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134 papers
Researchers gave the new Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and the older Rutter questionnaires to parents and teachers of 403 children from dental and psychiatric clinics. SDQ scores were highly correlated with Rutter scores, and parent-teacher agreement was similar or sometimes better for the SDQ. Both tools were about equally…
Emotional intelligence (EQ) is a set of skills for noticing, understanding and managing your own feelings and other people’s feelings. Employers and experts say EQ helps at work by improving relationships, morale and productivity, and the Covid-19 pandemic made these skills more important. A Gallup survey reported that the share…
This meta-analysis combined results from 213 school-based, universal social and emotional learning (SEL) programs involving 270,034 kindergarten-through-high-school students. Compared with control groups, students in SEL programs showed better social and emotional skills, attitudes, and behavior, and their school achievement was higher by about 11 percentile points. Regular school teaching staff…
The study introduced the Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ), a short self-test that gives a score from 0 to 50 to measure autistic traits in adults with normal intelligence. The researchers tested four groups (58 adults with Asperger/high-functioning autism; 174 random controls; 840 Cambridge students; and 16 math Olympiad winners) and found…
This meta-analysis combined 241 effect sizes from 114 studies to test how six habitual emotion-regulation strategies relate to symptoms of anxiety, depression, eating disorders, and substance-related problems. Rumination showed the strongest (large) link with symptoms. Avoidance, problem solving, and suppression showed medium-to-large links, while reappraisal and acceptance showed smaller (small-to-medium)…
In a small, carefully controlled study, seven people with major depression each received a single low-dose ketamine infusion on one day and a saline infusion on another day, without anyone knowing which was which. People who got ketamine showed clear improvement in their depressive symptoms within three days, while those…
This paper is a meta-analysis of more than 300 studies in humans that looked at links between psychological stress and measures of the immune system. It found that very short, acute stressors (minutes) were tied to increases in some natural (innate) immune measures and decreases in some specific (adaptive) immune…
The WHO Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS) has 18 questions about recent ADHD symptoms, and a shorter six-question screener was tested against blind clinical diagnoses in 154 people from the US National Comorbidity Survey Replication. Each ASRS item was linked to the clinical rating, but agreement varied a lot across…
This paper reviews research on procrastination and runs a meta-analysis of 691 correlations. It finds that some personality traits (neuroticism, rebelliousness, sensation seeking) have only weak links to procrastination. Strong and consistent predictors include task aversiveness, task delay, low self-efficacy, impulsiveness, and low conscientiousness (including poor self-control, distractibility, poor organization,…
This research found that writing about important personal experiences in an emotional way for as little as 15 minutes on three separate days was linked to better mental and physical health. The results were seen across ages, genders, cultures, social classes, and personality types. Computer text analysis showed that people…
This review looked at research on emotion dysregulation (problems managing emotions) in people with ADHD. It found three main points: emotion dysregulation is common across the lifespan and causes substantial problems; it may come from trouble noticing, recognizing, or paying attention to emotional cues tied to a brain circuit that…
Researchers interviewed 92 adults with autism to study “camouflaging,” which means hiding or changing autistic behaviors in social situations. They used thematic analysis to make a three-stage model. People said they camouflage to fit in and make connections. Camouflaging included masking (hiding traits) and compensation (using learned social techniques). Reported…
