Dating and Sexual Behavior Among Single Parents of Young Children in the United States

Abstract:

Theory and research on partnered parents suggests trade-offs between parenting and sexuality, with those trade-offs most pronounced among mothers of young children. However, little research has focused on how a growing demographic of single parents negotiates dating and sexual activity. The current study drew upon a 2012 nationally representative sample of 5,481 single Americans 21 years of age and older, of whom 4.3% were parents of a child age five or younger. Dependent variables were sexual thoughts, frequency of sexual activity, number of sexual partners in the past year, dates during the previous three months, and whether one was actively seeking a relationship partner. Covariates included parental age, sex/gender, sexual orientation, education, and income. Using the entire sample of singles, we found no main effects of number (0, 1, 2+) of children aged five years and younger or number of children aged two years and younger on dating and sexual behavior variables. Next, using analyses restricted to single parents (n = 2,121), we found that single parents with a child aged five years or younger, adjusting for covariates, reported greater frequency of sexual activity and first dates but no differences in other outcomes compared with single parents of older children.

Source: The Journal of Sex Research via University of Indiana News Service.

Press Release: Kinsey study of single parents' dating, sexual activity contradicts assumptions

Coached for the Classroom: Parents’ Cultural Transmission and Children’s Reproduction of Educational Inequalities

Abstract:

Scholars typically view class socialization as an implicit process. This study instead shows how parents actively transmit class-based cultures to children and how these lessons reproduce inequalities. Through observations and interviews with children, parents, and teachers, I found that middle- and working-class parents expressed contrasting beliefs about appropriate classroom behavior, beliefs that shaped parents’ cultural coaching efforts. These efforts led children to activate class-based problem-solving strategies, which generated stratified profits at school. By showing how these processes vary along social class lines, this study reveals a key source of children’s class-based behaviors and highlights the efforts by which parents and children together reproduce inequalities.

Source:  American Sociological Review August 25, 2014 doi: 0003122414546931

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Reactions to Media Violence: It’s in the Brain of the Beholder

Abstract:

Media portraying violence is part of daily exposures. The extent to which violent media exposure impacts brain and behavior has been debated. Yet there is not enough experimental data to inform this debate. We hypothesize that reaction to violent media is critically dependent on personality/trait differences between viewers, where those with the propensity for physical assault will respond to the media differently than controls. The source of the variability, we further hypothesize, is reflected in autonomic response and brain functioning that differentiate those with aggression tendencies from others. To test this hypothesis we pre-selected a group of aggressive individuals and non-aggressive controls from the normal healthy population; we documented brain, blood-pressure, and behavioral responses during resting baseline and while the groups were watching media violence and emotional media that did not portray violence. Positron Emission Tomography was used with [18F]fluoro-deoxyglucose (FDG) to image brain metabolic activity, a marker of brain function, during rest and during film viewing while blood-pressure and mood ratings were intermittently collected. Results pointed to robust resting baseline differences between groups. Aggressive individuals had lower relative glucose metabolism in the medial orbitofrontal cortex correlating with poor self-control and greater glucose metabolism in other regions of the default-mode network (DMN) where precuneus correlated with negative emotionality. These brain results were similar while watching the violent media, during which aggressive viewers reported being more Inspired and Determined and less Upset and Nervous, and also showed a progressive decline in systolic blood-pressure compared to controls. Furthermore, the blood-pressure and brain activation in orbitofrontal cortex and precuneus were differentially coupled between the groups. These results demonstrate that individual differences in trait aggression strongly couple with brain, behavioral, and autonomic reactivity to media violence which should factor into debates about the impact of media violence on the public.

Source: PLOS One

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The Context of Military Environments: An Agenda for Basic Research on Social and Organizational Factors Relevant to Small Units

Description:

The United States Army faces a variety of challenges to maintain a ready and capable force into the future. Missions are increasingly diverse, ranging from combat and counterinsurgency to negotiation, reconstruction, and stability operations, and require a variety of personnel and skill sets to execute. Missions often demand rapid decision-making and coordination with others in novel ways, so that personnel are not simply following a specific set of tactical orders but rather need to understand broader strategic goals and choose among courses of action. Like any workforce, the Army is diverse in terms of demographic characteristics such as gender and race, with increasing pressure to ensure equal opportunities across all demographic parties. With these challenges comes the urgent need to better understand how contextual factors influence soldier and small unit behavior and mission performance.

Source: National Academies Press

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Poor early language skills linked to later behavior and attention problems

From the news release:

Many previous studies have shown a correlation between behavior problems and language skill. Children with behavior problems, particularly those with attention deficits and hyperactivity, such as in ADHD, often have poor language skills. Whether one of these problems precedes the other and directly causes it was until recently an open question.

