视觉注意离散性的实验范式

注意离散性是注意间歇性地采集外界信息的特性。文章综述了视觉注意离散性的4种实验范式:(1)车轮错觉范式,刺激强度大、实验条件少、被试任务量小,较早地证实了视觉注意的离散性;(2)视觉探测范式,同时观察了被试的行为表现与电生理信号,确定了视觉注意离散性与神经振荡的关联;(3)线索靶子范式和视觉搜索范式,通过系统地变化SOA大幅提高了行为数据的时间分辨率,直观地探测到注意离散性调制的行为振荡。     

Wagon-wheel illusion under steady illumination: real or illusory?

Wheels turning in the movies sometimes appear to rotate backwards. This is called the wagon-wheel illusion (WWI). The mechanism of this illusion is based on the intermittent nature of light in films and other stroboscopic presentations, which renders them as a series of snapshots rather than a continuous visual data stream. However, there have been claims that this illusion is seen even in continuous light, which would suggest that the visual system itself may sample a continuous visual data stream. We examined the rate of this putative sampling and its variations across individuals while in different psychological states. We obtained two results: (i) WWI occurred in stroboscopic lights as expected, (ii) WWI was never reported by our subjects under continuous lights, such as sunlight and lamps with DC power source. Thus, WWI cannot be taken as evidence for discreteness of conscious visual perception.     

Reinforcement magnitude and the inhibiting effect of reinforcement

In a two-key concurrent variable-interval schedule (using pigeons), if the reinforcement frequency for one response is held constant while that for the other is increased, the rate of response on the constant key decreases. The immediate reinforcement for key pecking can usually be conceptualized as the change from a condition in which the key light is on and the food hopper light is off to one in which the key light is off and the hopper light is on. The prechange condition is associated with a delay to food of one-half the average interreinforcement interval in effect during this condition. The postchange condition is associated with a delay to food of about .5 seconds. The programming of additional reinforcement results in a decrease in the delay to food associated with the prechange stimulus condition, and thus a decrease in the value of the improvement that results from the change. This would appear to be analogous to a decrease in the amount of reinforcement, and thus sufficient explanation for the decrease in the rate of the response.     

Measurement of Social Freedom: The Starkweather Social Conformity Test Revised (SSCT-R)

Freedom to conform or not to conform to peer choices is one of the traits of a child with high creative potential. The Starkweather Social Conformity Test-Revised is described and compared to the original test. The Starkweather Social Conformity Test-Revised is useful for determining conformity, nonconformity, and freedom of young children when they are given the opportunity to make a book based on their personal preferences or on the preferences of pictures chosen for their friends. The test is individually administered; it may be given to a child who is involved in a group or to a child in a therapeutic setting.     

Le statut de la critique en psychologie du travail : une clinique de l’activité

The first purpose of the article is to take advantage of observations made on the status of criticism in sociology. This involves a diagnosis on the state of work psychology. The aim is to alter the trend of criticism and support a clinical approach to activity derived from Vygotski's research. The idea of critical psychology as a self-sufficient line of study is invalidated. An example is developed in order to describe the operating method. The last part of the article is devoted to a brief discussion of Beauvois's recent theories.     

Assessing change with the extended logistic model

The purpose of this article is to define a method for the assessment of change. A reinterpretation of the extended logistic model is proposed. The extended logistic model for the assessment of change (ELMAC) allows the definition of a time parameter which is supposed to identify whether change occurs during a period of time, given a specific event or phenomenon. The assessment of a trend of change through time, on the basis of the time parameter which is estimated at different successive occasions during a period of time, is also considered. In addition, a dispersion parameter is calculated which identifies whether change is consistent at each time point. The issue of independence is taken into account both in relation to the time parameter and the dispersion parameter. An application of the ELMAC in a learning process is presented. The interpretation of the model parameters and the model fit statistics is consistent with expectations.     

The 'new career' changes: Understanding and managing anxiety

Extensive changes in work structure and conditions have been widely noted, and many more are predicted. The impact on individuals of these changes is examined. This generally involves the expectation of diminished job/work security, and a requirement for individuals to demonstrate greater responsibility and autonomy in the workplace. The importance and meaning of work to individuals is explored from a psychoanalytic perspective. Particular attention is given to ways in which the predicted changes may create anxiety, when there is a threat to such a significant aspect of human activity. It is suggested that those involved in the counselling process in the workplace or in career guidance may need special awareness of these issues, and the ways that they may manifest in the workplace. The concept of 'containment' is examined as a helpful notion in considering intervention approaches     

Silence and communication: nonverbal dialogue and therapeutic action

The subject of this article is silence as communication, with the starting point in the silences of three patients in treatment—in one of them his silences lasted up to a year. Silence is also seen as a specific dimension linked to speech, as the treatment of a third patient shows. The nonverbal interaction between patient and analyst is illustrated. This interaction led to a developmental process in each of the patients, characterized by fusion and separation processes, which included a development of three-dimensionality. The curative process taking place in each of the three, not through verbalisation but through the relation, is understood in the light of Modell's (1990) concept of “dependent/containing transference”. The treatment results demonstrate that the “dependent transference” is curative in itself when the therapeutic setting is maintained. The analyst's inner work during the dependent transference is described: a form of nonverbal participation and joint creativity in the intersubjective field.     

