The application of the standard of care doctrine to psychological testing

Malpractice issues surrounding clinical psychologists' misuse of diagnostic testing are examined. Common forms of misuse are contrasted with appropriate standards of use for six frequently administered tests: The WAIS-R, WISC-R, Rorschach, TAT, Bender Gestalt, and MMPI. It is argued that not only negligent and unethical conduct but also intentional malfeasance may be construed when a qualified specialist applies unstandardized procedures which lack scientific authenticity. Suggestions are provided to both psychologists and attorneys to reduce the misuse of psychological tests in clinical and forensic evaluations.     

Recognition of affixed words and the word frequency effect

Three experiments are reported in which the word frequency effect is used as a diagnostic for determining whether affixed words coming from the same stem are stored together or separately in the lexicon. Prefixed words are examined in the first experiment, inflected words in the second and third. In the first two experiments, two types of word are compared where the words in each condition are matched on surface or presented frequency but are varied on the frequency of their stems or base frequency. It is found that lexical decision times are influenced by base frequency, thus indicating that words related by affixation are stored together in the lexicon. The third experiment, however, demonstrates that when base frequency is held constant and surface frequency is varied, lexical decision times are influenced by surface frequency. The results are accounted for by a model of word recognition whereby frequency has its effect at two different stages of the recognition process.     

The nature of the mental representation of radicals in Chinese: a priming study

Using a priming procedure, 4 experiments were carried out to investigate the effects of a short preexposure of a prime that was a radical or contained radicals identical to the target. Significant facilitation was found when the target contained the prime as a radical, although only for low-frequency targets which did not arise merely as a result of graphical similarity. Facilitation also occurred when the prime and target shared a radical in the same position but not when in different positions. When the prime and target had exactly the same radicals but in different positions, however, the priming effect was inhibitory. This set of results suggests that simple characters (radicals) and complex characters are represented at a different level.     

Shame,posttraumatic stress disorder,and intimate partner violence perpetration

Drawing from theoretical and empirical literature linking shame to aggression and violence, the authors propose that shame may be an important variable to examine in studies of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and intimate partner violence (IPV) perpetration. The authors review the literature linking shame, PTSD, and IPV, propose ideas for future research, and suggest that shame and shame regulation may be a useful target of clinical interventions aimed at violence perpetrators.     

Lexical Representation of Gender: A Quasiregular Domain

The relationship between gender and word ending in French is a quasiregular one (e.g., most words ending in -ette are feminine, but not all). As such, the gender of low-frequency irregular forms (e.g., squelette, which is masculine) should take longer to classify than low-frequency regular forms according to neural network models. A regularity effect was found in Experiment 1, but it did not interact with word frequency. It was further revealed that there was difficulty in making gender decisions (Experiment 2) and gender verification responses (Experiment 3) to words whose endings were highly informative of gender, but whose associated article was not. These words were place names beginning with a vowel, like Australie, which do not take an indefinite article and whose definite article is ambiguous (1'). How a neural network might handle these results is discussed, and an alternative account is considered whereby there are two potential sources of gender information, lexical and nonlexical, with the latter being used to confirm the former.     

Training Experiences as Mediators of the Association Between Gender-Role Egalitarianism and Women��s Adjustment to Marine Recruit Training

Women may face particular challenges adjusting to the military environment, in part due to their numerical minority status in a traditionally male culture. In addition, women are more likely than men to experience the added stressor of sexual harassment. We examined several potential mediators of the relationship between gender-role egalitarianism and adjustment to boot camp training in a sample of 658 female U.S. Marine recruits. Results indicated that sexual harassment, performance stress, and unit cohesion mediated the relationship between egalitarianism and mental health symptomatology. These findings suggest that beliefs about gender roles are important to consider in efforts to improve women??s adjustment in the military.