All three articles today address interventions to assist parents. First, Sanchez, Javadi & Comer (2024) published “Family Engagement in a Behavioral Parenting Intervention: A randomized comparison of telehealth versus office-based treatment formats” in Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology. Here’s the edited abstract and impact statements:

Today, we look at three studies of psychotherapy for depression. First, Snippe, Elmer, Ceulemans, Smit, Lutz & Helmich (2024) published “The Temporal Order of Emotional, Cognitive, and Behavioral Gains in Daily Life during Treatment of Depression” in Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.  Here’s the edited abstract:

Despite the importance for understanding mechanisms of change, little is known about the order of change in daily life emotions, cognitions, and behaviors during treatment of depression.

All three studies today deal with youth experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity, increasingly common phenomena across the US. First, Bird, Jenzer & Read (2023) published “Youth Experiencing, and Youth at Risk of, Homelessness: Associations between trauma type, posttraumatic negative cognitions, and posttraumatic stress disorder” in Traumatology. Here’s the edited abstract

Experiencing homelessness as an adolescent or young adult confers risk for trauma experiences and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

Today, I selected two articles that pertain to successful psychotherapy. First, Iovoli et al. (2024) published “The Relationship between Interpersonal Problems and Therapeutic Alliance in Psychotherapy: A three-level mixed-effects meta-analysis” in Psychotherapy. Here are the edited abstract and impact statements:

Today, I present an article that I found helpful regarding gender and sexual diversity. Hammack & Manago (2024) published “The Psychology of Sexual and Gender Diversity in the 21st century: Social technologies and stories of authenticity” in American Psychologist. Here are extracts from the article:

Today, I present an article that I found helpful regarding gender and sexual diversity. Hammack & Manago (2024) published “The Psychology of Sexual and Gender Diversity in the 21st century: Social technologies and stories of authenticity” in American Psychologist. Here are extracts from the article:

The 21st century has seen shifts in social and scientific understandings of gender and sexuality in the United States. From the legitimization of same-sex marriage to the heightened visibility of transgender identities, nonbinary gender, and forms of intimate diversity such as asexuality, kink, and polyamory, core cultural and scientific assumptions about gender and sexuality have been challenged.

I like attachment research, especially that which includes both moms and dads. Today, I present three studies of early experiences with parenting. First, Zhang, Tian, Maclaine, Hazen & Jacobvitz (2024) published “Trust Over the Transition to Parenthood: Links to attachment, perception of partner’s caregiving, and parenting” in Journal of Family Psychology. Here’s the edited abstract:

Today, I present a study of narcissism and therapy. Ge, Hewitt, Mikail, Flett & Kealy (2024) published “Pathological Narcissism’s Impact on Psychodynamic Group Therapy for Perfectionism” in Psychotherapy. Here are the edited abstract and impact statements:

Several decades of theory suggest that pathological narcissism (PN) may limit psychotherapy success, but empirical evidence for such theories is limited and mixed. In addition, it has been proposed that individuals with high levels of PN may benefit more from supportive compared to interpretive psychodynamic therapies, but no studies thus far have investigated this question empirically.

Today, I present two studies that indicate that how people feel about their circumstances matter. First, Gómez, Vázquez, Alba, Blanco, Chinchilla, Chiclana & Swann (2024) published “Feeling Understood Fosters Identity Fusion” in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.  Here’s the edited abstract:

If the consequences of identity fusion are well established, its psychological antecedents are not.

Three studies today examine borderline personality disorder (BPD). First, Di Bartolomeo, Siegel, Fulham & Fitzpatrick (2024) published “Borderline Personality Disorder and Social Connectedness: A systematic review” in Personality Disorders: Theory, Research, and Treatment.  Here’s the edited abstract:

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a debilitating disorder characterized by deficits in social connectedness, which is a multifaceted construct with structural (i.e., the number, diversity, or frequency of social relationships), functional (i.e., the actual or perceived resources relationships provide), and quality (i.e., the positive and negative aspects of social relationships) elements (Holt-Lunstad, 2018).

Both articles today deal with families of sexual and gender minority youth. First, Bitran et al. (2024) published “The Effects of Family Support and Smartphone-Derived Homestay on Daily Mood and Depression Among sexual and gender minority adolescents. Journal of Psychopathology and Clinical Science. Here are the edited abstract and impact statements

Sexual and gender minority (SGM) adolescents are at elevated risk for depression. This risk is especially pronounced among adolescents whose home environment is unsupportive or nonaffirming, as these adolescents may face familial rejection due to their identity.

