A lifetime of caring: Dimensions and dynamics in late‐life close relationships

This review of research on close relationships in old age is informed by principles of life span developmental psychology and life course theory in sociology. It begins with an elaboration of life span and life course concepts as applied to relationships and an analysis of the multiple forms that caring can take. The discussion continues with presentation of research on the effects of sociohistorical contexts on relationships in old age and studies of the effects of personal development and life events on relationships as well. A section examining problems in late‐life close relationships is followed by examples of new directions for research on the intersections of personal development and close relationships.     

Narcissistic mortification of ageing men

The development of a male gender identity involves the task of relinquishing the identification with the female primary object. If this separation is experienced as loss or expulsion, and responded to by the development and libidinous cathexis of phallic-narcissistic characteristics, a specifically male narcissistic vulnerability emerges, which can, particularly in ageing men, escalate to critical proportions. However, phallic-narcissistic crises in the ageing process also contain opportunities for development, provided the losses of age can be faced with mourning. The author sets out the statements on the subject of old age in the myth of Narcissus and makes use of the concepts of developmental psychology. He outlines clinical examples illustrating this problem. Finally, he brings to mind the narcissistic plight of the aged Oedipus.     

In conversation with Joseph B. Wheelwright

This article reviews some aspects of successful aging and personality development in later life, discusses some ways of maximizing one's potential at that time, and explains why the social stereotypes of aging are no longer relevant. Psychological and spiritual growth, learning, and creativity are independent of age and often continue until very old age, so that it is a mistake to think of aging as a period of relentless decline. Old age has its own developmental tasks. One can therefore grow into old age and not simply sink into it. Jungian psychology can make an important contribution to understanding the importance of this time of life for both the individual and society.     

具身心智对进化心理学的质疑与挑战

具身-生成心智倡导生命与认知的深刻连续性,它重新定义了自然选择,强调身体和生命活动对认知的关键意义,并指出每一个人都是经过文化适应的主体。它在心智进化的本质、认知的核心工作假设、人类本性与文化,以及基因、身体、生命活动与认知的关系等问题上都有着完全不同于进化心理学的理解,并对后者提出了质疑和挑战。     

进化心理学视角中的腐败行为及心理机制

腐败作为全世界普遍关注的焦点问题,不同领域学者针对腐败行为产生原因与对策进行探讨。普遍认为制度、权力、文化等因素是腐败行为产生的重要原因,个别研究涉及到腐败主体的内在心理。进化心理学从进化和适应的视角对人类行为发生及心理内在特征具有终极解释度。因此,本文在前人研究的基础上,基于进化心理学的独特视角,从个体生命史历程(如童年创伤、贫穷经历等)去揭示腐败行为产生的心理机制。     

中国理论心理学的原创性反思

理论心理学已成为一门国际性的学科。中国理论心理学在世界理论心理学的发展中具有重要地位。我国老一辈心理学家对这个学科的发展做出了较大贡献,中青年学者在这一领域取得了可喜的成果。但我国理论心理学的发展状况与社会对理论心理学的期待还很不相称,有许多值得反思的地方,集中到一点就是中国理论心理学研究的原创性水平不足,这阻碍了中国心理学的发展。研究者认为,要提高中国理论心理学的原创性水平,理论研究者至少要从以下几个方面下功夫：理论研究必须回归到人本身;理论创新最需要的是坚定的理论信念;提倡批判思维,鼓励建构思维;心理学不能走入理论与实证相互怨恨的歧途;鼓励多途径理论创新;理论心理学需要理论心理学家相互合作、共同攻关。     

Adolescent Childbearing as Career “Choice”: Perspective From an Ecological Context

Adolescent childbearing among lower socioeconomic-status African American girls who are 16 to 21 years of age is a career choice and an alternative, normative life path within African American culture. Career choice is defined here to signify selection of a role through which one implements one's identity and which represents one's life work. This choice is first addressed from the perspective of vocational psychology and is then presented within two models of developmental psychology: the model of female development presented by Chodorow (1978) and Gilligan (1982) and the model of ecological human development by Bronfenbrenner (1977, 1988). These views incorporate a reassessment of the negative consequences of adolescent child-bearing. Finally, implications for research and practice are suggested.     

