The role of stress and area‐specific self‐esteem in adolescent smoking

Stress and self‐esteem have been shown to be important risk factors for adolescent cigarette smoking, and self‐esteem has previously been implicated as a stress‐moderating and a stress‐mediating variable. This study aimed to examine the associations between stress, area‐specific self‐esteem, and adolescent smoking, and to investigate whether specific areas of self‐esteem moderate or mediate the relationship between stress and smoking. Four hundred and ninety‐five adolescents (aged 14–19) responded to a questionnaire that examined these variables. Results showed that self‐esteem in the areas of school subjects and parent relations were related to smoking. Adolescents with low self‐esteem in these areas were more likely to smoke than their high self‐esteem counterparts. Highly stressed adolescents were more likely to smoke than those with low stress. However, the relationship between stress and smoking was completely mediated by self‐esteem in the area of school subjects. No moderation was revealed. Thus, high global self‐esteem may not be sufficient to reduce the risk of smoking. To maximise benefit, prevention and intervention efforts should target self‐esteem in the areas of school subjects and parent relations. Initiatives focusing on stress are only likely to decrease smoking to the extent that they influence self‐esteem in the area of school subjects.     

Finding God in the Classics: The Theistic Confucianism of Dasan Jeong Yagyong

Dasan Jeong Yagyong (1762–1836) is regarded in South Korea today as one of pre-modern Korea’s best philosophers. This article examines one of the reasons he is so respected. He modified traditional Korean Confucian moral philosophy to include notions of human nature as desires rather than innate virtue, the importance of free will rather than mere determination, and the existence of a Lord Above as a necessary incentive to proper behavior. Though he supported these changes to traditional Korean Confucian philosophy with references to the Classics and his own personal moral experience, observers have noticed the possibility of Western influence on his thinking. He is thus hailed by Koreans as a cross-cultural philosopher, an example of how Koreans can borrow from the West while nonetheless remaining authentically Korean.     

Electroencephalography when meditation advances: a case-based time-series analysis

Increased alpha and theta activities in electroencephalography (EEG) have been found during various forms of meditation. However, advanced stage of meditation drew less attention to date. We aimed at exploring EEG characteristics during advanced meditation. Bilateral absolute alpha and theta EEG powers were recorded when a single meditator at rest, exercising breath meditation, and reaching the advanced meditative stage in 10 sessions of meditation. Averaged time-series data were analyzed using simulation modeling analysis to compare the powers during different meditative phases. During breath meditation, significantly higher activities compared with baseline were found only in bilateral theta (P = 0.0406, 0.0158 for left and right sides, respectively), but not in alpha (P = 0.1412, 0.0978 for left and right sides, respectively) bands. When meditation advanced, significantly increased activities were found both in bilateral alpha (P = 0.0218, 0.0258 for left and right sides, respectively) and theta (P = 0.0308, 0.0260 for left and right sides, respectively) bands compared against breath meditation. When advanced meditation compared against baseline, bilateral alpha (P = 0.0001, 0.0001 for left and right sides, respectively) and theta (P = 0.0001, 0.0001 for left and right sides, respectively) bands revealed significantly increased activities. Our findings support that internalized attention manifested as theta activity continuingly enhances significantly in sequential phases of meditation, while relaxation manifested as alpha activity is significant only after the advanced meditative phase is reached.     

Failure to exploit learned spatial value information during visual search

ABSTRACT

In recent years there has been rapid proliferation of studies demonstrating how reward learning guides visual search. However, most of these studies have focused on feature-based reward, and there has been scant evidence supporting the learning of space-based reward. We raise the possibility that the visual search apparatus is impenetrable to spatial value contingencies, even when such contingencies are learned and represented online in a separate knowledge domain. In three experiments, we interleaved a visual choice task with a visual search task in which one display quadrant produced greater monetary rewards than the remaining quadrants. We found that participants consistently exploited this spatial value contingency during the choice task but not during the search task – even when these tasks were interleaved within the same trials and when rewards were contingent on response speed. These results suggest that the expression of spatial value information is task specific and that the visual search apparatus could be impenetrable to spatial reward information. Such findings are consistent with an evolutionary framework in which the search apparatus has little to gain from spatial value information in most real world situations.     

‘Othering’ and ‘selving’ in therapeutic dialogue

In this article we consider therapeutic conversations about suffering and sexual identity through an ethical and practical lens we refer to as ‘othering’ and ‘selving’. The ethical lens is shaped by recent developments in discursive theory and approaches to therapy. Our practical lens draws from research by discourse analysts showing how conversational practices feature in consequential ways in delicate discussions such as those about suffering and sexual identity. After helping readers understand these lenses we then use them in examining actual discussions about identity and suffering. We conclude with some general ideas and reflective questions for therapists wishing to extend these kinds of sensitivities and conversational practices in their work with clients.     

Feminism, Family, and Women's Rights: A Hermeneutic Realist Perspective

In this article I apply the insights of hermeneutic realism to a practical‐theological ethics that addresses the international crisis of families and women's rights. Hermeneutic realism affirms the hermeneutic philosophy of Hans‐Georg Gadamer but enriches it with the dialectic of participation and distanciation developed by Paul Ricoeur. This approach finds a place for sciences such as evolutionary psychology within a hermeneutically informed ethic. It also points to a multidimensional model of practical reason that views it as implicitly or explicitly involving five levels—background metaphysical visions, some principle of obligation, assumptions about pervasive human tendencies and needs, assumptions about constraining social and natural environments, and assumed acceptable rules of conduct. The fruitfulness of this multidimensional view of practical reason is then demonstrated by applying it to practical‐theological ethics and the analysis of four theorists of women's rights—Martha Nussbaum, Susan Moller Okin, Lisa Cahill, and Mary Ann Glendon. Finally, I illustrate the importance and limits of the visional dimension of practical reason by discussing the concept of “Africanity” in relation to the family and AIDS crisis of Eastern Africa.