Psychology Commons^™

Clinical Benefits Of Emotional Freedom Techniques On Food Cravings At 12-Months Follow-Up: A Randomized Controlled Trial, Peta Stapleton, Teri Sheldon, Brett Porter

Peta B. Stapleton

This randomized, single-blind, crossover trial tested whether participants who used Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT) maintained reduced food cravings after 12-months and updates previously reported 6 month findings. Ninety-six overweight/obese adults were allocated to a 4-week EFT treatment or wait list condition. Degree of food craving, perceived power of food, restraint capabilities, and psychological symptoms were assessed pre- and post-test and at 12-month follow-up for collapsed groups. Significant improvements occurred in weight, body mass index, food cravings, subjective power of food, craving restraint, and psychological coping for EFT participants from pre-test to 12 months (p < .05). It appears EFT can result in participants maintaining reduced cravings over time and affect weight and BMI in overweight and obese individuals.

Disentangling Self-Stigma: Are Mental Illness And Help-Seeking Self-Stigmas Different?, Jeritt Tucker, Joseph Hammer, David Vogel, Bitman Rachel, Wade Nathaniel, Maier Emily

Jeritt R. Tucker, M.S.

Two established but disparate lines of research exist: studies examining the self-stigma associated with mental illness and studies examining the self-stigma associated with seeking psychological help. Whereas some researchers have implicitly treated these 2 constructs as synonymous, others have made the argument that they are theoretically and empirically distinct. To help clarify this debate, we examined in the present investigation the overlap and uniqueness of the self-stigmas associated with mental illness and with seeking psychological help. Data were collected from a sample of college undergraduates experiencing clinical levels of psychological distress (N = 217) and a second sample of community …

Examining School-Level Variation In The Relationship Between Psat/Nmsqt Scores And Ap Examination Grades, J. Kopp, Dena Pastor, T. Patelis

Dena A Pastor

Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Northeastern Educational Research Association, Rocky Hill, CT.

"Toxic" Workplaces: The Negative Interface Between The Physical And Social Environments, Linda Too, Michael Harvey

Linda Too

Toxic real estate has been used as a negative phrase to describe non-performing assets on a firm's balance sheet. Today there is another form of "TOXIC" real estate that needs management's attention, i.e. physical workplaces that are harmful to employees on a day-in and day-out basis. Particularly when productivity of workforce is now central to business competitiveness, it is timely to explore the interface between physical and social environments as many of the social/psychological impacts on employees have not been recognized or calibrated. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the links between physical workplace and social behaviour.

The Perception Of Rhythmic Units In Speech By Infants And Adults, C. Echols, M. Crowhurst, Jane Childers

Jane Childers

No abstract provided.

Children Extend Both Words And Non-Verbal Actions To Novel Exemplars, Jane Childers, M. Tomasello

Jane Childers

No abstract provided.

The Role Of Pronouns In Young Children’S Acquisition Of The English Transitive Construction, Jane Childers, M. Tomasello

Jane Childers

No abstract provided.

Two 1/2-Year-Old Children Use Animacy And Syntax To Learn A New Noun, Jane Childers, C. Echols

Jane Childers

No abstract provided.

Do Patient-Reported Androgen-Deprivation Therapy Side Effects Predict Anxiety And Depression Among Prostate Cancer Patients Undergoing Radiotherapy? Implications For Psychosocial Therapy Interventions, Christopher Sharpley, Vicki Bitsika, David Christie

Vicki Bitsika

Antiandrogen therapy (AAT) is a common adjunct treatment for prostate cancer (PCa) patients and has shown significant benefits to long-term outcomes from radiation or surgery. Although AAT has some adverse side effects and data from breast cancer patients indicate that such side effects from hormonal therapies may contribute to anxiety and depression and may also hinder AAT treatment compliance, this issue has not been investigated within a sample of PCa patients. This study explores the incidence of AAT side effects in a sample of PCa patients, the links between those side effects and anxiety and depression, the possible ways in …

Do Prostate Cancer Patients Suffer More From Depressed Mood Or Anhedonia?, Christopher Sharpley, Vicki Bitsika, David Christie

Vicki Bitsika

Objective: This study aimed to compare the prevalence of depressed mood and anhedonia in a sample of men with prostate cancer (PCa) and to determine which of these key symptoms contributed most to the overall depressive status of that sample. Method: From Zung Self-rating Depression Scale (SDS) responses collected on 526 PCa patients, direct comparisons were made between the prevalence of the first two DSM-IV-TR symptoms of Major Depressive Episode. These symptoms were then tested for their predictive power on depression total score and Zung’s criteria for ‘clinically significant’ depression. Results: Mean scores for anhedonia were significantly higher than for …

