In order to study neuropsychological characteristics of subcortical-frontal brain regions function and assessment of their relation with vulnerability to schizophrenia 59 patients and 23 controls were investigated using Luria's neuropsychological methods. The analysis established bilateral abnormalities of the function of prefrontal and profound frontal lobe zones in patients as compared with controls. These abnormalities were more predominate in the left hemisphere. Point biserial correlation coefficients of determined integrative neuropsychological indicators with liability to schizophrenia were 0.39 ± 0.11 and 0.28 ± 0.09, for the left and right brain zones respectively. The obtained data permits discussion of the integrative neuropsychological indicators of subcortical-frontal brain regions as potential markers of liability to schizophrenia and confirms the role of structural and functional brain asymmetry in the pathogenesis of schizophrenia.

We examined the influence of interdependence goals on the accessibility of implicit gender stereotypical associations. Participants were asked to cooperate with or compete against a woman on a mathematical abilities task and subsequently the relative activation of positive and negative warmth and competence traits was measured using a primed categorization task. Results showed that female primes (vs. male primes) facilitated the activation of low warmth and high competence in the competition condition, whereas high warmth was activated in the cooperation condition and no differences were found for competence traits. These results are discussed referring to the stereotype content model and the compensation effect in person perception. The goal dependent nature of implicit gender stereotypes is emphasized.

In this paper, the distributional properties and power rates of the Lz, Eci2z, and Eci4z statistics when they are used as item fit statistics were explored. The results were compared to t-transformation of Outfit and Infit mean square. Four sample sizes were selected: 100, 250, 500, and 1000 examinees. The abilities were uniform and normal with mean 0 and standard deviation 1, and uniform and normal with mean –1 and standard deviation 1. The pseudo-guessing parameter was fixed at .25. Two ranges of difficulty parameters were selected: ±1 logits and ±2 logits. Two test lengths were selected: 15 and 30 items. The results showed important differences between the T-infit, T-outfit, Lz, Eci2z, and Eci4z statistics. The T-oufit, T-infit, and Lz statistics showed poor standardization with estimated parameters because their distributional properties were not close to the expected values. However, the Eci2z and Eci4z statistics showed satisfactory standardization on all conditions. Further, the power rates of Eci2z and Eci4z were 5% to 10% higher than the power rates of Lz, T-outfit, and T-infit to detect items that do not fit Rasch model.

Free time is considered to be a very important aspect of adolescents’ psychosocial development. One of the instruments that has been developed to explore motivation in relation to free time activities is Baldwin and Caldwell’s (2003) Free Time Motivation Scale for Adolescents (FTMS-A), based on Ryan and Deci (2000) Self-Determination Theory. The main aim of this study is to explore the psychometric properties of the FTM S-A after its translation and adaptation to Catalan, administering it to a sample of 2,263 adolescents aged between 11 and 18 (M = 14.99; SD = 1.79) from Catalonia, Spain. To explore structural validity we follow two steps: Firstly, we analyze how the scale fits with the original model by conducting a CFA on the whole sample; secondly, we conduct an EFA on one half of the sample and a CFA on the other half in order to identify which structure best suits the sample. We also analyze convergent validity using three indicators of subjective well-being: The Personal Well-Being Index (PWI), the Satisfaction with Life scale (SWLS) and the Overall Life Satisfaction scale (OLS). The initial CFA produces a 5-factor model like the original, but with goodness of fit indices that do not reach the acceptable minimum. The EFA and the second CFA show a good fit for a 3-dimensional model (χ2(90) = 320.293; RMSEA = .048; NNFI = .92; CFI = .94) comprising introjected motivation, intrinsic motivation and amotivation. The correlations obtained between the FTMS-A and the three measures of subjective well-being scales show an association between free time motivations and this construct. Due to the model of scale used in the present study differs from the original, it is proposed that the new scale structure with 16 items be tested in the future in different cultural contexts.

