Social representations of the individual: a post-Communist perspective

Social representations of the individual are examined in three post-Communist Central European nations, i.e. the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary, and in three West European nations, i.e. Scotland, England and France. All six nations share a common European history since the Renaissance and Humanism, based on such values as freedom, agency, individual rights and individual responsibility. Many of these values were rejected by the Communist regimes in which people lived for 40 years. Extreme forms of individualism developed in certain West European nations during the same period. In view of these historical events we have asked the following questions: Do people in the post-Communist countries of Central Europe, after 40 years of totalitarian collectivism, still adhere to the values of the common European heritage? What is the meaning of ‘the individual’ today, in Western democracies and in Central European post-Communist nations? Which issues are important for the well-being of the individual and how do they relate to the political and economic circumstances of those individuals? The results show that the values of the common European heritage in Central Europe have not been destroyed and that factors relating to the well-being of the individual differ between the two parts of Europe. These data are discussed in terms of the political and economic situations in Central and Western Europe, the relationship between language and social representations and the structure of social representations. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Neurotic pride

The American Journal of Psychoanalysis -     

The Prediction of Family Interaction from a Battery of Projective Techniques

This study first explored the adequacy of items on the Rorschach Rating Scale (RRS), which measures Rorschach constructs from a variety of scoring systems. Analyses determined that all items had an adequate capacity to differentiate people and none were clearly redundant. At the same time, the current version of the RRS requires good reading comprehension skills for accurate completion (13th grade level). Next, we developed two sets of RRS scales. Factor analysis of observer ratings (N = 234) indicated the RRS contained six broad, empirically derived factors. In addition, 19 conceptually derived scales were developed from the RRS item pool. Both sets of scales were evaluated for reliability and then compared to the Big Five model (B5M) of personality through a series of factor and regression analyses. Results indicated that RRS scales do not provide adequate definition of all B5M dimensions and B5M scales do not provide adequate definition of all RRS dimensions. We discuss the place of psychotic processes within a comprehensive model of personality and other implications from these findings.     

Supervisory reactions: an important aspect of supervision

Anne Alonso was passionate about the practice of supervision. An excellent supervisor herself, she sought to identify and teach the ingredients of effective supervision throughout her career. Her first book, The Quiet Profession (1985), was about the supervisory relationship and the various influences on it from within and without the relationship, and she insisted that the Center for Psychoanalytic Studies training program that she directed for many years include a required course on supervision. While the usual focus in supervision is on the supervisee and the clinical material presented, supervisors often experience powerful emotional reactions. Sometimes this is parallel process, in which the dynamics of the psychotherapy are replayed in the supervisory relationship. However, many other sources can contribute to supervisory affect, including the personality, background, and developmental stage of the supervisor, the impact of the clinical material, and the setting in which the supervision takes place. Supervisory reactions can be informative about the psychotherapy being supervised, about the supervisory relationship, or about the supervisor. Supervisors need self-awareness in order to identify their own contribution to their affective responses in supervision. The use of a supervisor decision tree of 1) awareness of reaction, 2) identification of its source, 3) relevance to current supervision, and 4) appropriate use of the reaction in the current supervision is recommended.     

The Concept of Culture and Its Significance for School Counselors

Understanding the role of culture, as it affects attitudes and behavior, can be extremely useful in the social service fields for enabling more effective communication across social barriers. However, in connection with the “culture of poverty,” or “cultural disadvantage,” the culture concept has often been distorted, and transformed into a stereotype behind which the individual is not revealed, but hidden. Specific examples of productive and unproductive uses of the concept in school guidance work are discussed. Another aspect of the cultural dimension, understanding of which is useful to the school counselor, is the nature of the counselor's role in relation to the institutional structure of the school.     

Perceptual learning and the theory of word perception

Perceptual learning involves the learning of distinctive features and higher-order invariants, learning progressing actively toward the most economical features and structure. Features of words are classified as phonological, graphic, semantic and syntactic. Features of these classes are processed independently and sequentially. Ordering of priorities changes with development, and shifts strategically with the demands of the task. Evidence is presented for priority differences for each class of feature depending on task differences.     

Semantic mechanisms in paralexia

This study explores the effects of semantic constraints on the occurrence of paralexic responses in two patients who tend to produce semantic errors in reading aloud. In the first experiment, semantic constraints were provided by using words as proper names (e.g., “brown” vs. “Sam Brown”), and in the second by using short, highly familiar phrases to restrict the meaning of the target word (e.g., the polar bear; green with envy). These constraints were found to be effective in reducing the frequency of paralexic errors.