A dualistic identity theory

Whilst it is accepted that humankind has been responsible for a considerable amount of environmental change, it is only recently that quantitative measures have been devised to express this. Such measures include a habitat index, the ecological footprint and the Living Planet Index. The applications and implications of these measures are discussed along with direct measures of changing atmospheric composition. All indicate that Europe is the most anthropogenically transformed continent and Australasia the least altered. In so far as a population increase of c. 36 per cent is likely to occur in the next 25 years, human induced environmental change is set to continue at a rapid pace. It is likely to be exacerbated by rapid industrialisation in some nations and increasing standards of living. Local, regional and international measures to curb environmental deterioration may temper this to a degree but new technologies e.g. biotechnology, may bring disadvantages as well as advantages.     

Book reviews

Charisma and Social Structure: A Study of Love and Power, Wholeness and Transformation. Raymond Trevor Bradley New York: Paragon House, 1987

The Leadership Challenge: How to Get Extraordinary Things Done in Organizations James M. Kouzes and Barry Z. Posner San Francisco: Jossey‐Bass, (fall) 1987. $21.95 hardback. 362 pages.

Mind Matters: How the Mind and Brain Interact to Create Our Consciousness Lives Michael S. Gazzaniga Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1988. 269 pages. Hardcover $17.95, Softcover $8.95.     

Understanding anhedonia in schizophrenia through lexical analysis of natural speech

Anhedonia is a negative prognostic indicator in schizophrenia. However, the underlying nature of this emotional deficit is unclear. Laboratory studies examining patients’ emotional reactions under controlled circumstances have failed to find evidence for a diminished hedonic response, instead finding that patients’ reactions to laboratory stimuli are characterised by high levels of negative emotion. The present study employed lexical analysis of natural speech in 52 patients and 49 non-patient controls while they discussed separate neutral, pleasant and unpleasant autobiographical memories. Patients with clinically rated anhedonia, versus other patients and controls, showed a dramatic increase in negative emotion expression when discussing pleasurable memories, but they showed no corresponding decrease in positive emotion. These findings provide further evidence that “anhedonia” is more reflective of negative emotional states than the absence of positive ones. These findings also raise questions about how positive and negative emotions can be simultaneously co-activated in patients with schizophrenia.     

Fear and Anxiety: Possible Roles of the Amygdala and Bed Nucleus of the Stria Terminalis

This paper presents a provisional classification of deliberate strategies for improving unpleasant affect based on conceptual judgements concerning their similarities and differences. A corpus of self-reported upward affectregulation strategies was collected using questionnaires, interviews, and group discussions, in conjunction with an examination of existing literature on related topics. A total of 162 distinct strategies were identified and a preliminary categorisation was developed by the investigators. We then conducted a card-sort task in which 24 participants produced separate classifications of the strategies. The similarity matrix arising from co-occurrence data was subjected to hierarchical cluster analysis and the obtained typology provided independent support for our proposed distinctions between strategies implemented cognitively and behaviourally, between diversion and engagement strategies, and between active distraction and direct avoidance, and for specific lower-level groupings of strategies relating to venting, reappraisal, and seeking social support. Potential refinements and applications of the resulting classification system are considered.     

The future is here: A review of foresight systems in anxiety and depression

Cognitive models of anxiety and depression have long suggested a central role for future-oriented thinking in these disorders. Experimental studies suggest that anxiety and depression are characterised by distinct future-oriented thinking profiles, and that these profiles are markedly different from those of asymptomatic adults. In this paper, we review these profiles and propose two explanatory models marked by two different neurocognitive systems. The Reconstructive Memory Model emphasises a role for emotionally driven learning and retrieval in episodic foresight (i.e., the construction of future-oriented scenarios), and the Valuation Model proposes that an overweighing of risk and uncertainty estimates can be invoked to explain the future-oriented thought patterns. We consider the effectiveness of interventions aimed at altering such thought patterns. We suggest that future research aimed at elucidating the neurobiological underpinnings of future-oriented thinking in anxiety and depression can play an important role in advancing development of effective biological and psychosocial interventions for these disorders.     

