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Background Little is known about the factors that bias event-based (i.e., self-initiated) reporting of health behaviors in ecological momentary assessment (EMA) due to the difficulty inherent to tracking failures to self-initiate reports. Purpose To introduce a real-time method for identifying the predictors of noncompliance with event-based reporting. Methods N = 410 adults who used both cigarettes and e-cigarettes completed a 1-week EMA protocol that combined random reporting of current contexts with event-based reporting of tobacco use. Each random assessment first asked if participants were currently using tobacco and, if so, the assessment converted into a “randomly captured” event report—indicating failure to self-initiate that report. Multilevel modeling tested predictors of failing to complete random reports and failing to self-initiate event reports. Results On the person level, male sex, higher average cigarette rate, and higher average cigarette urge each predicted missing random reports. The person-level predictors of failing to self-initiate event reports were older age, higher average cigarette and e-cigarette rates, higher average cigarette urge, and being alone more on average; the moment-level predictors were lower cigarette urge, lower positive affect, alcohol use, and cannabis use. Strikingly, the randomly captured events comprised more of the total EMA reports (28%) than did the self-initiated event reports (24%). These report types were similar across most variables, with some exceptions, such as momentary cannabis use predicting the random capture of tobacco events. Conclusions This study demonstrated a method of identifying predictors of noncompliance with event-based reporting of tobacco use and enhancing the real-time capture of events.

Introduction A large body of literature indicates that nicotine results in an acute mood “boost,” including increased positive affect and decreased negative affect. Young adults frequently engage in polysubstance use of cigarettes with cannabis and alcohol—a trend that is likely to accelerate with the expanding legalization of cannabis. However, little is known about whether polysubstance use, defined here as combustible tobacco cigarette use within the same hour as cannabis and alcohol, is associated with changes in the nicotine mood boost. The present study aimed to address this gap. Methods Young adults (N = 202, 52% female, mean age = 21 years at time 1) provided ecological moments assessment (EMA) reports of cigarette use over two 7-day bursts spaced 1 year apart. In each report, participants rated mood levels before and after smoking, and indicated cannabis and alcohol use. Mixed-effects location-scale modeling simultaneously tested changes in mood levels and variability related to smoking events with cannabis and/or alcohol compared with smoking-only events. Results From before to after smoking, positive affect increased and negative affect decreased, on average. Overall, the additions of cannabis and/or alcohol had nonsignificant associations with these mean changes. However, polysubstance use, as well as cigarette-cannabis co-use, were each associated with significantly greater within-person variability in the positive and negative affect changes related to smoking. Conclusions The mood benefits associated with smoking were more erratic in the contexts of polysubstance use and cigarette-cannabis co-use. Potential implications for young adults’ long-term nicotine use trajectories are discussed. Implications Among young adults who smoke cigarettes, the mood “boost” from smoking may be more erratic—which is to say, more likely to be either amplified or attenuated—with the additions of cannabis and alcohol together, or cannabis alone. On occasions when young adults seek out cannabis and alcohol to enhance their smoking mood boost, but instead experience a dampening effect, they might consume more nicotine, contributing over time to greater dependence. Future investigation is warranted, with particular attention to nicotine-cannabis co-use.

Little is known about the pattern and course of recovery following acute COVID-19. Increasing numbers of reports describe persistent illness following infection with SARS-COV-2, also known as Post-Acute Sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 (PASC). This report describes the methods and results of a multi-pronged strategy to rapidly identify and enroll, over a one week period in April 2021, a racially and ethnically diverse sample of individuals and to characterize PASC among a this diverse sample. Participants were recruited through community outreach, clinical registries, and research registries across four cities in Illinois to complete an online survey. We examined presence of symptoms among 246 individuals who were at least three months past testing positive for SARS-CoV-2. Respondents were 70% female; 48% Hispanic/Latinx; 18% Black, and 28% White. Most had mild illness (78% were not hospitalized), and 26% reported they had not yet returned to their usual health within 3 months of their diagnosis. The most prevalent symptoms persisting 3-months following COVID-19 diagnosis included fatigue (20%), difficulty thinking (19%), problems with taste or smell (15%), and muscle or body aches (15%). In a multivariable logistic regression model, older age (40-59 vs. 18-39 years: adjusted odds ratio [aOR] = 0.46 [95% confidence interval, 0.24 to 0.90]) and having been hospitalized with COVID-19 (vs. not hospitalized: aOR = 0.28 [0.12 to 0.64]) were independently associated with a lower likelihood of recovery within 3 months. Compromised health continued well beyond the acute phase of COVID-19 in our ethnically diverse sample, especially among older individuals and those who were hospitalized. The partnerships with community- and faith-based organizations developed for the current study offer the potential to broadly disseminate study findings and to further understand and mitigate underlying determinants of risk, severity, and duration of PASC.

