Murderers' and sexual offenders' experiences of police interviews and their inclination to admit or deny crimes

This research concerns murderers' and sexual offenders' experiences of Swedish police interviews and their attitudes towards allegations of these serious crimes. The explorative study is based on a questionnaire answered by 83 men convicted of murder or sexual offences. Results show that when police officers interview murderers and sexual offenders, the individuals perceive attitudes that are characterized by either dominance or humanity. Logistic regression shows that police interviews marked by dominance are mainly associated with a higher proportion of denials, whereas an approach marked by humanity is associated with admissions. When suspects feel that they are respected and acknowledged, they probably gain more confidence and mental space, allowing them to admit criminal behaviour.     

The Use of a Family History Risk Assessment Tool within a Community Health Care System: Views of Primary Care Providers

Primary care providers (PCPs) offered input regarding the incorporation of a family health history (FHH) risk assessment tool into a community health care system (CHCS). Sixteen PCPs participated in one of three focus groups. Perceived impediments included the lack of standard screening guidelines, effective screening tests, genetic counseling resources, and services for high-risk patients. The PCPs were concerned about their level of expertise, the cost of preventive health care, and genetic discrimination. They also were concerned about the use of a FHH tool by oncologists within the CHCS because of communication gaps between oncologists and PCPs, lack of clarity regarding follow-up and legal liability, and reimbursement issues. To integrate a FHH tool into a CHCS, PCPs will need consultation and referral services, evidence-based recommendations, and "just-in-time" educational resources. Oncologists who use the tool will need to develop a streamlined communication system with PCPs, establish clearly defined roles, and ensure patient follow-up.     

Comprehension of the Referential Intent of Looking and Pointing Between 12 and 15 Months

Butler, Caron, & Brooks (2000) tested the gaze following of 14-and 18-month-olds under 3 conditions: (1) when the adult's view of the targets was blocked by barriers, (2) when the barriers contained open windows, and (3) no barriers. Contrary to a nonmentalist "ecological" model (adult turns serve as cues to the location of interesting events), frequency of gaze following by 14-month-olds was not equivalent across the 3 conditions. Contrary to a mentalist model (infant wants to see what the adult is seeing), gaze following was not substantially less in the barrier than in the window and no-barrier conditions (as was the case for 18-month-olds). To examine whether the barriers posed vector projection problems for essentially nonmentalist, or line-of-sight problems for essentially mentalist younger infants, 3 experiments were conducted. In Experiment 1, a 12-month group was tested in the same 3 conditions to determine if, being younger, they might yield a more clearcut nonmentalist pattern. Contrarily, they behaved like Butler et al.'s 14-month-olds. In Experiment 2, a 14-month group was tested in the barrier and window conditions, but now combining pointing with turning. Infants behaved as predicted by the mentalist model: strong responding in the window condition and minimal in the barrier (where many strained to look inside the partitions). In Experiment 3, an attempt was made to differentiate between mentalist and "geometric" (vector projection) interpretations of the results of Experiment 2 by testing another 14-month group with the adult's eyes closed while pointing. Gaze following now dropped precipitously in the window condition as did looking inside the solid barriers, indicating (1) that infants in Experiment 2 had not simply been guided to target by an extended arm, but construed it as part of a referential act that was as much visual as gestural, and (2) that by 14 months, infants may have acquired a mentalistic concept of seeing.     

Bidirectional Effects of Positive Affect,Warmth, and Interactions Between Mothers With and Without Symptoms of Depression and Their Toddlers

Maternal depression has negative implications for parenting and child outcomes, but it is also important to understand the daily transactional interactions that occur between mothers varying in symptoms of depression and their children. The current study aimed to examine immediate bidirectional effects between maternal warmth and positive affect and toddler affect in a sample of mothers varying in symptoms of depression. Ninety-one mothers and their 24-month-old toddlers completed a laboratory free-play/clean-up task. Mothers rated their symptoms of depression using the CES-D, and maternal warmth and positive affect and toddler positive and negative affect were observationally coded from a free-play and clean-up laboratory task. Sequential analyses indicated that mothers with no or mild symptoms of depression exhibited mutual positive affect with their children, but mothers with more severe symptoms of depression did not. Mothers with higher symptoms of depression displayed a decrease in warmth concurrent with toddlers’ positive affect. Further, unlike dyads in which mothers had higher symptoms of depression, dyads of mothers with lower symptoms appeared to exhibit some covariation in positive affect across the episode. These results provide evidence that even in non-clinical samples, affective manifestations of mothers’ subthreshold levels of depression may have negative immediate effects on toddlers’ emotions, and that mothers without symptoms of depression may have more reciprocal affective exchanges with their toddlers.     

Why reread? Evidence from garden-path and local coherence structures

Two eye-tracking experiments were conducted to compare the online reading and offline comprehension of main verb/reduced relative garden-path sentences and local coherence sentences. Rereading of early material in garden-path reduced relatives should be revisionary, aimed at reanalysing an earlier misparse; however, rereading of early material in a local coherence reduced relative need only be confirmatory, as the original parse of the earlier portion of these sentences is ultimately correct. Results of online and offline measures showed that local coherence structures elicited signals of reading disruption that arose earlier and lasted longer, and local coherence comprehension was also better than garden path comprehension. Few rereading measures in either sentence type were predicted by structural features of these sentences, nor was rereading related to comprehension accuracy, which was extremely low overall. Results are discussed with respect to selective reanalysis and good-enough processing.     

Parafoveal processing of inflectional morphology on Russian nouns

The present study investigated whether inflectional morphology on Russian nouns is processed parafoveally during silent reading. The boundary-change paradigm [Rayner, K. (1975). The perceptual span and peripheral cues in reading. Cognitive Psychology, 7, 65–81] was used to examine parafoveal processing of nominal case markings of Russian nouns. The results yielded preview cost for morphologically related preview in gaze duration (vs. an identical baseline) and in total time (TT) (vs. a non-word baseline) and preview benefit in regressions out of the target word. The contribution of the study is two-fold. First this is the first demonstration that bound nominal inflectional morphemes are processed parafoveally in a language with linear concatenated morphology (Russian). Second the observed preview effects suggest that parafoveal preview of a morphologically related word was processed fully in the parafovea and interfered with the integration of the target word into the syntactic structure of the sentence.     

The Contribution of Temperamental and Cognitive Factors to Childhood Anxiety Disorder Symptoms: A Closer Look at Negative Affect,Behavioral Inhibition,and Anxiety Sensitivity

This study examined the role of anxiety sensitivity as an explanatory variable in the link between two temperamental dimensions (i.e., behavioral inhibition and negative affect) and anxiety disorder symptom severity in a sample of children with anxiety disorders. Forty-four children (52?% African American) between 8 and 12 years of age and their mothers participated in this study. An assessment battery consisting of diagnostic interviews, questionnaires, and behavioral assessment of behavioral inhibition was administered. Findings revealed that anxiety sensitivity was a significant explanatory variable linking child self-reports of behavioral inhibition and negative affect to anxiety disorder symptom severity. For parent-completed measures, only direct effects of behavioral inhibition on anxiety disorder symptom severity were found. The clinical implications of our findings, including the importance and feasibility of anxiety sensitivity and behavioral inhibition assessments as part of routine clinical care of children with anxiety disorders are discussed, along with the limitations of our study.