Evaluation of the factor structure of the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale in older adults

The Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale is the most utilized measure of global self-esteem. Although psychometric studies have generally supported the uni-dimensionality of this 10-item scale, more recently, a stable, response-bias has been associated with the wording of the items (Marsh, Scalas, & Nagengast, 2010). The purpose of this report was to replicate Marsh et al.’s findings in a sample of older adults and to test for invariance across time, gender and levels of education. Our results indicated that indeed a response-bias does exist in esteem responses. Researchers should investigate ways to meaningfully examine and practically overcome the methodological challenges associated with the RSE scale.     

Brief Sensation Seeking Scale for Chinese – Cultural adaptation and psychometric assessment

International behavioral research requires instruments that are not culturally-biased to assess sensation seeking. In this study we described a culturally adapted version of the Brief Sensation Seeking Scale for Chinese (BSSS-C) and its psychometric characteristics. The adapted scale was assessed using an adult sample (n = 238) with diverse educational and residential backgrounds. The BSSS-C (Cronbach alpha = 0.90) was correlated with the original Brief Sensation Seeking Scale (r = 0.85, p < 0.01) and fitted the four-factor model well (CFI = 0.98, SRMR = 0.03). The scale scores significantly predicted intention to and actual engagement in a number of health risk behaviors, including alcohol consumption, cigarette smoking, and sexual risk behaviors. In conclusion, the BSSS-C has adequate reliability and validity, supporting its utility in China and potential in other developing countries.     

Factorial validity of the Mental Toughness Questionnaire-48

The purpose of this study was to assess the factorial validity of the Mental Toughness Questionnaire-48 (Clough, Earle, & Sewell, 2002). In total, 8207 participants (male n = 4019, female n = 3922, unspecified = 266) aged between 16 and 68 years (M = 37.00, SD = 12.09) completed the MTQ48. Model fit was assessed using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and exploratory structural equation modeling, in addition to the robust maximum likelihood estimator. Overall, our results support the factorial validity of the MTQ48 and indicate that the MTQ48 is a robust psychometric measure of mental toughness. Along with previous data, which supports the internal validity of the MTQ48 in addition to results of this study, it would appear that the MTQ48 is an acceptable method of assessing mental toughness.     

Anxiety sensitivity and intolerance of uncertainty: Evidence of incremental specificity in relation to health anxiety

Anxiety sensitivity (AS) reflects the fear of arousal-related sensations and intolerance of uncertainty (IU) represents the dispositional fear of the unknown. Within cognitive–behavioral models, AS and IU are individual difference variables considered central to the phenomenology of health anxiety. However, prior studies have cast doubt on whether both variables incrementally contribute to our understanding of health anxiety. Addressing limitations of these prior studies, the present study examined the incremental specificity of AS and IU as these two variables relate to health anxiety in a large medically healthy sample of community adults (N = 474). Both AS and IU incrementally contributed to the concurrent prediction of health anxiety beyond both negative affect and one another. However, within these analyses, the physical dimension of AS and the inhibitory dimension of IU were the only AS and IU dimensions to evidence incremental specificity in relation to health anxiety.     

Culture,Emotion, and Well-being: Good Feelings in Japan and the United States

We tested the hypothesis that “good feelings”—the central element of subjective well-being—are associated with interdependence and interpersonal engagement of the self in Japan, but with independence and interpersonal disengagement of the self in the United States. Japanese and American college students (total N = 913) reported how frequently they experienced various emotional states in daily life. In support of the hypothesis, the reported frequency of general positive emotions (e.g. calm, elated) was most closely associated with the reported frequency of interpersonally engaged positive emotions (e.g. friendly feelings) in Japan, but with the reported frequency of interpersonally disengaged positive emotions (e.g. pride) in the United States. Further, for Americans the reported frequency of experience was considerably higher for positive emotions than for negative emotions, but for Japanese it was higher for engaged emotions than for disengaged emotions. Implications for cultural constructions of emotion in general and subjective well-being in particular are discussed.     

