The self ideal versus the model ideal

A list of 50 ways of perceiving one's personal ideal was constructed and administered to 74 women about to make a lifelong commitment. The mean number of items endorsed was 28. An item analysis yielded discrimination indices for 28 items at better than the .05 level of significance. These attitudes were discussed as less motivativing, and opposite attitudes from the same point of view were grouped under six principles of motivation: dominant relationship, closeness, growth, valuational center, similarity, realism. From these two diametrically opposite perceptual structures of attitudes emerged the self ideal and the model ideal.Daniel Patrick Foley, S.J., is with Xavier University. This report is based on a paper entitled Constellation of Attitudes Toward a Religious Ideal, presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Honolulu, Hawaii, September, 1972.     

Teaching a thinking strategy: Transfer across domains and self learning versus class-like setting

The purpose of this study is to investigate two issues related to the teaching of thinking skills: (1) transfer across domains; and (2) comparison between individual learning of a thinking strategy and ‘class-like’ setting, which consists of a didactic intervention that takes place in small groups. A microgenetic design was used, in which community college students engaged in investigation of problems (each student participated in 20 sessions). It was found that: (1) the control of variables strategy that was taught in the context of a problem in one domain transferred fully to a new problem in the same domain, hut transferred less well to an isomorphous problem in a different domain; (2) the ‘class-like’ setting contributed to improved performance (as measured by the frequency of valid inferences), with the didactic intervention seeming to contribute to this improvement; and (3) the learning environment described in this study had a larger effect on ‘slower learners’ than on ‘faster learners’. It is proposed to teach for enhanced transfer by focusing explicitly on recognition of underlying logical structures of content-rich contexts.     

The role of stimulus familiarity in context-dependent recognition

Memory & Cognition - Investigations of context-dependent recognition, a phenomenon in which recognition is better for items studied and tested with the same rather than different context, have...     

The embodied self: thinking psychoanalytically in a time of 'science'

Abstract :  In order to be relevant in our 'scientific' times, it is necessary that we psychoanalysts situate our ideas in thoughtful and respectful relationship to neighbouring disciplines such as genetics, cultural studies, and neuro-anatomy. In this paper I suggest that, although psychoanalysis still continues to have valuable contributions to make to the understanding of human sexual experience and behaviour, in order to make these contributions relevant we must tune in with openness to the challenges posed by the unfolding discoveries in the other disciplines that grapple with the arena of human sexuality.
I will suggest ways in which research on sexual desire and gender identity may be assimilated into psychoanalytic thinking and give some examples of its use in analytic practice.     

The emerging self: the convergence of mind,personality and thinking styles

This paper aims to integrate research and theorizing about problem solving, self and personality into a comprehensive theory. With this purpose, the paper attempts to answer three questions: how do humans become aware of themselves and how do the products of self-awareness interrelate to produce an integrated self-system, which includes the domains of cognition and personality? How do persons know and influence each other? How do these processes change with development? The answers given to these questions by self, personality and cognitive developmental psychology are critically examined. It is concluded that an overarching model would have to assume a multilevel and multidimensional architecture. This would involve three main levels: the first includes general-purpose processes and functions, such as processing efficiency and working memory, which define current cognitive potentials; the second includes several domain-specific systems directed to different aspects of the environment; the third includes self-oriented processes that register, represent and regulate processes at the other two levels. Each person’s self-concepts result from the application of the third level on the other two and they differentially reflect their condition. Personality reflects the interaction between these self-concepts and dispositions to act in particular ways. Because humans share this architecture they can negotiate and affect each other’s self- and reflected representations. Thus, the formation of mind, self and personality results from a continuous flow of interactions between the levels and domains of mind within and across persons. The article summarizes a series of studies lending support to this general model.     

Saving for your future self: The role of imaginary experiences

Despite increased longevity, many people fail to save the funds necessary to support their retirement. In an attempt both to elucidate and remedy this failing, research exploring the “future-self continuity” hypothesis has revealed that temporal discounting is decreased and saving increased when connections between one’s current and future self are strengthened. Here, we explored the possibility that a basic component of mental imagery – spatial visual perspective – may be an important determinant of people’s decisions to spend now or save for the future. The results of two experiments supported this prediction. Rates of saving were enhanced when a distant-future event was generated from a third-person vs. first-person vantage point, an effect that was mediated by visual bodily awareness during mental imagery.     

