Adam D. Brown

Trauma Centrality and PTSD in Veterans Returning From Iraq and Afghanistan

Research has demonstrated that the extent to which an individual integrates a traumatic event into their identity (trauma centrality) positively correlates with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptom severity. No research to date has examined trauma centrality in individuals exposed to combat stress. This study investigated trauma centrality using the abridged Centrality of Event Scale (Berntsen & Rubin, 2006) among Operation Enduring Freedom/Operation Iraqi Freedom combat veterans (n = 46). Multiple regression analyses demonstrated that trauma centrality predicted PTSD symptoms. Trauma centrality and PTSD symptoms remained significantly correlated when controlling for depression in subgroups of veterans with or without probable PTSD. This study replicates and extends findings that placing trauma at the center of ones identity is associated with PTSD symptomatology.

The Role of Narratorship and Expertise in Social Remembering

Are individuals more likely to serve as a vehicle for social contagion because they are perceived as experts or because they talk a lot? This study parses the contribution of expertise and narratorship by asking groups of three or four individuals to study variants of a curriculum vitae (CV) and then to recall the CV individually, as a group, and once again individually, with a recognition test following the final recall. The group was falsely led to believe that one member had expertise. Narratorship was also determined. Expertise and Narratorship contributed independently to critical false recollections, with Narratorship contributing more than Expertise. The way a conversation unfolds and the emergence of a narrator can reshape memories.

Time, before, and after time: temporal self and social appraisals in posttraumatic stress disorder.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVESnIn the aftermath of a traumatic event, individuals may engage in a series of comparisons in which they appraise their current functioning in relation to how they functioned prior to the traumatic event, as well as how they anticipate functioning in the future. In addition, trauma-exposed individuals may also appraise their functioning in relation to other individuals exposed to the same or similar types of traumatic events. We examine whether PTSD and non-PTSD classified individuals differ in temporal self and social appraisals.nnnMETHODSnOperation Enduring/Iraqi Freedom (OEF/OIF) combat-veterans with and without PTSD appraised their own past, current, and anticipated future functioning, as well as hypothetical other OEF/OIF veterans functioning across the same three temporal points.nnnRESULTSnIndividuals without PTSD appraised their own functioning as progressively improving across time. In contrast, individuals with PTSD viewed their current pre-trauma current self more favorably than their current or anticipated future self. Both groups appraised hypothetical other OEF/OIF veterans improving with time, yet individuals with PTSD evaluated other OEF/OIF veterans more favorably than those without PTSD.nnnLIMITATIONSnLimitations of the study include a cross-sectional design, precluding causality; the lack of a non-trauma exposed group, relatively small sample, and all-male gender of participants limit the generalizability to other populations.nnnCONCLUSIONSnPTSD and non-PTSD individuals differ in self and social appraisals when asked to evaluate past, present, and future functioning. Further research needs to better understand the extent to which these differences are associated with resilience to or maintenance of PTSD symptoms.

Integrating Science in Applied Psychology Programs: A Student-Operated Journal

As a requirement of APA accreditation, many PhD programs in applied psychology subscribe to some variant of the scientist-practitioner model. However, critics have argued that integrating science into an applied psychology curriculum may be too challenging a task. This article describes the development of The New School Psychology Bulletin, a student-operated journal dedicated to publishing original research articles written by psychology graduate students. We argue that the process of publishing a student-operated journal can have a positive effect on students attitudes toward research and has the potential to serve as a model to foster integration of research and training experiences in an applied psychology program.

The Perceived Relevance and Efficacy of a Graduate School Journal Among Graduate Faculty and Training Directors

A total of 35 psychology department members from 21 universities assessed the relevance and efficacy of the New School Psychology Bulletin (NSPB), a graduate student journal, to training in psychology. Overall, a small sample of psychology department members viewed NSPB as an effective vehicle for student training. Perceptions among faculty were less favorable than previous research demonstrated with a student sample. The majority of respondents reported that students in their programs learn about manuscript preparation but noted that 50% or fewer students actually publish in peer-reviewed journals during graduate school. This suggests that although faculty members perceive that their students are adequately trained in this domain, a large number of students are not putting these skills into practice by submitting manuscripts to peer-reviewed journals.

Introduction: Memory and the Future: Why a Change of Focus is Necessary

For those who study memory, there is a nagging concern that memory studies is inherently backward-looking, and that memory itself — and the ways in which it is deployed, invoked and utilized — can potentially hinder efforts to move forward. It is the purpose of this book to challenge these assumptions by looking at how the study and practice of memory are ultimately about and for the present and future. This Janus-faced view of memory as looking to the past in order to shape the present and future is the basis for the increasingly relevant and pressing concerns and scholarship about the relationship of individual and collective memory to democratic politics; human rights and transitional justice; revenge, imposture and forgery; social movements and utopian moments; and historical facts and scientific technologies.

Filling the Gaps of Graduate School Training: Perceived Relevance and Efficacy of the New School Psychology Bulletin

We examined whether the New School Psychology Bulletin (NSPB), a peer reviewed journal operated by graduate students, was perceived as relevant and effective among individuals pursuing clinical, nonclinical (research and academic), and combined clinical and nonclinical careers. Individuals (N = 155) were surveyed for career goals, current research interests, as well as perceived relevance and efficacy of the NSPB. Although research interests differed by career goals, participants perceived the NSPB as effective for providing valuable writing and peer review experiences, cultivating research, and increasing communication between students and faculty, and relevant for training clinical and nonclinical students. The results of this survey suggest that students perceive those skills offered by the NSPB as relevant and effective in their professional development, which in turn, may foster the scientist-practitioner training model.

The resounding echoes of memory in terrorism and political aggression

Welcome to this special issue of Behavioral Sciences of Terrorism and Political Aggression (BSTPA) on memory and terrorism. This issue represents an attempt to generate an interdisciplinary dialogue about how memory studies may contribute to the study of terrorism and political aggression. It is our hope that this special issue will broaden the current discourse and analyses employed by those studying terrorism and political aggression, and serve as a catalyst to initiate new research agendas that consider memory a critical perspective within this field. To that end, we feel that this collection of papers highlights a wide range of topics within terrorism and political aggression research that memory scholars seek to address, and demonstrates how memory studies will aide in the conceptualization, prevention, coming to terms with, and response to terrorism. Before introducing the papers included in this special issue, we begin by discussing our motivations and timing for it. We then attempt to briefly contextualize and locate memory and terrorism within larger theoretical frameworks and describe what we believe are understudied, yet important, topics in memory and terrorism research. We begin this special issue by recognizing the Editors of BSTPA, Daniel Antonius and Samuel Justin Sinclair, for their interest in this subject and creating a journal in which these interdisciplinary interactions can occur. In addition, we would also like to thank the authors and peer-reviewers. Their commitment and dedication to this special issue, as well as their geographic and theoretically diverse composition provide important insights into this challenging research. Most importantly, we would like to acknowledge those individuals whose lives have been affected by terrorism and political violence. It is our hope that this special issue takes another small step to address the atrocities faced by communities throughout the world.