A process analysis of group development

A process analysis of group development forms the basis of a methodology for identifying group phase boundaries and describing moment-to-moment process in psychotherapy groups. This paper presents the general rationale for identifying variables, the statistical technique for producing graphs and the first of three variables used in the process analysis. The focus is on phases two and three as defined by Beck's theory of group development. The first variable tracks the members' responses toward the Scapegoat Leader in terms of supportiveness, criticism or hostility. Results on two groups show a clear shift in responses from negative to supportive as the group moves from phase two to phase three.     

EXPLICATING THE IMPLICIT: THE LOCAL LEVEL AND THE MICROPROCESS OF CHANGE IN THE ANALYTIC SITUATION

This paper proposes a method of examining the micro-events of the analytic process that borrows heavily from developmental research. The increasing importance of illuminating the microprocess of interaction to understanding the process of change in analytic treatment is emphasised. A set of constructs and terminology is proposed for the study of the moment-to-moment interactive process in psychoanalytic therapy referred to as the local level. A theory of therapeutic action based on 'local-level' process is then explicated. Its central element involves a step-by-step process of 'fitting together', which leads to changes in implicit knowing through alteration of emotional procedures.     

Moment-to-moment fluctuations in fMRI amplitude and interregion coupling are predictive of inhibitory performance

We investigated how moment-to-moment fluctuations in fMRI amplitude and interregional coupling are linked to behavioral performance during a stop signal task. To quantify the relationship between single-trial amplitude and behavior on a trial-by-trial basis, we modeled the probability of successful inhibition as a function of response amplitude via logistic regression analysis. At the group level, significant logistic slopes were observed in, among other regions, the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), caudate, and putamen, all bilaterally. Furthermore, we investigated how trial-by-trial fluctuations in responses in attentional regions covaried with fluctuations in inhibition-related regions. The coupling between several frontoparietal attentional regions and the right IFG increased during successful versus unsuccessful performance, suggesting that efficacious network interactions are important in determining behavioral outcome during the stop signal task. In particular, the link between responses in the right IFG and behavior were moderated by moment-to-moment fluctuations in evoked responses in the left intraparietal sulcus. A supplemental figure for this article may be downloaded from http:// cabn.psychonomic-journals.org/content/supplemental.     

The Five Minute Speech Sample as a Measure of Parent–Child Dynamics: Evidence from Observational Research

Use of the Five Minute Speech Sample in parenting research has become increasingly widespread in recent years, raising important questions about how it maps onto other more established methods for assessing parent–child dynamics. Given the historical emphasis on direct observation as a gold standard in such assessment, our aim was to examine associations between the Five Minute Speech Sample and direct observational coding of parent–child interactions, and to evaluate the assumption that the Five Minute Speech Sample reflects moment-to-moment exchanges between parents and children. A systematic search of three databases conducted identified 25 relevant studies (total N?=?2945 child participants). These studies focused largely on four distinct systems for coding the Five Minute Speech Sample, and reported on distinct developmental periods ranging from infancy (17 months) through to adolescence (17 years). In 20 of 25 studies, the Five Minute Speech Sample was significantly associated with observations of parent–child interactions. These associations were apparent in all age groups examined, yet findings for fathers were somewhat more mixed than mothers. Available evidence suggests that the Five Minute Speech Sample holds strong potential as a brief but richly informative tool for indexing parent–child dynamics—particularly affective dimensions of the parent–child relationship—in both research and clinical contexts.     

