Alan E. Stewart

Minding the Weather

Abstract Weather salience is a construct that pertains to the psychological value, significance, and attunement that people have for the weather and its changes. In this article the author describes the construct of weather salience and a measure that was created to assess it, the Weather Salience Questionnaire (WxSQ). The author evaluates the measures psychometric properties, its relationship to owning and using a thermometer, and its relationship with prior hurricane evacuations and having experienced the effects of severe weather using a convenience sample of 946 undergraduate students. The WxSQ measurement model exhibits a good fit to the data following a maximum likelihood factor analysis of the items. The results of other analyses reveal that the WxSQ possesses acceptable psychometric properties (Cronbachs α = 0.83, test–retest reliability coefficient of 0.91). Weather salience was related to the ownership and use of a thermometer and also to being able to correctly distinguish between weather wat...

Driving and riding avoidance following motor vehicle crashes in a non-clinical sample: psychometric properties of a new measure.

Three studies were conducted to assess the reliability and validity of a measure that we developed using a non-clinical sample of university undergraduates, the Driving and Riding Avoidance Scale (DRAS). Study 1 indicated that the scale was internally consistent (alpha=0.92) and that a four-factor model (general avoidance, avoidance of traffic and busy roads, avoidance of weather or darkness, and riding avoidance) provided the best fit to the data in a sample of 386 crash survivors. This study also revealed that survivors who received medical treatment for their crash-related injuries reported significantly greater avoidance than people who were uninjured or injured and not medically treated. Study 2 revealed that the DRAS possessed acceptable test-retest reliability (r=0.83) over a 4-week interval in a sample of 67 crash survivors. Using a sample of 118 survivors, study 3 examined the instruments convergent and divergent validity through correlations with the Accident Fear Questionnaire (AFQ), the Mobility Inventory (MI), the Fear Survey Schedule-II (FSS-II), and the Fear Questionnaire (FQ). The strongest relationships were observed between the DRAS and the AFQ and with a driving subscale created from the MI items. The DRAS exhibited significantly weaker relationships with the FQ subscales that assessed other kinds of phobic avoidance.

Internship training: Do models really matter?

uring the past 50 years, a number of models of training (scientist-practitioner, practitioner-scholar, inical scientist) have been developed. This study examined how these models are conceptualized and iplemented at internship and postdoctoral training programs. Surveying 248 internship programs (42% ponse rate), the authors found that the model name (i.e., scientist-practitioner) was not related to how grams were conceptualized or how their training was implemented, raising questions about accredion requirements. Implications for training sites and the American Psychological Association Comee on Accreditation are explored.

Effects of group membership on perception of risk for aids

The role of social identity as a moderator for perception of risk for AIDS has not been examined. The purpose of this study was to examine perception of risk for AIDS as a function of membership in an identified risk group. 34 subjects who were homosexual, 58 intravenous drug users (IV), and 34 college students rated a 21-item list of behaviors for perception of AIDS risk. The findings indicate that the IV drug-use group significantly underestimated five risk behaviors, four of which are high probability behaviors of IV drug-users and two of which are exclusively IV drug-use behaviors. The homosexual group significantly underestimated four risk behaviors, all of which are primarily characteristic of that group. The college group was generally more accurate in assessing risk than either of the other two groups. These findings support the hypothesis that membership in a perceived risk group is related to differential perceptual bias associated with the need for positive social identity for ones group.

A Climatology of Cold-Season Nonconvective Wind Events in the Great Lakes Region

Abstract A 44-yr climatology of nonconvective wind events (NCWEs) for the Great Lakes region has been created using hourly wind data for 38 first-order weather stations during the months of November through April. The data were analyzed in terms of the two National Weather Service (NWS) criteria for a high-wind watch or warning: sustained winds of at least 18 m s−1 for at least 1 h or a wind gust of at least 26 m s−1 for any duration. The results indicate a pronounced southwest quadrant directional preference for nonconvective high winds in this region. Between 70% and 76% of all occurrences that satisfied the NWS criteria for NCWEs were associated with wind directions from 180° through 270°. Within the southwest quadrant, the west-southwest direction is preferred, with 14%–35% of all NCWEs coming from this particular compass heading. This directional preference is borne out in five out of six stations with high occurrences of cold-season NCWEs (Buffalo, New York; Dayton, Ohio; Lansing, Michigan; Moline, ...

