James D. Griffith’s research while affiliated with Shippensburg University and other places

The present study examined rates of scholarly productivity amongst academic psychologists in the United States, including annual peer-reviewed publication rate, normative rates per year of conference presentations and book chapters as well as the average amount of annual grant monies. Psychology faculty at 4-year or higher institutions in the United States were recruited via an email invitation, resulting in 1,214 participants. Participants were examined according to their institutions’ Carnegie Classification. The largest observed group in our sample were from master’s Colleges and Universities: Larger Programs, M1 category, (N = 350; 28.83%), whereas the smallest observed group were from baccalaureate Colleges: Diverse Fields, B/DF category, (N = 47; 3.87%). Results indicated a significant effect of Carnegie Classification on rates of scholarly productivity, such that faculty at R1 and R2 institutions outperformed all other Carnegie Classifications on all measures. In addition, faculty at R1 institutions outperformed faculty at R2 institutions on all measures except for conference presentations. Given that scholarly output is used as an indicator in tenure and promotion processes, the present study provides essential reference information for academic psychologists in the United States.

The current research conducted a systematic review on sample size and the use of inferential statistics in basic and applied behavioral research by assessing all experimental studies from 2009 to 2018 in the Journal of the Experimental Analysis of Behavior (JEAB) and the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA) which was 1,155 articles. The use or non-use of inferential statistics in behavioral research remains controversial as visual inspection has deep historical roots. JEAB had a median number of eight subjects and JABA had a median number of four subjects, which was statistically different using Mood’s median test. In addition, articles in JEAB were more likely to use inferential statistics compared to JABA. In general, inferential statistics were used in the presence of larger sample sizes, however, the use of animal subjects was associated with smaller sample sizes. Although patterns of the use of inferential statistics varied across journal, sample size, and species, this does not preclude the use of statistical methods by applied behavioral researchers, which should be used to support and confirm visual inspections of data. Keywords: sample size, inferential statistics, behavioral research, systematic review.

Rationale Major depressive episodes are severe mood episodes which occur both in major depressive disorder and bipolar I and II disorder. Major depressive episodes are characterized by debilitating symptoms that often persist and interfere with typical daily functioning. Various treatments exist for major depressive episodes; however, most primary pharmacologic treatments may take weeks to months to provide relief from depressive symptoms. Ketamine is a demonstrated treatment for major depressive episodes, as relief from depressive symptoms can occur rapidly following treatment. Objectives Prior meta-analyses have been conducted to analyze the effectiveness of ketamine for the treatment of major depressive episodes, but at the time of this writing, no meta-analysis had been conducted to observe ketamine treatment efficacy beyond 2 weeks. Methods The present meta-analysis evaluated the efficacy of ketamine for the treatment of major depressive episodes; observations of depressive episode severity were analyzed at 2, 4, and 6-weeks post-treatment. Results The present meta-analysis observed large effects at 2 weeks (g = −1.28), 4 weeks, (g = −1.28), and 6 weeks (g = −1.36) post-treatment. Conclusions The results from the present meta-analysis indicate that ketamine can be an effective pharmacologic intervention for major depressive episodes, with treatment effects lasting up to 6 weeks post-ketamine administration, which has many positive implications for treatment.

In this study, we explored the relationship between personality traits and the tendency to lie. Specifically, we examined the correlation between various forms of lying and the personality factors of self-esteem, openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism. We developed a lie scale that assessed the tendency to tell three types of lies: altruistic, self-serving, and vindictive. A total of 352 participants completed the lie scale, the Ten-Item Personality Inventory, and the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale. Self-esteem, openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, and agreeableness were negatively correlated with lying, while neuroticism was positively correlated with lying. Multiple regression analyses were used to determine the unique set of personality predictors for each type of lie.

