The efficacy of using countermeasures in a model statement interview / La eficacia del uso de contramedidas en una entrevista de declaración modelo

In a countermeasures experiment, we examined to what extent liars who learn about the Model Statement tool and about the proportion of complications (complications/complications + common knowledge details + self-handicapping strategies) can successfully adjust their responses so that they sound like truth tellers. Truth tellers discussed a trip they had made; liars fabricated a story. Participants were of Lebanese, Mexican, and South-Korean origin. Prior to the interview they did or did not receive information about (I) the working of the Model statement and (II) three types of verbal detail: complications, common knowledge details and self-handicapping strategies. We found no evidence that liars sounded like truth tellers after being informed about the Model Statement and/or types of detail we examined. Actually, veracity differences were similar across experimental conditions, with truth tellers reporting more detail and more complications and obtaining a higher proportion of complications score than liars

En un experimento de contramedidas examinamos hasta qué punto los mentirosos que reciben información sobre la Declaración modelo y la proporción de complicaciones que presenta (complicaciones / complicaciones + detalles de conocimiento general + estrategias de autoobstaculización) pueden ajustar sus respuestas con éxito para que parezca que dicen la verdad. Los que dicen la verdad declararon sobre un viaje que habían hecho; los mentirosos inventaron una historia. Los participantes eran de origen libanés, mexicano y surcoreano. Antes de la entrevista habían recibido o no información sobre (I) el funcionamiento de la Declaración modelo y (II) tres tipos de detalles verbales: complicaciones, detalles de conocimiento general y estrategias de autoobstaculización. No encontramos evidencia de que los mentirosos se parecieran a los que dicen la verdad después de ser informados sobre la Declaración modelo y los tipos de detalle que examinamos. En realidad, las diferencias de veracidad fueron semejantes en todas las condiciones experimentales: los que decían la verdad informaron con mayor detalle y de más complicaciones y obtuvieron una mayor puntuación en la proporción de complicaciones que los mentirosos

Verbal baselining: within-subject consistency of CBCA scores across different truthful and fabricated accounts / La línea base verbal: la congruencia intrasujeto de las puntuaciones del CBCA en diferentes relatos veraces e inventados

Statement Validity Assessment (SVA) proposes that baseline statements on different events can serve as a within-subject measure of a witness' individual verbal capabilities when evaluating scores from Criteria-based Content Analysis (CBCA). This assumes that CBCA scores will generally be consistent across two accounts by the same witness. We present a first pilot study on this assumption. In two sessions, we asked 29 participants to produce one experience-based and one fabricated baseline account as well as one experience-based and one fabricated target account (each on different events), resulting in a total of 116 accounts. We hypothesized at least moderate correlations between target and baseline indicating a consistency across both experience-based and fabricated CBCA scores, and that fabricated CBCA scores would be more consistent because truth-telling has to consider random event characteristics, whereas lies must be constructed completely by the individual witness. Results showed that differences in correlations between experience-based CBCA scores and between fabricated CBCA scores took the predicted direction (cexperience-based = .44 versus cfabricated =.61) but this difference was not statistically significant. As predicted, a subgroup of event-related CBCA criteria were significantly less consistent than CBCA total scores, but only in experience-based accounts. The discussion considers methodological issues regarding the usage of total CBCA scores and whether to measure consistency with correlation coefficients. It is concluded that more studies are needed with larger samples

