Health psychology: Continuity and change.

This issue of Health Psychology marks a transition in editorship. I assumed the role as editor-in-chief for Health Psychology on January 1, 2005. However, editorial transitions typically require some time to clear the backlog of articles accepted by the previous editor. Because this is one of the first issue including articles accepted by the current editorial board, we now take the opportunity to outline some of the new directions that we have planned. Our overall goal is to increase the impact of the journal on theory, research, and practice relevant to health and behavior. To accomplish this goal, we want to publish the highest quality science. Although psychologists remain the most common authors for Health Psychology, we encourage articles from multidisciplinary teams and from authors in other disciplines. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Continuity and change in personality.

Examines the stability and resistance to change of "cognitive constructions about ourselves and the world" and cognitive styles in problem solving. The mind is presented as creating and maintaining a "perception of continuity even in the face of perpetual observed changes in actual behavior." Questions are raised regarding correlations between new cognitive style measures, IQ (as measured by WISC), and RT. (21 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Continuity and change in psychopathic traits as measured via normal-range personality: A longitudinal-biometric study.

The discriminant validity of the interpersonal-affective and social deviance traits of psychopathy has been well documented. However, few studies have explored whether these traits follow distinct or comparable developmental paths. The present study used the Multidimensional Personality Questionnaire (A. Tellegen, in press) to examine the development of the psychopathic traits of Fearless Dominance (i.e., interpersonal-affective) and Impulsive Antisociality (i.e., social deviance) from late adolescence to early adulthood in a longitudinal- epidemiological sample of male and female twins. Results from mean- and individual-level analyses revealed stability in Fearless Dominance from late adolescence to early adulthood, whereas Impulsive Antisociality declined over this developmental period. In addition, biometric findings indicated greater genetic contributions to stability in these traits and greater nonshared environmental contributions to their change over time. Collectively, these findings suggest distinct developmental trends for psychopathic traits from late adolescence to early adulthood. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Residential mobility as an adaptive experience.

Derivations from ecological theory predict that high residential mobility will contribute to the development of cognitive complexity, flexibility, and autonomy by providing diversity of experience. High residentially mobile students were expected to adapt better to the stress, novelty, and complexity of the college environment. Situational and chronic anxiety scales, classroom preference questionnaire, and the Omnibus Personality Inventory were administered to 26 male and 43 female undergraduates classified for residential and social mobility. High residentially mobile Ss reported less anxiety than low mobile Ss both in acute situations and on chronic measures. Residential mobility did not effect classroom preferences, but social mobility did. Results on the personality measures are consistent with the theoretical expectations for males, but not for females. High residentially mobile males differed from low residentially mobile males in being more intellectually oriented, placing more value on autonomy and independence, and in being more adaptive. (16 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Instigative aggression as a function of past experience and target characteristics.

Examined third-party-instigated aggression by manipulating the provocativeness of the same or a new target in Part 2 of a task. Effects of previous experience with aggression (i.e., interacting with partners supportive of or disapproving of aggression in Part 1) were also examined. Ss were 80 female undergraduates. Although the provocativeness of the target accounted for the most variance in the amount of aggression expressed, when the target in Part 2 was new, prior experience influenced aggression. Results are discussed in terms of an interactional model of behavior. The clearer the current situational demands (i.e., known, predictable target) were, the less the influence of past aggressive experience on continued aggression; the more ambiguous the current situation (i.e., new, unpredictable target) was, the more the influence of past aggressive experience on continued aggression. (14 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Continuity and change: Assortative marriage and the consistency of personality in adulthood.

How is personality stability possible amid the myriad of social changes and transformations that characterize a human life? We argue that by choosing situations that are compatible with their dispositions and by affiliating with similar others, individuals may set in motion processes of social interchange that sustain their dispositions across time and circumstance. To test this proposition we examined mate selection, using data on married couples from two ongoing longitudinal studies at the Institute of Human Development, University of California, Berkeley. Consistent with other research, the results point to homogamy as a basic norm in marriage. More important, the results show that marriage to a similar other promotes consistency in the intraindividual organization of personality attributes across middle adulthood. We offer some speculations for a more relational approach to the problem of individual continuity and change. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Continuity and change in children's social maladjustment: A developmental behavior genetic study.

