Behavioral Science Research Research Articles

Genetics, Genomics, and Oncology

Genetics, Genomics, and Oncology

Disciplinary Divides within Asian American Studies: Lessons from Intergroup Contact Theory and Community-Based Participatory Research

Disciplinary Divides within Asian American Studies: Lessons from Intergroup Contact Theory and Community-Based Participatory Research Richard M. Lee (bio) I begin with a confession. I have been an on-again, off-again member of the Association for Asian American Studies (AAAS) for the past seventeen years with the majority of time as a lapsed member. Yet throughout this time, I have been actively involved as a faculty member in Asian American studies (AAS) programs at the University of Texas at Austin (1997–2000) and the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (2000–present). Moreover, as a professor of psychology, my research on ethnic identity, perceived discrimination, acculturation, parent-child cultural conflicts, and international adoption has long drawn upon AAS perspectives and scholarship. Nevertheless, I remain ambivalent about AAAS as a professional home, and I believe my own reservations with AAAS reflect a larger disconnect between the behavioral and social sciences and the field of AAS. In this article, I draw upon intergroup contact theory and community-based participatory research methods to suggest ways to bridge the divide between the behavioral and social sciences and AAS/AAAS.9 First, it’s important to begin with an understanding of what I mean by the behavioral and social sciences. I adopt a rather narrow definition that focuses primarily on empirical approaches to understanding human development, health, and well-being, because this specific subset of the field, which includes my own scholarship, is most absent from AAS/AAAS. The Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research at the National Institutes of Health provides the following description: Basic research in the behavioral and social sciences is designed to further our understanding of fundamental mechanisms and patterns of behavioral and social functioning relevant to the Nation’s health and well-being, and as they interact with each other, with biology and the environment. . . . Applied research in the behavioral and social sciences is designed to predict or influence health outcomes, [End Page 99] risks, or protective factors. It is also concerned with the impact of illness or risk for illness on behavioral or social functioning.10 This definition explicitly avoids naming particular disciplines, but behavioral and social sciences in this context most often refer to the fields of psychology, political science, sociology, economics, and anthropology—as well as other allied fields such as public health, education, social work. Moreover, behavioral/social scientists use quantitative and qualitative research designs to address these basic and applied research questions. In this respect, most researchers in this defined group of behavioral and social sciences adopt a positivist or postpositivist philosophy of science. Beyond my own confession, the 2013 AAAS Conference programming highlights the lack of involvement by behavioral/social scientists in AAS/AAAS. In a cursory review of the 180 or so program session titles, including plenaries and workshops, I identified only four, possibly five, sessions whose topics and titles allude to a focus on behavioral and social functioning, as defined by NIH. Even among these few sessions, it was not apparent if the presentations involved qualitative or quantitative data. In addition to programming, AAAS also recognizes outstanding scholarship by conferring book awards at the conference, but there are no awards for best peer-reviewed journal articles—which is how the majority of behavioral/social scientists disseminate scholarship. These constructive critiques are not to say behavioral/social scientists only study health and mental health, rely on quantitative or qualitative data analyses, and publish in peer-reviewed journals, but they do suggest an organizational bias or preference within AAAS. It would be easy to blame this poor representation in sessions and awards on the lack of participation by behavioral/social scientists in AAAS or on the outdatedness of the theories and methodologies used by behavioral/social scientists. However, blaming the other (especially when they are in the minority within the organization) is rarely productive and often destructive. To bridge this apparent divide, I adopt intergroup contact theory as a framework to understand how to help overcome perceived barriers and biases. Allport developed the theory based on early field research on black-white relations, such as desegregation/integration leading to more positive racial attitudes. In his pioneering book The Nature of Prejudice, Allport...

Youth Development: An Approach for Physical Activity Behavioral Science

Positive youth development (PYD) is an emerging area of study and practice that targets fostering the assets of young people to avoid problem behaviors and excel in meeting diverse life challenges. This paper describes how PYD evolved from treating problem behaviors to preventing problem behaviors in at-risk youth, to more recently helping all youth thrive and excel in numerous domains. Although evidence to inform community policy and practice has emerged, there is a lack of consensus on how to define PYD, and this lack of consensus has impacted progress in PYD physical activity behavioral science. This paper recommends PYD physical activity behavioral science reject disciplinary boundaries and (a) examine the nature of person-environment interaction in the context of physical activity as the primary outcome, (b) target big-picture physical activity outcome questions, and (c) come to a consensus on the domains of physical activity behavioral science research competencies.

