Antiabortion Rhetoric and the Undermining of Choice: Women's Agency as Causing “Psychological Trauma” Following the Termination of a Pregnancy

Historically the antiabortion movement has opposed abortions through reference to the fetus' human status. However, recently there has been a rhetorical shift whereby abortion is criticized based on its alleged negative psychological impact on women, with some authors voicing concerns related to this medicalized repertoire undermining women's capacity to act as rational decision-makers. However, no research to date has systematically analyzed how women's agency over their abortions features in antiabortion rhetoric. In this article, through a discourse analysis of interviews with 15 antiabortion supporters, I explore how psychological concepts are employed to indirectly undermine women's agency to abort. Participants construct the termination of a pregnancy as psychologically damaging when women's agency is evident (e.g., in abortions or rape-pregnancy abortions). Women's choice also appears as enforced by society, victimizing them and removing accountability over it. However, unintentional termination (e.g., miscarriage) is constructed as “natural” and psychologically harmless due to the lack of agency. Overall, the pathologization of abortion through reference to psychological trauma stemming from the exercise of agency allows antiabortionists to naturalize motherhood and oppose abortions in an “objective,” depoliticized, nonrestrictive, and prowoman manner, without explicitly disregarding women's ability to choose or breaching Western norms of autonomy and freedom of choice.     

Is the Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act Guilty of Disability Discrimination?

South Africa's Choice on Termination of Pregnancy Act of 1996 implicitly expresses the attitude that the prenatal detection of foetal abnormality justifies selective abortion, even at a stage when abortion is in general morally prohibited. It will be argued that this attitude is logically incompatible with a simultaneous commitment to non-discrimination against persons with disabilities, in that the Act makes allowance for the subjection of beings that are considered to be morally significant, but that exhibit disabling characteristics, to worse treatment than their non-disabled counterparts, despite the fact that this differential treatment is not always justified by the presence of impairment.     

Posttraumatic Growth Following Trauma: Is Growth Accelerated or a Reflection of Cognitive Maturation?

Over the past two decades, there has been an exponential increase in studies investigating posttraumatic growth (PTG) in samples exposed to various traumatic experiences. The prevalence of PTG following trauma has been variable, and mixed findings have emerged pertaining to factors associated with PTG. To date, however, there has been a notable paucity of research that has considered the PTG phenomenon in relation to lifespan developmental, cognitive, and humanistic theories. The objective of this review is to evaluate the prominent theory of PTG proposed by Tedeschi and Calhoun (1996 Tedeschi, R. G. & Calhoun, L. G. (1996). The posttraumatic growth inventory: Measuring the positive legacy of trauma. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 9, 455–471.[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) in context of the theories of Erikson and Maslow, as well as Frankl's theory of meaning-making postadversity. Methodological issues are also considered to inform the advancement of future research in this field.     

Exploring Maternal Grief: A Mixed-Methods Investigation of Mothers’ Responses to the Death of a Child From Cancer

This study investigated the meaning-making phenomena underlying the responses of 13 bereaved mothers to the death of a child from cancer. Using a mixed-methods research design incorporating constructivist data collection methods, we found specific characteristics, coping processes, and factors to distinguish adaptive as opposed to complicated grief responses to this type of loss. However, the findings did not distinguish the bereaved mothers themselves as “adaptive” or “complicated grievers,” as they all evidenced both types of responses to their loss within or across different datasets. Despite this finding, the mothers’ results varied in terms of the proportions of adaptive as compared to complicated grief responses to their loss, which in turn were related to features of their self-construing, change or reinforcement of their world assumptions, ongoing relationship to their child and others in their social world, and management of loss- and restoration-oriented coping. Results suggest the utility of constructivist and cognitive coping models and methods in illuminating the experience of parental bereavement.     

From Desire to Civility: Is Xunzi a Hobbesian?