The role of self‐esteem and anxiety in decision making for self versus others in relationships

Previous research has documented a tendency for people to make more risk‐seeking decisions for others than for themselves in relationship scenarios. Two experiments investigated whether this self–other difference is moderated by participants' self‐esteem and anxiety levels. In Experiment 1, lower self‐esteem and higher anxiety levels were associated with more risk‐averse choices for personal decisions but not for decisions for others. Therefore, participants with lower self‐esteem/higher anxiety showed greater self–other differences in comparison to participants with higher self‐esteem/lower anxiety levels. Experiment 2 demonstrated that this effect was largely mediated by participants' expectations of success and feelings about potential negative outcomes. These results are discussed in the context of “threats to the self,” with a central role played by anxiety and self‐esteem threats in personal decision making but not in decision making for others. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Positively versus negatively charged moral emotion expectancies in adolescence: The role of situational context and the developing moral self

The study analyses adolescents' positively charged versus negatively charged moral emotion expectancies. Two hundred and five students (M= 14.83 years, SD= 2.21) participated in an interview depicting various situations in which a moral norm was either regarded or transgressed. Emotion expectancies were assessed for specific emotions (pride, guilt) as well as for overall strength and valence. In addition, self‐importance of moral values was measured by a questionnaire. Results revealed that positively charged emotion expectancies were more pronounced in contexts of prosocial action than in the context of moral transgressions, whereas the opposite was true for negatively charged emotions. At the same time, expectations of guilt and pride were substantially related to the self‐importance of moral values.     

The motivating function of thinking about the future: expectations versus fantasies

Two forms of thinking about the future are distinguished: expectations versus fantasies. Positive expectations (judging a desired future as likely) predicted high effort and successful performance, but the reverse was true for positive fantasies (experiencing one's thoughts and mental images about a desired future positively). Participants were graduates looking for a job (Study 1), students with a crush on a peer of the opposite sex (Study 2), undergraduates anticipating an exam (Study 3), and patients undergoing hip-replacement surgery (Study 4). Effort and performance were measured weeks or months (up to 2 years) after expectations and fantasies had been assessed. Implications for the self-regulation of effort and performance are discussed.     

Thinking styles and modes of thinking: implications for education and research

The author investigated the relationship of thinking styles to modes of thinking. Participants were 371 freshmen (aged 18 and 19) from the University of Hong Kong. Participants responded to the Thinking Styles Inventory (R. J. Sternnberg & R. K. Wagner, 1992) and the Style of Learning and Thinking (Youth Form; E. P. Torrance, B. McCarthy, & M. T. Kolesinski, 1988). A major finding was that creativity generating and complex thinking styles were significantly positively correlated with the holistic mode of thinking but significantly negatively correlated with the analytic mode of thinking. Thinking styles that denote the tendency to norm favoring and simplistic information processing were significantly positively correlated with the analytic mode of thinking and significantly negatively correlated with the holistic mode of thinking. In a preliminary conclusion, it appears that the thinking style construct overlaps the mode of thinking construct. Implications of this finding for teachers and researchers are delineated.     

Editorial: The role of reasoning in mathematical thinking

ABSTRACT

Research into mathematics often focuses on basic numerical and spatial intuitions, and one key property of numbers: their magnitude. The fact that mathematics is a system of complex relationships that invokes reasoning usually receives less attention. The purpose of this special issue is to highlight the intricate connections between reasoning and mathematics, and to use insights from the reasoning literature to obtain a more complete understanding of the processes that underlie mathematical cognition. The topics that are discussed range from the basic heuristics and biases to the various ways in which complex, effortful reasoning contributes to mathematical cognition, while also considering the role of individual differences in mathematics performance. These investigations are not only important at a theoretical level, but they also have broad and important practical implications, including the possibility to improve classroom practices and educational outcomes, to facilitate people's decision-making, as well as the clear and accessible communication of numerical information.     

The spyglass self: a model of vicarious self-perception

Self-perception theory posits that people sometimes infer their own attributes by observing their freely chosen actions. The authors hypothesized that in addition, people sometimes infer their own attributes by observing the freely chosen actions of others with whom they feel a sense of merged identity--almost as if they had observed themselves performing the acts. Before observing an actor's behavior, participants were led to feel a sense of merged identity with the actor through perspective-taking instructions (Study 1) or through feedback indicating that their brainwave patterns overlapped substantially with those of the actor (Studies 2-4). As predicted, participants incorporated attributes relevant to an actor's behavior into their own self-concepts, but only when they were led to feel a sense of merged identity with the actor and only when the actor's behavior seemed freely chosen. These changes in relevant self-perceptions led participants to change their own behaviors accordingly. Implications of these vicarious self-perception processes for conformity, perspective-taking, and the long-term development of the self-concept are discussed.     

