Using bald eagles to indicate the health of the Great Lakes' environment

The bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) is one of the most studied birds of North America, and a great amount of natural life‐history information, including the response of various stressors on the eagles' ability to reproduce, are well known. In Michigan, the eagle has been chosen to track the trends of bioaccumulative compounds of concern across watersheds in the state. The state has been divided into major watersheds, and 20% of these are surveyed each year. A control area in northern Minnesota, Voyageurs National Park, is also sampled annually. We report here on the methods used, the preliminary results of the 1999 field season, and how differences in mercury concentrations varied over a 10‐year period. Mercury in feathers of nestling eagles declined over time only in Lakes Michigan and Huron, but have not decreased among other subpopulations in Michigan. Concentrations of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) and 4,4′‐DDE in blood plasma from nestling eagles have declined over time for most subpopulations; however, they remain greater for breeding areas associated with the Great Lakes' food web. Sea eagles of the genus Haliaeetus are a good sentinel species to track trends in bioaccumulative compounds in aquatic systems.     

Making LibGuides Work: Student Interviews and Usability Tests

This article discusses student use of and feedback on LibGuides in an academic library. The authors conducted interviews and usability tests with on-campus and distance students to determine their preferences and expectations, as well as to identify specific pain points. Based on the findings, the authors changed LibGuides best practices at their institution and overhauled the LibGuides index page.     

Who said what? Source memory for narrator and character agents in literary short stories.

One dimension of reading literacy involves the tracking of agents associated with the text. In a literary short story, there is a society of character agents and pragmatic agents. This study investigated the relative salience of different classes of agents in memory. Two experiments measured source memory as an index of agent salience in long-term memory. Patterns of source memory scores supported an invisible third-person narrator hypothesis and an agent amalgamation hypothesis, but not a structural prominence hypothesis: First-person narrator > nonnarrator character > third-person narrator > 0. Statement detection parameters did not significantly differ among the 3 classes of agents, so differences in source memory could not be explained by differences in the content of the speech acts. Source memory scores also could not be explained by surface features of the text, differences among readers, and sophisticated guessing on the basis of a story abstract. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Detection of adulteration of locust bean gum with guar gum by capillary electrophoresis and polarized light microscopy

Capillary electrophoresis (CE) and polarized light microscopy (PLM) were utilized in the detection of the adulteration of locust bean gum with guar gum. For CE analyses, standards of locust bean and guar gums were extracted with 30% CH₃CN, removing the residual proteins from the gum matrix. A 8.75 mM NaH₂PO₄-20.6 mM Na₂B₄O₇ buffer, pH 9, was used to separate these proteins and to identify marker proteins that were present in the guar gum. These markers did not co-migrate with components in the extracts of mechanically processed locust bean gum, and are used as indicators of adulteration. Using PLM with toluidine blue and iodine staining techniques, unadulterated locust bean gum samples were distinguished from mixed samples through the differential staining of components in locust bean versus guar and tara gums. These experiments in the use of CE and PLM provide orthogonal and complementary methods for the verification of 'true' positives and the elimination of 'false' positives.     

MMPI and Rorschach: Three decades of research.

Research references on the Rorschach and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) were counted for each year, 1950–1985, to analyze the trends noted by W. M. Reynolds and N. D. Sundberg (see record 1979-00119-001) and to test their prediction that research on personality tests would decline after 1971. Results show that there was a decline between 1971 and 1975. However, the number of Rorschach references leveled off after 1975, and there was a resurgence of interest in MMPI research. Recent data suggest that both tests continue to be popular topics for published research. (11 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Religious orientation and overt versus covert racial prejudice.

Tested the prediction that being more religious in one way—as an intrinsic end in itself—would be associated with displaying less racial prejudice when the prejudice was overt, but not when it was covert. It was also predicted that being more religious in another way—as an open-end quest—would be associated with displaying less racial prejudice even when the prejudice was covert. An attributional ambiguity technique developed by M. L. Snyder et al (see record 1981-05489-001) was used. 44 White undergraduates interested in religion chose between sitting with a Black person or a White person to watch a movie. In the overt prejudice condition, the same movie was being shown in both locations; in the covert prejudice condition, 2 movies were being shown. Although not all predicted relations were statistically reliable, the pattern of correlations was consistent with both predictions. An intrinsic orientation to religion was significantly negatively correlated with choosing to sit with the White person in the overt condition, but this correlation was close to zero in the covert condition. Only the quest orientation to religion was significantly negatively correlated with choosing to sit with the White person in the covert condition. (12 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Delineation of female performance on the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure.

103 female college students (aged 18–24 yrs) were administered the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure on Copy, Immediate Recall, and 20-min Delayed Recall. Ss were grouped based on handedness, familial handedness, and academic major (mathematics/science and nonmath/science). Based on the scoring system of D. Waber and J. Holmes (see PA, Vols 72:24305 and 74:9917) the mathematics/science anomalous dominance groups obtained higher mean scores than all other subgroups, and the non-math/science familial right-handers were the low performers. The high-performing groups may have an increased ability to coordinate the use of left- and right-hemisphere processing. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Hypnosis, reporting bias, and suggested negative hallucinations.

Examined the role of reporting bias in hypnotic negative hallucinations by using a paradigm in which reporting bias was assessed independently of perceptual change. In Exp 1, highly hypnotizable Ss reported significant loudness reductions when tested for hypnotic deafness. Later, however, these Ss biased their reported loudness reductions in the absence of perceptual change, and their reporting bias scores were almost as large as their hypnotic deafness reports. Ss also biased their ratings of strategy use. In Exp 2, ratings of blindness given in response to a hypnotic negative visual hallucination suggestion were significantly correlated with reporting bias scores obtained in this paradigm. Although hypnotic blindness and hypnotic deafness correlated significantly, the partial correlation between these variables was nonsignificant when reporting bias scores were statistically controlled. Theoretical implications are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Clinical management of anxiety disorders in psychiatric settings: Psychology's impact on evidence-based treatment of children and adults.

The role of psychologists in psychiatric settings has evolved over the past century from primarily conducting psychological evaluations to being the vital and integral link (sometimes the only such link) to the delivery of scientifically sound assessment and treatment methods. Consequently, the role of the psychologist, with respect to the scientist-practitioner model, has expanded to include collaborator with, consultant to, and teacher of our colleagues in psychiatry. In the integrated areas of research and treatment of anxiety disorders, psychologists have been at the forefront of developing, evaluating, and disseminating empirically supported methods for the range of these conditions in children, adolescents, and adults. Issues common to psychologists practicing in psychiatric settings are discussed in this article, specifically with reference to the tasks and issues encountered by the anxiety specialist. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)