建立心理学学科门类及学位类别的分析与展望

摘 要 为了促进中国本土化心理学体系建设和心理学学科的整体发展,从中国与发达国家心理学学科管理制度的比较中发现中国心理学学科归属所存在的问题,并在反思中探讨形成问题的原因。通过心理学在现有学科归属中的局限性,心理学成为独立学科门类的可能性,心理学成为独立学科门类后学科新体系的系统性,心理学成为独立学科门类的社会性四个方面的分析与讨论,研究了使心理学成为独立学科门类与学位类别的必要性与可行性。特别是从建设和谐社会的角度对心理学的学科归属、心理学的未来发展、现代社会发展及心理学与其它学科的广泛联系等需要的讨论中,指出中国心理学在专业设置方面隶属于理学和教育学的不足之处,认为这种隶属关系将会制约心理学的发展和学科成熟。提出应该在现有学位体系中增加心理学学科门类与学位类别,使心理学作为一个与理学和教育学并列的独立学科门类。通过改进学位体系让心理学在更大的学科背景中,建设中国本土心理学自身体系,使心理学研究方法更加多样化,为产生众多边缘学科和更好地发挥社会应用功能创造条件,也为今后心理学发展带来许多发展机遇,并在此基础上为展望心理学未来发展提供新的视角。     

Where is the phenomenology of attention that Husserl intended to perform? A transcendental pragmatic-oriented description of attention

For the most part, attention occurs as a theme adjacent to much more topical and innovatingly operating acts: first, the intentional act, which represents a destitution of the abstract opposition between subject and object and which paves the way for a detailed analysis of our perceptive horizontal subjective life; second, the reductive act, specified in a psycho-phenomenological sense as a reflective conversion of the way I am looking at things; third, the genetic method understood as a genealogy of logic based on our experiential affective pre-discursive world-life. In this respect, here are some of the leading questions of my investigation: What are the differences and the proximities between these methods and attentional activity? Why is the latter not put to the fore as a method? To what extent is this secondary part played by attention linked to the constitution of phenomenology as opposed to psychology (for which attention is a central theme), and what does it mean for the impossibility of phenomenology to freeing itself completely from psychology?     

How Pierre Janet used pathological psychology to save the philosophical self

According to traditional French historiography, French scientific psychology was born when it differentiated itself from philosophy. This split between the two disciplines is attributed to Taine and Ribot, who, consequently, are considered to be the "founding fathers" of French psychology. In this paper we shall examine the case of Pierre Janet, who, at the turn of the century, was recognized worldwide as the most important French psychologist. It is generally said that he was the follower of Ribot and of Charcot. However, he was also Paul Janet's nephew. Paul Janet was a very well known and influential philosopher of the so-called French "spiritualistic" school, for which psychology was central to philosophy. In 1889, Pierre Janet published his doctoral dissertation, L'Automatisme psychologique, which was immediately considered to be a classic in psychology. We shall argue that this book is as much indebted to the old spiritualistic psychology, which claimed the substantial unity of the self, as to the new psychology at the time, which questioned it. With Pierre Janet, the split between psychology and philosophy in France was reconsidered. It would be more accurate to speak in terms of a compromise between philosophy and the "new" physiological and pathological psychology.     

心理学危机的实质与解决方案

人们曾在不同层面上讨论心理学的危机,而这种对危机认识的偏离本身又进一步加强了学科本身的分裂。在总结前人对危机认识的基础上,通过分析表明,心理学危机是心理学学科发展中自我同一性危机的表现,其实质在于心理学学科同一性的缺乏,而根源来自于心理学建立之初的理论基础。因此,心理学危机的解决有待于其学科同一性的确立,心理学学科的发展则有待于其学科同一性的展开。     

A Voice and So Much More: The Neglect and Representation of Language in Social Psychology