El Statement Validity Assessment (SVA) propone que las declaraciones sobre diferentes eventos pueden servir como una línea base intrasujeto de la medida de las capacidades verbales individuales de un testigo al evaluar las puntuaciones del Criteria Based Content Analysis (CBCA). Esto implica que las puntuaciones del CBCA serán congruentes en dos relatos del mismo testigo. Presentamos un primer estudio piloto sobre este supuesto. Se pidió a 29 participantes en dos sesiones que elaboraran un relato verdadero (línea base) y otro inventado, además de un relato verdadero y otro inventado (cada uno en situaciones diferentes), arrojando un total de 116 relatos. Se planteó la hipótesis de una correlación al menos moderada entre la declaración fabricada y la verdadera, que indicaría una consistencia entre las puntuaciones en el CBCA de relatos inventados y experimentados y que las puntuaciones en el CBCA inventadas serían más consistentes porque la verdad incluye las características aleatorias de los hechos, mientras que las mentiras las construye totalmente el testigo. Los resultados mostraron que las diferencias en las correlaciones entre las puntuaciones en el CBCA de relatos experimentados y fabricados iban en la dirección predicha (cvivido = .44 frente a cinventado = .61), pero esta diferencia no fue significativa. Como se predijo, un subgrupo de criterios de CBCA relacionados con los hechos fue menos congruente que las puntuaciones totales de CBCA, pero sólo en los relatos de hechos experimentados. Se discuten las implicaciones metodológicas relacionadas con el uso de las puntuaciones totales del CBCA y si se debe medir la consistencia mediante el coeficiente de correlación. Se concluye que se necesitan otros estudios con muestras más grandes

Identifying perceptual, motor, and cognitive components contributing to slowness of information processing in multiple sclerosis with and without depressive symptoms

Increasing findings suggest that different components of the stimulus-response pathway (perceptual, motor or cognitive) may account for slowed performance in Multiple Sclerosis (MS). It has also been reported that depressive symptoms (DS) exacerbate slowness in MS. However, no prior studies have explored the independent and joint impact of MS and DS on each of these components in a comprehensive manner. The objective of this work was to identify perceptual, motor, and cognitive components contributing to slowness in MS patients with and without DS. The study includes 33 Relapsing-Remitting MS patients with DS, 33 without DS, and 26 healthy controls. Five information processing components were isolated by means of ANCOVA analyses applied to five Reaction Time tasks. Perceptual, motor, and visual search components were slowed down in MS, as revealed by ANCOVA comparisons between patients without DS, and controls. Moreover, the compounding effect of MS and DS exacerbated deficits in the motor component, and slowed down the decisional component, as revealed by ANCOVA comparisons between patients with and without DS. DS seem to exacerbate slowness caused by MS in specific processing components. Identifying the effects of having MS and of having both MS and DS may have relevant implications when targeting cognitive and mood interventions

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The Role of Acceptance of Violence Beliefs and Social Information Processing on Dating Violence Perpetration.

This study's main objective was to explore whether beliefs legitimizing dating violence predict dysfunctional social information processing (SIP) when adolescents deal with ambiguous dating situations, and whether this more proximal cognitive processing acts as a mediator between acceptance of violence beliefs and dating violence perpetration. Participants were 855 high school students who completed self-report measures at three time points, with a 1-year interval between them. SIP did not act as a mediator, but the emergence of anger emotions in dating conflict situations, along with aggression-justifying beliefs, were revealed as essential in explaining dating violence. Previous aggression also explained a subsequent higher anticipation of positive consequences for aggressive acts. We discuss the implications for prevention and treatment strategies with adolescents.

Validación preliminar del Método para la Evaluación de la Mentalización en el Contexto Interpersonal (MEMCI) / Preliminary Validation of the Method for Evaluation of Mentalization in the Interpersonal Context (MEMIC)

El objetivo de este estudio fue realizar una validación preliminar de un instrumento diseñado para evaluar mentalización en adultos (Método para la Evaluación de la Mentalización en el Contexto Interpersonal, MEMCI). Una muestra de 97 estudiantes (72% mujeres) y una muestra de 10 pacientes (50% mujeres) participaron en el estudio. Los participantes completaron el MEMCI junto con medidas de empatía, teoría de la mente y apego. El análisis factorial sugirió una estructura de dos dimensiones (mentalización de pensamientos/mentalización de sentimientos y de otros estados mentales subyacentes a la conducta) que explicaban el 75,26% de la varianza. La consistencia interna fue alta y el acuerdo entre jueces adecuado. En cuanto a la validez, la puntuación total del instrumento correlacionó alto con las puntuaciones en función reflexiva. También correlacionó significativamente con empatía, apego y teoría de la mente. Asimismo, diferenció pacientes con trastorno límite de personalidad de la población normal (AU)