ASSOCIATIONS OF SCORES ON THE WHITE-CAMPBELL PSYCHOLOGICAL BIRTH ORDER INVENTORY AND THE KERN LIFESTYLE SCALE

This study investigated the relations among psychological birth order, actual birth order, and lifestyle. The study also further examined the convergent validity of the White-Campbell Psychological Birth Order Inventory. This inventory and Kerns Lifestyle Scale were administered to 126 individuals in a southeastern urban university. The several analyses of variance and canonical correlation analysis (1) supported a stronger relationship between psychological birth order and lifestyle than between actual birth order and lifestyle, (2) identified differential relationships between particular birth-order positions and lifestyle scales that were predicted and in accord with Adlerian theory, and (3) further supported the validity of the inventory. The results reaffirmed the lifestyle pattern and birth-order characterizations of Adlerian theory.

Origins of george kelly's constructivism in the work of korzybski and moreno

Abstract Although Mahoney (1988) has traced the heritage of general constructive metatheory and 7 Lelhart and Jackson (1983) have examined the influences of Kellys Kansas environment on his developing theory, there has been relatively little investigation of the origins of Kellys constructivism. Although Kelly (1955) was undoubtedly influenced by many philosophers and psychologists as he developed the psychology of personal constructs, the roles of these people have not been extensively investigated. However, Kelly (1955, 1969) cited, in a general way, the works of Korzybski and Moreno several times in describing the origins of his theory. Lecture notes taken by one of Kellys students (Barry, 1948) reveal more specifically the sources (Korzybski, 1933, 1943; Moreno, 1937) that seemed influential as Kelly developed his theories. Kelly borrowed ideas of Korzybski and Moreno, among many others, in creating parts of his role therapy and personality theory. In adapting Korzybskis notion that semantic and l...

Possible contributions of skin pigmentation and vitamin D in a polyfactorial model of seasonal affective disorder

Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is a polyfactorial and polygenetic disorder that involves biological and psychological sub-mechanisms that differentially involve depression, seasonality, circadian rhythms, retinal sensitivity, iris pigmentation, sleep factors, and the neurotransmitters involved with these systems. Within the framework of the polyfactorial conceptualization of SAD, we review the possible contributions of vitamin D3 with respect to the aforementioned sub-mechanisms. We hypothesize that rather than functioning primarily as a proximal or direct sub-mechanism in the etiology of SAD, vitamin D likely functions in a more foundational and regulative role in potentiating the sub-mechanisms associated with the depressive and seasonality factors. There are several reasons for this position: 1. vitamin D levels fluctuate in the body seasonally, with a lag, in direct relation to seasonally-available sunlight; 2. lower vitamin D levels have been observed in depressed patients (as well as in patients with other psychiatric disorders) compared to controls; 3. vitamin D levels in the central nervous system affect the production of both serotonin and dopamine; and 4. vitamin D and vitamin D responsive elements are found throughout the midbrain regions and are especially concentrated in the hypothalamus, a region that encompasses the circadian timing systems and much of its neural circuitry. We also consider the variable of skin pigmentation as this may affect levels of vitamin D in the body. We hypothesize that people with darker skin pigmentation may experience greater risks for lower vitamin D levels that, especially following their migration to regions of higher latitude, could contribute to the emergence of SAD and other psychiatric and physical health problems.

Through the Eyes of the Experts: Meteorologists’ Perceptions of the Probability of Precipitation

AbstractPrior surveys of the public indicated that a variety of meanings and interpretations exist about the probability of precipitation (PoP). Does the same variety of meanings for the PoP exist among members of the professional atmospheric science community? What do members of the professional community think that the public should know to understand the PoP more fully? These questions were examined in a survey of 188 meteorologists and broadcasters. Meteorologists were observed to express a variety of different definitions of the PoP and also indicated a high degree of confidence in the accuracy of their definitions. Differences in the definitions stemmed from the way the PoP was derived from model output statistics, parsing of a 12-h PoP over shorter time frames, and generalizing from a point PoP to a wider coverage warning area. In this regard 43% of the online survey respondents believed that there was no or very little consistency in the definition of PoP; only 8% believed that the PoP definition ...

Topics in the Journal of Counseling Psychology, 1963–2015.

Historical trends in a scientific field should be apparent in the changing content of journal articles over time. Using a topic modeling approach, a statistical method for quantifying the thematic content of text, 70 topics were extracted from the abstracts of 3,603 articles published in the Journal of Counseling Psychology from 1963 to 2015. After examining interpretability of 70 topics derived from the model, 64 meaningful topics and their trends were named. In addition, the authors also classified some of the related topics into 4 categories—counseling process and outcome, multiculturalism, research methodology, and vocational psychology. Counseling process and outcome related topics have decreased recently, while topics relating to multiculturalism and diversity have shown increasing trends. The authors also discussed trends that were observed and tried to account for the changing frequencies of some important research topics within these categories.