视觉诱发电位与老年人智力和记忆力相关性研究的多因素逐步回归分析

以年龄在55—79岁的正常人(男40人,女34人,平均年龄64.34±5.67岁)为被试,做视觉诱发电位(VEP),并测试韦氏智力测验的11项分值及智力商数、临床记忆测验的5项分测验及记忆商数、测量血压和头颅CT的脑萎缩程度,根据眼底动脉硬化表现和神经体征确定脑动脉硬化的程度.将上述资料数字化输入计算机进行多因素逐步回归分析。结果表明,智力和记忆力分别与视觉诱发电位的某些指标变量有关,与脑动脉硬化程度有关,与收缩压相关性较大,与舒张压相关性不大,与生理性脑萎缩程度关系不大。还探讨了推测老年人智力和记忆力的计算公式。     

Community-referenced leisure skill clusters for adolescents with multiple disabilities

We evaluated the effectiveness of a training package used to teach student-selected community-referenced leisure skill clusters — ordering a pizza-to-go and renting a video from a local vendor — to two adolescents with multiple disabilities. The adolescents were taught the leisure skills (e.g., ordering the pizza) as well as related behaviors necessary to perform those leisure skills (e.g., using a phone, interacting with the delivery person, cutting and serving pizza, cleaning up). The students were taught functional skill clusters, problem-solving skills, and assistance-seeking skills. Training consisted of didactic instruction, feedback, a least intrusive prompting procedure for incorrect responses, and verbal praise and natural consequences for correct responses. Simulation training was conducted at school and in vivotraining was conducted in the local community. A multiple baseline design demonstrated the controlling effects of treatment. Also, follow-up probes conducted up to five months after treatment showed these students maintained treatment gains. Applied issues related to the efficiency of the training package, general and specific skills training, and factors influencing skill maintenance are discussed.     

SELF-ADMINISTERED WRITTEN PROMPTS TO TEACH HOME ACCIDENT PREVENTION SKILLS TO ADULTS WITH BRAIN INJURIES

This study evaluated the use of written checklists and task analyses as self-administered prompts to teach home accident prevention skills to 4 adults with brain injuries. Subsequent to baseline, participants used written checklists that identified potential in-home hazards but did not prompt behaviors necessary for hazard remediation. Written individualized task analyses, incorporating specific behavioral steps for correcting hazards that participants had failed to remediate during the checklist phase, were used to prompt appropriate responding when necessary. These were subsequently faded to transfer stimulus control to the natural conditions. A multiple probe technique across participants and settings was used. Results indicated that the checklist alone was sufficient to increase appropriate responses to many of the potential hazards. Individualized task analyses, when needed, resulted in appropriate remediation of all potential hazards. Generalization to untrained potential hazards occurred to some degree for all participants. Follow-up results showed that most skills trained were maintained over a 1-month period.     

Rehearsing for confrontation

Social confrontation is a particular kind of communication episode which may be initiated when one actor signals another actor that his or her behavior has violated (or is violating) a rule or expectation for appropriate conduct within the relationship or situation (Newell & Stutman, 1988). This paper explores the decision, structure and process of rehearsing for confrontation. Intensive interviews with 75 actors followed by a questionnaire administered to 99 others revealed that confronters maintain two strands of confrontative goals: strategic and performance goals. Strategic goals for confronters include (a) influence, (b) catharsis, (c) relational maintenance, (d) retribution, and (e) enhanced understanding of the other. While these goals lead to different tactical outcomes, actors also hold intentions related to performance goals. Two performance goals are of central concern to some actors: (a) the desire to be argumentatively complete, and (b) the desire to maintain the position of the confronter rather than the confrontee. An analysis of the data revealed that differences in goal configurations guided both the decision to rehearse and the process of this rehearsal.     

Effects of schedule of reinforcement on a pentobarbital discrimination in rats.

The purpose of this study was to determine the effects of the schedule of reinforcement on a pentobarbital discrimination in rats. Five rats were trained to discriminate 10 mg/kg pentobarbital from saline under a multiple fixed-interval 180-s fixed-ratio 20 schedule of reinforcement. During both saline and pentobarbital training sessions, subjects emitted a higher percentage of correct responses under the fixed-ratio component as compared to the fixed-interval component of the multiple schedule. Determination of the pentobarbital dose-response curve under the fixed-ratio component resulted in a steep curve characterized by responding on the saline lever at low doses and on the drug lever at higher doses. Under the fixed-interval component, a graded dose-effect curve was produced, with considerable responding on both levers after intermediate doses of pentobarbital. The administration of phencyclidine and MK-801 resulted in an intermediate level of drug-lever responding for some subjects. Administration of d-amphetamine resulted in saline (nondrug) appropriate responding. The results of this study demonstrate that the schedule of reinforcement is a determinant of drug stimulus control, just as it is a determinant of other drug effects.     

