Deficits In Interpersonal Skills Research Articles

Integrating interpersonal skill development in an MBA accounting course

ABSTRACT Despite recognition of the high value placed on interpersonal skills (IPS) by education, business and government stakeholders, this area of skills development only has a limited place within MBA programs. This paper introduces and tests the effectiveness of a mock-business simulation named ‘Practice Aspects of Management’ incorporated into an early-stage accounting course within an MBA Program, with the aim of accelerating students’ IPS development. We investigate whether embedding a client interface simulation within an MBA course can improve the IPS that employers are now seeking. Following the science of training and Bedwell and colleagues’ ‘stepping stones’ to assist IPS integration within existing MBA programs, we outline a successful initiative to address the IPS deficits. We contribute to the literature by detailing how IPS can be integrated into an accounting course and utilised to equip students with both the technical and IPS attributes now desired by employers.

Change in Interpersonal and Metacognitive Skills During Treatment With Cognitive Behavioral Analysis System of Psychotherapy and Metacognitive Therapy: Results From an Observational Study.

Background: Interpersonal skills deficits and dysfunctional metacognitive beliefs have been implicated in the etiology and maintenance of depression. This study aimed to investigate the association between changes in these skills deficits and change in depressive symptoms over the course of treatment with Cognitive Behavioral Analysis System of Psychotherapy (CBASP) and Metacognitive Therapy (MCT).Methods: In this prospective, parallel group observational study, data was collected at baseline and after 8 weeks of an intensive day clinic psychotherapy program. Based on a shared decision between patients and clinicians, patients received either CBASP or MCT. Ninety patients were included in the analyses (CBASP: age M = 38.7, 40.5% female, MCT: age M = 44.7, 43.3% female). Interpersonal deficits were assessed with the short-form of the Luebeck Questionnaire for Recording Preoperational Thinking (LQPT-SF) and the Impact Message Inventory (IMI-R). Metacognitive beliefs were assessed with the Metacognition Questionnaire-30 (MCQ-30). The Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology (QIDS-SR16) was utilized to assess depressive symptoms. A regression analysis was conducted to assess variables associated with outcome. ANCOVAs were utilized to investigate whether improvement in skills deficits is dependent on type of treatment received.Results: Improvements in preoperational thinking and increases in friendly-dominant behavior were associated with change in depressive symptoms. There was no association between reductions in dysfunctional metacognitive beliefs and a decrease in depressive symptoms. While both treatment groups showed significant improvements in interpersonal and metacognitive skills, there was no significant between-group difference in the change scores for either of these skills.Conclusion: Our findings suggest that changes in interpersonal skills seem to be of particular relevance in the treatment of depression. These results have to be replicated in a randomized-controlled design before firm conclusions can be drawn.

Do interpersonal fears mediate the association between childhood maltreatment and interpersonal skills deficits? A matched cross-sectional analysis

Objective: Childhood maltreatment, interpersonal fear and a specific kind of interpersonal skills deficit (preoperational thinking) have all been associated with persistent depressive disorder (PDD). We hypothesize that interpersonal fears mediate the association between childhood maltreatment and preoperational thinking.Method: A total of 108 matched participants have been examined cross-sectionally (31 healthy controls, 30 patients with episodic depression and 47 patients with PDD) with the following instruments: the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ-SF), a measure of interpersonal fear (CBASP Interpersonal Questionnaire) and the Lübeck Questionnaire of Preoperational Thinking.Results: Patients with PDD reported significantly more childhood maltreatment than patients with episodic depression (d = 0.65) and healthy controls (d = 1.29). They also had more interpersonal fears (d = 0.71 and d = 2.11 respectively) and higher levels of preoperational thinking (d = 0.90 and d = 2.78 respectively). The association between childhood maltreatment and preoperational thinking was mediated through interpersonal fears.Conclusions: Our findings might have important implications for psychotherapy of PDD because they demonstrate how specific problems in social interactions can be associated with interpersonal fears that arise secondary to childhood maltreatment.

