bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Vigilance and Arousal in Depressive States
Authors: BYRNE D. G. 
Published: July 2011

An experiment was performed to investigate predictions of vigilance performance among depressive patients, based on the assumptions that vigilance would vary in a predictable manner with level of arousal, and that levels of arousal among diagnostic categories of depressive patients are well known. It was found that psychotic depressives, presumed to be hypo‐aroused relative to normals, exhibited poor signal detection performances and committed few false positive errors relative to normals. This was consistent with predictions. Neurotic depressives, presumed to be hyper‐aroused relative to normals, detected fewer signals than did normals, but also made more false positive errors than normals. Again this was consistent with predictions.A measure of arousal in experimental subjects, namely barbiturate tolerance, was found to directly relate to the false positive error rate in all subjects. The relationship between arousal and total signal detection rate was significantly curvilinear, and an ‘inverted U’ (quadratic) function provided the best fit. This justified the conclusion that vigilance performance is a function of at least that component of arousal measured by barbiturate tolerance.
Increasing Patients' Satisfaction with Communications
Authors: LEY PHILIP , BRADSHAW PETER W. , KINCEY JOHN A. , ATHERTON STEPHEN T. 
Published: July 2011

This paper reports a successful experimental attempt to increase satisfaction with communications amongst general medical patients. A group of patients who received extra interviews designed to increase their understanding of what they had been told about their illnesses showed significantly greater satisfaction than patients treated in the usual manner, and patients who received extra placebo interviews about their hospital stay.Changes in satisfaction with communications over the period following discharge from hospital are also described and possible reasons for them are discussed.
Affiliation before and after child delivery as a function of repression‐sensitization
Authors: Rofé Yacov , Lewin Isaac , Padeh Benjamin 
Published: July 2011

A group of 177 women were asked, before and after child delivery, to state their preference for being alone or with other women. They were also asked to rank their level of anxiety. After delivery they filled out the Repression‐Sensitization Scale of Byrne, Barry & Nelson (1963).Results show sensitizers to be more anxious than repressors before but not after delivery. Before delivery repressors preferred to be alone, while sensitizers wanted to stay with others. After delivery both groups show a significant preference for being with others. There is no significant correlation between anxiety and affiliation.
The selection interview: Candidates' reactions and interviewers' judgements
Authors: Keenan A. 
Published: July 2011

Candidates in 551 initial graduate recruitment interviews provided estimates of the level of their motivation to succeed immediately before and after each interview. Their level of state anxiety was also measured before interviews. At the end of the interview they indicated how much they liked the interviewer personally and estimated both the likelihood of their being successful in the interview and the likelihood that they would accept a job with that company, if eventually offered one. Interviewers were asked to evaluate each candidate and to estimate his chances of being offered a job by their company.When candidates liked interviewers personally, they were more optimistic about their chances of success and were more willing to accept potential job offers. Candidates were also more confident of success at the end of the interview when their pre‐interview motivation had been high. However, interviewer evaluations of candidates were most favourable when the level of their pre‐interview motivation had been intermediate. Candidate state anxiety was unrelated to the favourability of interviewers' evaluations of them.
An experimental study of the effectiveness of different techniques of questioning child witnesses
Authors: Dent Helen R. , Stephenson Geoffrey M. 
Published: July 2011

Two experiments were conducted to investigate the effects upon accuracy of recall of different techniques of obtaining evidence from 10‐ and 11‐year‐old children about a previously witnessed incident.The first experiment studied three techniques: (a) free report, (b) use of general questions, and (c) use of specific questions. It was expected that the free report method would produce the most accurate but least complete initial recall, but that this lack of completeness might have a detrimental effect upon the accuracy of later recall. The free report technique did produce highly accurate, although rather incomplete recall, but initial use of this technique did not have any detrimental effect upon later, more structured recall.The second experiment investigated the sole use of the free report technique over a 2‐month period. It was expected that a high level of accuracy would be achieved at all recall sessions. The effect upon accuracy of recall of a delay of 2 weeks or 2 months prior to the first experimental recall session was also investigated in this experiment. A high level of accuracy was obtained at all recall sessions. However, a delay before the first recall session had an adverse effect upon the completeness of recall.
Physiological effects of meditation: A longitudinal study
Authors: West Michael A. 
Published: July 2011

