Helplessness: The inability to know-that you don’t know-how

The sense of helplessness stands at the very core of the traumatic experience. This paper suggests that a sense of helplessness arises when, despite the functioning of the cognitive system and awareness of circumstances and feelings, an individual is unable to access practical knowledge. As a result, the subject becomes a victim of one’s own inability to perform, or act, in the real world.     

Construct validity of a competitive reaction-time aggression paradigm

This study tested the construct validity (convergent and discriminant) of a competitive reaction-time aggression paradigm. Seventy-nine males completed three trait aggression questionnaires and then competed on a reaction-time task whereby they received and delivered shocks to a fictitious opponent. Results demonstrated strong positive relationships between shock intensity administered and the trait measures of overt aggression but not with the measures unrelated to overt aggression. Results are discussed with regard to their contribution to the construct validity of the aggression paradigm used in this study. © 1995 Wiley-Liss, Inc.     

Relationship of pain tolerance with human aggression

In research with animals as well as samples of chronic pain patients and elderly persons, pain has been positively correlated with measures of irritability, hostility, and aggression. The present investigation examined the relationship of pain tolerance with aggression. 72 men participated in the Response Choice Aggression Paradigm, described previously by Zeichner and colleagues, in which aggressive response to provocation was possible but not required of participants. Subjective pain tolerance, defined as maximal electrical shock willingly tolerated by participants, was assessed. Significant but small Pearson product-moment correlations between pain tolerance and aggression ranged between .21 and .32, with the largest accounting for 9% of variance.     

The Influence of Television Programs on Appearance Satisfaction: Making and Mitigating Social Comparisons to “Friends”

Studies of “media effects” on women’s appearance satisfaction have focused largely on images from fashion magazines and television commercials, and rarely on images from television programs. The present study reports on the effects of experimental exposure to a television situation-comedy depicting thin and highly physically-attractive characters on appearance satisfaction in Canadian undergraduate women (N?=?76) from a large, ethnically-diverse, metropolitan area. The results demonstrate a detrimental effect on participants’ satisfaction with their overall appearance, as measured on a Visual Analogue Scale (VAS). This result is interpreted in line with social comparison theory. In addition, exposure to written intervention material, designed to remove the basis for social comparison with television images, was shown to be effective in mitigating this effect.     

Trinh Thuan and The Intersection of Science and Buddhism

Trinh Thuan, professor of astronomy at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, since 1976, has published a number of books over the years that have touched on topics in the science‐and‐religion discussion. This essay reviews these volumes in light of a recent book he coauthored with Matthieu Ricard, a monk in the Tibetan Mahayana tradition with previous background and training in the biological sciences. The shift is observed in Thuan's views from at one point being attracted to a form of theism based on inferences drawn from the anthropic principle to later being intrigued by Ricard's explanations of the cosmos based on Buddhist consciousness theories. Thuan's journey as a scientist seeking further understanding is a lesson to the religion‐and‐science dialogue that more of the world's religious traditions need to be engaged with their specificities so that what emerges is an expanded conversation.