Getting to the Root of Relationship Attributions: Family-of-Origin Perspectives on Self and Partner Views

A large body of research has been devoted to the study of family-of-origin (FOO) experience influences on future relationship outcomes and processes. In addition, substantial information exists regarding the role relationship attributions play in connection with relationship quality and stability. Yet, limited information has been forthcoming regarding how the FOO experience has an influence on attributions made in romantic relationships. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was employed to assess the impact of the FOO experience on attributions made about one’s own communication and personality variables, as well as the communication and personality variables of one’s partner from a sample of individuals who had completed the RELATionship Evaluation (N = 6,649). Results show evidence of a relationship between the FOO experience and the attributions made about oneself and one’s partner. Results were particularly pronounced for the communication variables. Gender differences also were found. The utility of study findings for couple and family researchers and practitioners is discussed.     

Cognitive Concepts of the Self and Romantic Relationships

The present study applied 2 complementary cognitive concepts of the self (i.e., self-complexity [SC] and self-concept differentiation [SCD]) to the area of romantic relationships and developed corresponding measures of cognitive concepts of romantic relationships (relationship complexity [RC] and relationship-concept differentiation [RCD], respectively). Then the associations between the cognitive concept measures and the degrees to which the participant's negative affect had been increased due to the recall of negative events in the romantic relationship were examined. Eighty-nine college students who were currently involved in a romantic relationship participated in the study. Results showed that the relationship-concept measures were related to, but not identical with, the self-concept measures. A greater affective reaction to the recall of a negative event in the romantic relationship was associated with a higher score in SC and a lower score in RC, whereas this affective reaction was neither significantly related to SCD nor to RCD. The findings imply that the relationship concept measures developed in the present study contribute significantly to the understanding of affective reactivity in romantic relationships.     

Black Women and White Women in Groups: Suggestions for Minority-Sensitive Group Services on University Campuses

Similarities and differences between group dynamics of one all-Black-woman's support group and one all-White-woman's support group are presented and discussed in terms of future implications for university counseling center program development.     

Crime: Self and Society: Psychoanalytical Perspectives on Taking Responsibility and Moving Forward

The occurrence of a tragic and unnecessary act of evil (crime) induces in us a need to search for blame, to find who or what is responsible. Often this search amounts in a Kleinian splitting between personal and social responsibility – we either blame the person or blame the society, or oscillate between the two. In fact, even movement into a more integrated, depressive position does not solve the problem—the evil of the event is too hot to be contained anywhere. True healing from crime will not result by perfecting the “assigning blame” mechanism in ourselves or our criminal justice system, but rather when we recognize the futility of that search. To use Lowe’s concept of creative limits, only by recognizing our own limitedness will creative and healing spaces that allow the return to innocence occur. Jessica Van Denend serving as an intern chaplain at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for the past 2 years, became increasingly interested in the complexity of societal and personal complexes wrapped up in the criminal justice processes, and their manifestation in the prison system. While studying under Prof. Ann Ulanov (in the Psychiatry and Religion program at Union Theological Seminary), the author had time to examine what some psychoanalytical tools might have to say about crime and its repercussions.     

Being a Black Woman Philosopher: Reflections on Founding the Collegium of Black Women Philosophers

Although the American Philosophical Association has more than 11,000 members, there are still fewer than 125 Black philosophers in the United States, including fewer than thirty Black women holding a PhD in philosophy and working in a philosophy department in the academy. 1 The following is a “musing” about how I became one of them and how I have sought to create a positive philosophical space for all of us.     

The Gulf War and the Rodney King Beating: Implications of the General Conservatism and Social Dominance Perspectives

Abstract

Both general conservatism and social dominance theory require relatively strong and significant relationships among indicators of racism, support for the Persian Gulf War, and approval of police actions in the Rodney King incident. With a nonprobability sample of 131 adults from Los Angeles, significant relationships were found among these variables as predicted by both theories. However, structural equation analysis disclosed that only social dominance theory was able to give a fully acceptable account of the entire matrix of correlations among the background and attitudinal variables involved. The data indicated that political conservatism, belief in racial superiority, caste-maintenance orientation, support of the Gulf War, and approval of police behavior in the beating of Rodney King were all significantly related to and possibly driven by a person's desire for group dominance (i.e., social dominance orientation). The relatively strong and consistent relationships among these variables were considered as possible evidence of a group-based form of ideological coherence (Converse, 1964).     