Previous research has shown physiological differences between meditators and non‐meditators but it is not known whether these differences are attributable to the practice of meditation. It is hypothesized that the regular relaxation, associated with the practice of meditation, produces physiological de‐arousal outside of meditation itself. Eleven subjects were taught meditation in the belief that it was an untried relaxation exercise.They regularly practised the technique for a period of 6 months. Pre‐, mid‐ and post‐‘treatment’ measures of skin conductance and spontaneous skin conductance responses were taken and were compared with similar measures taken from a comparison group, who merely attended for retesting. The experimental group showed a significant decrease in spontaneous skin conductance responses over the 6 month period. The comparison group and a small group of subjects who gave up meditation early in the experiment exhibited no significant change on this parameter. The experimental group also demonstrated a progressively greater decrease in skin conductance during meditation over the 6 months. This progression was not evident in the small group of ‘drop‐outs’. The results suggested that regular meditation practice might be effective in producing some physiological relaxation outside of the meditation state itself.
Social problem solving and social skills training
Authors: Kagan Carolyn 
Published: July 2011

Community residents who reported extensive social difficulties and who were undergoing social skills training (SST) were found to be less accurate in their perception of simple and complex social goals and in the number of alternative behaviours they were able to generate in pursuit of these goals than a validation group of people who regarded themselves as socially adept. Following SST, goal perception was more accurate, with greater change occurring regarding the complex scene: the number of alternative behaviours available also increased, particularly with regard to the simple scene. It was felt that training facilitated accuracy of goal perception, and that prior inaccuracy led to a distorted number of alternative behaviours produced. The study was repeated with different though comparable groups. This time, subjects were told what the social goals were, and were asked only to generate alternative behaviours. Following SST, training subjects were able to generate more alternative behaviours for both simple and complex scenes, although there were still fewer than the number generated by the validation group. The relative difficulty in generating alternative behaviours in a complex situation remained.The results are discussed with reference to incidental benefits of SST.
Chord perception in schizophrenia*
Authors: Green Elizabeth J. 
Published: July 2011

Groups of acute schizophrenics and normal controls were presented with two tasks involving the perception of musical chords. There were no significant differences in performance due to ear of presentation (left, right or both). Taking performance over all conditions, the schizophrenic group was not significantly different from the controls on one of the two tasks although it was significantly worse on the other.These findings contrast with earlier results using a story comprehension task which suggests that the schizophrenic deficit in performance found in those studies may be specific to the processing of verbal information.
Return of fear: Perceived skill and heart‐rate responsivity
Authors: Craske M. G. , Rachman S. J. 
Published: July 2011

The hypothesis that high heart rate and low perceived skill would be associated with greater return of fear than low heart rate and high perceived skill was investigated in a group of 63 anxious musical performers. Musicians were taught progressive muscle relaxation and attention‐focusing skills over the course of four weekly sessions. Return of subjective fear was assessed between training programme sessions and at a three‐month follow‐up assessment. Performance quality ratings served as the behavioural measure, anticipatory heart rate as the physiological measure, and subjective units of distress scales as the subjective measure.Four classification groups (high heart rate, low perceived skill; high heart rate, high perceived skill; low heart rate, low perceived skill; and low heart rate, high perceived skill) were formed on the basis of median splits of heart rate and perceived skill pre‐assessment levels. Each group demonstrated subjective fear reduction, while heart rate reduced in the high heart‐rate subjects, and performance quality improved overall at post‐assessment. Follow‐up return of fear was apparent in high heart‐rate subjects, regardless of their perceived skill status. High heart‐rate subjects reported more anxious thoughts than did low heart‐rate subjects. Perceived skill was not clearly associated with return of fear. Post‐hoc comparisons indicated that subjects who demonstrated follow‐up return of fear had higher heart rate, lower perceived skill, more anxious thoughts, less performance skill and fewer performances over the follow‐up interval than subjects who did not demonstrate a return of fear. However, initial heart rate was the only significant predictor of follow‐up fear levels.
Do autistic children have obsessions and compulsions?
Authors: Baron‐Cohen Simon 
Published: July 2011

Autistic children are frequently reported to show obsessions and compulsions. This terminology implies that such behaviours in autism are similar to those seen in obsessive—compulsive disorder. However, these autistic behaviours fail to satisfy the definitions of either obsessions or compulsions, because essential subjective data (relating to unwantedness, distress, resistance, senselessness and egodystonia) are not available in the case of autistic children. Recent cognitive evidence suggests that this is because autistic children are unable to contemplate or talk about their own mental states.Because of this state of insufficient evidence, it is suggested that the terms obsession and compulsion should be used with considerable caution to describe autistic behaviours. In this paper, the more descriptive term ‘repetitive activities’ is used. To gain a better understanding of such repetitive activities in autism, functional analyses are needed. Examples of such analyses are discussed, and predictions from a social‐cognitive deficit theory of repetitive activities are specifically considered. The paper aims to encourage research into this neglected area.
Psychosocial aspects of cardiac rehabilitation in Europe
Authors: Maes Stan 
Published: July 2011

