Beyond the individual: the impact of ethnic context and classroom behavioral norms on victims' adjustment

With a sample of 1,630 sixth-grade students from 77 classrooms, the authors used hierarchical linear modeling to examine how ethnicity within context and classroom social disorder influenced the association between peer victimization and social-psychological adjustment (loneliness and social anxiety). Victimized students in classrooms where many classmates shared their ethnicity reported feeling the most loneliness and social anxiety. Additionally, classroom-level social disorder served as a moderator such that the association between victimization and anxiety was stronger in classrooms with low social disorder. Both findings were interpreted as evidence that problem behavior deviating from what is perceived as normative in a particular context heightens maladjustment. The authors discuss implications for studying ethnicity and classroom behavioral norms as context variables in peer relations.     

The impact of salient advertisements on reading and attention on web pages

Human vision is sensitive to salient features such as motion. Therefore, animation and onset of advertisements on Websites may attract visual attention and disrupt reading. We conducted three eye tracking experiments with authentic Web pages to assess whether (a) ads are efficiently ignored, (b) ads attract overt visual attention and disrupt reading, or (c) ads are covertly attended with distraction showing up indirectly in the reading performance. The Web pages contained an ad above a central text and another ad to the right of the text. In Experiments 1, 2, and 3A the task was to read for comprehension. Experiment 1 examined whether the degree of animation affects attention toward the ads. The results showed that ads were overtly attended during reading and that the dwell times on ads were the longest when the ad above was static and the other ad was animated. In Experiments 2 and 3, the ads appeared abruptly after a random time interval. The results showed that attention (i.e., the time when the eyes first entered an ad) was related to the ad onset time. This happened especially for the ad to the right, indicating that ads appearing close to the text region capture overt attention. In Experiment 3B the participants browsed the Web pages according to their own interest. The study demonstrated that salient ads attract overt visual attention and disrupt reading, but during free browsing, ads were viewed more frequently and for longer time than during reading.     

Ethnic diversity and perceptions of safety in urban middle schools

Students' perceptions of their safety and vulnerability were investigated in 11 public middle schools (more than 70 sixth-grade classrooms) that varied in ethnic diversity. Results of hierarchical linear modeling analyses indicate that higher classroom diversity is associated with feelings of safety and social satisfaction. African American (n= 511) and Latino (n= 910) students felt safer in school, were less harassed by peers, felt less lonely, and had higher self-worth the more ethnically diverse their classrooms were, even when controlling for classroom differences in academic engagement. Results at the school level were similar to those at the classroom level; higher ethnic diversity was associated with lower levels of self-reported vulnerability (but no difference in self-worth) in both fall and spring of sixth grade. In the spirit of Brown v. Board of Education, the current findings offer new empirical evidence for the psychological benefits of multiethnic schools.     

Smoothing enhances the detection of common structure from multiple time series

The effects of smoothing (i.e., temporal averaging) on the detection of intraindividual interdependency from between-subjects aggregated (i.e., multiple) bivariate time series were examined. A simple moving average smoother was applied to different types of simulated processes that included error. The results indicated that smoothing facilitates the detection of common intraindividual structure from multiple time series. The efficacy of smoothing was dependent on the characteristics of the underlying process. It is suggested that smoothing increases the efficiency of the detection of common structure by increasing the signal-to-noise ratio (i.e., temporal reliability) of the time series. The issue and application of smoothing is further discussed in terms of signal extraction and classical test theory.     

Association of pupil vandalism, bullying and truancy with teachers' absence due to illness: a multilevel analysis

The aim of this study was to examine whether vandalism, bullying, and truancy among pupils at school are associated with absence due to illness among teachers. Data on such problem behaviour of 17,033 pupils in 90 schools were linked to absence records of 2364 teachers. Pupil reported vandalism and bullying at the school-level were associated with teachers' short-term (1- to 3-day) absences. Cumulative exposure to various forms of pupils' problem behaviour was associated with even higher rates of short-term absences among teachers. No association was found between pupils' problem behaviour and teachers' long-term (>3-day) absences. In conclusion, there seems to be a link between pupils' problem behaviour and teachers' short-term absence due to illness. Further work should determine whether problem behaviour is a cause or a consequence of absences or whether the association is noncausal.     

Perceived norms and social values to capture school culture in elementary and middle school

The current study was designed to gain insights into shifting school culture by examining perceived peer group norms and social values across elementary and middle school grades. Perceived norms were assessed by asking participants (N = 605) to estimate how many grade mates were academically engaged, disengaged, and antisocial. To capture social values, peer nominations were used to assess “coolness” associated with these behaviors. Perceived norms became gradually more negative from fall to spring and across grades four to eight. Whereas academic engagement was socially valued in elementary school, negative social and academic behaviors were valued in middle school. Additionally, improved social status was associated with increased academic engagement in fifth grade, disengagement in seventh and eighth grades, and antisocial behavior in sixth grade. The findings suggest that differences between elementary and middle school cultural norms and values may shed light on negative behavior changes associated with the transition to middle school.     

Central executive function in mild cognitive impairment: a PET activation study

Using positron emission tomography (PET), we explored the neural correlates of an executive function, dual tasking, in patients with amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) and in elderly controls. The experiment employed simple auditory and visual tasks that were presented both in isolation and simultaneously to create a task condition requiring enhanced attentional control. Behaviorally, both groups performed well, albeit the patients made more errors on the visual task. The PET analysis focused at prefrontal regions where group differences in task-related activation patterns were expected. During dual task performance, the patients showed attenuated activity in the left inferior frontal region when compared to the controls. This suggests abnormalities in the neural processes underlying attentional control in aMCI.     

Effects of hemispheric asymmetry on electrodermal conditioning in a dichotic listening paradigm

It was predicted that when an auditive verbal conditional stimulus (CS+), previously associated with an aversive unconditional stimulus (UCS), is presented to theright ear (initial left hemisphere input), in a dichotic listening task, with the CS-simultaneously presented in the left ear, the result would be greater resistance to extinction than when the same CS+ is presented to the left ear (initial right hemisphere input). In the same vein, it was predicted that, when a tonal CS+ is presented to theleft ear, greater resistance to extinction would occur as compared with when it is presented to the right ear. During a dichotic test phase, each group was split into two subgroups, and the CS+ and CS—repeatedly were presented simultaneously to each ear. Half of the subjects in each subgroup had the CS+ presented to the left ear. The other half had the CS+ presented to the right ear. Skin conductance responses were recorded from both hands. Results showed significantly larger responding in all groups to the CS+/UCS compound during the acquisition phase. However, during the dichotic extinction phase, the verbal CS+ right-ear subgroup showed significantly larger resistance to extinction as compared with the verbal CS+ left-ear subgroup. No differences were found between the two tonal subgroups.