Die Anwendung von Introvision zur Verringerung der Belastung durch Tinnitus und Verbesserung der Hörfähigkeit

The following article describes the first empirical study of the effectiveness of Introvision as a pedagogical – psychological intervention for tinnitus. Introvision is based on the theory of subjective imperatives and the theory of mental introference. The intention was to ceace dysfunctional automatical selfregulation- strategies. Studies of the past have shown that dysfunctional selfregulation- strategies are a cause of increased subjective strain of tinnitus. The following pilot study, accomplished within a bigger project was conducted with 13 elder persons suffering from light to moderate tinnitus in a six-week-intervention with Introvision. Comparison to a control group without intervention showed a significant reduction of the tinnitus in the introvision group (STI, p ≤0.022). At the same time the audiometrically measured hearing ability of the Introvisiongroup increased significantly compared to the controlgroup (p≤0.001) while a decrease of the subjective loudness of the tinnitus could be only partially ascertained.     

Principals' perceptions of benefits and barriers to school-based suicide prevention programs

Suicidal behavior among children and adolescents is a national problem and schools can be an effective context for suicide prevention and intervention efforts. School-wide screening programs are viewed as most effective from a public health standpoint, although they garner the least support from school administrators. The purpose of this article is to examine administrators' perceptions of three school-based suicide prevention models while also capturing opinions on barriers and benefits to implementation. Data were gathered through interviews with seven principals from one Midwestern state. Findings reveal agreement among principals that schools play a key role in suicide prevention, but they differ on which type of prevention approach is most appropriate. School principals believed the school-wide screening program included more barriers to implementation than either the in-service or the curriculum-based program, largely due to the likelihood of parental disapproval. Limitations of the study and implications for improving suicide prevention efforts are discussed.     

Cohabitation and social background: Trends observed for Swedish women born between 1936 and 1960

This paper throws some light on changing family-building patterns in Sweden during the 1960s and 1970s. The family-building events analyzed are first informal cohabitation, first marriage, birth of first child (both outside a union and within a consensual union), and separations from childless informal cohabitation. Results from three previous studies are first summarized. These analyze the patterns by socio-economic and regional origin, applying multiple-decrement techniques separately for each background factor. The new results presented here are based on analyses that use multiplicative hazard models, permitting isolation of the effects of socio-economic background and region of childhood and adolescence respectively. It is generally found that socio-economic background is more important than the region where the woman grew up. Marriage intensities, however, which exhibit a clear regional pattern, are exceptions to this.     

Verarmungsrisiken nach kritischen Lebensereignissen in Deutschland und den USA

We study how the impact of job loss, sickness, retirement, and family dissolution on the risk of relative income poverty differs between Germany and the United States, and whether the impact of these events has changed between 1980 and 2009. Americans are more likely than Germans to enter poverty after any of the four events, yet they also recover more quickly from job loss and family dissolution. Comparisons over time do not indicate a secular rise in the impact of critical life events on poverty risks, but our results show that poverty trajectories are subject to stronger cyclical fluctuations in the United States: Through its emphasis on market mechanisms, the liberal American welfare state raises the importance of (re-)employment opportunities for coping with the consequences of adverse life events. The absence of clear long-term trends leads to a reassessment of common views about welfare state change such as Jacob Hacker??s thesis of a ??Great Risk Shift?? or the notion of an ??Americanization?? of Continental European welfare states. So far, there is also little evidence that the often claimed recalibration of welfare states towards ??new social risks?? has alleviated the adverse economic consequences of family dissolution.     

Resistance training is linked to heightened positive motivational state and lower negative affect among healthy women aged 65–70

Resistance training (RT) improves overall health, but the psychological effects of RT in healthy old adults have not been tested. The aim of this study was to investigate a sample of 65–70-year-old healthy and physically active women to assess their sense of coherence, health-related quality of life, hope, and affect, before and after taking part in a 24-week RT intervention (N = 14), compared to controls (N = 18). Findings showed a significant increase in hope (p = 0.013) and a significant decrease in negative affect (p = 0.002). Starting RT after age 65 does not appear to negatively impact on women’s psychological health but seems to be associated with important psychological health benefits.     

Taxes,risky investments,and the simultaneous choice of organizational form and financing

By taking explicit account of liability limitations, we analyse the influence of taxes on the simultaneous choice of organizational form and financing. In a two-state model for a single reporting period investors striving for maximisation of expected utility choose the organizational form (with or without liability limitation) in which they implement a given risky real investment and decide how they finance it (equity or debt). We demonstrate that liability limitations result in tax-relevant differences between organizational forms. Thus, for example, the tax bases differ in relation to the chosen liability-contingent debt capital compensations as well as to tax loss offset rules. Therefore, even in the event of identical tax rates, taxes can influence the decision regarding the organizational form.     

Factors Associated with Suicidal Ideation Among Women Abused in Intimate Partner Relationships

This study examines factors associated with suicidal ideation among women abused in intimate partner relationships. Data were collected from the case records of 95 women screened upon in‐person contact with admissions workers in a domestic violence shelter in one Midwestern state. Forty‐three percent of the women reported suicidal ideation as significantly associated with childhood sexual abuse, childhood physical abuse, and adulthood intimate partner abuse lasting fewer than 12 months in duration. The results have policy and practice implications for those interested in the mental health needs of women abused in childhood and adulthood. Implications for research are presented that more precisely identify how the effects of past and current traumatic experiences intersect and contribute to suicidal ideation among women abused in intimate relationships.     

Group Interventions were not Effective for Female Turkish Migrants with Recurrent Depression - Recommendations from a Randomized Controlled Study

We tested group interventions for women with a Turkish migration background living in Austria and suffering from recurrent depression. N = 66 participants were randomized to: (1) Self-Help Groups (SHG), (2) Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) Groups, and (3) a Wait-List (WL) Control condition. Neither SHG nor CBT were superior to WL. On an individual basis, about one third of the participants showed significant improvements with respect to symptoms of depression. Younger women, women with a longer duration of stay in Austria and those who had encountered a higher number of traumatic experiences, showed increased improvement of depressive symptoms. The results suggest that individual treatment by ethnic, female psychotherapists should be preferred to group interventions.     

What is the effective sample size of a spatial point process?

Point process models are a natural approach for modelling data that arise as point events. In the case of Poisson counts, these may be fitted easily as a weighted Poisson regression. Point processes lack the notion of sample size. This is problematic for model selection, because various classical criteria such as the Bayesian information criterion (BIC) are a function of the sample size, n, and are derived in an asymptotic framework where n tends to infinity. In this paper, we develop an asymptotic result for Poisson point process models in which the observed number of point events, m, plays the role that sample size does in the classical regression context. Following from this result, we derive a version of BIC for point process models, and when fitted via penalised likelihood, conditions for the LASSO penalty that ensure consistency in estimation and the oracle property. We discuss challenges extending these results to the wider class of Gibbs models, of which the Poisson point process model is a special case.