Hope in Personnel Selection

This study examined the potential role of hope as a personality trait in performance in personnel selection batteries. We hypothesized that hope would be associated with overall success in the selection process, mediated by coping. One hundred twenty job applicants who went through a full day of individual psychological assessment also filled out measures of hope and coping style. Structural equation modeling analysis provided support for a partial mediation model, with problem‐solving‐oriented coping mediating the association between hope and the psychologists’ general recommendation based on various psychological measures (though hope and coping were not included in the psychologists’ considerations). The model remained significant after controlling for general mental ability, personality, interview, and group simulation measures used in the assessment. The potential implications and limitations of the study are discussed in light of existing research on hope and performance.     

The comparator account on thought insertion,alien voices and inner speech: some open questions

Recently, many philosophers and psychologists have claimed that the explanation that grounds both passivity phenomena in the cognitive domain and passivity phenomena that occur with respect to overt actions is, along broad lines, the same. Furthermore, they claim that the best account we have of such phenomena in both scenarios is the “comparator” account. However, there are reasons to doubt whether the comparator model can be exported from the realm of overt actions to the cognitive domain in general. There is a lingering worry concerning such explanations of thought insertion: the "What is compared to what?" problem. Here I examine two ways to tackle this problem. First: thought insertion consists of the misattribution of strings of inner speech which are not attenuated (thought insertion is thus another name for auditory verbal hallucinations). Second: thought insertion is misattributed inner speech which exhibits the same phenomenological characteristics as normal inner speech. After explaining the types of problem that each of these potential solutions faces, I conclude with a set of open questions that the comparator theorist has to tackle.     

Community treatment for the seriously mentally ill: Is this community psychology?

Community treatment for seriously mentally ill individuals fits well into the philosophy of community psychology. Community psychologists have skills and experiences with other populations that represent assets in improving the ACT service model and producing richer and more useful research results for the future. Maybe we should ask ourselves why community psychologists have obviously avoided this intervention area and the population of seriously mentally ill individuals. Does this represent an adolescent reaction to the parent discipline — clinical psychology? Is the label “mentally ill” as stigmatizing to community psychologists as it is to the general population? Are these individuals written off as not worthy of or capable of benefiting from preventive interventions? Advocates for the seriously mentally ill are mounting a backlash against prevention services. We would be well advised at this time to become involved in community treatment and demonstrate that community psychology is forall vulnerable and at-risk population groups. If the truth of the matter is that “community psychology is not doing much of a job of empowering people” (Berkowitz, 1990), maybe the truth of the matter is also that we need to reach out to more disenfranchised populations with research to show that community psychologycan do the job of empowering some.     

第二次认知革命与社会建构论的产生

第二次认知革命是后现代主义的革命。它的直接结果是促进了社会建构论的产生。社会建构论主张(1)知识是建构的,建构是社会的建构,而不是个体的建构。(2)人格、态度、情绪等心理现象并不存在于人的的内部,而是存在于人与人之间,是文化历史的产物。(3)语言并非是具有确定意义的透明的媒介,语言是先在的,规定了思维的方式。(4)没有超越历史和文化的普遍性知识,我们对于心理现象的理解是受时间、地域、历史、文化和社会风俗等制约的。(5)心理学家应该关注话语的作用,话语分析是心理学的基本研究方法。     

LANGAGE ET PENSÉE

This paper is devoted to some issues which are to be first examined in order to approach the problem of the relations between language and thought in a positive way. The term “thought” arouses distrust in the psychologists who are attached to the scientific method, because it evokes philosophical presuppositions. However, when the problem is posed in terms of what does happen in the subject or what sort of cultural reality does correspond to a system of concepts, an objective analysis is possible and has been realized in some well-known works. Then, the author emphasizes the fact that any attempt at defiring the influence of language on the development of thought, for instance, demands that both terms should not be dealt with as global entities. Discussing the priority of thought over language, or vice versa, is greatly sterilized as long as these terms are treated so. For instance, intelligence does not necessarily correspond to the same abilities before language — or independently from it — as after language — or when intelligence is informed by it. All the same, language is not a whole: a subject who has low abilities in mere grammatical forms can nevertheless use language in an efficient way. Deaf children offer great opportunities for the study of the role of language in mental development, because, by studying them, one avoids wrong explanations based only on correlations which result from the studies in normal children. The collaboration between linguists and psychologists is discussed. The difficulties which psychologists sometimes meet with the works of linguists are outlined; the author eventually suggests some issues on which the cooperation of the linguist could particularly help the psychologist.     

Models of consultation: Preferences of educational professionals at five stages of service

Three professional education groups (elementary school principals, special education teachers, and second-grade teachers from two school systems) were asked to rate their preference for four models of consultation as offered by school psychologists at each of five stages of the consultation process. Results indicate that there were no differences among the three professional education groups in their ratings of the models. However, there was a significant difference in the ratings given to each model, with the collaboration model receiving the highest rating. A model by stage interaction also was noted, a finding which suggests that consultation preference should not be considered a unidimensional concept. The implications of these results for the training and practice of school psychologists in the consultation role are discussed.     

