Infant placement and language exposure in daily life

Children's daily contexts shape their experiences. In this study, we assessed whether variations in infant placement (e.g., held, bouncy seat) are associated with infants' exposure to adult speech. Using repeated survey sampling of mothers and continuous audio recordings, we tested whether the use of independence-supporting placements was associated with adult speech exposure in a Southeastern U.S. sample of 60 4- to 6-month-old infants (38% male, predominately White, not Hispanic/Latinx, from higher socioeconomic status households). Within-subject analyses indicated that independence-supporting placements were associated with exposure to fewer adult words in the moment. Between-subjects analyses indicated that infants more frequently reported to be in independence-supporting placements that also provided posture support (i.e., an exersaucer) were exposed to relatively fewer adult words and less consistent adult speech across the day. These findings indicate that infants' opportunities for exposure to adult speech ‘in the wild’ may vary based on immediate physical context.     

Eating Disorder Symptom and Fear Change Trajectories During Imaginal Exposure Therapy: A Slope Network Analysis

Eating disorders (EDs) are characterized by fears related to food, body image, and social evaluation. Exposure-based interventions hold promise for targeting a range of ED fears and reducing ED psychopathology. We investigated change mechanisms and optimal fear targets in imaginal exposure therapy for EDs using a novel approach to network analysis. Individuals with an ED (N = 143) completed up to four online imaginal exposure sessions. Participants reported ED symptoms and fears at pretreatment, posttreatment, and 6-month follow-up. We constructed networks of symptoms (Model 1), fears (Model 2), and combined symptoms and fears (Model 3). Change trajectory networks from the slopes of symptoms/fears across timepoints were estimated to identify how change in specific ED symptoms/fears related to change in other ED symptoms/fears. The most central changing symptoms and fears were feeling fat, fear of weight gain, guilt about one’s weight/shape, and feared concerns about consequences of eating. In Model 3, change in ED fears bridged to change in desire to lose weight, desiring a flat stomach, following food rules, concern about eating with others, and guilt. As slope networks present averages of symptom/fear change slopes over the course of imaginal exposure therapy, further studies are needed to examine causal relationships between symptom changes and heterogeneity of change trajectories. Fears of weight gain and consequences of eating may be optimal targets for ED exposure therapy, as changes in these fears were associated with maximal change in ED pathology. Slope networks may elucidate change mechanisms for EDs and other psychiatric illnesses.     

Sense of agency: Sensorimotor signals and social context are differentially weighed at implicit and explicit levels

Sense of agency (SoA) describes the experience of being the author of an action. Cue integration approaches divide SoA into an implicit level, mostly relying on prospective sensorimotor signals, and an explicit level, resulting from an integration of sensorimotor and contextual cues based on their reliability. Integration mechanisms at each level and the contribution of implicit to explicit SoA remain underspecified. In a task of movements with visual outcomes, we tested the effect of social context (contextual cue) and sensory prediction congruency (retrospective sensorimotor cue) over implicit (intentional binding) and explicit (verbal judgments) SoA. Our results suggest that prospective sensorimotor cues determine implicit SoA. At the explicit level, retrospective sensorimotor cues and contextual cues are partly integrated in an additive way, but contextual cues can also act as a heuristic if sensorimotor cues are highly unreliable. We also found no significant association between implicit and explicit SoA.     

The self-reported driving behaviour of young drivers in Lithuania: An application of the behaviour of young novice drivers scale – Lithuania (BYNDS-Li)

BackgroundWith just one year left in the Decade of Action for Road Safety, it is timely nations reflect on their progress in the realm of improving road safety more generally, and in young driver road safety specifically given the pernicious problem that is young driver risky driving behaviour and road crashes. Effective intervention requires a fundamental foundation of understanding the nature of the problem. Therefore the current study explored the self-reported risky driving behaviour of young drivers in Lithuania, a nation classified as a developed country as recently as 2015.MethodThe self-report Behaviour of Young Novice Drivers Scale (BYNDS, 1) was applied in a sample of 457 Lithuanian young drivers aged 18–24 years, after a rigorous forward-backward translation process.ResultsSeven factors (risky exposure, transient rule violations, driver misjudgements, driver mood, vehicle overcrowding, personal seatbelt use, substance consumption) explained 65.2% of the variance in self-reported risky driving behaviour as measured by the BYNDS-Li. The most common risky driving behaviours included driving in excess of posted speed limits, and driving at high risk times such as at night and on weekends.Discussion and implicationsThe seven-factor structure of the BYNDS-Li supports arguments that culturally-valid measures should be operationalised in jurisdictions other than those in which they were developed (in the case of the BYNDS, Queensland, Australia). Moreover, systems thinking argues that interventions and efforts must be multi-sectoral and collaborative interventions. In the case of young driver road safety, these should be framed within the 4E’s of education, engineering, enforcement, and engagement.     

