Testing children for genetic predispositions: is it in their best interest?

Serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine; 5-HT), an endogenous and ubiquitous monoamine, has become a subject of "explosive" research. Though its vasoconstrictor properties were first noticed in defibrinated or clotted blood, 5-HT was discovered 75 years later going through several denominations such as "enteramine, serotonin or 5-HT". Once confirmed that serotonin, enteramine and 5-HT were the same substance, the compound was synthesized and efforts with a view to analyze 5-HT receptors were performed. On the basis of the actions of 5-HT and other drugs on several smooth muscle experimental preparations, it was originally suggested that 5-HT could act via different receptors. Thus, Gaddum and Picarelli proposed the "D" and "M" classification based on the differential sensitivity of guinea pig ileum 5-HT-induced contraction to some drugs. Later on, this classification was confronted with the new Peroutka's 5-HT, and 5-HT2 classification derived from radioligand binding studies. Since these 5-HT receptors were being referred to by many names, an international committee formulated some criteria for the characterization and a framework for the nomenclature of 5-HT receptors into 5-HT1, 5-HT2 and 5-HT3 categories. More recently, functional evidence unrelated to activation of the above 5-HT receptor types was given and a new 5-HT (5-HT4) receptor was proposed to exist. From this stage, molecular biologists have been cloning several 5-HT receptors which are different from the various receptors (sub)types characterized thus far. This review is focused on the discovery of 5-HT and the evolution of the classification of 5-HT receptors, from historical remarks to the modern concepts about receptor characterization; furthermore, the relevance of this development to medical research is considered.     

Do African American mothers really “love” their sons and “raise” their daughters?

This study assessed 1500 adolescents from the National Longitudinal Study of Youth to test the hypothesis that African American mothers differentially socialize their girls and boys. The results showed that later-born boys had fewer chores, argued more with their mothers, lived in less cognitively stimulating homes, and were not allowed to make the same decisions as were the girls or firstborn boys at the same age. The later-born boys were also lowest in achievement and highest in externalizing behaviors. Parenting differences accounted for the achievement differences but not for the externalizing behavior differences. It was concluded that the later-born boys would achieve at the same rates as their siblings if they were socialized in the same manner as their siblings. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do children profit from looking beyond looks? From similarity-based to cue abstraction processes in multiple-cue judgment.

The authors investigated the ability of 9- to 11-year-olds and of adults to use similarity-based and rule-based processes as a function of task characteristics in a task that can be considered either a categorization task or a multiple-cue judgment task, depending on the nature of the criterion (binary vs. continuous). Both children and adults relied on similarity-based processes in the categorization task. However, adults relied on cue abstraction in the multiple-cue judgment task, whereas the majority of children continued to rely on similarity-based processes. Reliance on cue abstraction resulted in better judgments for adults but not for children in the multiple-cue judgment task. This suggests that 9- to 11-year-olds may have defaulted to similarity-based processes because they were not able to employ a cue abstraction process efficiently. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Communicating in Dynamic Conditions: How Do On-Site Construction Project Managers Do It?

A great many of today’s construction projects are characterized by high levels of dynamics, namely, the combined effect of complexity, uncertainty, and speed. Managing projects under such conditions is difficult and challenging, and the question is asked: How do managers do it? Aspiring to answer this question, ten excellent on-site construction project managers were systematically observed during one workweek each, within an extensive study that examined their performance in their dynamic management environments. The structured observation and documentation and the analysis that followed them enabled us to characterize the managers’ work and exposed their unique modes of operation through which they consistently excel in their work. Among many aspects addressed by the said study, this paper focuses on communication and, using various measures, examines the intensiveness and extensiveness of communication performed by the PMs in the broad context of their work. The study found that the on-site construction PMs were strongly oriented toward verbal communication of information (during nearly 80% of their activities and time); they spent a major portion of their workdays in meetings (during 60% of their activities, and of which nearly 80% were unplanned); and they showed clear preference for interacting informally with no more than one or two other persons (during 93% of their activities and 88% of the time). The unique knowledge base resulting from this study constitutes a potential contribution for practitioners who are required to function in similar dynamic work environments, as well as for students, teachers, and researchers of construction management.     

Exercise in hypertensive children and adolescents: any harm done?

Hypertensive children and adolescents are frequently arbitrarily excluded from sports or exercise because of the fear of possible complications, such as stroke or myocardial infarction. No hypertensive children have had exercise-related morbidity or mortality in the reviewed literature. No restriction from dynamic exercise seems warranted; training has led to reductions in blood pressure in hypertensive youth. Isometric exercise is more hotly debated. Because no complications of exercise have been reported, the author prefers to allow participation if no target organ damage is present. Life-long maintenance of habitual physical activity may help prevent adult-onset essential hypertension.     