Beyond Compliance: Mother–Child Joint Action During a “Do” Task

Much of the literature on parent-toddler interactions does not account for the lack of independence in data. This investigation used a theory and method appropriate for examining the moment-to-moment patterns of joint actions between mothers and toddlers during a “do” task. Using contextual action theory to guide a mixture of methods, we observed and described the joint goal-directed series of actions of mothers and their toddlers as well as mothers’ intentions, meanings, and emotions they ascribed to their actions. Additionally, the associations between the patterns of joint mother-toddler actions and children’s negative emotionality were examined. Thirty mothers and their children participated in the study. Data collection included video-recorded activity, video recall interviews, and self-report questionnaires. Quantitative and qualitative analysis of the data revealed that (a) children were mostly engaged in the task alongside with their mothers’ on-going involvement; (b) mothers attributed a range of meanings to their interactions with their children; and (c) mothers’ perceptions of their toddlers’ dimensions of emotional negativity were associated with the organization of dyads’ joint goal directed actions—both when children were engaged in the task or self-focused.     

Losing a father all over again: the termination of an analysis of an adolescent boy suffering from father loss

Criteria for beginning and conducting the termination phase of psychoanalysis have provoked debate and confusion from the early days of psychoanalysis. Gabbard (2009) has recently pointed to the field's tendency to cling to idealized versions of these criteria as a way to deal with disagreements. The situation becomes more complicated for child and adolescent psychoanalysts because their patients are in the midst of a developmental process at the very time they are engaged in a psychoanalytic process. The termination phase of an adolescent male suffering from father loss is presented in depth in order to provide clinical data toward further consideration of the vexing questions surrounding termination in psychoanalysis. His termination is used to examine the relative importance of losing the analyst as a transference object as against a developmental object; the meaning of action during termination; the complicating role of trauma vis-à-vis termination; and the importance of the post-termination phase of analysis. It is suggested that his termination phase demonstrates that a "good enough" termination involves the development of a self-analyzing capacity that continues to evolve and develop after termination.     

Thinking Developmentally in Child and Adult Psychoanalysis

Psychoanalysis in theory and clinical practice is a developmental domain. Psychoanalysts think about their patients from a developmental point of view. The analytic relationship promotes development in both analyst and patient. Two concepts central to this author’s developmental point of view are epigenetics—as used in biology and philosophy—and that of the analyst as “developmental object.” Optimally, the analyst as developmental object facilitates what Rita Tähkä terms the “developmental illusion,” which intersubjectively transforms psychic structures, enabling alternatives to the repetition compulsion. Two vignettes with adult patients illustrate how empathic intimacy in psychoanalysis with an emphasis on latency and toddler phases as reconstructed in adult analysis presaged psychic growth. Transference as a vehicle for a developmental history taking is also considered.     

The Right Brain Implicit Self Lies at the Core of Psychoanalysis

In this contribution I expand my continuing work on the centrality of right brain structures and unconscious processes from the neuropsychoanalytic perspective of regulation theory, an overarching model of the development, psychopathogenesis, and treatment of the implicit self. In an introduction I highlight the essential role of not only implicit cognition but implicit affect, communication, and regulation in current relational psychoanalytic models. I then briefly discuss recent developmental and neurobiological studies of implicit processes in early development and psychopathogenesis. In the bulk of this work I explore the essential role of implicit affective processes in psychotherapeutic change processes. I focus particularly on the expression of right brain unconscious mechanisms in affect-laden enactments, and on the therapist's moment-to-moment navigation through these heightened affective moments by not left brain explicit secondary process cognition but right brain implicit primary process affectively driven clinical intuition. Direct access to these right brain implicit processes by both patient and therapist is central to effective treatment.     

Molecular (moment-to-moment) and molar (aggregate) analyses of behavior

Ten meanings or usages of the terms molecular and molar analyses are based on (1) numbers of responses, (2) durations of activities, (3) levels, (4) scales, (5) contiguity versus correlation, (6) behavioral standards, (7) function with or without structure, (8) local versus global phenomena, and (9) control by shaping of sequential moment-to-moment behavior. These usages reveal divisive viewpoints along with ambiguities in the Law of Effect, the definition of an operant, response strength, response probability, random behavior, time allocation, shaping, controlled versus uncontrolled operants, and roles for ordinary language. Usage 10 is less divisive and combines, and in that sense unifies, molecular behavior, defined as shaped moment-to-moment sequential behaving, and molar, defined as averages of aggregates of those shaped responses. It combines shaping, that establishes and changes operant behaviors, and strengthening that changes the amounts of those shaped behaviors. I conclude that general behavioral theory will combine strengthening with such methods as parametric, hybrid, or nonparametric shaping, and will use computational methods to simulate moment-to-moment behavior streams from which any aggregates of theoretical interest may be computed. Such a synthesis may not require different levels, scales, or new scientific paradigms.     

