Associations Between Peer Pressure and Adolescents' Binge Behaviors: The Role of Basic Needs and Coping

Framed from a framework based on the integration of self-determination theory (Ryan & Deci, 2000) and Endler and Parker’s (1990) conception of coping strategies, the authors analyzed the relationships between peer pressure and binge behaviors (binge eating and binge drinking) in adolescence. Moreover, the authors explored the mediating role of satisfaction/frustration of basic psychological needs and coping strategies in these associations. Participants were 570 high school students (M = 15.75 years, SD = 1.14 years) living in Italy. The study design was cross-sectional and adolescents were administered self-report questionnaires. Path analysis showed significant and positive direct associations of peer pressure with both binge eating and binge drinking. Moreover, findings show that there is an indirect path in which peer pressure is positively associated with need frustration that is related to the use of emotion-oriented coping strategies that, on their turn, are associated with binge eating. Differently, binge drinking seems to be only directly related to peer pressure. The authors put light to the complex nature of the relationships between peer pressure and binge behaviors in adolescence, taking into account the separate contribution of need satisfaction and need frustration, as well as of coping strategies. Finally, practical implications of the study are discussed

The Role of parental control and Coping Strategies on adolescents\u2019 problem behaviors

The current study was aimed at contributing to the understanding of the role of perceived parental monitoring, psychological control, and coping strategies on adolescents\u2019 problem behaviors, in terms of anxiety and drinking behavior. Participants were 541 high school students, 17 to 19-year old (M = 17.09, SD = 0.80) high school students in Sicily and Calabria (Italy). Participants completed self-report measures assessing parental monitoring, psychological control, coping strategies (i.e., TaskOriented, Emotion-Oriented, and Avoidance-Oriented). Results of the path analysis showed that coping strategies play a mediating role in the association between parental psychological control and both adolescents\u2019 anxiety and drinking behavior. Furthermore, a direct positive association was reported from parental psychological control and anxiety, while a negative direct association was reported from parental monitoring to drinking behavior. Results of this study provide a comprehensive model that showed that the different coping strategies could explain the psychological mechanisms that underline the associations between two different kinds of parental control (psychological control and monitoring) and both internalizing and externalizing adolescents\u2019 form of maladjustment (e.g. anxiety and drinking behaviors). Overall, coping strategies seem to be a fruitful target for the prevention programs for adolescents\u2019 anxiety and drinking behaviors

The earliest known Italian case of bilateral non-osseous calcaneonavicular coalition from the mediaeval cemetery of Troina (Enna, Sicily)

In this article, we detail a case of tarsal coalition in the osteological remains of an adult female individual from the mediaeval cemetery of the Catena district of Troina (Enna, Sicily). The burial that contains the skeleton described in this work (Burial 2) was subjected to a multidisciplinary analysis starting from the excavation on the field and ending with a full palaeopathological study including palaeoradiology and 3D virtual reconstructions. The obtained results contribute to our understanding of this congenital condition in the past and represent, to the best of our knowledge, the first case ever reported from Sicily and the Italian peninsula of bilateral non-osseous calcaneonavicular tarsal coalition

Revision of the Student Adaptation to College Questionnaire (SACQ) for Use with Italian Students

Background: This multistudy report was aimed at examining the psychometric properties in the Italian context of the Student Adaptation College Questionnaire (SACQ) that represents the most important self-report measure for assessing how students adjust to university. Methods: Three studies were conducted in order to revise and improve the instrument for being more efficient in measuring adjustment to university. Results: The final result was the SACQ-SF consisting in 12 item assessing three dimensions: a) student’s perception of one’s study skills (Studying); b) student’s sense of satisfaction with courses and programs (Satisfaction with curriculum); c) student’s evaluation of the degree to which he has social skills and is making new friends (Social adjustment). Conclusions: Convergent and construct validity may be considered also adequate. In sum, the SACQSF can be considered a promising valuable and efficient instrument in measuring adjustment to university in the Italian context, and probably in the European one too. Further, as a brief instrument, it can be easily administered and used as a quick screening tool

A virtual customer assistant for the wealth management domain in the UWMP project

The Universal Wealth Management Platform (UWMP) project has the objective of creating a new service model in the financial domain. An integral part of this service model is the creation of a new Virtual Customer Assistant, that is able to assist customers via natural language dialogues. This paper is a report of the activities performed to develop this assistant. It illustrates a general architecture of the system, and describes the most important decisions made for its implementation. It also describes the main financial operations that it is able to assist customers with. Finally, it delineates some avenues for future work

AMICO galaxy clusters in KiDS-DR3: cosmological constraints from counts and stacked weak-lensing