Are there "autistic-like" features in congenitally blind children?

Reduced levels of serum albumin concentration, a routine blood test, within the "normal" range have been reported to be associated with mortality risk. The literature is reviewed, with a focus on cohort studies meeting specified criteria, and findings are summarized. In studies of many populations, comprising healthy subjects and patients with acute or chronic illness, serum albumin concentration is inversely related to mortality risk in a graded manner over its entire range; the estimated increase in the odds of death ranges from 24% to 56% for each 2.5 g/l decrement in serum albumin concentration. The association predicts overall and cause-specific mortality including cardiovascular mortality. It is likely that albumin concentration is a highly sensitive indicator of preclinical disease and disease severity. A direct protective effect of the albumin molecule is suggested by the persistence of the association after adjustment for other known risk factors and preexisting illness, and after exclusion of early mortality. Although biologically plausible, there is no direct evidence for this hypothesis. Serum albumin concentration is an independent predictor of mortality risk and could be useful in the quantification of risk in a broad range of clinical and research settings.     

Caught in the middle? Occupancy in multiple roles and help to parents in a national probability sample of Canadian adults

This article considers, for a Canadian national probability sample of middle-aged women and men, the question of how typical is the experience of being "caught in the middle" between being the adult child of elderly parents and other roles. Three roles are examined: adult child, employed worker, and parent (and a refinement of the parent role, being a parent of a co-resident child). Occupancy in multiple roles is examined, followed by an investigation of the extent to which adults in various role combinations actually assist older parents and whether those who provide frequent help are also those "sandwiched" by competing commitments. The majority of middle-aged children do not provide frequent help to parents. Notably, the highest proportion of daughters who assist elderly parents are those in their fifties whose children are no longer co-resident. For both sons and daughters, being "caught in the middle" is far from a typical experience in this cross-sectional analysis.     

Relationship between preschool teachers’ reports of children’s behavior and their behavior toward those children.

The relationships between preschool children and their teachers are an important component of the quality of the preschool experience. This study used attribution theory as a framework to better understand these relationships, examining the connection between teachers’ perceptions of children’s behavior and teachers’ behavior toward those children. One hundred seven preschool children and 24 preschool teachers participated in this study. Two teachers reported on each child’s behavior using the Teacher Report Form of the Child Behavior Checklist. Commands and praise directed toward children by the teachers in the study were coded from classroom videotapes. Teachers gave more commands to children that they perceived as having greater general behavior problems, even after controlling for the shared variance in the other classroom teacher’s report of the child’s behavior. Implications for school psychologists, teachers, and researchers are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is it possible to improve sleep in children? A research on health education in nursery schools

An educational project in nursery schools was carried out with the aim to improve children's sleep. Its effectiveness was tested in terms of awareness of families and length of sleep of children. The method was a prevention trial based on the random division of classes of 3-year old into two groups (intervention group and control group) comprising children enrolled in nursery schools in the Rh?ne region (France) in 1992. The project, lasting 2 years, relied on physicians from the community (Maternal, Child Health Service and School Health Service), their role being to mobilise the teaching teams, distribute specific teaching tools and raise awareness of families to respect the sleep patterns of children, during routine medical examinations. The study was carried out in 140 nursery schools with 1,500 children in each group. The evaluation was based on the application of a logistical regression model taking potentially confounding factors into account, and an analysis in sub-groups in order to demonstrate the effectiveness of intervention on particularly exposed groups. The results show: 1) the feasibility of such an intervention among nursery school children on a large scale, 2) the effectiveness of the action, with a reduction of the risk of "poor knowledge" among parents (OR = 0.76), particularly in urban areas, and a reduction in the risk "short nights" in the sub-group of children who had " little sleep at 3 years" in low social class families (OR = 0.50).     

Chronic and acute stressors among military personnel: Do coping styles buffer their negative impact on health?

This study examined the moderating impact of positive and negative coping styles on the relationship of acute and chronic job stressors with self-reported health symptoms of 521 military personnel. The number of acute work-related events was associated with a high frequency of self-reported symptoms. Similarly, role ambiguity, overload, and lack of job stimulation were associated with increased symptoms. Only the negative coping styles (i.e., venting of negative emotions and denial/disengagement) were uniquely associated with symptoms. Only 5 of the 13 proposed Stressor?×?Coping interactions were significant, and they all involved the negative coping styles. That is, instead of alleviating the negative outcomes of work stressors, these coping styles were associated with high strain, regardless of the amount of stressor, and, in some cases, these coping styles exacerbated the negative effect of the stressor on the strain outcomes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do organizational strategies mediate nonverbal memory impairment in drug-na?ve patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder?