It has been suggested that achieving greater effectiveness in psychotherapeutic treatment requires analyzing what therapists actually do and say, how they do this and when it is done. Based on this approach, in this study we focused on the rules emitted by therapists, since providing rules is thought to be of fundamental importance in promoting effective and efficient clinical change. Specifically, we sought to determine whether the experience level of therapists and the brevity of therapy would be related to patterns of therapist rule emission as categorized by the Category System of Rules emitted by the Therapist (SISC-RULES-T) (Vargas-de la Cruz & Pardo-Cebrián, 2014). Greater therapist experience and shorter therapy duration were found to be reliably predictive of more rule emissions across most rule categories (Z values between: Z = –3.68 and Z = –2.05; p values: p < .05 and p < .001). These variables were also predictive of more emissions of rules that specified all three operant contingency elements (situation, behavior, and consequence) rather than fewer elements (Z = –2.59, p < .05; Z = –2.26, p < .05). In the expert therapists and therapist with shorter cases, there was a nonsignificant tendency for the emission of general and conceptual rules to increase over sessions whereas emissions of concrete and particular rules tended to decrease; the explicitness of the three contingency elements also tended to decrease as treatment progressed. These findings may help to identify verbal characteristics of therapists that could lead to improved therapeutic practice.

The purpose of this study was to assess the effects caused by the instruction method “Think actively in academic contexts, TAAC”, an adaptation of Wallace and Adams' (1993) method of thinking skills, creativity, selfregulation, and academic learning, with students from the second grade of Compulsory Secondary Education (CSE). We used a pretest-intervention-posttest design with control group. The sample was made up of 110 participants, aged between 13 and 15 years, 58 of them in the experimental group and 52 in the control group. Six assessment instruments were administered before and after applying the method in order to measure the dependent variables. The method, divided into eight stages, was used in all the didactic units of the syllabus content of Natural Sciences, Social Sciences, and Language, during one academic course, and allowed the conjoint teaching of thinking skills and the syllabus content. The results of the analyses of variance indicate positive impact of the intervention, as the experimental subjects improved significantly in thinking skills and academic achievement. Some interesting reflections for research and education are derived from this study.

Intracellular recording in the retina of the snail, Helix pomatia L., reveals the existence of two types of cell responsive to diffuse flashes of achromatic or monochromatic light: B-type cells, which respond with sustained depolarization that is sometimes accompanied by spikes, and D-type cells, which respond with sustained hyperpolarization. The peak of spectral sensitivity for both B- and D-cells falls in the 450-500 nm range and coincides with range of maximal sensitivity for the rhodopsin family of photopigments. Within a proposed two-channel model of snail achromatic vision, responses of the B- and D-cells are represented by a two-dimensional ‘excitation vector’. The length of the ‘excitation vector’ is approximately constant, and its direction correlates with light intensity. The vector model of light encoding in the snail is discussed in relation to models of achromatic vision in vertebrates (fish, frog, monkey, and humans) based on psychophysical, behavioral and neurophysiological data. Intracellular data in the snail taken together with data from vertebrate animals support the hypothesis that a 2-dimensional model of brightness and darkness encoding utilizes a universal mechanism of ‘vector encoding’ for light intensity in neuronal vision networks.

The apparently contradictory co-existence of high levels of gender equality and intimate partner violence against women (IPVAW) found in Nordic countries has been termed the Nordic Paradox. The aim of this study was to examine how the Nordic Paradox is discussed and explained by Spanish professionals working in the IPVAW field. Five focus groups (n = 19) and interviews with key informants (n = 10) were conducted. Four main categories of possible explanations for the Nordic Paradox were identified: Macro-micro disconnect (i.e., discordance between individual beliefs and behaviors and macro-social norms of gender equality), IPVAW as multicausal (i.e., IPVAW defined as a multicausal phenomenon that does not necessarily have to be associated with gender equality), cultural patterns of social relationships (i.e., the role of social relationships and the way people relate to each other in the Nordic countries), and backlash effect (i.e., men’s reaction to greater equality for women). Although this study does not provide a final explanation for the Nordic paradox, its results provide us with a better understanding of the phenomenon and can help to advance research in this field.