The aim of this study was to perform a preliminary validation of an instrument designed to assess mentalization in adults (Method for Evaluation of Mentalization in the Interpersonal Context, MEMIC). A sample of 97 students (72% women) and a sample of 10 patients (50% women) participated in the study. They completed the MEMIC and some other measures of empathy, theory of mind and attachment. The results of the factor analysis suggested a two-dimensional structure (mentalizing thoughts/mentalizing feelings and several other mental states that underlie behavior) that explained 75,26% of the variance. The internal consistency was high, and inter-rater reliability was adequate. Regarding validity, the total score of the instrument showed high correlations with reflective function scores, and significant correlations with empathy, attachment and theory of mind. Furthermore, it showed capacity to differentiate patients with borderline personality disorder from the general population (AU)

Successful intelligence and giftedness: an empirical study / Inteligencia exitosa y superdotación: un estudio empírico

The aim of our research is to look into the diversity within gifted and talented students. This is important to better understand their complexity and thus offer a more appropriate educational programs. There are rather few empirical works which attempt to identify high abilities profiles (giftedness and talent) that actually exist beyond the theoretical level. The present work intends to single out the different patterns or profiles resulting from the combination of the successful intelligence abilities (analytical, synthetic and practical), as defined by Stenberg. A total of 431 students from the Region of Murcia participated in this study. These students performed the Aurora Battery tasks (Chart, Grigorenko, & Sternberg, 2008), designed to measure the analytical, practical and creative intelligence. Analytically gifted students (n=27), practically gifted (n=33) and creatively gifted (n= 34) were identified, taking as criteria scores equal to or higher than 120 IQ on each intelligence. Different Q-factor analyses were carried out for the three groups of students, in such a way that students were grouped according to their similarities. A total of 10 profiles showing how successful intelligence abilities are combined were obtained, something that has made possible to support the theory put forward by Sternberg (2000): the analytical, practical and creative talent profiles, as well as the resulting combinations, the analytical-practical, analytical-creative, practical-creative profiles, along with the consummate balance talent (high performance in the three types of intelligence)

Ahondar en el estudio de la alta habilidad es importante para conocer los distintos tipos de superdotación y talento y poder ofrecer una mejor atención a nuestros alumnos. Existen pocos trabajos empíricos que traten de buscar los perfiles de alta habilidad que se dan en la realidad, más allá del nivel teórico. El presente trabajo trata de identificar los patrones de combinación de las habilidades de inteligencia triárquica definidas por Sternberg en alumnos superdotados. Han participado un total de 431 chicos y chicas de distintos centros de la Región de Murcia. Estos alumnos completaron las tareas de la Batería Aurora (Chart, Grigorenko & Sternberg, 2008), diseñada para medir la inteligencia analítica, práctica y creativa. De ellos se seleccionaron a los superdotados analíticos (n=27) a los superdotados prácticos (n=33) y a los superdotados creativos (n= 34), tomando como criterio que su puntuación en dichas inteligencias fuera mayor de CI 120. Se realizaron diferentes Q-factor análisis sobre los tres grupos de alumnos, de forma que los alumnos se agruparon según sus semejanzas. En total se extrajeron 10 perfiles que muestran cómo se combinan las habilidades de la inteligencia triárquica y que han permitido corroborar la teoría propuesta por Sternberg (2000): el perfil del talento analítico; el perfil práctico, el perfil creativo; el perfil analítico-práctico, el perfil analítico-creativo; el perfil practico-creativo y el perfil de equilibrio sumo

Affective norms for French words (FAN).

The present study provides affective norms for a large corpus of French words (N = 1,031) that were rated on emotional valence and emotional arousal by 469 French young adults. Ratings were made using the Self-Assessment Manikin (Lang, 1980). By combining evaluations of valence and arousal, and including ratings provided by male and female young adults, this database complements and extends existing French-language databases. The response reliability for the two affective dimensions was good, and the consistency between the present and previous ratings was high. We found a strong quadratic relationship between the valence and arousal ratings. Perceptions of the affective content of a word were partly linked to sex. This new affective database (FAN) will enable French-speaking researchers to select suitable materials for studies of how the character of affective words influences their cognitive processing. FAN is available as an online supplement downloadable with this article.

