Avicenna's Conception of the Efficient Cause

The concept of efficient causation originates with Aristotle, who states that the types of cause include ‘the primary source of the change or rest’. For Medieval Aristotelians, the scope of efficient causality includes creative acts. The Islamic philosopher Avicenna is an important contributor to this conceptual change. In his Metaphysics, Avicenna defines the efficient cause or agent as that which gives being to something distinct from itself. As previous studies of Avicenna's ‘metaphysical’ conception of the efficient cause attest, it takes God as a model agent. This essay considers whether Avicenna's ‘metaphysical’ conception of the efficient cause applies to natural agents. It ultimately argues that Avicenna offers a unified view of the efficient cause, which includes both divine and natural agents. On this view, an efficient cause gives being to another and is simultaneous with its effect. While Avicenna's defence of this view is an important chapter in the history of the concept of the efficient cause, it is also of interest in its own right. By appeal to a version of the principle of sufficient reason, it challenges a widespread view that causes are temporally prior to their effects.     

An eight-eyed version of Hawkins and Shohet's clinical supervision model: the addition of the cognitive analytic therapy concept of the ‘observing eye/I’ as the ‘observing us’

This paper proposes incorporating the concept of the ‘observing eye/I’, from cognitive analytic therapy (CAT), to Hawkins and Shohet's seven modes of supervision, comprising their transtheoretical model of supervision. Each mode is described alongside explicit examples relating to CAT. This modification using a key idea from CAT (in the form of the addition of a Mode 8 ‘observing us’) enhances the model's utility in supervisory practice. With this adaptation, the model could also be used, with greater breadth and depth, in therapies where the primary focus is not relational. The collaboratively reflexive ‘observing us’ ensures that the very process of supervision is effectively monitored and attended to. The inclusion of this eighth level leads to more formal emphasis on the meta communication and meta commentary levels in supervision.     

Some considerations about personality structure in child psychosis

This paper begins by describing the three main areas that can be addressed in seeking to bring about change in parent?–?infant work, and questions the extent to which a brief therapy model may be generally effective. Following a clinical example, there is a discussion of the nature of the process of change with this particular population. Drawing on ideas from Paula Heimann and others it is suggested that the ‘ghost in the nursery’ described by Fraiberg represents an ‘unassimilated object’ that may frequently be projected on to the infant but is also likely to appear elsewhere. It is argued that, especially if therapy relieves the infant of this projection, it will most often manifest its presence in the couple's relationship. In consequence, it is this relationship that should be a primary focus for our interventions, particularly as this also provides the essential context for the infant's psychological development.     

Counselling in general practice: Clients' perceptions of significant events and outcome

An investigation of clients' perceptions of the change process and outcome of counselling in primary care is presented. Significant events were identified by 51 clients post-session for a mean of 4.7 counselling sessions. Outcome was assessed by clients, through their perceptions of goal attainment and change in quality of life from pre-to post-counselling. Four-hundred-and-nine events were categorized by use of the Therapeutic Impact Content Analysis System (TICAS) and a content analysis system was created to categorize clients' goals. Results showed that ‘reassurance’, ‘problem solution ’, ‘insight’ and ‘involvement’ impacts were reported most frequently by clients. No category of significant events was related to change in quality of life. For 11 clients who set goals in the ‘expression’ category, more ‘reassurance’ and fewer ‘problem solution’ impacts were related to attainment of ‘expression’. Some suggestions are made for the lack of significant relationships with overall measures of outcome and it was suggested that more qualitative analysis of the process of outcome is needed.     

On measuring the minimum detection time: A simple reaction time study in the time estimation paradigm

Kornblum's time estimation paradigm, together with the so‐called ‘race model’, provides an appealing alternative for measuring the ‘cut‐off’ which separates ‘true’ reaction times from anticipatory reaction times. However, the model is not precise enough to reveal the relation between the signal intensity and the ‘cut‐off’. Accordingly, Kornblum's model is extended with an emphasis on the measure of the ‘cut‐off’. Another aspect of the extension is to use a parametric method to analyse the data. In particular, it is assumed that the time estimation‐induced latency is gamma distributed and the signal‐induced latency is Weibull distributed, with the latter shifted by the ‘cut‐off’. The rationale behind the parametric assumption is discussed. For illustrative purposes, two pieces of experimental work are presented. Since the core of the race model is the assumption of an independent race between the time estimation process and the detection process, the first experiment tests whether, for the same signal intensity, the signal‐induced latency distribution is invariant across different time intervals; the second experiment tests whether, for the same time interval, the time estimation‐induced latency distribution is invariant across different signal intensity conditions. The data from the second experiment are also used to test various parametric assumptions in the model, which include the signal effect on the ‘cut‐off’. The new model fits the data well.     