Two developmental models were used to study genetic and environmental mechanisms underlying continuity and change in children's maladjustment. The transmission model assumed that successive levels of functioning were causally linked and that earlier experiences or prior genetic influences affected later maladjustment. The liability model related continuity in problem behavior to stable underlying environmental or genetic factors. The analyses pertained on average to 436 pairs of full siblings, 119 pairs of half siblings, and 122 pairs of cousins for whom maternal ratings of problem behaviors were available at ages 4–6, 6–8, and 8–10. Nonshared environmental influences appeared to be most important for changes in children's problem behaviors and did not have significant effects on age-to-age continuity. To represent the genetic and shared environmental mechanisms underlying stability in problem behavior, the authors preffered liability models without time specific effects. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Continuity and change in industrial/organizational psychology: Learning from previous mistakes.

Previous predictions of changes in industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology have failed to materialize due to omissions in mainstream I/O psychology. Three of these deficiencies (ahistorical habits, failure to appreciate continuity, and implicit acceptance of a particular political–economic framework) are explored to examine I/O psychology's past and present and to better predict its future. These 3 characteristics are seen as pathologies in I/O psychology, and their consequences for predictions are regarded as symptoms of the pathology. The analysis suggests that the future will be more like the present than is currently assumed and that I/O psychologists need to better understand the position of their field in history, the historical context of organizational evolution, and the ongoing political economy. (37 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The central adaptation syndrome: psychosocial stress as a trigger for adaptive modifications of brain structure and brain function

This review makes an attempt to combine data from biological and psychosocial stress literature and to suggest an alternative interpretation of the relationship between stress and disease. It rearranges the presently available knowledge on the short- and long-term effects of stress on many different aspects of brain structure and brain function in the form of a new conceptualization of the biological role of the stress response. The higher associative brain structures are not only the sites in which environmental and psychosocial demands are recognized and from which a less or more systemic, i.e. controllable or uncontrollable, stress response is initiated. They are also the sites which are primarily affected in the course of the stress response: the stress response acts as a trigger for the adaptive modification of the structure and the function of the brain of higher vertebrates and serves thus to adjust, in a self-optimizing manner, the behavior of an individual to the ever-changing requirements of its external world. This novel concept summarizes a large amount of information into a framework that lends itself to testable strategies for future research.     

Continuity and change in the development of psychology around the world.

A survey conducted in 1998 by the International Union of Psychological Science showed that psychology is continuing to grow and expand around the world. At the same time, psychology faces severe challenges, including these: (a) responding to increased demands for accountability, (b) developing research that will be applicable to such problems as resolving and alleviating ethnic conflicts, (c) gaining an appropriate classification for psychology among the disciplines, and (d) helping to meet the needs of the "knowledge society." Taking stock of psychology's present resources and state of development should be a helpful exercise in planning for further development. Some proposals are suggested and more are welcomed to deal with the challenges to be faced in the international development of psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Personality change as a function of volunteer experience in a psychiatric hospital.

Tested 416 college students for degree of moral tolerance and self-acceptance before and after completing undergraduate psychology courses. 16 of the students concurrently did volunteer work in mental hospitals. The within-Ss analysis indicates the volunteer experience did not significantly change the moral tolerance scores, whereas it did result in greater self-acceptance scores. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dual adaptation and adaptive generalization of the human vestibulo-ocular reflex

In two experiments, we examined the possibility that the human vestibulo-ocular reflex (VOR) is subject to dual adaptation (the ability to adapt to a sensory rearrangement more rapidly and/or more completely after repeated experience with it) and adaptive generalization (the ability to adapt more readily to a novel sensory rearrangement as a result of prior dual adaptation training). In Experiment 1, the subjects actively turned the head during alternating exposure to a visual-vestibular rearrangement (target/head gain = 0.5) and the normal situation (target/head gain = 0.0). These conditions produced both adaptation and dual adaptation of the VOR but no evidence of adaptive generalization when tested with a target/head gain of 1.0. Experiment 2, in which exposure to the 0.5 gain entailed externally controlled (i.e., passive) whole body rotation, resulted in VOR adaptation but no dual adaptation. As in Experiment 1, no evidence of adaptive generalization was found.     