While the present objectives of cardiac rehabilitation include recovery or restoration of everyday behaviour and secondary prevention, the effects of the traditional exercise‐based cardiac rehabilitation programmes are quite modest.It is argued that psychological interventions may affect these targets more easily, since there is evidence from controlled studies that psychological interventions may have beneficial effects on psychosocial recovery, compliance with medical advice and cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. As a consequence one may expect that psychologists would be at least part‐time members of most cardiac rehabilitation teams in European countries.In order to get an impression of the position of psychologists and the share of psychosocial care in cardiac rehabilitation in Europe, a questionnaire was sent out to two or three individuals in each European country. Health care professionals from 16 European countries returned their completed questionnaires on time.Among other things, the results show that in general social workers and psychologists, who may be considered the main potential agents for psychosocial care, are largely underrepresented in cardiac rehabilitation teams.As far as psychologists are concerned, the number involved in cardiac rehabilitation varies significantly from country to country. Three groups of countries could be distinguished: a group consisting of The Netherlands, Austria, and Italy, where psychologists are fairly well represented; a second one consisting of Norway, Finland and Belgium, where small numbers of psychologists are involved in cardiac rehabilitation; and a third group (the largest) consisting of Switzerland, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Ireland, Sweden, the UK, Greece, Portugal and Turkey, where the number of psychologists is negligible.
Psychology and screening: Narrowing the gap between efficacy and effectiveness*
Authors: Matteau Theresa M. 
Published: July 2011

The success of any health‐related screening programme depends primarily upon behavioural factors, namely whether people attend, and for those who do attend, the cognitive, emotional and behavioural consequences of doing so. Some of the problems now evident in screening programmes, such as low attendance or high levels of anxiety following participation are due in part to an under‐investigation of the psychological processes and outcomes critical to achieving the goals of screening programmes. These goals include high rates of informed participation and satisfactory psychological outcomes of such participation.The development of psychological models in this area may help in documenting the factors mediating and moderating responses to screening, and may suggest interventions likely to facilitate the achievement of the goals of a screening programme.
The psychoimmunological association of panic disorder and allergic reaction
Authors: Schmidt‐Traub Sigrun , Bamler Karl‐Joachim 
Published: July 2011

During treatment of out‐patients suffering from DSM‐III‐R panic disorder (PD) with and without agoraphobia, our attention was drawn to a high frequency of comorbid allergic reactions. In a controlled study, the prevalence of immediate type I reactions was determined in panic patients. Conversely, the prevalence of psychological disorders was recorded among allergic patients. Altogether, 79 out‐patients with PD, 100 type I allergic out‐patients and 66 controls underwent structured clinical interviews and tests for allergies. Of the patients suffering from PD, 70 per cent displayed type I immediate reactions (controls = 29 per cent). Vasodilatation (often approaching circulation collapse) is a frequently occurring allergic syndrome which is a very dramatic experience. Fifty per cent of the allergic patients showed mild to severe psychological disturbances (controls = 25 per cent); and 16 per cent had problems requiring treatment (controls = 9 per cent). Ten per cent of the allergic patients revealed PD (controls = 2 per cent).The association between PD and allergic (vasomotor) reactions was found to be highly significant. A functional relationship is hypothesized in terms of conditioning cognitive and vasomotor interactions during autonomic arousal.
Intervention for the bereaved: Gender differences in the efficacy of two counselling programmes
Authors: Schut H. A. W. , Stroebe M. S. , van den Bout J. , de Keijser J. 
Published: July 2011

This article describes an investigation of emotion‐focused versus problem‐focused intervention for widows (N = 23) and widowers (N = 23) who were suffering elevated levels of distress 11 months after their loss. They were randomly assigned to an intervention condition and improvement (on the General Health Questionnaire) was compared with non‐intervention controls (N = 59).Two alternative hypotheses were considered: (1) men, since they focus less on their emotions, would benefit from problem‐focused counselling, while women, focusing more on their emotions, would benefit from emotion‐focused intervention; (2) each gender, having been comparatively unsuccessful in coping through these usual strategies, would benefit more from intervention directed towards the less familiar strategy. Results supported the second hypothesis: widowers benefited more from emotion‐focused, widows from problem‐focused interventions. Implications for supporting widows and widowers are discussed.
Reduced cognitive inhibition in schizotypy
Authors: Moritz Steffen , Mass Reinhard 
Published: July 2011

