Culture and empowerment in the Deaf community: An analysis of internet weblogs

Although deafness is traditionally conceptualized as a medical problem or disability, about 500 000 deaf people in the United States identify as members of an ethno‐linguistic minority that takes pride in being Deaf. This study examined 416 Internet weblog posts authored by nine Deaf bloggers to describe aspects of Deaf culture and individual and community level empowerment strategies expressed in weblogs. Results highlight aspects of American Deaf culture, such as the value placed on American Sign Language and equal treatment of D/deaf and hearing people. Findings also provide evidence of expressions of Deaf culture such as the use of humour and supporting the community that have been less emphasized in previous literature. Community level empowerment strategies evident in posts included disseminating information, rallying the involvement of members and advocating for social justice. Overlap between expressions of Deaf culture and empowerment strategies were also found. Present results inform a growing literature on empowerment strategies that occur without intervention by professionals. Implications of the study for community research and action are discussed. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Two forms of group therapy and individual treatment of work-related depression: a one-year follow-up study

Patients on long-term sick-leave (> 90 days) from white collar work, with a diagnosis of work-related depression, dysthymia, or maladaptive stress reaction were randomized either to cognitive group therapy (CGT), focused psychodynamic group therapy (FGT), or to a comparison group. All patients were interviewed and responded to self-report questionnaires before the start of treatment and at 6 and 12 months. At the 12-month follow-up, 70% of the patients met the criteria for reliable change of the target symptom (depression), and the sample as a whole improved significantly on all measures used. However, there were no differences in outcome between the three treatment groups.     

Episodic retrieval and feature facilitation in intertrial priming of visual search

Huang, Holcombe, and Pashler (Memory & Cognition, 32, 12-20, 2004) found that priming from repetition of different features of a target in a visual search task resulted in significant response time (RT) reductions when both target brightness and size were repeated. But when only one feature was repeated and the other changed, RTs were longer than when neither feature was repeated. From this, they argued that priming in visual search reflected episodic retrieval of memory traces, rather than facilitation of repeated features. We tested different variations of the search task introduced by Huang et al., with the aim of uncovering when priming is episodic and when feature based. We found that varying the signal strength of target against distractors had a strong effect on the priming pattern. In difficult search with low signal-to-noise ratios of target against distractors, the priming patterns were episodic. When feature contrasts between target and distractors were increased, priming of different features was independent and additive. Our results suggest that, during inefficient search,priming can be episodic but that, for more efficient search, priming from different features occurs independently. The results support two-stage (or multistage) accounts of priming in visual search.     

Electrophysiological evidence of altered memory processing in children experiencing early deprivation

Associations between early deprivation and memory functioning were examined in 9- to 11-year-old children. Children who had experienced prolonged institutional care prior to adoption were compared to children who were adopted early from foster care and children reared in birth families. Measures included the Paired Associates Learning task from the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test and Automated Battery (CANTAB) and a continuous recognition memory task during which ERPs were also recorded. Children who experienced prolonged institutionalization showed deficits in both behavioral memory measures as well as an attenuated P300 parietal memory effect. Results implicate memory function as one of the domains that may be negatively influenced by early deprivation in the form of institutional care.     

Do ‘Objectivist’ Features of Moral Discourse and Thinking Support Moral Objectivism?

Many philosophers think that moral objectivism is supported by stable features of moral discourse and thinking. When engaged in moral reasoning and discourse, people behave ??as if?? objectivism were correct, and the seemingly most straightforward way of making sense of this is to assume that objectivism is correct; this is how we think that such behavior is explained in paradigmatically objectivist domains. By comparison, relativist, error-theoretic or non-cognitivist accounts of this behavior seem contrived and ad hoc. After explaining why this argument should be taken seriously (recent arguments notwithstanding), I argue that it is nevertheless undermined by considerations of moral disagreement. Even if the metaphysical, epistemic and semantic commitments of objectivism provide little or no evidence against it, and even if the alternative explanations of ??objectivist?? traits of moral discourse and thinking are speculative or contrived, objectivism is itself incapable of making straightforward sense of these traits. Deep and widespread moral disagreement or, rather, the mere appearance of such disagreement, strongly suggests that the explanations operative in paradigmatically objective discourse fail to carry over to the moral case. Since objectivism, no less than relativism, non-cognitivism and error-theories, needs non-trivial explanations of why we behave ??as if?? objectivism were correct, such behavior does not presently provide reason to accept objectivism.     