The topic of infantile amnesia, or often referred to as one’s earliest childhood memory, has been studied for more than 100 years. Recently, there have been increased efforts to examine cultural differences in earliest childhood memories. The present study recruited participants ( N = 242) from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk (MT), referred to as Turkers, who were either from an individualist (United States) or collectivist (India) culture, and compared their earliest recollections. Turkers from India reported earliest recollections that were from a later age, had more social themes, had more unpleasant memories, had more specific memories, and took longer to complete the task compared to Turkers from the United States. These findings suggest that unique cultural differences may be associated with early memories, which may reflect cultural differences in the development of one’s self-concept.

Female escorts represent an occupational group that charges a fee for sex, which can be regarded as an extreme form of short-term mating. The present study examined if the fees charged by escorts are related to traits typically associated with female short-term mate value. A total of 2,925 advertisements for female escorts offering sexual services in the United States were examined, as a customized software program was used to download all the advertisements from an online escort directory. The advertisement content was coded, and relationships between advertised physical characteristics and the hourly rate charged by female escorts were examined. The analyses showed that higher fees were associated with female escorts who advertised a waist-to-hip ratio near 0.7, lower weight and body mass index, younger age, and photographic displays of breast and buttocks nudity. The findings provide evidence that evolutionarily relevant traits associated with female short-term mate value are systematically related to fees charged for sexual services.

Sex work is an industry that typically has a negative stigma associated with both sellers and buyers of sexual services and products. Bisexuality is commonplace in some sectors of sex work and can actually serve as an advantage for women working as pornographic actresses and/or escorts. Research has also shown that there is a higher value associated with those advertising sexual services to both genders. As such, limited research has examined sex work as a legitimate occupation and how to view the career development of those involved in this industry. This chapter provides a conceptual framework to explain the career development of bisexual female pornographic actresses and escorts from the United States using Social Cognitive Career Theory (Lent et al. Journal of Vocational Behavior 45:79–122, 1994). This theory has been particularly useful in examining marginalized groups such as gay and lesbian workers across a variety of occupations and is applicable to bisexual female pornographic actresses and escorts.

The rapid increase of researchers utilizing internet sites for conducting research has not yet been adequately investigated for the degree to which psychometric properties of instruments remain intact. Although using the internet for data collection is now commonplace, there are a limited number of studies that have investigated the quality of data provided from online subject pools and responses from those platforms compared to methods used to create these instruments. The present study collected data using the World Health Organization's WHOQOL-BREF instrument across four different types of data collection methods which included Amazon.com's Mechanical Turk, Craigslist.org, college students completing the survey online, and college students completing a survey in a traditional face-to-face format. Feldt tests comparing observed Cronbach's alphas to alphas from a published validation study and confirmatory factor analyses corroborated the use of online data collection for quality of life for the general public and college students. However, the face-to-face data collection method did not provide as consistent results across the scales. Further research should investigate the lack of internal consistency in face-to-face responses.

The literature lacks a consistent pattern on the relationship between attitudes toward death and dying across occupations and recreational pursuits. The present cross-sectional study categorized a group of individuals engaging in a high-risk recreational activity (i.e., skydivers) on the basis of experience and classified them into student, intermediate, and experts. There were more negative attitudes of death and dying among student skydivers compared with more experienced skydivers. It was also found that expert skydivers had more negative attitudes toward death and dying on some of the measures compared with the intermediate level experienced skydivers. It may be the case that factors such as perceived personal control, overconfidence, and metacognition may be related to these observed differences between the two more experienced groups of skydivers. The possibility of the factors playing a role in skydivers’ attitudes toward death and dying should be taken into consideration in the training programs for skydiving.

This study compared women who advertised on an online escort website and marketed themselves as either bisexual or heterosexual. The analyses showed that advertised sexual orientation, age, weight, and photographs depicting buttock nudity were related to rates charged by escorts. A series of moderator analyses were conducted that showed that advertised sexual orientation moderated the effect of age and weight: The effects were more pronounced for women advertising a bisexual orientation. A discriminant analysis revealed that age, in-call rate, and photo identification could predict group membership with 62% accuracy. Limitations and future research perspectives are discussed.