East of West,West of East: a matter of global and local identity

Research is a very personal matter. On the basis of experiences in different countries with researchers from different cultures over many years, some observations will be described. The conceptual frame of this attempt is to look for anthropological universals and cultural specifics. Much can be learned from spatial representations in the arts. Whereas in the West since Renaissance time the central perspective has become dominant in visual art, in Eastern landscape paintings the “floating view” is typical. The claim that the central perspective corresponds to geometric laws and matches how we see the world is misleading for at least two reasons: It violates mechanisms of size constancy, and the visual world is spatially reduced in pictures to the perifoveal region only. Research on spatial attention has disclosed two different attentional systems being responsible either for near-fovea vision or for the far periphery. This fundamental principle as a global characteristic of visual processing is neglected in Western art. In Eastern art with a floating view geometric laws are violated, and different potential perspectives are integrated within a holistic pattern. The semantics of what shall be expressed becomes important irrespective of physical parameters. The latter may also create the unique phenomenon of becoming subjectively part of the picture confirming personal identity. Cultural specifics like in the arts (what one might expect) can surprisingly also be observed in theoretical considerations about visual processing. Whereas in the tradition of Western science visual percepts are built up with local elements like feature detectors, in an important Chinese theory global topological features are analyzed first. An important task of the brain is to create the identity of a percept on the basis of spatially and temporally distributed neural activities. It is, thus, an important theoretical question how to deal with the challenge to create and maintain the identity of a percept for some time. It is suggested that one should leave behind a monocausal reasoning for such explanations but adopt for analytical strategies the concept of complementarity as a generative principle.     

How Competent are Adolescent Bullying Perpetrators and Victims in Mastering Normative Developmental Tasks in Early Adulthood?

A substantive body of literature suggests that those involved in bullying as perpetrators but particularly victims are at greater risk for psychological maladjustment. In comparison, relatively little is known about associations between bullying-victimization and perpetration and mastery of early adult tasks in domains including romantic relationships, education, work, financial competence, and conduct. These links were tested using data from two Dutch cohorts (RADAR-young, n = 497, 43% girls; TRAILS, n = 2230, 51% girls) who reported on victimization and perpetration at age 11 (TRAILS) and 13 (RADAR-young) and mastery of developmental tasks in early adulthood. Unadjusted regression analyses suggested for both cohorts that perpetrators were less likely to abide the law and more likely to smoke. Victims in TRAILS were less competent in the domains of education, work, and finances, and more likely to smoke in RADAR-young. Adjusting for childhood demographics and child intelligence and including psychopathology in the prediction models substantially reduced the strength of associations between bullying involvement and later outcomes in both cohorts; although association were retained between victimization and welfare dependence and perpetration and crime involvement in TRAILS. Parental support did not buffer associations in either sample and neither were gender differences detected. Overall, findings underline that negative outcomes of bullying are not only a concern for victims but also for their perpetrators although involvement in bullying is not a stable predictor of mastery of developmental tasks when childhood demographics, child intelligence, and psychopathology are taken into account.     

LAC-Depressionsstudie

The study on long-term therapy of chronic depression (LAC depression study) is one of the first prospective studies to compare psychoanalytic with cognitive behavioral long-term treatment and also investigates the impact of patient assignment by randomization and preference. This comprehensive multicenter study combines a naturalistic and a randomized controlled approach. The long-term follow-up is based on a broad spectrum of quantitative and qualitative research methods and is expected to contribute to the further development of psychotherapeutic treatment methods in this hard to treat patient group as well as to research on the effectiveness of long-term treatment. The background, design and current state of the assessment are presented. A total of 402 patients with chronic depression were included in the trial and the 1 and 2?year follow-up results are currently being analyzed.     

Characterization of the Practice and Attitudes of Genetic Counselors with Doctoral Degrees

Potential advantages and disadvantages of doctoral training in genetic counseling have been debated. In this study, individual interviews were conducted to characterize the practice and attitudes of genetic counselors who have achieved doctoral degrees in any field. Participants (N=31) were more likely to spend time in research and less likely to spend time in clinic than genetic counselors in general. Advantages identified by participants were consistent with theorized advantages, and included increased knowledge, wider research roles, additional opportunities and greater respect. Disadvantages identified by participants focused more on individual perspectives than previously theorized profession-wide disadvantages. These included increased time commitment and decreased patient contact. The attitudes of participants towards the development of doctoral training in genetic counseling were generally positive. The results suggest that doctoral training in genetic counseling would have more benefits than drawbacks for individuals pursuing this degree.