Attention deficit and reading difficulty, intellectual humility, consumer choice, overspending, maternal substance misuse and trust

Abstract

This issue of Nordic Psychology features a selection of important and intriguing articles to be enjoyed during the stormy and rainy Nordic summer. The articles cover signi fi cant themes such as Attention De fi cit and Reading Dif fi culty, Intellectual Humility, Consumer Choice, Overspending, Maternal Substance Misuse, and Trust. In the fi rst article of this issue “ Linking aberrant pauses during object naming to letter and word decoding speed in elderly with attention complaints ” Roger Carlsson, Idor Svensson, Christer Jacobson and Siegbert Warkentin tested whether the association between Attention de fi cit and reading dif fi culty are comorbid in neuropsychiatric disorders is also present in healthy elderly with undiagnosed attention problems. Thirty-two subjects (65 þ years) with life-long complaints of attention and with a Mini Mental (MMSE) cutoff of 27 points were tested with MapCog Spectra (MCS), with a word recognition test (Word Chains test) and CANTAB subt-ests of attention. The study showed that attention was linked to decoding speed irrespective of intelligence and gender. The authors therefore suggest that a clinical assessment of attention de fi cit should also include an assessment of decoding ability, and vice versa, as these cognitive functions are strongly interdependent. In the second article of this issue “ A Preliminary Investigation of Intellectual Humility as a Protective Factor for Maladaptive Personality Traits ” Francesca Penner, Lauren Bowersox, Jacob Leavitt and Carla Sharp examined associations between intellectual humility (IH) and the fi ve maladaptive traits outlined in the Alternative Model of Personality Disorders from Section III of the DSM-5: negative affect, detachment, antagonism, disinhibition, and psychoticism. The sample included 897 young adults between the ages of 18 – 25 (79.8% female), who completed the fi ve-factor Personality Inventory for DSM-5 and the three-factor Intellectual Humility Scale as part of a cross-sectional online study. The results showed that fi ve maladaptive traits were signi fi cantly and inversely predicted by at least one of the three IH domains, over and above age and gender. The authors discuss the clinical implications of the results, particularly for personality disorders that involve antagonism