Practitioners in rural areas face particular challenges in providing psychological services, ranging from disparate rates of mental disorders to unique circumstances in treating special populations. In this article, we discuss the burden of mental disorders in rural areas, current trends in integration of mental health care and primary care, and unique concerns practitioners face in treating two special populations in rural areas (children and families, and older adults and their caregivers). Implications for practice are also discussed.

Nearly all undergraduate psychology programs in the United States (99%) offer an Introductory Psychology (IP) course (Norcross et al., 2016). Yet, there is a surprising dearth of information relating to the learning outcomes and course designs employed in IP, nor is information readily available regarding the training and support of those who teach it. Over the past 12 years, American Psychological Association (APA) working groups have made recommendations intended to strengthen IP but no empirical data are available concerning the efficacy or impact of those recommendations. This national census of IP instructors, conducted by APA's Introductory Psychology Initiative (IPI), surveyed instructors of the course nationally to investigate how past IP recommendations have been implemented and to develop a baseline understanding of the current state and structure of the IP course. The census was structured in four parts, paralleling the four subgroups of the IPI: Student Learning Outcomes and Assessment; Course Models and Design; Teacher Training and Development; and Student Success and Transformation. We provide an overview of who teaches the course, how it is taught, how instructors' teaching skills are developed and supported, and the extent to which evidence-based learning strategies are incorporated into the IP course.

Diagnostic negative information presents people with a motivational dilemma. Although negative feedback can provide useful information with which to guide future self-improvement efforts, it also presents short-term affective costs. We propose that construal level, jointly with the perceived changeability of the feedback domain, determines whether people choose to accept or dismiss such information. Whereas low-level construal promotes short-term self-protection motivation (promoting dismissal), high-level construal promotes long-term self-change motivation (promoting acceptance)--to the extent that change is perceived as possible. Four studies support this hypothesis and examine underlying cognitive and motivational mechanisms. The present work may provide an integrative theoretical framework for understanding when people will be open to and accept negative diagnostic information, and has important practical implications for promoting self-change efforts.

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Specific autobiographical memories have been theorised to serve a directive function, whereby the content of the memory directs behaviour outside awareness. The present research tested whether the extent to which a memory feels low in closure, or psychologically not in the past, moderates this directive effect. A total of 163 participants in an online experiment were asked to recollect a specific autobiographical memory of a time they had failed to donate to charity, or were not asked to recollect a memory. Those who recollected a memory were randomly assigned to think of the memory as high versus low in closure. Recollecting an autobiographical memory made to feel low in closure led to more memory-relevant behaviour than either recollecting a memory made to feel high in closure, or no memory at all. Moreover, the directive effect of a low-closure memory occurred whether participants were made aware of an upcoming behavioural opportunity or not. Discussion centres on possible processes linking low closure and behaviour, as well as implications for the self-memory system theory of autobiographical memory.