Assessing the relationship of Type A beliefs to cardiovascular disease risk and psychosocial distress

Investigators have begun to take a multimodal approach to the assessment and treatment of psychosocial risk factors for cardiovascular disease (CVD). For instance, cognitive responses have become the focus of contemporary research along with continued examination of overt Type A behaviors. Price (1982) has outlined a set of beliefs purportedly associated with Type A behavior and subsequent CVD risk. The current study examines the validity of this belief set as represented by a newly developed measure, the Type A Cognitive Questionnaire (TACQ). Subjects were 221 employed adults participating in a worksite CVD risk reduction program. They completed the TACQ as part of a pretreatment CVD risk screening protocol. As hypothesized, TACQ scores were significantly associated with Type A behavior, hostility, physiological mediators of CVD, and psychosocial distress. Discussion addresses continued refinement of the Type A belief construct.     

PROMOTING SAFETY BELT USE WITH TRAFFIC SIGNS AND PROMPTERS

Two studies were conducted examining the stimulus-control effects of conventional traffic signs as prompts for motor vehicle driver safety belt use. Following pilot research which suggested that a traffic sign reading “Fasten Safety Belt” posted at a parking lot exit was effective in producing small increases in safety belt use, Study I demonstrated the superiority of having human prompters display such signs compared to simply posting the signs. Study II replicated the findings of Study I and found that posted signs became more effective in prompting safety belt use if simple posting was preceded by a period involving human prompters who displayed the signs. The results bear upon the development of more effective use of traffic signs in promoting safety belt use and in viewing such use as an instance of rule-governed behavior.     

Do children use similar processes to read and spell words?

The use of spelling-sound information in both reading and spelling was evaluated by having children read and spell nonwords and five types of words that differed in terms of their regularity for reading and spelling. The subjects were grade 3 children who had been psychometrically defined as good readers and good spellers (“good”), good readers and poor spellers (“mixed”), or poor readers and poor spellers (“poor”). Results indicated that all children attempted to use spelling-sound correspondences in both reading and spelling, although children in both the mixed and the poor groups had weaker knowledge of these correspondences and were less systematic in their use of them. Furthermore, even though the children in the mixed group had been matched with children in the good group on reading comprehension, the number and type of errors made by the mixed subjects on both the reading and spelling tasks were more similar to those of the poor subjects than to those of the good subjects.     

The relation between classroom social status and classmate likability,compromising skill,temperament, and neighborhood social interactions

Classmate likeability, compromising skill, and temperament (n = 135) and after-school patterns of social interaction (n = 101) were examined for third through seventh grade children who were identified by a binomial probability model as popular, rejected, neglected, or average in the classroom setting. Significant effects were obtained for each type of score. Compared to the other social status groups, popular children were the best liked and rejected children were the least liked; neglected and average children fell between these two extremes. Popular children had higher compromising scores than either rejected or average children, and neglected children had higher scores than rejected children. Compared to average children, rejected children had higher attention and rhythmicity temperament scores. Finally, popular and average children had more neighborhood friends than either rejected or average children, and meglected children had more younger neighborhood friends than did average children. Results are discussed in terms of models of peer social status.     

Vowel duration in stutterers participating in precision fluency shaping

The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which stutters manipulate vowel duration to achieve fluency after participating in Precision Fluency Shaping. Nine stutterers who read an all-voiced sentence fluently before and after therapy were selected for study. Wide-band spectrograms were made of the initial phrase of the sentences, and vowel durations were computed. Results indicated that extended vowel durations were characteristic of the fluency of stutterers posttherapy. The subject that had the highest rate of disfluency after therapy also had the shortest vowel durations. Clinical implications concerning the importance of speech rate during carryover practice are made.     

Group differences in intelligence and speed of information-processing

Three samples of different levels of mental ability, but each of average or above- average intelligence, were administered a battery of reaction time test which measure the speed with which persons can execute various elementary cognitive processes. Discriminant analyses revealed significant differences between the groups in reaction times and intraindividual standard deviations, and univariate analyses indicated that higher ability groups tended to obtain significantly faster mean reaction times and to show significantly less intraindividual variability than lower ability groups. Groups which differed the most in mental ability differed to the greatest extent on the more complex reaction time tests but this pattern was reversed for groups which were relatively close in mean IQ. Generally, the results support the hypothesis that speed- of-processing is an important factor unferlying intelligence, but a number of puzzling findings indicate the need for continued research in this area.     

Observed behaviors during clinical interviews predict improvement in depression

A considerable percentage of depressed patients do not respond to antidepressive treatment. Early indicators of prognosis are needed. The aims of this study are to examine (a) whether the interpersonal behavior of patients and psychiatrist, as assessed by means of direct observation of behavior during a baseline clinical interview, might have predictive value with respect to therapeutic outcome and (b) which predictive potency measures of psychomotor activation, as assessed by less refined methods, such as global clinical judgment, might have. In the analysis used, speech-pause behavior was taken as the basic structure of the interaction. The relations of other behaviors such as looking and hand and head movement with this structure were determined. Evidence is presented that in a group of 31 depressives, improvement after a period of 10 weeks was related to observed behaviors during a baseline interview. The behaviors of the patients are interpreted as relational or nonrelational. The relational behaviors (i.e., looking yesnodding, gesturing) occur less in patients who will improve, whereas the nonrelational behaviors (i.e., intensive body touching, head movements) occur more in these patients. The nonrelational behaviors are presumed to be indicative of the state of arousal. The predictive potency of these variables could not be explained by their relationship with the baseline severity of depression, which in itself also predicted improvement. Moreover, global clinical assessment of psychomotor activation (i.e., retardation and agitation) could not be related to outcome.