Linguistic diversity is an irreducible characteristic of the world we live in today, yet the study of language remains relatively neglected in mainstream and critical social psychologies alike. In order to argue for a renewed confrontation between language and critical social psychology, this study presents an overview of both the absence of language from mainstream, experimental social psychology and of the emergence, since the 1970s, of the social psychology of language as a distinctive subfield in the discipline. It is argued that although the social psychology of language made the subject perceptible as a speaking and above all accented subject, foregrounding language as an index of class, ethnicity and race, it achieved this perceptibility without challenging the basic ideological coordinates according to which experimental social psychology conceptualises the world and subjects in relation to language. For this reason, the social psychology of language, despite its important contributions, reproduces an essentially national and monolingual imagination of language related phenomena and linguistic subjectivities. The task for a critical social psychology of language, it is argued, is to 'demythologise' and 'disinvent' language and language ideologies in the discipline.     

当前积极心理学变革的新趋向及理论价值

近20年来西方积极心理学以其独特的研究视角曾经吸引过全球人的目光,被誉为是理论心理学研究的一个新的重要方向。积极心理学主要围绕着“一个中心三个支撑点” 来开展相关的研究,即以主观幸福感为中心,以积极体验、积极人格、积极社会制度为支撑点。在强硬的现实面前,具有“理想主义情怀”的积极心理学也面临着许多困境与挑战。近年来西方一些学者正在寻求突破积极心理学的瓶颈性因素,围绕着“美德、意义、韧性和幸福”这四大支柱打造新的版本,促进积极心理学理论研究的可持续发展和升级换代。     

面向未来的理论心理学

理论应当是任何学科体系中的重要组成部分,是一个学科的基础。相应的,理论心理学也应当是心理学的基础和重要组成部分。然而在当下,心理学对于理论心理学缺乏重视,在这其中既有来自外部的原因也有来自理论心理学本身的问题。但总而言之,无论具体是何种原因,实际上都对理论心理学提出了更深层次的要求,即着眼当下,放眼未来。理论心理学对于当下的介入主要从两个方面展开:一是实时接收当代各思想话语的影响,用以武装整个心理学科并回应各思想话语提出的问题; 二是对当下心理学中的各具体问题进行理论层面的讨论,发现问题,指出问题并尝试解决问题。理论心理学要想在未来心理学的发展中大放异彩首先应当保持对当下的介入,只有这样才能凸显自身的价值与意义,并且为整个心理学的发展发光发热。     

荆其诚的国际心理学思想与实践

荆其诚先生是当代中国著名的心理学家, 是改革开放后中国心理学界在国际上的代言人。他视野开阔, 是颇具造诣的实验心理学家, 也是功底深厚的理论心理学家。文章没有涉及他在认知与发展心理学方面所做的贡献, 只从理论方面分析他的国际心理学思想及实践, 找寻他对心理学研究所持的基本态度与价值追求。文章认为荆其诚在宏观把握心理学的发展逻辑后, 以“两个阵营的心理学”来界定心理学的现状, 坚信心理学的未来是一种国际的心理学。为了达成这一学术理想, 荆其诚不仅撰文将国外心理学介绍到中国、将中国心理学推介到国外, 还积极投身于国际心理学组织与实践, 长期担任国际心联的领导职务, 组织并主持召开了2004年第28届国际心理学大会。荆其诚的一生为彰显心理学的国际维度、促进国际心理学交流、将中国心理学推上世界舞台作出了巨大贡献。     

六祖惠能的积极心理学思想蕴涵

六祖惠能的禅宗思想中蕴涵着丰富且深邃的积极心理学思想,其旨在解脱心灵、远离尘世烦恼的终极目标及其蕴含的生命的大智慧与当代积极心理学思想高度契合。其积极心理学思想主要包括积极心理品质、积极认知、积极人生态度、积极自我以及积极关系等方面,这些思想对当代社会仍具有很大的现实价值。因此,通过对惠能的积极心理学思想的研究,可加强传统心理学思想与现代主流心理学的融合,既继承与发扬中国传统文化,促使学者关注传统心理学文化; 又推动了积极心理学在中国的发展,使得当代中国人更好地理解和践行积极心理学思想,从而更好地生活。     

