Adolescent drug use and attitudes toward the family.

Examined the evaluative dimensions of adolescents' perceptions of the family as a unit and attempted to relate these dimensions to the use of tobacco, alcohol, and marihuana. A questionnaire was administered anonymously to 286 Grade 9 students in 7 semi-rural high schools. Item intercorrelations were factored and the 6 factors extracted were related to drug use behaviors using correlational and regression techniques. The factors extracted included Warmth, Support and Interest; Organization; Disinterest; Parents' Togetherness; Unsocial (Keeps to Itself); and General Excitability. For the males, Warmth, Support and Interest related negatively and significantly to the use of alcohol and tobacco, while for the females this factor related negatively and significantly to the use of all 3 drugs. For the females, Unsocial (Keeps to Itself) related negatively and significantly to the use of alcohol, while Disinterest related positively and significantly to the use of marihuana. (French summary) (24 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Patterns of attitudes toward child rearing and the family.

24 scales of the Parental Attitude Research Instrument were administered to 100 student nurses. A centroid factor analysis of the scales revealed 5 relatively independent factors: suppression and interpersonal distance, hostile rejection of the homemaking role, excessive demand for striving, over-possessiveness, and hostile punitive control. Similarity of these factors to behavior and attitudes of parents of emotionally disturbed children and to factors isolated from the Fels Parent Behavior Scales was noted. This measuring instrument may permit prediction of different patterns of mother-child interaction. 19 references. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Parents' attitudes toward their child's therapist and therapy.

Parents of children in therapy typically have strong feelings and thoughts about their child's treatment, and their cooperation and support is often a critical aspect of successful treatment. Recent literature, in conjunction with the results of a small-scale study of 51 parents of children currently in treatment, suggests that contrary to classic psychoanalytic literature, parents experience primarily positive attitudes and feelings toward their child's therapist; they tend to feel hopeful, understood, and grateful. For the sake of both promoting and preserving therapeutic gains, therapists should actively pursue an alliance with parents and encourage their participation in their child's treatment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Guttman-type scales for union and management attitudes toward each other.

A systematic study of scale preparation for industrial relations purposes is reported. 14 multiple-choice items were presented to 41 officials. Unidimensionality on at least 7 items was confirmed by the analysis. "The refined scales are valuable instruments for substantive research on union-management relations at the plant level." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Changing knowledge and attitudes about skin cancer risk factors in adolescents.

Examined knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors related to skin cancer (SC), sun exposure, sunscreen use, and use of tanning booths in 903 female and 800 male adolescents. The effectiveness of a brief, school-based intervention designed to increase teens' knowledge and preventive attitudes about SC was also evaluated. Females, older students, and those with high-risk skin types were most likely to use sunscreen and to take precautions. However, overall level of protection was low. Intentions to take precautions were associated with levels of perceived susceptibility to SC, attitudes about the benefits of sun exposure, skin type, and sex. Beyond intentions, sunscreen use was associated with perceived susceptibility and skin type. The 1-session, school-based intervention significantly increased knowledge of and perceived susceptibility to SC but not behavioral intentions. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Retributive and utilitarian motives and other correlates of Canadian attitudes toward the death penalty.

An in-depth survey of 144 English Canadian adults examined the motives behind, and other social psychological correlates of, attitudes toward capital punishment. The results suggested that for a substantial percentage of people the motive of retribution may be more important than deterence as a reason for favoring the death penalty. Other findings indicated that the more strongly people favored the death penalty, the more likely they were to score high on measures of authoritarianism, punitiveness, dogmatism, and prejudice. They were also more likely to be older and less educated. The hypothesis that people who felt threatened by crime would be more likely to favor capital punishment received equivocal support. Both theoretical and practical applications of the data are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Forming implicit and explicit attitudes toward individuals: Social group association cues.