Project Date SMART: a Dating Violence (DV) and Sexual Risk Prevention Program for Adolescent Girls with Prior DV Exposure.

Clinical Trials, NCT01326195, and http://www.clinicaltrials.gov.

The Relationship between Executive Functioning and Emotional Intelligence in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder

Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) demonstrate marked deficits in the ability to initiate, maintain and sustain meaningful social interaction. While the social-emotional deficits represent a core set of problems, persons with ASD also demonstrate significant problems in initiating, sustaining and maintaining appropriate goal directed behaviors. Emotional Intelligence (EI) is a construct that has been successfully applied to a range of skills that allow for the prediction of competent human social behavior. Executive Functions (EF) refer to constructs involving cognitive abilities necessary for initiating, sustaining and maintaining purposeful goal-oriented behavior. While both children and adults with ASD have previously shown to have atypical patterns of EF skills, little is known about EI in either children or adults with ASD. Moreover, there is no study examining the relationship between EI and EF that has been reported in individuals with ASD. The current study examined the relationship between EF and EI in children with ASD. Twenty children with ASD were compared to twenty neurotypical children on self-report and clinical assessments of EI and EF. Although the relationship between EF and EI was not statistically significant, results showed that children with ASD have deficits in interpersonal skills, intrapersonal skills and overall EI when compared to their neurotypical peers. These results suggest that EF and EI are relatively independent domains of development that show compromise in persons with ASD and each may be necessary to support typical socially directed behaviors.

Exploring Medical Student Learning Needs in the Pediatric Emergency Department: "What Do You Want to Learn Right Now?".

When precepting medical students in the emergency department, faculty physicians often have only minutes per patient encounter to devote to direct teaching. Instructional strategies that promote independent student learning after each case may have merit. It is not known, however, to what degree patient-triggered learning needs are amenable to independent study. The aims of this study were to determine self- and faculty-reported learner needs at the time of patient encounters and to assess the degree to which these perceived needs may be satisfied by independent study. We interviewed medical students and faculty in our pediatric emergency department. Immediately before or after they saw a patient, we asked "What do you want to learn right now?". For half of the student interviews, we separately asked the same questions of their preceptors. Interviews were taped and transcribed. Responses were coded by 3 investigators who did content analysis to identify dominant themes and the extent to which the learning need could be addressed independently. Investigators agreed that Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education competency domains could be used to classify the responses. We interviewed 82 students and 44 preceptors yielding 126 patient-triggered learning needs. Competency area(s) were medical knowledge (70), patient care (1), interpersonal skills (27), systems-based practice (2), practice-based learning (3), and professionalism (4). Two raters independently assigned the same competency in 89%. Medical knowledge competency learning needs were almost all at least moderately amenable to independent learning (68/70, 98%), but the other competencies were not (22/57, 39%) according to the raters (interrater reliability, 0.7). Preceptor responses were congruent in competency type with students' responses in 29 (67%) of 43. Students listed interpersonal skills deficits far more often than did faculty (24% vs 5%, P < 0.05). Most student learning needs in the pediatric emergency department focus on medical knowledge. These deficits could be amenable to structured independent study at the point of care.

Characterizing common workplace communication skills for disorders associated with traumatic brain injury: A qualitative study.

Interpersonal skill deficits are the primary reason for workplace separation after traumatic brain injury (TBI). Communication is integral to interpersonal skills, but workplace communication demands are inadequately described in the rehabilitation literature. This study describes inter-stakeholder examples of workplace communication behaviors for a level of employment to which people with TBI commonly attempt to return. Setting: Mid-level workplaces.Design: Semi-structured interviews were audio recorded, transcribed verbatim, then analyzed using thematic content analysis. Findings were linked to common communication deficits in persons with TBI.Participants: A volunteer sample of twenty healthy individuals employed in the mid-level workplaces, ten employees and ten supervisors.Main Outcome Measure(s): Taxonomy of communication skill deficits common in persons with TBI and associated with mid-level workplaces. Interviews revealed seven communication-related skills associated with mid-level employment: 1) spoken language processing; 2) verbal memory; 3) reading and writing; 4) verbal reasoning; 5) expressive pragmatics; 6) multi-tasking; and 7) social cognition. Workers and supervisors from an assortment of mid-level jobs with differing job contents all identified similarly common and important cross-occupational communication-related skills. Findings provide a preliminary guide to assess and treat communication skills for patients who have work re-entry as a goal.

