Quality of life assessment in Turkish patients with schizophrenia and their relatives

Quality of life of first-degree relatives living in the same household with patients having schizophrenia has not been sufficiently explored. 30 patients with schizophrenia (16 women, 14 men), diagnosed using DSM-IV criteria, 31 of their relatives (15 women, 16 men), and 34 control subjects (21 women, 13 men) were included in the study. The mean age of the patients, their relatives, and the control subects were 39.8 +/- 10.9, 58.1 +/- 12.5 and 37.3 +/- 17.0, respectively. The World Health Oranization Quality of Life-Brief Form was administered to all subjects. Quality of life was worse for the patient group than for their relatives and control subjects, but relatives of the patients and control subjects were not significantly different on Quality of life. Quality of life was negatively correlated with the severity of psychopathology and extrapyramidal side effects induced by antipsychotic drugs in the patients.     

The Influence of Trauma Symptoms on the Therapeutic Alliance Across Treatment

The authors examined the influence of early phase dissociation, interpersonal problems, and retraumatization on the therapeutic alliance at early, middle, and later treatment phases. Participants were 84 female survivors of child abuse (ages 18 to 60 years, 53.6% Caucasian) who were receiving counseling at a university training clinic. Master’s- and doctoral-level students provided counseling using integrated relationship and trauma-based cognitive behavior therapy. Treatment followed a 3-phase model. The authors used structural equation models to test the hypothesis. In the early and later phases, fewer interpersonal problems significantly predicted a stronger alliance. In the middle phase, fewer interpersonal problems, less dissociation, and more revictimization significantly predicted a stronger alliance. Tasks, goals, and bond contributed significantly to the alliance in each of the 3 phases. Interpersonal problems were consistently the strongest predictor across the 3 phases, whereas tasks consistently made the greatest contribution to the therapeutic alliance across all 3 phases.     

Grade effects on teacher ratings of ADHD symptoms among primary school students

Several studies have reported that being younger for grade increases the risk of having attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) diagnosis and being on ADHD medication among students. The aim of this study was to investigate this association in a low‐middle income country setting. Sample included 2,627 children from first to fourth grades. We compared students who were older than the 75th and younger than the 25th percentiles in consecutive grades. Teachers completed SNAP‐4 scale. Results indicated that teacher rated ADHD symptoms were 2.5 to 3.6 times more common in students who were younger for their grade, after age, gender, and Fluid IQ scores were controlled. Teacher SNAP‐4 scores were also significantly associated with grade. Our results suggested that the phenomenon of higher rates of teacher rated ADHD symptoms among younger for grade students was not limited to Western countries and that the teacher reported symptom loads were higher in these children.     

Predictors of Turkish Women’s and Men’s Attitudes toward Sexual Harassment: Ambivalent Sexism, and Ambivalence Toward Men

This study examined the relationships among ambivalent sexism (hostile/benevolent), ambivalence toward men (hostility/benevolence) and Turkish women/men’s attitudes toward sexual harassment, including attitudes toward viewing sexual harassment as a result of provocative behaviors of women (ASHPBW) and attitudes toward viewing sexual harassment as a trivial matter (ASHTM). Participants included 220 Turkish undergraduates (136 female; M_age?=?20.00). They tended to blame women for the incidents of sexual harassment whereas they viewed sexual harassment as a very important social problem. As compared to women, men scored higher in both ASHPBW and ASHTM, suggesting that men are more tolerant of sexual harassment. For both genders, hostile sexism and benevolence toward men predicted ASHPBW. However, for only men, hostile and benevolent sexism predicted ASHTM.     

Memory for object locations: Priority effect and sex differences in associative spatial learning

This paper reports two experiments conducted to examine priority effects and sex differences in object location memory. A new task of paired position-learning was designed, based on the A–B A–C paradigm, which was used in paired word learning. There were three different paired position-learning conditions: (1) positions of several different objects (B-objects and C-objects) around referent objects (A-objects) were learned in the A–B A–C position-learning condition, (2) positions of several different objects with no referent objects were learned in the 0–B 0–C position-learning condition, and (3) positions of identical objects (stars) with no referent objects were learned in the 0-star 0-star position-only condition. The results revealed a significant priority effect on performance in the A–B A–C and the 0–B 0–C position-learning conditions but not in the 0-star 0-star position-only condition. Contradictory results were obtained with respect to the sex variable: a female superiority effect on paired position learning was significant in Experiment 1, but this effect was not replicated in Experiment 2. In addition, an articulatory suppression task used in Experiment 2 had a significant effect on recall of different object positions but no effect on recall of identical object positions. This suggested that verbal encoding was not necessary for learning of positions of identical objects.