The utility of the cognitive-affective processing system in the diagnosis of personality disorders: some preliminary evidence.

The Cognitive-Affective Processing System (CAPS) suggests that personality is best understood as a collection of situationally consistent traits that are expressed contingent upon features of the situation that elicit them. This differs from the Five-Factor Model (FFM) of personality, in which personality is believed to be composed of five broad trait domains that are observed consistently across multiple situations. In this study, 202 licensed members of a state psychological association assigned diagnoses to written case studies that were created out of situationally specific descriptions of Axis II criteria. The accuracy of these diagnoses were compared to case studies written from FFM trait descriptions representative of the same Axis II disorders (schizoid, narcissistic, and obsessive compulsive) and to case studies taken from published DSM case books. Results demonstrated that cases constructed with the CAPS descriptions yielded more accurate diagnoses in two of the three cases compared to FFM trait description cases and equivalent diagnostic accuracy when using the DSM-IV. Based on these initial findings, it appears that clinicians may be able to judge personality disorders better with situationally specific, or context-dependent, information than simple trait descriptions.

Patterns of breakdown in spelling in primary progressive aphasia.

INTRODUCTION: The objective of this study is to determine which cognitive processes underlying spelling are most affected in the three variants of primary progressive aphasia (PPA): Logopenic variant primary progressive aphasia (lvPPA), Semantic variant primary progressive aphasia (svPPA), and Nonfluent variant primary progressive aphasia (nfvPPA). METHODS: 23 PPA patients were administered The Johns Hopkins Dysgraphia Battery to assess spelling. Subtests evaluate for effects of word frequency, concreteness, word length, grammatical word class, lexicality (words vs pseudowords), and "regularity" by controlling for the other variables. Significant effects of each variable were identified with chi square tests. Responses on all spelling to dictation tests were scored by error type. 16 of the 23 subjects also had a high resolution MRI brain scan to identify areas of atrophy. RESULTS: We identified 4 patterns of spelling that could be explained by damage to one or more cognitive processes underlying spelling. Nine patients (3 unclassifiable, 4 with lvPPA, 2 with svPPA) had dysgraphia explicable by impaired access to lexical representations, with reliance on sublexical phonology-to-orthography conversion (POC). Two patients (with nfvPPA) showed dysgraphia explicable by impaired access to lexical representations and complete disruption of sublexical POC. Seven patients (4 with lvPPA, 1 with svPPA, 2 unclassifiable) showed dysgraphia explicable by impaired access to lexical-semantic representations and/or lexical representations with partially spared sublexical POC mechanisms. Five patients (1 with nfvPPA, 2 with svPPA, 1 with lvPPA, and 1 unclassifiable) showed dysgraphia explicable by impairment of the graphemic buffer. CONCLUSIONS: Any cognitive process underlying spelling can be affected in PPA. Predominance of phonologically plausible errors, more accurate spelling of regular words than irregular words, and more accurate spelling of pseudowords than words (indicating spared POC mechanisms) may indicate a low probability of progression to nfvPPA.

Rasch analysis of the Executive Interview (The EXIT-25) and introduction of an abridged version (The Quick EXIT).

OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the psychometric properties of the Executive Interview (EXIT-25) and to propose modifications that will improve those properties. DESIGN: Rasch analysis of existing datasets contributed by 3 prior projects, all of which examined criterion-related validity of the EXIT-25. SETTING: A large, urban, academic free-standing rehabilitation facility. PARTICIPANTS: The sample of 147 was comprised of 109 adults diagnosed with stroke evaluated during inpatient rehabilitation and 38 adults with traumatic brain injury evaluated during inpatient (n=11) or outpatient rehabilitation (n=27). INTERVENTIONS: Not applicable. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The EXIT-25, Repeatable Battery for the Assessment of Neuropsychological Status, and Trails A and B. RESULTS: Eleven of the 25 items correlated weakly with the total measure and misfit the rating scale model. Deleting these 11 items improved the internal consistency of the remaining 14 items and enhanced the measure's criterion-related validity. CONCLUSIONS: The EXIT-25 can be reduced from 25 to 14 items without reducing internal consistency. Convergent validity of the abbreviated measure is supported by moderate-size correlations with standard measures of cognitive deficits.