What Kind of Empirical Research Should We Publish, Fund, and Reward?

ABSTRACT— When evaluating empirical papers for publication, grant proposals, or individual contributions (e.g., awarding tenure), the basic question one should ask is how much the contribution adds to understanding in psychology and not whether the contribution takes a particular form or represents one particular model of how to do empirical studies. Academic psychology has flourished with its mastery of the hypothesis–experiment model of science and its expertise in generating and eliminating alternative hypotheses and isolating causation. These accomplishments are a critical part of psychology, and they are well and appropriately taught by psychologists. However, they are only a part of science and should not comprise the almost exclusive criteria for evaluating research. In particular, discovery of fundamental phenomena, such as functional relations that apply to the real world and have generality, should have a higher priority in psychology. Such findings have been the basis for theoretical advances in other natural sciences.     

Human rights and applied psychology

Applied and community psychology necessarily involves the consideration of human rights issues. The problems experienced by many of the clients of applied psychologists result from human rights abuses, the provisions of the Human Rights Act (1998) relate to the everyday practice of applied and community psychologists, and psychologists have a distinctive perspective on human rights. For psychologists, human rights reflect formalized systems for ensuring that people's basic needs are satisfied. Declarations of human rights and legal provisions therefore represent, for psychologists, codifications of how we collectively understand our relationships and social obligations. It is therefore argued that psychologists should positively advocate for the application of psychological science to these issues. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

What Psychologists Know and Believe about Memory: A Survey of Practitioners

We surveyed 858 licensed psychologists, members of the Norwegian Psychological Association, about their knowledge and beliefs about human memory. The results were compared to the results of parallel surveys of legal professionals and lay persons, and evaluated in the light of the results of current memory science. The results indicate that psychologists are not memory experts qua psychologists; as a group, psychologists do not score above the level of knowledge of lay persons or trial judges on issues of eyewitness memory, and a substantial minority of the sample of respondents harbours scientifically unproven ideas of memory. The implications of these findings for psychological practice, with special reference to the court room, are briefly discussed. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

后经验主义时代的理论心理学

随着经验实证主义的衰落,心理学迎来了后经验主义时代。在后经验主义时代,人们对理论和经验观察的关系有了新的理解。理论不再是经验观察的附属物,相反,经验事实是被理论决定的。理论不是经验事实的概括和归纳,而是一种文化历史的建构。后经验主义时代的理论心理学以库恩的范式论、现象学、释义学和社会建构论作为自己的哲学基础。理论的评价标准不再是与经验事实的一致性。因为经验事实由于受到理论的污染,不再是一种客观的标准。在后经验主义条件下,理论的评价标准可建立在概念和逻辑、价值观和意识形态、修辞与叙事以及实践和应用的水平上     

ON THE METHODS AND THEORY OF CLUSTERING

The need for methods of clustering individuals into homogeneous groups seems clear. One hopes, by applying them to his data, to discover clusterings which may prove to be important. This aim appears straightforward, but the methods which exist do not necessarily satisfy them. The procedures which employ the correlation measure of profile similarity, and those which employ the distance measure are discussed. Technical and logical problems are shown to exist for both measures. The key defect in almost all clustering procedures seems to be the absence of a statistical model. The suggestion is made that the clustering problem be stated as a mixture problem. The need for further work by psychologists and statisticians is pointed out.     

A computational analysis of conservation

An approach to modeling cognitive development with a generative connectionist algorithm is described and illustrated with a new model of conservation acquisition. Among the conservation phenomena captured with this model are acquisition, the problem size effect, the length bias effect, and the screening effect. The simulations suggest novel explanations for sudden jumps in conservation performance (based on new representations of conservation transformations) and for the problem size effect (based on an analog representation of number). The simulations support the correlation-learning explanation of length bias (that length correlates with number during number altering transformations). Some conservation phenomena that so far elude computational modeling attempts are also discussed along with their prospects for capture. Suggestions are made for theorizing about cognitive development as well as about conservation acquisition. A variety of classic puzzles about cognitive development are addressed in the light of this model and similar models of other aspects of cognitive development.     

Prospective payment: its impact on psychology's role in health care

This article describes the new Medicare payment system based on diagnosis-related groups (DRGs) and its impact on professional psychology. DRGs represent medically oriented notions about how many inpatient days a prudent physician needs to effectively treat a patient who suffers from a specified disease. However, for the most part, DRGs ignore the behavioral variables that moderate entry into the tertiary care system and the subsequent use of hospital resources. Under DRGs, the development and use of behavioral treatments for somatic disorders could be discouraged. For example, many newer behavioral medicine techniques may be more time-consuming and/or expensive than traditional treatment options (e.g., bed rest vs. biofeedback for low back pain) and thus not fall within the time period or "trim points" alloted for such disorder, regardless of comparative effectiveness. Also, under the new system, psychologists can no longer bill separately for their inpatient services. It is argued that the framers of health care policies should recognize and support health psychologists in light of the fact that many of their techniques can reduce the cost and consumption of health care through programs that: reduce behavioral risk factors, increase compliance with medical regimens, and prepare patients psychologically for stressful medical procedures.     