News from the NIH: research to evaluate “natural experiments” related to obesity and diabetes

Obesity is a major contributor to many serious health conditions that increase morbidity and reduce quality of life. For example, obesity is a significant risk factor for diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and certain forms of cancer. The prevalence of obesity in children and adults in the USA has dramatically increased in the past four decades [1, 2]. Although some cities and states are showing reductions in rates of childhood obesity, the prevalence is still far above 1970 levels [3–5]. Diabetes currently affects an estimated 25.8 million people in the USA and another 79 million Americans are estimated to be at greatly increased risk of developing diabetes in the next several years [6]. Further, most adults with diabetes in the USA are not meeting the recommended goals for diabetes care [7]. Overweight, obesity, and/or excessive weight gain during pregnancy are also contributing to rising rates of gestational diabetes mellitus which in turn increases risk of future type 2 diabetes in the mother and child. In addition to the considerable impairments to health and quality of life with these conditions, there are also serious economic consequences. The estimated current annual cost of diabetes alone in the USA is $245 billion dollars per year with $176 billion in direct medical costs and the remainder related to reduced productivity [8]. The increasing challenges of obesity and its related health conditions in our society also coincide with a dynamic time for health care in the USA, including changing consumer demands (employers and individuals) and the pressing need to deliver evidence-based care, improve health outcomes for all Americans, and control costs. In communities and in health-care settings, many of the policy and programmatic changes are evidence-informed, but often little is known about population-level effects. Rigorous scientific evaluation of these “natural experiments” can help to more rapidly build an evidence base to inform key stakeholders and policy makers. Evaluation research generally, and rigorous evaluation of natural experiments specifically, is increasingly recognized as an important and appropriate approach to health-related research, particularly in the context of policy and environmental [9, 10] change. The term experiment in natural experiments is something of a misnomer as the implementation of these public health and health-care system policies and programs are not often designed as true experiments. Generally, the term natural experiment refers to an exposure or change that is not directly manipulated by the researcher, but rather the result of policy or program interventions that are varied in their implementation along a number of possible dimensions, such as time, geography, or content. Research that evaluates the real-world implementation of polices and program has some challenges such as the potential for bias, confounding, and threats to casual inference. Despite these limitations, the data from natural experiment research offers unique opportunities to enrich the evidence base and can offer advantages not provided by other research designs, such as improved external validity. This research can provide important data about the impact of a policy or program in real-world settings and populations; see for example the well-known study on the impact of education on health outcomes by Lleras-Muney [11]. Often, these are data that would be very difficult, potentially unethical, and often cost prohibitive to collect in the context of an investigator-initiated randomized experiment [12]. Natural experiment research also allows for the assessment of potential unintended consequences or subgroup differences in response to the program or policy and measurement of implementation fidelity, variability, and process. Since 2010, several institutes and centers (ICs) at the National Institutes of Health have jointly issued funding opportunity announcements intended to support rigorous evaluation of natural experiments related to obesity and/or diabetes outcomes, including the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK); National Cancer Institute (NCI); Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD); National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI); National Institute on Aging (NIA); and the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research (OBSSR). In these funding opportunity announcements, policies are broadly defined to include public policies at local, state, and federal levels of government and organizational level policies, such as those implemented by large organizations, worksites, or school districts. Polices can be formal such as laws and regulations or informal such as guidelines and procedures. Program is defined as a set of activities initiated by governmental or other organizational bodies to enhance obesity prevention and control.

