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Purpose: This article reviews research on executive function (EF) skills in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and the relation between EF and language abilities. The current study assessed EF using nonverbal tasks of inhibition, shifting, and updating of working memory (WM) in school-age children with ASD. It also evaluated the association between children's receptive and expressive language abilities and EF performance., Method: In this study, we sought to address variables that have contributed to inconsistencies in this area of research-including task issues, group comparisons, and participant heterogeneity. EF abilities in children with ASD (n = 48) were compared to typically developing controls (n = 71) matched on age, as well as when statistically controlling for group differences in nonverbal cognition, socioeconomic status, and social communication abilities. Six nonverbal EF tasks were administered-2 each to evaluate inhibition, shifting, and WM. Language abilities were assessed via a standardized language measure. Language-EF associations were examined for the ASD group as a whole and subdivided by language status., Results: Children with ASD exhibited significant deficits in all components of EF compared to age-mates and showed particular difficulty with shifting after accounting for group differences in nonverbal cognition. Controlling for social communication-a core deficit in ASD-eliminated group differences in EF performance. A modest association was observed between language (especially comprehension) and EF skills, with some evidence of different patterns between children on the autism spectrum with and without language impairment., Conclusions: There is a need for future research to examine the direction of influence between EF and language. It would be beneficial for EF interventions with children with ASD to consider language outcomes and, conversely, to examine whether specific language training facilitates aspects of executive control in children on the autism spectrum., Presentation Video: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.7298144.

Few disorders appear to be more challenging for parents than autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Little is known about the extent to which parenting stress experienced by parents of children with ASD affects or is affected by marital quality. We examined daily spillover between level of parenting stress and marital interactions in a sample of 176 married couples (89.4% Caucasian, non-Hispanic) who have a child with ASD (5-12 years of age, 85% male) via a 14-day daily diary approach. On each day of the daily diary, parents individually reported on 8 positive and 8 negative marital interactions and their level of parenting stress. Dyadic multilevel modeling analyses using hierarchical linear modeling were conducted to examine same-day and lagged-effect associations between number of positive and negative marital interactions and level of parenting stress. Having a day with a higher number of negative marital interactions was associated with a higher level of parenting stress for both mothers and fathers of children with ASD. Having a day with fewer positive marital interactions was associated with having a more stressful parenting day for mothers of children with ASD. Same-day spillover was moderated by parent gender and the functioning of the child with ASD. Spillover flowed bidirectionally for mothers of children with ASD. Helping parents of children with ASD find ways to engage in positive marital interactions on stressful parenting days and avoid having negative affect, tension, and behaviors stemming from negative marital interactions spill into parenting experiences are important intervention targets.

Much of the research to date about the structure of self-regulation in early childhood has been conducted with low medical risk samples, with the general conclusion that self-regulation can be separated into overlapping executive function and effortful control factors that differentially predict child outcomes. We examined the factor structure of 36-month self-regulation among children born prematurely ( n = 168) and the extent to which self-regulation predicted maternal ratings of children's socioemotional and academic competence when they were six years of age. Statistical analyses revealed a single self-regulation factor for this high neonatal risk sample, and this self-regulation factor mediated associations between early sociodemographic risk and mothers' ratings of academic competence and externalizing problems. Our findings suggest that early intervention research with children born preterm should focus on promoting supportive early environments, particularly parental sensitivity to infant cues.

1-Butyl-3-methylimidazol-2-ylidene borane has been synthesized directly from two inexpensive commercial reagents: 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium bromide and sodium borohydride. This NHC-borane reagent is a stable, free-flowing liquid that shows promise for use in radical, ionic, and metal-catalyzed reactions.

Factorial experiments have rarely been used in the development or evaluation of clinical interventions. However, factorial designs offer advantages over randomized controlled trial designs, the latter being much more frequently used in such research. Factorial designs are highly efficient (permitting evaluation of multiple intervention components with good statistical power) and present the opportunity to detect interactions amongst intervention components. Such advantages have led methodologists to advocate for the greater use of factorial designs in research on clinical interventions (Collins, Dziak, & Li, 2009). However, researchers considering the use of such designs in clinical research face a series of choices that have consequential implications for the interpretability and value of the experimental results. These choices include: whether to use a factorial design, selection of the number and type of factors to include, how to address the compatibility of the different factors included, whether and how to avoid confounds between the type and number of interventions a participant receives, and how to interpret interactions. The use of factorial designs in clinical intervention research poses choices that differ from those typically considered in randomized clinical trial designs. However, the great information yield of the former encourages clinical researchers' increased and careful execution of such designs., (Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Ltd.)