Assessment of the global intelligence and selective cognitive capacities in preterm 8-year-old children / Evaluación de la inteligencia y capacidades cognitivas específicas en niños prematuros de 8 años de edad

The aim of this study was to assess various cognitive abilities such as attention, IQ, reasoning, and memory related to academic achievement in 8- and 9-year-old preterm children. A total of 141 children were assessed. The preterm group (= 37 weeks) comprised 63 children and was compared to 78 full term children. Attention was evaluated using the d2 Selective Attention test, and the IQ by the L-M form of the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale, establishing a profile of abilities: perception, memory, comprehension, reasoning, and verbal fluency. Significant differences in IQ were found between the preterm and full-term children. Of the cognitive abilities assessed, the only significant differences were found in verbal fluency, with preterm boys showing lower verbal fluency scores than full-term children. In conclusion, all preterm groups have attention ability similar to that of full-term children. However, preterm children obtain lower scores in intelligence measures. In addition, preterm boys have verbal fluency difficulties. Taking into account the increase in preterm births, suitable intervention programs must be planned to attend the difficulties found (AU)

El objetivo de este estudio fue evaluar diferentes habilidades cognitivas tales como la atención, cociente intelectual, razonamiento y memoria relacionadas con el rendimiento académico en niños prematuros de 8 y 9 años de edad. Se evaluaron un total de 141 niños. El grupo de prematuros (= 37 semanas) estaba compuesto por 63 sujetos y se comparó con 78 niños nacidos a término. La atención fue evaluada con la prueba D2 de atención selectiva, y el cociente de inteligencia con la forma de LM de la escala de inteligencia del Stanford-Binet, estableciendo un perfil de habilidades: percepción, memoria, comprensión, razonamiento y fluidez verbal. Se encontraron diferencias en el cociente intelectual entre los niños prematuros y los nacidos a término. De las habilidades cognitivas evaluadas, se encontraron diferencias en la fluidez verbal, donde los niños prematuros mostraron puntuaciones más bajas. En conclusión, los prematuros tienen una capacidad de atención similar a los niños a término pero obtienen puntuaciones menores en las medidas de inteligencia. Además, los niños prematuros tienen dificultades en la fluidez verbal. Considerando el aumento en los nacimientos prematuros, deberían organizarse programas de intervención adecuados para asistir a las dificultades encontradas en esta población (AU)

Decoding the large-scale structure of brain function by classifying mental States across individuals.

Brain-imaging research has largely focused on localizing patterns of activity related to specific mental processes, but recent work has shown that mental states can be identified from neuroimaging data using statistical classifiers. We investigated whether this approach could be extended to predict the mental state of an individual using a statistical classifier trained on other individuals, and whether the information gained in doing so could provide new insights into how mental processes are organized in the brain. Using a variety of classifier techniques, we achieved cross-validated classification accuracy of 80% across individuals (chance = 13%). Using a neural network classifier, we recovered a low-dimensional representation common to all the cognitive-perceptual tasks in our data set, and we used an ontology of cognitive processes to determine the cognitive concepts most related to each dimension. These results revealed a small organized set of large-scale networks that map cognitive processes across a highly diverse set of mental tasks, suggesting a novel way to characterize the neural basis of cognition.

Factor analysis of the Repeatable Battery for the Assessment of Neuropsychological Status.

A sample of 175 veterans' scores on the Repeatable Battery for the Assessment of Neuropsychological Status (RBANS; Randolph, 1998) was examined to investigate the factor structure of this scale. First, we attempted to replicate a five-factor model to reflect the five Index Scores of the RBANS (immediate memory, visuospatial/constructional, language, attention, and delayed memory) from the 12 individual subtests, using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). We were unable to identify a five-factor structure of the RBANS. The RBANS subtests were then subjected to an exploratory factor analysis with a maximum likelihood extraction and orthogonal rotation to determine a new dimensional model. Results indicated a two-factor structure that can roughly be described as memory and visuospatial function. CFA of this new structure indicated an adequate fit for this sample. Findings suggest that it may be appropriate to place more emphasis on the individual subtest scores than the index scores during interpretation.

