<p> The purpose of the present study was to explore differences in the cognitive representation of stressful memories versus less stressful memories. Five hundred-fifty six participants indicated whether they were currently involved in a significant romantic relationship, had experienced the breakup of a relationship in the last 12 months, or had not been involved in a relationship in the last 12 months. To compare stressful memories to less stressful memories, participants who experienced a breakup rated how stressful the breakup was for them (past distress). Ninety-one participants who had experienced a breakup reported low distress about the breakup; 117 reported high distress. Three hundred-forty eight participants who had not experienced the breakup of a significant romantic relationship in the last 12 months were included in the study as comparison groups. A multidimensional scaling (MDS) technique was used to measure the cognitive representations of participants? memories using 6 behaviors and 6 emotions associated with romantic relationships. In addition, participants completed a measure of intrusive thoughts about the relationship and wrote a brief essay describing their deepest thoughts and feelings about their past relationship and the subsequent breakup. Results indicated that the cognitive representations of participants in the low stress breakup group were more clustered than those in the high stress breakup group . Post-hoc analysis of current distress over the breakup found that participants who were less able to accept the breakup rated the emotions and the behaviors associated with the relationship more similarly, had more aberrant cognitive representations of the relationship, had more intrusive thoughts about the breakup, and evidenced a greater use of cause and insight words when asked to describe their past relationship. Results are discussed in terms of cognitive theories of the structure of stressful memories and clinical theories of recovering from a stressful experience.<P>

<p>Today's labor force is more mobile than any cohort in recent history. Labor force mobility and state level retention can have profound effects on the economy of a state. It is necessary for organizations to both effectively retain their own talent as well as to attract top talent from other states. Understanding the individual level factors that predict who will move and who will stay in-state after graduating from college is important for policy makers and organizations looking to tailor their recruiting efforts in order to maximize their efforts to attract and retain top talent in science and engineering fields. The present study examined data collected by the National Science Foundation in their National Survey of Recent College Graduates (NSRCG:1997) to determine factors that predict state retention of high school and most recent college degree recipients in science and engineering fields. Logistic regression was used to analyze two dichotomous dependent measures of retention, high school degree and most recent college degree. Results found support for a core set of predictors common to both measures; they include race, college major, annual salary, and stayers (those who stayed in-state to attend college). In addition, undergraduate GPA predicted retention at the high school level while respondent age and citizenship predicted retention/ most recent degree. By far, stayers had the largest effect on retention for both dependent measures.<P>

<p>Applying attribution theory to capital sentencing decisions, it was hypothesized that temporal location of mitigation (suggesting defendant impairment) and level of defendant effort would affect mock jurors' ratings of mitigating value and subsequent life v. death votes. This was tested experimentally in a 2 (type of mitigation: proximal v. remote-chronic) x 2 (defendant effort: high v. low) design with 240 university psychology students. Two sentencing scenarios were nested within each level of type of mitigation. Thus, participants received one of eight sentencing scenarios. Participants rated the evidence on a variety of dimensions, including perceived defendant impairment, effort and responsibility. They also assigned mitigating value to the circumstances presented in the scenarios and indicated a final penalty vote (life in prison or death). Multivariate analysis of variance results indicated that outcomes were affected by whether the mitigation had a recent or distant onset, but they were not affected by the level of defendant effort. The mitigating value rating was a significant predictor of the vote for life, as more mitigating value was associated with an increased likelihood of voting for life. Supplementary analyses indicated that perceived impairment was a significant mediator of the relationship between mitigating value and the vote for life. When controlling for perceptions of impairment, the predictive power of mitigating value was diminished. These results support previous qualitative and exploratory experimental research concerning the efficacy of capital mitigation. <P>