An investigation of source use in the results and the closing sections of empirical articles in Information Systems: In search of a functional-semantic citation typology for pedagogical purposes

This paper presents an analysis of how behavioral science researchers from the soft domain of Information Systems (IS) engage prior knowledge of the field to construct research claims in journal articles. Data was drawn from the Results and the Discussion sections of 40 IS research articles published in one research journal (MIS Quarterly, N = 20) and one applied-research journal (Information Management, N = 20). To perform the analysis, the Results and the Discussion sections of the articles were first parsed into moves, and citations in each of the moves were classified according to their rhetorical functions and the types of knowledge cited (semantic content). Based on the classification, a functional-semantic citation typology was developed. Counts of the citations in each category represented in the typology were then subjected to a series of statistical analyses to examine their distribution across the two journals as well as the two target sections. The results reveal that while all the citation categories in the typology were present in both journals, they appeared only sparingly in the IM articles, and cross-sectional differences in their distribution were statistically significant in the MIS Quarterly corpus only. Pedagogical implications will be presented.

Annual review of Asian American psychology, 2012.

This article provides a systematic and criteria-based review of behavioral science research articles published about Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders in 2012. As the fourth review in the series, we followed the format used in previous reviews (Juan, Lee, & Bates, 2012; B. S. K. Kim, Wong, & Maffini, 2010; Okazaki, Kassem, & Tan, 2011). However, we also addressed recommendations listed in prior reviews advocating for a review based on common themes and trends emerging from the research. A search using PsycINFO revealed 248 empirical articles that were coded for specific topics, research methods, and type of sample. We then selected 3 main themes to focus on, based on emerging trends in the field. These areas include health and health-related behaviors, racism and discrimination, and immigrant and refugee communities. A discussion of trends in methods, content, and communities is provided. We also discuss limitations across studies and themes and offer directions for future research.

Informed Consent: An Ethical Issue in Conducting Research with Male Partner Violent Offenders

Ethical codes help guide the methods of research that involves samples gathered from “at-risk” populations. The current article reviews general as well as specific ethical principles related to gathering informed consent from partner violent offenders mandated to outpatient treatment, a group that may be at increased risk of unintentional coercion in behavioral sciences research due to court mandates that require outpatient treatment without the ethical protections imbued upon prison populations. Recommendations are advanced to improve the process of informed consent within this special population and data supporting the utility of the recommendations in a sample 70 partner violent offenders are provided. Data demonstrate that participants were capable of comprehending all essential elements of consent.

Mortality from Diabetes by Hispanic Groups: Evidence from the US National Longitudinal Mortality Study

Diabetes is a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in the United States, especially in minority communities. In mortality research, Hispanics are frequently studied as a homogeneous group. The present study was undertaken to compare diabetes deaths among persons of Hispanic origin by disaggregating groups in order to determine whether the components in the Hispanic label have differential mortality. Data utilized were from the US National Longitudinal Mortality Study. Cox proportional hazards regression models were fitted to the data. Findings showed that individuals in the broader Hispanic label were 28% more likely to die from diabetes mellitus than non-Hispanic whites (ARR = 1.28, CI = 1.05, 1.55). When groups were broken down, it was observed that Mexicans were 50% more likely to die of diabetes than their non-Hispanic white counterparts. No other Hispanic origin group was significantly associated with diabetes mortality risk. Education and family income were strong predictors of mortality, regardless of Hispanic origin grouping. It was concluded from the analysis that future behavioral and social science research would be more informative if the broader Hispanic label was broken down into subcategories. Failure to do so might lead to drawing false inferences as a finding may well hold for one group within the Hispanic label, but not for others.

The benefits of rule following: A new account of the evolution of desires

A key component of much current research in behavioral ecology, cognitive science, and economics is a model of the mind at least partly based on beliefs and desires. However, despite this prevalence, there are still many open questions concerning both the structure and the applicability of this model. This is especially so when it comes to its ‘desire’ part: in particular, it is not yet entirely clear when and why we should expect organisms to be desire-based—understood so as to imply that they consult explicit tokenings of what they ought to do—as opposed to being drive-based—understood so as to imply that they react to the world using behavioral reflexes. In this paper, I present the beginnings of an answer to this question. To do this, I start by showing that an influential recent attempt to address these issues—due to Kim Sterelny—fails to be fully successful, as it does not make sufficiently clear what the relative benefits and disadvantages of drive-based and desire-based cognitive architectures are. I then present an alternative account of this matter based on the idea that organisms that can follow explicit behavioral rules (i.e. which have desires) avoid having to memorize a large set of state of the world–action connections—which can (though need not) be adaptive. Finally, I apply this account to the question of what the cognitive value of mental representations should be seen to be; here, I conclude that—contrary to some recent claims—relying on mental representations can make decision making easier, not harder, but also that—in line with these recent claims—whether it does so depends on the details of the case.