The present study investigates the role of perceived social support and development-focused feedback techniques on behavioral integration of feedback in the context of individual psychological assessment. We hypothesized that development-focused techniques would predict participants’ motivational intention to act on feedback and tested whether perceived social support would mediate or moderate the relationship between motivational intention and behavioral outcomes. We performed structural equation modeling analyses on data collected at two time-points. Two hundred and forty (N = 240) participants completed questionnaires immediately after their feedback session (T1) and 138 of them completed questionnaires three months later (T2). The model results, χ2 = 230.09, p < .01, CFI = .97, TLI = .97, SRMR = .06, RMSEA = .03 90% CI [.02, .05], suggest that development-focused techniques predict motivational intention, social support mediates the relationship between motivational intention and developmental activities (R2 = .31), and social support also interacts with development-focused techniques to predict behavior change (R2 = .40). The relationship between social support and behavioral change is higher when the assessor uses few development-focused techniques (at –1 SD, b = .32, p < .001, 95% CI [.27, .36]). The study provides empirical insights about how behavioral change unfolds in an IPA feedback context and suggests that participants could benefit from obtaining social support to act on feedback. Assessors should focus on development during feedback and encourage the participant to seek social support to facilitate their subsequent professional development. Because the findings rely on self-reported data, future studies would benefit from including observed measures.

The present study examines the prevalence of obsessive-compulsive symptoms (OCS) in a population 1,061 adolescents (mean age 13.92) in Spain. The association between OCS and anxiety symptoms severity (panic attacks, separation anxiety, social phobia, generalized anxiety and school phobia) and depressive symptom severity has also been studied. Two distinct groups of subjects were defined and analyzed as being ‘positive’ on the obsessive-compulsive screen: The first group (called High interference) included all of the subjects who scored 25 or more in Leyton Obsessional Inventory-Child Version (LOI-CV) interference score regardless of symptom presence score, and the second group (labeled High symptom presence) consisted of all subjects with a symptom presence score equal to or above 15 and an interference score of 10 or less. Females scored higher than did males both on the symptom presence and interference scores. Forty- one subjects (3.9%) showed an interference score of 25 or more (high interference group) while eight students (0.8%) were included in the high symptom presence group. The most prevalent and interfering symptoms were: fussy about hands, hating dirt and contamination and going over things a lot. In addition, the association between LOI and depressive symptom severity was significant, while the association between LOI and anxiety symptoms severity was insignificant.

This study aims to present the development of a scale focused on youth’s perceptions about their group in residential care and to offer evidences of validity and reliability. This work is part of a national study involving 59 institutions and 360 adolescents (55% males) from 11 to 18 years old (M = 14.72; SD = 1.81). Evidences of validity were tested, as well as the reliability data and the relationship between group perceptions, individual characteristics and placement length. A structure with three components was found explaining 62% of variance: Deviant behavior, Positive Attributes and Oppositional Behavior. The CFA revealed good values of fit: CFI = .95, GFI = .90 and RMSEA = .050. Furthermore, a positive and significant correlation was found between positive attributes and life satisfaction (p < .001), and negative ones with deviant behavior (p < .01) and oppositional behavior (p < .01). Finally, a positive and significant correlation was found between Deviant behavior and youth’s age (p < .05), and significant gender differences were found in this dimension (i.e., p < .001; d = .38, 95% CI [–9.97, 2.94]; males reported higher scores than females). No significant correlations were found regarding the length of placement. These results suggest that this tool reveals satisfactory psychometric properties to be used in further studies with youth in residential care.

It has been demonstrated that perception of objects automatically evokes potential actions to interact with those objects; this is termed as affordance. The present study investigated how the corresponding affordance effect of graspable objects was modulated by the cue about risk levels of object. Participants were presented with pictures of dangerous graspable objects or neutral graspable objects. The participants were required to perform an upright/upside down discrimination task by pressing different keys. Results showed that both the affordance effects of dangerous object and neutral object in children were enhanced when a cue preceded the object, t(35) = 3.83, p < .01, Cohen’s d = 1.29. These results indicate that the prompt of risk level can improve individual’s appropriate manipulation to the object.

