Stress conceptions in life event research: Towards a person-centred perspective

The present article focuses on a discussion of the theoretical foundations of life event research. Since critical life events are usually regarded as stressful events, the main question is which concepts of stress are employed in different life event approaches and what is their rationale. The discussion centres on two topics that have to be treated independently: the question of specificity vs nonspecificity and the question of individualized vs normative weightings. It is shown that different life event approaches rely on different concepts of stress. Numerous objections lead to a rejection of the nonspecificity concept and a normative proceeding. However, even when a specificity view of stress is advocated and individual weights are used, life stress measures do not account for a substantial proportion of the variance in the stress-related dependent variables. Therefore, a reorientation of life event research is required. It is proposed that future life event research should concentrate on the individual meaning of events and adequately consider the time dimension as well CIS processes of coping.     

Towards a new model of science

Journal for General Philosophy of Science - One — Sided understanding of Aristotle led to the view that the principal aim of science is general knowledge. In modern times this view must be...     

Examining explanatory mechanisms of positive and expressive writing: Towards a resource-oriented perspective

This study tested the hypothesis that benefits of positive and expressive writing accrue when the intervention matches or activates the participant’s personal resources. Students were randomly assigned to keep a newly developed resource diary (RD, n = 114), which asked the participants to write about positive experiences and personal resources, or an expressive writing diary (ED, n = 114), which asked the participants to engage with negative emotional experiences, at home on three consecutive days per week for four weeks. Participants keeping the RD perceived significantly more social support and reported a significantly better mood at post-test than participants keeping the ED. Compared to a control group (n = 81) treatment effects of both writing interventions were higher for participants with lower pre-test values of well-being and brooding as well as for participants who wrote in an ‘atmosphere of activated resources.’ It is suggested that research should move away from testing deficit-compensating hypotheses towards a stronger resource orientation.     

Meta-diagnosis: Towards a hermeneutical perspective in medicine with an emphasis on alcoholism

This essay argues that making a diagnosis in medicine is essentially a hermeneutic enterprise, one in which interpretation skills play a major part in understanding a disease. The clinical encounter is an event comprised of two voices; one is the voice of science which is grounded in empiricism, the other is that of human experience, which is grounded in story-telling and the interpretation of those stories.Using two voices, one from the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-III-Revised, which describes alcohol abuse and alcohol dependence, and the other, that of Claire, a character in Edward Albee's play, A Delicate Balance, who is conversing with her brother-in-law, Tobias, I apply principles from Hans-Georg Gadamer's hermeneutics to the clinical diagnostic process. The essay will demonstrate that we overlook an enormous amount of information about alcoholism by an overreliance on objective data and that our hope for understanding alcoholics is in listening to their voices, and sharing the interpretation of their experiences with them.     

Sexuality and cyberporn: Towards a new agenda for research

This article presents theoretical considerations based on cultural analysis approaches to studying pornography and sexuality as a means of starting to suggest a new agenda for cyberporn research. By bringing to the forefront concepts of how subjectivity and sexuality are produced within the computer/Internet apparatus, I hope to diversify the focus in cyberporn research away from social science approaches and pre-Foucaultian assumptions of the subject which obscure understandings of new media and cyberporn use. Through a summary of visual culture studies and reception studies of pornography, I argue that cyberporn must be understood as contingent within the encoding and decoding processes and discourses of sexuality (Foucault) in which it is produced and consumed. My focus here is the home office/terminal as the site of reception/cyberporn use. While there is potential for a great variety of cultural analytic approaches to the study of cyberporn and how new media use influences sexuality, I end with specific suggestions for researching cyberporn reception in the home. The computer’s allure is more than utilitarian or aesthetic; it is erotic. Instead of a refreshing play with surfaces, as with toys or amusements, our affair with information machines announces a symbiotic relationship and ultimately a mental marriage to technology. Rightly perceived, the atmosphere of cyberspace carries the scent that once surrounded Wisdom. The world rendered as pure information not only fascinates our eyes and minds, but also captures our hearts. We feel augmented and empowered. Our hearts beat in the machines. This is Eros. (Michael Heim, The Metaphysics of Virtual Reality)     

Towards a new functional anatomy of language

The classical brain-language model derived from the work of Broca, Wernicke, Lichtheim, Geschwind, and others has been useful as a heuristic model that stimulates research and as a clinical model that guides diagnosis. However, it is now uncontroversial that the classical model is (i) empirically wrong in that it cannot account for the range of aphasic syndromes, (ii) linguistically underspecified to an extent that prohibits contact with the language sciences, and (iii) anatomically underspecified. We briefly summarize some of the central issues that motivate why a new functional anatomy of language is necessary, in the context of introducing a collection of articles that describe systematic new attempts at specifying the new functional anatomy. The major convergent observations are highlighted and the emergent conceptual and empirical trends are identified.     

