Perfectionism and coping with daily failures: positive reframing helps achieve satisfaction at the end of the day

Differentiating perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns, the present study examined how perfectionism predicts what coping strategies people use, when dealing with failures, and how perfectionism and coping influence people's satisfaction. A sample of 149 students completed daily reports for 3–14 days, reporting the most bothersome failure they experienced during the day, what strategies they used to cope with the failure, and how satisfied they felt at the end of the day. Multilevel regression analyses showed that perfectionistic concerns predicted more frequent use of self-blame, less frequent use of active coping and acceptance, and higher satisfaction at the end of the day, whereas perfectionistic strivings predicted less frequent use of self-blame and higher satisfaction. Although positive reframing, acceptance, and humor predicted higher satisfaction for all students, further analyses showed that positive reframing coping was particularly helpful for students high in perfectionistic concern. The findings suggest that accommodative coping strategies are generally helpful in dealing with personal failures, with positive reframing being a coping strategy that works particularly well for people high in perfectionistic concerns (who are prone to dissatisfaction) to achieve higher satisfaction at the end of the day.     

Multilevel Investigation into the Community Context of Child Maltreatment

Official rates of child maltreatment vary considerably from community to community. Extensive research on the role of the community context in maltreatment suggests that the neighborhood in which families live could impact their maltreatment behavior. However, the vast majority of existing studies and literature reviews on the topic have not used statistical methods to appropriately control for the impact of these variables at the individual level. This literature review approaches the question of whether the community context affects maltreatment behavior above and beyond the individual-level variables by critiquing the studies that have successfully measured maltreatment risks at both the individual and community level using multilevel modeling.     

3D feedback and observation for motor learning: Application to the roundoff movement in gymnastics

In this paper, we assessed the efficacy of different types of visual information for improving the execution of the roundoff movement in gymnastics. Specifically, two types of 3D feedback were compared to a 3D visualization only displaying the movement of the expert (observation) as well as to a more ‘traditional’ video observation. The improvement in movement execution was measured using different methods, namely subjective evaluations performed by official judges, and more ’quantitative appraisals based on time series analyses. Video demonstration providing information about the expert and 3D feedback (i.e., using 3D representation of the movement in monoscopic vision) combining information about the movement of the expert and the movement of the learner were the two types of feedback giving rise to the best improvement of movement execution, as subjectively evaluated by judges. Much less conclusive results were obtained when assessing movement execution using quantification methods based on time series analysis. Correlation analyses showed that the subjective evaluation performed by the judges can hardly be predicted/ explained by the ‘more objective’ results of time series analyses.     

Cue Combinatorics in Memory Retrieval for Anaphora

Many studies have shown that memory retrieval for real‐time language processing relies on a cue‐based access mechanism, which allows the cues available at the retrieval site to directly access the target representation in memory. An open question is how different types of cues are combined at retrieval to create a single retrieval probe (“cue combinatorics”). This study addresses this question by testing whether retrieval for antecedent‐reflexive dependencies combines cues in a linear (i.e., additive) or nonlinear (i.e., multiplicative) fashion. Results from computational simulations and a reading time experiment show that target items that match all the cues of the reflexive are favored more than target items that mismatch these cues, and that different degrees of mismatches slow reading times in comparable amounts. This profile is consistent with the predictions of a nonlinear cue combination and provides evidence against models in which all cues combine in a linear fashion. A follow‐up set of simulations shows that a nonlinear rule also captures previous demonstrations of interference from nontarget items during retrieval for reflexive licensing. Taken together, these results shed new light on how different types of cues combine at the retrieval site and reveal how the method of cue combination impacts the accessibility of linguistic information in memory.     

Effects of task constraint on action dynamics

The actualization of action possibilities (i.e., affordances) can often be accomplished in numerous ways. For instance, an individual could walk over to a rubbish bin to drop an item in or throw the piece of rubbish into the bin from some distance away. The aim of the current study was to investigate the action dynamics that emerge from such under-constrained task or action spaces using an object transportation task. Participants were instructed to transport balls between a starting location and a large wooden box located 9 m away. The temporal interval between the sequential presentation of balls was manipulated as a control parameter and was expected to influence the distance participants moved prior to throwing or dropping the ball into the target box. A two-parameter state space derived from the Cusp Catastrophe Model was employed to illustrate how behavioral variability emerged as a consequence of the under-constrained task context. Two follow-up experiments demonstrated direct correspondence between model predictions and observed action dynamics as a function of increasing task constraints. Implications for modeling, the theory of affordances, and empirical studies more generally are discussed.     

