Expository Text Comprehension in the Primary Grade Classroom.

This study investigates the effectiveness of an instructional program designed to teach 2nd graders how to comprehend compare-contrast expository text. Along with introducing new content (animal classification), the program emphasizes text structure via clue words, a sequence of questions, and a graphic organizer, and via the close analysis of specially constructed exemplar paragraphs. The authors compared the program with (a) more traditional instruction that focused only on the new content and (b) a no instruction control; 128 7- and 8-year-olds participated. Classroom teachers provided the instruction. The program improved students' ability to comprehend compare-contrast texts. Students were able to demonstrate transfer to uninstructed compare-contrast texts though not to text structures other than compare-contrast. Moreover, the text structure instruction did not detract from their ability to learn new content. The results provide evidence, heretofore lacking, that explicit instruction in comprehension is feasible and effective as early as the 2nd grade. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cardiovascular reactivity during social and nonsocial stressors: Do children's personal goals and expressive skills matter?

The relationships between social competence and cardiovascular reactivity were evaluated in 180 children (ages 8-17; 52% female; 53% Caucasian). Participants performed a social task (Social Competence Interview [SCI]) and 2 nonsocial tasks while reactivity measures were obtained. Social competence was coded from SCI audiotapes. Among adolescents, higher scores on the Acceptance-Affiliation subscale were associated with increased heart rate (HR) and blood pressures and with decreased HR variability during the SCI. Among boys, greater Acceptance-Affiliation scores were associated with increased vascular reactivity during the SCI. During the nonsocial tasks, higher Self-Defensiveness and Expressiveness scores were associated with increased cardiac output and stroke volume among African American children. Personal strivings and expressive skills do matter for understanding cardiovascular responses in children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The Treatment Beliefs Questionnaire (TBQ): An instrument to assess beliefs about children's mood disorders and concomitant treatment needs.

Parent and child beliefs about the child's mood disorder and need for treatment may affect the willingness of the patient and his or her family to participate in and adhere to treatment recommendations. Such beliefs may also affect mental health treatment outcomes. However, there is a paucity of research in this area, which is further reflected in a lack of assessment instruments. The present study describes the creation and initial psychometric evaluation of parent and child versions of the Treatment Beliefs Questionnaire (TBQ) in a sample of 8- to 11-year-old children with a primary mood disorder and comorbid psychiatric conditions. Preliminary results support the reliability and validity of these scales in this population. The role of health beliefs in mental health treatment adherence and treatment outcome is addressed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Cognitive factors differentiating attention deficit–hyperactivity disorder with and without a comorbid mood disorder.

Mood disorders and attention deficit–hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) co-occur in 20–30% of children and adolescents diagnosed in both epidemiological and clinical studies, but little information is available regarding cognitive factors that may be relevant to the expression of co-occurring mood disorders and ADHD. This study examined whether ADHD with and without a comorbid mood disorder could be differentiated on the basis of cognitive factors associated with prominent theories of depression. Children meeting diagnostic criteria for ADHD (n?=?14) or ADHD and a comorbid mood disorder (n?=?27) were assessed on a variety of cognitive indices. Children in the comorbid group reported more negative views of themselves and a more depressogenic attributional style. Cognitive disturbances associated with A. T. Beck's (1967) cognitive model and attributional style theories of depression differentiate ADHD children with significant mood pathology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Distinctive late-life challenges: Implications for coping and well-being.

Two distinctive late-life challenges, community relocation and caring for an adult child with mental retardation, were studied to determine their influence on coping and well-being. These challenges differ in terms of their normativeness, duration, and whether they were expected. Data from 2 ongoing longitudinal studies (N?=?449) were used to test the hypotheses that women experiencing residential relocation would report higher well-being and use problem-focused coping more frequently than women with long-term caregiving responsibilities. As predicted, more positive changes in well-being across time were reported by the relocation sample, which also showed more problem-focused coping. Women in the caregiving sample, however, showed stronger relationships between coping and well-being, underscoring possible gains in expertise that accompany challenges of lengthy duration. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

What Is Perseverated in Schizophrenia? Evidence of Abnormal Response Plasticity in the Saccadic System.

