<p> Mindfulness-based interventions are becoming increasingly popular with clinicians and researchers. While there is a rapidly increasing number of mindfulness-based intervention outcomes reported in scientific journals of medicine and psychology (Burke, 2010; Krasner, 2004), the descriptions and definitions of mindfulness are not entirely consistent across investigators (Brown, Ryan, &amp; Creswell, 2007; Williams, 2010), and do not lend themselves to scientific analysis (Hayes &amp; Shenk, 2004). A behavior-analytic approach to this subject may provide the foundation for a scientific analysis of mindfulness phenomena. For example, Diller and Lattal (2008) suggested that mindful behavior might be shaped by the methods that Ray (1969) used to demonstrate the acquisition of selective attention with rhesus monkeys. Thus, the present investigation replicated the methods used by Ray (1969) with verbally sophisticated human participants and discusses the findings as they relate to a behavior analytic interpretation of mindfulness phenomena.</p>

<p> The purpose of this research was to investigate how parental stress is related to student behavior and the impact of the family system on student behavior. Bronfenbrenner&rsquo;s (1994) ecological model was used as the theoretical framework with a focus on relationships within the family and direct links to student behaviors. The sample size (n) was small equaling 10 parents and 10 students. The study investigated two groups of parents and children, one group consisted of five students identified as typically developing students with behaviors and numerous office referrals of more than five visits per year. The second group of five students received special educational services and had medically diagnosed behavior disorders. This study used the Parent Stress Index (PSI-4) survey to measure parental pressures and the direct influences on the parent to gain insight into four main domains: Total Stress, Life Stress, Child Domain, and Parent Domain. Interviews of both parents and children offered insight to the social occurrence of behaviors and the relationship between the parent and child. The study revealed themes describing a relationship between parenting stress and child behavior that were representative of a bi-directional relationship between a parent and child reflective in the influence of one&rsquo;s direct environment within the family unit. This research adds to the body of literature looking at parenting stress and the effect on child behavior.</p>

<p> Today's nurse leaders face many challenges and concerns that require a new type of leadership &mdash; authentic leadership. Nurse leaders who are authentic are behaviorally altruistic, transparent, have personal integrity, possess attributes of caring, ethical moral values, shared and balanced decision making, effective communication, and integral relationships. The purpose of this research was to explore, develop and validate an instrument measuring perceived authentic leadership, by staff nurses, that is grounded in a nursing theoretical framework that supports clinical practice and knowledge development. In addition, to validation of the instrument, hypotheses investigated in this research examined the extent in which the Authentic Nurse Leadership Questionnaire, is supported by the Authentic Nurse Leadership conceptual framework, and its relationship between authentic nurse leaders' attributes, nurse engagement, and nurse work-life. The methodology included Polit and Beck's method of multi-item scale development. A cross-over design was employed to compare the Authentic Nurse Leadership Questionnaire, this new instrument, with Authentic Leadership Questionnaire was implemented in the pilot and full study phase. Sample included: an expert panel (n =19) which included clinical nurse leaders, faculty and researchers, pilot study (n = 20) registered staff nurses and full study (n = 309) registered staff nurses who provide 50% or more direct patient care. Study results indicated: the average Content Validity Indices (CVI) for the final 29-item scale, its subscales and individual questions, all surpassing the .9 bench mark. The Cronbach's alpha coefficients ranged from .89 to .99, and the Intra Class Coefficients (ICCs) for 3 week test-retest reliability from 0.87 to .94. Findings indicated the ANLQ was reliable and valid instrument to measure authentic nursing leadership. Overall the ANLQ demonstrated better nursing values as indicated by a stronger relationship with nursing areas of work-life and nurse engagement than what ALQ did. The ANLQ concepts were statistically supported by both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. Nurse leaders who incorporate Authentic Nurse Leadership into their practice are uniquely positioned to influence nurse work-life environment and nurse engagement.</p>