An fMRI investigation of posttraumatic flashbacks

Flashbacks are a defining feature of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), but there have been few studies of their neural basis. We tested predictions from a dual representation model of PTSD that, compared with ordinary episodic memories of the same traumatic event, flashbacks would be associated with activity in dorsal visual stream and related areas rather than in the medial temporal lobe. Participants with PTSD, with depression but not PTSD, and healthy controls were scanned during a recognition task with personally relevant stimuli. The contrast of flashbacks versus ordinary episodic trauma memories in PTSD was associated with increased activation in sensory and motor areas including the insula, precentral gyrus, supplementary motor area, and mid-occipital cortex. The same contrast was associated with decreased activation in the midbrain, parahippocampal gyrus, and precuneus/posterior cingulate cortex. The results were discussed in terms of theories of PTSD and dual-process models of recognition.     

Parent-Youth Rating Concordance for Hair Pulling Variables,Functional Impairment,and Anxiety Scale Scores in Trichotillomania

ABSTRACT

Knowledge of cross-informant rating concordance is critical for the assessment of child and adolescent problems in clinical and research settings. We explored parent-youth rating concordance for hair pulling variables, functional impairment, and anxiety symptoms in a sample of child and adolescent hair pullers (n = 133) satisfying conservative diagnostic criteria for trichotillomania (TTM). Whole group analyses reveal significant parent-youth agreement on all study variables. Split group analyses, however, reveal superior parent-youth concordance for the adolescent (15–17 years old) versus younger (10–12 years old) hair pullers for awareness of hair pulling and anxiety scale scores. These results highlight the need for both parent and youth ratings when assessing younger children with TTM.     

Defining the boundary of childhood amnesia

When adults are asked to recall their earliest autobiographical memories most can recall nothing about their infancy and early childhood, a phenomenon commonly referred to as childhood amnesia. There is general consensus regarding the existence of childhood amnesia, but there remains considerable debate over its boundary. Most researchers have argued that the boundary of childhood amnesia occurs between the ages of 3 and 4 years, but in 1993 Usher and Neisser published a highly influential paper, which has subsequently been used to argue that the boundary may be as low as 2 years. In the present experiment we examined how changes in scoring criteria influence our estimates of the age of adults’ earliest memories. We conclude that some coding criteria are more valid than others and that the best estimates of childhood amnesia will include measures of free recall in addition to the specific questions that have dominated prior research in this area.     

The benefit of forgetting

Recent research using change-detection tasks has shown that a directed-forgetting cue, indicating that a subset of the information stored in memory can be forgotten, significantly benefits the other information stored in visual working memory. How do these directed-forgetting cues aid the memory representations that are retained? We addressed this question in the present study by using a recall paradigm to measure the nature of the retained memory representations. Our results demonstrated that a directed-forgetting cue leads to higher-fidelity representations of the remaining items and a lower probability of dropping these representations from memory. Next, we showed that this is made possible by the to-be-forgotten item being expelled from visual working memory following the cue, allowing maintenance mechanisms to be focused on only the items that remain in visual working memory. Thus, the present findings show that cues to forget benefit the remaining information in visual working memory by fundamentally improving their quality relative to conditions in which just as many items are encoded but no cue is provided.     

Non-Violent Survival Strategies in the Face of Intimate Partner Violence and Economic Discrimination

Intimate partner violence (IPV) theory often locates violence equitably between women and men. Women, however, sustain greater degrees of injury than men and often use violence as a measure of protection rather than as an act of aggression. Yet measures of protection must be viewed in multiple contexts. In this case, the context is poverty, which reveals that violence by women in response to IPV is not the only way that women deal with the violence in their lives. This article explicates four strategies that battered women in poverty deploy in their protective trajectory and highlight alternative resistance strategies women use to overcome multiple structural barriers.