On matters of mind and body: regarding Descartes

In this paper the author considers Descartes’ place in current thinking about the mind‐body dilemma. The premise here is that in the history of ideas, the questions posed can be as significant as the answers acquired. Descartes’ paramount question was ‘How do we determine certainty?’ and his pursuit of an answer led to cogito ergo sum. His discovery simultaneously raised the question whether mind is separate from or unified with the body. Some who currently hold that brain and subjectivity are unified contend that the philosopher ‘split’ mind from body and refer to ‘Descartes’ error’. This paper puts forward that Descartes’ detractors fail to recognise Descartes’ contribution to Western thought, which was to introduce the Enlightenment and to give a place to human subjectivity. Added to this, evidence from Descartes’ correspondence with Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia supports the conclusion that Descartes did in fact believe in the unity of mind and body although he could not reconcile this rationally with the certainty from personal experience that they were separate substances. In this Descartes was engaged in just the same dilemma as that of current thinkers and researchers, a conflict which still is yet to be resolved.     

Changing Jobs and Changing Chores? The Longitudinal Association of Women’s and Men’s Occupational Gender-Atypicality and Couples’ Housework Performance

Prior research linking occupational sex composition (the proportion of women in an occupation) to housework has yielded conflicting results and relies exclusively on cross-sectional data. The present article extends scholarship on the gendered division of household labor by using longitudinal data from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics (PSID) 1981–2013 to assess how changes in occupational sex composition alter heterosexual married couples’ housework performance over time. I find that either spouse’s gender-atypical employment (e.g., husband’s employment in a predominately female job) is associated with gender-atypical housework performance by both spouses (e.g., higher housework hours for the husband and fewer hours for the wife). The association of women’s occupational sex composition with housework is driven by changes in individual women’s occupations and both spouses’ housework over time. In contrast, the association of men’s occupational sex composition with housework is driven by differences between different couples, not by within-couple change over time. Thus, fundamentally different causal mechanisms link women’s and men’s occupational sex composition to couples’ housework performance, and only for women are longitudinal changes in occupational sex composition associated with changes in housework. These findings have important implications for understanding occupation and housework as domains of gender performance.     

The Treatment Planning of Experienced Counselors: A Qualitative Examination

Using consensual qualitative research, the authors examined the treatment planning process of experienced counselors (N = 9). The data analysis resulted in 4 domains: assessment steps, clinical impressions, treatment factors, and treatment strategies. These domains describe the process used by experienced counselors in making clinical decisions and offer insight into the nature of clinical expertise and the need for further research on treatment planning.     

Psychological Safety and Appreciation of Differences in Counselor Training Programs: Examining Religion,Spirituality, and Political Beliefs

This study focused on the extent to which religion, spirituality, and political beliefs predicted counseling students' perceptions of psychological safety and appreciation of differences in their programs. The authors used hierarchical regression models to analyze data from 264 students from 4 different institutions. Results indicated that student age, political conservatism, extrinsic religiosity, and intrinsic spirituality were significant predictors of perceived psychological safety and appreciation of differences. The authors discuss implications of these findings.     

The Counseling Center Assessment of Psychological Symptoms Distress Index: A pragmatic exploration of general factors to enhance a multidimensional scale

Objective: The authors attempted to develop and validate a general distress index for a multidimensional psychological symptom/outcome measure used in over 300 college counseling centers with more than 100,000 cases annually: the Counseling Center Assessment of Psychological Symptoms (CCAPS). Method: Four models were compared for fit indices (n = 19,247): the existing first-order factor model (without a general factor), a second-order factor model, a bifactor model, and a single factor or “total score” model. In separate clinical and non-clinical samples, concurrent and divergent validity were examined using several well-established measures of psychological symptoms, as well as two-week test–retest and treatment utilization data. Results: Second-order and bifactor models which captured a single “distress” factor both exhibited good fit to the data relative to the baseline and “total score” model. Validity data indicated that factors adequately measured meaningful clinical onstructs. Conclusion: Both the bifactor and second-order models indicated the presence of a “distress index” comprised items across many of the CCAPS subscales. This distress scale has strong applicability for benchmarking the overall severity and complexity of patients at different centers, and can be used to help identify colleges and universities with areas of clinical strength, which can be studied to improve the field. Clinically, the distress index offers a parsimonious and efficient method for clinicians to monitor patients’ progress through treatment.