<p>This study measured job performance of United States Army Special Forces (SF) soldiers using a Mixed Standard Rating Scale (MSRS) format, performance dimension ratings, and rankings. Each SF soldiers performance was examined with a three dimension conceptual model ( i.e. soldiering skills, Special Forces specific skills, and team member skills). This model was tested on two different samples. The first sample was made up of 1,273 U.S. Army Special Forces Soldiers who were rated by officers. The second sample was comprised of 1,121 U.S. Army Special Forces Soldiers who were rated by noncommissioned officers. This study found that the three dimensions of performance were highly intercorrelated with the highest correlation being between the soldiering skills and SF specific dimensions. In addition to correlation analysis, several regression models were also used to analyze each of the three dimensions. A full model was used to regress each of the nine sub-dimensions with the three dimensions of performance. Three reduced models were also made by regressing three sub-dimensions with each of the three dimensions of performance. It was found that each dimension used significantly different regression models. As well, the three reduced models were found to be significant in explaining each dimension. However, the reduced models were unable to explain a significant amount of variance when compared to the full model. Additionally, this study concluded that including all the items (positive, neutral, negative) improved each dimensional model?s multiple correlation coefficient, but only marginally. <P>

Thesis (Ph.D.)--New York University, School of Social Work, 2006. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 360-374). Also available in electronic format on the World Wide Web. Access restricted to users affiliated with the licensed institutions.

Truancy and academic underachievement are significant problems among adolescents. Considering the historical emphasis on studying delinquency in populated urban areas, a more concerted effort is needed to examine this issue in rural areas to determine the extent to which findings are culturally generalizable. As a move in this direction, truant behavior was examined in an East Tennessee county in the southern region of the Appalachian Mountains. The primary objective of this exploratory investigation was to assess personality, behavioral, religious, and environmental factors most associated with high school absenteeism and academic achievement in the Appalachian south. Participants were 374 adolescents in grades 9 through 12 who attended four different high schools in a rural county in East Tennessee. Results of the current study lend some support to the notion that problem behaviors tend to cluster within individuals and be inversely related to academic performance. Having set rules and boundaries within the home was found to be important in preventing truant behavior among this high school sample. Participation in prosocial activities was not supported as a protective factor against problem behaviors to the extent that has been found in other samples. Regression analyses indicate that alcohol use and increased sexual activity were especially strongly associated with truant behavior and academic underperformance, as well as the possibility of a cumulative negative effect of absenteeism on G.P.A. over time.

Student-athletes are thought to be at greater risk for some psychopathologies while underutilizing mental health services. Few studies have explored depression in student-athletes or the reasons behind the resistance to seeking psychological help. The goals of this study were to examine in a nationwide sample of NCAA D-IA and D-IAA student-athletes the (a) manifestation of depressed mood as it relates to gender, injury, injury characteristics (i.e., perceived impact, time in treatment, chronicity), and student-athlete role behaviors (e.g., frequency of skipping events, role strain, self-destructive behaviors) and (b) examine their treatment resistance, perceived barriers to seeking help, and counselor preference should they choose to seek psychological help. Using a web-survey format, student-athletes were presented survey materials and the Personality Assessment Inventory (Morey, 1991) Depression and Treatment Rejection scales. Results indicated student-athletes reported moderately low depression scores. Depression was not impacted by gender or the occurrence of injury; however, for those who were injured, only the perceived impact of their injury accounted for variance in depression scores. Strong relationships between role behaviors and depression indicated possible outward expressions of depression. Additionally, student-athletes reported moderately high treatment rejection scores indicating little desire or perceived need to change and little motivation for entering into counseling. Access to services, privacy issues, stigmatization, and the fear of not being understood acted as barriers to seeking help. Lastly, student-athletes indicated clear preferences for counselor type and practitioner’s location, familiarity with sport, gender, racial similarity, and age. Results highlighted a need for education, awareness, promotion of mental health services, and increased accessibility to services for student-athletes. Recommendations were put forth for university counseling centers as well as athletic department staff members.

