Forensic-psychologic-psychiatric assessment from the viewpoint of perpetrators--data from a survey

In this contribution, various aspects of the expert/culprit-relationship and of the communication behavior styles between the included persons within the scope of forensic-psychological-psychiatric expertise, are discussed. A survey is given on results gained with a questionnaire study (n = 93 culprits; Department of Forensic Psychiatry, Charité Berlin) of the most important expectations, of the social-relevant attitudes towards the assessment and physicians before the forensic investigation as well as of the experiences of own feelings, stress and of the culprit's reflections on the physician/proband relationship after the assessment. A good partnership relation between experts and culprits presupposes that the expert not only possesses a high profession but also the necessary interpersonal-social competence.     

Learning from text benefits from enactment

Classical studies on enactment have highlighted the beneficial effects of gestures performed in the encoding phase on memory for words and sentences, for both adults and children. In the present investigation, we focused on the role of enactment for learning from scientific texts among primary-school children. We assumed that enactment would favor the construction of a mental model of the text, and we verified the derived predictions that gestures at the time of encoding would result in greater numbers of correct recollections and discourse-based inferences at recall, as compared to no gestures (Exp. 1), and in a bias to confound paraphrases of the original text with the verbatim text in a recognition test (Exp. 2). The predictions were confirmed; hence, we argue in favor of a theoretical framework that accounts for the beneficial effects of enactment on memory for texts.     

聚焦两会·佛教界代表委员的声音

帕松列龙庄勐:保护少数民族语言文字,铸牢中华民族共同体意识全国政协常委、中国佛教协会副会长、云南省佛教协会副会长帕松列龙庄勐,提交了关于传承历史和保护少数民族语言文字,铸牢中华民族共同体意识的提案。帕松列龙庄勐在提案中指出,在传承傣族民族语言文字方面,南传佛教僧团可以“辅助双语教学”“辅助做好宣传资料双语互译的工作”“配合做好傣族传统、风俗保护的工作”。     

The emergence of a novel representation from action: evidence from preschoolers

Recent work in embodied cognition has proposed that representations and actions are inextricably linked. The current study examines a developmental account of this relationship. Specifically, we propose that children’s actions are foundational for novel representations. Thirty‐two preschoolers, aged 3.4 to 5.7 years, were asked to solve a set of simple gear‐system problems. Participants’ motions and verbalizations were coded to establish the strategies they used. The preschoolers initially solved the problems by simulating the turning and pushing of the gears. Subsequently, most participants discovered a new representation of the problems: the turning direction of the gears alternates. Results show that the number of actions that embodied alternation information, during their simulation of the system, predicted the later emergence of the higher‐order representation (i.e. that the gears alternate turning direction). Thus, it appears that the preschoolers discovered a new representation based on their own actions. These results are consistent with the developmental embodiment hypothesis: actions are central to the emergence of new representations.     

Distinguishing states of awareness from confidence during retrieval: evidence from amnesia

Two experiments were conducted to determine whether recollective experience is distinguishable from confidence. In Experiment 1, we tested college participants in a within-subjects design and replicated Gardiner and Java's (1990) findings from a between-subjects design. We observed higher remember judgments for words than for nonwords, but higher know judgments for nonwords than for words. For confidence judgments, we obtained greater sure than unsure responses for both words and nonwords. In Experiment 2, we tested amnesic participants and matched control participants. Control participants produced the same pattern of results as college participants, but the results of amnesic participants diverged in an important way. For confidence judgments, the amnesic participants, like the control and college participants, made more sure than unsure judgments to both words and nonwords. But for recollective judgments, amnesic participants did not produce the crossover interaction for words and nonwords. This striking difference between the performance of memory-intact and amnesic participants demonstrates that recollective judgments and confidence that accompany retrieval are not isomorphic psychological experiences.     

Meaning from syntax: Evidence from 2-year-olds

When toddlers view an event while hearing a novel verb, the verb’s syntactic context has been shown to help them identify its meaning. The current work takes this finding one step further to reveal that even in the absence of an accompanying event, syntactic information supports toddlers’ identification of verb meaning. Two-year-olds were first introduced to dialogues incorporating novel verbs either in transitive or intransitive sentences, but in the absence of any relevant referent scenes (see Yuan & Fisher, 2009). Next, toddlers viewed two candidate scenes: (a) two participants performing synchronous actions, (b) two participants performing a causative action. When asked to “find mooping”, toddlers who had heard transitive sentences chose the causative scene; those who had heard intransitive sentences did not. These results demonstrate that 2-year-olds infer important components of meaning from syntactic structure alone, using it to direct their subsequent search for a referent in a visual scene.     

