Intergenerational Montessori Program for Adults With Memory Concerns

Purpose This study evaluated the effects of an intergenerational Montessori after-school program on the engagement, affect, and quality of life of older adults with memory concerns and on the attitudes of children toward older adults. Method Eleven older adults were paired with 11 children to participate in a 45-min after-school activity program. Observations of engagement and affect during the interactions were collected 3 times a week for 4 weeks. The older adults' engagement and affect also were observed during 45-min planning/discussion sessions without the children present before their arrival to the program. Results Results revealed significant differences in older adults' engagement and positive affect when the children were present. Significant pre–post improvements in reported quality of life and maintenance of cognitive status were associated with program participation. Children demonstrated more active than passive engagement and more happy than neutral affect during activity sessions. Four of the seven children improved their positive ratings of older adults. Conclusions This program documented success in improving engagement and affect in older adults with mild memory concerns while engaging with children. Future studies with a larger sample of participants with varying degrees of memory impairment are needed to investigate the potential of this promising program.

Μεταγνωστικές εμπειρίες στην προοπτική μνήμη νεότερων και μεγαλύτερων σε ηλικία ατόμων: παίζει ρόλο η απερισκεψία;

The present study aimed to examine metacognitive experiences in situations with respect to perspective memory (PM). The metacognitive experiences studied were blank in mind, “tip of the tongue”, mind wandering, and mind blanking. Young, middle-aged and elderly people of both sexes participated in this study. We also studied affect, cognitive failures and mindlessness as personality traits, which were also used as correlation factors of metacognitive experiences. The results of the current study showed that personality traits are related to metacognitive experience of blank in the mind, but not with performance in the PM task. Moreover, the results showed that there is a decline in task performance in older people, but no effect on metacognitive experiences. There were also high correlations between the metacognitive experiences of mind wandering, blank in mind and mind blanking, but there were no correlations between them and the “tip of the tongue” experience. Finally, regarding the correlation of affect with the task performance and metacognitive experiences, it was found that neutral affect correlates positively with mind wandering and blank in mind and negatively with mind blanking self-reports, but it does not necessarily correlate with lower task performance.

The games they play: Observations of children with autism spectrum disorder on the school playground

The playground may be an important context to examine the social functioning of children with autism spectrum disorder. Previous literature on playground peer engagement has used quantitative methods, but there is limited research using qualitative observations to understand the nuances of playground behavior. Using a mixed-methods approach, 55 elementary school–aged children with autism spectrum disorder who are primarily included in general education settings were observed on the school playground using the Playground Observation of Peer Engagement. Quantitative and qualitative data were examined using a mixed-methods approach. The results showed that children with autism spectrum disorder: engage in solitary and peripheral activities; demonstrate appropriate initiations and responses to peers; display self-stimulatory, motoric behaviors most frequently during solitary activities; and often have neutral affect on the playground. These findings suggest that intervention and supports for children with autism spectrum disorder may be important to deliver at recess to address peer engagement.

Utilizing Neutral Affective States in Research: Theory, Assessment, and Recommendations

Even though researchers regularly use neutral affect induction procedures (AIPs) as a control condition in their work, there is little consensus on what is neutral affect. This article reviews five approaches that researchers have used to operationalize neutral AIPs: to produce a(n) (a) minimal affective state, (b) in-the-middle state, (c) deactivated state, (d) typical state, or (e) indifferent state. For each view, the article delineates the theoretical basis for the neutral AIP, how to assess it, and provides recommendations for when and how to use it. The goal of the article is to encourage researchers to state their theoretical assumptions about neutral affect, to validate those assumptions, and to make appropriate conclusions based on them.

Enhancing Interpersonal Communication: Positive Mood Effects

I tested the possibility that positive affect would promote the design of effective interpersonal communication. Participants were 44 male and 96 female undergraduates at a mid-sized university in the Southeastern United States, who were induced to experience positive or neutral affect and were then asked to design communications relating to 15 abstract stimuli. Results indicated that, compared with the participants who had experienced neutral affect, those in a positive mood constructed messages that contained greater detail and more literal information for another person (vs. messages intended for their own use at a later time). This suggests that those experiencing positive affect made adjustments to account for the perspective of the recipient. That effect was not observed for participants experiencing a neutral mood. My findings suggest that effective interpersonal communication depends, in part, on the affective state of the communicator.

How do parents' depression and anxiety, and infants' negative temperament relate to parent–infant face-to-face interactions?

The present study investigated the associations of mothers' and fathers' lifetime depression and anxiety symptoms, and of infants' negative temperament with parents' and infants' gaze, facial expressions of emotion, and synchrony. We observed infants' (age between 3.5 and 5.5 months, N = 101) and parents' gaze and facial expressions during 4-min naturalistic face-to-face interactions. Parents' lifetime symptoms of depression and anxiety were assessed with clinical interviews, and infants' negative temperament was measured with standardized observations. Parents with more depressive symptoms and their infants expressed less positive and more neutral affect. Parents' lifetime anxiety symptoms were not significantly related to parents' expressions of affect, while they were linked to longer durations of gaze to parent, and to more positive and negative affect in infants. Parents' lifetime depression or anxiety was not related to synchrony. Infants' temperament did not predict infants' or parents' interactive behavior. The study reveals that more depression symptoms in parents are linked to more neutral affect from parents and from infants during face-to-face interactions, while parents' anxiety symptoms are related to more attention to parent and less neutral affect from infants (but not from parents).

Keep at bay! – Abnormal personal space regulation as marker of paranoia in schizophrenia

BackgroundDuring threat, interpersonal distance is deliberately increased. Personal space regulation is related to amygdala function and altered in schizophrenia, but it remains unknown whether it is particularly associated with paranoid threat.MethodsWe compared performance in two tests on personal space between 64 patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders and 24 matched controls. Patients were stratified in those with paranoid threat, neutral affect or paranoid experience of power. In the stop-distance paradigm, participants indicated the minimum tolerable interpersonal distance. In the fixed-distance paradigm, they indicated the level of comfort at fixed interpersonal distances.ResultsParanoid threat increased interpersonal distance two-fold in the stop-distance paradigm, and reduced comfort ratings in the fixed-distance paradigm. In contrast, patients experiencing paranoid power had high comfort ratings at any distance. Patients with neutral affect did not differ from controls in the stop-distance paradigm. Differences between groups remained when controlling for gender and positive symptom severity. Among schizophrenia patients, the stop-distance paradigm detected paranoid threat with 93% sensitivity and 83% specificity.ConclusionsPersonal space regulation is not generally altered in schizophrenia. However, state paranoid experience has distinct contributions to personal space regulation. Subjects experiencing current paranoid threat share increased safety-seeking behavior.

Elicited Awe Decreases Aggression

Awe is a feeling of wonder and amazement in response to experiencing something so vast that it transcends one's current frames of reference. Across three experiments (N = 557), we tested the inhibition effect of awe on aggression. We used a narrative recall task paradigm (Studies 1 and 2) and a video (Study 3) to induce the emotion of awe. After inducing awe, we first examined participants’ emotion and their sense of ‘small self’, and then the manifestation of aggressiveness in a Shooting Game (Study 1), Tangram Help/Hurt Task (Studies 2 and 3) and Aggression-IAT (Study 3), respectively. Results indicated that awe reduced aggression and increased prosociality and a sense of small self relative to neutral affect and positive emotions of happiness and amusement. Mediation analyses evidenced mixed support for a sense of small self mediating the effect of awe on aggression and prosociality.