Stages of change and decisional balance for 12 problem behaviors.

Investigated the generalization of the transtheoretical model across 12 problem behaviors. The cross-sectional comparisons involved relationships between 2 key constructs of the model, the stages of change and decisional balance. The behaviors studied were smoking cessation, quitting cocaine, weight control, high-fat diets, adolescent delinquent behaviors, safer sex, condom use, sunscreen use, radon gas exposure, exercise acquisition, mammography screening, and physicians' preventive practices with smokers. Clear commonalities were observed across the 12 areas, including both the internal structure of the measures and the pattern of changes in decisional balance across stages. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Autominder: an intelligent cognitive orthotic system for people with memory impairment

The world’s population is aging at a phenomenal rate. Certain types of cognitive decline, in particular some forms of memory impairment, occur much more frequently in the elderly. This paper describes Autominder, a cognitive orthotic system intended to help older adults adapt to cognitive decline and continue the satisfactory performance of routine activities, thereby potentially enabling them to remain in their own homes longer. Autominder achieves this goal by providing adaptive, personalized reminders of (basic, instrumental, and extended) activities of daily living. Cognitive orthotic systems on the market today mainly provide alarms for prescribed activities at fixed times that are specified in advance. In contrast, Autominder uses a range of AI techniques to model an individual’s daily plans, observe and reason about the execution of those plans, and make decisions about whether and when it is most appropriate to issue reminders. Autominder is currently deployed on a mobile robot, and is being developed as part of the Initiative on Personal Robotic Assistants for the Elderly (the Nursebot project).     

The effect of test conditions on apparent smoke density from various materials

Four samples of thermoplastics and nine samples of wood were evaluated for smoke evolution in the Aminco-NBS smoke chamber under piloted (flaming) conditions, using two different types of pilot burners, and in the Arapahoe chamber. Product Safety Corporation     

Inferences of ability and effort: Evidence for two different processes.

In 2 experiments, 295 undergraduates judged either ability (given performance and effort information) or effort (given performance and ability information) where both the reliability and value of the given information varied. Ss made judgments of IQ (or study time) based on information about the effort a person expended in studying (or IQ), student's performance, or both. Individual differences were found in the judged relationship between ability and effort. Some judged ability and effort to be positively related, whereas others judged ability and effort to be negatively related. These groups also differed in the way information reliability influenced their judgments. The positive group showed effects that agree with either an averaging or correlational model: Higher reliability of one type of information was correlated with a lesser effect of the other type of information. For the negative group, an increase in the reliability of one type of information actually increased the effect of the other type of information, a result that is inconsistent with the averaging model. Both an expectancy-contrast model and a correlational model can account for the results of the negative group. The different effects of information reliability for the 2 groups can be interpreted as evidence of 2 different inference processes. Results show flexibility of human judgment strategies and the need for research considering variables that influence strategy use. (24 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Psychosocial considerations for mass decontamination

Mass exposure to explosions, infectious agents, foodborne illnesses, chemicals or radiological materials may require mass decontamination that have critical psychosocial implications for the public and for both traditional and non-traditional responders in terms of impact and of response. Five main issues are common to mass decontamination events: (i) perception, (ii) somatisation, (iii) media role and communication, (iv) information sharing, (v) behavioural guidance and (vi) organisational issues. Empirical evidence is drawn from a number of cases, including Chernobyl; Goiania, Brazil; the sarin gas attack in Tokyo; the anthrax attacks in the USA; Three Mile Island; and by features of the 2003 severe acute respiratory syndrome pandemic. In this paper, a common platform for mass casualty management is explored and suggestions for mass interventions are proposed across the complete event timeline, from pre-event threat and warning stages through to the impact and reconstruction phases. Implication for responders, healthcare and emergency infrastructure, public behaviour, screening processes, risk communication and media management are described.     

The logic of interpreting evidence of developmental ordering: Strong inference and categorical measures.

Developmental ordering is a fundamental prediction of developmental theories and a central issue in developmental research. However, logically sound evidence of developmental ordering is difficult to obtain. This article analyzes the logical basis of testing developmental order hypotheses with categorical measures. Depending on whether saltatory (i.e., discrete) or continuous developmental changes are being assessed, the observed relationship between categorical measures yields very different types of information about developmental ordering. When change is continuous, the relationship between the measures does not confirm any one ordering hypothesis, but rather, disconfirms one or more hypotheses. Whether an underlying variable undergoes saltatory or continuous development has long been recognized as an important theoretical issue, but its impact on the interpretation of developmental ordering has not previously been explicated. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Variations in recollection: The effects of complexity on source recognition.

Whether recollection is a threshold or signal detection process is highly controversial, and the controversy has centered in part on the shape of receiver operating characteristics (ROCs) and z-transformed ROCs (zROCs). U-shaped zROCs observed in tests thought to rely heavily on recollection, such as source memory tests, have provided evidence in favor of the threshold assumption, but zROCs are not always as U-shaped as threshold theory predicts. Source zROCs have been shown to become more linear when the contribution of familiarity to source discriminations is increased, and this may account for the existing results. However, another way in which source zROCs may become more linear is if the recollection threshold begins to break down and recollection becomes more graded and Gaussian. We tested the “graded recollection” account in the current study. We found that increasing stimulus complexity (i.e., changing from single words to sentences) or increasing source complexity (i.e., changing the sources from audio to videos of speakers) resulted in flatter source zROCs. In addition, conditions expected to reduce recollection (i.e., divided attention and amnesia) had comparable effects on source memory in simple and complex conditions, suggesting that differences between simple and complex conditions were due to differences in the nature of recollection, rather than differences in the utility of familiarity. The results suggest that under conditions of high complexity, recollection can appear more graded, and it can produce curved ROCs. The results have implications for measurement models and for current theories of recognition memory. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)