Objectives. The relationship between negative priming and the positive symptoms of schizotypy was investigated. It was hypothesized that high schizotypes would display less negative priming than low schizotypes. A further important aim of the study was to disentangle the modalities involved in negative priming performance, since a reduction in negative priming, as revealed by schizophrenics and schizotypes, might reflect a failure to actively inhibit irrelevant information (cognitive inhibition) as well as dyslexia or a general slowness in information processing.Design. A paper test based on the German version of the Stroop test was used to measure negative priming. A baseline condition of the test, colour word reading, that has proven to be a valid indicator of dyslexia was used to measure the influence of reading disturbances on negative priming. Addtionally, a priming condition, termed inverted priming, in which the target of a stimulus is identical with the distractor in the subsequent stimulus, was employed.Methods. Fifty healthy adults were drawn from the general population. After neuropsychological assessment participants completed a battery of schizotypal questionnaires. Correlational analyses and mean comparisons were used to investigate the relationship between neuropsychological data and schizotypy.Results. Results suggest that reduced negative priming is related to positive schizotypy. Reduced negative priming in high schizotypes was unrelated to dyslexia, and found unlikely to be affected by deficits in early processing. The inverted priming condition produced comparatively fewer errors in high schizotypes.Conclusions. Results support the hypothesis that reduced cognitive inhibition may underlie positive schizotypal symptomatology.
Treatment choice for agoraphobic women: Exposure or cognitive‐behaviour therapy?
Authors: Burke Miriam , Drummond Lynne M. , Johnston Derek W. 
Published: July 2011

Objectives. The paper describes a treatment trial where exposure was compared with cognitive‐behaviour therapy in the treatment of 39 female participants with a diagnosis of agoraphobia (DSM‐111‐R). The primary objective of the study was to see if cognitive therapy enhanced the effectiveness of exposure in the treatment of agoraphobia.Design. Participants were randomly assigned to either exposure or cognitivebehaviour therapy. The two treatment groups were balanced for severity and duration of agoraphobia, presence of panic disorder, and age.Methods. The exposure and the cognitive‐behaviour therapy groups received the same amount of therapist‐assisted exposure to feared situations but the participants in the cognitive‐behaviour therapy group were, additionally, taught to identify and challenge negative automatic thoughts and dysfunctional assumptions. In the cognitive‐behaviour therapy condition exposure was presented as an opportunity to identify and challenge negative thoughts. In the exposure condition, participants were given a behavioural rationale for doing exposure. Participants were seen individually for 10 sessions. Assessments were carried out before and after the treatment programme and, also, six months later. Assessments included self‐reports of fear and avoidance, a behavioural test and questionnaire measures of relevant cognitions. Thirteen participants dropped out of treatment leaving 14 in the exposure condition and 12 in the cognitive‐behaviour condition. Therapy sessions were taped and a sample of tapes was given to a judge who rated the quality of the cognitive‐behaviour therapy.Results. Substantial improvement was seen on virtually all measures irrespective of treatment condition both at the end of treatment and six months later. The cognitive‐behaviour therapy group and the exposure group did not differ significantly at post‐treatment or at six‐month follow‐up.Conclusions. The results of the study suggest that cognitive therapy does not add to the effectiveness of exposure in the treatment of agoraphobia.
Automaticity of cognitive biases in addictive behaviours: Further evidence with gamblers
Authors: McCusker Christopher G. , Gettings Briege 
Published: July 2011

Objectives. The hypotheses that automatic, non‐volitional, attentional and memory biases for addiction‐related constructs exist is tested with compulsive gamblers.Design. An independent groups design was employed. Processing of gambling, compared to neutral and drug‐related information was examined in 15 gamblers recruited from new members of Gamblers Anonymous. Comparisons were made with the performance of their spouses (N = 15) to help distinguish addiction mechanisms from more non‐specific emotional experiences with gambling, and an independent control group (N = 15), recruited from the staff and students of a university department.Methods. A modified Stroop procedure was first employed. Automative cognitive interference was assessed relatively, by comparing colour‐naming times on the gambling, drug and neutral Stroops. A subsequent word‐stem completion task of implicit memory was then used to assess selective and automatic priming of the gambling constructs in memory.Results. Only the gamblers showed selective and automatic interference for gambling‐related constructs on the Stroop task. Spouses behaved like the control group on this task. An implicit memory bias for gambling‐related words was statistically detected only in the gamblers compared to the control group, although the trend was similar in the comparison with spouses. Further evidence for the specificity of these effects was obtained in subgroup comparisons involving fruit‐machine with racing gamblers.Conclusions. Results are generally consistent with an automaticity in the cognitive biases gamblers show for gambling‐related information. Implications for cognitive understanding and treatments are highlighted.