Transference symptom

Transference symptom is a hazy notion in Freud's writings. The notion is presented here as a particular moment in the crystallization of the transference neurosis. It results from a double cathexis of the analytic frame and the analyst resulting in a symbolic distortion that is represented plastically within the session, as occurs in dreams. The transference symptom proceeds from two different preconscious cathexes, one attached to the reality of the frame, the other to the drive linked to the analyst. A psychic space is thereby opened up for interpreting both the resistance and the unconscious derivatives of infantile conflict. The transference symptom is a compromise formation that includes the analyst and questions the countertransference stance. Three different analytic situations give rise to transference symptoms according to the relative balance between frame and process in the analytic encounter. The concept is compared with enactment.     

Measuring rationality independent of social desirability

The development of a test to measure Elli's concept of rationality is described. In the first study discussed, a 58-item test is developed to measure rationality, and the reliability and convergent validity of the test is described. In a second study, the discriminant validity of the test is examined. An attempt is also made to reduce social-desirability content in the test by eliminating items most highly correlated with a Social Desirability Scale. The final 44-item test is found to be high in both reliability and validity. The factor structure of the test is also examined.     

The Equiprobability Bias from a Mathematical and Psychological Perspective

The equiprobability bias (EB) is a tendency to believe that every process in which randomness is involved corresponds to a fair distribution, with equal probabilities for any possible outcome. The EB is known to affect both children and adults, and to increase with probability education. Because it results in probability errors resistant to pedagogical interventions, it has been described as a deep misconception about randomness: the erroneous belief that randomness implies uniformity. In the present paper, we show that the EB is actually not the result of a conceptual error about the definition of randomness. On the contrary, the mathematical theory of randomness does imply uniformity. However, the EB is still a bias, because people tend to assume uniformity even in the case of events that are not random. The pervasiveness of the EB reveals a paradox: The combination of random processes is not necessarily random. The link between the EB and this paradox is discussed, and suggestions are made regarding educational design to overcome difficulties encountered by students as a consequence of the EB.     

The PSYCHLAB programming system: A tool for developing experimental control programs

The PSYCHLAB system is designed to facilitate the task of writing experimental control programs. The system consists of two major components: (1) a collection of procedures and functions to facilitate presenting stimuli, collecting responses, and measuring response times and (2) a high-level language (LAB-TALK) designed to organize and sequence events in experiments. The PSYCHLAB system is formally an interpreter that will interpret programs written in LAB-TALK. The interpreter is customized to perform the detailed functions of each trial in an experiment. The occurrence of these trials is controlled by the LAB-TALK program. Thus, once a particular experimental paradigm has been represented in a customized version of the interpreter, many different experiments in that paradigm can be programmed by variations in the LAB-TALK program.     

The induced effect,vertical disparity,and stereoscopic theory

The induced effect is an apparent slant of a frontal plane surface around a vertical axis, resulting from vertical magnification of the image in one eye. It is potentially important in suggesting a role for vertical disparity in stereoscopic vision, as proposed by Helmholtz. The paper first discusses previous theories of the induced effect and their implications. A theory is then developed attributing the effect to the process by which the stereoscopic response to horizontal disparity is scaled for viewing distance and eccentricity. The theory is based on a mathematical analysis of vertical disparity gradients produced by surfaces at various distances and eccentricities relative to the observer. Vertical disparity is shown to be an approximately linear function of eccentricity, with a slope or gradient which decreases with observation distance. The effect of vertical magnification on such gradients is analyzed and shown to be consistent with a change in the eccentricity factor, but not the distance factor, required to scale horizontal disparity. The induced effect is shown to be an appropriate stereoscopic response to a zero horizontal disparity surface at the eccentricity indicated. However, since extraretinal convergence signals provide conflicting evidence about eccentricity, they may attenuate the induced effect from its mathematically predicted value. The discomfort associated with the induced effect is attributed to this conflict.     

