Philosophy of Education in a Poor Historical Moment: A Personal Account

Under the post-metaphysical sky “old” humanistic-oriented education is possible solely at the cost of its transformation into its negative, into a power that is determined to diminish human potentials for self-exaltation. Nothing less than total metamorphosis is needed to rescue the core of humanistic genesis: the quest for edifying Life and resistance to the call for “home-returning” into the total harmony that is promised to us within nothingness.     

The role of empathy and social anxiety in Latinx adolescents' indirect peer aggression during the transition to high school

The primary purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship between decreased empathy (i.e., cognitive and affective) and indirect and cyber peer aggression among Latinx adolescents during their transition to high school. Further, we examined the degree to which social anxiety moderated this relationship. Participants were 469 Latinx ninth graders, ages 13–17 years (M = 14.52, SD = 0.58; 58% girls). Adolescents completed the Revised Peer Experiences Questionnaire, Cyber Peer Experiences Questionnaire, Basic Empathy Scale, and Social Anxiety Scale for Adolescents at two different time points, 3 months apart. Hierarchical linear regression analyses revealed concurrent and prospective relationships between lower cognitive empathy and the perpetration of both indirect and cyber aggression. In addition, social anxiety moderated the concurrent associations between both types of empathy and both types of aggression perpetration. Results suggest that interventions that facilitate cognitive empathy and decrease social anxiety may help to reduce adolescents' indirect and cyber aggression toward peers throughout the high school transition.     

Psychoanalytic patients in the U.S., CANADA,and Australia: I. DSM-III-R disorders,indications, previous treatment,medications, and length of treatment

To determine the demographics, DSM-III-R disorders diagnosed, indications used in recommending psychoanalysis, previous treatment histories, use of medication, and length of treatment in patients in psychoanalysis in the U.S., Canada, and Australia, a mail survey of practice was sent to every other active member of the American Psychoanalytic Association and every member of the Australian Psychoanalytical Society. This supplemented an earlier survey sent to all Ontario psychoanalysts. The response rates were 40.1 % (n = 342) for the U.S., 67.2% (n = 117) for Canada, and 73.9% (n = 51) for Australia. Respondents supplied data on 1,718 patients. The employment rate for patients increases as analysis progresses (p < .0001). The mean number of concurrent categories of disorders (Axis I, Axis II, and Disorders First Evident in Childhood) per patient at the start of treatment is 5.01 (SD = 3.66; median = 4; mode = 3). There are no statistically significant differences across countries. Mood, anxiety, sexual dysfunction, and personality disorders are most common. American Psychiatric Association / American Psychoanalytic Association peer review criteria for indicating psychoanalysis are followed for 86.5% of patients. Over 80% of patients in all three countries had undergone previous treatments prior to analysis. In the U.S., 18.2% of analysands are on concurrent psychoactive medication; in Australia, 9.6%. The mean length of analyses conducted in the U.S. is 5.7 years, in Australia 6.6, and in Canada 4.8. Psychoanalytic patients in all three countries have similar rates of DSM-III-R psychopathology, and many indications of chronicity.     

Context and the interpretation of likelihood information: the role of intergroup comparisons on perceived vulnerability

Four experiments investigated how people's perceptions about a group's (e.g., women's) vulnerability to a disease are influenced by information about the prevalence of the disease in a comparable group (e.g., men). Participants read symptom and prevalence infomation about fictitious diseases before answering questions regarding target group vulnerability. Participants used the prevalence rate for a nontarget group as an immediate comparison standard for intuitively interpreting the degree of vulnerability of a target group, resulting in robust contrast effects. Experiments 3 and 4 illustrated that these contrast effects can cause a person's intuitive perceptions about a group's vulnerability to selected diseases to conflict with his or her knowledge of the prevalence rates for the diseases. The results support a distinction between 2 components of psychological uncertainty-beliefs in objective probability and more intuitive perceptions of certainty.