Emotion recognition in fathers and mothers at high-risk for child physical abuse

Objective

The present study was designed to determine whether parents at high risk for physical child abuse, in comparison with parents at low risk, show deficits in emotion recognition, as well as to examine the moderator effect of gender and stress on the relationship between risk for physical child abuse and emotion recognition.

Methods

Based on their scores on the Abuse Scale of the CAP Inventory (Milner, 1986), 64 parents at high risk (24 fathers and 40 mothers) and 80 parents at low risk (40 fathers and 40 mothers) for physical child abuse were selected. The Subtle Expression Training Tool/Micro Expression Training Tool ( [Ekman, 2004a] and [Ekman, 2004b]) and the Diagnostic Analysis of Nonverbal Accuracy II (Nowicki & Carton, 1993) were used to assess emotion recognition.

Results

As expected, parents at high risk, in contrast to parents at low risk, showed deficits in emotion recognition. However, differences between high- and low-risk participants were observed only for fathers, but not for mothers. Whereas fathers at high risk for physical child abuse made more errors than mothers at high risk, no differences between mothers at low risk and fathers at low risk were found. No interaction between stress, gender, and risk status was observed for errors in emotion recognition.

Conclusions and practice implications

The present findings, if confirmed with physical abusers, could be helpful to further our understanding of deficits in processing information of physically abusive parents and to develop treatment strategies specifically focused on emotion recognition. Moreover, if gender differences can be confirmed, the findings could be helpful to develop specific treatment programs for abusive fathers.     

Bridge over troubled water: using implementation science to facilitate effective services in child welfare

To maximize benefits to children and their families, effective practices need to be used competently in child welfare settings. Since the 1990s, researchers and policy makers have focused attention on empirically supported interventions (ESIs). Much less attention has been paid to what is needed to implement these in a range of real-world settings. Without proper implementation, which includes an evaluation strategy from feasibility to fidelity to on-going work on moderators and mediators of program effects, established effective programs can be rendered ineffective in practical application. The paper will touch on progress, to date, of implementation science, its application to child welfare programs and practices, and will highlight a set of practical strategies for implementing empirically supported interventions in child welfare.     

The relation between abuse and violent delinquency: the conversion of shame to blame in juvenile offenders

Objective

While the relationship between abusive parenting and violent delinquency has been well established, the cognitive and emotional processes by which this occurs remain relatively unidentified. The objective of this work is to apply a conceptual model linking abusive parenting to the conversion of shame into blaming others and therefore to violent delinquency.

Methods

A retrospective study of 112 adolescents (90 male; 22 female; ages 12-19 years; M = 15.6; SD = 1.4) who were incarcerated in a juvenile detention facility pending criminal charges, completed measures of exposure to abusive and nonabusive discipline, expressed and converted shame, and violent delinquency.

Results

Findings tend to confirm the conceptual model. Subjects who converted shame (i.e., low expressed shame, high blaming others) tended to have more exposure to abusive parenting and showed more violent delinquent behavior than their peers who showed expressed shame. Subjects who showed expressed shame (i.e., high expressed shame, low blaming others) showed less violent delinquency than those who showed converted shame.

Conclusions

Abusive parenting impacts delinquency directly and indirectly through the effects of shame that is converted. Abusive parenting leads to the conversion of shame to blaming others, which in turn leads to violent delinquent behavior.

Practice implications

For juvenile offenders, the conversion of shame into blaming others appears to contribute to pathological outcomes in relation to trauma. Translation of this work into clinical practice is recommended.     

Children's disclosures of sexual abuse: learning from direct inquiry

Objectives

Published protocols for forensic interviewing for child sexual abuse do not include specific questions about what prompted children to tell about sexual abuse or what made them wait to tell. We, therefore, aimed to: (1) add direct inquiry about the process of a child's disclosure to a forensic interview protocol; (2) determine if children will, in fact, discuss the process that led them to tell about sexual abuse; and (3) describe the factors that children identify as either having led them to tell about sexual abuse or caused them to delay a disclosure.

Methods

Forensic interviewers were asked to incorporate questions about telling into an existing forensic interview protocol. Over a 1-year period, 191 consecutive forensic interviews of child sexual abuse victims aged 3-18 years old in which children spoke about the reasons they told about abuse or waited to tell about abuse were reviewed. Interview content related to the children's reasons for telling or for waiting to tell about abuse was extracted and analyzed using a qualitative methodology in order to capture themes directly from the children's words.

Results

Forensic interviewers asked children about how they came to tell about sexual abuse and if children waited to tell about abuse, and the children gave specific answers to these questions. The reasons children identified for why they chose to tell were classified into three domains: (1) disclosure as a result of internal stimuli (e.g., the child had nightmares), (2) disclosure facilitated by outside influences (e.g., the child was questioned), and (3) disclosure due to direct evidence of abuse (e.g., the child's abuse was witnessed). The barriers to disclosure identified by the children were categorized into five groups: (1) threats made by the perpetrator (e.g., the child was told (s)he would get in trouble if (s)he told), (2) fears (e.g., the child was afraid something bad would happen if (s)he told), (3) lack of opportunity (e.g., the child felt the opportunity to disclose never presented), (4) lack of understanding (e.g., the child failed to recognize abusive behavior as unacceptable), and (5) relationship with the perpetrator (e.g., the child thought the perpetrator was a friend).

Conclusions

Specific reasons that individual children identify for why they told and why they waited to tell about sexual abuse can be obtained by direct inquiry during forensic interviews for suspected child sexual abuse.

