Evaluating the Factor Structure of the MIDI Personality Scale Using Exploratory Structural Equation Modeling

This study investigated the factor structure of the 26‐item Midlife Development Inventory (MIDI) Personality Scale in a sample of 2,720 Americans. It was found that whereas confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) did not provide an acceptable fit to the data, exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM) provided an acceptable fit. The results of ESEM revealed that the a priori five‐factor structure of personality was generally consistent with the data, and all items had salient loadings on their target factors. ESEM also revealed that some of the items contributed significantly to more than one personality factor. The results are in line with previous research, and indicate that ESEM is more suitable than CFA for the study of personality traits.     

Testing emotional memories: does negative emotional significance influence the benefit received from testing?

A large body of research shows that emotionally significant stimuli are better stored in memory. One question that has received much less attention is how emotional memories are influenced by factors that influence memories after the initial encoding of stimuli. Intriguingly, several recent studies suggest that post-encoding factors do not differ in their effects on emotional and neutral memories. However, to date, only detrimental factors have been addressed. In the present study, we examined whether emotionally negative memories are differentially influenced by a well-known beneficial factor: the testing of memories. We employed a standard cued recall testing-effect paradigm where participants studied cue-target pairs for negative and neutral target pictures. In a subsequent post-encoding phase, one third of the cue-target pairs were tested and one third restudied; the remaining third served as control pairs. After one week, memory for all cue-target pairs was tested. While replicating both the testing effect and the emotional enhancement effect, no differences between negative and neutral memories in the benefits received from testing and restudying were observed. Thus, it seems to be true that post-encoding factors do not influence emotional memories in any other way than neutral memories, even when they are beneficial.     

The Counseling Center Assessment of Psychological Symptoms Distress Index: A pragmatic exploration of general factors to enhance a multidimensional scale

Objective: The authors attempted to develop and validate a general distress index for a multidimensional psychological symptom/outcome measure used in over 300 college counseling centers with more than 100,000 cases annually: the Counseling Center Assessment of Psychological Symptoms (CCAPS). Method: Four models were compared for fit indices (n = 19,247): the existing first-order factor model (without a general factor), a second-order factor model, a bifactor model, and a single factor or “total score” model. In separate clinical and non-clinical samples, concurrent and divergent validity were examined using several well-established measures of psychological symptoms, as well as two-week test–retest and treatment utilization data. Results: Second-order and bifactor models which captured a single “distress” factor both exhibited good fit to the data relative to the baseline and “total score” model. Validity data indicated that factors adequately measured meaningful clinical onstructs. Conclusion: Both the bifactor and second-order models indicated the presence of a “distress index” comprised items across many of the CCAPS subscales. This distress scale has strong applicability for benchmarking the overall severity and complexity of patients at different centers, and can be used to help identify colleges and universities with areas of clinical strength, which can be studied to improve the field. Clinically, the distress index offers a parsimonious and efficient method for clinicians to monitor patients’ progress through treatment.     

Learning Painting Styles: Spacing is Advantageous when it Promotes Discriminative Contrast

Repetitions that are distributed over time benefit long‐term retention more than when massed. Recent research has suggested that the advantage of spacing may extend to induction learning‐‐learners were better able to identify the artists of previously unseen paintings when, during training, artists' paintings were spaced (paintings by different artists were interleaved) rather than massed (a given artist's paintings were blocked and presented consecutively). Increasing temporal spacing between paintings while maintaining a presentation sequence that was blocked by artist produced test performance no better than massed presentation (both worse than interleaved presentation) (Experiment 1). Displaying paintings by different artists simultaneously produced test performance as good as interleaved presentation and better than massed presentation (Experiment 2). Our findings argue that spacing benefits perceptual induction learning not because of increased temporal spacing per se but rather because interleaving paintings by different artists enhances discriminative contrast between the artists' styles. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Longitudinal associations of cognitive ability,personality traits and school grades with antisocial behaviour

This study investigated the role of adolescents' cognitive ability, personality traits and school success in predicting later criminal behaviour. Cognitive ability, the five‐factor model personality traits and the school grades of a large sample of Estonian schoolboys (N = 1919) were measured between 2001 and 2005. In 2009, judicial databases were searched to identify participants who had been convicted of misdemeanours or criminal offences. Consistent with previous findings, having a judicial record was associated with lower cognitive ability, grade point average, agreeableness, and conscientiousness and higher neuroticism. In multivariate path models, however, the contributions of cognitive ability and conscientiousness were accounted for by school grades and the effect of neuroticism was also accounted for by other variables, leaving grade point average and agreeableness the only independent predictors of judicial record status. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

不确定性决策违背“确定事件原则”的心理机制再探

不确定性决策违背＂确定事件原则＂的心理机制再探从决策理由切入,在现实情境中考察了违背确定事件原则（sure-thing principle）的心理机制,检验了基于理由（reason-based）的假设。研究结果表明,违背确定事件原则的被试在不确定条件下知觉到的理由冲突程度显著高于遵循确定事件原则的被试在不确定条件下知觉到的理由冲突程度;违背确定事件原则的被试在不确定条件下知觉到的理由清晰程度显著低于其在两种确定条件下知觉到的理由清晰程度,而遵循确定事件原则的被试在不确定条件下知觉到的理由清晰程度则介于其在两种确定条件下知觉到的理由清晰程度之间。研究结果支持了基于理由的假设。     

Affective responses to movie posters: differences between adolescents and young adults

Although the link between cognition and affect in the advertising context has been demonstrated in several studies, no research to date has considered adolescents’ affective responses to movie posters and their attitudes to negative and positive images. A 2 (between subjects) × 4 (within subjects) mixed‐factorial experiment design comprising two groups of subjects (80 adolescents and 80 young adults) and four advertising stimuli (two highly positive images and two highly negative images) was used to test the differences in the subjects’ attitudes to advertising, positive and negative affect, and viewing intentions. Although the adolescents, compared to the young adults, did not appear to have significantly stronger attitudes to emotional advertisements (ads), they showed a similar level of intensity of affective response when exposed to negative and positive images.     

Associations Between Religious Behavior and Attitude to Christianity Among Australian Catholic Adolescents: Scale Validation

Abstract

In a sample of 1,166 Catholic high school students (age = 13–18 years), the author used confirmatory factor analysis to validate a 30-item instrument that assesses 6 dimensions of attitude to Christianity (viz., attitude to prayer, attitude to God, attitude to Jesus, attitude to the Bible, attitude to Christian practice, attitude to social justice). Goodness-of-fit indices for the proposed measurement model revealed that the model fitted the data very well, thus confirming the instrument's structure. A correlation analysis revealed associations between religious behavior and attitude to Christianity.