Personal construct theory and mental health

Although it has been an illusive and controversial concept, mental health is likely to continue to have currency in the presently high-profile debates on health and health education. In this article, I consider the manner in which personal construct theory deals with the concept of mental health. I suggest that an augmentation of the mode of construing called perspectivism provides a sound and workable idea of mental health. That augmentation is provided from the study of mentalities, in particular the idea of egalitarian mentality.     

The effects of shyness on love styles and relationship status

As prior research has indicated that shyness is associated with social anxiety, inhibition, and generally less fulfilling social relationships, this study examined the possible affect of shyness on one specific type of relationship, romantic love. Participants (N = 124) completed the Revised Cheek-Buss Shyness Scale and the Love Attitudes Scale, and provided basic information about themselves and their current romantic relationships. A chi-square test showed no significant association between high or low Shyness scores and whether participants were currently involved in a romantic relationship, but there were significant positive correlations between these scores and those on two of the six love styles, Storge and Mania. In interpreting the results, the effects of shyness on relationships, social expectations, and love attitudes are discussed.     

Personal construct assessment of sport teams

This paper is intended to show the usefulness of a personal construct approach to assessment in sports psychology. A repertory grid design to assess managers of sports teams is presented. The method provides useful information about the commonalty between the group and the manager's view and also allows an evaluation of the changes produced as a result of manager's interventions. Research carried out in a Spanish football team is presented and some results are discussed from the perspective of selected information to be conveyed to the manager in order to develop his sociality in construing the players.     

Personal construct theory and general trends in contemporary philosophy

This paper is a modest attempt to chart something of the broad trends in contemporary philosophy (the philosophy of the last half century)–trends against which personal construct theory might be aligned, evaluated, or simply reflected upon. These trends themselves emerge from a complex scene in philosophical effort. This scene is marked by increasing specialization, the appearance of new, sometimes interdisciplinary approaches (e.g., bioethics), and the emergence of new sociohistorical and technical phenomena that give rise to new problems. The material that follows is in three parts. The first presents some general observations concerning philosophy and the broadest outline of its development. The second considers the nature of personal construct theory in terms of its own constructivist philosophy, and in relation to other historical philosophical systems, particularly phenomenology. The third part relates personal construct theory to the outline in the first part and attempts some conclusions. In general, I will suggest that as concern with process or praxis moves further toward center stage in philosophy, personal construct theory comes more and more into prominence and its philosophical integrity becomes more obvious.     

Personal construct theory and the argument against mental illness

An attempt is made to integrate Thomas Szasz's 0974) theory of personal conduct and George Kelly's (1955) theory of personal constructs (PCT). It is argued that PCT provides an alternative to the void left behind by Szasz's negation of mental illness. Because PCT is concerned with psychological, rather than physiological, constructions of problems in living, it is not compatible with the biological model associated with Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) diagnostic categories. Rather, it is in keeping with the views of Szasz. Kelly's and Szasz's writings are used to support this view. Kelly's transitive diagnosis approach to “mental illness”, wherein diagnosis and therapy are construed as process oriented as opposed to category driven, is described as an alternative to the biological model. A contextualist approach (Sarbin & Mancuso, 1980) is also discussed. These approaches not only empower clients and allow them to assert responsibility and control over their lives, but also provide an alternative system to the one rejected by Szasz.     

Socially desirable responding and impression management in the endorsement of love styles.

In 2 experiments, the researcher investigated the social desirability of different love styles (Eros, Ludus, Storge, Pragma, Mania, and Agape). In Experiment 1, the Marlowe-Crowne measure of social desirability (D. P. Crowne & D. Marlowe, 1960) was correlated negatively with possessive, dependent (Mania) love styles in both men and women. In men, social desirability was correlated positively with romantic, passionate love (Eros) and game-playing love (Ludus), but negatively with all-giving, selfless love (Agape). In women, social desirability was correlated positively with Agape, but negatively with Ludus. In Experiment 2, the researcher replicated these findings using an impression management manipulation (good, bad, and honest responding). The gender differences in social desirability of different love styles are explained in terms of traditional and nontraditional gender role socialization.     

Associations between television viewing and love styles: an interpretation using cultivation theory

This study evaluated the associations between television viewing and love styles. The Love Attitudes Scale (LAS), based on Lee's love style taxonomy, was administered to a sample of 338 unmarried Israeli students along with questions about TV viewing habits, current involvement in a serious romantic relationship, and marital intentions. A confirmatory factor analysis of the LAS indicated that the expected six-factor solution adequately fit the data. Correlations between individual love styles and TV viewing were small to moderate, ranging from .12 to .29. Scores for Ludus love style correlated positively with viewing of news and general programming. Those for Pragma love style correlated positively with news viewing and negatively with viewing genres frequently including love themes such as soap operas and family drama, while scores for Eros love style positively correlated with watching these love abundant genres. No significant association was found for TV viewing with Storge, Mania, and Agape love styles. Hierarchical regression using demographic variables, love status, and viewing habits mirrored these results, with the unique R2 for Ludus, Pragma, and Eros ranging from 1.8% to 8%, while the total variance accounted for by the models ranged from 12% to 21%. The findings can be interpreted as support for a weak cultivation effect, in which habits in long-term TV viewing among young adults correspond to small to moderate tendencies for particular love styles that thematically relate them. However, because they are correlational, the findings could equally be interpreted in terms of tendencies that exist due to modeling within families and socialization during development.     