This randomized controlled trial examined the efficacy of peer network interventions to improve the social connections of 47 high school students with severe disabilities. School staff invited, trained, and supported 192 peers without disabilities to participate in individualized social groups that met throughout one semester. Compared to adolescents in the "business-as-usual" control group (n = 48), students receiving peer networks gained significantly more new social contacts and friendships. Although many peer relationships maintained one and two semesters later, their spill over beyond the school day was limited. Students and staff affirmed the social validity of the interventions. We offer recommendations for research and practice aimed at improving the implementation and impact of peer network interventions in secondary schools.

Background: The majority of health care utilization decisions in the United States are made by persons with multiple chronic conditions. Existing public reports of health system quality do not distinguish care for these persons and are often not used by the consumers they aim to reach., Objective: Our goal was to determine if tailoring quality reports to persons with diabetes mellitus and co-occurring chronic conditions would increase user engagement with a website that publicly reports the quality of diabetes care., Methods: We adapted an existing consumer-focused public reporting website using adult learning theory to display diabetes quality reports tailored to the user's chronic condition profile. We conducted in-depth cognitive interviews with 20 individuals who either had diabetes and/or cared for someone with diabetes to assess the website. Interviews were audiotaped and transcribed, then analyzed using thematic content analysis., Results: Three themes emerged that suggested increased engagement from tailoring the site to a user's chronic conditions: ability to interact, relevance, and feeling empowered to act., Conclusions: We conclude that tailoring can be used to improve public reporting sites for individuals with chronic conditions, ultimately allowing consumers to make more informed health care decisions., Competing Interests: Conflicts of Interest: None declared., (©Maureen A Smith, Lauren Bednarz, Peter A Nordby, Jennifer Fink, Robert T Greenlee, Daniel Bolt, Elizabeth M Magnan. Originally published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research (http://www.jmir.org), 21.12.2016.)

When assessments are primarily used to measure change over time, it is important to evaluate items according to their sensitivity to change, specifically. Items that demonstrate good sensitivity to between-person differences at baseline may not show good sensitivity to change over time, and vice versa. In this study, we applied a longitudinal factor model of change to a widely used cognitive test designed to assess global cognitive status in dementia, and contrasted the relative sensitivity of items to change. Statistically nested models were estimated introducing distinct latent factors related to initial status differences between test-takers and within-person latent change across successive time points of measurement. Models were estimated using all available longitudinal item-level data from the Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale-Cognitive subscale, including participants representing the full-spectrum of disease status who were enrolled in the multisite Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative. Five of the 13 Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale-Cognitive items demonstrated noticeably higher loadings with respect to sensitivity to change. Attending to performance change on only these 5 items yielded a clearer picture of cognitive decline more consistent with theoretical expectations in comparison to the full 13-item scale. Items that show good psychometric properties in cross-sectional studies are not necessarily the best items at measuring change over time, such as cognitive decline. Applications of the methodological approach described and illustrated in this study can advance our understanding regarding the types of items that best detect fine-grained early pathological changes in cognition. (PsycINFO Database Record, Competing Interests: There were no actual or potential conflicts of interest for any of the authors., ((c) 2016 APA, all rights reserved).)

For certain multiple-choice tests, it might be theorized that respondents evaluate response options in a stepwise fashion. Statistical models that assume such a process may compete against models that imply a process in which all response options are simultaneously compared, such as Bock's nominal response model. In this article, a sequential response model for multiple-choice items (SRM-MC) is considered. The model is applied to a sentence correction test in which the recognition of error and correction of error can be viewed as separate steps in solving an item. The proposed model permits the introduction of different proficiencies across steps. A fully Bayesian approach to estimating the model is presented, and an empirical comparison is performed against competing models. Empirical results support the proposed model and suggest distinct proficiencies related to recognition and correction., Competing Interests: Declaration of Conflicting Interests: The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Background: Patient-reported outcome (PRO) measures play a key role in the advancement of patient-centered care research. The accuracy of inferences, relevance of predictions, and the true nature of the associations made with PRO data depend on the validity of these measures. Errors inherent to self-report measures can seriously bias the estimation of constructs assessed by the scale. A well-documented disadvantage of self-report measures is their sensitivity to response style (RS) effects such as the respondent's tendency to select the extremes of a rating scale. Although the biasing effect of extreme responding on constructs measured by self-reported tools has been widely acknowledged and studied across disciplines, little attention has been given to the development and systematic application of methodologies to assess and control for this effect in PRO measures., Methods: We review the methodological approaches that have been proposed to study extreme RS effects (ERS). We applied a multidimensional item response theory model to simultaneously estimate and correct for the impact of ERS on trait estimation in a PRO instrument. Model estimates were used to study the biasing effects of ERS on sum scores for individuals with the same amount of the targeted trait but different levels of ERS. We evaluated the effect of joint estimation of multiple scales and ERS on trait estimates and demonstrated the biasing effects of ERS on these trait estimates when used as explanatory variables., Results: A four-dimensional model accounting for ERS bias provided a better fit to the response data. Increasing levels of ERS showed bias in total scores as a function of trait estimates. The effect of ERS was greater when the pattern of extreme responding was the same across multiple scales modeled jointly. The estimated item category intercepts provided evidence of content independent category selection. Uncorrected trait estimates used as explanatory variables in prediction models showed downward bias., Conclusions: A comprehensive evaluation of the psychometric quality and soundness of PRO assessment measures should incorporate the study of ERS as a potential nuisance dimension affecting the accuracy and validity of scores and the impact of PRO data in clinical research and decision making.