Systems Science

This supplement of Health Education & Behavior showcases the current state of the field of systems science applications in health promotion and public health. Behind this work lies a steady stream of public dollars at the federal level. This perspective details nearly a decade of investment by the National Institutes of Health's Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research. These investments have included funding opportunity announcements, training programs, developing resources for researchers, cross-disciplinary fertilization, and publication. While much progress has been made, continuing investment is needed in the future to ensure the viability and sustainability of this young but increasingly important field.

Homo homini lupus? Explaining antisocial punishment.

Punishing group members who parasitize their own group’s resources is an almost universal human behavior, as evidenced by multiple cross-cultural and theoretical studies. Recently, researchers in social and behavioral sciences have identified a puzzling phenomenon called “antisocial punishment”: some people are willing to pay a cost to “punish” those who act in ways that benefit their shared social group. Interestingly, the expression of antisocial punishment behavior is regionally diverse and linked to the socio-psychological dimensions of local cultural values. In this review, we adopt an ecological perspective to examine why antisocial punishment might be an advantageous strategy for individuals in some socio-economic contexts. Drawing from research in behavioral economics, personality, social psychology and anthropology, we discuss the proximate mechanisms of antisocial punishment operating at an individual level, and their consequences at the group and cultural levels. We also consider the evolutionary dynamics of antisocial punishment investigated with computer simulations. We argue that antisocial punishment is an expression of aggression, and is driven by competition for status. Our review elucidates the possible socio-ecological underpinnings of antisocial punishment, which may have widespread repercussions at a cultural level.

Advancing Scientific Inquiry by Blurring Research Boundaries

AffiliationsDirector, Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research (OBSSR), NIHGuest Editor, Health Scientist Administrator OBSSR, NIHGuest Editor, Health Scientist Administrator OBSSR, NIH

ALONE AGAIN: JOHN ZUBEK AND THE TROUBLED HISTORY OF SENSORY DEPRIVATION RESEARCH

In the 1950s, sensory deprivation research emerged as an influential new field for behavioral science researchers, supported by the intelligence community. Within a few years, deprivation research had become ubiquitous; images of sensory deprivation were invoked to explain a wide range of phenomena, from religious revelations to the very structure of psychoanalysis. Yet within a decade and a half, this field of research became implicated in cases of torture and abuse. This article examines the history of University of Manitoba psychologist John Zubek, who remained one of the final researchers still conducting sensory deprivation research in the 1970s. It raises questions on how might it be possible to successfully and cautiously perform controversial research.

Multidimensional Item Response Theory Models with Collateral Information as Poisson Regression Models

Multiple choice items on tests and Likert items on surveys are ubiquitous in educational, social and behavioral science research; however, methods for analyzing of such data can be problematic. Multidimensional item response theory models are proposed that yield structured Poisson regression models for the joint distribution of responses to items. The methodology presented here extends the approach described in Anderson, Verkuilen, and Peyton (2010) that used fully conditionally specified multinomial logistic regression models as item response functions. In this paper, covariates are added as predictors of the latent variables along with covariates as predictors of location parameters. Furthermore, the models presented here incorporate ordinal information of the response options thus allowing an empirical examination of assumptions regarding the ordering and the estimation of optimal scoring of the response options. To illustrate the methodology and flexibility of the models, data from a study on aggression in middle school (Espelage, Holt, and Henkel 2004) is analyzed. The models are fit to data using SAS.

