A phenomenological survey of auditory verbal hallucinations in the hypnagogic and hypnopompic states

The phenomenology of auditory verbal hallucinations (AVHs) occurring in hypnagogic and hypnopompic (H&H) states has received little attention. In a sample of healthy participants (N = 325), 108 participants reported H&H AVHs and answered subsequent questions on their phenomenology. AVHs in the H&H state were found (1) to be more likely to only feature the occasional clear word than to be clear, (2) to be more likely to be one-off voices than to be recurrent voices, (3) to be more likely to be voices of people known to the individual than unknown persons, (4) to be more likely to talk directly to the person rather than not, and (5) to only rarely give commands, ask questions, or to result in an interactive conversation. Their phenomenology was similar to normative AVHs in wakefulness (as established by previous research) in that the voice-hearer was usually the target of the voice, and the voice was more likely to be of a recognized person. However, H&H AVHs differed from AVHs in wakefulness in that commands and questions were rare, and there was typically no dialogical engagement with the voice. We conclude by proposing that two distinct types of H&H AVHs may exist (which we term “dialogic” and “monologic”), based on an analysis of the phenomenology of the experience, and suggest avenues for future research.     

Research into therapists’ perceptions of therapeutic change using vignettes and aMSN messenger

This article describes a research approach to investigating the ways in which therapists understand the nature of therapeutic change. The research was based in qualitative, narrative approaches to in-depth analysis of vignettes provided by drama therapists. The article describes the approach to the generation of data through the internet by aMSN messenger. It reports on the approach taken to the analysis of data along with samples from the findings.     

Global Predictions of Memory in Alzheimer’s Disease: Evidence for Preserved Metamemory Monitoring

Previous researchers have argued that there is a metamemory monitoring deficit in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) because patients tend to overestimate their recall performance on a word list. We propose that these previous results are a misleading by-product of the methodologies used, rather than evidence of an underlying metamemory deficit. In two experiments, AD patients and older adult controls made predictions of performance both before and after encoding a to-be-remembered list. Metamemory function was measured by observing the shift in predictions made with, and without, an opportunity to monitor the list. Experiment 1 found that although there were differences between the groups’ accuracy for their prestudy predictions of recall, both groups were equally accurate after encoding. Experiment 2 explored this using four lists that varied in item difficulty and semantic relatedness. This experiment replicated the findings of Experiment 1, and it was also found that the AD group became more accurate at predicting their performance with more exposure to study-test trials. These studies suggest that metamemory monitoring is intact in AD, because AD patients utilize information gained during processing the to-be-remembered items to revise their predictions of subsequent performance.     

The home advantage in individual sports: An augmented review

ObjectivesIs the home advantage in individual sports comparable in magnitude and consistency to that in team sports? If not, is it nevertheless a major factor? The present paper reviews the literature to date with respect to these questions and augments it with original analyses where appropriate.DesignThe review is framed and dominated by a design consideration, namely, that all major team sports play balanced home-and-away schedules, whereas individual sports rarely, if ever, do. As a result, it is necessary to take player quality into account in assessing home advantage in an individual sport.Method/approachThe paper begins with three individual sports (tennis, golf, and boxing) in which home advantage has been studied using available controls for player quality. It moves on to individual and team sports in the Olympics, where home advantage has also been studied with credible controls on player (country) quality. Studies are then reviewed in which player quality has not been controlled. Finally, data are presented for two individual efforts embedded in team sports (free throws in basketball and shootouts in ice hockey).ResultsSubjectively evaluated sports such as diving, gymnastics, or figure skating usually show sizable and significant home advantages. Otherwise, occasional findings have been reported but they are not consistent within a sport, are generally weak, and often statistically unreliable.ConclusionsExcept for subjectively evaluated sports, home advantage is not a major factor in individual sports, much less does it play a role in individual sports comparable to its role in team sports.     

‘Beyond the oedipal complex’: Freud and lacan revisited

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to explore the position that the mother occupies in both Freud's and Lacan's accounts of oedipalization. Both authors' work will be addressed with reference to contemporary feminist critiques of their accounts. The aim will be to query the belief that the mother must be repudiated in order for the child to move into culture. It will be suggested that both Lacan's and Freud's accounts may ironically perpetuate both the ‘interminable’ nature of analysis and a relationship with the maternal in which the mother will continue to haunt, beckon and terrify until some attempt is made at reparation.     

Identification With Video Game Characters as Automatic Shift of Self-Perceptions

Two experiments tested the prediction that video game players identify with the character or role they are assigned, which leads to automatic shifts in implicit self-perceptions. Video game identification, thus, is considered as a kind of altered self-experience. In Study 1 (N = 61), participants either played a first-person shooter game or a racing game. Subsequently, they performed an Implicit Association Test (IAT) designed to detect cognitive associations between character-related concepts and players' self. Findings indicate a stronger automatic association of military-related concepts to shooter players' self and a stronger association of racing-related concepts to racing game players' self. Study 2 (N = 48) replicated the IAT result from Study 1 and demonstrated the stability of the identification pattern. Implications for identification as an element of the video game experience and future research directions are discussed.     

Conceptualizing,Capturing, and Modeling Change: Challenges for Psychology

A primary goal of scientists, be they psychologists or physicists, is the detection of cause‐and‐effect relationships. In whatever field of study, the impact of the independent variable upon the dependent variable is assessed either indirectly through presumed change (comparing groups cross‐sectionally) or directly through observed change (comparing a single entity or groups of entities longitudinally). Researchers' conceptualization of change varies quite dramatically, even within the field of psychology, with attendant variation in research designs and statistics commonly employed. We discuss the array of options available to conceptualize, capture, and model change, including their strengths and weaknesses, using examples from our own research in personality lifespan development, along with others' related research.     

Factores familiares en la recaída de pacientes esquizofrénicos

Resumen

Nuestro estudio de la atmósfera emocional de los hogares de los pacientes esquizofrénicos en California del Sur ha replicado los descubrimientos británicos en relación con la influencia del ambiente familiar sobre el curso de la esquizofrenia. Como en los estudios británicos, las críticas y la implicación emocional excesiva de un familiar clave para el paciente en el momento de su ingreso constituyen el mejor predictor aislado de recaída sintomática en los nueve meses posteriores al alta hospitalaria. Al igual que en los resultados británicos, la asociación entre la emoción expresada de los familiares y la recaída fue independiente de todas las demas variables investigadas. Los resultados transculturales sobre los efectos preventivos de la medicación sugieren que los clínicos deben considerar la atmósfera emocional del hogar, a la hora de explicar los fracasos de la medicación.     

Emerging as a Personality Disorder Service

Personality Disorder Services working along psychotherapeutic lines are gaining appeal with Health Care Commissioners following the publication of the NICE guidelines for Borderline & Antisocial Personality Disorders and the emerging successful application of psychoanalytically-derived approaches.

Establishing a new Personality Disorder Service is akin to constructing a ‘home’ within which the therapeutic work with patients can develop. As clinicians, we are required to question what facets are important to the development of this new home, and to further to endure the unfamiliar state of being ‘not at home’ while the identity of the service is established.

We address how this process parallels the task facing the patient as they struggle to establish their own identity. We also highlight some important tenets in the work of securing a robust identity for both the service and the patient suffering from a personality disorder.