两种自我（ego和self）的概念关系探析

在英语中,“自我”主要有“self和“ego”两个对应词或概念。前者是作为意识对象或客体(object)的、具有反身意识性质的、与他人相对应的“自我”或“自身”,后者则是作为施事(agent)并在一定程度上涉及潜意识活动的“自我”。从学术渊源上看,后者可视为精神分析心理学意义上的“自我”,而前者则可视为非精神分析理论意义上的“自我”。然而,ego意义上的自我似乎一直未能引起我国科学心理学研究的注意,     

Motivation and the Self Concept: Persisting Goals of Young Women and Men

This study undertook to measure important goals and their persistence over time for young men and women belonging to two age groups using a theoretical framework derived from recent advances in motivation which links motivation to the self concept. A method for categorising subject goals was adapted from Nuttin (1985), namely the Motivational Content Analysis. The new system for categorising goals can be useful to psychologists, vocational counsellors, etc. Results of the study indicated that females had more persisting goals than men, and that there were significant main effects for sex in persisting goal types of Physical, Character, Autonomy, Intimacy and Contact in General with others. Sex × age interaction effects were found for Character and Autonomy, with 20-year-old females obtaining significantly higher scores for these persisting goals than other groups. Findings are discussed in terms of gender identity, and what Nuttin (1984) calls “crossroads” in adult development.     

Perspectives of Women College Athletes on Sport and Gender

Although sport access for females has greatly improved, certain behaviors continue to be considered more or less appropriate for females depending upon how compatible they are with biologically or socially constructed female characteristics. However, young women who have grown up playing sports and continue participation at the college level have constructed meanings about being a young woman and an athlete. Semi-structured interviews were conducted and analyzed to investigate how seven gymnasts and seven softball players competing in NCAA Division I athletics view and contend with a “female/athlete paradox.” These women recognized preferred femininity and at times constructed images based on this notion. However, they also embraced their athleticism and felt at ease choosing not to perform femininity in some contexts.     

Does Jesus Save the Neanderthals? Theological Perspectives on the Evolutionary Origins and Boundaries of Human Nature

Does Jesus save the Neanderthals? Do the Neanderthals need saving? Are they worth saving? And what about other non‐human animals? What theological sense can be made of the boundaries of human nature when considered in light of contemporary evolutionary biology and paleoanthropology? This article explores how theologians can begin to approach such questions by looking at four key areas where theological anthropology, evolutionary biology, and paleoanthropology intersect—1) human nature, 2) human uniqueness, 3) the imago Dei, and 4) the incarnation.     

Mother, Father, and Self: Sources of Young Adults' God Concepts

Following developmental attachment theory, we predicted a path in which nurturing parents affect young adults' self-concepts and self-esteem, which in turn predicts the image of a nurturing God. To ascertain how images of parents and images of self predict God images, 132 young adults aged 18–22 (M = 19) completed the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale, and a six-item measure of God's perceived involvement in their lives (religiosity scale). In a follow-up interview, they rated their parents, God, and selves on scales of closeness, nurturing, power, and punishing/judging. For men, mothers were responsible, more than fathers, for creating a climate for sons' self-esteem through nurturance and discipline, which in turn contributed to seeing God as nurturing, feeling close to God, and being more religious. For women, mothers and fathers created a model of nurturance and power, which contributed to seeing God as nurturing and powerful. Punishing/judging parents directly affected punishing/judging God images in these young adults. Men perceived God to be more punishing/judging than did women, while women perceived God to be more nurturing. Even in adulthood, parents, especially mothers, continue to exert influences on young adults' faith and images of God.     

Black Women and the Pleasures of Intellectual Work

What does it mean for a Black woman to choose to do intellectual work? In the twenty‐first century, Black women, either by virtue of their academic careers or their vocations outside of institutional settings, pursue intellectual work for its own sake as well as in pursuit of collective goals. That is to say, they can acknowledge intellectual work as a source of personal fulfillment, indeed a source of joy in ways that earlier generations of Black women could not. At least that should be true. In fact, it remains difficult for Black women to own the joy that their engagement with ideas produces.     

Discussing Racial Justice in Light of 2016: Black Lives Matter,a Trump Presidency,and the Continued Struggle for Justice

The broad fields of ethical reflection on racialization, racial justice, black liberation theology, and queer theology of color must come to terms with the year 2016, which can be framed on one side with the Black Lives Matter movement, and on the other side with a presidential election cycle in which racism and racial justice played particularly salient roles. Against this backdrop, this book discussion looks at recent literature on racial justice asking three questions. How does historical consciousness shape contemporary ethical thought on racial justice? In what ways do the intersectionalities of gender and sexuality, immigration and transnationality, class, and contemporary culture present particular challenges and new possibilities? And how do the ethical frameworks of religious traditions contribute to the development of public theology for racial justice? The conclusion considers how religious ethics concerned with racial justice does harm or contributes to religiously grounded responses to racial injustice. Reflection on these questions points to the need for ongoing engagement with the black experience—broadly construed and within the context of multiple intersections—in the United States and globally in ethical analysis. However, this in turn makes particular and critical demands on how it is that we are to both teach and read religious ethics and political theology at our institutions, as well as in the churches.