In a longitudinal study published last year, Petersen, Bates and several others concluded that the arrow points decisively from poor language ability to later behavioral problems, rather than the reverse. The current study shows that it does this by way of self-regulation, a varied concept that includes physical, emotional, cognitive and behavioral control. Self-regulation is integral to children’s capacity to adapt to social situations and to direct their actions toward future goals. The absence of self-regulation abilities is a key predictor and component of future behavior problems.

A number of studies have sought to explain the role of language in the development of self-regulation in terms of the cognitive and neurological mechanisms by which they are linked. This study traces the way they unfold over time and the role of self-regulation in this process.

Source: Indiana University

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Go to published study:  The role of language ability and self-regulation in the development of inattentive–hyperactive behavior problems. Development and Psychopathology, available on CJO2014. doi:10.1017/S0954579414000698. 

Behavioral consequences of eating past the point you are sated.

From the Stanford GSB Blog:

The research is important in the field of memory, where academics are engaged in questions about the relationship between time and memory and when our recency bias shows up. For instance, as you make decisions, do you more clearly remember the first piece of information or the last? Or, which do you weigh more in the decision-making process? What if you have many pieces of information to draw from?

Data and Sources:  
Garbinsky, Emily N., Carey K. Morewedge, and Baba Shiv (forthcoming), “Interference of the End: Why Recency Bias in Memory Determines When a Food is Consumed Again,” Psychological Science.
*Materials and Data: Study 1 Materials, Study 1 Data, Study 2 Materials, Study 2 Data, Study 3 Materials, Study 3 Data

Read more about it on the GSB Blog 

When good people do bad things : Reduced self-referential neural response during intergroup competition predicts competitor harm

From the M.I.T. Press Release:

In a study that recently went online in the journal NeuroImage, the researchers measured brain activity in a part of the brain involved in thinking about oneself. They found that in some people, this activity was reduced when the subjects participated in a competition as part of a group, compared with when they competed as individuals. Those people were more likely to harm their competitors than people who did not exhibit this decreased brain activity.

“This process alone does not account for intergroup conflict: Groups also promote anonymity, diminish personal responsibility, and encourage reframing harmful actions as ‘necessary for the greater good.’ Still, these results suggest that at least in some cases, explicitly reflecting on one’s own personal moral standards may help to attenuate the influence of ‘mob mentality,’” says Mina Cikara, a former MIT postdoc and lead author of the NeuroImage paper.

Sources: M.I.T. and NeuroImage
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Download pdf publication: "Reduced self-referential neural response during intergroup competition predicts competitor harm"

What Ever Happened to the “Cool” Kids? Long-Term Sequelae of Early Adolescent Pseudomature Behavior

Abstract:

Pseudomature behavior—ranging from minor delinquency to precocious romantic involvement—is widely viewed as a nearly normative feature of adolescence. When such behavior occurs early in adolescence, however, it was hypothesized to reflect a misguided overemphasis upon impressing peers and was considered likely to predict long-term adjustment problems. In a multimethod, multireporter study following a community sample of 184 adolescents from ages 13 to 23, early adolescent pseudomature behavior was linked cross-sectionally to a heightened desire for peer popularity and to short-term success with peers. Longitudinal results, however, supported the study's central hypothesis: Early adolescent pseudomature behavior predicted long-term difficulties in close relationships, as well as significant problems with alcohol and substance use, and elevated levels of criminal behavior.

Source: Child Development

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Adolescent Indoor Tanning Use and Unhealthy Weight Control Behaviors

From the abstract:

Youth indoor tanning rates remain high despite the potential for increased melanoma risk. No previous study has assessed the prevalence of unhealthy weight control behaviors in both male and female adolescent indoor tanning users using a nationally representative survey.

Methods:
Pooled data on high school students from the 2009 and 2011 Youth Risk Behavior Survey were used (n = 26,951). Multivariate logistic regression was used to assess associations between the recent indoor tanning use and recently doing the following to lose weight: fasting for more than 24 hours; taking a pill, powder, or liquid without a doctor's consent; and vomiting or taking a laxative.

Results:
Pooled data showed 23.3% of females reported indoor tanning within the past year; 6.5% of males did so as well. Adjusted multivariate results show that females who indoor tan were, on average, more likely to have fasted (odds ratio [OR], 1.2; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.0–1.5), taken a pill, powder, or liquid (OR, 2.4; 95% CI, 1.9–3.0), and vomited or taken a laxative to lose weight (OR, 1.4; 95% CI, 1.1–1.7) within the past 30 days than those who did not. Males who indoor tanned within the past year were, on average, more likely to have fasted (OR, 2.3; 95% CI, 1.7–3.1), taken a pill, powder, or liquid (OR, 4.4; 95% CI, 3.3–6.0), and vomited or taken a laxative to lose weight (OR, 7.1; 95% CI, 4.4–11.4) within the past 30 days.