This is another long post but relates to work with high SES. Laurin, Engstrom, Alic & Tracy (2024) published “Is Being Elite the Same as Living an Easy Life? Two distinct ways of experiencing subjective socioeconomic status” in Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Here are some highly edited portions of the article:

Socioeconomic status (SES) predicts a large number of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors; here, we build on these findings to try to paint a comprehensive picture of what people who occupy different SES ranks are like.

Sometimes, I am simply intrigued by an article. Here’s one that immediately captured my attention. Chang, Silver & Holman (2024) published “Betrayal Trauma and Somatic Symptoms among Patients in a Medically Underserved Primary Care Clinic” in Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy.  Here are the edited abstract and impact statements:

Betrayal Trauma Theory posits that victims of trauma are more prone to developing psychological and physical problems if the traumatic event includes the element of betrayal.

Today, I present a long summary of an interesting article. Duncan, Zhang, Futris & Sims (2024) published “Examining Predictors of Relationship Dissolution among Unmarried Parents: Applying the vulnerability–stress–adaptation framework” in Journal of Family Psychology. Here’s some highly edited information from the article:

Prior research has established that parents who are in a relationship, yet unmarried at the time of their child’s birth, are at an increased risk of relationship instability. However, the processes that may lead to the dissolution of these unmarried parents’ couple relationships are less clear. Guided by the vulnerability–stress–adaptation model, the present study examined data from a sample of 1,575 mother and father dyads who participated in the Future of Families and Child Wellbeing Study over a 9-year period. A

Today, I present three studies of treatment for depression. First, Cuijpers, Harrer, Miguel, Ciharova & Karyotaki (2023) published “Five Decades of Research on Psychological Treatments of Depression: A historical and meta-analytic overview” in American Psychologist. Here are the edited abstract and impact statements:

Since the 1970s, hundreds of randomized trials have examined the effects of psychotherapies for depression, and this number is increasing every year. In this study, we report outcomes from a living systematic review of these studies.

I like to present studies that utilize technology not available to the average clinician. Su et al. (2024) published “Atypical Child–Parent Neural Synchrony is Linked to Negative Family Emotional Climate and Children’s Psychopathological Symptoms” in American Psychologist. Here are the edited abstract and impact statements:

Family emotional climate is fundamental to children’s well-being and mental health. Family environments filled with negative emotions may lead to increased psychopathological symptoms in the child through dysfunctional child–parent interactions.

The rates of suicidal ideation in LGBTQ+ individuals are clearly high. Today, I look at a study of Bi+ individuals. Katz, Chang, Dorrell, Selby & Feinstein (2023) published “Aspects of Positive Identity Buffer the Longitudinal Associations Between Discrimination and Suicidal Ideation Among Bi+ Young Adults” in Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.  Here are the edited abstract and impact statements:

Prior research has demonstrated that discrimination is associated with suicidal ideation among bi + individuals, but little is known about resilience factors (both general and bi + specific) that may buffer these associations.

Today, I present an article that deals with one of my favorite research topics – sleep. Harb, González-Van Wart, Brzezinski, deRoon-Cassini & Larson (2024) published “Subtypes of Childhood Maltreatment and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Symptoms in an Adult Trauma Sample: The mechanistic role of sleep” in Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy.  Here are the edited abstract and impact statements:

Childhood maltreatment is indisputably linked to adverse mental health outcomes, including an increased risk to develop posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in adulthood.

I do a lot of questioning of the value of IQ and other general mental ability (GMA) tests. Whether or not you work in personnel selection, you may find this article interesting. Berry, Lievens, Zhang & Sackett (2024) published “Insights from an Updated Personnel Selection Meta-analytic Matrix: Revisiting general mental ability tests’ role in the validity–diversity trade-off” in Journal of Applied Psychology. Here’s the edited abstract:

General mental ability (GMA) tests have long been at the heart of the validity–diversity trade-off, with conventional wisdom being that reducing their weight in personnel selection can improve adverse impact, but that this results in steep costs to criterion-related validity.

I’ve written about harsh parenting before, but both studies today relate to respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA). RSA is heart rate variability that is in synchrony with respiration. It is state dependent and affected by factors such as breathing pattern, sleep and wakefulness, psychological stress and physical activity (Eckberg, 1983). First, Li, Sturge-Apple & Lunkenheimer (2023) published “Longitudinal Associations between Maternal Harsh Parenting and Child Temperament: The moderating role of children’s respiratory sinus arrhythmia” in Journal of Family Psychology.  Here’s the edited abstract:

To better understand biology by environment interactions in early temperament, we examined whether children’s respiratory sinus arrhythmia