Training in empirically validated treatments: What are clinical psychology students learning?

Directors of clinical training (83%) and directors of internships with American Psychological Association approval (55%) responded to a survey concerning empirically validated psychological treatments in which their students received training. Most programs provided supervised clinical experience in a number of these treatments. However, over 20% of doctoral training programs failed to provide minimal coverage of empirically validated treatments in didactic courses, and internship programs typically did not require that students be competent in any of these treatments before completion of the program. The absence of didactic and clinical training in empirically validated psychodynamic therapies and interpersonal therapy was most marked. These findings suggest that programs need to be more attentive to teaching data-based treatments. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Visual habituation, sensorimotor development, and tempo of play in one-year-old infants

The pattern of relationships between rate of visual habituation, sensorimotor development, play tempo, and motor activity was examined in 168 1-year-old infants. Subjects were exposed to 3 consecutive series of a repeated visual stimulus and the rate of habituation determined for each series. The measures of sensorimotor development included both standard psychometric and Piagetian scales. Measures of play tempo and motor activity were obtained from observations of free play. Longer fixation time to the initial stimulus presentation and faster habituation on the original series were associated with advanced sensorimotor development for girls. Longer initial fixation time in boys was associated with a slower tempo of play. The magnitude of these relationships, however, was found to be dependent on whether the subject completed the entire experimental session or was terminated early due to irritability or drowsiness. The results suggest that both the sex and state of the infant are important moderators of the relationship between measure of visual attention and other individual difference variables.     

New roles for psychologists in environmental impact assessment.

Comments that efforts described by D. M. Hartsough and J. C. Savitsky (see record 1985-29572-001) to study technological disaster and show links between stress and health are important contributions to psychology and to management of environmental hazards. Roles for psychologists beyond the limits set by the National Environmental Policy Act and by the courts are suggested, based on a discussion of these elements. Within the framework of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act (i.e., a clear line is drawn between science and politics), psychologists can contribute by providing new information about the human effects of new technology. (14 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

White therapist and female minority clients: Gender and culture issues.

Discusses ramifications of a White female therapist working with female minority clients. The personality of the therapist and the meaning of White and minority to him/her appear to be important variables for success with minority clients. It is argued that therapy with minorities must always be viewed in the context of one's own political perspective, attitudes, and biases and that racial homogeneity for client and therapist is less important than interpersonal trust in a situation of gender likeness and equality. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A Nucleophilic Activity-Based Probe Enables Profiling of PLP-Dependent Enzymes

PLP-dependent enzymes represent an important class of highly “druggable” enzymes that perform a wide array of critical reactions to support all organisms. Inhibition of individual members of this family of enzymes has been validated as a therapeutic target for pathologies ranging from infection with Mycobacterium tuberculosis to epilepsy. Given the broad nature of the activities within this family of enzymes, we envisioned a universally acting probe to characterize existing and putative members of the family that also includes the necessary chemical moieties to enable activity-based protein profiling experiments. Hence, we developed a probe that contains an N-hydroxyalanine warhead that acts as a covalent inhibitor of PLP-dependent enzymes, a linear diazirine for UV crosslinking, and an alkyne moiety to enable enrichment of crosslinked proteins. Our molecule was used to study PLP-dependent enzymes in vitro as well as look at whole-cell lysates of M. tuberculosis and assess inhibitory activity. The probe was able to enrich and identify LysA, a PLP-dependent enzyme crucial for lysine biosynthesis, through mass spectrometry. Overall, our study shows the utility of this trifunctional first-generation probe. We anticipate further optimization of probes for PLP-dependent enzymes will enable the characterization of rationally designed covalent inhibitors of PLP-dependent enzymes, which will expedite the preclinical characterization of these important therapeutic targets.