INTRODUCTION: Recent research exploring cortical functional connectivity defines a default network (DNt) of brain function and activation of a core midline network (CMS) in the processing of self. The electroencephalographic (EEG) activity in these components of the human DNt and CMS is not well understood. METHODS: This study was conducted with 63 participants. Individuals were recorded during eyes-closed (ECB) and eyes-opened (EOB) baselines and active task (AT) conditions (e.g., self-referential, self-image, self-concept, recent symptomology, other face and object processing). We estimated EEG source localization with standardized low resolution electromagnetic tomography (sLORETA). Subjective experience was obtained for baselines and photographic conditions. RESULTS: The ECB resting condition shows higher activity in all frequencies as compared to all other conditions. Likewise, the active tasks show differential effects for increased activity as compared to EOB for each region of interest (ROI) in each frequency domain. CONCLUSION: The data are in agreement with other neuroimaging techniques (fMRI/PET) investigating the DNt of brain function and further shows that the 3-dimensional localization accuracy of LORETA EEG is sufficient for the study of the DNt. In examining both within and between functional core regions there was a higher degree of activity in lower frequency bands during eyes closed; however, this pattern does not extend to all ROIs for all frequency domains. The differences may represent functional connectivity relating to endogenous/exogenous attention states as opposed to the simple concept of “resting” or “non-activity”. Further study of the functional relationships between EEG frequencies within and between regions in the default network and during self-specific processing may prove important to understanding the complex nature of neocortical functional integration.

The current study explored the role oflessons and dialogue in communication between mothers and their children in an effort to better understand the processes that influence and support healthy child narrative development. Volunteers were recruited from an elementary school, and pairs ofmothers and their children were observed. Observations were coded for the presence oflessons and dialogue, and mother and child narratives were gathered. It was predicted that dialogue would be an important component ofthe communication between mother and child, and that its presence would correlate with mother and child narrative measures. It was also predicted that mother and child would be in synchrony with each other in their communication. However, very little dialogue was present in the current study_ There was a negative correlation between mother narrative coherence and the use ofquestions by mother and child, and a positive correlation between the use oflessons and CBCL Internalizing scores. Possible reasons for the lack ofdialogue are discussed, as are the correlations between narrative measures and the observational codes.

The two studies included in this project were aimed at understanding the effect that relational closeness has on perceived ease of forgiveness and betrayal severity and, in turn, how betrayal severity and relational closeness influence people’s conceptualization of forgiveness. Study 1 addressed the fact that although past studies have shown that relational closeness predicts one’s willingness to forgive and researchers have posited that betrayals that are committed by those closest are the most severe, it is still unclear whether these trends are due to the characteristics of close relationships or to the characteristics of the types of betrayals that are committed within close relationships. Two randomized groups of college undergraduates imagined the same betrayal narratives being committed by either someone relationally close or someone relationally distant. As was expected, imagining someone close led to participants viewing the betrayals as easier to forgive. However, contrary to what was expected, participants who imagined the betrayals being committed by someone close viewed the betrayals as less severe. Together, these findings suggest that it is not the characteristics of the betrayals being committed in close relationships, but the qualities of the relationship that affect the perceived severity of betrayals as well as how easy they are to forgive. Study 2 addressed the notion that people’s conceptualization of forgiveness may vary as a function of the closeness of the betrayer and the severity of the offense. College undergraduates read one of six betrayal narratives taken from the first study that varied in both severity and the relational closeness of the imagined betrayer. Results indicated that participants expected a more positive outcome from the forgiveness of less severe betrayals as well as betrayals that were committed by someone relationally close. The interaction of these two constructs demonstrated that relational closeness has less influence on one’s conceptualization of forgiveness of less severe betrayals. The results of this second study suggest that forgiveness is not a completely static construct and that its conceptualization is dependent upon both who committed the betrayal as well as the severity of the betrayal in question. Implications, limitations, and future directions are discussed.