This article argues that, contrary to conventional wisdom, Xunzi’s and Hobbes’s understandings of human nature are qualitatively different, which is responsible for the difference in their respective normative political theory of a civil polity. This article has two main theses: first, where Hobbes’s deepest concern was with human beings’ unsocial passions, Xunzi was most concerned with human beings’ appetitive desires (yu 欲), material self-interest, and resulting social strife; second, as a result, where Hobbes strove to transform the pathological (anti-)politics of resentment into the politics of recognition by creating rational egalitarian citizenship under the all-encompassing constitutional sovereign power, Xunzi attempted to nourish human beings’ basic appetitive desires (yu 欲) by instituting a li 禮 ordered civil entity. This article concludes by showing how Confucian civility that Xunzi reconstructed by means of the li 禮 can effectively deal with unsocial passions.     

From Mental Health to Juvenile Justice: What Factors Predict This Transition?

We identify youth who are at risk for a critical transition from mental health to juvenile justice. A statewide longitudinal sample of Medicaid-eligible youth (aged 10–17) in the public mental health system (n = 5,455), during approximately one fiscal year (July 1, 1994–August 30, 1995), was used to determine the risk factors for, and timing of, a subsequent juvenile justice detention or commitment during the three subsequent fiscal years (1994–1997). Logistic regression and Cox Proportional Hazards modeling were used. Risk factors for juvenile justice detention or commitment included being: male, black or Hispanic, in junior high school, involuntarily admitted to mental health, having a DSM-IV diagnosis of conduct disorder, alcohol problems, a constellation of risk behavior, and receiving prior mental health services. Factors that accelerate the timing of detention or commitment in the juvenile justice system after a mental health visit included most of the general risk factors except risk behavior and involuntary admission were no longer significant and having a DSM-IV nonalcohol drug use diagnosis, antisocial behavior, and school problems became significant. Our study helps to identify youth who are at risk for multiple system use so that they may be provided appropriate services to prevent multiple system use.     

Good Grief—What Becomes of the Lost Relationship: Reply to Commentaries

In replying to the discussions of Gilbert Cole and Stefanie Solow Glennon, I focus on several issues raised, including the continuing intrapsychic relationship with a dead parent who may have been destructive to the patient; the analyst's facilitating role in enabling the patient to connect with, and construct the future of, the lost relationship; the potential meaning of an enactment with a bereaved patient; and some thoughts on the dyad's needs to work creatively postloss in multiple affective time zones.     

From Theravada to tantra: the making of an American tantric Buddhism?

This paper examines recent innovations in the American vipassana or insight community, specifically a current I identify as ‘West Coast Vipassana’ that has revisioned the Theravadin Buddhist goal of liberation, from a transcendental condition that demands a renunciation of the world, to an ‘embodied enlightenment’ that affirms everyday householder life as a site for awakening. I draw on Jeffrey J. Kripal's tantric transmission thesis to advance an essentially tantric hermeneutic of West Coast Vipassana. I argue that while West Coast Vipassana is originally based in Theravada Buddhism, an Asian renouncer tradition that sharply differentiates between the immanent and transcendent, it has taken a markedly tantric turn in America. I also note, however, that it considerably differs from traditional Buddhist tantric traditions such as Tibetan Buddhism or esoteric Japanese Buddhism in being distinctively modern and American.     

From contexts to circumstances of evaluation: is the trade-off always innocuous?

Both context relativists and circumstance-of-evaluation relativists agree that the traditional semantic interpretation of some sentence-types fails to deliver the adequate truth-conditions for the corresponding tokens. But while the context relativists argue that the truth-conditions of each token depend on its context of utterance—each token being thus associated with a distinct intension—circumstance-of-evaluation relativists preserve a unique intension for all the tokens by placing circumstances of evaluations under the influence of a certain ‘point of view’. The main difference between the two approaches is that only the former can operate locally. It is shown that, for this reason, circumstance-of-evaluation relativism makes erroneous semantic predictions about (relative) gradable adjectives.     

Reconfiguration of task-set: Is it easier to switch to the weaker task?

