Le débat sociologique autour du « modèle de la compétence »

This paper aims to pointing out, through a survey of the French sociological literature about this topic, that this discipline, unlike managers or business science, rarely speaks of a “competency model”. Beyond the denunciation of its actual or supposed damages, the competencies management is in fact more a development or an hybrid of the previously prevailing “qualification model”. In order to be efficient and relevant, it also has to adjust to the contingencies that rule the firms where it is implemented: this certainly weakens the very idea of a consistent “model”, but means neither the failure, nor the end of any competencies management.     

Traitement cognitif d’une représentation « mythique »

Previous studies have shown that participants provided more wild beliefs (i.e., beliefs that do not stem from institutionalized and programmed discourse) about an inexplicable event when they were exposed first to a condition of cognitive control and second when they were exposed to a fantastic (versus factual) presentation of this event. This question has been examined here for a salient social event considered as unpredictable just before it happens. This social event has been discussed a lot after its apparition, is now part of a shared social memory, and is considered as a “myth”: that is the 11 September 2001 attacks. This event has been studied in the same terms that in Deconchy's studies (2006). One hundred and twenty-six participants were assigned to a cognitive control condition (A₁) or a non cognitive control (A₂). Some participants had to explain this social event presented with a use of a pure iconography (Twins towers in black and white, clouds of smoke with clear demarcations: B₁) whereas others faced this event with a presentation linked to phantasmagoria (Twins towers in blue, green and yellow colours, clouds of bloated flames, flaky background: B2). Five different kinds of “explanations” (usually provided just after the 9/11) were offered for which participants had to rate the relevance: mysterious, technological, sociological, typical factors, internal causes attributed to the presumed actors (prestereotypical). Factorial scores on mysterious and internal explanations were high for the experimental condition A₁B₂ (cognitive control with phantasmagoria) and were significantly different from the other experimental conditions.     

La psychologie contemporaine des « traits » dans le cadre de la recherche néogaltonienne : comment elle est censée fonctionner et pourquoi en réalité elle ne fonctionne pas

For its epistemic integrity as a framework for scientific personality studies, contemporary trait psychology requires the assumption that aggregate statistical patterns gleaned from correlational studies of individual differences constitute an epistemic “window” onto what is transpiring with the individuals comprising that aggregate. This assumption is the cornerstone of the “neogaltonian” paradigm for psychological research (Danziger, 1987) in terms of which Cronbach (1957) famously called for a merger of scientific psychology's experimental and the correlational disciplines. In the present contribution, this perspective on personality studies is submitted to close critical scrutiny and shown to be scientifically untenable. It is argued that a viable science of personality will be one focused on persons and not on individual differences variables.     

L'activité conversationnelle d'un jury de validation d'acquis : analyse interlocutoire de la formation d'un concept potentiel

In this contribution, authors try to give an interlocutory analysis of a particular verbal and work situation: a face to face activity of acquired knowledge validation panel. The analysis is made in order to verify the hypothesis that conversational activity, that realises an evaluative activity, is both the place and the instrument of the construction of a potential concept. Vygotski (1934/1997) calls “potential concept” the meeting between a concrete meaning, developed in action, with a “scientific concept”.     

Une redéfinition des relations entre la personnalité « Ouverte à l’expérience » et l’intelligence