Cognitive models of stereotype change: (1). Generalization and subtyping in young people's views of the police

We report investigations of change in, and cognitive representation of young people's stereotypes of the police, in response to a police-schools liaison programme. This programme provides a real-life application of the ‘conversion’ model of stereotype change (in which stereotypes change radically in response to salient instances of disconfirming information). Study 1 revealed that school police officers were rated significantly more positively than the police in general, but that this view did not generalize to perceptions of the police in general. Stereotypes of the police became less positive over one year, although females were more positive than males, and school police officers were not judged typical of the category. Study 2 revealed that subjects categorized their school police officer separately from the police in general, and perceived him to share features with ‘caring and welfare’ professions, rather than other police officers and authority figures. Both studies converge on the limitations of the conversion model and tend to support the subtyping model (in which extremely disconfirming individuals are isolated from other group members).     

Cognitive models of stereotype change: (2) Perceptions of homogeneous and heterogeneous groups

The reported study compared change in stereotypic perceptions of homogeneous and heterogeneous groups, when subjects were presented with a pattern of stereotype-inconsistent information that was either concentrated in two extreme group members or dispersed across six members. Results pro vided some support for the ‘conversion’ model (in which stereotypes change in response to salient instances) in the case of a homogeneous group, where stereotypical responding was lower in concentrated than dispersed conditions. In the heterogeneous-group conditions, there was no effect of pattern. In addition, subjects' estimates of stereotype-consistent information were higher, and of inconsistent information were lower, and they perceived more members as typical, and fewer as atypical, when the target group was heterogeneous versus homogeneous. There was also support for the ‘subtyping’ model (in which disconfirming individuals are isolated from other group members) in the concentrated conditions. A theoretical account of these findings is given in terms of stereotype change via salience for homogeneous groups, and the need to integrate research on cognitive models of stereotype change and perceived group variability.     

The role of media in road safety education for young children

This study compares the effectiveness of two videotaped traffic safety messages, both concerning crossing the road in the vicinity of parked cars. In the ‘instructional’ version the message was presented according to the principles generally used in media presentations for children. The ‘modelling’ version closely followed social learning principles. Both versions were presented to subjects 5 years of age. The subjects were pre-tested and post-tested on crossing the road and their comprehension of the film content was tested after presentation. The ‘modelling’ version resulted in a significant increase in the children's capacity to demonstrate the crossing behaviour, whereas the ‘instructional’ version did not. The comprehension test demonstrated that children exposed to the ‘modelling’ version also showed a significantly higher level of understanding. The conclusion is drawn that traditional media presentations are not successful in effectuating behavioural change in young children. Presentations which follow ‘modelling’ principals and are adapted to the developmental characteristics of the audience can improve young children's behaviour capabilities and can as such be an important part of educational programmes such as road safety which aim at causing behavioural change in young children.     

Tuning into the psychotic wavelength: Psychoanalytic supervision for mental health professionals

In this paper, material is presented from supervision groups run for mental health professionals in different mental health settings. I will argue that a psychoanalytic framework, which puts the transference and countertransference at the centre of clinical practice, offers an important model for thinking about psychosis and psychotic means of communication. When staff are able to ‘tune in’ to their patients' communications it can help to change a patient's monologue about his/her delusional world into a meaningful dialogue about their emotional world.     

The image schema and innate archetypes: theoretical and clinical implications

Based in contemporary neuroscience, Jean Knox's 2004 JAP paper ‘From archetypes to reflective function’ honed her position on image schemas, thereby introducing a model for archetypes which sees them as ‘reliably repeated early developmental achievements’ and not as genetically inherited, innate psychic structures. The image schema model is used to illustrate how the analyst worked with a patient who began life as an unwanted pregnancy, was adopted at birth and as an adult experienced profound synchronicities, paranormal/telepathic phenomena and visions. The classical approach to such phenomena would see the intense affectivity arising out of a ruptured symbiotic mother‐infant relationship constellating certain archetypes which set up the patient's visions. This view is contrasted with Knox's model which sees the archetype an sich as a developmentally produced image schema underpinning the emergence of later imagery. The patient's visions can then be understood to arise from his psychoid body memory related to his traumatic conception and birth. The contemporary neuroscience which supports this view is outlined and a subsequent image schema explanation is presented. Clinically, the case material suggests that a pre‐birth perspective needs to be explored in all analytic work. Other implications of Knox's image schema model are summarized.     