Understanding the “Medicine” of Native American Traditional Values: An Integrative Review

A major goal of counseling is to promote the wellness of the client by promoting his or her optimum development through positive human change, and it is important for counselors to be able to informally assess and more fully understand Native American cultural values to promote the wellness of those clients. The cultural values of Native Americans are discussed, an integrative review of value studies conducted on Native Americans is presented, and a traditional Native American view of wellness is described with implications for counseling. You have noticed that everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because the Power of the World always works in circles, and everything tries to be round. … The sky is round, and I have heard that earth is round like a ball, and so are all the stars. The wind, in its greatest power, whirls. Birds make their nest in circles, for theirs is the same religion as ours. … Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back again to where they were. The life of a [person] is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves. (Black Elk, cited in Neihardt, 1959)     

Tarasoff v. confidentiality

The Tarasoff decision is discussed as a logical extension of evolving legal doctrine imposing a special duty on caretakers. The mental health professions are being held to a standard of negligence and perhaps even to a standard of strict liability. Tarasoff is viewed as a part of society's interest in using the information disclosed in confidential relationships as a means of social control. This in turn is seen as part of a disquieting trend to curtail First Amendment rights. The adversarial nature of the relationship between the 1974 Tarasoff decision and the constitutional rights of patients to privacy, confidentiality, and privilege is discussed. The author re-asserts: “As asepsis is to surgery, so is confidentiality to psychiatry” (Beigler, 1978, p. 255).     

A Thurstonian model for the dual pair (4IAX) discrimination method

The Institute for Perception, Richmond, Virginia In the dual pair method, the subject is presented with two stimuli in two pairs: One pair is composed of two samples of the same stimulus; the other pair is composed of two samples of different stimuli, one being the same as that in the identical pair. The task of the judge is to select the most different pair. The psychometric function for the dual pair method is derived and expressed in terms of a singly noncentral beta distribution. A table is provided that connects a measure of the degree of difference, d , to the probability of a correct response. This table assumes an unbiased observer and differencing decision rule. A table is provided to give an estimate of the variance of d¢, the experimental estimate of d. The power of the dual pair method is also investigated, and a formula to determine the sample size required to meet Type I and Type II error specifications is given. The dual pair method appears to be slightly less powerful than the duotrio and the triangular methods. Experimental investigation is needed to explore the dual pair in applied research work.     

Creating a Secure Family Base: Some Implications of Attachment Theory for Family Therapy

The aim of this article is to make attachment research findings available in a form that family therapists can use. In attachment theory, parents are conceptualized as providing a secure base from which a child can explore. Family therapists, however, need a systemic concept that goes beyond the parent/child dyad. The concept of a secure family base is proposed, in which a network of care is made available for all family members of whatever age so that all family members feel secure enough to explore, in the knowledge that support is available if needed. Factors that contribute to the security or insecurity of the family base are outlined. The overall aim of therapy is to establish a secure family base from which the family can explore new solutions to family problems both during and after therapy. The role of the therapist is to help to resolve conflicts that threaten relationships, and to explore relevant belief systems that may be contributing to a sense of insecurity. The conceptual framework presented allows for an integration of family therapy techniques and ideas into a coherent whole. A new school of family therapy is not proposed.     

Self as verb and the metaphor of dance: An explanation of the self discovery experience within a constructivist framework

The concept of self discovery within a constructivist framework is difficult to explain given the central assumption of constructivism that self is a created construct rather than an entity to be discovered. Two problems are identified as impediments to constructivist accounts of the self discovery experience: first, their failure to adequately account for the embodied experience of self, and second, the difficulties inherent in using self as a noun to express a process.
It is proposed that if self is considered as a verb, as the action of a body-subject, the verbal contortionism of referring to self as a process in a language that places self as an entity may be overcome. The notion of self as verb places the individual firmly in the role of active embodied participant in the experience of self. The metaphor of "self'" as "dance" is explored to emphasize the materiality of the human animal that is argued to be central to the experience of self discovery.     

Perceived risk: an experimental investigation of consumer behavior when buying wine

The purpose of this paper is to investigate differences in expressed attitude as a function of the manner in which information on perceived risk is communicated. The experiments are conducted through a choice‐based questionnaire to reflect the consumer‐oriented decision of the purchase of a bottle of wine based on posted prices. The experiments reported in this paper are based on questionnaires distributed to 323 participants in multiple samples and examine the behavior of people when faced with different information on the probability of loss. The present study demonstrates that changes in the manner in which information is presented, without any underlying change in problem structure, affects observed preferences when buying wine. The impact of perceived risk and character on the willingness to buy and to pay for a bottle is analyzed and show that price habits and perceived risk are the main factors affecting the willingness to pay for a bottle of wine. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.