<p> Individuals that struggle with inattention, hyperactivity, and impulsivity experience difficulties in several life domains including struggles in academia (Biederman, Monuteaux et al., 2004), interpersonal relationships (e.g., Friedman et al., 2003), marital satisfaction (e.g., Eakin et al., 2004), and occupational performance (e.g., Barkley et al., 2008). In spite of a history of academic and social failures, many individuals with ADHD maintain a self-protective bias in which they maintain high self-evaluations of causal efficacy (Owens et al., 2007). This may contribute to greater levels of inattention, impulsivity, and resulting dysfunction, as self-evaluation is rule-governed rather than a result of self-awareness and discrimination. This study aimed to examine how derived causal efficacy might impact inattention and impulsivity. Participants completed a series of Go/NoGo tasks with and without contextual cues that had derived causal efficacy functions through their relations with discriminative stimuli for high or low rates of responding. The impact of derived causal efficacy was then examined in terms of errors of omission (inattention) and errors of commission (impulsivity). Implications for behavioral interventions for ADHD were discussed.</p>

<p> The CDC (2016) recommends children engage in 60 min of moderate to vigorous physical activity daily to achieve health benefits. Recess in school settings can provide opportunities for children to try and meet these guidelines. However, research suggests that recess alone does not increase physical activity levels. To combat this problem, antecedent manipulations (e.g., manipulating the physical environment or introducing planned activities) are commonly implemented as an intervention to increase physical activity. These interventions, however, do not provide salient consequences for physical activity to ensure the likelihood that these behaviors will occur again in the future. A more promising approach might be to develop interventions that assess the use of group contingencies in an effort to increase physical activity during recess time. The purpose of the current study was to implement the Step it UP! game (a modified version of the good behavior game) in three different classrooms during their recess periods and to evaluate the effect of group contingencies on physical activity levels in elementary school-aged children. The Step it UP! game was compared to traditional recess periods (i.e., without the game) in an alternating treatment design. The overall results of the study indicated that the Step it UP! game engendered higher mean step counts than traditional recess periods. These results suggest that schools should provide contingent reinforcement for children&rsquo;s increased physical activity during recess.</p>

<p> This study examined the relationship between employees&rsquo; Organizational Commitment and the perception of the management of deviant behavior and examined if Organizational Culture moderated the strength of the relationship between Organizational Commitment and the perception of the management of deviant behavior. Three assessments were administered either electronically or in hardcopy form and were completed by 114 participants who were employed adults ages 18 and above, managed by someone else, in the southeastern U.S. The Organizational Culture Inventory (OCI) developed by Cooke and Lafferty (2013) measured overall Organizational Culture of employees at an individual level of assessment. The instrument used to measure employee Organizational Commitment was the TCM Employee Commitment Survey (Wellspring Worldwide, LLC, 2010). The instrument used to measure the perception of the management of deviant behavior was derived from a non-self-report measure created by Stewart, Bing, Davidson, Woehr, and McIntyre (2009). A moderated multiple regression analysis determined that the relationship between the perception of the management of deviant behavior and organizational commitment was not predicted by a constructive, aggressive/defensive, or passive/defensive culture style. The study found that the perception of the management of deviant behavior did not have a statistically significant predictive relationship with regards to organizational commitment, nor did workplace culture moderate the perceptions or attitudes of employees. The empirical evidence provided in this study enhanced the body of knowledge related to workplace culture. Specifically, the results of the study provided quantitative information, which provided a valuable understanding that a macro-variable such as workplace culture does not necessarily attenuate the relationship between perception of management and organizational commitment within certain diverse workplaces. </p>

<p> This transcendental phenomenological study sought to understand how the followers of authentic leaders in a multi-national healthcare organization experienced well-being. Twenty followers of 5 authentic leaders participated in the research and shared their lived experiences. Followers reported they experienced workplace well-being by maintaining work-life balance, feeling fulfilled/doing meaningful work, and feeling appreciated/recognized for their contributions. Workplace well-being was experienced as a result of their perceptions of feeling trusted and cared about as a <i>whole being</i> and not just an employee by their leaders. Followers also reported that the organizational culture provided support for leaders to demonstrate behaviors of authentic leadership, caring, trust, appreciation, respect, valuing others, openness, honesty, and transparency, which led them to feel an attachment to their leaders and organizations. Followers were motivated to exhibit organizational citizenship behaviors by providing extra or discretionary effort beyond their expected role requirements. These findings indicate that authentic leaders can provide value by cultivating well-being in the workplace. Findings also suggest recommendations for establishing organizational best practices.</p>