Purpose: There is considerable controversy regarding whether to use telegraphic or grammatical input when speaking to young children with language delays, including children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). This study examined telegraphic speech use in parents of preschoolers with ASD and associations with children's spoken language 1 year later., Method: Parent-child dyads (n = 55) participated when children were, on average, 3 (Time 1) and 4 years old (Time 2). The rate at which parents omitted obligatory determiners was derived from transcripts of parent-child play sessions; measures of children's spoken language were obtained from these same transcripts., Results: Telegraphic speech use varied substantially across parents. Higher rates of parent determiner omissions at Time 1 were significantly associated with lower lexical diversity in children's spoken language at Time 2, even when controlling for children's baseline lexical diversity and nonverbal IQ. Findings from path analyses supported the directionality of effects assumed in our regression analyses, although these results should be interpreted with caution due to the limited sample size., Conclusions: Telegraphic input may have a negative impact on language development in young children with ASD. Future experimental research is needed to directly investigate how telegraphic input affects children's language learning and processing.

Response styles are frequently of concern when rating scales are used in psychological survey instruments. While latent trait models provide an attractive way of controlling for response style effects (Morren, Gelissen, & Vermunt, 2011), the analyses are generally limited to accommodating only a small number of response style types. The use of anchoring vignettes provides an opportunity to overcome this limitation. In this article, a new latent trait model is introduced that uses vignette responses to measure and control for any form of response style. An illustration is provided with data from a cross-national study of self-reported conscientiousness by Mõttus, Allik, Realo, Pullman, et al. (2012)., (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved)

This prospective longitudinal study examined predictors of parenting stress trajectories over time in a sample of 125 mothers and their preterm infants. Infant (multiple birth, gestational age, days hospitalized, and neonatal health risks) and maternal (socioeconomic, education, depressive symptoms, social support, and quality of interaction during infant feeding) characteristics were collected just prior to infant hospital discharge. Parenting stress and maternal interaction quality during play were measured at 4, 24, and 36 months corrected age. Hierarchical linear modeling was used to analyze infant and maternal characteristics as predictors of parenting stress scores and change over time. Results indicated significant variability across individuals in parenting stress at 4 months and in change trajectories. Mothers of multiples and infants with more medical risks and shorter hospitalization, and mothers with lower education and more depressive symptoms, reported more parenting stress at 4 months of age. Parenting stress decreased over time for mothers of multiples and for mothers with lower education more than for mothers of singletons or for mothers with higher educational levels. Changes in parenting stress scores over time were negatively associated with maternal behaviors during mother-infant interactions. Results are interpreted for their implications for preventive interventions.

Background: Five health-related quality-of-life (HRQoL) indexes--EQ-5D, HUI2, HUI3, QWB-SA, and SF-6D--are each used to assign community-based utility scores to health states, although these scores differ., Objective: The authors transform these indexes to a common scale to understand their interrelationships., Methods: Data were from the National Health Measurement Study, a telephone survey of 3844 US adults. The 5 indexes were analyzed using item response theory analysis to estimate scores on an underlying construct of summary health, theta. Unidimensionality was evaluated using nonlinear principal components analysis. Index scores were plotted against the estimated scores on the common underlying construct. In addition, scores on the Health and Activities Limitation Index (HALex), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Healthy Days questions, and self-rated health on a 5-category scale ranging from excellent to poor were plotted., Results: SF-6D and QWB-SA are nearly linear across the range of but with a shallow slope; EQ-5D, HUI2, and HUI3 are linear with a steep slope from low (poor health) into midrange of , then approximately linear with a less steep slope for higher (health just below to well above average), although the inflection points differ by index., Conclusion: Simple linear functions may serve as crosswalks among these indexes only for lower health states, albeit with low precision. Ceiling effects make crosswalks among most of the indexes ill specified above a certain level of health. Although each index measures generic health on a utility scale, these indexes are not identical but are relatively simply, if imprecisely, related.

