This research investigated (a) the role of empathy and stigmatizing attitudes in the use of noun labels applied to people with psychological disorders (e.g., John is a schizophrenic), and (b) whether depicted violence increases such usage. In Study 1, undergraduate participants (N = 308) read two mock newspaper stories in counterbalanced order: one depicting a man with schizophrenia committing a nonviolent crime and one depicting a man with schizophrenia committing a highly violent crime. Participants then selected seven headlines for each of the two news stories, in each case choosing between headlines employing either a noun label (e.g., Schizophrenic Snaps) or a person-first label (e.g., Person with Schizophrenia Snaps), following which they completed measures of trait empathy and stigmatizing attitudes. As hypothesized, lower empathy and higher stigmatizing attitudes predicted noun label usage, and violent depictions of a person with schizophrenia increased the use of noun label headlines. In Study 2, with 313 undergraduate participants, we replicated the effect of violence on noun label headline usage and demonstrated that dehumanization mediates this relationship. Several implications of these findings are discussed.

Objective: Although there is a consensus that cannabis intoxication will have deleterious effects on a wide spectrum of cognitive skills, there is no consensus regarding the duration of time from last use necessary to ameliorate these effects. Method: A systematic review and series of meta-analyses were undertaken to assess anticipated gains in verbal learning with longer periods of cannabis abstinence. Studies assessing verbal learning performance in abstinent regular cannabis users and nonusing control participants; studies reporting length of cannabis abstinence at the time of neuropsychological assessment; and studies implementing one of three highly comparable measures of verbal learning and memory were included in the analyses. The included tasks have demonstrated some of the most robust declines associated with cannabis use and are prevalent in the clinical practice of neuropsychology. We assessed associations between cannabis abstinence and verbal learning scores via mixed effects subgroup analyses. Results: Twenty-three studies (k ϭ 28; N ϭ 1,711) met all inclusion criteria. Cannabis users abstinent for 7 days or fewer performed worse than controls on verbal learning tasks, whereas cannabis users abstinent for longer periods showed no average significant difference in verbal learning performance compared with controls. Conclusions: Based on available evidence, some amelioration of verbal learning limitations presumed to result from cannabis appear to resolve between 7 and 28 days of sustained abstinence. However, in the reviewed studies, years of regular use were inversely related to longer periods of abstinence and verbal learning performance, undermining a confident inference that abstinence alone has direct benefits to verbal learning and memory.

Introduction: In recent years, computerized cognitive training (CCT) programs have been developed commercially for widespread public consumption. Despite early enthusiasm, whether these programs enhance cognitive abilities in healthy adults is a contentious area of investigation. Given the mixed findings in the literature, researchers are beginning to investigate how beliefs and attitudes toward CCT impact motivation, expectations, and gains after cognitive training. Method: We collected survey data from 497 North American participants from Amazon's Mechanical Turk (MTurk). This survey asked novel questions regarding respondents' beliefs about the effectiveness of CCT for improving different domains of cognition, mood, and daily life; beliefs about whether CCT programs are supported by research; and whether impressions of CCT have improved or worsened over time. Exploratory analyses are reported descriptively, while parametric tests were used to analyze a priori hypotheses. Results: Almost half of the surveyed participants had used CCT, and respondents with a self-reported psychological or neurological disorder were more likely to have used CCT platforms than participants without such conditions. Motivations for using CCT included curiosity; to improve or maintain cognition; to prevent cognitive decline; and/or for enjoyment or fun. Participants believed that CCT is somewhat effective for improving mood and cognition across a variety of domains. Greater age and fewer years of education predicted perceived effectiveness of CCT. Finally, participants largely reported unchanged opinions of CCT platforms over time. Conclusion: Our study suggests the need for future research regarding the general population's beliefs and attitudes toward CCT, along with knowledge translation for relevant stakeholders.

Anhedonia, the reduced capacity to experience pleasure, has long been considered a prominent feature of schizophrenia spectrum disorders. Many domain-specific conceptualizations of anhedonia and pleasure capacity have been developed, and there currently exist a variety of self-report assessment tools that purport to assess these various domains. The current systematic review and meta-analysis (PROSPERO: CRD42020156169) aimed to quantify overall and domain-specific self-reported anhedonia in people with schizophrenia compared to nonpsychiatric controls. We performed a literature search of PsycINFO, MEDLINE, and Embase databases for dissertations and peer-reviewed articles published in English prior to June 2021. Studies employing a psychometrically validated self-report measure of anhedonia, pleasure experience or affect in people with schizophrenia, schizoaffective, or schizophreniform disorders; studies utilizing at least one clearly defined healthy or community control group for comparison; and studies providing sufficient data to calculate effect sizes were included in this review. Random and mixed effects meta-analyses, meta-regressions, and subgroup comparisons were run across domains of anhedonia to explore weighted mean effect sizes and their associated moderators. In total, 146 studies met inclusion criteria, yielding 390 Hedges’ g effect sizes from the included comparisons. People with schizophrenia reported moderate-to-large elevations in overall and domain-specific anhedonia. A sensitivity analysis accounting for high risk of bias studies did not significantly impact results. Lastly, patient sex, education, negative symptom severity, antipsychotic class, and trait negative affect differentially moderated effect sizes across domains of anhedonia. Despite the heterogeneity inherent in schizophrenia spectrum disorders, self-reported anhedonia is ubiquitously reported across self-report measures in this population.