<p> Research investigating the impact of religion and religiosity on aggression and prosocial behavior is mixed. The reason for these inconsistent results may be due to the multifaceted nature of religion. This study was the first to investigate both the impact of different aspects of religion (e.g., spirituality, institutional religion, good and evil supernatural agents, etc.) as well as views of God as punitive on subsequent aggressive behavior. Results indicated that more punitive perceptions of God were correlated with lower levels of aggression. Furthermore, there was a marginal interaction between religious orientation and type of religious priming. Although simple effects and subsequent post-hoc tests did not reach standard levels of statistical significance, the direction of the effect for Christian participants was that priming with evil supernatural agents reduced aggressive behavior but this trend was in the opposite direction for non-Christians.</p>

This study examined (1) how verbal self-instruction (VSI) affects behavioural self-restraint and (2) individual differences in impulsiveness and verbal regulation of behaviour (VRB) in children. The review of Luria's interpretation of VRB and other related works suggested that VRB can be examined at different levels of generality. The elementary level concerns the execution and inhibition of simple motor responses; the intermediate level involves control of more complicated behaviour by detailed self-instructions, while the highest level of abstraction relates to the role of speech in the socio-cultural development in Man. The first three experiments focussed on the elementary motor responses and demonstrated that self-instruction was detrimental to motor performance. There was no evidence to support the assumption that verbal responses were superior to motor responses. However, verbal and motor responses tended to co-ordinate with each other temporally and this feature was utilized in differential-reinforcement-of-low-rate (DRL) experiments, which showed that self-instruction aided behavioural restraint. However, the content of self-instruction was not important, but how it was said. Behavioural measures of self-restraint and responsiveness to verbal instructions were related to individual differences in cognitive style (measured by the Matching Familiar Figures Test) and personality (measured by self-rated questionnaires and a teacher'srating scale designed for the purpose). Whereas the use of self-instructions tended to override any individual differences related to behavioural self-restraint, the results supported the hypothesis that cognitive impulsivity was related to measures of anxiety, and behavioural impulsiveness to anxiety and psychoticism. There was no evidence that impulsiveness was related to extraversion. In view of the theoretical discussion on cognitive impulsivity by Kagan and Block, and on impulsiveness in personality by Eysenck and Gray, it seems that behavioural, cognitive and personality impulsiveness cannot be conceptualized as a unitary concept.

It was considered from the relevant literature that the most satisfactory explanation of the behavioural effects of noise would be in terms of an arousal/distraction model (Teichner et al, 1966), Monetary incentives appeared to have the most satisfactory physiological and behavioural evidence as an arouser. An explanation of incentives and other arousers was offered by Kahneman (1973), in his model of effort and attention. The first experiment was designed to examine Kahneman's model more closely. Monetary incentives, 3 task difficulty levels, incidental learning (the colour of the word) and intentional learning (free recall of item) were incorporated in a two by three factorial design. The results favoured incentives as an arouser but not in the way envisaged by Kahneman. The data suggested that incentives increased capacity above and beyond the demands of the task (a la Davies and Jones, 1975). Further, the increased use of order recall coupled with increased item recall was not consistent with Domic's conception of order as a lower memory process. On the contrary, order appeared to be a successful STM retrieval strategy. The personality analysis could not make any distinctions between Eysenck's (1967) and Gray's (1972) theories. However, it did support the notion of incentives operating an arousal mechanism (extraversion).The second experiment was of a similar design but three levels of noise (60db, 80db and l00db), instead of incentives, were the main arousers. There was no significant evidence for noise acting as a distractor. Noise only appeared to affect neurotics significantly, particularly in the harder task where they appeared to "give up" (cf. Wiener and Schnieder 1970).The third, fourth and fifth experiments were designed to examine the role of order and other retrieval cues under incentives and noise. The results suggested that order enhances recall in both noise and incentive conditions. However, word locations were only successfully utilised by incentive groups. This again suggests that incentives 'broaden' attention whilst noise 'narrows' attention. The final chapter discussed the differential role of order under noise and incentives, and also the possibility that an explanation of many of the effects may lie in the masking properties of noise.