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Purpose: Physical activity (PA) is known to improve cognitive and brain function, but debate continues regarding the consistency and magnitude of its effects, populations and cognitive domains most affected, and parameters necessary to achieve the greatest improvements (e.g., dose). Methods:In this umbrella review conducted in part for the 2018 Health and Human Services Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans Advisory Committee, we examined whether PA interventions enhance cognitive and brain outcomes across the lifespan, as well as in populations experiencing cognitive dysfunction (e.g., schizophrenia). Systematic reviews, meta-analyses, and pooled analyses were used. We further examined whether engaging in greater amounts of PA is associated with a reduced risk of developing cognitive impairment and dementia in late adulthood.

Behavior change techniques are not widely marketed in contemporary physical activity apps. Based on the available descriptions and functions of the observed techniques in contemporary health behavior theories, people may need multiple apps to initiate and maintain behavior change. This audit provides a starting point for scientists, developers, clinicians, and consumers to evaluate and enhance apps in this market.

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Achievement goals in sport have traditionally been defined according to the definition of competence alone (i.e., mastery/task, performance/ego). Emerging research and theory from the academic domain indicates that the utility of the achievement goal construct can be enhanced when the valence (i.e., approach, avoidance) of goals is also considered in conjunction with the definition of competence. The present study was designed to evaluate the psychometric properties of scores for mastery-approach, mastery-avoidance, performance-approach, and performance-avoidance goals from a measure of achievement goals in sport. The a priori 2 × 2 model fit the data better than any of the plausible alternative models. In a series of longitudinal factorial invariance and latent growth curve analyses, scores for the four subscales exhibited structural invariance, and both differential and latent mean stability over a 21-day period. Achievement goal scores conformed to theoretical predictions regarding their relationship with fear-of-failure scores. The AGQ-S would be an appropriate instrument for future research using the 2 × 2 model of achievement goals in sport, particularly for experimental/intervention research on change processes associated with achievement goals.

The Pathological Narcissism Inventory (PNI) is a recently developed multidimensional inventory for the assessment of pathological narcissism. The authors describe and report the results of two studies that investigate the higher order factor structure and gender invariance of the PNI. The results of the first study indicate that the PNI has a higher order factor structure that conforms to the theoretical structure of pathological narcissism with one factor representing narcissistic grandiosity and the other capturing narcissistic vulnerability. These results uniquely place the PNI as the only measure to broadly assess the two phenotypic themes of pathological narcissism. In the second study, results from tests of measurement invariance indicate that the PNI performs similarly in large samples of men (n = 488) and women (n = 495). These results further establish the psychometric properties of the PNI and suggest that it is well suited for the assessment of pathological narcissism.

Using the interpersonal circumplex as an exemplar, this article serves as a methodological primer for integrating techniques of group description and comparison when employing circumplex-based assessment instruments. Circular statistics (Mardia & Jupp, 1999) and the structural summary method (Gurtman & Balakrishnan, 1998) each offer unique and incrementally useful information when applied to group-level data on circumplex measures. Circular statistics offer a set of parameters that are conceptually similar to their linear equivalents (i.e., mean, variance, and confidence intervals). In interpersonal circumplex models, these parameters each provide specific information regarding substantive theme and group homogeneity and allow for the statistical comparison of groups based on the geometry of the circular model. In a similar fashion, the structural summary method for circumplex data provides a set of parameters that complement circular statistics by offering measures of the interpersonal prototypicality of the group profile, levels of profile differentiation and elevation, and a weighted measure of substantive theme. Used in conjunction, these methods offer more information than is available using either in isolation. We provide 4 examples to demonstrate the complementary information the 2 methods provide for assessments employing interpersonal circumplex measures. These examples will allow investigators to generalize the methods to other personality assessment domains in which circumplex models are utilized, such as emotion and vocational preference. [Supplementary materials are available for this article. Go to the publisher's online edition of the Journal of Personality Assessment for the following free supplemental resources: an Excel file that calculates the circular statistics and structural summary information described in this article using manually entered octant scores from up to 500 participants.]

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