Although perseveration is sometimes attributed to defective set switching, the authors have recently shown that set-switching is normal in schizophrenia. In this article, the authors tested for persistent states of the saccadic response system, rather than set perseveration. Schizophrenic and healthy subjects performed antisaccades and prosaccades. The authors analyzed for 3 carry-over effects. First, whereas the latency of the current saccade correlated with that of the prior saccade in both groups, the correlations under mixed-task conditions declined in healthy but not in schizophrenic subjects. Second, antisaccades in penultimate trials delayed upcoming saccades in schizophrenic but not in healthy subjects. Third, schizophrenic subjects were more likely to erroneously perseverate the direction of a prior antisaccade but not a prior prosaccade. The authors concluded that, in schizophrenia, the effects of correct antisaccades are persistent not weak. Saccades in schizophrenia are characterized by perseveration of antisaccade-induced changes in the saccadic response system rather than failures to switch task set. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Fully Bayesian estimation of Gibbs hyperparameters for emission computed tomography data

In recent years, many investigators have proposed Gibbs prior models to regularize images reconstructed from emission computed tomography data. Unfortunately, hyperparameters used to specify Gibbs priors can greatly influence the degree of regularity imposed by such priors and, as a result, numerous procedures have been proposed to estimate hyperparameter values from observed image data. Many of these procedures attempt to maximize the joint posterior distribution on the image scene. To implement these methods, approximations to the joint posterior densities are required, because the dependence of the Gibbs partition function on the hyperparameter values is unknown. In this paper, we use recent results in Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) sampling to estimate the relative values of Gibbs partition functions and using these values, sample from joint posterior distributions on image scenes. This allows for a fully Bayesian procedure which does not fix the hyperparameters at some estimated or specified value, but enables uncertainty about these values to be propagated through to the estimated intensities. We utilize realizations from the posterior distribution for determining credible regions for the intensity of the emission source. We consider two different Markov random field (MRF) models-the power model and a line-site model. As applications we estimate the posterior distribution of source intensities from computer simulated data as well as data collected from a physical single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) phantom.     

Relationships among aspects of student alienation and self concept.

This study investigated the relationships among previous experiences of student alienation and the various aspects of self concept. A total of 351 undergraduate students were administered the Student Alienation and Trauma Survey-Revised (SATS-R) and the Tennessee Self Concept Scale: Second Edition (TSCS:2). Students were asked to report on their worst experience in school, symptoms they had following this worst experience, and overall feelings about themselves. Results indicated a moderate negative correlation between self concept and student alienation. A stepwise multiple regression analysis indicated that among the subtests of the SATS-R, Hopelessness, and General Maladjustment scores best predicted poor student self concept. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Stability and change in the complexity of senatorial debate: Testing the cognitive versus rhetorical style hypotheses.

Tested the cognitive vs rhetorical style hypothesis (conservatives have more simplistic rhetorical, not cognitive styles than liberals or moderates) by assessing the integrative complexity of 10 paragraph-sized statements of 81 senators in 5 US Congresses: 3 dominated by liberals and moderates (the 82nd, 94th, and 96th Congresses) and 2 dominated by conservatives (the 83rd and 97th Congresses). Results show that liberals and moderates were more complex than conservatives in the 82nd, 94th, and 96th Congresses but that these differences among ideological groups were much less pronounced in the 83rd and 97th Congresses. The change in pattern was due to sharp declines in the complexity of liberals and, to a lesser extent, moderates in conservative-dominated sessions, not to an increase in the complexity in conservatives. Conservatives displayed more traitlike stability in integrative complexity both within and across Congressional sessions. It is suggested that the integrative complexity of senatorial debate may be a joint product of relatively context-specific styles of political impression management and relatively stable cognitive styles of organizing the political world. (41 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)