A practical guide to understanding reliability in studies of within-person variability

This article concerns how to estimate reliability (defined as the internal consistency of responses to a scale) in designs that are commonly used in studies of within-person variability. I present relevant issues, describe common errors, make recommendations for best practice, and discuss unresolved issues and future directions. I describe how to estimate the reliability of scales administered in studies in which observations are nested within persons, such as daily diary and “beeper” studies and studies of social interaction. Multilevel modeling analyses that include a measurement level can estimate the occasionlevel (e.g., days or beeps or interactions) reliability of scales. In such models, items on a scale are nested within occasions of measurement and occasions of measurement are nested within persons.     

Effects of physical and verbal aggression,depression, and anxiety on drinking behavior of married partners: a prospective and retrospective longitudinal examination

In an ethnically diverse sample of 195 married couples, we conducted a latent factor growth analysis to investigate the longitudinal link (4 time points over 4½ years) between marital aggression (physical and verbal aggression self‐ and partner‐reports) and individual internalizing symptoms (depression and anxiety) as they relate to trajectories of alcohol use among husbands and wives. Alcohol use was operationalized as a latent factor with self‐ and partner reports of problem drinking as measured by the Michigan Alcoholism Screening Test and the Alcohol Dependence Scale. Verbal aggression by husbands or wives, by itself, has no effect on their alcohol use over time. In conjunction with depression, however, verbally aggressive husbands do have elevated drinking levels. The effects of husbands' and wives' physical aggression on their own and their partners' drinking behavior were also significant. This study is one of the first to examine the change over time in alcohol use for marital partners as related to marital aggression and internalizing symptoms. Our results shed light on areas of marital functioning (aggression, internalizing, alcohol use) that have not been investigated in conjunction with each other in a longitudinal design. Aggr. Behav. 35:296–312, 2009. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

A comparison of two flash-card methods for improving sight-word reading

Flash cards have been shown to be useful for teaching sight-word reading. To date, the most effective flash-card instruction method is incremental rehearsal (IR). This method involves the instructor interspersing unknown stimulus items into the presentation of known stimulus items. In this study, we compared IR to a modified IR procedure-strategic incremental rehearsal (SIR)-to determine whether the effects of IR might be improved by incorporating variables likely to increase word acquisition. These included increased opportunities to respond to unknown stimuli, using learner responding as a basis for changing instructional items, and systematic prompting methods. An A-B-A-B design was used to compare the effects of IR and SIR for increasing sight-word reading with 4 elementary school students. Results indicated that students read more words correctly with SIR than with IR. In addition, similar patterns of responding were seen at a 2-week follow-up.     

Percentile Norms and Accompanying Interval Estimates from an Australian General Adult Population Sample for Self‐Report Mood Scales (BAI,BDI, CRSD,CES‐D,DASS, DASS‐21, STAI‐X,STAI‐Y,SRDS, and SRAS)

Despite their widespread use, many self‐report mood scales have very limited normative data. To rectify this, Crawford et al. have recently provided percentile norms for a series of self‐report scales. The present study aimed to extend the work of Crawford et al. by providing percentile norms for additional mood scales based on samples drawn from the general Australian adult population. Participants completed a series of self‐report mood scales. The resultant normative data were incorporated into a computer programme that provides point and interval estimates of the percentile ranks corresponding to raw scores for each of the scales. The programme can be used to obtain point and interval estimates of the percentile ranks of an individual's raw scores on the Beck Anxiety Inventory, the Beck Depression Inventory, the Carroll Rating Scale for Depression, the Centre for Epidemiological Studies Rating Scale for Depression, the Depression, Anxiety, and Stress Scales (DASS), the short‐form version of the DASS (DASS‐21), the Self‐rating Scale for Anxiety, the Self‐rating Scale for Depression, the State–Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), form X, and the STAI, form Y, based on normative sample sizes ranging from 497 to 769. The interval estimates can be obtained using either classical or Bayesian methods as preferred. The programme (which can be downloaded at http://www.abdn.ac.uk/~psy086/dept/MoodScore_Aus.htm ) provides a convenient and reliable means of obtaining the percentile ranks of individuals' raw scores on self‐report mood scales.