Suicide and self-inflicted injuries

The present study addressed itself to the problem of self-inflicted injuries (SII) in the Israeli army, and to the wider question whether non-fatal self injuries and suicide are part of the same phenomenon. The findings show that in some cases SII is an unsucessful suicide while in others SII is anything but a reflection of a death wish. It appears that the modus operandi is a major indication as to the intentions of the actor. The study also demonstrates the difference between the population of the suiciders and that of the SII victims. While suiciders seem to score higher on the Performance Prediction Score (PPS) and Combat Suitability Scale, the SII population seems to be overly represented in the lower parts of the PPS and the Combat Suitability Scale. The study used a data set that represents a 5 year period, and followed the consequences of the SII in terms of medical status and occupational assignment of the actors. The findings yielded some possible policy implications, in terms of a better classification of the relevant populations, and a possible attribution of a more refined meaning to the behavior. © 1994 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Do developmental and temperamental characteristics mediate the association between preterm birth and the quality of mother-child interaction?

BackgroundThe current study aims to evaluate the association between preterm birth and the quality of mother-child interaction of very preterm-, moderate preterm-, and full-term-born children at 18 and 36 months and to determine whether developmental and behavioral characteristics mediate the association between preterm birth and the quality of mother-child interaction.MethodParticipants included 110 preterm-born children and 39 full-term-born children assessed at ages 18 and 36 months. Mother-child free play interactions, the Mullen Scales of Early Learning, the Infant Behavior Questionnaire, and the Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire were administered.ResultsSignificant associations between preterm birth and the quality of mother-child interaction were found at 18 and 36 months. The mother-child interaction quality was less optimal for the preterm-born children compared with the full-term-born children, mainly so for the very preterm-born children. Unlike behavioral characteristics, cognitive development was found to mediate the association between the gestational age-based group and the quality of mother-child interaction.ConclusionsIntervention programs for preterm-born children and their families, should consider maternal and children’s behaviors during mother-child interactions, in addition to cognitive, language, motor and emotional regulation abilities, and particularly so with very preterm-born children, who exhibit slower cognitive development.     

Comparing predictive validity in a community sample: High-dimensionality and traditional domain-and-facet structures of personality variation

Prediction of outcomes is an important way of distinguishing, among personality models, the best from the rest. Prominent previous models have tended to emphasize multiple internally consistent “facet” scales subordinate to a few broad domains. But such an organization of measurement may not be optimal for prediction. Here, we compare the predictive capacity and efficiency of assessments across two types of personality-structure model: conventional structures of facets as found in multiple platforms, and new high-dimensionality structures emphasizing those based on natural-language adjectives, in particular lexicon-based structures of 20, 23, and 28 dimensions. Predictions targeted 12 criterion variables related to health and psychopathology, in a sizeable American community sample. Results tended to favor personality-assessment platforms with (at least) a dozen or two well-selected variables having minimal intercorrelations, without sculpting of these to make them function as indicators of a few broad domains. Unsurprisingly, shorter scales, especially when derived from factor analyses of the personality lexicon, were shown to take a more efficient route to given levels of predictive capacity. Popular 20^th-century personality-assessment models set out influential but suboptimal templates, including one that first identifies domains and then facets, which compromise the efficiency of measurement models, at least from a comparative-prediction standpoint. © 2020 European Association of Personality Psychology     

A Psychometric Network Perspective on the Validity and Validation of Personality Trait Questionnaires

This article reviews the causal implications of latent variable and psychometric network models for the validation of personality trait questionnaires. These models imply different data generating mechanisms that have important consequences for the validity and validation of questionnaires. From this review, we formalize a framework for assessing the evidence for the validity of questionnaires from the psychometric network perspective. We focus specifically on the structural phase of validation, where items are assessed for redundancy, dimensionality, and internal structure. In this discussion, we underline the importance of identifying unique personality components (i.e. an item or set of items that share a unique common cause) and representing the breadth of each trait's domain in personality networks. After, we argue that psychometric network models have measures that are statistically equivalent to factor models but we suggest that their substantive interpretations differ. Finally, we provide a novel measure of structural consistency, which provides complementary information to internal consistency measures. We close with future directions for how external validation can be executed using psychometric network models. © 2020 European Association of Personality Psychology     

The Multiplicative AHP,SMART and ELECTRE in a Common Context

This paper presents a comparative study of three popular methods for multicriteria decision analysis based on a particular model of human preferential judgement. Since decisions are invariably made within a given context, we model relative preferences as ratios of increments or decrements in an interval on an axis of desirability. Next we sort the ratio magnitudes into a small number of categories, represented by numerical values on a geometric scale. We explain why the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and the French collection of ELECTRE methods, typically based on pairwise comparison methods, are concerned with categories of ratio magnitudes, whereas the simple multiattribute rating technique (SMART) essentially uses orders of magnitude of these ratios. This phenomenon provides a common basis for the analysis of the methods in question and for a cross-validation of their results. We illustrate the approach via a well-known case study, the choice of a location for a nuclear power plant. We conclude by discussing the scope of the comparative study. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Beyond the molar-molecular distinction: we need multiscaled analyses.

