Stress, intrusive imagery, and chronic distress

Discusses the nature of stress in the context of problems with its definition and sources of confusion regarding its usefulness and specificity. Stress can be defined as a negative emotional experience accompanied by predictable biochemical, physiological, and behavioral changes that are directed toward adaptation either by manipulating the situation to alter the stressor or by accommodating its effects. Chronic stress is more complex than most definitions suggest and is clearly not limited to situations in which stressors persist for long periods of time. Responses may habituate before a stressor disappears or may persist long beyond the physical presence of the stressor. This latter case, in which chronic stress and associated biobehavioral changes outlast their original cause, is considered in light of research at Three Mile Island and among Vietnam veterans. The role of intrusive images of the stressor or uncontrollable thoughts about it in maintaining stress is explored.     

An Exploration of a Possible Physiological Explanation for Stressor Aftereffects1

The present study examined the relationship between performance deficits that occur following exposure to uncontrollable stressors and activation of the endogenous opioid system. Subjects were given an injection of saline or naloxone, an opioid antagonist, prior to exposure to 23 min of unpredictable intermittent bursts of noise or silence. Changes in mood were assessed following the injection and the stressor. Performance was measured during and after stressor exposure. Measures of performance following the stressor included a proofreading, an encoding, and a puzzle task. Results replicated previous work on the effects of noise on performance; exposure to noise was associated with performance deficits during and after the stressor. Although naloxone had no effect on performance following the noise, it was associated with greater performance deficits during exposure to the stressor. Further, although all subjects became more hostile, anxious, and depressed following exposure to noise or silence, naloxone improved mood before the stressor began.     

Acute Stressors and Chronic Response: The Case of Traumatic Stress1

The nature of acute and chronic stress is explored, including analysis of three different ways of categorizing the duration of a stressful episode: the duration of the physical stressor, the duration of threat perception or demand, and the persistence of response. Of particular interest here are situations characterized by brief stressor exposure but long-term threat perception and/ or stress response. Traumatic events are ordinarily very brief but frequently give rise to chronic threat and stubborn response patterns. In many of these cases, distress clearly outlives the event and the “normal” postevent recovery period. Possible mechanisms for such situations are discussed, as are implications for the study of traumatic stress.     

Female Receptivity and Secondary Traumatization in the Family

This paper addresses the question of gendered receptivity to Secondary Traumatic Syndrome (STS) in the family. Unlike other manifestations of distress in the family, where gender comparisons are a matter of course, very few such comparisons are made in studies of STS. Review of the findings of 12 studies, the only studies, to date, that provide data enabling the comparison of STS in males and females, shows that females in the family, whether daughters, wives, or mothers, are consistently more likely than the males, whether sons, husbands, or fathers, to experience the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms of a traumatized family member without having experienced the traumatic event itself. This pattern pertains to whether the event that precipitated the primary trauma was a collective or individual trauma and whether the STS sufferer was a child or adult or living or not living with the PTSD casualty. The Discussion points out that gender is an important factor in the development of STS, whether in interaction with role, beyond role, or both.     

Predictive Validity of the MMPI–2 Restructured Clinical (RC) Scales in a Batterers' Intervention Program

Summary: The test-retest reliability of the Hutt Adaptation of the Bender-Gestalt Test was explored with a population of 40 process schizophrenics over a two-week interval. The total Psychopathology Scale Score was found to have high retest reliability for both male and female patients (rho = .87 for males and .83 for females). Moreover the three major components of the Scale were found to have high reliability, and fairly high reliabilities were obtained for patients scoring high as well as low on the Scale. Interjudge reliability was also found to be very high (rho = .895), confirming previous studies in this respect. On these grounds, the Scale offers promise both for clinical and research purposes.     

Concurrent variable‐interval variable‐ratio schedules in a dynamic choice environment

Most studies of operant choice have focused on presenting subjects with a fixed pair of schedules across many experimental sessions. Using these methods, studies of concurrent variable‐ interval variable‐ratio schedules helped to evaluate theories of choice. More recently, a growing literature has focused on dynamic choice behavior. Those dynamic choice studies have analyzed behavior on a number of different time scales using concurrent variable‐interval schedules. Following the dynamic choice approach, the present experiment examined performance on concurrent variable‐interval variable‐ratio schedules in a rapidly changing environment. Our objectives were to compare performance on concurrent variable‐interval variable‐ratio schedules with extant data on concurrent variable‐interval variable‐interval schedules using a dynamic choice procedure and to extend earlier work on concurrent variable‐interval variable‐ratio schedules. We analyzed performances at different time scales, finding strong similarities between concurrent variable‐interval variable‐interval and concurrent variable‐interval variable‐ ratio performance within dynamic choice procedures. Time‐based measures revealed almost identical performance in the two procedures compared with response‐based measures, supporting the view that choice is best understood as time allocation. Performance at the smaller time scale of visits accorded with the tendency seen in earlier research toward developing a pattern of strong preference for and long visits to the richer alternative paired with brief “samples” at the leaner alternative (“fix and sample”).     

What is Radical Behaviorism? A Review of Jay Moore's Conceptual Foundations of Radical Behaviorism

B. F. Skinner founded both radical behaviorism and behavior analysis. His founding innovations included: a versatile preparation for studying behavior; explicating the generic nature of stimulus and response; a pragmatic criterion for defining behavioral units; response rate as a datum; the concept of stimulus control; the concept of verbal behavior; and explicating the explanatory power of contingencies. Besides these achievements, however, Skinner also made some mistakes. Subsequent developments in radical behaviorist thought have attempted to remedy these mistakes. Moore's book presents a “party line” version of radical behaviorism. It focuses narrowly on a few of Skinner's concepts (mostly mentalism and verbal behavior) and contains no criticism of his mistakes. In fact, Moore adds a few mistakes of his own manufacture; for example, he insists that the mental realm does not exist—an unprovable and distracting assertion. The book's portrayal of behavior analysis would have been current around 1960; it mentions almost none of the developments since then. It also includes almost no developments in radical behaviorism since Skinner. Moore's book would give an unwary reader a highly distorted picture of contemporary behavior analysis and radical behaviorism.     

Evasion, private events, and pragmatism: A Reply to Moore's response to my review of Conceptual Foundations of Radical Behaviorism

Moore's screed in response to my review of his book uses several rhetorical tricks to counter criticism without actually addressing it: he tries to preempt the transparency of his own orthodoxy by groundlessly accusing me of orthodoxy; he caricatures my criticisms to make them appear obviously wrong; he professes lack of understanding so as to dodge having to attempt a genuine response; and he engages in pejorative labeling to dismiss the criticisms without analysis. From a scientific and pragmatic point of view, private events are a mistake, precisely because they are private. They cannot serve as independent variables, as Moore suggests, because they cannot be measured; “private independent variable” is a contradiction in terms. When we carefully examine locutions like “observe” and “report on,” we discover that they entail only public verbal and nonverbal behavior, not objects and not private events as objects. A person in pain is not reporting on anything, is engaging in public verbal and nonverbal pain‐behavior, and an infant or a dog may be considered to be in pain. The public behavior is all that matters, because determining whether a person is really in pain privately is impossible. The same is true of any private event, and the control of the public behavior on which the verbal community comments lies in the public environment. We cannot have two sets of principles, one for verbal behavior and one for nonverbal behavior or one for humans and one for other animals.