Prayer as a cause of recovery from illness

This research aimed to examine the developmental trajectory of the beliefs about the power of prayer to aide recovery from illness. One hundred and sixty children and young adults divided in four age groups participated in the study. Participants were interviewed with vignettes presenting two sick individuals who differed in terms of prayers that they received from their friends in order to recover from their illness. The results showed that children and pre-adolescents strongly believe in the power of prayer to recover from illness while only about half of the university students share this belief. Thus, contrary to the framework theory approach, children, adolescents, and young adults did not replace these beliefs (as naive explanations), with the scientific explanations. Instead, they continue to hold these beliefs in parallel to their scientific explanations.     

Positive beliefs about worry: A psychometric evaluation of the Why Worry-II

Positive beliefs about worry are theorized to maintain excessive and uncontrollable worry, the hallmark of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD; American Psychiatric Association, 2013). The Why Worry-II (WW-II) is a 25-item revised questionnaire designed to measure five positive beliefs about worry. These five beliefs are that worry: (1) facilitates problem solving; (2) enhances motivation; (3) protects against negative emotions; (4) prevents negative outcomes; and (5) reflects a positive personality trait. The main goal of this study was to assess the WW-II’s psychometric properties, including its factor structure. Undergraduate participants (N = 309) completed the WW-II, and measures of worry, depression, anxiety, and positive and negative beliefs about worry. Overall, the results suggest that the five-factor model is a good fit to the data. The WW-II demonstrated excellent internal consistency, good test–retest reliability at six weeks, and evidence of convergent and divergent validity. The WW-II also uniquely predicted worry severity. Overall, our findings suggest that the WW-II has a five-factor structure congruent with theoretical predictions, sound psychometric properties, and a unique relationship to excessive worry. The theoretical and clinical implications of these findings are discussed.     

3～6岁儿童情绪伪装认知能力发展及其与错误信念理解的关系

个体的情绪伪装能力是其情绪社会化发展极为重要的方面,选取某幼儿园123名3～6岁儿童为被试,通过“区分外表-真实情绪”任务和“错误信念”任务考察3～6岁儿童情绪伪装认知能力的发展特点,进而探讨情绪伪装认知与错误信念理解的关系.结果表明：（1）儿童情绪伪装认知能力随年龄增长而提高,3～5岁为儿童情绪伪装认知能力的快速发展期;（2）儿童在消极情境下区分内外情绪的能力显著高于在积极情境中的表现;同时,对两种情绪伪装动机（社会适应、自我保护）的认知能力无显著差异;（3）儿童情绪伪装认知和错误信念理解能力显著相关,两种错误信念（意外内容、意外地点）理解都能很好地预测情绪伪装认知能力.     

Malleability of weight-biased attitudes and beliefs: A meta-analysis of weight bias reduction interventions

Weight bias exists across many important life domains, necessitating interventions designed to reduce weight-biased attitudes and beliefs. Though the effectiveness of weight bias interventions has been questioned, to our knowledge no meta-analysis of these interventions has been conducted. This meta-analysis evaluated the impact of weight bias interventions on weight-biased attitudes and beliefs and explored potential moderators. Interventions were eligible if they used an adult sample and a validated measure of weight-biased attitudes, which resulted in the inclusion of 30 studies represented in 29 articles. A random effects approach using inverse weights resulted in a mean effect size estimate of g = −0.33 (lower scores indicate less weight bias) for both attitudes and beliefs. Intervention type, publication type, and population type were not significant moderators but demonstrated noteworthy trends. Results reveal a small, positive effect of weight bias interventions on weight-biased attitudes and beliefs and provide useful information for future interventions.     

Demographic correlates of normative beliefs about aggression among adolescents from low income communities in South Africa

The present study investigated the association of age, gender, and family size with normative beliefs about aggression among South African adolescents from low-income areas. Adolescents (n = 229; mean age = 16 years; female = 61%) completed the Normative Beliefs about Aggression Scale. Step-wise regression analyses were conducted with age, gender, and family size as predictors of normative beliefs about aggression. Boys demonstrated greater endorsement of physical, non-physical, and relational aggression; as compared to girls. Living in an extended family was associated with less approval of aggression. Aggression reduction interventions with children from disadvantaged areas need to consider the role of gender and family-related factors.     

To Brexit or not to Brexit: The roles of Islamophobia,conspiracist beliefs,and integrated threat in voting intentions for the United Kingdom European Union membership referendum

We used an identities approach to examine voting intentions in the June 2016 UK referendum on membership of the European Union (EU). In April 2016, 303 British adults (58.7% women, age M = 34.73) indicated their voting intentions for the referendum and completed measures of identification with the national in-group, perceived threat from Muslim immigrants, belief in Islamophobic conspiracy narratives, Islamophobia, general conspiracist beliefs, ambiguity tolerance, and belief in a clash of civilizations. Path and mediation analyses indicated that greater belief in Islamophobic conspiracy theories mediated the link between Islamophobia and intention to vote to leave. Islamophobia and Islamophobic conspiracist beliefs also mediated the effects of perceived threat from Muslims on voting intentions. Other variables acted as antecedents of perceived threat or Islamophobic conspiracy narratives. These findings highlight the role that identity-based cognitions may have played in shaping voting intentions for the UK EU referendum.     

Authoritarian Disbeliefs in Diversity

Ethnic diversity poses a threat to authoritarians, as it indicates non-conformism to group norms and poses a threat to group conformity. According to authoritarian dynamic theory, threats elicit authoritarian reactions in people with authoritarian predispositions. In the present article we tested a mediation model derived from authoritarian dynamic theory in a sample of 171 students. As expected, authoritarian predisposition negatively predicted diversity beliefs. This effect was fully mediated by an authoritarian manifestation, that is, authoritarian aggression. The two other components of right-wing authoritarianism, authoritarian submission and conventionalism, did not mediate the effect. Results confirm contemporary research on authoritarianism and the differentiation of authoritarian predispositions and its manifestations.     

Who’s afraid of the big bad wolf? The interweaving of values and science

The role of values in the scientific process is widely debated. But evidence and values cannot be neatly separated. Instead, values infuse the entire scientific process, starting with the choice of research questions. Research avenues are selected based on prior beliefs about the workings of the world. In fact, informally assigned prior probabilities and normalizing constants play an essential role in distinguishing causes from correlations and ignoring irrelevant associations that would otherwise be suggested by raw data. But since these initial probabilities often have a heterogeneous pedigree – often not all that went into their formation is known or knowable – it becomes difficult to cleanly separate evidence from values. At the same time, this reality does not undermine science’s unique status in generating knowledge. This is because it is not the evidence per se generated by science, but rather the method by which science generates it, that justifies science’s privileged role.     

The sociocultural conceptualisations of schizophrenia and patterns of help seeking in south-east Nigeria

Socioculturally influenced interpretations of mental illness play decisive roles on the time and choice of treatment. These often result in significant delays before patients present at the psychiatric services, with consequent worsening of the prognosis. The aim was to assess the association between sociocultural factors, choice of treatment and treatment delay among patients with schizophrenia. A cross-sectional study of 360 patients with schizophrenia, without previous contact with any statutory psychiatric services, was done. Of this, 75.8% of the participants had visited traditional/faith healers as the first treatment option and have attributed schizophrenia to magico-supernatural causation, despite 70.0% of the participants being educated, while 24.2% of them believed in the natural causation of the illness and presented early to psychiatric hospital. There is a need for community-based psychiatric services that would have mental health education as one of their core mandates; and collaborations with traditional and faith-based healers aimed to reduce delay in their facilities.