Memory control beliefs and everyday forgetfulness in adulthood: the effects of selection, optimization, and compensation strategies

Controlling for age, gender, education, and self-rated health, the present study used regression analyses to examine the relationships between memory control beliefs and self-reported forgetfulness in the context of the meta-theory of Selective Optimization with Compensation (SOC). Findings from this online survey (N = 409) indicate that, among adult New Zealanders, a higher sense of memory control accounts for a 22.7% reduction in self-reported forgetfulness. Similarly, optimization was found to account for a 5% reduction in forgetfulness while the strategies of selection and compensation were not related to self-reports of forgetfulness. Optimization partially mediated the beneficial effects that some memory beliefs (e.g., believing that memory decline is inevitable and believing in the potential for memory improvement) have on forgetfulness. It was concluded that memory control beliefs are important predictors of self-reported forgetfulness while the support for the SOC model in the context of memory controllability and everyday forgetfulness is limited.     

Panel: The complementary roles of the IAAP and the JAP in developing Jungian clinical practice

The relationship between the IAAP (International Association for Analytical Psychology) and the JAP (  Journal of Analytical Psychology ) in the course of their 50-year old existence is explored from historical, theoretical, institutional, personal and clinical perspectives. This relationship is seen to have been contentious as well as complementary in promoting an interdisciplinary approach to Jungian clinical practice. The complementary aspects are evidenced in the training programmes of IAAP constituent Societies and in papers presented at the Cambridge Congress of 2001 and the Barcelona Congress of 2004. The role of the Journal in holding together different, sometimes divergent, views relating to Jung's concepts and theories, and in subjecting these views to discussion, debate and assessment as to their clinical relevance and effectiveness, is explored.     

No decision‐maker is an Island: integrating expert advice with information acquisition

The present research examined the social context of information acquisition. The main purpose was to examine how decision‐makers' information acquisition processes changed when they were provided access to expert advice. Results indicated that all decision‐makers opted to acquire advice; however, they typically did so only after completing over 75% of their own information search. Decision‐makers agreed more with the advice as task complexity increased, but, in general, searched information in two stages—i.e., a pre‐advice “hypothesis generation” stage and a post‐advice “hypothesis testing” stage. To behave in an adaptive manner, decision‐makers could have used expert advice either to increase their decision accuracy or to reduce their effort expenditure (or both); they chose the former. Implications and further extensions are discussed. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Rats with dorsal hippocampal lesions do react to new stimuli but not to spatial changes of known stimuli

The effect of visual distracting stimuli upon the straight alleyway performance of dorsal hippocampectomized Wistar rats was investigated. In comparison with control animals it was observed that dorsal hippocampectomized animals (1) ambulated more during the preexposure phase, (2) acquired at the same rate a running response for food (training phase), (3) reacted similarly to a new visual stimulus (black cards) presented in a sector of the alleyway, and (4) habituated to successive presentations of that stimulus in the same place. (5) However, dorsal hippocampectomized rats did not react, unlike the controls, to the presentation of the same stimulus in another place of the alleyway but (6) reacted to the visual pattern change of the stimulus (now black/white check cards) in the same place. These results indicate that under certain experimental conditions, hippocampus-lesioned animals are capable of interrupting a running response for food in order to explore a new conspicuously located stimulus, habituate to repeated presentations of that stimulus, and to react to a new pattern of visual stimulation. They suggest that hippocampectomized rats do not lose the capacity to react to a new stimulus; the disruption seems to be related to the spatial context of stimulus presentation, supporting a spatial mapping hypothesis of hippocampal function.