Previous investigations of the relations between the Big Five personality traits and cognitive abilities have consistently supported that higher levels of openness to experience are associated with higher levels of crystallized abilities or knowledge. However, consistent with the idea that crystallized abilities are the product of the exercise of fluid abilities in the past, a moderately strong correlation between both types of abilities is generally found. Then, the first purpose of the current project was to examine the role of fluid abilities in the relation between openness to experience and crystallized abilities. It aimed at determining whether the relation of openness to crystallized abilities was still significant after controlling for the specific contribution of fluid intelligence to crystallized abilities; or conversely, whether this relation was explained by the relation of openness to fluid intelligence. The second purpose was to determine if the relation of openness to experience to both fluid and crystallized abilities varied as a function of age. The possibility that openness to experience differentially contributes to the variance in fluid and crystallized abilities as a function of age was examined. One hundred and sixty-four participants, aged 18 to 96, completed the openness to experience scale (French version of the IPIP, Goldberg, 1999. Personality psychology in Europe), in addition to several tests of fluid and crystallized abilities. After controlling for the variance associated with fluid abilities in crystallized abilities, Openness to experience was not related to crystallized abilities anymore. Moreover, the contribution of the personality trait of Openness to the variation in fluid and crystallized intelligences was similar at different ages in adulthood. Several possible interpretations and their respective implications are discussed. First, people more open may exercise fluid abilities more than people who are less open, and then increase the efficiency of these abilities. Second, fluid abilities may influence the development of the personality trait of openness to experience, that is people's tendency to seek out for novelty and curiosity. And third, the openness to experience scale may only reflect people's self-assessments of their abilities, such as a self-assessed intelligence construct. In any case, our results strongly suggest that the openness-cognition relation reflects something different from a relation between activity and knowledge acquisition.     

Schémas cognitifs, croyances addictives et défenses dans la consommation et l’addiction au cannabis de jeunes adultes

Theoretical background

Integrating the cognitive approaches based on the model of Beck et al. (1993) information treatment, the Young (1994) model of maladapted schemas, the integrative approach of Plutchik (1995) and the clinical approach based on defense mechanisms (Bond, 1995), this study aimed at investigating: (a) the role of the hyperactivated maladapted schemas, (b) the addictive beliefs, (c) the suractivation of the conscious derives of defensive mechanisms and (d) the relationships between these cognitive and defensive variables, in young people's cannabis intensity addiction.

Method

Forty-four young adults, 25 females and 19 males, have completed a self-reported questionnaire estimating: (a) the intensity of cannabis addiction (Décamps et al., 2008), (b) the Rusinek (2006) adaptation of Young's maladapted schemas and (c) the questionnaire of addictive beliefs of Tison and Hautekeete (1998) and the defensive styles questionnaire of Bond et al. (1983) and Bond (1995). Non-parametric statistical analysis has been conducted on three subject's groups (“non-users”, “users non addicted”, “users-addicted”) to test the implications and the links between hypothesized psychological factors (e.g., schemas, beliefs and defences) in cannabis use intensity.

Results and discussion

The intensity of cannabis addiction is correlated significantly with: (a) an hyperactivation of three maladapted schemas: inadequate autocontrol, dependence and fear of lose the control, (b) a hyperactivation of permissive, anticipatory and relief oriented beliefs and (c) a higher activation of the defence “sublimation” and a lower activation of the “displacement”. “sublimation” is correlated with the global activation of 13 schemas that are correlated with the positive relief-oriented beliefs, which are correlated with the “displacement” defence, which is correlated with the anticipatory beliefs. The results showed that the permissive beliefs have the power to differentiate the “non-consumption”, the “consumption without addiction” and “the addiction” to cannabis. Our interpretation displays that greater attention to the dysfunctional beliefs will be required in future researches and should be essential targets in cognitive therapy of this substance use disorder.     

EMOVAL : évaluation automatique de la valence et de l’activation émotionnelles des textes à l’aide d’une méta-norme de 5656 mots-racines

