Overcoming Obstacles to Empathy: The Use of Experiential Learning in Addictions Counseling Courses

Empathy is associated with positive outcomes in addictions counseling. The moral model of addiction and unresolved countertransference issues may hinder counseling students’ development of empathic understanding for clients with substance use disorders. Counselor educators must structure courses in such a way as to help students overcome obstacles to empathy. We provide examples of several experiential activities framed within the context of Kolb’s experiential-learning cycle that are designed to deconstruct obstacles to student empathy development.     

Presentism: Foreigner-Friendly or Xenophobic?

I argue that, for all we know, there are perfectly ordinary actual entities that are temporal in the usual sense and yet never present, past, or future. This epistemic fact requires us to modify the theses of presentism and eternalism. More importantly, it generates three new and quite serious objections to presentism, which I formulate and partially evaluate in this paper.     

Parallel associative processing in the dorsal striatum: segregation of stimulus-response and cognitive control subregions

Although evidence suggests that the dorsal striatum contributes to multiple learning and memory functions, there nevertheless remains considerable disagreement on the specific associative roles of different neuroanatomical subregions. We review evidence indicating that the dorsolateral striatum (DLS) is a substrate for stimulus–response habit formation – incremental strengthening of simple S–R bonds – via input from sensorimotor neocortex while the dorsomedial striatum (DMS) contributes to behavioral flexibility – the cognitive control of behavior – via prefrontal and limbic circuits engaged in relational and spatial information processing. The parallel circuits through dorsal striatum interact with incentive/affective motivational processing in the ventral striatum and portions of the prefrontal cortex leading to overt responding under specific testing conditions. Converging evidence obtained through a detailed task analysis and neurobehavioral assessment is beginning to illuminate striatal subregional interactions and relations to the rest of the mammalian brain.     

Generalized others and imaginary audiences: A neo-Meadian approach to adolescent egocentrism

Piaget’s conception of adolescent egocentrism, as interpreted and extended by Elkind (1967) is discussed, and research that has related Elkind’s egocentric ideations of personal fable and imaginary audience to age and intellectual development is considered. Alternative theories of adolescent egocentrism and its decentration are examined, and a neo-Meadian framework is discussed that understands the imaginary audience ideation of adolescents as a possibly functional, highly variable response to the complex task of coordinating individual and social perspectives as part of the adolescent’s search for identity.     

Associations between types of combat violence and the acquired capability for suicide

Research suggests that combat exposure might increase risk for suicide. The interpersonal-psychological theory of suicide (IPTS) proposes that exposure to painful and provocative experiences such as combat contribute to fearlessness about death and increased pain tolerance, which serve to enhance the individual's capability to attempt suicide. Violent and aggressive combat experiences, in particular, should demonstrate relatively stronger associations to this capability. The current study tests this proposition in a sample of deployed active duty combatants. Results indicate that all types of combat exposure independently contribute to capability for suicide. Consistent with the IPTS, when considering all types of combat simultaneously, combat characterized by violence and high levels of injury and death are associated with relatively stronger associations to this capability.     

The Predictive Validity of Injury Proxies: Predicting Early Adolescent Injuries with Assessments of Minor Injuries

This study offers an initial step in establishing the predictive validity of injury proxies. Proxies are utilized frequently by injury researchers to overcome various methodological and ethical issues inherent in injury research, although psychometric data on proxies are limited. Using data from the NICHD Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development we found that minor injuries predicted adolescent injuries longitudinally, even in the context of well-established predictors of injury risk. This study is the first to demonstrate the predictive validity of minor injuries, a common proxy of pediatric injury risk. Findings are discussed with respect to implications for conceptual understanding of injury risk, future research, and prevention efforts.     

Preliminary Evidence for Associations of CHRM2 with Substance Use and Disinhibition in Adolescence

Evidence for shared heritable influences across domains of substance use suggests that some genetic variants influence broad risk for externalizing behaviors. Theories of externalizing psychopathology also suggest that genetic liability for substance use manifests as temperamental risk factors, particularly those related to behavioral disinhibition, during adolescence. The cholinergic muscarinic receptor 2 gene (CHRM2) is a promising candidate for studying genetic influences on broad-based risk for externalizing traits. This study examined a candidate CHRM2 polymorphism (rs1455858) in relation to substance use and personality measures of disinhibition in a sample of high-risk adolescents (n?=?124). Bivariate analyses and structural equation modeling (SEM) evaluated associations of rs1455858 with measures of drug involvement (alcohol, tobacco and marijuana) and disinhibition (indexed by impulsivity and sensation seeking scores). Bivariate analyses showed significant associations of CHRM2 with several behavioral phenotypes. In SEM analyses CHRM2 related significantly to latent measures of substance use and disinhibition; additionally, disinhibition mediated the association of CHRM2 with substance use. These results suggest that CHRM2 variants are potentially relevant for adolescent substance use and that temperamental risk factors could contribute to these associations.     

Assessing within-person personality variability via frequency estimation: More evidence for a new measurement approach

Variability in personality has been recognized in recent years as an important aspect of personality both conceptually and empirically. A relatively new and efficient method of obtaining variability information is frequency-based personality assessment (Edwards & Woehr, 2007). The purpose of the present research is to further examine the viability of frequency-based personality measurement as an alternative to traditional (Likert-type) measurement and to assess the usefulness of the variance-based parameters. Toward this end, three studies are presented. Specifically, Study 1 examined relationships between a frequency-based measure of the Big Five personality traits and several motivational variables. Study 2 examined the moderating role of temporal consistency information (provided by frequency-based measurement) on relationships between personality and peer ratings of task performance. Study 3 compared the frequency-based measure to a Likert-type measure with respect to each measure’s susceptibility to deliberate response distortion. Results indicated that consistency information increases the predictive validity of agreeableness and conscientiousness and that a frequency-based format is less susceptible to faking than a Likert-type format for conscientiousness, emotional stability, and openness to experience.     

Calling and work-related outcomes: Career commitment as a mediator

The current study tested the hypothesis that experiencing a calling to a particular career would relate positively to work-related outcomes, and that these relations would be mediated by career commitment. Using a sample of 370 employees representing diverse occupations at a Western research university, results supported these hypotheses as calling moderately correlated with career commitment, job satisfaction, and organizational commitment and weakly correlated with withdrawal intentions. Career commitment was found to fully mediate the calling–job satisfaction relation, partially mediate the calling–organizational commitment relation, and act as a suppressor in the relation between calling and withdrawal intentions; calling was associated with somewhat greater withdrawal intentions once a person's level of career commitment was taken into consideration. These results suggest that career commitment may represent a critical link between calling and work-related well-being. Implications for research and practice are explored.