Relations between learning potential, cognitive and interpersonal skills in Asperger children

Asperger Syndrome is a developmental disorder characterized by severe deficits in interpersonal skills. Different theories have tried to explain this disorder by taking into account general intelligence, information processing, executive functions, emotional intelligence, etc., but to date, none of these completely explains the cause of these deficits. The present study investigates the relations between interpersonal skill deficits and different cognitive skills. A total of 45 children with Asperger Syndrome, between the ages of 7 and 13, were assessed using tests of intelligence, executive function (using a dynamic assessment methodology) and social comprehension. The results show that Asperger Syndrome children profit from the brief training inserted into a dynamic assessment test. In addition, dynamic assessment reveals differences within the Asperger Syndrome group that go unnoticed in standard assessment, and shows how these differences are related to measures of social comprehension and to the intercorrelation between WISC sub-tests. In conclusion, use of dynamic assessment methodology may be useful for planning interventions.

Co-Occurring Chronic Depression and Alcohol Dependence

Objectives: Research suggests a lack of successful treatment options targeted specifically for chronically depressed alcohol-dependent individuals. This may be due, in part, to the complex characteristics these individuals possess that make their treatment more challenging. There are currently several empirically supported behavioral treatments for depression and alcoholism as individual disorders; however, few interventions have shown consistent results for treating these disorders concurrently. Cognitive Behavioral Analysis System of Psychotherapy (CBASP) has demonstrated effectiveness in treating chronic depression, but has not yet been studied in persons with co-occurring alcohol dependence and chronic depression. We examine the feasibility of utilizing CBASP in 2 individuals who have co-occurring chronic depression and alcohol dependence, and explore its impact upon depression and alcohol intake. Methods: We conducted 2 case studies and implemented 20 weeks of manualized CBASP adapted for use in alcohol-dependent individuals. Results: Both participants tolerated the therapy well and completed the study. CBASP was effective in reducing symptoms of chronic depression and significantly reducing alcohol intake to healthy drinking levels. Conclusions: CBASP seems to be ideally suited for this population, which has extensive avoidance learning, high rates of early trauma, repeated interpersonal failures, and uses alcohol to cope. We propose that treatment for this population must be tailored to the underlying interpersonal issues and skill deficits described above in order to be effective, and that CBASP can be the therapy for the chronically depressed, alcohol-dependent individual.

Commentary: Unravelling the effects of additional sex chromosomes on cognition and communication – reflections on Lee et al. (2012)

Commentary: Unravelling the effects of additional sex chromosomes on cognition and communication – reflections on Lee et al. (2012)

Effects of Self Esteem, Emotional Health and Social Competence on Romantic Relationship of Adolescents in Nigeria

This study examined the effects of self esteem, emotional health, and social competence on romantic relationship of adolescents in Nigeria. Two hundred and eighty-five adolescents who are undergraduate students of Ekiti State University, Ado Ekiti Nigeria, with a mean age of 20.52 years, were randomly selected for the study. The research participants completed a questionnaire comprising of the Rosenberg Self Esteem Scale, the General Health Questionnaire, the Relationships Scale Questionnaire and the Social Interaction Anxiety Questionnaire. Using a 2 by 2 by 2 Analysis of Variance, four hypotheses were tested and results showed that social competence; and emotional health had significant main effects on romantic relationship of adolescents in Nigeria [F (1,240) =9.457; p .05. Furthermore, it was found out that there was a significant interaction effect of social competence and emotional health on romantic relationship of adolescents in Nigeria [F (1,240) =2.086;p<.05]. There was also a significant interaction effect of self esteem and social competence on romantic relationship of adolescents [F (1,240) = 2.150; p<.05]. However, there was no significant interaction effect of self esteem and emotional health on romantic relationship of adolescents in Nigeria, and no significant interaction effect of self esteem, emotional health, and social competence on romantic relationship of adolescents in Nigeria was found. The implications of the finding were discussed in light of available literature and it was suggested, among others, that parents, especially, should make efforts to ensure that the much needed affection and attention that is essential for their children.s social and psychological developments and well being are given to them. It is evident that negative self image, deficits in social competence or interpersonal relationship skills and psychological well being often results from a lack of proper parental care for their children and wards. Key words : self esteem, social competence, emotional health, romantic relationships, adolescents, Nigeria

