The rise of stress studies has led to the existence of multiple stress induction protocols. However, cultural differences in stress reactivity are often overlooked. Therefore, this study aims to validate the Maastricht Acute Stress Test (MAST) in the Spanish population. A sample of 96 young adult participants was divided into an experimental group and a control group based on whether they were exposed to the MAST or a non-stressful control task. State anxiety and positive and negative affects were measured before and immediately after the protocol, while physiological stress (blood pressure and heart rate) was monitored throughout the experiment. The experimental group exhibited an increase in state anxiety, negative affect, and systolic and diastolic blood pressures after the MAST protocol. Participants with higher psychopathological risk presented higher scores of psychological stress than those with lower risk. Finally, it was found that participants with higher mathematical performance exhibited lower anxious reactivity following stressor exposure. Our results confirm the efficacy of the MAST and its validation for use in the Spanish population.

A recent report revealed that 21.7% of women in Spain who went on a Tinder date were raped. These findings suggest that the incidence of sexual violence on Tinder dates in Spain may be higher than in other social contexts. This study explores the experiences of Tinder users in Spain to understand the factors contributing to this phenomenon and to propose measures for enhancing user safety. We conducted four focus groups separated by sociodemographic characteristics that replicated the typical victims’ and perpetrators’ profile (age and gender). Male participants initially expressed disbelief and attributed the phenomenon to Tinder’s environment, pathological behavior, pornography, and women’s actions. In contrast, female participants accepted the statistic as reflective of real-world issues, dismissing pathological explanations and highlighting systemic victim-blaming, fear-induced paralysis, and the impact of pornography as key factors. The findings underscore a significant disparity in perceptions between genders, with males often minimizing or misattributing the problem, while females recognizing deeper systemic issues. These insights suggest a need for targeted interventions and policies that address both the behavioral and perceptual factors contributing to sexual violence on dating platforms.

Since the publication of “What is the Current and Future Status of Digital Mental Health Interventions?” the exponential growth and widespread adoption of ChatGPT have underscored the importance of reassessing its utility in digital mental health interventions. This review critically examined the potential of ChatGPT, particularly focusing on its application within clinical psychology settings as the technology has continued evolving through 2023 and 2024. Alongside this, our literature review spanned US Medical Licensing Examination (USMLE) validations, assessments of the capacity to interpret human emotions, analyses concerning the identification of depression and its determinants at treatment initiation, and reported our findings. Our review evaluated the capabilities of GPT-3.5 and GPT-4.0 separately in clinical psychology settings, highlighting the potential of conversational AI to overcome traditional barriers such as stigma and accessibility in mental health treatment. Each model displayed different levels of proficiency, indicating a promising yet cautious pathway for integrating AI into mental health practices.

This study aims to empirically test whether family has a unique significance for the self that cannot be captured by the social self alone. Specifically, it examines whether family self-concept, compared to social self-concept, is more closely related to family-specific indicators (i.e., parent–child communication and family functioning) as well as to indicators of emotional maladjustment like mental health deterioration (i.e., psychological distress and depressive symptoms). The sample comprised 4,953 Mexican adolescents, including 2,551 men (51.5%) and 2,402 women, aged 14–17 years (M = 15.60, SD = 0.92). Confirmatory factor analysis was applied to evaluate the proposed big five-dimensional self-concept model. Cohen’s d confidence intervals, derived from the shared variance of Pearson’s r correlations, were analyzed to relate self-concept dimensions to parent–child communication, family functioning, and mental health deterioration. Results from factorial confirmatory analysis showed that the five-dimensional oblique model (i.e., academic, social, emotional, physical, and family, as different from social) provided a better fit than competing unidimensional and orthogonal models. Correlation analyses showed that family self-concept was significantly associated with both parent–child communication and family functioning, as well as with psychological distress (d = −1.10, confidence interval [CI] −1.21 to −1.02) and depressive symptoms (d = −1.24, CI −1.31 to −1.22). These findings add evidence that family is not accurately represented within the social self-concept. Furthermore, perceiving oneself as unloved and undervalued at home (i.e., low family self-concept) is strongly associated not only with dysfunctional family processes but also with mental health deterioration.

This study examines the mediating role of horizontal trust and collective resilience in the relationship between organizational justice and job performance at the team level based on the HEalthy & Resilient Organizations Model (HERO) (Salanova et al., 2012). The sample consisted of 927 workers grouped into 100 work teams belonging to seven healthcare centers in Spain. The relationships among organizational justice, horizontal trust, collective resilience, and perceived job performance of work teams were analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM). The results revealed that the perceptions of justice and organizational trust positively impact job performance at the team level. Furthermore, the predictive role of horizontal trust in collective resilience was evidenced, with both variables mediating the relationship between the perception of justice and job performance of work teams. These findings underscore the significance of cultivating both horizontal trust and resilience in work teams, offering valuable insights for healthcare management and organizational psychology in highly complex environments such as healthcare organizations.