Cognition, action, and object manipulation

Although psychology is the science of mental life and behavior, little attention has been paid to the means by which mental life is translated into behavior. One domain in which links between cognition and action have been explored is the manipulation of objects. This article reviews psychological research on this topic, with special emphasis on the tendency to grasp objects differently depending on what one plans to do with the objects. Such differential grasping has been demonstrated in a wide range of object manipulation tasks, including grasping an object in a way that reveals anticipation of the object's future orientation, height, and required placement precision. Differential grasping has also been demonstrated in a wide range of behaviors, including 1-hand grasps, 2-hand grasps, walking, and transferring objects from place to place as well as from person to person. The populations in which the tendency has been shown are also diverse, including nonhuman primates as well as human adults, children, and babies. The tendency is compromised in a variety of clinical populations and in children of a surprisingly advanced age. Verbal working memory is compromised as well if words are memorized while object manipulation tasks are performed; the recency portion of the serial position curve is reduced in this circumstance. In general, the research reviewed here points to rich connections between cognition and action as revealed through the study of object manipulation. Other implications concern affordances, Donders' law, naturalistic observation, and the teaching of psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).     

Biographical Transitions From a Midlife Perspective

Recent advances in life-span developmental psychology suggest that individual lives can be characterized as a series of interrelated transitions. The question of when and how past transitions have been experienced and how they affect subsequent ageing may be critical to understanding midlife adjustment. The aim of this study is (a) to investigate timing and emotional valence of experienced normative and silent transitions of middle-aged persons, and (b) to discover the impact of past transitions on current well-being and on anticipation of old age. Analysis of interview data from 268 persons suggest a considerable stability in the basic structure of human biography, but also evidence for age group, gender, and personality differences in the subjective perception of the life-course, adjustment and future anticipation in middle age. Emotional valence of puberty and that of personality variables were found to be important predictors of actual psychological well-being and anticipation of old age.     

Margaret F. Washburn (1871–1939): First Woman Ph.D. in Psychology

Margaret Floy Washburn was one of the first generation of leading psychologists trained in America and became an eminent and influential psychologist during the first third of the 20th century. She was recognized for significant contributions in theory development, experimental work, teaching, and professional service, but this paper focuses on her activities as director of the psychology program at Vassar College and author of the classic text in comparative psychology, The Animal Mind . Although full biographical details are not given, a listing of bibliographic sources is provided so that scholars might more readily obtain access to information omitted from the paper. The discussion also considers Washburn's professional life and personal characteristics and how she might be viewed as a role model.
"Nothing in the world is so compelling to the emotions as the mind of another human being" (Washburn, 1916b, p. 606). This statement, tucked away in an essay on the psychology of esthetic experience in music, provides an insightful clue to one of the motivations which sustained Margaret Floy Washburn's significant career as one of the most influential psychologists in psychology's first half–century as a distinct discipline. She held a life long fascination with the minds of humans and animals and was convinced that experimental psychology provided the appropriate methodology for exploring the topic. She devoted her unflagging energy and outstanding ability to the newly evolving science throughout a 43–year career which covered the period 1894–1937.     

The concept of the self in psychoanalytic theory and its philosophical foundations.

Concepts of "the self" in psychoanalytic theory have important philosophic underpinnings which may not be adequately appreciated. Both self psychology and ego psychology, with their contrasting positions on the self as a mental structure, retrace paths taken by Western philosophy beginning at least with Hume and Descartes. They reflect traditional philosophic questions, notably of a homuncular self internal to consciousness and the isolation of the subject from other selves. Psychoanalysis has not utilized Hegel's conception of the intersubjective origins of the self, in which the self emerges only in an encounter with another subject, although this approach is implicit in the work of Winnicott on the mother-infant dyad. This movement from a one- to a two-person psychology also presents conceptual problems, as illustrated by the psychoanalytic theories of Sartre and Lacan, who take up opposing positions on the status of consciousness and on intersubjectivity in the formation of the self. Sartre's phenomenology, with its emphasis on the questing nature of the subject in search of an identity, resonates with contemporary theories of narcissism in which the painful isolation of self from self-affirming and mirroring objects is central to clinical practice. Lacan's insight into the role of acquisition of language helps us to understand the formation of the subject in pursuit of a virtual selfhood, as Sartre described, but embedded within an intersubjective matrix.