EMOVAL: automatic evaluation the emotional valence and arousal of texts using a 5656 root-words metanorm. EMOVAL is an emotional valence and arousal analysis model of texts. EMOVAL draws from linguistic tradition the hypothesis that every word has a denotative aspect (“meaning”) and a connotative aspect (“affective halo”). It uses a meta-analysis of seven French norms and one English norm with the objective to characterize the emotional valence of texts, paragraphs, or sentences in a pleasant or unpleasant way. The meta-analysis indicates that the seven French norms data are highly correlated in between (0.82 to 0.99), and highly correlated with the Affectiv Norm for English Words (Bradley et Lang, 1999) (0.81 to 0.97). Arousal values taken from Affective Norm for English Words (ANEW) (Bradley et Lang, 1999) and the Leleu (1987) norm are significately correlated (0.55). The metanorm has 5656 words (nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs) characterized in valence (−1 to +1), and 3265 words characterized in arousal. These items are used by EMOVAL for valence judgments of texts. Two types of texts are proposed: the evaluation of the whole (702) or of extracts (110) of a corpus of sentences judged in a seven-point scale (−3 very unpleasant to +3 very pleasant) (Bestgen et al., 2004), and of 12 texts positively valenced (happiness and good surprise) and negatively valenced (fear, anger, disgust, sadness, and bad surprise). These two types of tests confirm the psychological pertinence of EMOVAL. Limits regarding the arousal dimension are discussed. The metanorm presented in this article can be obtained from the authors.     

Les tâches de développement : un concept à redécouvrir

Over 60 years ago, developmental and educational psychologist Robert J. Havighurst (1948, 1953, 1972) proposed the concept of “developmental-task” in order to better understand and help improve if necessary the psychosocial development of the individual. This concept is still widely used in German and Anglo-American psychology and deserves, according to us, to be better known in France. Thus, the aim of the paper is to present different aspects of this concept and to demonstrate its interest for developmental psychology.     

Le mathème du fantasme à l'adolescence

In Lacan's writing the matheme is a logical construction aiming to correspond to the bone structure of the subject. In what respect can the formalization of fantasy enlighten us as regards the adolescent “passage”? Is this passage from child neurosis to the adolescent period accompanied by a different positioning in fantasy? This is the assumption which will be illustrated and defended with clinical cases. Fantasy is logically constructed. The matheme unite and separate through the awl, the two sides of the subject: the “barred subject” and the “object a”. The recasting of fantasy at adolescence will consist in revisiting the three terms while gauging the worth of the link-break operation which is the awl.     

Enfants juifs cachés (1940-1944) : une littérature récente

The psychological literature about child survivors of the Holocaust, including “hidden children”, is recent and essentially American and Israeli. Trauma of child survivors of the Holocaust has been recognized in the 1980s. First articles have been published in the United States and Israel. All the clinicians identify traumatic symptomatology. The diagnosis of PTSD is questioned. Literature about “hidden children” has been written after 1991. After recognition of their suffering, articles and books emerged, especially American and Israeli studies. In Europe, only a few articles come out, they are mostly from Netherlands. This article presents a review of the psychological literature, predominantly American and Israeli concerning child survivors of the Holocaust and “hidden children” according to qualitative and quantitative methodology. Recently, a few researches start coming out and are published in French journals.     

La professionnalité des psychologues : acquisition de compétences et processus de professionnalisation

The aim of this work is to study professions from a psychosocial perspective. As such, a semi-structured questionnaire was used to detect the “specific” and “transversal” competences of two professional groups: psychologists and educators. The results show the job seniority and the intervention area are the two elements, linked to the professional context, more involved into the development of the perception of oneself competence and consequently into professionalisation process. The psychologic dimensions, we supposed implied into the development of competence process - for example Self efficacy and Professional commitment - were competence premonitory elements, implied in the professionalisation process, too.     

Reconnaissance des visages d’un autre groupe ethnique : éclairage d’une approche développementale