Callous Unemotional (CU) traits are associated with different environmental risk factors, such as negative stressful life events (SLE). The most common studied SLE associated with CU trait has been childhood maltreatment, but less is known about how other SLE impact the development of CU traits. Therefore, this work examines risk factors, personal factors (executive functioning), and mental health outcomes associated with the trajectories of Callous Unemotional (CU) traits and Stressful Life Events (SLE) in a community sample of children. A cohort of 377 preschoolers were followed up between ages 3 and 10. Several risk factors and outcomes for three trajectory groups (high CU/SLE; high CU/low SLE; and the reference group with low CU/SLE) were analyzed by using multiple post-hoc comparisons. We hypothesized that children with high CU/SLE would face more contextual risk factors, more executive functioning difficulties and more mental health problems than children with high CU/low SLE or the reference group. At the age of 3, children who showed high CU/SLE faced more early contextual adversity, including socioeconomic difficulties and maternal antisocial behavior than the other groups of children. At the age of 10, children with high CU/SLE presented more peer problems and higher psychopathology symptoms than the reference group, but no differences on mental health outcomes in comparison to the high CU/low SLE group. These results have potential implications for clinical practice and studies attempting to identify different CU subtypes in children.

Sport climbing requires a combination of physical and cognitive skills, with working memory (WM) playing a crucial role in performance. This study aimed to investigate the association between WM capacity and climbing ability, while considering potential confounding factors including sex, age, education level, and climbing experience. Additionally, the study compared prefrontal cortex (PFC) hemodynamic responses among different climbing ability groups and sex during WM performance. Twenty-eight climbers participated, with WM assessed using the eCorsi task and PFC hemodynamic responses measured with near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS). Initial linear regression analyses revealed no association between WM and climbing ability. However, significant associations were found after adjustment for covariates. Specifically, sex (p = .014), sex in conjunction with age (p = .026), sex combined with climbing experience (p = .022), and sex along with education level (p = .038) were identified as significant predictors of differences in WM between Expert and Elite climbers. Additionally, notable differences in PFC hemodynamic responses were observed between Expert and Elite climbers, as well as between sexes during the WM task, providing support for differences in WM capacity. This study contributes to understanding the complex relationship between WM capacity and climbing performance, emphasizing the need to account for influencing factors in assessments.

Anxiety and depression are highly prevalent and comorbid problems in childhood, which deserve greater understanding for effective prevention and treatment. The main aim of the present study was to explore the comorbidity between anxiety and depression symptoms using a novel and valuable approach to study comorbidity, such as network analysis. Specifically, the connectivity between symptoms and possible relevant symptoms was examined through comorbidity estimation and shortest pathway networks, as well as bridge symptoms. This study comprised 281 Spanish-speaking children aged 8–12 years (45.2% girls), whose anxiety and depression symptoms were assessed through specific brief parent-report measures. Analyses revealed that in the comorbidity network, the most central symptoms were related to depression (“No good anymore,” “Could never be as good,” “Hated self,” “Did everything wrong,” “Nobody loved him/her”) or anxiety (“Suddenly feels really scared”). Furthermore, it was found that the most central bridge symptoms, whose activation would play a key role in the activation of other domain symptoms, were anxiety symptoms such as “Trouble going to school” and “Suddenly feels really scared” and depression symptoms, such as “Could never be as good” and “Hated self.” Additionally, the shortest path network suggested the existence of different possible pathways of connection between anxiety and depression symptoms. Overall, these findings help to understand the complexity of the anxiety-depression comorbidity. It suggests the existence of central and bridge symptoms that complement previous studies, which may be potential targets for interventions to prevent and treat childhood anxiety and depression.

Suicide notes are an important warning sign for suicidal behaviors. The aim of this exploratory research is (a) to contribute to understanding the place of suicide notes in the spectrum of suicidal behaviors in Portugal, and (b) to analyze the content remembered by individuals regarding a suicide note. Two complementary studies were carried out. In the first, a quantitative investigation, the statistical relationship of writing a suicide note: To the occurrence of lifetime suicide attempts, to lifetime self-harming behaviors, and to suicidal ideation in the two weeks prior to the assessment was evaluated. In the second study, a qualitative investigation, the content recalled by individuals regarding a suicide note was analyzed. In the quantitative study, 841 adults aged between 18 and 65 years, and 1,012 young adults participated. In the qualitative study, 18 young adults participated. Findings of the quantitative study reveal that writing a suicide note significantly related to the lifetime presence of a suicide attempt and to self-harming behaviors and to suicidal ideation in the two weeks prior to the assessment. Findings of the qualitative study suggest that individuals who have written suicide notes exhibit a significant self-oriented focus, yet they also demonstrate a strong sense of concern for the survivors.