Objective: The present study aimed to examine nonverbal memory and organizational skill functions in psychotropic-na?ve patients with OCD. Method: Forty-one drug-na?ve, 41 medicated OCD patients and 41 healthy controls, all of whom were matched for gender, age, education and intelligence, were included in the study. The Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure Test (RCFT) was administered to evaluate nonverbal memory ability and organizational skill. Results: OCD patients demonstrated impaired nonverbal memory irrespective of medication status (F = 6.54, p 2p = .098 for immediate recall; F = 7.76, p p = .114 for delayed recall). Medicated patients showed deficits in organizational strategies (η2p = .079), which mediated nonverbal memory impairment (Z = ?2.20, p = .027). The difference of organizational skill between drug-na?ve and control groups did not reach statistical significance (η2p = .054) and the association between organization and nonverbal memory was weak in the drug-na?ve sample (Z = ?1.74, = .081). There was no significant difference between the patient groups in RCFT indices. Conclusions: Our findings suggest that the organizational strategies may not be an effective mediator of nonverbal memory impairment in OCD and indicate that the clinical characteristics may be important to be considered in future research. Further studies are needed to improve understanding of the nature of nonverbal memory dysfunction in OCD. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do interactions between personality and social-environmental factors explain smoking development in adolescence?

This study examined if the effects of peer smoking, family smoking, and parenting on smoking development during adolescence are moderated by personality characteristics of adolescents. Longitudinal data were obtained from 428 adolescents (aged M = 13.4, SD = .50) and their parents. Latent Growth Curve models assessed the development of smoking as a function of predictors and if effects of smoking-specific parenting and exposure to smoking were moderated by adolescents’ Big Five personality dimensions. Findings revealed that having peers who smoked was associated with an increased likelihood of being a smoker at baseline. Further, significant interactions revealed that adolescents lower in agreeableness were more likely to be a smoker at baseline if they had an older sibling who smoked or if their parents engaged in frequent smoking-related discussions with them and that effective smoking-specific conversation was more strongly related to smoking at baseline among adolescents who were highly emotionally stable. No interactions predicted growth in smoking over time yet significant main effects showed that growth in smoking was associated with higher levels of extraversion, lower levels of emotional stability, and less effective parental smoking-specific communication. This study highlights the relevance of personality-target interventions and policy programs directed at parents and peers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The agonistic metaphor in psychotherapy: Should clients battle their blues?

A tradition stretching back to early Greek philosophy has described the mind as a field of struggle or even battle. This comparison has been termed the agonistic metaphor, based on the Hellenistic notion of athletic contests. Today, it is not uncommon for psychotherapists and the general public to seek solutions to mental health problems agonistically. Examples of this are cited from major psychodynamic, cognitive, behavioral, family, and humanistic theorists, and advantages and disadvantages of the metaphor are explored. Although agonistic thinking can energize clients and ennoble the therapeutic journey, it runs the risk of ignoring educative aspects of problematic situations and ironically perpetuating the resistance it predicts. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Change in posttraumatic stress disorder symptoms: Do clinicians and patients agree?

This study assessed the longitudinal association between clinician and patient ratings of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms over the course of 2 different randomized clinical trials of veterans with chronic PTSD. One trial, the Department of Veterans Affairs Cooperative Study 420 (CSP 420; N = 360) compared trauma-focused and present-centered group therapies, and the 2nd trial compared cognitive processing theory and a waitlist control condition (N = 60). Linear mixed effects modeling revealed significant associations between clinician ratings (Clinician-Administered PTSD Scale; CAPS; D. D. Blake et al., 1990) and patient ratings (Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Checklist; PCL; F. W. Weathers, B. T. Litz, J. A. Herman, J. A. Huska, & T. M. Keane, 1993) in total and symptom clusters of PTSD. Contrary to hypothesis, the amount of change on the CAPS ranged from .75 to .82 standard deviations for every 1 standard deviation change on the PCL. The CAPS and PCL were more closely associated in the trauma-focused vs. present-centered treatment condition in CSP 420, and especially regarding hyperarousal symptoms. When comparing categorization of clinically significant change on the CAPS and PCL, the authors found no differences in the percentages of agreement between clinicians and patients in improvement and exacerbation. The value of multimodal assessment of PTSD treatment outcomes is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do treatment manuals undermine youth–therapist alliance in community clinical practice?

