When philosophers want an example of a person who lacks the ability to do otherwise, they turn to psychopathology. Addicts, agoraphobics, kleptomaniacs, neurotics, obsessives, and even psychopathic serial murderers, are all purportedly subject to irresistible desires that compel the person to act: no alternative possibility is supposed to exist. I argue that this conception of psychopathology is false and offer an empirically and clinically informed understanding of disorders of agency which preserves the ability to do otherwise. First, I appeal to standard clinical treatment for disorders of agency and argue that it undermines this conception of psychopathology. Second, I offer a detailed discussion of addiction, where our knowledge of the neurobiological mechanisms underpinning the disorder is relatively advanced. I argue that neurobiology notwithstanding, addiction is not a form of compulsion and I explain how addiction can impair behavioural control without extinguishing it. Third, I step back from addiction, and briefly sketch what the philosophical landscape more generally looks like without psychopathological compulsion: we lose our standard purported real‐world example of psychologically determined action. I conclude by reflecting on the centrality of choice and free will to our concept of action, and their potency within clinical treatment for disorders of agency. 相似文献
Everyday behavior is getting increasingly attention, both in the prevention of mental impairment and the promotion of mental health – within and beyond the work context. The present study aimed to identify the importance of mental health activities for well-being and positive functioning of teachers, while taking affectivity into account. Teachers are confronted with various stressors, and identifying predictors of teachers’ well-being and positive functioning is important, not only for teachers’ personal health, but also for their students’ well-being and achievement. Based on the Broaden and Build (B&B) theory and Conservation of Resources (COR) theory, we assumed that (1) the practice of mental health activities is associated with well-being (i.e., positive mental health) and positive functioning (i.e., healthy and unhealthy work-related behavior and experiences), and that (2) mental health activities mediate the association between affectivity and the respective outcomes. These assumptions were tested in a sample of 326 German teachers (75% female, age: M = 44, SD = 11.85). The practice of mental health activities was associated with more positive mental health, more healthy work-related behavior and experiences, and less unhealthy work-related behavior and experiences. Moreover, mental health activities partly explained the relationship between affectivity and the respective outcomes. The present findings indicate the potential of mental health activities for mental health promotion in teachers but future studies are recommended in order to establish causal effects.
A miniature linguistic system was used to study acquisition of recombinative symbolic behavior. Three studies evaluated the teaching conditions of conditional discriminations with printed and spoken pseudowords that could potentially generate recombinative reading. Fifty-four college students across all studies learned to match 12 printed pseudowords to 12 spoken pseudowords. Some also matched pictures to the same spoken words. Each two-syllable pseudoword was formed by symbols from an arbitrarily created alphabet composed of four vowels and four consonants. Letters had univocal correspondence with phonemes. Recombinative receptive reading, comprehensive reading, and textual responding to pseudowords were periodically assessed. Experiment 1 (n = 20) showed that recombinative reading increased as the number of trained words composed of the same symbols increased. Experiment 2 (n = 14) showed that overtraining the same two words did not produce recombinative reading for most participants. Experiment 3 (n = 20), in which training with pictures was omitted, showed that elemental control by within-syllable units can develop even when the trained pseudowords are meaningless (not related to pictures). The present results support the utility of the miniature linguistic system methodology for identifying and controlling environmental determinants of rudimentary reading skills. 相似文献
This study explored the factor structure of the Korean version of the Perfectionistic Self-Presentation Scale, originally developed by Hewitt and colleagues in 2003 with three factors (Perfectionistic Self-promotion, Non-display of Imperfection, and Non-disclosure of Imperfection). In Study 1, a confirmatory factor analysis was performed on the Korean version with 27 items for 151 Korean college students, but the model fit was poor. Subsequently, an exploratory factor analysis was conducted, and the results yielded three factors as found in Hewitt, et al., yet with 20 items rather than the original 27 items. This new version had good internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha =.88); convergent validity estimate was established with a measure of self-presentation motivation. In Study 2, to support the structural validity of the Korean version, another confirmatory factor analysis was conducted with 203 Korean college students. The model fit was good, but a few amendments were made. 相似文献
We examined emotional memory enhancement (EEM) for negative and positive pictures while manipulating encoding and retrieval conditions. Two groups of 40 participants took part in this study. Both groups performed immediate implicit (categorization task) and explicit (recognition task) retrieval, but for one group the tasks were preceded by incidental encoding and for the other group by intentional encoding. As indicated by the sensitivity index (d'), after incidental encoding positive stimuli were easier to recognize than negative and neutral stimuli. Participants' response criterion was more liberal for negative stimuli than for both positive and neutral ones, independent of encoding condition. In the implicit retrieval task, participants were slower in categorizing positive than negative and neutral stimuli. However, the priming effect was larger for emotional than for neutral stimuli. These results are discussed in the context of the idea that the effect of emotion on immediate memory enhancement may depend on the intentionality to encode and retrieve information. 相似文献
Predictors of monetary donations to victims of humanitarian disasters were examined. Participants (N = 219) chose between donating to different scenarios and justified their choices in an open response format. This was followed by a questionnaire. The perceived extent of the victims’ Need, the Impact of a potential donation, and the Amount donated by others all influenced donation decisions. There was a three‐way interaction between these factors: The perceived Need for help only mattered if the perceived Impact of a donation was high, and the perceived Amount donated by others was small. Implications for theory and practice are discussed. 相似文献
The purpose of this exploratory study is to develop a deeper understanding of the way in which the metaphorical language of therapists evolves in dialogue with a client over the course of a therapeutic session. We first briefly report on a study in which we categorized the metaphors used by therapists in twelve therapy sessions with a role‐played client. Then we focus on an intensive micro‐analysis of one particular metaphor that was introduced in the session by one particular therapist in the categorization study: the metaphor of a fireman in the family. Our analysis allowed us a detailed look at some of the ways in which metaphorical language opens dialogical space in the session to talk about the position of parentification of the client and about the price she has to pay for this position in terms of preoccupying worries and loneliness. Furthermore our analysis revealed the delicate dialogical nature of the therapeutic process in which, in talk, the therapist takes the client's experiencing into account all the time. 相似文献