Construing of others in psychotherapy: Personal construct perspectives

Regardless of the initial complaints, psychotherapists frequently interpret their client's problems as involving difficulties in personal relationships. This makes achieving a better understanding of the nature of interpersonal construing important for a theory of psychotherapy. George Kelly's psychology of personal constructs provides a perspective on this issue that can illuminate several recent developments in psychodynamic therapy, including Arlene Wolberg's and Hyman Spotnitz's treatment techniques for severely disturbed clients. These techniques are viewed as ways of helping the client to develop more comprehensive and flexible construct systems for understanding other people. A neglected aspect of empathy is also discussed.A version of this paper was presented at the first meeting of the North American Personal Construct Network, Cincinnati, OH, June, 1984.     

Personal construct psychology in spain: A promising perspective

Abstract

This paper presents a general outline of the development of personal construct psychology (PCP) in Spain. Although Spanish original work did not begin until this decade, there are now several consolidated groups located at Valencia, Madrid, and Barcelona. Each group comprises several faculty members who are working together to produce a coordinated research effort. Some sociohistorical data are presented and compared with international standards. Prom this analysis we can conclude that PCP has a promising outlook in Spain.     

Winners love winning and losers love money

Salience and satisfaction are important factors in determining the comparisons that people make. We hypothesized that people make salient comparisons first, and then make satisfying comparisons only if salient comparisons leave them unsatisfied. This hypothesis suggests an asymmetry between winning and losing. For winners, comparison with a salient alternative (i.e., losing) brings satisfaction. Therefore, winners should be sensitive only to the relative value of their outcomes. For losers, comparison with a salient alternative (i.e., winning) brings little satisfaction. Therefore, losers should be drawn to compare outcomes with additional standards, which should make them sensitive to both relative and absolute values of their outcomes. In Experiment 1, participants won one of two cash prizes on a scratch-off ticket. Winners were sensitive to the relative value of their prizes, whereas losers were sensitive to both the relative and the absolute values of their prizes. In Experiment 2, losers were sensitive to the absolute value of their prize only when they had sufficient cognitive resources to engage in effortful comparison.     

Hostility and health: Mediating effects of belief systems and coping styles

The present study investigates the relationship between hostility, health, belief systems, and ways of coping with anger, anxiety, and sadness in a college student sample. Hostility is of interest in the health psychology literature because it has been associated with coronary heart disease, other illnesses, and general mortality. The results reveal that relative to their low-hostility counterparts, individuals scoring high on the Cook and Medley Hostility Scale report poorer physical health and a belief system characterized by vindictiveness, pessimism, unrealistic expectations of the self and others, and a desire to avoid difficulties. They were also more likely to employ confrontive and escape-avoidance coping styles when dealing with anger and escapeavoidance strategies in coping with anxiety and sadness. Irrational beliefs and escapeavoidance coping with anger were found to play a mediating role in the relationship between hostility and health. Clinical implications of the findings are discussed.     

Hostility and health: Mediating effects of belief systems and coping styles

The present study investigates the relationship between hostility, health, belief systems, and ways of coping with anger, anxiety, and sadness in a college student sample. Hostility is of interest in the health psychology literature because it has been associated with coronary heart disease, other illnesses, and general mortality. The results reveal that relative to their low-hostility counterparts, individuals scoring high on the Cook and Medley Hostility Scale report poorer physical health and a belief system characterized by vindictiveness, pessimism, unrealistic expectations of the self and others, and a desire to avoid difficulties. They were also more likely to employ confrontive and escape-avoidance coping styles when dealing with anger and escapeavoidance strategies in coping with anxiety and sadness. Irrational beliefs and escapeavoidance coping with anger were found to play a mediating role in the relationship between hostility and health. Clinical implications of the findings are discussed.     

Personal knowledge,belief systems,and educational innovators

The role of early socialization is examined to determine the relationship of this prior experience to teachers' belief systems. A brief analysis of belief systems is undertaken, followed by a narrative drawn from the life history of one reform-minded teacher from an innovative school. A constructivist position represented by George Kelly and Jerome Bruner is used to explicate the analysis. Implications are drawn for the importance of considering the early experience of teachers in developing teacher education programs. In particular, the recent reform literature in teacher education is critiqued and faulted for ignoring the important role of teacher belief systems, which in turn are argued to be strongly influenced by early socialization.     

Relationships among defensive styles, cognitive styles, processing styles, and attentional styles of normal adolescents

Cognitive and psychodynamic theorists agree that an individual's personality and behavior are determined by both cognitive and dynamic processes. This study examined the relationship among three cognitive approaches--cognitive style, attentional style, and processing style--and examined their relations to defensive style. Adolescents from Grades 11 and 12 (146 boys, 164 girls) were examined in groups for cognitive style (Group Embedded Figures Test), attentional style (Test of Attentional and Interpersonal Style), processing style (a sequential/simultaneous processing test battery), and defensive style (Defense Mechanism Inventory). Least squares completely randomized two-way analyses of variance (or analyses of covariance where applicable) were employed to assess the relations among the three cognitive measures and/or between the cognitive measures and defensive style. While most comparisons were nonsignificant, a significant relationship was observed between sequential processing and field-dependence and between simultaneous processing and field-independence. Also, a trend was noted between field-independence and ideational defenses and between field-dependence and repression-based defenses.     

Psychological significance in personal and supplied construct systems: A defining experiment

An implication was examined of three assumptions of Personal Construct Theory. Personal and supplied construct systems were compared for their capacity to account for 34 subjects' behaviour in an independent sorting task. It was found that either construct system tended to account for a significant amount of the variance in sorting behaviour, but that more was accounted for by personal Construct systems. Observations were made on the way in which this phenomenon varied between subjects, sub-tasks, and parts of construct systems. The assumptions examined were held to be relevant to Social perception and cognitive theories.