Conceptualizing cultural and gendered identities in psychological therapies

This paper addresses implications for psychological therapies and practices of recognizing the varieties of ways ‘race' and gender intersect and impact on therapeutic relationships. We illustrate how ‘race' and gender have either eluded analysis or been treated in oversimplified ways that disallow their interchange and varieties of forms, and impoverish the recognition and process of therapeutic change. Debates about ‘race' and gender in psychotherapy are situated within more general discussions about theorizing whiteness as a normalized cultural absence. This is used to inform how ethnic minorities in Britain, and specifically minority women, have been represented in (and omitted from) the psychiatric and psychotherapeutic literature. Common claims about cultural specificity (or its converse, universality) in psychological therapies, the grounds on which they are offered and their discursive consequences are evaluated. The case is made for therapy as an inevitably intercultural enterprise, while also cautioning against some prevalent misconceptions of intercultural approaches. The final substantive section develops the conceptual arguments proposed in relation to debates about culturally relevant and appropriate models in psychological therapies, including a critical commentary on the uses of gender, cultural and racial ‘matching'. Finally, implications for the training and practices of mental health professionals are discussed.     

Deduction,inference and illation

From the standpoint of the theory of medicine, a formulation is given of three types of reasoning used by physicians. The first is deduction from probability models (as in prognosis or genetic counseling for Mendelian disorders). It is a branch of mathematics that leads to predictive statements about outcomes of individual events in terms of known formal assumptions and parameters. The second type is inference (as in interpreting clinical trials). In it the arguments from replications of the same process (‘data’) lead to conclusions about the parameters of a system, without calling into question either the probabilistic model or the criteria of evidence. The third is illation (as in the elucidation of symptoms in a patient). It is a process whereby, in the light of the total evidence and the conclusions from the other types of reasoning, one may modify, expand, simplify or demolish a conceptual framework proposed for deductions, and modify the nature of the evidence sought, the criteriology, the axioms, and the surmised complexity of the scientific theory. (The process of diagnosis as applied to a patient may in extreme cases lead to the discovery of an entirely new disease with its own, quite new, set of diagnostic criteria. This course cannot be accommodated inside either of the other two types of reasoning.) Illation has something of the character of Kuhn's ‘scientific revolution’ in physics; but it differs in that it is the nature, not the degree or frequency of change that distinguishes it from Kuhn's ‘normal science.’     

The Chicago school and the study of organization-environment relations

The ecological perspective on organizational change represents the most significant development in contemporary organization research. The two reigning paradigms explain organizational change in terms of ‘environmental selection’ and ‘adaptation,’ respectively. What is generally unrecognized is that these developments are anticipated in the writings of the Chicago School of Sociology–specifically in their model of Ecological, Economic, and Cultural Organization. Their writings also provide a novel examination of organization-environment relations in terms of natural history, social organization and disorganization, and social control. The Chicago School investigations did not contribute directly to recent developments. Their theoretical approach was neither formalized in published work nor persistently adopted in research efforts, and at the end of Chicago's dominance it became obscured. Many elements of the Chicago model have nonetheless continued in the writings of community theorists linked to Chicago. It is from these theorists that contemporary organization research has drawn its ecological perspective.     

A slow unfolding – at double speed: reflections on ways of working with parents and their young children within the Tavistock clinic's under fives service

This paper describes clinical work carried out as part of the Tavistock Clinic Under Fives Service, which offers brief focused psychoanalytically based interventions to families with young children, as well as longer-term work. It elaborates psychoanalyst Annette Watillon's idea that it is the dramatic way in which children enact their (and their family's) predicament in the consulting room which speeds up the process of change. The author clusters clinical cases into three categories, each cluster representing a different kind of ‘dramatic’ enactment and leading to a different kind of intervention relating to the therapist's role, the structure of the interventions and the ‘ports of entry’ for the work. The categories are defined as: ‘child-led drama’ with the therapist in the role of ‘therapeutic observer’; ‘internal parental drama’ with the therapist in the role of ‘therapeutic consultant’; and ‘external parental drama’ with the therapist in the role of ‘therapeutic modulator’. The author defines these categories, illustrating each category with clinical examples.     