Visual scanning of faces in 22q11.2 deletion syndrome: Attention to the mouth or the eyes?

Previous research demonstrates that people with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (22q11DS) have social and interpersonal skill deficits. However, the basis of this deficit is unknown. This study examined, for the first time, how people with 22q11DS process emotional face stimuli using visual scanpath technology. The visual scanpaths of 17 adolescents and age/gender matched healthy controls were recorded while they viewed face images depicting one of seven basic emotions (happy, sad, surprised, angry, fear, disgust and neutral). Recognition accuracy was measured concurrently. People with 22q11DS differed significantly from controls, displaying visual scanpath patterns that were characterised by fewer fixations and a shorter scanpath length. The 22q11DS group also spent significantly more time gazing at the mouth region and significantly less time looking at eye regions of the faces. Recognition accuracy was correspondingly impaired, with 22q11DS subjects displaying particular deficits for fear and disgust. These findings suggest that 22q11DS is associated with a maladaptive visual information processing strategy that may underlie affect recognition accuracy and social functioning deficits in this group.

Gelotophobia, emotion-related skills and responses to the affective states of others

Gelotophobia (the fear of being laughed at) has recently been introduced as an individual difference variable that is not only relevant in clinical practice but also as part of a normal variant of personality. Observations of several emotion-related concomitants of gelotophobia suggested that gelotophobic individuals may be inapt or insecure with regard to the habitual use of certain emotion-related skills. We evaluated relationships of gelotophobia to measures of trait emotional intelligence and also examined participants’ responses to the affective states of another person in an experimental setting (exposure to emotionally contagious films displaying intense cheerfulness, sadness, anxiety, anger, or neutral mood). Individuals with high gelotophobia scores indicated that they feel relatively weak at regulating their emotions, and the attempts they typically make to manage their emotions are considered inefficient by experts. Accordingly, they showed a high degree of emotional contagion of negative moods. They also reported to have a strong tendency to control the expression of their emotions. Both self-report, typical-performance and experimental data only revealed differences in the use of intrapersonal emotion-related skills, but provided no evidence that gelotophobia may be related to deficits in interpersonal skills.

Reconnaissance de l’émotion faciale et schizophrénie

A broad range of deficits in interpersonal skills characterizes schizophrenia. A natural way to tackle these deficits is to explore the ability of schizophrenic patients to process stimuli that have a well-established psychosocial content: faces, for instance. Schizophrenia deficits in facial recognition and discrimination have been studied extensively and most investigators have pointed out that patients with schizophrenia perform less well than non-patients and psychiatric controls in numerous facial paradigms, including facial identity, emotion and age recognition tests. The extent of the schizophrenic deficit suggests the alteration of a processing mechanism common to all kinds of facial information and the configural information extraction process has then been regarded as a probable candidate. Nevertheless, only a few studies directly tested the hypothesis. In what follows, we draw a general schema of the schizophrenia deficit in facial processing, next we present a series of studies investigating the putative implication of configural information in the abnormal processing of facial emotion in the disease.