Making Meaning: The Constructive-Developmental Approach to Persons and Practice

The constructive (in the sense of construing) and developmental (but throughout the lifespan) framework, whose conceptual roots lie in the work of Piaget, outlines the holistic personality process of systems of making meaning, systems that organize human thought, feeling, and action. In this article Kegan discusses and then applies the model—to a worker in a CETA program and to a psychiatric ward patient—elucidating the perspectives—on mental health and employability—it can open for practitioners.     

The Relationality of Everyday Life: The Unfinished Journey of Relational Psychoanalysis

Building on the insights embodied in Stephen Mitchell’s critiques of the developmental tilt and the metaphor of the baby, this paper aims to further illuminate the limitations of theoretical models rooted in infantile prototypes and to point relational theory toward a more thoroughgoing understanding of the contextuality and relationality of every facet of our lives. In its examinations of both the mother–infant interaction and the intricacies of the analytic relationship, the relational turn has yielded deep insights into the reciprocal, two-person causal sequences that characterize the development and dynamics of personality. But in the massive zone of living that occurs outside the nursery or the consulting room—the countless interactions and experiences of everyday life—relational theory has made less of a contribution, implicitly relying on an older psychoanalytic model in which these events of daily life reflect or express inner dynamics, rather than highlighting how daily life experiences continue to shape the inner world even as the inner world gives meaning and shape to those ongoing experiences. Drawing on both parallels and differences between Mitchell’s seminal contributions and the theoretical perspective known as cyclical psychodynamics, the paper aims to extend relational advances in understanding the mother–infant matrix and the dynamic structure of the analytic relationship to the everyday events that constitute the vast majority of our waking hours. In doing so, it points to a consequentiality to everyday life that, when appreciated and taken seriously, opens new pathways for therapeutic advance and provides a more solid and comprehensive foundation for relational theory.     

The contribution of ego psychology to understanding the process of termination in psychoanalysis and psychotherapy

Ego psychology is presented as an integrated psychoanalytic developmental theory, including a theory of object relations. The process of termination is employed as one of the many possible illustrations of the usefulness of this theory. Termination is regarded as a process that pervades the treatment from the outset, rather than as the final phase of treatment only, because the treatment process, whether psychoanalysis or psychotherapy, includes continuous promotion of ever-increasing autonomy. Ideally, by the time termination proper takes place, maximum autonomy has been attained. To the definition of autonomy as intersystemic, involving relative independence of the ego from the drives (and from the super-ego), an object-relations dimension is added which extends that definition to include an intrasystemic consideration--namely, relative independence of the self-representation from the object representations. Especially in the treatment of the borderline conditions is the intrasystemic factor cogent because borderline states are characterized by varying degrees of incompletely differentiated self- and object representations. The objective, in the psychoanalysis of neurosis, where self- and object constancy already exist to a large degree, is ego autonomy in the intersystemic sense. In the psychotherapy of the borderline conditions, the objective is greater differentiation of the self-representation from the object representations.     

