds.SLV330 markedly improved aging and scopolamine-induced memory deficits in the T-CAT in mice with a lowest effective dose (LED) of 1 mg/kg p.o., while reversing the cognitive dysfunction induced by the N-methyl-d-aspartate (NMDA) antagonist dizocilpine (MK-801) only at the middle dose of 3 mg/kg. In the ORT, we have found that combined administration of subthreshold doses of SLV330 (1 mg/kg, p.o.) and the AChEI donepezil (0.1 mg/kg, p.o.), that had no discernable effects on performance when given alone, enhanced memory performance in Wistar rats with deficits induced by the muscarinic antagonist scopolamine, suggestive of additive synergistic effects of SLV330 and donepezil on cognitive impairment. Finally, SLV330 was found to have cognition enhancing properties in a time delay paradigm in the SRT at a LED dose of 3 mg/kg (p.o.).In conclusion, the CB₁R antagonist SLV330 was found to clearly improve memory in several preclinical models for cognitive impairment.     

Nonlinear epigenetic variance: review and simulations

We present a review of empirical evidence that suggests that a substantial portion of phenotypic variance is due to nonlinear (epigenetic) processes during ontogenesis. The role of such processes as a source of phenotypic variance in human behaviour genetic studies is not fully appreciated. In addition to our review, we present simulation studies of nonlinear epigenetic variance using a computational model of neuronal network development. In each simulation study, time series for monozygotic and dizygotic twins were generated and analysed using conventional behaviour genetic modelling. In the results of these analyses, the nonlinear epigenetic variance was subsumed under the non-shared environmental component. As is commonly found in behaviour genetic studies, observed heritabilities and unique environmentabilities increased with time, whereas common environmentabilities decreased. The fact that the phenotypic effects of nonlinear epigenetic processes appear as unsystematic variance in conventional twin analyses complicates the identification and quantification of the ultimate genetic and environmental causes of individual differences. We believe that nonlinear dynamical system theories provide a challenging perspective on the development of individual differences, which may enrich behaviour genetic studies.     

When observing gaze shifts of others enhances object desirability

The present research explored when observing gaze shifts of another person, involving both the observer and a specific object, enhances desirability of the gazed-at object. Specifically, we offer an initial attempt to test the idea that a three-step sequence consisting of direct gaze at the observer, followed by object-directed gaze and then by direct gaze at the observer, cues the desirability of an object to the observer and hence increases the perceived desirability of the gazed-at object. We examined this hypothesis in three experiments by manipulating eye-gaze shifts and including a no-gaze control condition. In line with our prediction, results showed that the dynamic sequence of gaze shifts indeed increases perceived object desirability. These findings provide new evidence that a sequence of gaze behavior involving the observer and an object plays an important role in influencing affective evaluation of objects.     

Angry facial expressions hamper subsequent target identification

There is considerable evidence indicating that people are primed to monitor social signals of disapproval. Thus far, studies on selective attention have concentrated predominantly on the spatial domain, whereas the temporal consequences of identifying socially threatening information have received only scant attention. Therefore, this study focused on temporal attention costs and examined how the presentation of emotional expressions affects subsequent identification of task-relevant information. High (n = 30) and low (n = 31) socially anxious women were exposed to a dual-target rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) paradigm. Emotional faces (neutral, happy, angry) were presented as the first target (T1) and neutral letter stimuli (p, q, d, b) as the second target (T2). Irrespective of social anxiety, the attentional blink was relatively large when angry faces were presented as T1. This apparent prioritized processing of angry faces is consistent with evolutionary models, stressing the importance of being especially attentive to potential signals of social threat.