The empathizing–systemizing (E–S) model of autism and psychoanalytic theories of truth,play and symbolization

Little psychoanalytic material or theory features today in psychological work on autism and autistic traits and vice versa. Baron-Cohen's (2003) empathizing–systemizing (E–S) model of the autism spectrum posits two main clusters of autistic features: those surrounding impaired empathy, and those surrounding heightened systemizing behaviours. (Baron-Cohen, 2009) speculates that the common root of these two clusters is the individual's concept of truth. Psychoanalysis has addressed the related issue of internal and external reality since (Freud, 1897) differentiated ‘psychic’ from ‘historical’ truths. This could be of interest to those espousing the E–S model from a cognitive paradigm, as a ‘truth’-oriented cognitive style in autism may develop interdependently with the individual's experience of internal and external realities. Psychoanalysis has developed further ideas of relevance to the E–S model surrounding play and symbolization, the latter being an often-overlooked aspect of Wing and Gould's (1979) triad of autistic features. Seen from a psychodynamic perspective, the E–S model might provide a means to increase therapists' awareness of milder autistic traits amongst service users and analysands. Equally, it could offer a tool to structure empirical research into psychodynamic therapy with autism spectrum conditions.     

Minority Group Membership and Perceptions of Self-help: Evidence from Israel

This study explores the meanings associated with the term ‘self-help’ in the general Arab population in Israel. It compares these associated meanings across various groups created by several demographic variables. The Arab population in Israel numbers nearly one million, comprising 18% of the total population of the state. The study used a random sample of 250 participants, representative of the general Arab population in Israel. Data was collected in a telephone survey which lasted 3–7 minutes. Three themes surfaced as the most prevalent meanings associated with the concept ‘self-help’: the individual meaning, which refers to one's ability to solve one's own problems and to rely on one's own strengths and resources; helping the ‘other’; and helping the needy. Significant differences in the associated meanings of the self-help concept related to level of education, marital status, and whether the respondent had heard of the self-help concept. The significance of the findings is discussed within several frames of reference. First, they are examined within the context of a particular minority culture which is constantly interacting with Israeli Jewish cultural values and is undergoing a change from traditional systems of values to modern Western ones. Second, the universal and particular attributes of the self-help phenomenon are outlined. Third, the initial developmental stages of self-help organizations within the Arab population living in Israel are discussed.     

Li in East Asian Buddhism: One Approach from Plato's Parmenides

In Plato's Parmenides, Socrates proposes a ‘Day’ analogy to express one possible model of part/whole relations. His analogy is swiftly rejected and replaced with another analogy, that of the ‘Sail’. In this paper, it is argued that there is a profound difference between these two analogies and that the ‘Day’ represents a distinct way to think about part/whole relations. This way of thinking, I argue, is the standard way of thinking in East Asian Buddhism. Plato's ‘Day’ analogy can then be used to illuminate the meaning of an opaque but very important concept in East Asian Buddhism: li, which in this paper is developed as a modal concept of ‘Wholeness’.     

A qualitative exploration of the motor skills required for elite triathlon performance

PurposeThe purpose of this research was to investigate the beliefs, attitudes, and experiences of stakeholders in youth triathlon regarding the important motor subskills that are required to be successful at the elite level of triathlon competition.MethodTwenty-five participants were recruited from five stakeholder groups in triathlon and interviewed via video conference. A constructionist and relativist approach to thematic analysis was used to identify three first order themes and several second order themes.ResultsThe first, first order theme was ‘Continuous Motor Skills' which consisted of the invariant features of triathlon's continuous motor skills and the parameterization of continuous motor skills. The second, first order theme was ‘Discrete Motor Skills' and consisted of discrete motor skills involved with cornering and change of direction in each discipline and transition phases in triathlon. The final first order theme was ‘Adaptability in Continuous and Discrete Motor Skills'.ConclusionThis research provides a novel and more broad understanding of the beliefs, attitudes, and experiences of stakeholders in triathlon regarding important motor skills that are required to succeed at the elite level of the sport. This novel and broad understanding of important triathlon motor skills has theoretical implications for evaluating triathlon performance with skill acquisition as a primary focus. Additionally, this research is practically important for coaches, administrators, and athletic performance staff who design training programs and pathways for young, developing triathletes.