Introduction: Relapse is the most common smoking cessation outcome. Accurate prediction of relapse likelihood could be an important clinical tool used to influence treatment selection or duration. The aim of this research was to develop a brief clinical relapse proneness questionnaire to be used with smokers interested in quitting in a clinical setting where time is at a premium., Methods: Diverse items assessing constructs shown in previous research to be related to relapse risk, such as nicotine dependence and self-efficacy, were evaluated to determine their independent contributions to relapse prediction. In an exploratory dataset, candidate items were assessed among smokers motivated to quit smoking who enrolled in one of three randomized controlled smoking cessation trials. A cross-validation dataset was used to compare the relative predictive power of the new instrument against the Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence (FTND) at 1-week, 8-week, and 6-month postquit assessments., Results: We selected seven items with relatively nonoverlapping content for the Wisconsin Predicting Patient's Relapse (WI-PREPARE) measure, a brief, seven-item questionnaire that taps physical dependence, environmental factors, and individual difference characteristics. Cross-validation analyses suggested that the WI-PREPARE demonstrated a stronger prediction of relapse at 1-week and 8-week postquit assessments than the FTND and comparable prediction to the FTND at a 6-month postquit assessment., Discussion: The WI-PREPARE is easy to score, suggests the nature of a patient's relapse risk, and predicts short- and medium-term relapse better than the FTND.

The construct of tobacco dependence is important from both scientific and public health perspectives, but it is poorly understood. The current research integrates person-centered analyses (e.g., latent profile analysis) and variable-centered analyses (e.g., exploratory factor analysis) to clarify the latent structure of nicotine dependence and to guide distillation of the phenotype. Using data from 4 samples of smokers, latent profiles were derived using the Wisconsin Inventory of Smoking Dependence Motives subscale scores. Across all 4 samples, results revealed a unique latent profile that had relative elevations on 4 subscales (Automaticity, Craving, Loss of Control, and Tolerance). Variable-centered analyses supported the uniqueness of these 4 subscales as they constituted a distinct common factor and were the strongest predictors of relapse and other dependence criteria. Conversely, the remaining 9 motives carried little unique predictive validity regarding dependence. Applications of a factor mixture model further supported the presence of a unique class of smokers in relation to a common factor underlying the 4 subscales. The results suggest that a pattern of smoking that is heavy, pervasive, automatic, and relatively unresponsive to instrumental contingencies is a necessary and sufficient condition for severe nicotine dependence., ((PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2008 APA, all rights reserved).)

This article describes the development and factor structure of the Revised Safe At Home instrument, a 35-item self-report measure designed to assess individuals' readiness to change their intimate partner violence behaviors. Seven new items have been added, representing content specific to the Maintenance stage, and other items have been revised to strengthen the assessment of earlier stages and address gender concerns. Confirmatory factor analysis using multisite data (two sites, a total of 281 men at intake) supported the conclusion that a four-factor model (Precontemplation, Contemplation, Preparation/Action, and Maintenance stages) was consistent with the observed covariances. A high degree of correlation between the Preparation/Action and Maintenance scales was observed, but subsequent testing indicated a need to treat the two as distinct factors in the model. It is recommended that scoring include only 31 items that perform well.

Item response theory was used to investigate the functioning of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R; R. D. Hare, 1991, 2003) in several offender populations. With male criminal offenders (N=3,847) as a reference group, differential item functioning analyses were performed for 3 comparison groups: female criminal offenders (N=1,219), male forensic psychiatric patients (N=1,246), and male criminal offenders scored from file reviews (N=2,626). Results are discussed in the context of the 2-factor, 4-facet model for the PCL-R (R. D. Hare, 2003; J. Parker, G. Sitarenios, & R. D. Hare, 2003). Application of a multigroup graded response model to all 4 groups suggests scalar equivalence may hold at least approximately for each population, although the PCL-R provided slightly greater information about the latent trait of psychopathy for male criminal offenders scored from the standard procedure., (((c) 2004 APA, all rights reserved))