Conclusions:
Significant associations between indoor tanning use and unhealthy weight control behaviors exist for both male and female adolescents, with a stronger association observed among males.

Source: Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics

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The Lehman Sisters hypothesis

Abstract:

This article explores the Lehman Sisters hypothesis. It reviews empirical literature about gender differences in behavioural, experimental and neuro-economics as well as in other fields of behavioural research. It discusses gender differences along three dimensions of financial behaviour: risk aversion and response to uncertainty, ethics and moral attitudes, and leadership. The article argues that gender stereotypes are influential in finance, constraining women to achieve top positions in banking and sustaining a strong masculine culture. At the same time the analysis indicates that the few women who make it to the top tend to perform on average better than men, in particular under uncertainty. This is explained by a combination of gender beliefs, gender stereotypes, gender identity and flexible biological processes. Although further research is necessary, the existing empirical literature would support a plea for having more rather than fewer women in financial trade, risk management and at the top of the financial sector.

Source: Cambridge Journal of Economics

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A Smartphone Application to Support Recovery From Alcoholism

From the abstract:

This article describes a randomized clinical trial of a smartphone application called the Addiction–Comprehensive Health Enhancement Support System (A-CHESS), which was designed to improve continuing care for AUDs by offering emotional and instrumental support at almost any time and place. The theoretical basis of A-CHESS is self-determination theory, which posits that meeting needs contributes to an individual’s adaptive functioning: being perceived as competent, feeling related to others, and feeling internally motivated and not coerced in one’s actions. Self-determination theory was chosen because evidence suggested that its constructs could be causal mechanisms that would affect A-CHESS targets, and because self-determination theory is broad and fundamental enough to cover a complex, multifaceted eHealth intervention such as A-CHESS. This study reports the primary outcome from a trial that hypothesized that patients leaving residential care for AUDs who received treatment as usual plus a multifeatured smartphone application would have fewer risky drinking days over 12 months than patients receiving only treatment as usual. We also report on 2 secondary outcomes: abstinence and negative consequences of drinking.

Source: JAMA Psychiatry
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Caught In The Scammer’s Net: Risk Factors That May Lead to Becoming an Internet Fraud Victim

Introduction:

The present study surveyed some 11,271 individuals age 18 and older nationally and in 12 state oversamples.  The survey sought to answer the following questions:

1. Are there behaviors and life experiences that may increase a person’s risk of becoming a victim of online fraud?
2. What proportion of individuals nationally, and in particular target states may be at risk of being victimized by online fraud?
3. How concerned are Americans about online fraud and what if any steps are they taking to protect themselves?

Data from this national and multi-state survey of over 11,000 online users also shows that Americans are very concerned about online fraud, yet many avoid taking basic precautions to protect themselves.  

Source: AARP Research

Download full pdf publication: Caught In The Scammer’s Net: Risk Factors That May Lead to Becoming an Internet Fraud Victim

Face to Face Versus Facebook: Does Exposure to Social Networking Web Sites Augment or Attenuate Physiological Arousal Among the Socially Anxious?

Abstract

The present study tested two competing hypotheses about the effect of Facebook exposure on the physiological arousal level of participants who then encountered the stimulus person in a face-to-face situation. Facebook exposure may attenuate later arousal by providing increased comfort and confidence, but it is also possible that Facebook exposure will augment arousal, particularly among the socially anxious. Participants completed a measure of social anxiety and were exposed to a stimulus person via Facebook, face to face, or both. Galvanic skin response was recorded during the exposures to the stimulus person. Results were consistent with the augmentation hypothesis: a prior exposure on Facebook will lead to increased arousal during a face-to-face encounter, particularly for those high in social anxiety.

Source: Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking

Download pdf: Face to Face Versus Facebook: Does Exposure to Social Networking Web Sites Augment or Attenuate Physiological Arousal Among the Socially Anxious?

APA Report on Gun Violence Identifies Precursors and Promising Solutions

Behavioral threat assessment identified as most effective prevention strategy

From the press release:

There is no single personality profile that can reliably predict who will use a gun in a violent act — but individual prediction is not necessary for violence prevention, according to a comprehensive report on gun violence released today by the American Psychological Association. 
 
The report summarizes the psychological research that has helped develop evidence-based programs that can prevent violence through both primary and secondary interventions. Primary prevention programs can reduce risk factors for violence in the general population. Secondary prevention programs can help individuals who are experiencing emotional difficulties or interpersonal conflicts before they escalate into violence.