Dinsmoor's (2001) adherence to molecular analyses may require him to assert that molar and molecular principles are mutually exclusive, but to instead analyze the phenomena of avoidance as inherently multiscaled is to follow a well-established practice in the natural sciences. Besides the issue of scale, two-factor theory, which Dinsmoor advocates, has little to say about some important and longstanding results in experiments that qualify as avoidance.     

Cross-Validation of the Behavioral and Emotional Rating Scale-2 Youth Version: An Exploration of Strength-Based Latent Traits

High-quality measurement is a necessary requirement to develop and evaluate the effectiveness of programs that use strength-based principles and strategies. Using independent cross-validation samples, we report two studies that explored the construct validity of the BERS-2 Youth Report, a popular measure designed to assess youth strengths, whose conceptual structure has not yet been examined. In Study 1, an exploratory factor analysis found a four-factor solution with conceptual support, which included both internal assets associated with (a) the management of emotions and positive social interaction skills and (b) engagement in the important social contexts of family and school. In Study 2, confirmatory factor analyses found reasonable model fit for the BERS-2 five-factor structure and superior model fit for the more parsimonious four-factor solution found in Study 1. In future studies, parallel reporting of the four-factor model may provide additional insight to the nature and structure of the BERS-2 Youth Version’s clinical validity and utility when compared with the five-factor model, thus potentially contributing to a broader objective to develop a better understanding of important strength-based latent traits.     

Variation of Preference Inconsistency When Applying Ratio and Interval Scale Pairwise Comparisons

Several studies on numerical rating in discrete choice problems address the tendency of inconsistencies in decision makers' measured preferences. This is partly due to true inconsistencies in preferences or the decision makers' uncertainty on what he or she really wants. This uncertainty may be reflected in the elicited preferences in different ways depending on the questions asked and methods used in deriving the preferences for alternatives. Some part of the inconsistency is due to only having a discrete set of possible judgments. This study examined the variation of preference inconsistency when applying different pairwise preference elicitation techniques in a five‐item discrete choice problem. The study data comprised preferences of five career alternatives elicited applying interval scale and numerically and verbally anchored ratio scale pairwise comparisons. Statistical regression technique was used to analyse the differences of inconsistencies between the tested methods. The resulting relative residual variances showed that the interval ratio scale comparison technique provided the greatest variation of inconsistencies between respondents, thus being the most sensitive to inconsistency in preferences. The numeric ratio scale comparison gave the most uniform preferences between the respondents. The verbal ratio scale comparison performed between the latter two when relative residual variances were considered. However, the verbal ratio scale comparison had weaker ability to differentiate the alternatives. The results indicated that the decision recommendation may not be sensitive to the selection between these preference elicitation methods in this kind of five‐item discrete choice problem. The numeric ratio scale comparison technique seemed to be the most suitable method to reveal the decision makers' true preferences. However, to confirm this result, more studying will be needed, with an attention paid to users' comprehension and learning in the course of the experiment. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Some thoughts on Likert-type scales

Many articles published in the International Journal of Clinical and Health Psychology describe the results obtained in studies that have used Likert-type scales. Such scales have advantages and disadvantages and in this article I comment on some of these. In particular I comment on the effects of using scales that start with the positive end and finish with the negative one, and on those that present high ratings on the left - as opposed to the right. I also consider that scores on negatively-worded items differ from those obtained on positively-worded ones and that it is not, therefore, appropriate to simply reverse the scores obtained on such items. Finally, I note that some items on these scales present more than one issue and it is hard to know whether when responding to these items, respondents are responding to all of the item or just one part.     

Adaptation et validation d’une version brève en langue française du questionnaire d’impulsivité de Barratt (BIS-15)

IntroductionThe Barratt Impulsiveness Scale is one of the most frequently used questionnaires to assess impulsivity. Many versions of the questionnaire were developed during the 50 years that followed its creation.ObjectivesThis article reports validation data for a French-language version of Spinella's (2007) BIS-15 questionnaire, a short version of Barratt's original scale (BIS-11; Patton, Standford, & Barratt, 1995).MethodReliability, principal component analyses and confirmatory factor analyses have been conducted with two university student samples (study 1, n = 366; study 2, n = 322).ResultsThe results of this study revealed a number of redundant items, which lead us to consider a unidimensional model with correlated measurement errors. Cronbach's alpha reliability was acceptable for study 1 (0.71), and satisfactory for study 2 (0.81). Test-retest reliability was also satisfactory (0.84). Elements of external validity (correlations with anxiety, neurosis, and extraversion) are reported.ConclusionsConsiderations regarding the type of response scales and assessment methods used in questionnaires are discussed in the conclusion.