Identifying Latent Classes of Behavioral Risk Based on Early Childhood

This study explored early childhood manifestations of self-control in a nationally representative cohort of kindergarten children. Finite mixture modeling was used to identify five latent classes of children based on parent and teacher reports of self control across three waves of data. These were a low impairment, teacher report ( n = 5,047, 29.3%), low impairment, parent and teacher report ( n = 2,889, 16.8%), moderate impairment, teacher report ( n = 5,267, 30.6%), moderate impairment, parent report ( n = 2,415, 14.0%), and severely impaired subgroups ( n = 1,594, 9.3%). Parental stress, externalizing behaviors, and interpersonal skills deficits were important differentiators across class memberships. The severely impaired subgroup possessed an array of neurocognitive deficits, behavioral problems, and learning difficulties relative to other classes. To forestall life-course problem behaviors for impaired children appropriate screening and intervention is warranted.

Interpreting facial expressions: The influence of social anxiety, emotional valence, and race

Social anxiety is posited to be linked to interpersonal skills deficits, including accurate interpretation of emotional social cues, such as facial expressions. However, empirical support for an interpersonal skills deficit model of social anxiety is lacking. Studies of information processes indicate that socially anxious individuals may be more accurate at identifying threatening facial expressions in particular. In the present study, undergraduates who self-identified as Caucasian ( N = 158) completed a task assessing facial expression accuracy. Relevant parameters such as emotional valence as well as race of the target were assessed. As predicted, socially anxious individuals were overall more accurate at identifying facial expressions. Whereas participants were more accurate overall at identifying Caucasian faces, there were differences in the extent of this discrepancy based on emotional valence. Implications for integration of information processing data and evolutionary models of social anxiety are discussed.

Comparative minicolumnar morphometry of three distinguished scientists

It has been suggested that the cell minicolumn is the smallest module capable of information processing within the brain. In this case series, photomicrographs of six regions of interests (Brodmann areas 4, 9, 17, 21, 22, and 40) were analyzed by computerized image analysis for minicolumnar morphometry in the brains of three distinguished scientists and six normative controls. Overall, there were significant differences (p < 0.001) between the comparison groups in both minicolumnar width (CW) and mean cell spacing (MCS). Although our scientists did not exhibit deficits in communication or interpersonal skills, the resultant minicolumnar phenotype bears similarity to that described for both autism and Asperger's syndrome. Computer modeling has shown that smaller columns account for discrimination among signals during information processing. A minicolumnar phenotype that provides for discrimination and/or focused attention may help explain the savant abilities observed in some autistic people and the intellectually gifted.

Neurocognitive and social cognitive predictors of interpersonal skill in schizophrenia

Social dysfunction is among the major criteria for receiving a diagnosis of schizophrenia, and research indicates that the impairments in social functioning experienced by individuals with schizophrenia are strongly related to deficits in interpersonal skills. In turn, these deficits in interpersonal skills have been linked to impairments in general cognitive abilities and impairments in social cognition. This study explored the relationship between neurocognition, social cognition, and interpersonal skills in 49 outpatients with schizophrenia and 44 non-clinical control participants. Results indicate that individuals with schizophrenia demonstrated impaired performance across several domains of neurocognitive and social cognitive functioning as well as interpersonal skills. In addition, among the participants with schizophrenia, social cognition significantly contributed unique variance to interpersonal skill beyond that of neurocognition. This pattern was not observed in the non-clinical control sample. These findings have implications for the treatment of the disorder and represent an important step in understanding the role of social cognition in schizophrenia.

The Functional Idiographic Assessment Template (FIAT) system: For use with interpersonally-based interventions including Functional Analytic Psychotherapy (FAP) and FAP-enhanced treatments.