Source: American Psychological Association

Download full pdf publication: Gun Violence: Prediction, Prevention, and Policy

Risking Your Health : Causes, Consequences, and Interventions to Prevent Risky Behaviors

From the description:

Changing behaviors is tricky — public health interventions via legislation with strong enforcement mechanisms can be more effective than simple communication campaigns informing consumers about the risks associated with certain behaviors, since translating knowledge into concrete changes in behavior seems to be hard to achieve. Economic mechanisms such as taxes (especially on alcohol and tobacco products), subsidies (such as free condoms), and conditional/unconditional cash transfers are also used to reduce risky behaviors (for example in HIV prevention). Of great interest to policy makers, academics and practitioners, this book assesses the efficiency of those interventions designed to reduce the prevalence of behaviors that endanger health. 

Source: World Bank


Download pdf: Risking Your Health : Causes, Consequences, and Interventions to Prevent Risky Behaviors

The “Daily Grind”: Work, Commuting, and Their Impact on Political Participation

Abstract:

Past research demonstrates that free time is an important resource for political participation. We investigate whether two central drains on citizens’ daily time—working and commuting—impact their level of political participation. The prevailing “resources” model offers a quantity-focused view where additional time spent working or commuting reduces free time and should each separately decrease participation. We contrast this view to a “commuter’s strain” hypothesis, which emphasizes time spent in transit as a psychologically onerous burden over and above the workday. Using national survey data, we find that time spent working has no effect on participation, while commuting significantly decreases participation. We incorporate this finding into a comprehensive model of the “daily grind,” which factors in both socioeconomic status and political interest. Our analysis demonstrates that commuting leads to the greatest loss in political interest for low-income Americans, and that this loss serves as a main mechanism through which commuting erodes political participation.

Source: American Politics Research

Download: The “Daily Grind”: Work, Commuting, and Their Impact on Political Participation

Changing Course: Preventing Youth From Joining Gangs

From the introduction:

The consequences of gangs — and the burden they place on the law enforcement and public health systems in our communities — are significant. People who work in the fields of public health and public safety know that efforts to address the problem after kids have already joined gangs are not enough. To realize a significant and lasting reduction in youth gang activity, we must prevent young people from joining gangs in the first place.

Source: National Institute of Justice (U.S.A.)

Download full ebook:  Changing Course: Preventing Youth From Joining Gangs

Eye Contact May Make People More Resistant to Persuasion

From the press release:

...new research shows that eye contact may actually make people more resistant to persuasion, especially when they already disagree.

Abstract:

Popular belief holds that eye contact increases the success of persuasive communication, and prior research suggests that speakers who direct their gaze more toward their listeners are perceived as more persuasive. In contrast, we demonstrate that more eye contact between the listener and speaker during persuasive communication predicts less attitude change in the direction advocated. In Study 1, participants freely watched videos of speakers expressing various views on controversial sociopolitical issues. Greater direct gaze at the speaker’s eyes was associated with less attitude change in the direction advocated by the speaker. In Study 2, we instructed participants to look at either the eyes or the mouths of speakers presenting arguments counter to participants’ own attitudes. Intentionally maintaining direct eye contact led to less persuasion than did gazing at the mouth. These findings suggest that efforts at increasing eye contact may be counterproductive across a variety of persuasion contexts.

Source:  Association for Psychological Science

Link to online press release
Download pdf article from Psychological Science (academic institution or subscription required)

Determining who responds better to a computer- vs. human-delivered physical activity intervention

From the Abstract:

Little research has explored who responds better to an automated vs. human advisor for health behaviors in general, and for physical activity (PA) promotion in particular. The purpose of this study was to explore baseline factors (i.e., demographics, motivation, interpersonal style, and external resources) that moderate intervention efficacy delivered by either a human or automated advisor.

Source:

International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, 10(1), 109. doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1479-5868-10-109. Retrieved from: eScholarship Repository: http://escholarship.org/uc/item/5584f2sq

Download pdf publication: Determining who responds better to a computer- vs. human-delivered physical activity intervention

Understanding Peer Effects in Financial Decisions

Abstract:

Using a high-stakes field experiment conducted in partnership with a large financial brokerage in Brazil, we attempt to disentangle channels through which a person's financial decisions affect his peers'. When someone purchases an asset, his peers may want to purchase it as well, both because they learn from his choice (“social learning") and because his possession of the asset affects others' utility of owning the same asset (“social utility"). We randomize whether one member of a peer pair is allowed to possess an asset that he chose to purchase. Then, we randomize whether the second member of the pair 1) receives no information about the first member, or 2) is informed of the first member's desire to own the assetandthe result of the randomization that determined possession. This allows us to estimate the effects of (a) learning plus possession, and (b) learning alone, relative to a control group, allowing us to separately identify effects of the “social learning" and “social utility" channels. In the control (no information) group, 42% of individuals purchased the asset; this increases to 71% in the “social learning only" group; and, it increases to 93% in the “social learning and social utility" group. We find thatboth“social learning" and “social utility" channels are quantitatively important, and have independent, statistically significant effects on the decision to purchase the asset.

Source: CEGA Working Papers, Center for Effective Global Action, UC Berkeley [via eScholarship repository]

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