Practice implications

When asked, children identified the first person they told and offered varied and specific reasons for why they told and why they waited to tell about sexual abuse. Understanding why children disclose their abuse and why they wait to disclose will assist both professionals and families. Investigators and those who care for sexually abused children will gain insight into the specific barrier that the sexually abused child overcame to disclose. Prosecutors will be able to use this information to explain to juries why the child may have delayed his or her disclosure. Parents who struggle to understand why their child disclosed to someone else or waited to disclose will have a better understanding of their child's decisions.     

Changes in the prevalence of child sexual abuse, its risk factors, and their associations as a function of age cohort in a Finnish population sample

Objective

We examined (1) the prevalence of childhood sexual abuse (CSA) experiences as a function of cohort and gender, (2) the prevalence of factors associated with CSA as a function of cohort and whether the association of these factors with CSA remained the same irrespective of cohort, and (3) whether any cohort differences could be explainable by cohort differences in reporting bias.

Method

We used the responses of 4,561 men (M = 29, SD = 7 years) and 8,361 female (M = 29, SD = 7 years) Finnish participants who responded to the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire-Short Form as well as questions regarding family structure.

Results

The prevalence of CSA experiences varied between 0.7-4.6% for men and 1.8-7.5% for women depending on the item. Younger cohorts reported less CSA as well as less of the risk factors (physical neglect and abuse, emotional neglect and abuse, parental substances abuse, not growing up with both biological parents) that were positively associated with the likelihood of CSA. The effects of these risk factors did not vary as a function of the cohort. Also, the declining trend was not explainable by social desirability being higher in the younger cohorts.

Conclusions

The results suggest that there is a real decline in the prevalence of CSA and it is associated with a simultaneous decline in factors associated with CSA.     

Implicit attitudes toward children may be unrelated to child abuse risk

Objective

To explore whether adults possess implicit attitudes toward children and whether those attitudes are especially negative among respondents who are high in child physical abuse (CPA) risk.

Methods

The present study used an implicit evaluative priming procedure. In this procedure, participants were instructed to make decisions about the evaluative implications of target words. These words were preceded by photographs of child faces or adult faces displaying positive, neutral, or negative expressions. Reaction times for the evaluative decisions were used as an index of the extent to which photos invoked negative or positive evaluative reactions.

Results

Results from 2 studies, the first conducted on a student sample (N = 90) and the second on a parent sample (N = 95), demonstrated that evaluative congruence between the facial expressions displayed in photographs and the target words facilitated responses. Furthermore, the results suggested that regardless of CPA risk, child faces, relative to adult faces, facilitated responses to negative target words, suggesting an out-group bias. This implicit out-group bias was not moderated by respondents’ CPA risk status.

Conclusions

Faces of children, relative to faces of adults, appear to activate negative information structures that facilitate evaluative decisions of negative stimuli, suggesting an out-group bias. Given that out-group biases typically lead to less favorable treatment of out-group members, additional research is needed to examine the pervasiveness of negative evaluative biases towards children and the potential implications of such biases on children's lives. Further, research examining whether high CPA risk parents and low CPA risk parents differ in how they manage initial negative evaluative reactions is needed.     

大型赛事知识产权与反垄断之间几个争议性问题的探究——以奥林匹克知识产权为例

奥运会在世界范围内的巨大影响力使得奥林匹克知识产权的价值日益飙升,对其市场开发所得的收益也已经成为现代奥运会重要的经济来源。与此同时,对奥运知识产权＂滥用＂,触及反垄断法限制的担忧也如影相随。奥运知识产权的市场开发究竟是否涉及市场垄断？本文以北京奥运会为例,仅从知识产权法和反垄断法的层面对与奥运知识产权市场开发相关的几个热点争议话题进行了探究。     

甘蔗糖蜜酒精生产中的废水治理——粗馏残液中悬浮固相的成份、来源及利用

酒精粗馏残液中含有一部分固相悬浮物,将残液进行固液分离,并分别加以利用和治理,也许是酒精粗馏残液治理的一条有效途径。本文对残液中固相悬浮物的化学成分及来源进行了分析和阐述,并提出将分离后得到的固相沉淀物直接用作水泥缓凝剂或农作物的间接肥料。     

特征值区间的有效划分对CRF识别效果的影响

与其他统计机器学习方法相比,条件随机场（CRF）算法更适合应用到命名实体的识别工作中来。在对中文化学物质名称进行识别的研究中,通过实验发现,有效的特征值区间划分能提高CRF的识别效果。另外,对词一级序列标注和字一级序列标注在不同特征值区间划分下的识别效果进行比较。     

甘薯中清除不同自由基的活性物质提取条件的优化

在单因素试验基础上,利用正交试验,分别对甘薯中清除羟自由基和超氧阴离子自由基的两类活性物质的提取条件进行优化。结果表明,甘薯中清除羟自由基活性物质的最佳提取条件为：以水作为提取溶剂,提取剂用量45 mL/g,提取温度为45℃,提取时间2.5 h;甘薯中清除超氧阴离子自由基活性物质的最佳提取条件为：以无水乙醇作为提取溶剂,提取剂用量35 mL/g,提取温度为45℃,提取时间3.0 h。在以水作为提取溶剂的条件下,各提取因素对活性物质羟自由基清除效果的影响顺序由大到小依次为：提取温度、提取时间、提取剂用量,各因素对羟自由基清除率的影响均极显著（p〈0.01）;在以无水乙醇作为提取溶剂的条件下,各提取因素对活性物质超氧阴离子自由基清除效果的影响顺序由大到小依次为：提取温度、提取剂用量、提取时间,各因素对超氧阴离子自由基清除率的影响均极显著（p〈0.01）。