How Prostate Cancer Patients Cope: Evaluation And Refinement Of The Prostate Cancer Patients' Coping Strategies Questionnaire, Christopher Sharpley, Vicki Bitsika, David Christie

Vicki Bitsika

Background: Prostate cancer (PCa) patients suffer from identifiable stressors that may cause them anxiety and/or depression. In a previous study, an initial exploration of the ways in which PCa patients seek to cope with those stressors was described. However, several methodological limitations prevented direct comparisons of the relative effectiveness of patients’ coping strategies. To further investigate this issue, a standardised format was used to present the most commonly-used coping strategies to a new sample of PCa patients and to compare the effectiveness of those strategies. Methods: A total of 147 PCa patients completed a background questionnaire and the Prostate Cancer …

Comorbidity Of Anxiety-Depression Among Australian University Students: Implications For Student Counsellors, Vicki Bitsika, Christopher Sharpley

Vicki Bitsika

The incidence, factor structure and scale item differences in anxiety-depression comorbidity were investigated in a sample of Australian university students defined according to the presence of anxiety and/or depression. The incidence of anxiety-depression comorbidity was over 32%, about four times that for anxiety or depression alone. Participants with comorbidity had significantly higher Selfrating Anxiety Scale (SAS) and Self-rating Depression Scale (SDS) total and factor scores than those with anxiety or depression alone. The major differences between the comorbid and unitary disordered subgroups were for self-disintegration and autonomic arousal. Comorbidity of anxiety and depression is a more serious disorder than either …

Differences In Neurobiological Pathways Of Four "Clinical Content" Subtypes Of Depression, Christopher Sharpley, Vicki Bitsika

Vicki Bitsika

Although often considered as a mental disorder, depression is best described as a behavioural-neurobiological phenomenon. In addition, although usually reported as a unitary diagnosis, Major Depressive Episode is composed of a range of different symptoms that can occur in nearly 1,500 possible combinations to fulfil the required diagnostic criterion. To investigate and describe the underlying behavioural and neurobiological substrates of these symptoms, they were clustered into "clinical content" subtypes of depression according to their predominant common behavioural characteristics. These subtypes were then found to possess different neurobiological pathways that argue for different treatment approaches.

A Multimodal Approach To Assessment Of Malingered Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: The Initial Validation Study Of A New Australian Instrument, Jacqueline Yoxall, Mark Bahr, Norman Barling

Mark Bahr

No abstract provided.

Assessing Differences In Emotion Recognition And Short Term Memory For Young Old, Middle Old And Older Adults, Richard Hicks, Victoria Alexander, Mark Bahr

Mark Bahr

Recently, age related cognitive decline has become an area of interest due to the maturing population. Research has identified that emotion recognition is likely to be affected by age related decline. It has also been suggested that memory subsystems may be responsible for decline. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to assess whether age related decline in emotion recognition could be accounted for by short term memory or visual memory. This study also expands on the aging literature as there is a paucity of research that compares aging across three age cohorts, as well as using relatively “young” participants. …

Stakeholder Perceptions Of Organisational Reputation, Mark Bahr, Jeni Warburton, Yolanda Van Gellecum, Margaret Shapiro

Mark Bahr

Good reputation management is becoming increasingly important as organisations and the social environments in which they function become more complex (Caruana, 2000; Bromley, 1993; Fryxell, 1994; Fombrun, 1996, 1998). Organisations are being evaluated by far more demanding standards than in the past, and are increasingly being held responsible for their environmental, social and ethical decisions as well as their economic decisions (Backer, 2001; Hanson, 2001; Inglehart, 1997; Pruzan, 2001; Schultz, 2001; Burke, 1999; Inglehart, 1994). Mishandled social, ethical and environmental issues can have dire consequences for corporate reputation. Well known and well documented examples include the Royal Dutch/Shell Brent Spar …

The Last Truth To Determine But The First To Consider: Navigating Negative Response Distortion On The Pai In A Forensic Context, Jacqueline Yoxall, Mark Bahr, Norman Barling