Towards a new epistemology of moral progress

Abstract: Awareness that moral beliefs and practices have changed across time threatens our confidence in our current moral beliefs: if past moral beliefs turned out to be wrong, how can we be sure ours aren't likewise mistaken? In this paper, I set up four desiderata for a successful theory of moral progress: it must allow us to judge that progress has occurred, avoid the image of increasing correspondence towards ahistorical truthmakers, allow for revision in belief, and yet not be disobligating. Rorty's pragmatist account of moral progress delivers on the first three, but at the cost of failing to meet the fourth: it drains moral beliefs of their categorical force. I then outline K.E. Løgstrup's understanding of the relation between the ‘ethical demand’ and changing, socially mediated norms. While Løgstrup does posit an unchanging ground of normativity ‐ the “ethical demand” to act for the sake of the other whose welfare is in our hands – he also thinks that changing social norms are an indispensable part of ethical life. I argue that Løgstrup's discussion of the ‘refraction‘ of the ethical demand through changing social norms provides resources for an account of moral progress that fulfils these four desiderata.     

Artists' vulnerability to psychopathology: Towards an integrative cognitive perspective

A relationship is commonly reported between high levels of artistic creativity and mental health problems (e.g., depression or psychosis), and it is now becoming clearer that the divergent cognitive style associated with creativity has commonalities with some of the processes involved in the development and maintenance of some psychological difficulties. Our aim was to investigate the nature of this cognitive style. More specifically, we considered the profile of probabilistic reasoning and associated problem solving abilities, as both of these mechanisms have been found to be integral to major forms of clinical dysfunction. We assessed levels of creative potential, mood, probabilistic reasoning, and problem solving abilities in 66 arts and 85 science undergraduate volunteers. As predicted, art students showed higher levels of creative potential and experienced lower levels of mood than their science peers. Differences in probabilistic reasoning were observed which are in keeping with the pattern reported to be present in those suffering with psychosis in that they tended to ‘jump to conclusions’. Art students also displayed both poorer problem solving abilities and self‐appraisal of their problem solving skills. Our results extend previous findings associated with the mediating role of cognitive processes in the relationship between creativity and some forms of psychopathology. Implications for the prevention and treatment of psychological difficulties in the creative are highlighted.     

After pluralism: Towards a new,integrated psychoanalytic paradigm1

After a restatement of the isolationism of psychoanalysis from allied disciplines, and an examination of some of the reasons for the diversity of schools of thought and the fragmentation of psychoanalytic knowledge, the author suggests the need to adopt principles of correspondence or external coherence along with those of hermeneutic coherence to validate psychoanalytic hypotheses. Recent developments in neurocognitive science have come to the aid of psychoanalysis in this period of crisis, resulting in the proposition of integrating both areas to form a new paradigm for the construction of the theory of the mind. This emerging paradigm tries to integrate clinical knowledge with neurocognitive science, fi ndings from studies on the process and outcome of psychotherapy, research into the early mother‐infant relationship, and developmental psychopathology. The author examines theoretical‐ technical models based on the concept of drives and of relationships in the light of interdisciplinary fi ndings. He concludes that the relational model has a broad empirical base, except when the concept of drives is discredited. Interdisciplinary fi ndings have led to the positing of the replacement of the Freudian model of drives with a model of motivational systems centred on affective processes. He draws certain conclusions which have a bearing on the technique of psychoanalytic treatment. These arise from the adoption of the new integrated paradigm.     

Looking at selection from a social process perspective: Towards a social process model on personnel selection

Traditional selection practice and research has exclusively focused on ''product'' and ''procedural'' characteristics of selection (e.g., reliability, validity of selection tools). This perspective is characterized by assumptions underlying the ''psychometric'' model on selection. Mainly triggered by environmental changes and present-day assessment practices, a new perspective on selection has emerged since the beginning of the 1990s, namely the negotiation perspective. The negotiation perspective pays attention to the social-emotional processes during selection. In this article, we explore the process side of personnel selection to a further extent. Based on relevant literature and research findings, we present a conceptual model of job applicants' expectations and appreciation of the selection encounter. The Social Process model on Selection (SPS model) contains eight process characteristics. We assume job applicants to value/have expectations of: (1) provision of general information on the job opening, (2) participation and control, (3) openness to assertiveness, (4) creation of transparency of testing, (5) provision of feedback, (6) guarantee of objectivity and standardization, (7) assurance of human treatment, and (8) respect for privacy and job relevance of information gathering. Directions for further research are discussed.     

Career success: A new perspective

If the effectiveness of vocational guidance services is to be evaluated it is important to have adequate ways of measuring career success. In this paper the concept of career success is discussed in relation to the societal, the individual and the organisational frames of reference, all of which are regarded as dynamic. The actual criteria of success discussed relate to the degree of achievement of valued goals via the occupational setting, as measured through a particular frame of reference. The authors deliberately use the term career success in preference to that of occupational success since they wish to emphasise the significance of work in a person's total life space.