最心安处是吾乡：本体安全感威胁对家乡品牌偏好的影响

全球化进程的加快和贸易战的发生让人们处于一种本体不安全的状态中, 即人们的本体安全感受到了威胁。本文研究了消费者本体安全感威胁对家乡品牌偏好的影响。三项研究的结果表明, 相比本体安全感没有受到威胁的个体, 本体安全感受到威胁的个体对家乡品牌的偏好度更高, 其中家乡依恋起到了中介作用。具体而言, 本体安全感受到威胁的个体更倾向于依恋可以提供常规生活和构建个人身份的家乡, 以此寻求本体安全感恢复, 从而增加了对家乡品牌的偏好。实验结果还发现, 自然栖息地情境展露在本体安全感威胁对家乡品牌偏好的作用中起到调节作用。具体而言, 当展露于自然栖息地情境时, 本体安全感受到威胁的个体能够通过对自然栖息地这一更广泛的地点依恋来对抗本体安全感威胁, 不再需要寻求家乡依恋来缓解本体安全感威胁, 从而使其在对家乡品牌和非家乡品牌的偏好上不再呈现出差异。本研究的发现丰富了现有本体安全感和品牌偏好的相关研究, 为品牌提供了一种新的本土营销策略, 具有丰富的理论贡献和管理启示。     

Prolonged exposure in patients with chronic PTSD: predictors of treatment outcome and dropout

The present study investigated predictors of treatment outcome and dropout in two samples of PTSD-patients with mixed traumas treated using prolonged imaginal exposure. Possible predictors were analysed in both samples separately, in order to replicate in one sample findings found in the other. The only stable finding across the two groups was that patients who showed more PTSD-symptoms at pre-treatment, showed more PTSD-symptoms at post-treatment and follow-up. Indications were found that benzodiazepine use was related to both treatment outcome and dropout, and alcohol use to dropout. Demographic variables, depression and general anxiety, personality, trauma characteristics, feelings of anger, guilt, and shame and nonspecific variables regarding therapy were not related to either treatment outcome or dropout, disconfirming generally held beliefs about these factors as contra-indications for exposure therapy. It is concluded that it is difficult to use pre-treatment variables as a powerful and reliable tool for predicting treatment outcome or dropout. Clinically seen, it is therefore argued that exclusion of PTSD-patients from prolonged exposure treatment on the basis of pre-treatment characteristics is not justified.     

At Both Ends of the Gun: Testing the Relationship Between Community Violence Exposure and Youth Violent Behavior

Much psychological inquiry has focused on understanding the contribution that exposure to urban violence makes to violent behavior among youth. However, other ways in which these variables may be related have been largely overlooked. This study compared four alternative social–ecological models of the link between community violence exposure and violent behavior to determine the degree to which (1) community violence exposure contributes to violent behavior, (2) violent behavior contributes to community violence exposure, (3) both are consequences of common antecedents, and (4) both are manifestations of the same higher order construct. Two hundred and seventy-seven adolescent offenders were interviewed about family, neighborhood, cognitive, and peer characteristics, in addition to violent behavior and community violence exposure. Results suggest that a plausible way to understand the association between community violence exposure and youth violent behavior is to consider both as representations of a general involvement in violence.     

Changing systems by changing individuals: the incubation approach to systems change

This article describes and evaluates the implementation of an innovative approach to systems change, the incubation approach, which was developed on a systems change project designed to increase the capacity of multiple systems (e.g., law enforcement, child protection, domestic violence, mental health, early education) to respond to children’s exposure to violence. The incubation approach encourages change agents to collaborate with project staff to gently nurture, or “incubate,” feasible and warranted change in target systems. Project staff gain concrete commitment from motivated and accessible change agents and collaborate with those agents to implement change actions. This approach works well with committed, executive-level change agents in target systems, with stable systems that have low turnover and well-integrated subsystems, and when seed funds are provided to key organizations.     

A Psychometric Evaluation of the Approach and Avoidance of Alcohol Questionnaire (AAAQ) in Alcohol Dependent Outpatients

The Approach and Avoidance of Alcohol Questionnaire (AAAQ; McEvoy et al. in Addiction 99:482–497, 2004) was administered to a clinical sample of 138 alcohol dependent men and women. An exploratory factor analysis was used to determine the AAAQ factor structure and a confirmatory analysis run on a second administration of the AAAQ. Convergent validity was examined by conducting an alcohol cue reactivity test and by administering the Timeline Follow-Back (TLFB), a retrospective calendar method for assessing alcohol consumption, and several measures of alcohol-related problems. The factor analysis supported a two-factor solution representing approach and avoidance dimensions. Regressions predicting measures of alcohol cue reactivity, alcohol consumption, and other alcohol-related constructs with the AAAQ provide support for its convergent validity. The results suggest that alcohol craving may be viewed as a multi-dimensional construct that includes both approach and avoidance inclinations which may vary depending on the population under examination.