Efecto de la edad en una tarea de planificación y organización (‘pirámide de México’) en escolares / The effect of age in a planning and arranging task (‘Mexican Pyramid’) among school children

Objetivo. Conocer los cambios relacionados con la edad en una tarea de planificación y organización, como componentes de las funciones ejecutivas. Sujetos y métodos. Se analizó la ejecución en la ‘pirámide de México’ de la evaluación neuropsi-cológica infantil en 239 escolares de México y Colombia de 5 a 16 años de edad, distribuidos en seis grupos. Se utilizaron cinco medidas: número de aciertos, número de movimientos y tiempo de ejecución en los diseños correctos, número de aciertos y tiempo de ejecución en los diseños correctos realizados con el mínimo de movimientos. Resultados. Se observó un efecto de la edad sobre las cinco medidas. En comparación con los otros grupos, los niños de 5 a 6 años tienen una menorcantidad de diseños correctos; los de 5 a 8 años requieren mayor número de movimientos. El tiempo de ejecución mostró un mayor número de diferencias intragrupales. El análisis por ensayo reveló que el grado de dificultad se relaciona con la cantidadde movimientos y lo novedoso de las reglas. Conclusiones. Además del número de aciertos y de movimientos invertidos para lograr cada acierto, el tiempo de ejecución es un indicador útil del desarrollo de estas funciones, dado que la rapidez enla ejecución es la que marca diferencias mayores entre los niños. Nuestros resultados apoyan la existencia de un desarrollo acelerado de las funciones de planificación y organización durante los primeros años de la etapa escolar, que sigue un cursomás lento en la adolescencia

Aim. To analyze the influence of age on the performance of a planning and organization task, two skills includedin the executive functions. Subjects and methods. Performance of the task ‘Mexican pyramid’ from the Evaluación Neuropsicológica Infantil (ENI) were analyzed on 239 school age children from México and Colombia, distributed in six age groups.Five measures were analyzed: number of correct designs, number of movements per design and execution time in the correct designs, number of correct designs built with the minimum of movements and its execution time. Results. There was a significant effect of age on the five measures. Comparison between groups showed that younger children (5 to 6 years old) hada smaller number of correct designs, while children from 5 to 8 years old need more movements. Execution time showed a greater number of differences between groups. Analyzing the 11 items of the task, it was evident that difficulty level is related with the number of movements and the novelty of rules. Conclusions. Our results suggest that accuracy of performance, the number of moves as well as the speed of performance are useful markers of the development of the executive functions. Our results support the notion that the development of planning and organization; is fast in the first years of the school age, and it slows down on adolescence

Cognitive and psychosocial development of children with Pierre Robin sequence.

AIM: It is unclear whether cognitive impairment in Pierre Robin sequence (PRS) results from a primary disturbance affecting both the brain and the mandible or from recurrent upper airway obstruction (UAO). If the latter were true, cognitive impairment should be preventable by early treatment of UAO. We wanted to determine the cognitive and psychosocial outcome of children with PRS treated with a new device aimed at relieving UAO in infancy (pre-epiglottic baton plate). METHODS: Thirty-four children with PRS and 34 healthy controls aged 4-11 years completed the Kaufman-Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC) and a self-concept inventory. Parents rated their children's emotional and behavioural problems. Multi- and univariate analyses of covariance were performed, controlling for gender, age, parental education, family income and parental depression. RESULTS: The cognitive development of the PR children was within the reference range. Compared to healthy children, however, the children with PRS performed significantly poorer. There were no significant differences concerning self-concept, emotional or behavioural problems. CONCLUSION: These children with non-syndromic PRS who had received treatment of UAO in infancy performed worse in the K-ABC. However, this did not reflect a major cognitive impairment.