Switching between two tasks afforded by the same stimuli results in slower reactions and more errors on the first stimulus after the task changes. This “switch cost” is reduced, but not usually eliminated, by the opportunity to prepare for a task switch. While there is agreement that this preparation effect indexes a control process performed before the stimulus, the “residual” cost has been attributed to several sources: to a control process essential for task-set reconfiguration that can be carried out only after the stimulus onset, to probabilistic failure to engage in preparation prior to the stimulus, and to two kinds of priming from previous trials: positive priming of the now-irrelevant task set and inhibition of the now-relevant task-set. The main evidence for the carry-over of inhibition is the observation that it is easier to switch from the stronger to the weaker of a pair of tasks afforded by the stimulus than vice versa. We survey available data on interactions between task switching and three manipulations of relative task strength: pre-experimental experience, stimulus-response compatibility, and intra-experimental practice. We conclude that it is far from universally true that it is easier to switch to the weaker task. Either inhibition of the stronger task-set is a strategy used only in the special case of extreme inequality in strength, or its consequences for later performance may be masked by slower post-stimulus control operations for more complex tasks. Inhibitory priming may also be stimulus specific. Received: 31 March 1999 / Accepted: 23 July 1999     

Respect for the Dignity of People: What Does This Principle Mean in Practice?

Researchers have found that disrespectful behaviour can have a notable psychological impact on victims and observers thereof. It is not surprising, therefore, that law and all the major psychology codes of ethics acknowledge the principle of respect for the dignity of persons. The practical implications of this principle, however, are not clear. In this article we argue, with reference to the philosophical roots of the principle, that there are rules of manners in all societies that describe how people should demonstrate respect for persons. Generally, the profession cannot require psychologists to adhere to the rules of manners, not even those that demonstrate respect for persons, but it can, and does, prescribe to psychologists how they should act while they practice as psychologists. We proceed to examine the principles and standards of the Australian Psychology Society's Code of Ethics (2007) that require psychologists to demonstrate respect for persons while acting as psychologists.     

Is Religious Coping Related to Better Quality of Life Following Acute Myocardial Infarction?

Although few studies have examined the extent to which religiousness is related to better well-being following acute myocardial infarction (AMI), studies from the broader literature suggest that positive religious coping may be helpful while more negative forms of religious coping may be related to poorer well-being. To assess the relationship between positive and negative religious coping and depressive symptoms in patients with AMI, we collected data twice over a 1-month period from 56 patients hospitalized with a first AMI. Controlling for demographic variables and social support, both positive and negative religious coping were independently related to higher levels of depressive symptoms both in hospital and at a one-month follow-up. Further, even when controlling for baseline depressive symptoms, religious coping predicted higher subsequent depressive symptoms. These results suggest that religious coping appears to be maladaptive in dealing with acute MI, perhaps because this type of recovery requires more active forms of coping.     

When Is It Ethical for Physician-Investigators to Seek Consent From Their Own Patients?

Classic statements of research ethics advise against permitting physician-investigators to obtain consent for research participation from patients with whom they have preexisting treatment relationships. Reluctance about “dual-role” consent reflects the view that distinct normative commitments govern physician–patient and investigator–participant relationships, and that blurring the research–care boundary could lead to ethical transgressions. However, several features of contemporary research demand reconsideration of the ethics of dual-role consent. Here, we examine three arguments advanced against dual-role consent: that it creates role conflict for the physician-investigator; that it can compromise the voluntariness of the patient-participant’s consent; and that it promotes therapeutic misconceptions. Although these concerns have merit in some circumstances, they are not dispositive in all cases. Rather, their force—and the ethical acceptability of dual-role consent—varies with features of the particular study. As research participation more closely approximates usual care, it becomes increasingly acceptable, or even preferable, for physicians to seek consent for research from their own patients. It is time for a more nuanced approach to dual-role consent.     

Is the Non-rivalrousness of Intellectual Objects a Problem for the Moral Justification of Economic Rights to Intellectual Property?

It is often argued that the fact that intellectual objects—objects like ideas, inventions, concepts, and melodies—can be used by several people simultaneously makes intellectual property rights impossible or particularly difficult to morally justify. In this article, I assess the line of criticism of intellectual ownership in connection with a central category of intellectual property rights, economic rights to intellectual property. I maintain that it is unconvincing.