分清科学与伪科学、宗教与邪教

20世纪80、90年代,我国伪科学和邪教大量出现,给我国社会和人民带来巨大危害,它们都宣称自己是科学,是宗教;不承认自己是伪科学,是邪教;甚至参与批判别的伪科学、邪教,以显示自己是科学,是宗教。这样就搅浑了水,混淆了视听,使人真伪莫辨,便于它们浑水摸鱼,在浑水中生存和发展。它们也正是在这种情况下发展起来。     

Recovery of 3-D shape from binocular disparity and structure from motion

Four experiments were conducted to examine the integration of depth information from binocular stereopsis and structure from motion (SFM), using stereograms simulating transparent cylindrical objects. We found that the judged depth increased when either rotational or translational motion was added to a display, but the increase was greater for rotating (SFM) displays. Judged depth decreased as texture element density increased for static and translating stereo displays, but it stayed relatively constant for rotating displays. This result indicates that SFM may facilitate stereo processing by helping to resolve the stereo correspondence problem. Overall, the results from these experiments provide evidence for a cooperative relationship between. SFM and binocular disparity in the recovery of 3-D relationships from 2-D images. These findings indicate that the processing of depth information from SFM and binocular disparity is not strictly modular, and thus theories of combining visual information that assume strong modularity-or-independence cannot accurately characterize all instances of depth perception from multiple sources.     

Beyond his story: from interpretation to impact of stories from different cultures

This paper deals with the history of psychoanalysis (Freud) and analytical psychology (Jung) in the light of recent developments and considers the release of new creativity in the field after its deconstruction. Cross-cultural contributions in the form of teaching stories are estimated to be of relevance, while the emphasis will be on what we, as analysts, can learn from these teachings, rather than interpreting them in the more traditional way in which such stories can be shown to fit analytical theory.
The most crucial debate in psychoanalysis of the recent era centres around stories and the deconstruction thereof. It is the debate between Lacan and Derrida on the interpretation of a crucial story (Poe's story, The Purloined Letter). The core of their views will be discussed in this paper in the light of the major differences between Freud and Jung. Whereas Freud's theoretical core-complex is closely related to Lacan's phallocentric Truth, it is Derrida who speaks of germination and dissemination as the way in which Truth manifests itself. Derrida's thought on text and words is very close to Jung's conceptions of the image and symbol, in which there is no monotheistic paradigm ruling theory     

Transfer of value from fit

People experience regulatory fit when they pursue a goal in a manner that sustains their regulatory orientation (E. T. Higgins, 2000). Five studies tested whether the value experienced from regulatory fit can transfer to a subsequent evaluation of an object. In Studies 1 and 2, participants gave the same coffee mug a higher price if they had chosen it with a strategy that fit their orientation (eager strategy/promotion; vigilant strategy/prevention) than a strategy that did not fit. Studies 3-5 investigated possible mechanisms underlying this effect. Value transfer was independent of positive mood, perceived effectiveness (instrumentality), and perceived efficiency (ease), and occurred for an object that w as independent of the fit process itself. The findings supported a value confusion account of transfer.     

Testing conclusions from functional imaging of working memory with data from acute stroke

Functional imaging studies indicate that the left hemisphere mediates verbal working memory, while the right hemisphere mediates both verbal and spatial working memory. We evaluated acute stroke patients with working memory tests and imaging to identify whether unilateral dysfunction causes deficits in spatial and/or verbal working memory deficits. While left cortical stroke patients had verbal working memory impairments (p<0.003), right cortical stroke patients had both verbal p<0.007) and spatial working memory (p<0.03) impairments, confirming functional imaging results. Patients with transient ischemic stroke and patients with non-cortical stroke did not have significant deficits in working memory in either modality.     

The perception of shape and curvedness from binocular stereopsis and structure from motion

The integration of binocular stereopsis and kinetic depth was measured for two distinct aspects of 3-Dstructure: (1)shape index, which is a measure of scale-independent structure, and (2)curvedness, which is a measure of scale-dependent structure. We found that motion contributes significantly more to judged shape index than it does to judged curvedness, and stereo contributes significantly more to judged curvedness than it does to judged shape index. This suggests that the differences in the relative contribution of motion and stereo reported here occurred because these two sources do not equally specify the scale-dependent and scale-independent aspects of surface structure. Furthermore, these results seem to be inconsistent with integration models in which the different visual cues all initially contribute to the same single representation of 3-Dstructure.     

Rising from the ashes: Recovery from physical trauma

A counsellor describes her trauma accompanying an accidental physical injury, and the course of psychological recovery during the following 6 weeks. The style of self-analysis which was used during this period reflects the transpersonal approach, using imagery and the intuitive function to increase self-awareness, with moments of therapeutic insight ('release' experiences) at the landmarks en route to a healthy state of re-integration. The implications of the whole experience are discussed in terms both of post-traumatic stress and of personal growth.     

Polyamory: Experiences of Power from Without,from Within,and in Between

This article highlights the ways in which cultural, relational, and therapeutic power can affect polyamorous relationships and the therapeutic process. In therapy, focusing on the power narratives that polyamorous partners might experience can aid in challenging mononormativity while creating space for a variety of relational orientations. Power processes are presented as occurring on three levels: social discourse (without), relational meaning-making (within), and therapeutic practice (in between). A case study is used to evaluate these processes and implications are provided for clinicians working with polyamorous families.