Relationship or interpersonal skills are considered important targeted behaviors for many psychotherapies. Behavior therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy interventions continue to be utilized for interpersonal problems and personality disorders. Contemporary behavior therapies, including Functional Analytic Psychotherapy, target the amelioration of complex social and interpersonal skills deficits and develop more effective behaviors that create meaningful relationships for clients. While traditional taxonomies exist, few are able to capture either the functional nature or the uniquely individual aspects of these types of behavioral problems. The Functional Idiographic Assessment Template (FIAT) manual allows the clinician to assess strengths and weaknesses within interpersonal relationships in the context of both the therapeutic relationship and those relationships clients have outside of therapy. The combination of a behavioral framework and an idiographic approach to analysis make this a unique assessment approach in the area of interpersonal relating. The FIAT system is organized around five main areas (called classes) of interpersonal functioning: (1) skills in identifying and asserting needs and values in relationships; (2) sensitivity to and responsiveness to receiving and providing feedback to others; (3) problems with specifying and expressing emotional and cognitive experiences; (4) difficulties with interpersonal closeness including disclosure; and (5) problems with interpersonal conflict. The FIAT manual includes an overview of how to use the manual, a description of how the assessment process is conducted, therapist assessment questions, and a paper-and-pencil client assessment called the FIAT-Questionnaire (FIAT-Q). Examples of clinician created idiographic assessment measures for both client and therapist are provided. The majority of the manual is devoted to definitions of each class of behavior and specific types of problems in the areas of contextual cues, discrimination, and response repertoire. In each area instances of behavioral problems are denoted and examples are provided for the clinician. The FIAT system captures specific interpersonal strengths and deficits so that a clinician can better tailor treatment to each client, leading to more efficient and effective amelioration of client problems. Key words: Functional assessment, behavioral assessment, idiographic, temp late, Functional Analytic Psychotherapy, social skills, personality disorders, Acceptance Commitment Therapy ********** FIAT Manual Instructions and User Information Overview This manual is designed to be used in conjunction with Functional Analytic Psychotherapy (FAP; Kohlenberg & Tsai, 1991) or FAP-enhanced treatments such as FAP Enhanced Cognitive Therapy (FECT; Kohlenberg, Kanter, Bolling, Parker, & Tsai, 2002) and FACT (Callaghan, Gregg, Marx, Kohlenberg, & Gifford, 2004). The FIAT manual specifies classes of behaviors seen in interpersonally focused interventions. These problems are based on the function of behaviors as they impact the client's ability to form effective interpersonal relationships. Some of these behaviors are experiential or intrapersonally focused; however, the impact of those behaviors ultimately resides in an interpersonal context. An example of the use of the FIAT can be seen in an article by Callaghan and colleagues on the treatment of a client with behaviors consistent with Personality Disorder Not Otherwise Specified (Callaghan, Summers, & Weidman, 2003). The template aspect of this manual resides with its use in creating idiographic assessment materials for each individual client. Examples of these assessments are included in the appendix of this manual. There is no one specific correct way to create these idiographic assessment devices; they should each be tailored the needs of the client, the therapist, and the on-going intervention. …

Combined LORETA and fMRI study of recognition of eyes and eye movement in schizophrenia

Schizophrenics and controls participated in functional MRI (fMRI) and event-related potential (ERP) experiments, in which they viewed a face, eyes and moving eyes. Low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography (LORETA) was reconstructed using ERPs. In fRMI, controls exhibited more eminent activations for the face in the fusiform gyrus and superior temporal gyrus bilaterally than did schizophrenics. For eyes, controls exhibited more prominent activations in the left inferior temporal gyrus and fusiform gyrus than did schizophrenics. In controls, moving eyes activated the posterior portion of the superior temporal region and transverse temporal gyrus right-dominantly or the middle and inferior occipital gyrus bilaterally. In contrast, schizophrenics tended to have greater activation in the left amygdala than controls. In LORETA, controls exhibited greater current density for the static face in the right middle temporal gyrus than did patients. In contrast, patients showed greater current density for the static eyes in the left insula. Furthermore, patients showed greater current density for moving eyes to the left in the left insula. Overactivation for eyes or moving eyes in the amygdala, insula, or extrastriate cortex observed in patients might indicate their hypersensitivity in the processing of feature details before processing the gestalt of the face or facial expression as a whole, which might be implicated in their deficits in interpersonal skills or in the formation of a variety of their clinical manifestations.