Mark Bahr

Negative response distortion must be a consideration for any psychologist endeavouring to measure reported psychopathology in populations for whom there exists an external incentive for a diagnosis. The Personality Assessment Inventory (Morey, 1991) is increasingly being used in psychological assessment in the forensic arena. This paper presents an overview of the validation of the negative validity indices of the PAI to interpret data from a recent archival file review of 400 individuals who participated in assessment as part of a compensation claim process or in preparation for criminal sentencing. Whilst malingering must be a standard consideration in any forensic assessment, …

Constructing A Valid Psychometric Tool: The Adolescent Depression Scale, Mona Taouk, Mark Bahr

Mark Bahr

In order to assess the impact of depression on adolescents and to achieve adequate domain coverage of the construct of depression, The Adolescent Depression Scale (TADS) was created as a screening measure of adolescent depression. The previous presentation and paper on the TADS, delivered at the 7th ACPID, detailed a number of the initial statistical results; however this presentation will explore the main methodological considerations in creating a valid and reliable assessment instrument. There are a number of guidelines to consider when creating a psychometric tool, and test construction can be viewed as being comprised of a number of individual …

What We Think Affects How We Behave: The Relationship Between Beliefs And Practice In Psychologists' Detection Of Malingering, Jacqueline Yoxall, Mark Bahr, Norman Barling

Mark Bahr

Malingering is the deliberate fabrication or gross exaggeration of symptoms in order to gain a specific outcome. Whilst the definition of this form of deception has remained relatively unchanged for over a century, the reasons that some individuals engage in malingering is less clear. Whilst several explanatory models of malingering were proposed by Rogers (1990) nearly 20 years ago, the relationship between psychologists’ beliefs about malingering and their assessment practice has yet to be explored. The current paper presents data from a recent Australian study, which explored differences in Australian psychologists’ beliefs about malingering and the influence of such beliefs …

Development Of A New Measure Of Adolescent Depression, Mona Taouk, Mark Bahr

Mark Bahr

A new scale to measure adolescent depression was developed by reviewing literature of adolescent depression, and an examination of existing depression instruments for both adults and adolescents. The Taouk Adolescent Depression Scale (TADS) was constructed as a multidimensional measure of depression, evaluated using a sample of 263 undergraduate and secondary school students (70 males, 193 females) aged between 12 and 21 years (M=15.53, SD=2.35). Four reliable factors comparable to those identified in previous research were obtained from an obliquely rotated principal axis factoring extraction, resulting in a final 20 item instrument with five items per domain, illustrating construct validity. The …

Age-Related Differences In Mental Categorisation And Recognition For Schematic Faces, James Champion, Mark Bahr

Mark Bahr

The nature of the processes underlying the categorisation of perceptual experiences in long term memory (LTM) has been hotly debated in the research literature. The prototype account of mental categorisation purports that a mental abstraction, or prototype, is formed for each mental category stored in LTM. Exemplar theories, in contrast, postulate that mental categories are represented by instances stored in LTM, and that recognition is therefore dependent on the degree of similarity between the encountered stimulus and representations of experienced exemplars, not an abstracted prototype. Recent studies have suggested the presence of age-related differences in the categorisation of visual stimuli, …

Measuring Adolescent Depression: The Adolescent Depression Scale, Mona Taouk, Mark Bahr

Mark Bahr

A new brief instrument for the measurement of adolescent depression is described. The instrument is the product of a systematic review of the factors currently considered to be salient to the investigation of adolescent depression. From an initial set of pilot investigations a 90-item test bank was constructed covering six domains of adolescent depression. The resultant instrument was administered to 263 adolescents, late adolescents and young adults. Factor analysis and item analysis reduced the item pool to a 20-item four-factor measure of adolescent depression, which correlates well with existing measures of depression.

Stakeholder Perspectives Of Organisational Reputation, Mark Bahr, Jeni Warburton, Yolanda Van Gellecum, Margaret Shapiro

Mark Bahr

Good reputation management is becoming increasingly important as organisations and the social environments in which they function become more complex (Caruana, 2000; Fombrun & van Riel, 2003). Organisations are being evaluated by far more demanding standards than in the past, and are increasingly being held responsible for their environmental, social and ethical decisions as well as their economic decisions. Mishandled social, ethical and environmental issues can have dire consequences for corporate reputation. Well-known and well-documented examples include the Royal Dutch/Shell Brent Spar and Nigeria incidents, in which perceived social violations were detrimental to their reputation (see e.g., Dickson & McCulloch, …

Australian Psychologists' Beliefs And Practice In The Detection Of Malingering, Jacqueline Yoxall, Mark Bahr, Norman Barling

