Perceived Threat of Disaster, Efficacy, and Psychological Distress Among Individuals with a Physical Disability: A Longitudinal Model.

Objective: Individuals with physical disabilities experience distress when faced with the threat of human-made and natural disasters, yet little is known about how to reduce that distress. This study used Protection Motivation Theory to longitudinally test the relationships between psychological distress and disaster-related cognitive appraisals, including perceived threat, emergency preparedness self-efficacy, and response efficacy, in a sample of individuals with physical disabilities.

Methods: A nationwide convenience sample of 106 adults completed 2 surveys approximately 5 years apart.

The Effects of Implicit Theories on Body Weight Information Avoidance.

Regular self-weighing is associated with more effective weight control, yet many individuals avoid weight-related information. Implicit theories about weight, or perceptions of how malleable weight is, predict more effortful weight management and may also influence weight-related information avoidance. Participants ( = 209) were randomly assigned to read an article stressing an incremental theory of weight (i.

Efficacy for Dealing With Terrorism Precautionary Behavior: Laying the Groundwork for Communication Effectiveness.

In order to formulate effective communication and intervention strategies to respond to the widespread lack of preparedness for public health crises resulting from natural and human-made disasters, researchers have developed models describing the interrelationships between factors associated with emergency preparedness decisions. Empirical research has generally assumed that two key elements of most health behavior theories-self-efficacy and response efficacy-additively influence the decision to prepare, despite compelling theoretical rationale for an interactive relationship. The few studies that have investigated interactions in preparedness outcomes have not tested the Social Cognitive Theory prediction that non-zero levels of both efficacy types are required before individuals will engage in any preparedness behavior.

Anxiety effects on disaster precautionary behaviors: A multi-path cognitive model.

Previous studies have revealed a negative relationship between anxiety and health-promoting behavior. This study identified three cognitive pathways through which anxiety operates on preparedness behaviors for terrorist attacks. Preparedness was regressed on trait anxiety, perceived threat, and self-efficacy based on data from 306 adults.

The Importance of Self-Efficacy in Parental Emergency Preparedness: A Moderated Mediation Model.

Objective: Disasters occur without warning and can have devastating consequences. Emergency preparedness can reduce negative effects. It is especially important that parents prepare, as children are particularly vulnerable after disasters.

Angular declination and the dynamic perception of egocentric distance.

The extraction of the distance between an object and an observer is fast when angular declination is informative, as it is with targets placed on the ground. To what extent does angular declination drive performance when viewing time is limited? Participants judged target distances in a real-world environment with viewing durations ranging from 36-220 ms. An important role for angular declination was supported by experiments showing that the cue provides information about egocentric distance even on the very first glimpse, and that it supports a sensitive response to distance in the absence of other useful cues.

Predictors of entry to the nursing home: does length of follow-up matter?

This study examined the extent to which predictors of nursing home entry vary in their salience as a function of length of follow-up. Participants were 201 persons attending five senior day care centers. The impact of baseline assessment on nursing home entry was examined at one, two, and three-year follow-up periods.

Network support as a prognostic indicator of drinking outcomes: the COMBINE Study.

Objective: To increase understanding of the interrelationship between a patient's social network and patient drinking, the Important People and Activities (IPA) instrument was developed. To meet the aims of the COMBINE (Combining Medications and Behavioral Interventions) Study, the IPA was modified to create the Important People Inventory (IPI), which was used to measure the contextual influence of the patient's social network on patient outcomes and treatment effects. The aims of the present article were to describe the IPI and its differences from the IPA and to test the relationship of network support as measured by the IPI in predicting drinking during and following treatment.

Extended naltrexone and broad spectrum treatment or motivational enhancement therapy.

Background: Randomized clinical trials on the effectiveness of naltrexone (NTX) in the treatment of alcohol dependence have produced conflicting results. One possible explanation for these discrepancies may lie in the various psychosocial treatments for which NTX is an adjunct. The goal of this study was to examine the interplay between psychosocial treatment and duration of NTX.

