A Randomized Trial of Attention Training for Generalized Social Phobia: Does Attention Training Change Social Behavior?

The use of attention training protocols for the treatment of generalized social anxiety disorder (SAD) is undergoing increased examination. Initial investigations were positive but more recent investigations have been less supportive of the treatment paradigm. One significant limitation of current investigations is overreliance on self-report. In this investigation, we expanded on initial investigations by using a multimodal assessment of patient functioning (i.e., including behavioral assessment). Patients with a primary diagnosis of SAD (n = 31) were randomly assigned to eight sessions of attention training (n = 15) or placebo/control (n = 16). Participants were assessed at pre- and posttreatment via self- and clinician-report of social anxiety as well as anxious and behavioral response to two in vivo social interactions. Results revealed no differences between groups at posttreatment for all study outcome variables, suggesting a lack of effect for the attention training condition. The results are concordant with recent investigations finding a lack of support for the use of attention training as an efficacious treatment for patients with SAD.     

Can We Consume Our Way Out of Climate Change? A Call for Analysis

The problem of climate change is analyzed as a manifestation of economic growth, and the steady-state economy of ecological economics is proposed as a system-wide solution. Four classes of more specific solutions are described. In the absence of analysis, cultural inertia will bias solutions in favor of green consumption as a generalized solution strategy. By itself, green consumption is a flawed solution to climate change because it perpetuates or even accelerates economic growth that is incompatible with a sustainable culture. Addressing climate change requires an integration of regulatory, energy efficiency, skill-based, and dissemination solutions. Behavioral scientists are encouraged to work with others in ecological economics and other social sciences who recognize cultural reinvention as a means of achieving sustainability.     

A “Manual” for Escaping Our Vicious Cycles: The Political Relevance of Enemy-Love

In his 2017 World Day of Peace message, Pope Francis made a subtle yet stunning move when he called the Sermon on the Mount the Church’s “manual” for peacemaking at every level. Continuing the “fresh reappraisal” of war that the Second Vatican Council launched, Francis's choice of a term associated with the “Manualist” tradition of natural-law casuistry signaled the Catholic magisterium’s growing commitment both to rooting its teaching on peace and war in biblical sources instead, and to active nonviolence in pursuit of just peace. Given centuries of dismissal of Jesus’s teaching as irrelevant to real-world politics by both Catholics and Protestants, reception of Francis’s signal will benefit both from fresh biblical exegesis and new insights into natural law. Informing the biblical side is the groundbreaking work by Glen Stassen on the triadic structure of Jesus’s teachings in Matthew 5-7, and its practical implications for just peacemaking. Informing the natural-law side are recent findings from social psychology and neuroanthropology on the role of mimesis in human formation. The two fields join in underscoring the creative power of what Stassen called transforming initiatives for breaking cycles of violence.     

A High By Any Other Name: Exploring the Motivations for Consumption of “Legal Highs”

A large number of legal, semi-legal, synthetic, and organic drugs are sold online or through commercial vendors as novelties, often labeled as “not for human consumption.” It is fairly common knowledge, however, that many, if not all, of the purchasers of such products buy them for personal use. This study conducted ethnographic interviews with 26 synthetic and organic drug users over a five month period. Using a grounded theory approach, the authors created a typology of users that fell into three general categories: Risk reducers (who saw these drugs as either safer or less likely to be detected than illegal drugs), plan “B” users (those who preferred illegal drugs but used these drugs when their preferred drugs were unavailable), and novelty seekers (who used these drugs experimentally, or simply for fun and recreation).     

A Family’s Coming Out Process: Systemic Change and Multiple Realities

The paucity of investigative studies exploring the coming out process of families was the impetus for this case study with a six member family-of-choice. In-depth interviews highlight the complexities of negotiating family rules, journey with the family as they struggled with their new identity, and reveal how the reflexive process contributed to the family’s co-creation of new stories. The four themes that emerged (embracing gay identity, integrating as a family, building social networks, and social awakening), offer details of how the family reconfigured from the rubble of confusion to become more cohesive, awakened and empowered. Implications for clinical practice with families with gay members are addressed.     

Specific Aptitude Theory Revisited: Is There Incremental Validity for Training Performance?

There has been controversy over the years about whether specific mental abilities increment validity for predicting performance above and beyond the validity for general mental ability (GMA). Despite its appeal, specific aptitude theory has received only sporadic empirical support. Using more exact statistical and measurement methods and a larger data set than previous studies, this study provides further evidence that specific aptitude theory is not tenable with regard to training performance. Across 10 jobs, differential weighting of specific aptitudes and specific aptitude tests were found not to improve the prediction of training performance over the validity of GMA. Implications of this finding for training research and practice are discussed.     

Theory for the mechanism of action of “miracle fruit”

The action of miracle fruit in changing the quality of a sour stimulus to that of sweet is hypothesized as being caused by blocking of the sour receptor sites. It is assumed, according to a new theory that holds that proton acceptors are sweet-evoking, that many sour stimuli are also simultaneously stimuli for the sweet receptors. However, the resulting sweet information is strongly inhibited by the sour system, so that sweet is not reported.     

“That's Not Analytic”: Theory Pressure and “Chaotic Possibilities” in Analytic Training

Hoping to create my own analytic voice, I experienced complex pressure to conform to the venerated rules of American ego psychology. I could find myself looking over my shoulder, and my training could become saturated with received ideas. Using complex systems theory as a ground, I contrast the constricting pressure to conform that I experienced with three supervisors with the openness that I found with my fourth. I propose that analytic training is a nonlinear, complex developmental process that occurs in a space of “chaotic possibilities” (Glatzer-Levy, 2004)     

A Critique of Langsam's “The Theory of Appearing Defended”

In this paper we consider, and reject, Harold Langsams defenceof the Theory of Appearing, in this journal (1997), in the faceof three standard arguments against it. These arguments are:the argument from hallucination; the argument from the samecause-same effect principle; and the argument from perceptualtime-gap.     