Mark Bahr

Malingering is a possibility in any assessment context where external incentive exists. However, it is not clear whether advances in malingering research over the last 10 years have translated to psychologists' assessment practices. There is limited Australian research regarding malingering base rates or psychologists' beliefs and practices in malingering detection (Sullivan, Lang, & Dawes, 2005). The current study surveyed Australian psychologists (n=102), currently engaged in psycho-legal practice, in regard to their estimation of malingering base rates; their beliefs about malingering; and their assessment practices. Information gathered raises important matters to be considered in regard to the translation of research to …

Places, Products, And People "Make Each Other Up": Culture Cycles Of Self And Well-Being, Victoria Plaut

Victoria Plaut

In this chapter, we first analyze how four U.S. regions (West, Northeast, Midwest, South) each produces their own culture cycle, and we then consider how place intersects with both race and class (Latinos in the Southwest, Asians in the Pacific region, Blacks in industrial northern cities, and rural Appalachians). We organize each analysis around a geographic unit and its associated historically shaped ideas and values, a set of products and practices that residents of that place create and come into frequent contact with (e.g., promotional material for universities, websites, personal ads), and residents’ psychological tendencies related to self and well-being

Some Personality Predictors Of Tolerance To Human Diversity: The Roles Of Openness, Agreeableness And Empathy, Rivka Witenberg, Ninawa Butrus

Rivka T Witenberg Dr

The aim of this study was to determine the most salient predictors of tolerance to human diversity. A total of 118 individuals (M = 32.93 years, SD = 13.80) responded to dilemma-like stories involving holding prejudicial beliefs (beliefs), talking about them (speech) and acting on them (acts). Participants also completed the Openness and Agreeableness scales from the Big Five Inventory and the Interpersonal Reactivity Index. Differences in tolerance judgements were found to be related to differences in personality characteristics. Results showed that Openness and Agreeableness were predictors of tolerance in the belief dimension; whereas the most salient predictor of tolerance …

Role Of Assertiveness In Telephone Crisis Supporter Well-Being And Service Provision, Coralie J. Wilson

Coralie J Wilson

Help-negation (reluctance to seek help as distress levels increase) occurs among Telephone Crisis Supporters (TCSs) who are exposed to suicidal, depressed and anxious callers, and impacts both personal wellbeing and TCSs intention to use recommended skills with callers (Kitchingman, Wilson, Caputi, Woodward, 2013). Assertiveness is a key clinical skill that facilitates the capacity to effectively and confidently deliver telephone crisis support. Due to the highly specific nature of the telephone counselling context, TCSs face challenges in communicating assertively and establishing of boundaries which are important in effective service provision and the maintenance of counsellor-wellbeing. This paper presents results of two …

The Consequences Of Educational Specialty And Nationality Faultlines For Project Teams, Yuan Jiang, Susan Jackson, James Shaw, Yunhyung Chung

James B Shaw

Using a sample of 162 R&D teams, we investigated the influence of HRM systems for knowledge intensive teamwork on external team knowledge acquisition and internal team knowledge sharing. This study also examined the interactive effect of HRM systems and knowledge tacitness and the combined influence of HRM systems and empowering leadership. HRM systems for knowledge-intensive teamwork were positively associated with team knowledge acquisition and team knowledge sharing. Knowledge tacitness moderated the HRM–knowledge acquisition relationship, reducing the influence of HRM systems. Further, empowering leadership appeared to substitute for the effect of HRM systems. Our findings suggest that an integration of strategic …

Fear And Death: A Meta-Analytic Review Of Fear Appeals From A Terror Management Perspective, Nancy Rhodes, David Hunt, Scott Radford

David M. Hunt

The Better-Than-Average Effect In Hong Kong And The United States: The Role Of Personal Trait Importance And Cultural Trait Importance, K-P. Tam, Ka Yee Angela Leung, Y-H. Kim, C-Y. Chiu, Yee-Man Ivy Lau, A. Au

Ka Yee Angela LEUNG

People tend to make self-aggrandizing social comparisons on traits that are important to the self. However, existing research on the better-than-average effect (BTAE) and trait importance does not distinguish between personal trait importance (participants’ ratings of the importance of certain traits to themselves) and cultural trait importance (participants’ perceptions of the importance of the traits to the cultural group to which they belong). We demonstrated the utility of this distinction by examining the joint effects of personal importance and cultural importance on the BTAE among Hong Kong Chinese and American participants. Results showed that the BTAE was more pronounced for …