Deficits in decision-making and episodic memory are often reported among heavy cannabis users, yet little is known on how they influence negative consequences from cannabis use. Individual differences in decision-making may explain, in part, why some individuals experience significant problems from their cannabis use whereas others do not. We hypothesized that poor decision-making would moderate relationships between amount of cannabis use and problems from cannabis use whereas episodic memory performance would not.Young adult cannabis users (n=52) with cannabis as their drug of choice and with minimal comorbidities completed semi-structured interviews, self-report questionnaires, and measures of neurocognitive functioning, with decision-making accessed via the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT), episodic memory via the Hopkins Verbal Learning Test - Revised (HVLT) and problems from cannabis use with the Marijuana Problems Scale.Strong relationships were observed between amount of cannabis use (lifetime, 12-month, and 30-day) and problems reported from use, but only among participants with low (impaired) decision-making (R(2)=.39 to .51; p.01). No significant relationships were observed among those with better (low average to high average) decision-making performance (p.05). In contrast, episodic memory performance was not a significant moderator of the relationship between amount of cannabis use and cannabis problems (p.05).Cannabis users with poor decision-making may be at greater risk for experiencing significant negative consequences from their cannabis use. Our results lend further support to emerging evidence of decision-making as a risk factor for addiction and extend these findings to cannabis users.

Religion can foster, facilitate, and be used to justify child maltreatment. Yet religion-related child abuse and neglect have received little attention from social scientists. We examined 249 cases of religion-related child maltreatment reported to social service agencies, police departments, and prosecutors' offices nationwide. We focused on cases involving maltreatment perpetrated by persons with religious authority, such as ministers and priests; the withholding of medical care for religious reasons; and abusive attempts to rid a child of supposed evil. By providing a descriptive statistical profile of the major features of these cases, we illustrate how these varieties of religion-related child maltreatment occur, who the victims and perpetrators are, and how religion-related child abuse and neglect are reported and processed by the social service and criminal justice systems. We end with a call for greater research attention to these important offenses against children.

Religion can foster, facilitate, and be used to justify child maltreatment. Yet religion-related child abuse and neglect have received little attention from social scientists. We examined 249 cases of religion-related child maltreatment reported to social service agencies, police departments, and prosecutors' offices nationwide. We focused on cases involving maltreatment perpetrated by persons with religious authority, such as ministers and priests; the withholding of medical care for religious reasons; and abusive attempts to rid a child of supposed evil. By providing a descriptive statistical profile of the major features of these cases, we illustrate how these varieties of religion-related child maltreatment occur, who the victims and perpetrators are, and how religion-related child abuse and neglect are reported and processed by the social service and criminal justice systems. We end with a call for greater research attention to these important offenses against children.

Abuse perpetrated under the guise of religion is a devastating form of child maltreatment that often involves multiple types of victimization. In a large-scale survey of clinicians, we investigated the nature and emotional sequelae of religion-related child sexual abuse cases. We predicted that there would be marked differences between cases involving multiple forms of abuse and those involving only sexual abuse. Our results indicate that as the number of abuses increases, so does the severity of the abusive experience and the seriousness of psychological consequences for the victim. Thus, religion-related abuse is best understood in light of the specific types and combinations of abuses suffered by victims.

Recent studies suggest that abstinent cannabis users show deficits on neurocognitive laboratory tasks of impulsive behavior. But results are mixed, and less is known on the performance of non-treatment-seeking, young adult cannabis users. Importantly, relationships between performance on measures of impulsive behavior and symptoms of cannabis addiction remain relatively unexplored. We compared young adult current cannabis users (CU, n = 65) and nonusing controls (NU, n = 65) on several laboratory measures of impulsive behavior, as well as on a measure of episodic memory commonly impacted by cannabis use. The CU group performed more poorly than the NU group on the Hopkins Verbal Learning Test-Revised Total Immediate Recall and Delayed Recall. No significant differences were observed on the measures of impulsive behavior (i.e., Iowa Gambling Task, IGT; Go-Stop Task; Monetary Choice Questionnaire; Balloon Analogue Risk Task). We examined relationships between neurocognitive performance and symptoms of cannabis use disorder symptoms (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-Fourth Edition, DSM-IV CUD) among the CU group, which revealed that poorer IGT performance was associated with more symptoms of DSM-IV CUD. Our results show poorer memory performance among young adult cannabis users than among healthy controls, but no differences on measures of impulsive behavior. However, performance on a specific type of impulsive behavior (i.e., poorer decision making) was associated with more cannabis use disorder symptoms. These results provide preliminary evidence to suggest that decision-making deficits may be more strongly associated with problems experienced from cannabis use, rather than solely being a consequence of cannabis use, per se.