Parents have reported emotional regulation problems in cognitive disengagement syndrome (CDS) and attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The first objective of this research was to explore the differences between the parents’ ratings on CDS, ADHD, hyperactivity/impulsivity, inattention, anxiety, depression and emotional dysregulation. The second one was to compare the predictive capacity of CDS and ADHD over anxiety, depression and emotional regulation problems. The third one was to analyze the mediation of emotional dysregulation in CDS, ADHD, hyperactivity/impulsivity, inattention, and anxiety and depression. The sampling used was non-probabilistic. The final sample consisted of 1,070 participants (484 fathers and 586 mothers) who completed the Emotion Regulation Checklist (ERC) and the Child and Adolescent Behavior Inventory (CABI). In relation to the first objective, first, mothers reported more emotional regulation problems in children than in fathers. Second, emotional regulation problems were more strongly correlated with hyperactivity/impulsivity. Significant differences were found in all father scores, except for anxiety and the emotional regulation subscale. Regarding mothers, significant differences were only observed in ADHD scores, hyperactivity/impulsivity, and depression. Both parents reported more problems in older children, except for hyperactivity/impulsivity scores and ADHD rated by mothers. According to the second objective, CDS scores were found to significantly predict anxiety and depression scores, but not those of inattention or emotional regulation problems. Finally, in relation to the third objective, emotional regulation problems mediated the relationships between CDS, ADHD, and anxiety and depression. In conclusion, the data support the importance of emotional regulation problems in understanding CDS and its relationship with ADHD, anxiety, and depression.

In the late 1930s, the Institute of Human Relations of Yale University developed a research program on conflict and anxiety as an outcome of Clark Hull's informal seminar on the integration of Freud's and Pavlov's theories. The program was launched at the 1937 Annual Meeting of the APA in a session chaired by Clark L. Hull, and the experiments continued through 1941, when the United States entered the Second World War. In an effort to apply the findings from animal experiments to the war situation, John Dollard and Neal E. Miller decided to study soldiers' fear reactions in combat. As a first step, they arranged interviews with a few veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade. Taking these interviews as a point of departure, Dollard devised a questionnaire to which 300 former Lincoln brigaders responded. The present paper analyzes the main outcomes of the questionnaire, together with the war experiences reported in the interview transcripts. Our purpose was to evaluate a project which was initially investigated by the FBI because of the communists among the Lincoln ranks, but eventually supported by the American Army, and which exerted great influence on the military psychology of the time.

The language of personality traits includes single-word trait descriptors, and longer phrases or sentences. Evidence has accumulated that abstract, semantic relationships among single words have the same underlying structure as the empirical relationships when words are applied to individuals. The present study examines whether these two kinds of structure are also isomorphic for longer trait descriptors. Empirical descriptions and judgements of semantic similarity were collected among the descriptors comprising the California Child Q-set, or CCQ, and analysed with multidimensional scaling. Canonical correlation showed the solutions to be closely related to one another, and to independent sets of ratings available for the CCQ items. Informants' similarity judgements were not affected by the context in which they were made. The dominant dimensions of the solutions reproduce dimensions found previously for the single-word personality lexicon, indicating the two trait-descriptive languages to be closely parallel.

Previous research has suggested that personality can influence the perception and reporting of physical symptoms, such as pain. To assess the relationship between the course of nonorganic neck pain and the individual's personality, we studied the association between two indicators of neck pain prognosis, such as the duration of sick leave associated with neck pain and sick leave recurrence, and 15 personality traits in a sample of 64 workers suffering from disabling neck pain without any signs of physical abnormalities in the neck area. The TEA Personality Test (TPT), a self-report instrument designed to evaluate personality traits related to organizational behaviors, was used. Compared to the normative data, the study sample obtained high scores in the Depression, Anxiety and Emotional Instability scales, thus suggesting a personality profile primarily characterized by high neuroticism-related scores. Controlling for age, gender, and any rehabilitation undergone, we found a positive relationship between Depression and the duration of sick leave (in weeks). Moreover, lower scores on the TPT personality trait Dynamism and activeness were associated with higher likelihood of sick leave recurrence. These findings highlight the need for further research into the role played by personality at the onset and in the maintenance of nonorganic neck pain. Furthermore, they suggest that a complementary psychological approach may be useful to nonorganic neck pain management.