The goodness of fit of categorical models of psychological processes is often assessed with the log-likelihood ratio statistic (G2), but its underlying asymptotic theory is known to have limited empirical validity. We use examples from the scenario of fitting psychometric functions to psychophysical discrimination data to show that two factors are responsible for occasional discrepancies between actual and asymptotic distributions of G2. One of them is the eventuality of very small expected counts, by which the number of degrees of freedom should be computed as (J−1) × I−P−K0.06, where J is the number of response categories in the task, I is the number of comparison levels, P is the number of free parameters in the fitted model, and K0.06 is the number of cells in the implied I × J table in which expected counts do not exceed 0.06. The second factor is the administration of small numbers ni of trials at each comparison level xi (1 ≤ i ≤ I). These numbers should not be ridiculously small (i.e., lower than 10) but they need not be identical across comparison levels. In practice, when ni varies across levels, it suffices that the overall number N of trials exceeds 40 × I if J = 2 or 50 × I if J = 3, with no ni lower than 10. Correcting the degrees of freedom and using large ni are easy to implement in practice. These precautions ensure the validity of goodness-of-fit tests based on G2.

Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are prevalent in people with substance use disorder (SUD). The aims of this study were to determine the prevalence of ACEs in a specific sample of people with SUD and to analyze the specific characteristics of these patients according to gender. The studied sample consisted of 215 people seeking treatment for SUD in two clinical centers in Spain. Descriptive and comparison analyses were carried out, and a logistic regression analysis was conducted to identify the main variables related to ACEs. The prevalence of at least one ACE was 82.3%. Women reported a higher prevalence of family mental health problems (p = .045; d = 0.14) and sexual abuse (p < .001; d = 0.43) than men. The group with ≥3 ACEs showed a higher severity profile for the addiction severity and psychopathological variables than the groups with 0 ACEs and 1–2 ACEs. Logistic regression showed that problems related to the group with ≥3 ACEs in the total sample were psychiatric and legal problems and lifetime suicidal ideation (in men, family/social problems and lifetime suicidal ideation; in women, employment/support problems). This study supports the high prevalence of ACEs in people with SUD and the cumulative effect of ACEs. In addition, gender is a relevant factor. The implementation of assessments and treatment for ACEs is necessary in SUD treatment programs.

Previous studies have shown the importance of self-perceptions of aging in predicting psychological distress throughout the life cycle. However, little is known about the processes through which self-perceptions of aging influence distress. The aim of the present study is to analyze the potential indirect effects of perceived control and pleasant activities in the association between self-perceptions of aging and depression and anxiety symptoms in middle-aged and older adults. A total of 315 people over 40 years of age (Mage = 58.8; SD = 10.8; 67.9% women) participated. Two indirect effects analysis models were conducted in serial with the aim of analyzing the role of perceived control and pleasant activities in the relationship between the self-perceptions of aging and depressive (model 1) and anxiety (model 2) symptomatology. A direct effect was observed between self-perceptions of aging and depressive, and anxious symptomatology. In addition, indirect associations through the variables perceived control and pleasant activities were significant. The tested models explained 46.1% of the variance in depressive symptomatology and 34.8% of the variance in anxiety. The results of this study confirm the association between self-perceptions of aging and psychological distress. This association is exerted through lower perception of control and fewer pleasant activities. Interventions aimed at promoting effective coping strategies that favor perceived control, activity and emotional well-being should include a module on identifying and modifying of negative self-perceptions of aging in middle-aged and older adults.

Data on the behavioral development of preterm infants are inconclusive. The aim of this study was to explore behavioral development during preschool years, considering prematurity, measurement time, gender, and informant. This is a prospective longitudinal analytical observational study, with a sample of 98 parents and 98 teachers of children aged 4, 5, and 6 years with and without a history of prematurity, who were evaluated by the Child Behavior Checklist and Teacher’s Report Form. Parents and teachers of the preschoolers report average scores on all behavioral scales. We observed variability according to degree of prematurity, age, and informant. Teachers detected more attention difficulties in the very preterm group (VPTG) than in the born-at-term group at 4 years. Parents and teachers coincided in detecting greater withdrawal in the moderate and late preterm group (MTPG) compared to the born-at-term group and an increase in difficulties with increasing age. The General Linear Model revealed that moderate prematurity, the age of 6 years, and parental report have a greater risk of behavioral difficulties. The need for follow-up also in moderate preterm infants is emphasized, especially at 6 years of age and with multi-informants.

The COVID-19 pandemic significantly challenged the mental health of children and adolescents, with existing research highlighting the negative effects of restrictive measures to control the virus’s spread. However, in the specific context of this pandemic, there is limited understanding of how these difficulties have persisted over time after the situation was fully restored. This study sought to evaluate the pandemic’s impact on psychological symptoms in children from Italy, Spain, and Portugal across five-time points (2, 5, and 8 weeks, 6 months, and three and a half years after the pandemic’s onset). A total of 1613 parents completed the Psychological Impact of COVID-19 and Confinement on Children and Adolescents Scale, reporting symptoms in their children aged 3–17 years (39.2% female). The findings reveal an initial surge in psychological difficulties—anxiety, mood, sleep, behavioral, eating, and cognitive disturbances—followed by improvements in these domains three and a half years later. By September 2023, Spanish children experienced more significant reductions in symptoms compared to their Italian and Portuguese peers. While the COVID-19 pandemic has been a prolonged crisis, with varying impacts over time and across regions depending on the strictness of restrictions, the trends suggest a gradual improvement in the psychological well-being of children and adolescents.