Investigating the influence of an effort–reward interaction on cognitive fatigue in individuals with multiple sclerosis

This study examined whether an alteration in the effort–reward relationship, a theoretical framework based on cognitive neuroscience, could explain cognitive fatigue. Forty persons with MS and 40 healthy age- and education-matched cognitively healthy controls (HC) participated in a computerized switching task with orthogonal high- and low-demand (effort) and reward manipulations. We used the Visual Analog Scale of Fatigue (VAS-F) to assess subjective state fatigue before and after each condition during the task. We used mixed-effects models to estimate the association and interaction between effort and reward and their relationship to subjective fatigue and task performance. We found the high-demand condition was associated with increased VAS-F scores (p < .001), longer response times (RT) (p < .001) and lower accuracy (p < .001). The high-reward condition was associated with faster RT (p = .006) and higher accuracy (p = .03). There was no interaction effect between effort and reward on VAS-F scores or performance. Participants with MS reported higher VAS-F scores (p = .02). Across all conditions, participants with MS were slower (p < .001) and slower as a function of condition demand compared with HC (p < .001). This behavioural study did not find evidence that an effort–reward interaction is associated with cognitive fatigue. However, our findings support the role of effort in subjective cognitive fatigue and both effort and reward on task performance. In future studies, more salient reward manipulations could be necessary to identify effort–reward interactions on subjective cognitive fatigue.     

Multiple schedules with response interruption and redirection to reduce stereotypy in children with autism spectrum disorder: Generalization and social validity

Although response interruption and redirection (RIRD) and multiple schedule arrangements have sometimes been shown to be effective in reducing stereotypy for individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), important questions remain about optimal methods for facilitating generalization and social validity. In the current study, we sought to extend the literature on stereotypy treatment and MSAs in several ways. First, we programmed for generalization by conducting sessions with two exemplars of two different categories of activities (i.e., school work, toy play) and assessing generalization with novel exemplars and activities and during the participant's typical instructional program. Second, we used RIRD instructions that were contextual models of appropriate behavior relevant to each activity. Third, during the free access component of the multiple schedule, we used a child's play tent as a first step toward teaching participants to engage in stereotypy during private free time. For all three participants with ASD, stereotypy decreased quickly and substantially, with reductions generalizing to novel activities and contexts. An extensive social validity assessment with board-certified behavior analysts indicated high social acceptability of the goals, procedures, and outcomes.     

大学生社会支持对睡眠质量的影响：多重中介模型的检验

以360名大学生为被试,采用匹兹堡睡眠质量指数量表、领悟社会支持量表、担忧问卷以及状态焦虑量表,考察了担忧、焦虑在社会支持和睡眠质量关系之间的多重中介作用。结果表明,复合式多重中介模型能够较好地解释焦虑和担忧在社会支持与睡眠质量之间所起的中介作用。     

Order‐constrained linear optimization

Despite the fact that data and theories in the social, behavioural, and health sciences are often represented on an ordinal scale, there has been relatively little emphasis on modelling ordinal properties. The most common analytic framework used in psychological science is the general linear model, whose variants include ANOVA, MANOVA, and ordinary linear regression. While these methods are designed to provide the best fit to the metric properties of the data, they are not designed to maximally model ordinal properties. In this paper, we develop an order‐constrained linear least‐squares (OCLO) optimization algorithm that maximizes the linear least‐squares fit to the data conditional on maximizing the ordinal fit based on Kendall's τ. The algorithm builds on the maximum rank correlation estimator (Han, 1987, Journal of Econometrics, 35, 303) and the general monotone model (Dougherty & Thomas, 2012, Psychological Review, 119, 321). Analyses of simulated data indicate that when modelling data that adhere to the assumptions of ordinary least squares, OCLO shows minimal bias, little increase in variance, and almost no loss in out‐of‐sample predictive accuracy. In contrast, under conditions in which data include a small number of extreme scores (fat‐tailed distributions), OCLO shows less bias and variance, and substantially better out‐of‐sample predictive accuracy, even when the outliers are removed. We show that the advantages of OCLO over ordinary least squares in predicting new observations hold across a variety of scenarios in which researchers must decide to retain or eliminate extreme scores when fitting data.     

More efficient parameter estimates for factor analysis of ordinal variables by ridge generalized least squares

Data in psychology are often collected using Likert‐type scales, and it has been shown that factor analysis of Likert‐type data is better performed on the polychoric correlation matrix than on the product‐moment covariance matrix, especially when the distributions of the observed variables are skewed. In theory, factor analysis of the polychoric correlation matrix is best conducted using generalized least squares with an asymptotically correct weight matrix (AGLS). However, simulation studies showed that both least squares (LS) and diagonally weighted least squares (DWLS) perform better than AGLS, and thus LS or DWLS is routinely used in practice. In either LS or DWLS, the associations among the polychoric correlation coefficients are completely ignored. To mend such a gap between statistical theory and empirical work, this paper proposes new methods, called ridge GLS, for factor analysis of ordinal data. Monte Carlo results show that, for a wide range of sample sizes, ridge GLS methods yield uniformly more accurate parameter estimates than existing methods (LS, DWLS, AGLS). A real‐data example indicates that estimates by ridge GLS are 9–20% more efficient than those by existing methods. Rescaled and adjusted test statistics as well as sandwich‐type standard errors following the ridge GLS methods also perform reasonably well.