We present a cosmological analysis of abundances and stacked weak-lensing profiles of galaxy clusters, exploiting the AMICO KiDS-DR3 catalogue. The sample consists of 3652 galaxy clusters with intrinsic richness $\lambda^*\geq20$, over an effective area of 377 deg$^2$, in the redshift range $z\in[0.1,\,0.6]$. We quantified the purity and completeness of the sample through simulations. The statistical analysis has been performed by simultaneously modelling the comoving number density of galaxy clusters and the scaling relation between the intrinsic richnesses and the cluster masses, assessed through a stacked weak-lensing profile modelling. The fluctuations of the matter background density, caused by super-survey modes, have been taken into account in the likelihood. Assuming a flat $\Lambda$CDM model, we constrained $\Omega_{\rm m}$, $\sigma_8$, $S_8 \equiv \sigma_8(\Omega_{\rm m}/0.3)^{0.5}$, and the parameters of the mass-richness scaling relation. We obtained $\Omega_{\rm m}=0.24^{+0.03}_{-0.04}$, $\sigma_8=0.86^{+0.07}_{-0.07}$, $S_8=0.78^{+0.04}_{-0.04}$. The constraint on $S_8$ is consistent within 1$\sigma$ with the results from WMAP and Planck. Furthermore, we got constraints on the cluster mass scaling relation in agreement with those obtained from a previous weak-lensing only analysis.Comment: 12 pages, 7 figures, 2 tables. Accepted by A&

Emotional Competence in Primary School Children: Examining the Effect of a Psycho-Educational Group Intervention: A Pilot Prospective Study

Emotional competence (EC) is a key component of children's psychological, cognitive, and social development, and it is a central element of learning. The primary goal of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of implementing a psycho-educational group intervention aimed at improving children's emotional competence (EC), quality of integration and scholastic skills. A total of 229 children (123 females; M Age = 7.22 years; SD = 0.97 years) completed the Pictures of Facial Affect (POFA), the Drawn Stories Technique, the Classroom Drawing, and the Colored Progressive Matrices. The total sample was randomly divided into an intervention group (N = 116) who took part in psycho-educational activities and a control (no-intervention) group (N = 84). Both groups were tested at baseline, before the intervention started, and at the end of the intervention (4 months from baseline). Results from mixed-model ANOVA revealed a significant main effect for POFA score over time (F = 6.24, p = 0.01) and an interaction effect between POFA and group (F = 4.82, p = 0.03). No significant main effect was found for classroom drawing over time (F = 0.81, p > 0.05) or for quality of integration and group intervention. These findings support the importance of developing psycho-educational programmes in school for promotion of emotional health for preventing not only the onset of problematic behaviours at school such as bullying but also the development of clinical conditions linked to difficulties in emotional recognition, expression, and regulation such as alexithymia

AMICO galaxy clusters in KiDS-DR3: Constraints on ΛCDM from extreme value statistics

We constrain the ΛCDM cosmological parameter s(8) by applying the extreme value statistics for galaxy cluster mass on the AMICO KiDS-DR3 catalogue. We sample the posterior distribution of the parameters by considering the likelihood of observing the largest cluster mass value in a sample of N-obs = 3644 clusters with intrinsic richness λ(*) > 20 in the redshift range z ∈ [0.10, 0.60]. We obtain s(8) = 0 . 90( + 0 .20) (-0.18), consistent within 1s with the measurements obtained by the Planck collaboration and with previous results from cluster cosmology exploiting AMICO KiDS-DR3. The constraints could improve by applying this method to forthcoming missions, such as Euclid and LSST, which are expected to deliver thousands of distant and massive clusters

AMICO galaxy clusters in KiDS-DR3: Cosmological constraints from angular power spectrum and correlation function

We study the tomographic clustering properties of the photometric cluster catalogue derived from the Third Data Release of the Kilo Degree Survey, focusing on the angular correlation function and its spherical harmonic counterpart, the angular power spectrum. We measure the angular correlation function and power spectrum from a sample of 5162 clusters, with an intrinsic richness $\lambda^*\geq 15$, in the photometric redshift range $z\in [0.1, 0.6]$, comparing our measurements with theoretical models, in the framework of the $\Lambda$-Cold Dark Matter cosmology. We perform a Monte Carlo Markov Chain analysis to constrain the cosmological parameters $\Omega_{\mathrm{m}}$, $\sigma_8$ and the structure growth parameter $S_8\equiv\sigma_8 \sqrt{\Omega_{\mathrm{m}}/0.3}$. We adopt Gaussian priors on the parameters of the mass-richness relation, based on the posterior distributions derived from a previous joint analysis of cluster counts and weak lensing mass measurements carried out with the same catalogue. From the angular correlation function, we obtain $\Omega_{\mathrm{m}}=0.32^{+0.05}_{-0.04}$, $\sigma_8=0.77^{+0.13}_{-0.09}$ and $S_8=0.80^{+0.08}_{-0.06}$, in agreement, within $1\sigma$, with 3D clustering result based on the same cluster sample and with existing complementary studies on other datasets. For the angular power spectrum, we derive statistically consistent results, in particular $\Omega_{\mathrm{m}}=0.24^{+0.05}_{-0.04}$ and $S_8=0.93^{+0.11}_{-0.12}$, while the constraint on $\sigma_8$ alone is weaker with respect to the one provided by the angular correlation function, $\sigma_8=1.01^{+0.25}_{-0.17}$. Our results show that the 2D clustering from photometric cluster surveys can provide competitive cosmological constraints with respect to the full 3D clustering statistics, and can be successfully applied to ongoing and forthcoming spectro/photometric surveys.Comment: 14 pages, 9 figures. Submitted to Astronomy & Astrophysics (A&A