Infants of “depressed” mothers interact better with their nondepressed fathers

To determine whether infants of “depressed” mothers interact better with their nondepressed fathers, twenty-six 3- to 6-month-old infants were videotaped during face-to-face interactions with their parents. The “depressed” mother group consisted of twelve 3- to 6-month-old infants and their “depressed” mothers and nondepressed fathers. The control group was composed of 14 nondepressed mothers and nondepressed fathers and their 3- to 6-month-old infants. In the “depressed” mother group, the nondepressed fathers received better interaction ratings than the “depressed” mothers. In turn, the infants received better interaction ratings when they interacted with their nondepressed fathers than with their “depressed” mothers. In contrast, nondepressed fathers and mothers and their infants in the control group did not differ on any of their interaction ratings. These findings suggest that infants' difficult interaction behaviors noted during interactions with their “depressed” mothers may not extend to their nondepressed fathers. The data are discussed with respect to the notion that nondepressed fathers may “buffer” the effects of maternal depression on infant interaction behavior.     

Pattern recognition makes search possible: Comments on Holding (1992)

Chase and Simon's chunking theory of expert memory, which emphasizes the role of pattern recognition in problem solving, has attracted much attention in cognitive psychology. Holding advanced a series of criticisms that, taken together, purported to refute the theory. Two valid criticisms – that chunk size and LTM encoding were underestimated – are dealt with by a simple extension of the theory. The remainder of Holding's criticisms either are not empirically founded or are based on a misunderstanding of the chunking theory and its role in a comprehensive theory of skill. Holding's alternative SEEK theory, which emphasizes the role of search, lacks key mechanisms that could be implemented by the type of pattern recognition proposed by Chase and Simon. Received: 3 September 1997 / Accepted: 28 January 1998     

Transformations of the Concept of Reason

This outline of the transformations of the concept of reason is based on the idea that this can be presented/illustrated by means of a historical sketch of the criticism of reason, because all essential differentiations in that concept can be understood as consequences of critical arguments. In Kant's work, the Critique of Speculative Reason reaches its first conclusion; it was followed by a Critique of Critical Reason by Hegel and his followers, and Schopenhauer established a new type of critical argument: the Critique of Functional Reason which dominates the radical criticism of reason in our time. This radical criticism is the great challenge for the philosophy of reason today.     

Aggression Observation Scale for Group Psychotherapy

An observational scale to record aggressive behaviors, defenses, and interventions that occur during a psychotherapy group has been developed. Content and process items were included. The content items focus on the spoken material and are on a continuum of increasing group members' awareness of and responsibility for their anger. The process items are directed to underlying psychodynamic issues on a continuum from avoiding anger, to indirect and then expression of anger. Leader interventions (responses) are also included. The development of the scale, the Aggression Observation Scale for Group Psychotherapy (AOSGP), is described including pilot testing and reliability and validity findings.     

The Structure and Dynamics of Worry: Theory, Measurement, and Cross-National Replications

This article presents a comprehensive conceptualization of the structure of worry and the relation of worry to mental health and well-being. It is assumed that worries have two facets, namely, the object of a worry (e.g., self, close others, society, the world) and the domain of a worry (the field of life with which it is concerned). The object of a worry is presumed to be more important than its domain in determining the impact of worries on mental health. Only worries concerned with self and close others (micro worries) are expected to be related to poor mental health, whereas worries about society or the entire world (macro worries) are expected to be positively related to mental health. An instrument is introduced to study worries in accordance with the proposed structure. Its validity is tested by two confirmatory techniques (similarity structure analysis and confirmatory factor analysis) in samples from Israel, West Germany, and (the former) East Germany. Worry scores are also related to five mental health indicators. Results show that across samples micro and macro worries can validly be distinguished. Micro worries are strongly related to poor mental health, whereas macro worries are unrelated to mental health or relate marginally to positive well-being.     

The peripheral drift illusion: a motion illusion in the visual periphery

Circularly repeating patches containing sawtooth luminance gradients produce a sensation of motion when viewed in the periphery. Illusory motion is perceived in a dark-to-light direction, but only when one's gaze is directed to different locations around the stimulus, a point outside the display is fixated and the observer blinks, or when the stimulus is sequentially displayed at different locations whilst the observer fixates one point. We propose that the illusion is produced by the interaction of three factors: (i) introducing transients as a result of eye movements or blinks; (ii) differing latencies in the processing of luminance; and (iii) spatiotemporal integration of the differing luminance signals in the periphery.     

Hierarchical switching in a multi-dimensional task space

We explored shift costs for a dimensionally organized set of tasks. Task dimensions were type of judgement (numerical vs. spatial) and judgement-to-response mapping (compatible vs. incompatible). Shift costs were determined as the difference in RTs between switch trials and repetitions in a situation in which the kind of task was unpredictable. Shift costs were greatest when the type of judgement was changed. A change in the mapping increased shift costs when the type of judgement remained unchanged, but reduced shift costs when the type of judgement was changed as well. Also, response alternations produced costs when both the type of judgement and SR mapping were unchanged, but reduced shift costs otherwise. In addition to the relation between successive tasks, shift costs were modulated by the specifics of the elementary tasks. The major characteristics of the pattern of shift costs could be accounted for by the hypothesis of a dimensionally organized task space in which hierarchically organized, relative switching operations are performed that affect the highest-level task dimension at which a change is required, and all lower-level dimensions in a first step. In a second step, lower-level dimensions are switched back when no change is required, and then the selected control structure is implemented. Received: 11 December 1997 / Accepted: 6 July 1998