Current conceptualizations of nicotine dependence suggest assessing its multidimensional structure, especially for understanding how dependence develops in teen smokers. It is unknown if a multidimensional structure holds for teens with varying levels of smoking. The psychometric properties and predictive validity of the youth-specific, multidimensional Nicotine Dependence Syndrome Scale (NDSS) was assessed among 526 teens (55.5% female; 74.3% Caucasian) who reported smoking in the past 30 days. NDSS and smoking measures were obtained at baseline and six months. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the NDSS-Total (NDSS-T, α = 0.94) and five factors for the sample: Drive (α = 0.92), Tolerance (α = 0.85), Priority (α = 0.83), Stereotypy (α = 0.73), and Continuity (α = 0.64). NDSS-T, Drive, Tolerance, and Priority were predictors of subsequent amount smoked (p < 0.01). Drive, Tolerance, and Continuity predicted subsequent cessation (p < 0.05). Though the youth-specific NDSS has good psychometric properties, tests of predictive validity for subsequent smoking and cessation behavior suggest only certain dimensions of dependence, particularly Drive and Tolerance, appear to be salient in this sample. Further studies should assess the multidimensional nature of nicotine dependence among teens with varying levels of smoking.

Recruiting adolescents into smoking cessation studies is challenging, particularly given institutional review board (IRB) requirements for research conducted with adolescents. This article provides a brief review of the federal regulations that apply to research conducted with adolescents, and describes researchers' experiences of seeking IRB approval for youth cessation research. Twenty-one researchers provided information. The most frequently reported difficulty involved obtaining parental consent. Solutions to commonly reported problems with obtaining IRB approval are also identified. Waivers of parental consent can facilitate recruitment of youths into studies; however, researchers must ensure that their protocols comply with federal regulations when requesting a waiver.

Recruitment of adolescents into tobacco use research is often challenging. This study reports on the predictors of recruitment and retention in a longitudinal study of adolescent smoking behavior. In 2000, 8th and 10th grade students at 18 schools (N = 5,298) in the Chicago metropolitan area completed brief screening surveys; 1457 students (ranging from susceptible nonsmokers to regular smokers) were invited to participate in a longitudinal study, and 48.9% agreed. Chi-square analyses revealed that female and white students were more likely to participate than male and nonwhite students. Recruitment rates did not vary by parental smoking status, students' experience with smoking, or student grade. Multivariate analyses revealed that overall, gender and race were significant predictors of participation. Chi-square and multivariate analyses revealed no significant differences in retention on the demographic, smoking experience, or psychosocial variables measured. Implications of the results and study limitations are discussed.

OBJECTIVE: Some of the most highly publicized child sexual abuse trials of this century have involved bizarre allegations of satanic ritual abuse, yet little is known about jurors' reactions to ritual abuse claims. We investigated how jurors' judgements of defendant guilt and witness credibility are affected by the presence or absence of satanic ritual abuse allegations. METHOD: Two hundred forty-three mock jurors rendered judgments about a case involving childhood sexual abuse allegations made by either a 5-year-old child or a 30-year-old adult survivor. The presence or absence of satanic ritual abuse allegations was varied between subjects. Jurors' religiosity was measured. RESULTS: Although jurors were significantly less likely to believe the satanic ritual allegations than other case details, they were as likely to vote guilty and to believe the victim in satanic as in nonsatanic cases. Victim age had no significant effect on mock jurors' judgments, but there were marked individual differences in decisions: When the allegations involved satanic ritual abuse, religious jurors were more likely than less religious jurors to believe the victim. Further, across all conditions, women made more pro-victim judgements than did men. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest that highly bizarre details may be discounted by jurors (particularly less religious jurors), but that jurors may set aside their skepticism of satanic ritual details and make judgments about child sexual abuse cases based on their perceptions of the credibility of nonsatanic allegations of harm. Whether or not this is an accurate approach to decision-making in these cases remains an empirical question. Language: en