The reasons for nursing home entry in an adult day care population: caregiver reports versus regression results.

This article aims to compare reasons for nursing home entry determined through a regression of baseline predictors to relatives' perceptions of reasons for entry. Participants included 201 community-residing members of 5 senior day care centers in Maryland. Through a prospective design, statistical predictors using Cox regressions were compared to the relatives' reports of reasons for nursing home entry.

Advances in causal chain development and testing in alcohol research: mediation, suppression, moderation, mediated moderation, and moderated mediation.

Background: While causal modeling is generally well known to alcohol researchers, several causal structures (including suppression, mediated moderation, and moderated mediation) are often poorly understood and seldom employed when investigators seek to model the complex mechanisms of behavior change, despite their widespread applicability to the field.

Methods: This paper compares and contrasts five basic structures of causal modeling in the context of contemporary alcohol research and demonstrates how mechanisms of behavior change can be conceptualized and tested as parallel and serial sequences of these basic causal structures, forming causal chains.

Conclusion: Recent methodological developments, while representing an important advancement for the field, fail to adequately address the complexities of alcohol dependence phenomena.

Characteristics of adult day care participants who enter a nursing home.

The authors sought to determine the characteristics of individuals enrolled in adult day care who are most likely to enter a nursing home. The status of 201 adult day care participants was assessed at baseline and at least 3 years after baseline evaluation. Risk factors for nursing home entry were identified on the basis of staff and family caregiver reports, participant testing, chart review, and physician evaluations.

Naltrexone's suppressant effects on drinking are limited to the first 3 months of treatment.

Rationale: Twelve weeks of naltrexone significantly improves drinking outcomes in alcoholics; however, the clinical benefits of naltrexone decline shortly after treatment is discontinued.

Objective: The present study investigated whether extended treatment with naltrexone significantly improved drinking outcomes.

Methods: One hundred forty-six alcohol-dependent patients received broad spectrum treatment or motivational enhancement therapy and either 12 or 24 weeks of naltrexone.

Building better cognitive-behavioral therapy: is broad-spectrum treatment more effective than motivational-enhancement therapy for alcohol-dependent patients treated with naltrexone?

Objective: The current study investigated the treatment effectiveness, during treatment, of a second-generation cognitive-behavioral therapy for alcoholism--broad-spectrum treatment (BST)--compared with motivational-enhancement therapy (MET), when both were offered in conjunction with a therapeutic dose of naltrexone (Revia).

Method: One hundred forty-nine alcohol-dependent patients completed a 3-month randomized, controlled trial of BST and naltrexone versus MET and naltrexone.

Results: Patients receiving BST had a significantly higher percentage of days abstinent than patients receiving MET.

Teaching a coherent theory of drug action to elementary school children.

This study examined whether two versions of a drug and alcohol curriculum explaining how substances affect behavior and health, one version more causally coherent than the other, were more effective than a control curriculum on disease in changing school-age children's (N=327) beliefs and attitudes regarding cocaine and alcohol. Few differences were found between the two drug and alcohol curricula. Compared to children receiving the control curriculum, however, both treatment groups demonstrated greater understanding of the circulation of alcohol and cocaine throughout the body, the true long-term effects of these substances, and the stimulant effects of cocaine.

Decomposing the relationships between pretreatment social network characteristics and alcohol treatment outcome.

Objective: In Project MATCH a summary measure of network support for drinking identified matching and prognostic effects. The goals of the present analyses were (1) to determine which of the 11 component indexes are most predictive of treatment outcome regardless of treatment type and (2) to determine which of the indexes are most influential in the already demonstrated network support by treatment interaction effect.

Method: This is a secondary data analysis of the outpatient arm of Project MATCH (N = 952), focusing primarily on the Important People and Activities instrument administered pretreatment.