A dual-process approach to health risk decision making: The prototype willingness model

Although dual-process models in cognitive, personality, and social psychology have stimulated a large body of research about analytic and heuristic modes of decision making, these models have seldom been applied to the study of adolescent risk behaviors. In addition, the developmental course of these two kinds of information processing, and their relation to the development of self-regulation are not well understood at this time. The current paper reviews what leading dual-process models have to say about the development of analytic and heuristic decision making, and their implications for adolescent risk behavior. In addition, it reviews research on the prototype willingness model of adolescent decision making—a dual-process model designed specifically to address non-intentional, but volitional adolescent risk behavior. It also discusses the implications of dual-process models for intervention research.     

The Development of Delinquency and Perceived Friendship Quality in Adolescent Best Friendship Dyads

The present study examines both the unique and the combined role of best friends' delinquency and perceived friendship quality in the development of adolescent delinquency. Questionnaire data were gathered from 435 Dutch adolescent best friends (mean age at first wave = 12.97) over a period of 5 years with annual assessments. Results showed that mean levels of delinquency and perceived friendship quality increased over time. Adolescent best friends were highly similar in both mean levels and changes in delinquency over time. For boys, similarity in mean level delinquency between best friends was higher than for girls. In addition, only for boys, friends' delinquency is associated with increases in adolescent delinquency over time, and adolescents' delinquency is associated with increases in friends' delinquency over time. No bidirectional longitudinal associations were found between perceived friendship quality and adolescent delinquency. No interaction effects between friendship quality and friends' delinquency on adolescent delinquency were found. Thus, findings were more in support of the differential association theory than of the social control theory.     

The Development of Aggression During Adolescence: Sex Differences in Trajectories of Physical and Social Aggression Among Youth in Rural Areas

To describe trajectories of aggressive behaviors for adolescents living in rural areas, we compared the patterns, timing and sex differences in development of physical and social aggression using five waves of data collected from youth in school surveys administered over 2.5 years. The sample (N = 5,151) was 50.0% female, 52.1% Caucasian and 38.2% African-American. Multilevel growth curve models showed that physical and social aggression followed curvilinear trajectories from ages 11 to 18, with increases in each type of aggression followed by subsequent declines. Physical aggression peaked around age 15; social aggression peaked around age 14. Boys consistently perpetrated more physical aggression than girls, but the trajectories were parallel. There were no sex differences in the perpetration of social aggression. Given the characteristics of the developmental trajectories observed, interventions with both boys and girls targeting physically and socially aggressive behaviors are needed in early adolescence to slow the development of aggression.     

Post-Traumatic Reactions in Adolescents: How Well Do the DSM-IV PTSD Criteria Fit the Real Life Experience of Trauma Exposed Youth?

This study examined the structure and symptom specific patterns of post traumatic distress in a sample of 1,581 adolescents who reported exposure to at least one traumatic event. Symptom reporting patterns are consistent with past literature in that females reported more symptoms than males and older youth reported more symptoms than did their younger peers. Young people reporting exposure to exclusively violent type traumas were also found to be more likely to endorse symptoms than peers exposed exclusively to non violent type traumas. Confirmatory factor analysis provided stronger support for a four-factor model of PTSD than either the DSM-IV model or an alternate model. Further examination of the four factor model revealed gender differences in factor loadings with small to moderate effect sizes for recurrent, distressing memories, flashbacks, restricted affect, difficulty remember details, detachment, limited future orientation, hypervigilance and startle symptoms. Differences in factor loadings with the four factor model were also noted between younger and older adolescents, with medium to large effect sizes on the arousal items. In contract, comparison of the factor loadings revealed only small differences between youth exposed exclusively to violent traumatic stressors and those exposed exclusively to non violent traumatic stressors, suggesting relative similarity between these two groups.     

PTSD青少年对威胁图片注意偏向的时程特点及习惯化倾向

探讨创伤后应激障碍(post-traumatic stress disorder,PTSD)青少年(n=20)与创伤控制组(n=20)对威胁图片注意偏向的时间进程特点以及习惯化倾向.在线索提示任务中,图片的呈现时间为100ms、500ms和1250ms.研究表明:(1)在时间进程上,当图片呈现100ms时,创伤控制组对地震图存在注意警觉;当呈现时间为500ms时,两组被试对负性图和地震图存在注意回避;当呈现时间为1250ms时,PTSD组对负性图仍存在注意回避、对地震图的注意偏向消失,创伤控制组对负性图和地震图的注意偏向均消失.(2)在习惯化倾向上,当第六次呈现威胁图片时,PTSD组对负性图和地震图的注意偏向消失,而创伤控制组对负性图和地震图的注意回避仍未消失.     

Parental involvement in competitive youth sport settings

ObjectivesBased on ecological systems theory [Bronfenbrenner, U. (2005). Making human beings human: Bioecological perspectives on human development. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage], the purpose of this study was to examine parents’ involvement in competitive youth sport settings.DesignData were collected through two distinct phases of fieldwork. Phase 1 involved longitudinal data collection with four families. Phase 2 involved observations of youth soccer settings.MethodData were collected from four families via individual interviews and audio-diaries and were supplemented through 120 h of observation. Data were transcribed verbatim and analyzed using grounded theory methodology.ResultsParents’ verbal reactions to their children's sport performance behaviors were placed on a continuum moving from more supportive to more controlling comments. These comments were categorized as praise/encouragement, performance contingent feedback, instruction, striking a balance, negative comments, and derogatory comments. Parents experienced empathy in that they perceived sharing the emotions their children felt in sport, and these emotions appeared to change in relation to dynamic game and contextual circumstances. Parents also thought that they possessed knowledge and expertise of sport, which they perceived enabled them to make comments to their children.ConclusionA series of reciprocal and bi-directional relationships were central to parents’ involvement in competitive youth sport.     

A longitudinal examination of the relation between co‐offending with violent accomplices and violent crime

Although the idea that youthful offenders are affected by the company they keep is widely accepted, evidence in support of this idea is based primarily on reports provided by offenders and their peers. As an alternative to relying on reports of criminal behavior, a method that may overestimate the role that peers play in criminal behavior, the current research on co‐offending uses court records to identify and track over time individuals who are known to commit crimes together. The present investigation is the first co‐offending study to track patterns of violent criminal behavior (over an 18‐year period) among a sample of urban offenders and their accomplices. The study tests whether violence “spreads” from violent offenders to those inexperienced in violence. Results indicate that nonviolent offenders who commit their first co‐offense with violent accomplices are at increased risk for subsequent serious violent crime. Findings suggest that lessons of violence can be learned “on the street,” where knowledge is passed along through impromptu social contexts, including those in which offenders commit crimes together. Aggr. Behav. 28:97–108, 2002. © 2002 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

The Racial Components of "Race-Neutral" Crime Policy Attitudes

Past studies have found evidence of a connection between race and crime in the minds of many white Americans, but several gaps remain in our knowledge of this association. Here, a multimethod approach was used to examine more closely the racial component of whites' support for ostensibly race-neutral crime policies. Conventional correlational analysis showed that negative stereotypes of African Americans—specifically, the belief that blacks are violent and lazy—are an important source of support for punitive policies such as the death penalty and longer prison terms. A survey experiment further showed that negative evaluations of black prisoners are much more strongly tied to support for punitive policies than are negative evaluations of white prisoners. These findings suggest that when many whites think of punitive crime policies to deal with violent offenders, they are thinking of black offenders.