Rule following and rule use in the balance-scale task

Quinlan et al. [Quinlan, p., van der Mass, H., Jansen, B., Booij, O., & Rendell, M. (this issue). Re-thinking stages of cognitive development: An appraisal of connectionist models of the balance scale task. Cognition, doi:10.1016/j.cognition.2006.02.004] use Latent Class Analysis (LCA) to criticize a connectionist model of development on the balance-scale task, arguing that LCA shows that this model fails to capture a torque rule and exhibits rules that children do not. In this rejoinder we focus on the latter problem, noting the tendency of LCA to find small, unreliable, and difficult-to-interpret classes. This tendency is documented in network and synthetic simulations and in psychological research, and statistical reasons for finding such unreliable classes are discussed. We recommend that LCA should be used with care, and argue that its small and unreliable classes should be discounted. Further, we note that a preoccupation with diagnosing rules ignores important phenomena that rules do not account for. Finally, we conjecture that simple extensions of the network model should be able to achieve torque-rule performance.     

The science of ethics: Deception, the resilient self, and the APA code of ethics, 1966-1973

This paper has two aims. The first is to shed light on a remarkable archival source, namely survey responses from thousands of American psychologists during the 1960s in which they described their contemporary research practices and discussed whether the practices were "ethical." The second aim is to examine the process through which the American Psychological Association (APA) used these survey responses to create principles on how psychologists should treat human subjects. The paper focuses on debates over whether "deception" research was acceptable. It documents how members of the committee that wrote the principles refereed what was, in fact, a disagreement between two contemporary research orientations. The paper argues that the ethics committee ultimately built the model of "the resilient self" into the APA's 1973 ethics code. At the broadest level, the paper explores how prevailing understandings of human nature are written into seemingly universal and timeless codes of ethics.     

Consumer response to theoretical role models in school psychology

This 1972 investigation analyzed differential perceptions and preferences of teachers, principals, and school psychologists to three models of interview style: clinical, phenomenological, and social learning. A simulated psychologist-teacher interview was videotaped for each model. A sample of principals, teachers, and school psychologists evaluated each type of interview with a Q sort of statements designed to represent theory-related practices revealed in psychologist behavior. Analysis of variance of Q sort items revealed significant (p. < .001) differences in preferences. Psychologists most preferred social learning and rejected the clinical role. Teachers preferred the phenomenological approach. Principals did not indicate a preferred model. Validity of the Q sort as a measure of theoretical orientation was also demonstrated (p. < .001). The conclusion that school psychology is on a behavioristic path not yet endorsed by educators was strongly supported.     

Evolutionary Psychology: The Wheat and the Chaff

Evolutionary approaches are on the rise in the social sciences and have the potential to bring an all–encompassing conceptual framework to the study of human behavior. Together with neuroscience, which is digging the grave of mind–body dualism, evolutionary psychology is bound to undermine the still reigning human–animal dualism. If a Darwinian reshaping of the social sciences seems inevitable, even desirable, this should not be looked at as a hostile takeover. The underlying theme of this essay is that it is time for psychologists to join the Darwinian revolution, yet the essay also critically reviews current evolutionary psychology. It questions the loose application of adaptationist thinking and the fragmentation of the genome, behavior, and the brain. From biology we learn that not every species–typical trait is necessarily advantageous, and from neuroscience we learn that not every psychological ability or tendency necessarily needs to have its own specialized brain circuitry. But even if the concept of adaptation is hard to apply, psychologists would do well to start looking at human behavior in the light of evolution.     

Is the Role of the School Psychologist in Early Childhood Truly Expanding? A National Survey Examining School Psychologists' Practices and Training Experiences

Historically, the role of school psychologists in early childhood settings has been limited to the identification and evaluation of children who may be in need of special education services under Part B of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. It has been suggested that the role should reflect a more proactive model; specifically, it should continue to expand to include involvement in school readiness and early intervention for all students. The purpose of this study was to examine the present role of school psychologists in early childhood settings and investigate the graduate-level training provided to school psychology graduate students. Results of the survey found that a significant percentage of school psychologist practitioners continue to spend a substantial portion of their professional time completing special education evaluations. Furthermore, respondents reported minimal to moderate graduate training in the area of early childhood populations. Implications for school psychology practitioners and school psychology graduate training programs are discussed.     

Sexual Contact Between Psychologists and Patients

Summary

This article discusses sexualized dual relationships between psychologists and patients, including both sexual contacts while treatment is in progress and after its termination. The reported prevalences of sexual contact between psychologists and patients and between psychologists and former patients are discussed as well as practitioners attitudes towards these two types of relationships. The profiles of both psychologists and patients likely to be involved are outlined as are the clinical and professional consequences of these behaviours. Finally, the APA Ethics Code (2002) is examined to determine whether its inclusions in these areas are adequate and to shed more light on clinicians' continued roles and responsibilities even after treatments have concluded.