Faculty Bibliography

Current models of autobiographical memory suggest that self-identity guides autobiographical memory retrieval. Further, the capacity to recall the past and imagine one's self in the future (mental time travel) can influence social problem solving. We examined whether manipulating self-identity, through an induction task in which students were led to believe they possessed high or low self-efficacy, impacted episodic specificity and content of retrieved and imagined events, as well as social problem solving. Compared to individuals in the low self efficacy group, individuals in the high self efficacy group generated past and future events with greater (a) specificity, (b) positive words, and (c) self-efficacious statements, and also performed better on social problem solving indices. A lack of episodic detail for future events predicted poorer performance on social problem solving tasks. Strategies that increase perceived self-efficacy may help individuals to selectively construct a past and future that aids in negotiating social problems.

Silence about the past permeates acts of remembering, with marked mnemonic consequences. Mnemonic silence-the absence of expressing a memory-is public in nature and is embedded within communicative acts, such as conversations. As such, silence has the potential to affect both speakers-the source of the silence-and listeners-those attending to the speaker. Although the topic of silence is widely discussed, it is rarely mentioned in the empirical literature on memory. Three factors are employed to classify silence into different types: whether a silence is accompanied by covert remembering, whether the silence is intentional or unintentional, and whether the silenced memory is related or unrelated to the memories emerging in a conversation. These factors appear to be critical when considering the mnemonic consequences. Moreover, the influence of silence on memory varies between speaker and listener. Although rarely mentioned, recent empirical research on memory clearly has a bearing on a topic of such general interest as silence.

Self-efficacy is a key construct underlying healthy functioning and emotional well-being. Perceptions of uncontrollability, unpredictability, and low self-efficacy are consistently associated with negative mental health outcomes, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). To test the causal relation between perceived coping self-efficacy and stress responses we employed a trauma film paradigm in which college students (N=33) viewed a graphic film of the aftermath of a motor vehicle accident following a high (HSE) or low self-efficacy (LSE) induction. Participants were tested for intrusions, distress, and memory recall for the film over the following 24 hours. LSE participants recalled more central details than HSE participants. Further, HSE participants reported fewer negative intrusions immediately following the film and at 24 hours. These findings suggest that strategies that increase perceived coping self-efficacy may reduce intrusive recollections of an aversive event, and also reduce the attentional bias associated with remembering aversive stimuli.

This study examined the relationship between killing or seriously injuring someone in the line of duty and mental health symptoms in a sample of police officers (N = 400) who were first assessed during academy training and at five additional time points over three years. We found that nearly 10% of police officers reported having to kill or seriously injure someone in the line of duty in the first three years of police service. After controlling for demographics and exposure to life threat, killing or seriously injuring someone in the line of duty was significantly associated with PTSD symptoms (p < .01) and marginally associated with depression symptoms (p = .06). These results highlight the potential mental health impact of killing or seriously injuring someone in the line of duty. Greater attention to mental health services following these types of exposures can serve as a preventative measure for police officers who have been negatively impacted

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: In the aftermath of a traumatic event, individuals may engage in a series of comparisons in which they appraise their current functioning in relation to how they functioned prior to the traumatic event, as well as how they anticipate functioning in the future. In addition, trauma-exposed individuals may also appraise their functioning in relation to other individuals exposed to the same or similar types of traumatic events. We examine whether PTSD and non-PTSD classified individuals differ in temporal self and social appraisals. METHODS: Operation Enduring/Iraqi Freedom (OEF/OIF) combat-veterans with and without PTSD appraised their own past, current, and anticipated future functioning, as well as hypothetical other OEF/OIF veterans functioning across the same three temporal points. RESULTS: Individuals without PTSD appraised their own functioning as progressively improving across time. In contrast, individuals with PTSD viewed their current pre-trauma current self more favorably than their current or anticipated future self. Both groups appraised hypothetical other OEF/OIF veterans improving with time, yet individuals with PTSD evaluated other OEF/OIF veterans more favorably than those without PTSD. LIMITATIONS: Limitations of the study include a cross-sectional design, precluding causality; the lack of a non-trauma exposed group, relatively small sample, and all-male gender of participants limit the generalizability to other populations. CONCLUSIONS: PTSD and non-PTSD individuals differ in self and social appraisals when asked to evaluate past, present, and future functioning. Further research needs to better understand the extent to which these differences are associated with resilience to or maintenance of PTSD symptoms

Research has demonstrated that the extent to which an individual integrates a traumatic event into their identity ('trauma centrality') positively correlates with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptom severity. No research to date has examined trauma centrality in individuals exposed to combat stress. This study investigated trauma centrality using the abridged Centrality of Event Scale (Berntsen & Rubin, 2006) among Operation Enduring Freedom/Operation Iraqi Freedom combat veterans (n = 46). Multiple regression analyses demonstrated that trauma centrality predicted PTSD symptoms. Trauma centrality and PTSD symptoms remained significantly correlated when controlling for depression in subgroups of veterans with or without probable PTSD. This study replicates and extends findings that placing trauma at the center of one's identity is associated with PTSD symptomatology