Problem Drinking: A Problem for the Theory of Reasoned Action?1

The present study examined the sufficiency of the theory of reasoned action (TRA) to predict intention and behavior with respect to problem drinking, as well as the ability of the theory of planned behavior (TPB) to predict intention and behavior over and above the TRA. The role of perceived control in the TPB was also examined. A 12-year longitudinal study on alcohol and drug use attitudes and behavior provided the context for this investigation. Two criterion variables were examined: intention to get drunk and frequency of getting drunk. It was hypothesized that heavier drinkers would perceive less control over their drinking. Coincidentally, the TRA, which assumes the behavior being predicted is volitional, would become less predictive as drinking became heavier. Furthermore, the TPB, which extends the TRA to include perceived (volitional) control over the behavior would be more predictive of intention and behavior than the TRA. All three hypotheses were supported. In addition, perceived control proved to be differentially predictive for nonproblem and problem drinkers. Specifically, perceived control contributed to the prediction of intention to get drunk for nonproblem drinkers, but to the prediction of behavior (frequency of getting drunk) for problem drinkers. Implications of these results for theory development and application are discussed.     

The “Hidden” Technology of Effective Parent Consultation: A Guided Participation Model for Promoting Change in Families

Parenting interventions based on social learning principles are amongst the most effective interventions available to prevent and manage social, emotional and behavioral problems in children and adolescents. The most successful programs employ active skills training methods (modeling, rehearsal, practice, feedback and homework) to teach new parenting skills. However, effective parent consultation also involves a broader range of interpersonal and process skills such as building a collaborative relationship, facilitating parent receptivity to new ideas or skills, managing within session resistance, and important micro skills associated with clinical tasks such as promoting parents self-regulation, independent problem solving and autonomy. This paper aims to articulate the “hidden” technology of effective parent consultation and identify implications for research on mechanisms of change in parenting interventions and practitioner training.     

Training and education for therapeutic practitionership: “Trans-modern” perspectives

In this paper I revisit the theme of therapy training, examined in this journal a decade ago in House (1996 House, R. 1996. The professionalization of counselling: A coherent ‘case against’?. Counselling Psychology Quarterly, 9(4): 343–358. [Taylor & Francis Online] [Google Scholar]. I first outline what I mean by the term “trans-modern” in the context of debates about “postmodern” and deconstructive approaches to therapy. I then explore the configuration that therapy training might plausibly take when technological rationality's positivistic certainties are dramatically undermined, and the path to becoming a therapy practitioner coheres more closely with the trans-modern, “New Paradigm” Zeitgeist–a world-view which both acknowledges the (albeit unbalanced) contributions of modernity, yet takes us well beyond modernity's constraining limitations. To illustrate my argument I focus on and problematize the role of theory in therapy training. I conclude with some speculations about plausible paths that a trans-modern approach to therapy training might profitably take in future.     

Where To From Here for the Psychology of Social Change? Future Directions for Theory and Practice

For a vibrant and viable psychology of social change it is necessary to examine its place and contribution to the societal processes it seeks to understand, explain, and (potentially) affect. In this article, we first consider the impact that research and theorizing on social change (should) have and related issues of how we communicate about our work (and to whom) and dilemmas around researchers being active participants in the change process. Second, we consider emerging trends in the field and comment on meta‐theoretical and “meta‐methodological” issues in going forward, including the interaction between individual and society, having theoretical models of the person that allow us to account for such an interaction, as well as rethinking our methodology and ways of “doing” psychology to better reflect people's experiences of mobilization and participation. In line with the proposed rethinking of our theories and methods, the final section introduces a new paradigm for investigating the nexus of social change and leadership dynamics. The overall aim of the article is to reflect on key questions and dilemmas facing the field and provide some starting points for debating and shaping its future.     

The “Religiously Mediated Change” of 11 Gay Men: A Case of Unexceptional Sublimation

This article addresses the current controversy in churches concerning homosexuality, especially the claim that the sexual orientation of homosexual males may be changed through religious interventions. Following personal accounts of the uses of “religiously mediated change” discourse in discussions of homosexuality in mainstream Protestant churches, the article focuses on the frequently cited article by Pattison and Pattison (1980) that evaluates 11 white males “who claimed to have changed sexual orientation from exclusive homosexuality to exclusive heterosexuality through participation in a Pentecostal church fellowship” (p. 1553). We evaluate the article in terms of its research design, findings, and conclusions; discuss its claim that the men “changed” in light of Freud’s concept of the sublimation of socially unacceptable psychic energies; and assess the Pentecostal church’s contention that homosexuality is an expression of psychological immaturity. We conclude that in light of the fact that the sublimation of sexual desires and impulses is a common experience among men, and homosexuality is not an expression of psychological immaturity, “religiously mediated change” discourse needs to go beyond claiming that change is possible and present a convincing argument that the change, if effected, will have demonstrable benefits to humanity that would not be realizable if the change did not occur.     

A Review of “Relational Competence Theory: Research and Mental Health Applications”

Within the Couple and Family Therapy literature, there are few articles directly linking theory to treatment within the lesbian community. Utilizing contextual theory, the author presents a gay affirmative therapeutic approach to work with lesbian couples. The fundamental concepts of contextual therapy are uniquely suited for work with lesbian clients; particularly the four dimensions of individual psychology, relational ethics, systemic interaction, and facts. A case study is presented to highlight this therapeutic process. This article is one step in a larger systemic change related to the challenge of adapting theoretical methodology and gathering evidence for effective treatment of marginalized groups.