Exploring Processes in Day-to-Day Parent–Adolescent Conflict and Angry Mood: Evidence for Circular Causality

Parent–adolescent conflict has been studied both as a precursor of long-term macrolevel developmental risks and as an outcome of microlevel, moment-to-moment interaction patterns. However, the family-level processes underlying the maintenance or regulation of conflict in daily life are largely overlooked. A meso-level understanding of parent–adolescent conflict offers important practical insights that have direct implications for interventions. The present study explores day-to-day reciprocal processes and carryover in parents’ and adolescents’ experiences of anger and conflict. Daily diary data provided by parent–adolescent dyads (N = 151) from two-caregiver households (adolescents: 61.59% female, mean age = 14.60 years) over 21 days were examined using a multivariate Poisson multilevel model to evaluate the circular causality principle in parents’ and adolescents’ daily conflict and anger. Findings offer empirical support for the theory, suggesting that parents’ and adolescents’ anger and conflict exist together in a feedback loop wherein conflict is both a consequence of past anger and also an antecedent of future anger, both within and across persons. Increased understanding of the daily interaction patterns and maintenance of parent–adolescent conflict can guide more informed, targeted, and well-timed interventions intended to ameliorate the consequences of problematic parent–adolescent conflict sequences.     

Level of Perceptual Development as Reflected in Responses to the Holtzman Inkblot Technique

To investigate the relationships between chronological age and scores on 10 variables from the Holtzman Inkblot Technique, 586 normal Ss comprising five criterion age-groups ranging from 5.2 to 19.5 years were tested. Each group had an equal number of males and females. Following a statistical correction for number of rejections, a sex-by-age analysis of variance revealed no significant sex differences or sex-by-age interactions. However, significant age-group differences were found for all 10 variables, six of them resulting in steadily increasing means across the five groups. These age trends are consistent with the sequence of perceptual change outlined by developmental theory, and are interpreted as indicating a developmental shift in the dominance of perceptual functions.     

A rational approach to memory search termination

An important component of many, if not all, real-world retrieval tasks is the decision to terminate memory search. Despite its importance, systematic evaluations of the potential rules for terminating search are scarce. Recent work has focused on two variables: the total time spent in memory search before search is terminated and the exit latency (the time between the last retrieved item and the time of search termination). These variables have been shown to limit the number of plausible rules for terminating memory search. Here, we introduce an alternative stopping rule based on a rational moment-to-moment cost–benefit analysis and derive a closed-form expression of the exit latency function using this rational approach. We show the model’s ability to capture critical latency data and make testable predictions about the influence of changing the relative costs and benefits of memory search. Results from an experiment are presented that support the model’s predictions. We conclude that the decision to terminate memory search is based on moment-to-moment changes in subjective utility of retrieved memories.     

Dual processes in decision making and developmental neuroscience: A fuzzy-trace model

From Piaget to the present, traditional and dual-process theories have predicted improvement in reasoning from childhood to adulthood, and improvement has been observed. However, developmental reversals—that reasoning biases emerge with development—have also been observed in a growing list of paradigms. We explain how fuzzy-trace theory predicts both improvement and developmental reversals in reasoning and decision making. Drawing on research on logical and quantitative reasoning, as well as on risky decision making in the laboratory and in life, we illustrate how the same small set of theoretical principles apply to typical neurodevelopment, encompassing childhood, adolescence, and adulthood, and to neurological conditions such as autism and Alzheimer’s disease. For example, framing effects—that risk preferences shift when the same decisions are phrased in terms of gains vs. losses—emerge in early adolescence as gist-based intuition develops. In autistic individuals, who rely less on gist-based intuition and more on verbatim-based analysis, framing biases are attenuated (i.e., they outperform typically developing control subjects). In adults, simple manipulations based on fuzzy-trace theory can make framing effects appear and disappear depending on whether gist-based intuition or verbatim-based analysis is induced. These theoretical principles are summarized and integrated in a new mathematical model that specifies how dual modes of reasoning combine to produce predictable variability in performance. In particular, we show how the most popular and extensively studied model of decision making—prospect theory—can be derived from fuzzy-trace theory by combining analytical (verbatim-based) and intuitive (gist-based) processes.