Objective: Some critics of treatment manuals have argued that their use may undermine the quality of the client–therapist alliance. This notion was tested in the context of youth psychotherapy delivered by therapists in community clinics. Method: Seventy-six clinically referred youths (57% female, age 8–15 years, 34% Caucasian) were randomly assigned to receive nonmanualized usual care or manual-guided treatment to address anxiety or depressive disorders. Treatment was provided in community clinics by clinic therapists randomly assigned to treatment condition. Youth–therapist alliance was measured with the Therapy Process Observational Coding System—Alliance (TPOCS–A) scale at 4 points throughout treatment and with the youth report Therapeutic Alliance Scale for Children (TASC) at the end of treatment. Results: Youths who received manual-guided treatment had significantly higher observer-rated alliance than usual care youths early in treatment; the 2 groups converged over time, and mean observer-rated alliance did not differ by condition. Similarly, the manual-guided and usual care groups did not differ on youth report of alliance. Conclusions: Our findings did not support the contention that using manuals to guide treatment harms the youth–therapist alliance. In fact, use of manuals was related to a stronger alliance in the early phase of treatment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do neuropsychological tests have the same meaning in Spanish speakers as they do in English speakers?

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine whether neuropsychological tests translated into Spanish measure the same cognitive constructs as the original English versions. Method: Older adult participants (N = 2,664), who did not exhibit dementia from the Washington Heights Inwood Columbia Aging Project (WHICAP), a community-based cohort from northern Manhattan, were evaluated with a comprehensive neuropsychological battery. The study cohort includes both English (n = 1,800) and Spanish speakers (n = 864) evaluated in their language of preference. Invariance analyses were conducted across language groups on a structural equation model comprising four neuropsychological factors (memory, language, visual-spatial ability, and processing speed). Results: The results of the analyses indicated that the four-factor model exhibited partial measurement invariance, demonstrated by invariant factor structure and factor loadings but nonequivalent observed score intercepts. Conclusion: The finding of invariant factor structure and factor loadings provides empirical evidence to support the implicit assumption that scores on neuropsychological tests are measuring equivalent psychological traits across these two language groups. At the structural level, the model exhibited invariant factor variances and covariances. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Welfare reform--are our children cared for?

Welfare reform is the talk of the nation. Since the inception of our country, we have struggled with how to care for the poor and have engaged in various reform methods; however, the poor are still with us. The latest attempt at providing jobs for the millions on AFDC was signed into law in August 1996 by President Clinton. This attempt to end "welfare as we know it" provides many challenges and risks to states and local governments. The groups most affected by this latest attempt to change the system are children and immigrants. How these groups will fare remains to be seen as states now have a fixed amount of money to address the issues of moving families from welfare to work by the year 2002. The attempt to transfer families from welfare to work is multifaceted and will require that state lawmakers be innovative and resourceful.     

Do reaction times in the perruchet effect reflect variations in the strength of an associative link?

In 3 experiments, we examined Perruchet, Cleeremans, and Destrebecqz’s (2006) double dissociation of cued reaction time (RT) and target expectancy. In this design, participants receive a tone on every trial and are required to respond as quickly as possible to a square presented on 50% of those trials (a partial reinforcement schedule). Participants are faster to respond to the square following many recent tone–square pairings and slower to respond following many tone-alone presentations. Of importance, expectancy of the square is highest when performance on the RT task is poorest—following many tone-alone trials. This finding suggests that RT performance is determined by the strength of a tone–square link and that this link is the product of a non-expectancy-based learning mechanism. The present experiments, however, provide evidence that the speeded RTs are not the consequence of the strengthening and weakening of a tone–square link. Thus, the RT Perruchet effect does not provide evidence for a non-expectancy-based link-formation mechanism. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do intercultural experiences affect attitudes?

The attitudes and personality traits of 183 secondary school and college students who went to Europe in the summer of 1950 were tested before and after their trip. The principal findings of the study are: (1) S's who establish close personal ties with Europeans are more likely than others to engage in international oriented activities. (2) An unstructured, heterogeneous intercultural experience does not have a significant impact on social attitudes. (3) Knowledge of a S's pre-existing attitudes is a better predictor of response to an intercultural experience than knowledge of the experience itself. (4) There are significant personality differences between world minded and nationalistic S's. (5) Changes in attitude can be measured over a two month interval. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Do Medicare HMOs cost shift?

We tested the hypothesis that health maintenance organizations (HMOs) increase their commercial premiums when Medicare pays less. Such a linkage would be taken as evidence of "cost shifting." Other studies have tested the cost-shifting hypothesis among health care providers, but this is the first to examine the HMO industry. Our data consisted of annual observations on all HMOs that operated in the United States between 1990 and 1995 and had a Medicare risk contract. A comparison group of HMOs that had no Medicare contract during that period also was analyzed. The main finding from this study is that HMOs have not shifted costs from Medicare to commercial premiums. This results supports the skeptical consensus that is developing toward the cost-shifting hypothesis. Additional findings include the negative effects of competition and for-profit status on HMOs' commercial premiums.