The authors explored how social group cues (e.g., obesity, physical attractiveness) strongly associated with valence affect the formation of attitudes toward individuals. Although explicit attitude formation has been examined in much past research (e.g., S. T. Fiske & S. L. Neuberg, 1990), in the current work, the authors considered how implicit as well as explicit attitudes toward individuals are influenced by these cues. On the basis of a systems of evaluation perspective (e.g., R. J. Rydell & A. R. McConnell, 2006; R. J. Rydell, A. R. McConnell, D. M. Mackie, & L. M. Strain, 2006), the authors anticipated and found that social group cues had a strong impact on implicit attitude formation in all cases and on explicit attitude formation when behavioral information about the target was ambiguous. These findings obtained for cues related to obesity (Experiments 1 and 4) and physical attractiveness (Experiment 2). In Experiment 3, parallel findings were observed for race, and participants holding greater implicit racial prejudice against African Americans formed more negative implicit attitudes toward a novel African American target person than did participants with less implicit racial prejudice. Implications for research on attitudes, impression formation, and stigma are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Frequency of replication errors in colorectal cancer and their association with family history

In the Czech Republic, the incidence of Lyme borreliosis (LB) has shown a rising trend since 1988. The goal of this study has been to find out to what extent a selected part of population is aware of ticks and of the relationship between ticks and LB. The study was based on a questionnaire survey. A total of 110 respondents were selected, including 19 secondary school students, 32 blood donors, 44 park-goers, 15 countryside people. As many as 99% of the respondents were aware of the presence of ticks, 91% knew that ticks are sucking blood of humans and animals, 1.8% thought they eat leaves. 74.5% of the respondents expect ticks to reach them from the vegetation while 22% believe that ticks fall from the trees. Furthermore, 87% and 75% of the respondents indicated to have had ticks attached to the skin or to have removed a tick from other persons' skin, respectively. Only 6.7% of them had never come into contact with ticks. 17% of the respondents use disinfectant when removing a tick, while 67% use oil for tick removal. Almost 30% remove ticks with naked hands. Over 14% destroy the ticks by squashing them with naked fingers. Finally, about 11% of the population studied had never heard about LB and 41% were not aware of the risk of tick-borne encephalitis.     

How Latino American and European American adolescents discuss conflicts, sexuality, and AIDS with their mothers.

The authors examined how the structure of mother–adolescent conversations differs by ethnic group, age, and dyadic and individual factors. Mother–adolescent dyads of European or Latino descent participated in conversations and reported on their relationship and AIDS knowledge. Latina American mothers dominated conversations more than European American mothers, independent of socioeconomic status. Mothers dominated conversations about sexuality and AIDS more than conversations about conflicts. Mothers of older adolescents reacted more negatively, and older adolescents reported less satisfaction, less openness, and more sexual discussions with persons other than their mothers. Latino American adolescents whose mothers dominated conversations more reported fewer sexual discussions. Latina American mothers who dominated conversations more reported more openness and satisfaction. When mothers dominated conversations more, adolescents had lower AIDS knowledge. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Gender and age as factors in the attitudes toward those stigmatized as mentally ill.

36 male and 72 female undergraduates read 2 case histories of either a male or female and young or old obsessive-compulsive patient or a schizophrenic patient. Ss' ratings of the patients on 5 rating scales support the proposition that males rate such patients as less ill and perceive less difficulty in getting along with them than females; however, they contradict the idea that female patients are considered less severely ill than a similarly described male patient. Age had no significant effects. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Managers' attitudes toward how their pay is and should be determined.

Investigated, by questionnaire, the perceptions of 563 managers toward how their pay is determined and their attitudes toward how it should be determined. The results show that in general the managers' perceptions of how their pay was determined reflected the way in which it was determined. However, the way their pay was determined did not appear to influence strongly their attitudes toward how it should be determined, although there was general agreement that merit should be the most important determinant. However, attitudes toward what factors should be important in determining pay were shown to be related to the managers' perception of their relative standing on the various factors. There was a positive correlation between how well the managers felt they compared with other managers on each factor and how important they felt the factor should be. The data also showed that there was a tendency for lack of congruence between a manager's attitudes toward how his pay should be determined and how it is determined to be associated with high dissatisfaction with pay. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Measurement of attitudes toward alcohol and their relation to personality variables.

2 10-item alcohol attitude scales were developed from an available item pool. 1 scale measures favorability of attitude toward "social drinking" while the other taps attitude toward "alcoholism and the alcoholic." Scores on the scales were consistent with ratings of attitudes and of drinking behavior made from interview reports obtained from 2 college student samples participating in a longitudinal study, 92 students at Stanford University and 102 at the University of California, Berkeley. Alcohol attitudes of these groups were correlated with scores on 2 personality variables, "social maturity" and "impulse expression." Differences between the 2 samples, and between the sexes, are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Religious beliefs of Catholic college students and their attitudes toward minorities.