We are reviewing the recent findings on the Other Race Effect (ORE), which is the difficulty to recognize faces from other race compared to own race faces. Several hypotheses were proposed: negative attitude (Brigham and Malpass, 1985), attentional mechanisms (Chance and Goldstein, 1981), and the contact hypothesis (Brigham et al., 1982) which postulates that the ORE is due to a lack of experience with other race's faces. The contact hypothesis being, of course, modulated by attention and attitude. Valentine (1991 ; Valentine and Endo, 1992) proposes a norm-based coding model in which faces are encoded as vectors according to their deviation from a prototypical average. The resulting dimensions will differ according to the input received with certain salient, individuating dimensions carrying more “weight” than others. Predominant exposure to faces of a specific species, gender, or race early in life will cause the dimensions of one's prototype to become “tuned” towards such faces. The evidence presented support Valentine's model but we are showing that the quality of the contact is crucial in the experience. We are arguing that a developmental approach is necessary to better understand the ORE. Infants are able to process and recognize faces from an early age and several recent studies have found that the ORE can be observed from 9-10 months of age. Experimental results indicate that 6- to 9-months of age represents an important time of transition in the face processing system. If a certain type of face (other races) is not experienced prior to this period, then we appear to lose our ability to discriminate between individual faces within those groups.     

The development of interpretations for novel noun-noun conceptual combinations during the early school years

This research investigates issues surrounding early school children's use of the similarity between head and modifier terms in deriving interpretations for novel noun-noun conceptual combinations. In these experiments, 6- and 9-year-olds and adults were asked to formulate interpretations of similar and dissimilar conceptual combinations. Both children and adults were sensitive to the similarity aspect of conceptual combinations, although the children had some difficulty with the property interpretations that high-similarity combinations require. Next, we examined 40 popular children's books for the presence of noun-noun conceptual combinations. Adult participants provided interpretations for these combinations and rated the similarity of the head and modifier nouns. Results indicated that there were few high-similarity combinations and few combinations requiring property interpretations, suggesting that children have limited exposure to highly similar combinations and property interpretations. Further analysis of children's interpretations indicates that they may have difficulty in selecting and integrating properties of the modifier onto the head, a process required by property interpretations.     

Développement de la précision temporo-motrice et cadences spontanées de jeunes enfants

Fifty children (six to ten years old) were asked to tap a flat surface as regularly as possible with their finger at different semi-spontaneous tempi. Their chosen tapping speed was estimated by each sequence's mean inter-tap interval. The range of chosen speeds widens with age. The just tenable difference (JTD) between inter-tap intervals is proportional to their reference, the mean. The motor-timing precision, estimated through the standard-deviation/mean ratio, clearly improves with age. Children are more precise at faster tempi, not around their “normal” tempo as adults. Our simple semi-spontaneous finger-tapping task could be applied to the clinical evaluation of age-dependent explicit and implicit timing components in motor performance.     

Généralisation de propriétés biologiques, physiques et comportementales chez l’enfant de cinq à neuf ans

This study is designed to examine how biological knowledge is organized and structured in children. Five- to nine-year-old children's interpretations of biological phenomena are studied by examining to what extent the transmission of different kinds of properties is perceived as being causally related to birth origins. A property generalization task is used, in which biological relations (birth origins) are pitted against adoptive relations. The characteristics to be generalized correspond to non-obvious biological characteristics, visible physic characteristics or behavioural characteristics. Our results show that five-year-old children do not understand the origin of these characteristics. A conceptual change seems to be at work by the age of seven but the delimitation of biological categories remains imperfect.     

Structure implicative des propriétés, conséquences pour l'étude de la catégorisation

We show how the notion of implication between properties and the relevance principle shed new light on the results of Rosch and her colleagues (1975, 1976). To uncover our hypotheses, concerning relationships between properties, participants were asked to respond to propositions linking properties A and B, relative to birds, of the type “If A, can it generally be said that B?” Results show that some properties are linked one to the other (quasi-equivalence, quasi-implication, or quasi-independence) and that these implicative links can be summarized by an implicative graph. The resulting property structure has a predictive character for participant response times.     

L’apport des États-Généraux au débat bioéthique

The objective for organizing the so-called “États-Généraux de la bioéthique” is certainly to encourage the idea that bioethics is not only a closed field for experts. But we should wonder if this quest of social legitimacy is not a mean to dissimulate power acquired by emerging institutions on human bodies.