The currency of procurement cost

As the number of instrtumental responses required to procure access to food is increased, animals decrease the frequency of initiating meals and increase meal size, conserving total intake while limiting the increase in the overall cost of feeding. In two studies, one using wheel turns and one using bar presses as the instrumental response, we asked whether freely feeding laboratory rats measure cost according to the energy or the time they expend. In each study we varied both the price (i.e., number of wheel turns or bar presses) and the force required to make a response (i.e., torque on the wheel or weight of the bar). Price affected both procurement time (from the first to the last procurement response) and procurement work, whereas torque and bar weight affected work without altering time in most cases. Meal patterns were altered by all manipulations of price, but changes in torque and bar weight had little effect on meal patterns, except in the conditions in which they altered procurement time. These results suggest that time is a critical currency of procurement cost in rats.     

The effects of aging and dorsal hippocampal lesions: performance on spatial and nonspatial comparable versions of the water maze

Aged intact and young hippocampal-lesioned rats show similar deficits on the spatial water maze. However, this does not necessitate that the source of these deficits in the aged animals is due to hippocampal damage. These water maze deficits may arise from other aging factors such as changes in thermoregulation, muscle fatigue, swim ability, and response to stress. Consequently, it is imperative to examine the performance of aged rats on a comparable nonhippocampal version of this task. Past attempts to develop a hippocampus-independent version of the water maze were confounded because these tasks were easier (i.e., the rats spent much less time swimming in the water) than the spatial versions of the task. The current study examined performance on a hippocampus-independent task comparable in difficulty to the spatial water one. Middle-aged (16-m) and old (25-m) male F344 rats were given sham or dorsal hippocampus lesions and tested on both a spatial and a nonspatial water maze. The middle-aged rats with hippocampal lesions were impaired on the spatial task but not on the nonspatial task. Conversely, aged animals showed a similar impairment on both types of water maze tasks. Additionally, hippocampal lesions exacerbated the age-related impairment on both tasks. These findings indicate that caution must be used when interpreting the results of water maze tasks for aged animals.     

The Primary and Secondary Factors That Promote Destructive Personalities

The ability of behavioral scientists to assist society deal competently with destructive behavior relies upon a recognition of its causes. Despite the pervasiveness of violence in American society, the roots of destructiveness are still poorly understood. Five primary and five secondary factors found in the developmental histories of people who have become involved in serious destruction are identified and discussed. The confluence of these factors in the steps toward destructive acts are traced.     

Curiosity as an Agent of Conscience

Public outcry against social outrages in our nation in the past few years have called for solutions that suggest that we as a nation believe that by strengthening the observational and punishing components of the superego of the American Psyche we can successfully overthrow our moral failings. By using data in regard to Adolph Eichman and other Nazis as clinical examples, it is suggested that the problem of our moral failings resides not in a deficient superego (a refluent moral agent) but in the insufficient development of conscience (a reflective consciousness). The roles that curiosity and impeded curiosity take in the development of morality are shown to be central to an understanding of how conscience differs from superego.     

Die Verantwortung der Psychoanalyse für die Psychotherapie

Whether psychoanalysis can take over the responsibility for psychotherapy when it is not operating as a part of psychoanalysis but on its own is a question which has currently become significant again. The present paper gives an affirmative answer, but under certain limiting conditions only. Psychoanalysis can take responsibility for psychotherapy. It can base this on the fact that the definition of “depth psychological psychotherapy” binds psychotherapy—as it is usually called—to psychoanalysis. How this is possible in practice is determined during the training. The training at the Michael-Balint-Institute in Hamburg is presented which partly occurs jointly and partly separately, in this way representing the reality of the two separate fields linked to each other and yet independent. The common ground is constituted by the basic principles of psychoanalysis. As an example of this common ground, the seminar on the technique of diagnosis and treatment, which is part of the early curriculum, is discussed in detail. Later on in the training, the two curricula separate more and more, each taking over its own responsibility. Not only questions of the contents but also formal aspects have to be considered. There are good reasons for establishing an independent Institute for Psychotherapy which runs the necessary arrangements together with the Institute for Psychoanalysis, from which it derives, and also remains close to the latter. Finally, it is pointed out that all of this is only possible when respecting each other’s work. Independent psychotherapy is not less valuable than psychoanalysis, but simply something else.     

Do Procedural Justice Perceptions in a Selection Testing Context Predict Applicant Attraction and Intention Toward the Organization?

This study examines the effects of procedural justice perceptions on outcomes in an actual selection context with applicants taking a general mental ability test to gain employment as utility meter readers. Applicant attraction and intention related to the organization were measured at 3 time periods. This allowed us to control for initial levels of outcome variables and the pass-fail result when assessing procedural justice effects. Procedural justice perceptions modestly predicted organizational attractiveness and intention prior to pass-fail feedback. However, the procedural justice effects on these outcomes were diminished after controlling for the pass-fail result. Either changes in R ² or regression coefficients associated with procedural justice perceptions failed to achieve significance for all outcomes. We discuss the implications of these findings for procedural justice research and for employment managers.     

Genes and psychology in the news

This article critiques the way that news articles report the relationship between genes and psychological processes. The news frequently reports that genes cause various psychological processes. However, these claims rest upon unscientific data; selective use of data (ignoring contradictory data); failure to consider just how the physical properties of genes and their by-products (e.g., neurotransmitters) could or could not control psychological phenomena; misconstruing the nature of psychological phenomena; specious arguments; and unwarranted leaps of faith. Consequently, the causal conclusion is unwarranted, and news reports misinform the public about this vital issue. The author delineates an alternative theory of the relation between biology and psychology which explains why genes may correlate with psychological processes without causing, or predisposing, them.