Continuity and change in the measurement of infant attachment: Comment on Fraley and Spieker (2003).

R.C. Fraley and S.J. Spieker (2003) refocused attention on the important question of continuous versus categorical measurement of infant attachment. This commentary begins with a brief response to Fraley and Spieker's position. Next, it highlights the usefulness of the categorical approach by reviewing some of the major advances in the field that have been fostered by a categorical approach. These include the identification of the disorganized attachment group, the development of the concept of conditional behavioral strategies, the creation of systems for coding attachment beyond infancy, and a greater understanding of cross-generational associations. The author then makes several propositions for future research that are necessary for clarifying how best to measure infant attachment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Effortful control in early childhood: Continuity and change, antecedents, and implications for social development.

The course, antecedents, and implications for social development of effortful control were examined in this comprehensive longitudinal study. Behavioral multitask batteries and parental ratings assessed effortful control at 22 and 33 months (N?=?106). Effortful control functions encompassed delaying, slowing down motor activity, suppressing/initiating activity to signal, effortful attention, and lowering voice. Between 22 and 33 months, effortful control improved considerably, its coherence increased, it was stable, and it was higher for girls. Behavioral and parent-rated measures converged. Children"s focused attention at 9 months, mothers" responsiveness at 22 months, and mothers" self-reported socialization level all predicted children"s greater effortful control. Effortful control had implications for concurrent social development. Greater effortful control at 22 months was linked to more regulated anger, and at 33 months, to more regulated anger and joy and to stronger restraint. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Growing up and growing old: Continuity and change in wishes and desires over the course of life.

This report summarizes the panel held at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Division 39 (Psychoanalysis). The panel explored the meaning of desire in childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. The discussants focused on the subjective experience of desire, its preconditions, and its significance in different developmental stages. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Temporal coordination and adaptation to rate change in music performance.

People often coordinate their actions with sequences that exhibit temporal variability and unfold at multiple periodicities. We compared oscillator- and timekeeper-based accounts of temporal coordination by examining musicians' coordination of rhythmic musical sequences with a metronome that gradually changed rate at the end of a musical phrase (Experiment 1) or at the beginning of a phrase (Experiment 2). The rhythms contained events that occurred at the same periodic rate as the metronome and at half the period. Rate change consisted of a linear increase or decrease in intervals between metronome onsets. Musicians coordinated their performances better with a metronome that decreased than increased in tempo (as predicted by an oscillator model), at both beginnings and ends of musical phrases. Model performance was tested with an oscillator period or timekeeper interval set to the same period as the metronome (1:1 coordination) or half the metronome period (2:1 coordination). Only the oscillator model was able to predict musicians' coordination at both periods. These findings suggest that coordination is based on internal neural oscillations that entrain to external sequences. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Enduringness and change in creative personality and the prediction of occupational creativity

Participants in a longitudinal study of women's adult development were scored at midlife on the Occupational Creativity Scale (OCS), which draws on J. L. Holland's (1985) model of vocational environments in the assessment of participants' creative achievement. College measures of cognitive-affective style and career aspirations predicted OCS scores at age 52, and consistency of creative temperament (H. G. Gough, 1992), motivation, and overall attributes of creative personality were demonstrated with both self-report and observer data over several times of testing. However, there was change along with this enduringness: Large fluctuations in creative temperament over one period of life or another were common in individuals, and OCS scores were associated with an increase in level of effective functioning over 30 years.