Predicting Self‐Confident Behaviour with Implicit and Explicit Self‐Esteem Measures

The present research compared the validity of popular direct and indirect measures of self‐esteem in predicting self‐confident behaviour in different social situations. In line with behavioural dual‐process models, both implicit and explicit self‐esteem were hypothesized to be related to appearing self‐confident to unacquainted others. A total of 127 participants responded to the Rosenberg Self‐Esteem Scale, the Multidimensional Self‐Esteem Scale, and an adjective scale for measuring explicit self‐esteem (ESE). Participants' implicit self‐esteem (ISE) was assessed with four indirect measures: the Implicit Association Test (IAT), the name‐letter task (NLT), and two variants of an affective priming task, the reaction‐time affective priming task (RT‐APT) and the error‐based affective priming task (EB‐APT). Self‐confident behaviour was observed in four different social situations: (i) self‐introduction to a group; (ii) an ostracism experience; (iii) an interview about the ostracism experience; and (iv) an interview about one's personal life. In general, appearing self‐confident to unknown others was independently predicted by ESE and ISE. The indirect measures of self‐esteem were, as expected, not correlated, and only the self‐esteem APTs—but not the self‐esteem IAT or the NLT—predicted self‐confident behaviours. It is important to note that in particular the predictive power of the self‐esteem EB‐APT pertained to all four criteria and was incremental to the ESE measures. Copyright © 2016 European Association of Personality Psychology     

Specters of Liberation: Great Refusals in the New World Order; Martin J. Beck Matuštík

Continental Philosophy Review -     

Remarks On Quantum Ontology

Despite the discrepancies between quantum objects and `classical' ones, mainly with regard to the fact that the latter may be thought of as `individuals', contrary to the former, we still regard the quanta as `things' in our ordinary discourse as well as in the logico-mathematical basis of quantum theories. This paper considers some possibilities for accomodating the logico-mathematical framework of the theories which deal with such a strange ontology where the inhabitants are things devoid of identity and both having and not having certain properties.``All right', said the Cat; and this time it vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone.``Well! I've often seen a cat without a grin', thought Alice, ``but a grin without a cat! It's the most curious thing I ever saw in all my life!'Lewis Carroll     

Spatial But Not Oculomotor Information Biases Perceptual Memory: Evidence From Face Perception and Cognitive Modeling

Recent research put forward the hypothesis that eye movements are integrated in memory representations and are reactivated when later recalled. However, “looking back to nothing” during recall might be a consequence of spatial memory retrieval. Here, we aimed at distinguishing between the effect of spatial and oculomotor information on perceptual memory. Participants’ task was to judge whether a morph looked rather like the first or second previously presented face. Crucially, faces and morphs were presented in a way that the morph reactivated oculomotor and/or spatial information associated with one of the previously encoded faces. Perceptual face memory was largely influenced by these manipulations. We considered a simple computational model with an excellent match (4.3% error) that expresses these biases as a linear combination of recency, saccade, and location. Surprisingly, saccades did not play a role. The results suggest that spatial and temporal rather than oculomotor information biases perceptual face memory.     

Does a Religious Transformation Buffer the Effects of Lifetime Trauma on Happiness?

A number of studies have examined religious transformations. But most of this work has been concerned with identifying different types of transformations and steps in the process of transformation. The current study was designed to examine the ways in which religious transformations may be associated with happiness. We take a novel approach toward the evaluation of this relationship. We argue that a religious transformation may be an important resource for coping with lifetime trauma. Two major findings emerge from our nationwide survey (N = 2,851). First, the data indicate that the magnitude of the relationship between lifetime trauma and happiness is reduced significantly for people who have had a religious transformation but not for those who have not had this type of religious experience. Second, the results reveal that the potential stress-related benefits of a religious transformation are more evident among younger adults than among middle-aged or older adults.     

A Phonological Existential Analysis to the Book of Job

This current article “A Phonological Existential Analysis to the Book of Job” explores the various ways that Job’s friends attempted to help him deal with his grief. Dr. Johnson is able to identify the various stages of grief that Job goes through and correlate each stage and the response from the friends in current psychological terms. It becomes clear that various practices of modern psychotherapy can be seen in each response from Job’s friends. It is reasonable to conclude that the responses from Job’s friends were part of the therapeutic process that moved Job to a state of rationality and wholeness. While the article approaches the Book of Job from a psychotherapeutic standpoint, it does not distract for the spiritual teachings found in the document. Fred Johnson is licensed as a counseling psychologist and is certified as a school psychologist. Dr. Johnson has worked many over 15 years as a private practicing family therapist and behavior specialist. Dr. Johnson completed his doctorate in counseling psychologist at the University of Louisville and attended Southern Baptist Theological Seminary obtaining a degree in pastoral psychology. He currently owns Educational Resource Services, a company that is dedicated to providing seminars in classroom behavior management throughout the United States and Canada. Dr. Johnson has published two books, Effective Discipline for the Difficult Child and From Chaos to Control: Managing Disruptive Classroom Behavior. He has also published several research studies, including ones dealing with the role of the ministers and a pastoral approach to divorce.