A structured multicomponent intervention adapted to individual risk profiles can increase the quality of life of ethnically diverse dementia caregivers. ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT00177489.

Do people make trait inferences, even without intentions or instructions, at the encoding stage of processing behavioral information? Tulving's encoding specificity paradigm (Tulving & Thomson, 1973) was adapted for two recall experiments. Under memory instructions only, subjects read sentences describing people performing actions that implied traits. Later, subjects recalled each sentence under one of three cuing conditions: (a) a dispositional cue (e.g., generous), (b) a strong, nondispositional semantic associate to an important sentence word; or (c) no cue. Recall was best when cued by the disposition words. Subjects were unaware of having made trait inferences. Interpreted in terms of encoding specificity, these results indicate that subjects unintentionally made trait inferences at encoding. This suggests that attributions may be made spontaneously, as part of the routine comprehension of social events. Although research on social inferences has dominated social psychology for well over a decade, the lion's share of scientific attention has centered on inferences made in response to explicit instructions. But as several researchers have recently pointed out (Berscheid, Fraziano, Monson, & Dermer, 1976; Pyszczynski & Greenberg, 1981; Wong & Weiner, 1981), there is little research on whether and when such inferences occur spontaneously. This issue of whether and when social inferences are initiated in the absence of investigators' instructions is important in its own right and has serious import for research in social cognition. The spontaneousness of these inferences largely determines their frequency outside the laboratory and is therefore crucial to any claim regarding their psychological importance.

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OBJECTIVES: To test the efficacy of a multicomponent intervention to reduce functional difficulties, fear of falling, and home hazards and enhance self‐efficacy and adaptive coping in older adults with chronic conditions. DESIGN: A prospective, two‐group, randomized trial. Participants were randomized to a treatment group or no‐treatment group. SETTING: Urban community‐living older people. PARTICIPANTS: Three hundred nineteen community‐living adults aged 70 and older who reported difficulty with one or more activities of daily living. INTERVENTION: Occupational and physical therapy sessions involving home modifications and training in their use; instruction in strategies of problem‐solving, energy conservation, safe performance, and fall recovery techniques; and balance and muscle strength training. MEASUREMENTS: Outcome measures included self‐rated functional difficulties with ambulation, instrumental activities of daily living, activities of daily living, fear of falling, confidence performing daily tasks, and use of adaptive strategies. Observations of home hazards were also conducted. RESULTS: At 6 months, intervention participants had less difficulty than controls with instrumental activities of daily living (P=.04, 95% confidence interval (CI)=−0.28–0.00) and activities of daily living (P=.03, 95% CI=−0.24 to −0.01), with largest reductions in bathing (P=.02, 95% CI=−0.52 to −0.06) and toileting (P=.049, 95% CI=−0.35–0.00). They also had greater self‐efficacy (P=.03, 95% CI=0.02–0.27), less fear of falling (P=.001, 95% CI=0.26–0.96), fewer home hazards (P=.05, 95% CI=−3.06–0.00), and greater use of adaptive strategies (P=.009, 95% CI=0.03–0.22). Benefits were sustained at 12 months for most outcomes. CONCLUSION: A multicomponent intervention targeting modifiable environmental and behavioral factors results in life quality improvements in community‐dwelling older people who had functional difficulties, with most benefits retained over a year.