Indigenous Psychotherapies and Religion: Moral Vision and Embodied Communities

Over the past century, the dominant model for addressing mental illness has been the treatment of individuals, largely by individual therapists who assume the availability of individual psychological resources. That form of therapy is a scarce commodity in capitalist societies, and social models of healing have been largely marginalized and forgotten. From the point of view of an indigenous psychology of religion, this essay (1) reports on local cultural and community models of healing that honor the common good, draw on local, communal narratives, and involve a given community in the process of healing. However, because it is not simply community in itself that is therapeutic, the authors argue (2) that healing cultures have communities that are guided by their moral vision and are committed to justice, moral integrity, and the sharing of resources. They draw on intergenerational studies that detail the effects in Inuit communities where a moral vision and a sense of community was present but then was eroded. Therapists whose interventions draw on the moral resources of the community may facilitate healing, as demonstrated by the use of allocentric imaging in more communal traditions. Finally, it is not simply communities with moral ideals that are therapeutic but (3) indigenous communities whose structures and whose role models embody their ethic that is critical for healing. The authors examine ecological communities in China committed to Confucian values and protection of the earth. The L’Arche communities begun in France by Jean Vanier and Alcoholics Anonymous groups around the world serve as examples of embodied moral communities.     

Couple Therapy with Veterans: Early Improvements and Predictors of Early Dropout

Family services within Veterans Affairs Medical Centers fulfill an important role in addressing relationship distress among Veterans, which is highly prevalent and comorbid with psychopathology. However, even for evidence‐based couple therapies, effectiveness is weaker compared to controlled studies, maybe because many Veteran couples drop out early and do not reach the “active” treatment stage after the 3–4 session assessment. In order to improve outcomes, it is critical to identify couples at high risk for early dropout, and understand whether couples may benefit from the assessment as an intervention. The current study examined (a) demographics, treatment delivery mode, relationship satisfaction, and psychological symptoms as predictors of dropout during and immediately following the assessment phase, and (b) changes in relationship satisfaction during assessment. 174 couples completed questionnaires during routine intake procedures. The main analyses focused on 140 male Veterans and their female civilian partners; 36.43% dropped out during the assessment phase and 24.74% of the remaining couples immediately following the first treatment session. More severe depressive symptoms in non‐Veteran partners were associated with dropout during assessment. Relationship satisfaction improved significantly during the assessment phase for couples who did not drop out, with larger gains for non‐Veteran partners. No demographics or treatment delivery mode were associated with dropout. Although more research is needed on engaging couples at risk for early dropout and maximizing early benefits, the findings suggest that clinicians should attend to the civilian partner's and Veteran's depressive symptoms at intake and consider the assessment part of active treatment.     

Evaluating self and partner physical attractiveness

This study used a novel questionnaire to examine ratings of self and partner physical attractiveness. Seventy-two men and 83 women estimated their own and their opposite-sex partner's overall physical attractiveness and the attractiveness of various body parts and measures. They also answered six simple questions concerning physical attractiveness. Results showed significant gender differences in self-estimates of overall facial attractiveness and upper body features. In general, and regardless of gender, participants rated their opposite-sex partners as being significantly more attractive than themselves. In addition, the results showed that body weight and facial attractiveness were the best predictors of overall physical attractiveness. Implications of these results in terms of social biases are considered.     

Control and synchronization of laser bursting and its implications in neuroscience

We present experimental and numerical evidence of control and synchronization of burst events in modulated CO₂ lasers. Bursts appear randomly in each laser as trains of large amplitude spikes intercalated by a small amplitude chaotic regime. Experimental data and model display the frequency locking of bursts in a suitable interval of coupling strengths. The analogy with neuronal bursting will also be discussed in view of the role of bursting synchronization in cognitive functions.     

The discrimination of discrete and continuous amounts in African grey parrots (Psittacus erithacus)

A wealth of research in infants and animals demonstrates discrimination of quantities, in some cases nonverbal numerical perception, and even elementary calculation capacities. We investigated the ability of three African grey parrots (Psittacus erithacus) to select the largest amount of food between two sets, either discrete food items (experiment 1) or as volume of a food substance (experiment 2). The two amounts were presented simultaneously and were visible at the time of choice. Parrots were tested several times for all possible combinations between 1 and 5 seeds or 0.2 and 1 ml of food substance. In both conditions, subjects performed above chance for almost all combinations. Accuracy was negatively correlated with the ratio, that is performance improved with greater differences between amounts. Therefore, these results with both individual items and volume discrimination suggest that parrots use an analogue of magnitude, rather than object-file mechanisms to quantify items and substances.     

Community,Spiritual Traditions,and Disasters in Chinese Society

Pastoral Psychology - This article posits a deeply contextual and communal therapy as the best path to a victim’s reconstruction of a sense of ‘home.’ The authors take seriously...     

The role of listening in interpersonal influence

Using informant reports on working professionals, we explored the role of listening in interpersonal influence and how listening may account for at least some of the relationship between personality and influence. The results extended prior work which has suggested that listening is positively related to influence for informational and relational reasons. As predicted, we found that: (1) listening had a positive effect on influence beyond the impact of verbal expression, (2) listening interacted with verbal expression to predict influence (such that the relationship between listening and influence was stronger among those more expressive), and (3) listening partly mediated the positive relationships between each of the Big Five dimensions of agreeableness and openness and influence.     

Boys’ and Girls’ Relational and Physical Aggression in Nine Countries

Distinguishing between relational and physical aggression has become a key feature of many developmental studies in North America and Western Europe, but very little information is available on relational and physical aggression in more diverse cultural contexts. This study examined the factor structure of, associations between, and gender differences in relational and physical aggression in China, Colombia, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, the Philippines, Sweden, Thailand, and the United States. Children ages 7–10 years (N = 1,410) reported on their relationally and physically aggressive behavior. Relational and physical aggression shared a common factor structure across countries. In all nine countries, relational and physical aggression were significantly correlated (average r = .49). Countries differed in the mean levels of both relational and physical aggression that children reported using and with respect to whether children reported using more physical than relational aggression or more relational than physical aggression. Boys reported being more physically aggressive than girls across all nine countries; no consistent gender differences emerged in relational aggression. Despite mean‐level differences in relational and physical aggression across countries, the findings provided support for cross‐country similarities in associations between relational and physical aggression as well as links between gender and aggression. Aggr. Behav. 38:298‐308, 2012. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

'Rallying around the flag': Can an intergroup contact intervention promote national unity?

A longitudinal study evaluated the success of a contact-based nation-building intervention (the Malaysian National Service Programme) in promoting various facets of national unity. The study assessed how post-test measures of quality of intergroup contact, outgroup evaluations, and levels of identification changed compared to their respective pre-test levels, for both National Service and control group participants. The intervention did not lead to a worsening of any of the constructs related to intergroup relations, which is noteworthy given the novelty for many participants of mixing in a multi-ethnic setting. Furthermore, all rater groups (Malays, Chinese, and Indians) maintained their ethnic identity, even in the presence of high levels of national identity, which we discuss with respect to past research on the effects of positive intergroup contact on minority group identification. However, the changes associated with the intervention yielded only small effect sizes, and, on the whole, National Service participants did not show significantly greater improvement than that experienced by control participants. We discuss the value of intergroup contact in this novel setting, considering various features of this programme that may have limited its effectiveness and discuss how such interventions can more successfully meet their goals.