Cognitive-emotional dysfunction among noisy minds: Predictions from individual differences in reaction time variability

Mental noise can be defined as less reliable information processing. Individuals with high levels of mental noise are thought to be disadvantaged in cognitive, emotional, and behavioural realms. The present five studies (total N=298) investigated such potential disadvantages among normally functioning college undergraduates. Mental noise was operationalised in terms of the reaction time coefficient of variation (RTCV), a measure of RT variability that corrects for average levels of mental speed. Individuals with higher RTCV exhibited less effective cognitive control (Studies 1 and 5), less controlled behaviour (Study 2), and were more prone to negative emotional experiences (Study 3) and depressive symptoms (Study 4). Study 5 extended these results and found that individuals higher (versus lower) in RTCV were more adversely affected by their attentional lapses in daily life. Results converge on the idea that mental noise is an important individual difference dimension with multiple adverse correlates and consequences.     

Father Involvement in Parent Training for Oppositional Child Behavior

Outcome literature (1981 to 1988) on behavioral parent training interventions for nonhandicapped children with oppositional behavior is reviewed to assess the extent and effects of father involvement in parent training. Thirteen studies were found that included some father involvement. Weaknesses of these studies include a failure to observe and measure changed in father-child interactions, a lack of emphasis on the impact of the marital relationship, a lack of attention to similarities in parental child management strategies, and a lack of assessment of paternal characteristics. Further research to assess the effects of including fathers on parent training outcomes can improve the efficiency and effectiveness of these interventions.     

On Impediments to the Process of Individuation

A clinical case is presented at length with a view to understanding how the healthy fear of incest, which favours the process of individuation, may come into conflict with the fear of leaving childhood and becoming adult. Among the consequences of this conflict is a sort of paralysis or impediment to living which may be converted into hate. The inquiry mainly regards anxiety, fear, hate and aggression as factors which conspire in holding an individual back from his path in life. The affects are taken into consideration in accordance with Fromm's theory of aggression and his ''syndrome of decay'' diagnostic scheme, which results from the confluence and interaction of incestuous symbiosis, narcissism and destructiveness. Emphasis is placed on mechanisms of repression and splitting of hate not employed in aggression. Repressed and split hate may sustain para-hallucinatory symptoms and produce terror. This view offers an explanation of the perturbing symptomatology that afflicted the patient presented here and also shows the power of hate as a bond, as concomitant cause of the mother fixation and as obstacle to the process of individuation.     

Fragments of a Case of Psychosis: From Institutional Sheltering to Psychoanalytical Experience

This article describes a psychoanalytical experience that took place in an institution for mental health, located in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. There, an art workshop was created in an attempt to welcome and shelter psychotic patients. This work space later proportioned a ''setting'' for the practice of psychoanalysis with psychotic patients. In the clinical case, herein examined, the author dedicates special attention to the relation that exists between certain psychotic aspects and the process described by Jacques Lacan as: the ''foreclosure of the name of the father''.     

Initial Validation of the U.S. Army Global Assessment Tool

The U.S. Army developed the Global Assessment Tool (GAT) to monitor psychosocial fitness and well-being among soldiers and provide a means to objectively gauge the success of newly implemented resilience training programs. Despite its widespread use (taken over 5.2 million times) and stated utility for program evaluation, there is relatively little published evidence regarding the GAT’s reliability and validity. We used exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM) with 4 random samples of soldiers (n = 10,000 each) to examine the factorial validity and reliability of the GAT. An 11-factor solution (Self-Management, Positive Affect, Meaning, Work Engagement, Organizational Trust, Loneliness, Negative Cognitions, Hostility, Negative Emotions, Depressive Symptoms, and Emotion-Focused Coping), with 4 additional factors assessing character strengths (Intellect, Warmth, Civic Strengths, and Temperance), fit well and replicated in a second random sample. A higher order, 2-factor model using composites scores and positing positive and negative psychosocial competencies also fit well. Tests of measurement invariance using a third random sample reinforced consistent measurement properties across gender, age, and rank, with the exception of character strengths, which produced different factor structures for males and females. Further validity tests using a fourth random sample underscored a modicum of divergence among the resilience factors and convergence among the character strengths factors. We conclude with recommendations for enhancing and refining the GAT and discuss the GAT’s utility as a reliable, multidimensional psychosocial assessment that can be used to evaluate the efficacy of military resilience training programs.