Using mental tasks transitions detection to improve spontaneous mental activity classification.

This paper presents an algorithm based on canonical variates transformation (CVT) and distance based discriminant analysis (DBDA) combined with a mental tasks transitions detector (MTTD) to classify spontaneous mental activities in order to operate a brain-computer interface working under an asynchronous protocol. The algorithm won the BCI Competition III--Data Set V: Multiclass Problem, Continuous EEG--achieving an averaged classification accuracy over three subjects of 68.65% (79.60, 70.31 and 56.02%, respectively) in a three-class problem.

Consistencia semántica de enunciados de destrezas mentales y de relación en el ámbito de la Administración Pública Vasca / Semantic consistence of descriptors of cognitive and social skills in the Basque Public Administration

En el contexto de implantación de los Análisis Funcionales de la Administración General del País Vasco (Gorriti, 2003; Oficina para la Modernización Administrativa, 1998), se analizaron los diferentes puestos de trabajo de esta Administración. Como parte de dicho proceso de análisis de puestos, se realizaron entrevistas de análisis de las tareas representativas de cada puesto. Los trabajadores entrevistados aportaron un total de 1.410 enunciados de destrezas mentales y 1.344 de relación. Para racionalizar dicha información se elaboró, en base a criterios de similitud semántica, una propuesta de 94 enunciados de destrezas mentales y 65 de relación. Así se redujo el número de enunciados sin pérdida de significado. El objeto de este estudio es comprobar la consistencia semántica de estos 94 y 65 enunciados propuestos a partir del grado de acuerdo de 5 expertos en Recursos Humanos con dicha propuesta.Para calcular dicho acuerdo se utiliza el Content Validity Ratio (CVR) de Lawshe (1975). El análisis de estos datos ha permitido identificar cuáles de estos 94 y 65 enunciados propuestos mantener, modificar o eliminar. Como resultado se obtienen 30 enunciados de destrezas mentales y 26 de relación. Estos enunciados finales serán la base de estudios posteriores, cuyo objetivo será identificar la estructura factorial y desarrollar una taxonomía de las destrezas mentales y de relación de los trabajadores de la Administración General del País Vasco (AU)

Jobs in the General Public Administration of the Basque Country were analyzed on the occasion of functional analysis implementation (Gorriti, 2003; Office for the Modernization of the Public Administration, 1998). As a step in the job analysis process, a number of interviews were carried out to analyze the representative tasks in each job. The interviews yielded 1,410 cognitive skill descriptors and 1,344 social skill descriptors. Based on semantic similarity criteria, five human resources experts reduced the number of descriptors to 94and 65 respectively, without losing any meaning. This paper checks the semantic consistency of these latter descriptors according to the Content Validity Ratio (CVS) (Lawshe,1975). Data analysis identified which descriptors to keep and which of them needed to be modified or rejected. As a result of this second analysis, 30 cognitive skill descriptors and26 social skill descriptors were left. These final descriptors will be the base for further studies in an attempt to identify a factor structure and develop a taxonomy of mental skills on one side and social skills on the other side concerning the employees of the General PublicAdministration of the Basque Country (AU)

Predictors of neurocognitive performance in chronic pain patients.

In a sample of 70 chronic pain patients, hierarchical multiple regression analyses were utilized to assess the additive and interactive contributions of pain severity and psychological distress variables to neurocognitive performance across attention and concentration, memory, and reasoning ability domains. Although the full model predicting attention and concentration was found to be significant, there was no significant contribution of pain severity, psychological distress, or the Pain Severity x Psychological Distress interaction to the prediction of attention and concentration scores after controlling for the effect of years of formal education. After controlling for the effect of years of formal education, pain severity and psychological distress did make separate and significant contributions to the prediction of memory scores; however, the Pain Severity x Psychological Distress interaction did not significantly affect memory scores. After controlling for the effect of years of formal education, there was no significant contribution of pain severity, psychological distress, or the Pain Severity x Psychological Distress interaction to reasoning ability scores. Results suggest the importance of assessing memory function when managing psychologically distressed chronic pain patients.