"There was a very significant tendency… for those scoring high on the religion scale to be less favorable toward Jews and Negroes and to favor segregation of Negroes in their own parishes, while those who scored low on the religion scale were significantly less prejudiced and were opposed to segregation." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal attitudes, dispositions, and behavior in family and other close relationships.

Presents a framework for describing behavioral patterns and considers how such patterns affect and are affected by interpersonal psychological dispositions and attitudes. The framework incorporates both objective behavioral elements and the subjective factors of cognition and emotion. Discussion focuses on how the framework contributes to the study of families and other close relationships. Interdependence research that links behavioral and attitudinal/disposition levels is critical to understanding how and why relationships evolve as they do. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Knowledge and attitudes toward breast-feeding: differences among dietitians, nurses, and physicians working with WIC clients

We assessed the knowledge of and attitude toward breast-feeding of dietitians, nurses, and physicians who work with individuals in the Alabama Special Supplemental Food Program for Women, Infants, and Children. On a scale of 0 to 100, dietitians expressed stronger interest in lactation (78.6) and exhibited greater knowledge (79.6) of the questions asked than nurses (74.5 and 73.0, respectively). Attitude and knowledge scores of physicians (70.2 and 75.5, respectively) were not statistically different from those of dietitians or nurses. Respondents disagreed greatly about the relationship of breast-feeding to weight loss and the appropriateness of oral contraceptives during breast-feeding 6 weeks postpartum. Professionals were more knowledgeable about benefits to infants than about maternal concerns. Results of this study suggest that professional breast-feeding education programs should address maternal concerns such as weight loss, contraception, and mastitis as well as benefits to the infant.     

Gender differences in adolescent sexual attitudes: the influence of individual and family factors

The present study, continuing a recent trend, examined multiple influences on adolescent sexuality, focusing on sexual attitudes because of their influence on sexual behavior. Empirical analyses were based on a nonrandom availability sample of 1,587 public high school students and 1,372 parents. Multiple regression analyses were conducted in three phases to elaborate models for adolescent attitudes about premarital sexual intercourse; separate models were developed for females and males. First, a regression model was developed that featured individual adolescent characteristics (e.g., age, gender, locus of control, self-esteem, and religious participation) as predictor variables. A second regression model was developed that included family characteristics (e.g., number of siblings, number of parents in home, communication with mother and father, family strengths, parent contribution to sexuality education, parental discussion of sexual values, and the sexual attitudes of mother and father). In the final step, multiple regression was conducted on both individual and family factors. Results indicated that (1) the integrated model had more explanatory power than either separate model, and (2) females were influenced by more family factors and males were influenced by more individual factors.     

Structure of client attitudes toward counseling and their relation to client-counselor similarity.

Client attitudes toward their counseling experience were assessed by a post-counseling questionnaire. A cluster analysis of responses indicated 3 clusters, Evaluation, Comfort-Rapport, and Judged Counselor Competence which show unexpectedly low positive correlations with each other. The relationship of client-counselor similarity on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator to client attitudes varies as a function of cluster content and nature of sample: Evaluation is curvilinear with similarity, middle similarity producing highest scores; Comfort-Rapport is related to high similarity for freshmen but to middle similarity for nonfreshmen; the effects of similarity tend to be more pronounced in opposite- than in same-sex pairings; high ratings of Judged Competence are associated with particular test dimensions rather than with overall similarity. (20 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Mum's the word: mothers' perspectives on communication about sexuality with adolescents

Mothers' perceptions of the style, content and frequency of their communications with their adolescents about sex and sexuality were examined. We administered semi-structured interviews to 30 mothers of 16-year-olds (16 mothers of sons, 14 mothers of daughters). Despite a uniform assessment that they were effective sexual communicators, mothers varied greatly in their style of sexual communication. Qualitative analyses revealed five communication styles: avoidant, reactive, opportunistic, child-initiated and mutually interactive. These styles differed in who initiated and maintained sexual communication, the comfort level of mother and of teenager, the frequency of sexual communications, the context in which communications took place and the topics discussed and avoided.