Linguistic Predictors of Adaptive Bereavement Pennebaker, James W; Mayne, Tracy J; Francis, Martha E
Journal of personality and social psychology,
04/1997, Letnik:
72, Številka:
4
Journal Article
Recenzirano
The words people use in disclosing a trauma were hypothesized to predict improvements in mental and physical health in 2 studies. The first study reanalyzed data from 6 previous experiments in which ...language variables served as predictors of health. Results from 177 participants in previous writing studies showed that increased use of words associated with insightful and causal thinking was linked to improved physical but not mental health. Higher use of positive relative to negative emotion words was also associated with better health. An empirical measure that was derived from these data correlated with subsequent distress ratings. The second study tested these models on interview transcripts of 30 men who had lost their partners to AIDS. Cognitive change and empirical models predicted postbereavement distress at 1 year. Implications of using computer-based text analyses in the study of narratives are discussed.
Previous studies have found that writing about upsetting experiences can improve physical health. In an attempt to explain this phenomenon, 72 first-year college students were randomly assigned to ...write about either their thoughts and feelings about coming to college or about superficial topics for three consecutive days. Measures of language use within the writing samples and cognitive measures of accessibility and schematic organisation were collected in the weeks before and after writing. As in previous studies, writing about college was found to reduce health centre visits for illness and to improve subjects' grade point average. Text analyses indicated that the use of positive emotion words and changes in words suggestive of causal and insightful thinking were linked to health change. Improved grades, although not linked to these language dimensions, were found to correlate with measures of schematic organisation of college-relevant themes. Implications for using written language to understand cognitive and health processes are discussed.
The increasing number of genomic sequences of bacteria makes it possible to select unique SNPs of a particular strain/species at the whole genome level and thus design specific primers based on the ...SNPs. The high similarity of genomic sequences among phylogenetically-related bacteria requires the identification of the few loci in the genome that can serve as unique markers for strain differentiation. PrimerSNP attempts to identify reliable strain-specific markers, on which specific primers are designed for pathogen detection purpose.
PrimerSNP is an online tool to design primers based on strain specific SNPs for multiple strains/species of microorganisms at the whole genome level. The allele-specific primers could distinguish query sequences of one strain from other homologous sequences by standard PCR reaction. Additionally, PrimerSNP provides a feature for designing common primers that can amplify all the homologous sequences of multiple strains/species of microorganisms. PrimerSNP is freely available at http://cropdisease.ars.usda.gov/~primer.
PrimerSNP is a high-throughput specific primer generation tool for the differentiation of phylogenetically-related strains/species. Experimental validation showed that this software had a successful prediction rate of 80.4 - 100% for strain specific primer design.
Background: Psychological distress for patients with serious illness has been associated with increased physical and spiritual distress, decreased quality of life, and increased medical expenses at ...end of life (EOL). For both cancer patients and their intimate partners (IPs), appraising the illness and communicating about it can be challenging. Yet, there is little evidence on how best to support them. Objectives: Bodenmann’s Systemic-Transactional Model (STM) of dyadic coping provided foundation to study how living with cancer impacts communication at primary appraisal level in patient/ IP dyad. The purpose of this exploratory multi-methods study was to understand patient/IP illness appraisals. This was investigated through following aims: 1. Describe patient/IP perceptions of dyadic communication before and after diagnosis of advanced cancer (including barriers and facilitators to sharing emotionally vulnerable content); 2. Describe patterns (incongruent/congruent) of patient and IP communication during advanced cancer; and 3. Explore relationships between experiential suffering (Suffering Pictogram) and communication congruency (CCAT-PF measure). Methods: Descriptive phenomenology was used for the qualitative phase. In-depth, semi-structured interviews with dyads were done, followed by individual interviews. The quantitative phase assessed cancer communication and suffering using established measures. Results: The main findings from qualitative analyses included: 1) Vulnerable communication is complicated by balancing two opposing worlds: Hope/Positivity and Uncertainty/Fear of Death; and 2) Vulnerable communication about EOL and hospice is emotional and unfamiliar. Hearing the word ‘hospice’ ends dyad’s uncertainty, confirming death from cancer is definite. Patients and IPs articulated feeling unprepared and needing guidance about skills to cross this vulnerable environment toward open communication. Quantitative data from communication measures showed low to medium discrepancy between dyads yet, patients displayed more discrepant communication behavior than their IP counterparts. IPs consistently exhibited higher suffering scores than patients across Overall Suffering and in 6/8 suffering domains. Worry and Fear were identified as highest domains of suffering for both patients/IPs. Conclusion: For IP dyads to articulate preferences for care with providers they must first be provided external support to facilitate vulnerable conversations within the dyad itself. These dyadic conversations must be initiated early after diagnosis to strengthen available supports during illness and EOL.
Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD) is a chronic disorder characterized by primary symptoms of inattention, impulsivity and sometimes hyperactivity. ADHD children suffer not only from these ...primary symptoms, but also from secondary negative impacts including poor peer relationships, increased conflict within family interactions as well as diminished academic achievement and increased classroom disruptions. In order to target these concerns, a 12 week pilot Multifamily Therapy Group curriculum was developed for implementation in a social service agency setting with ADHD children aged ten to twelve and their families. Using the Delphi Method, a panel of experts evaluated the curriculum, treatment process, and modality applicability. Findings and recommendations from the expert reviews will be discussed.
Master of Science
Inhibiting or holding back one's thoughts, feelings, or behaviors is associated with long-term stress and disease. Actively confronting upsetting experiences can reduce the negative effects of ...inhibition. The present study describes a unique approach to aid individuals in dealing with psychological and emotional issues that they must often face.
Forty-one of the 81 university employees who were participating in a wellness program agreed to participate in the present study. Subjects were randomly assigned to write about either personal traumatic experiences (n = 23) or non-traumatic topics (n = 18) for 20 minutes once a week for four consecutive weeks.
Results indicate that individuals who wrote about upsetting personal experiences evidenced significant drops in selected blood measures compared to those who wrote about non-traumatic topics (e.g., for SGOT: 4.0% drop among traumatic topic group versus 13.1% increase among non-traumatic topic group, ANOVA p = .029; for SGPT: 24.5% drop versus 7.7% increase, p = .001). During the month of writing, traumatic topic group subjects evidenced a 28.6% reduction in absentee rates from work relative to the eight months before the experiment compared with a 48.5% increase in absentee rates among non-traumatic topic subjects (p = .04). Subjects low in emotional inhibition evidenced the greatest reductions in absentee rates following personal disclosure compared to those high in emotional inhibition (p = .011).
The proposed writing strategy offers a unique tool for health promotion practitioners.
Recent work in the area of health psychology has firmly established the therapeutic value of confronting personal upheavals. Results from various disclosure studies indicate that the act of writing ...about traumatic experience produces psychological as well as physical benefits. The focus of the current project was to study the key language dimensions which are involved as individuals disclose their thoughts or feelings concerning a variety of topics, including personal upheavals, superficial subjects, and 'stream of conscious' thoughts. To analyze the dynamics of these language dimensions in written text, LIWC, the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count, was designed and developed. LIWC is a computerized content analysis tool that analyzes written text on a word by word basis and produces output totals on 61 language variables relevant to the four categories of emotional expression, cognitive mechanisms, content domains, and language composition. Essays gathered from nine previous writing studies were used as input for analysis. Taken together, this set of samples reflects 1,594 essays written by 475 subjects. Overall LIWC percentage means for the various study samples are presented to provide a broad overview of the nature and characteristics of written disclosure. Support is established for LIWC's external validity in a number of emotional, cognitive, and language dimensions. In addition, LIWC output variables are used to analyze the stability of written communication over time and across topic. Results of these analysis provide a general profile of several styles of personal disclosure as well as highlight key 'fingerprints' of personal communication that exist over a number of content domains.
PDF