The dynamics of memory: context-dependent updating

Understanding the dynamics of memory change is one of the current challenges facing cognitive neuroscience. Recent animal work on memory reconsolidation shows that memories can be altered long after acquisition. When reactivated, memories can be modified and require a restabilization (reconsolidation) process. We recently extended this finding to human episodic memory by showing that memory reactivation mediates the incorporation of new information into existing memory. Here we show that the spatial context plays a unique role for this type of memory updating: Being in the same spatial context during original and new learning is both necessary and sufficient for the incorporation of new information into existing episodic memories. Memories are automatically reactivated when subjects return to an original learning context, where updating by incorporating new contents can occur. However, when in a novel context, updating of existing memories does not occur, and a new episodic memory is created instead.     

Remembering and imagining: the role of the self

This study investigated whether temporal clustering of autobiographical memories (AMs) around periods of self-development ( [Rathbone et al., 2008] and [Rathbone et al., 2009] ) would also occur when imagining future events associated with the self. Participants completed an AM task and future thinking task. In both tasks, memories and future events were cued using participant-generated identity statements (e.g., I am a student; I will be a mother). Participants then dated their memories and future events, and finally gave an age at which each identity statement was judged to emerge. Dates of memories and future events were recoded as temporal distance from the identity statement used to cue them. AMs and future events both clustered robustly around periods of self-development, indicating the powerful organisational effect of the self. We suggest that life narrative structures are used to organise future events as well as memories.     

Love and expansion of the self: The state of the model

The self-expansion model of love developed out of a confluence of research on attraction and arousal, Eastern psychology, motivation theory, and the social psychology of personal relationships. The model treats love (the desire for a relationship with a particular other) as arising from a desire to expand the self by including that other in the self, as well as by associating expansion with that particular other. First, the model is described, including its function as a source of heuristically important metaphors for common human experiences of love and its unique focus in relation to other approaches to love. The remainder of the article examines its application, including supporting research, to predictors of falling in love, motivations for unrequited love, consequences of falling in love, love as including each other in each other's self, and how love changes (and how it can be maintained) in long-term relationships. The conclusion examines current trends in which the model serves as both a very general integration of useful perspectives and as a set of precise mini-theories.     

The role of the self in mindblindness in autism

Since its inception the 'mindblindness' theory of autism has greatly furthered our understanding of the core social-communication impairments in autism spectrum conditions (ASC). However, one of the more subtle issues within the theory that needs to be elaborated is the role of the 'self'. In this article, we expand on mindblindness in ASC by addressing topics related to the self and its central role in the social world and then review recent research in ASC that has yielded important insights by contrasting processes relating to both self and other. We suggest that new discoveries lie ahead in understanding how self and other are interrelated and/or distinct, and how understanding atypical self-referential and social-cognitive mechanisms may lead to novel ideas as to how to facilitate social-communicative abilities in ASC.     

Fabricated bodies: A model for the somatic false self

This paper draws attention to a particular use of the body, one in which basic psychical security is achieved through a radical detachment from body vitality, necessitating the creation of a coercive regime of psychosomatic control and autostimulation for purposes of artificial enlivenment of the self. When the personality is organized predominantly along the lines of a systematic dissociation (and then pseudo-integration) of the mental and the somatic realms of psychical life, the psyche-soma undergoes a far-reaching transmutation: the desiring body is eclipsed and replaced with a fabricated body. Clinical observation of this set-up is obscured by the fact that, in these cases, the body is deployed in a 'realistic' manner, rather than in a recognizably symptomatic way. It is, indeed, the hallmark of a successful somatic false-self organization that the colonization of the body is disguised as natural, ego-syntonic and compatible with social norms. The treatment approach requires a broadening of analytic attention to apprehend shifts in states of consciousness and psychophysical cues.     

The crucial role of postcue encoding in directed forgetting and context-dependent forgetting

People can intentionally forget previously studied material if, after study, a forget cue is provided and new material is learned. It has recently been suggested that such list-method directed forgetting arises because the forget cue induces a change in internal context and causes context-dependent forgetting of the studied material (L. Sahakyan & C. M. Kelley, 2002). The authors compared directed forgetting and context-dependent forgetting by examining whether, like a forget cue, a change in internal context needs subsequent learning of new material to be effective. Participants studied an item list and, after study, received a remember cue or a forget cue or their internal context was changed through an imagination task. In each condition, half the participants learned a second list, and the other half fulfilled an unrelated distractor task. Both the forget cue and the change in internal context induced forgetting of the first list only when learning of the second list was interpolated. These results suggest that postcue encoding of new material is crucial for both directed forgetting and (some forms of) context-dependent forgetting.