Best Practices for Mixed Methods Research in the Health Sciences John W. Creswell, Ann Carroll Klassen, Vicki L. Plano Clark, Katherine Clegg Smith for the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research; Qualitative Methods Overview Jo Moriarty

Best Practices for Mixed Methods Research in the Health Sciences <i>John W. Creswell, Ann Carroll Klassen, Vicki L. Plano Clark, Katherine Clegg Smith for the Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research</i>; Qualitative Methods Overview <i>Jo Moriarty</i>

Behavioral Science Research Informs Bioethical Issues in the Conduct of Large-Scale Studies of Children's Disease Risk

Background: Birth cohort studies of the natural history of pediatric common disease risk raise many bioethical issues, including reconsenting participants over time as children mature and cohort retention. Understanding participants’ study-specific knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and behavior may offer insights into these issues from a psychological perspective. Methods: We conducted an analysis of factors associated with parent–child communication about minor children's participation in a population-based birth cohort; children's knowledge about their own participation; and parental willingness to be recontacted for future study among Swedish parents (N = 3,605) of children originally enrolled at birth in a prospective study of type 1 diabetes risk. Results: More open parent–child communication about disease risk screening research and greater knowledge among children about their own research participation facilitated greater parent willingness to participate in further study. Parents’ decisions about further study participation were most strongly favorable among those who communicated openly with their child and with high study-specific knowledge. Conclusions: Epidemiologists, bioethicists, and others involved in the design and conduct of large-scale, prospective birth cohorts may consider embedding periodic assessments of participants’ study-specific attitudes and behavior to address long-term retention and willingness to engage in future research.

Translating Social and Behavioral Science Research to the AIDS Epidemic

Integration of innovative social and behavioral science with public health approaches for HIV prevention and treatment is of critical importance for slowing the global HIV epidemic. Strengthening and focusing social and behavioral research linking testing and treatment strategies to populations at greatest risk for HIV is crucial. The Social and Behavioral Science Research Network(SBSRN), originated in 2006, involves twenty NIH-funded CFAR Centers and is responding to this challenge.

Resident Honors Department Chair Who Led Through Katrina

Resident Honors Department Chair Who Led Through Katrina

Translating basic behavioral and social science research to clinical application: The EVOLVE mixed methods approach.

To describe a mixed-methods approach to develop and test a basic behavioral science-informed intervention to motivate behavior change in 3 high-risk clinical populations. Our theoretically derived intervention comprised a combination of positive affect and self-affirmation (PA/SA), which we applied to 3 clinical chronic disease populations. We employed a sequential mixed methods model (EVOLVE) to design and test the PA/SA intervention in order to increase physical activity in people with coronary artery disease (post-percutaneous coronary intervention [PCI]) or asthma (ASM) and to improve medication adherence in African Americans with hypertension (HTN). In an initial qualitative phase, we explored participant values and beliefs. We next pilot tested and refined the intervention and then conducted 3 randomized controlled trials with parallel study design. Participants were randomized to combined PA/SA versus an informational control and were followed bimonthly for 12 months, assessing for health behaviors and interval medical events. Over 4.5 years, we enrolled 1,056 participants. Changes were sequentially made to the intervention during the qualitative and pilot phases. The 3 randomized controlled trials enrolled 242 participants who had undergone PCI, 258 with ASM, and 256 with HTN (n = 756). Overall, 45.1% of PA/SA participants versus 33.6% of informational control participants achieved successful behavior change (p = .001). In multivariate analysis, PA/SA intervention remained a significant predictor of achieving behavior change (p < .002, odds ratio = 1.66), 95% CI [1.22, 2.27], controlling for baseline negative affect, comorbidity, gender, race/ethnicity, medical events, smoking, and age. The EVOLVE method is a means by which basic behavioral science research can be translated into efficacious interventions for chronic disease populations.

DISFA: A Spontaneous Facial Action Intensity Database

Access to well-labeled recordings of facial expression is critical to progress in automated facial expression recognition. With few exceptions, publicly available databases are limited to posed facial behavior that can differ markedly in conformation, intensity, and timing from what occurs spontaneously. To meet the need for publicly available corpora of well-labeled video, we collected, ground-truthed, and prepared for distribution the Denver intensity of spontaneous facial action database. Twenty-seven young adults were video recorded by a stereo camera while they viewed video clips intended to elicit spontaneous emotion expression. Each video frame was manually coded for presence, absence, and intensity of facial action units according to the facial action unit coding system. Action units are the smallest visibly discriminable changes in facial action; they may occur individually and in combinations to comprise more molar facial expressions. To provide a baseline for use in future research, protocols and benchmarks for automated action unit intensity measurement are reported. Details are given for accessing the database for research in computer vision, machine learning, and affective and behavioral science.