Cost–Benefit Associations and Financial Behavior

Financial behavior involves costs and benefits. How strongly costs and benefits are perceived as being related to each other is hypothesised to influence affect, cognition, and behavior. Thus, the subject of cost–benefit associations is relevant in several domains of applied psychology. Illustrated by examples from applied areas like consumption, work, and citizenship, the current paper underlines the importance of cost–benefit associations by presenting theoretical approaches to their analysis and discussing major antecedents and consequences.
Le comportement financier implique des coûts et des bénéfices. Nous testons la façon dont la perception des liens entre coûts et bénéfices influence l'affect, la cognition et les comportements. L'analyse des liens coûts-bénéfices est pertinente pour différents domaines de la psychologie appliquée. Illustrés par des exemples pris dans des domaines d'application comme la consommation, le travail et la citoyenneté, cet article souligne l'importance des liens coûts-bénéfices en présentant les approches théoriques qui ont servis à leur analyse et en discutant de leurs antécédents et leurs conséquences majeurs.     

Prevalence and correlates of hoarding behavior in a community-based sample

Little is known about the prevalence and correlates of hoarding behavior in the community. We estimated the prevalence and evaluated correlates of hoarding in 742 participants in the Hopkins Epidemiology of Personality Disorder Study. The prevalence of hoarding was nearly 4% (5.3%, weighted) and was greater in older than younger age groups, greater in men than women, and inversely related to household income. Hoarding was associated with alcohol dependence; paranoid, schizotypal, avoidant, and obsessive-compulsive personality disorder traits; insecurity from home break-ins and excessive physical discipline before 16 years of age; and parental psychopathology. These findings suggest that hoarding may be relatively prevalent and that alcohol dependence, personality disorder traits, and specific childhood adversities are associated with hoarding in the community.     

The persistence of implicit behavioral associations for moms and dads

While the concept of the “new involved father” has gained popularity in the media and academic circles, it is unclear to what extent behavioral expectations of moms and dads today reflect gender equality. Using a Go/No-Go Task, Study 1 examined implicit associations between behavioral images indicative of childcare versus the professional world with (a) parent roles (dads versus moms) and (b) gender categories (males versus females). Both evidenced strong persistence of traditional stereotypes. Moreover, females were more strongly associated with the role mom than males were with dad. In Study 2, individual variation in the strength of these implicit associations predicted differences in judgments of how best to resolve work—family conflicts along traditional stereotypic lines. Implicit associations tying mom to childcare and dad to the professional world likely contribute to greater experienced conflict for women than men in striving to be both a parent and a professional.     

Voluntariness, intention, and the defence of mental disorder: toward a rational approach

This article addresses how mental disorder may be used in common law countries to negate the requirements of voluntariness and intention in serious criminal offences as well as to provide the basis for current versions of the insanity defence. The notion that mental disorder can cause conduct to become completely involuntary or unintentional is questionable, given current thinking in the behavioral sciences. This article argues that different forms of mental disorder should be subsumed within a separate defence of mental disorder. Providing that a range of dispositional options is available, the law in this complex area would be simplified and brought into line with current psychological notions of goal-directed behavior.     

Plato's Child and the Limit-Points of Educational Theories

This paper analyzes how the figure of the childhas been used to authorize a series ofboundaries that have constituted thelimit-points of educational theories orphilosophies. Limit-points are the conceptualboundaries that educational theories produce,move within, respond to, and make use ofbecause the perception is that they cannot beargued away or around at the time. A method ofcomparative historico-philosophy is used tocontrast limit-points in Platonic figurationsof the child and education with childcenteredand eugenic theories of the late nineteenth andtwentieth century West. The figuration of thechild in both periods is imbricated in formingboundaries around a power-motion-reason nexusand in delineating what necessity and justicemean. The meaning-space that the child canoccupy in relation to such concepts has shiftedwith them and has been important to depictingUtopian and cosmological imaginings atdifferent historical moments and forauthorizing in turn what counts as anappropriate and/or realistic educationalphilosophy.