The search for the mother: narcissistic regression as a pathway of mourning in childhood.

Previous observers, following Freud's formulations in Mourning and Melancholia, have disagreed over the question of whether the child can mourn. To support the thesis that the child does mourn but in a different way from the adult, the author focuses on the importance of the child's identification with the lost love object, the narcissistic regression, and the associated autoerotic activities. Clinical material is presented from the analysis of a latency child and of an adult, both of whom lost their mothers during childhood.     

Helpful Only in the Abstract?

ABSTRACT— This study tested the hypothesis that empathizing with out-group members is beneficial outside of, but not within, intergroup-contact situations. We predicted that in the context of intergroup interaction, the potential for evaluation would lead individuals' perspective-taking efforts to take on an egocentric and counterproductive flavor. As predicted, when empathy was instantiated during an intergroup exchange, it failed to exert its usual positive effect on intergroup attitudes and led higher-prejudice individuals to derogate an out-group member who was an interaction partner; empathy also blocked the prejudice-reducing influence of intergroup contact. Mediation analyses indicated that activation of negative metastereotypes regarding the out-group's view of the in-group accounted for these effects. The findings, which demonstrate ironic effects of empathy in intergroup interaction, indicate that interventions based on studies of individuals' reactions to out-group members in the abstract might have dramatically different consequences when put into practice in real exchanges between members of different groups.     

Salient Intergroup Ideology and Intergroup Interaction

ABSTRACT— Two experiments examined how rendering different intergroup ideologies salient affects dominant- and minority-group members' behavior during, and experience of, intergroup interactions. We hypothesized that ideologies that encourage an outward focus on appreciating out-group members' distinctive qualities (multiculturalism) would have more positive implications than ideologies that encourage a self-control focus on ignoring social categories and avoiding inappropriate behavior (color blindness and antiracism). As predicted, in both ostensible ( Study 1 ) and actual face-to-face ( Study 2 ) intergroup interactions, the multicultural ideological prompt led dominant- and minority-group members to adopt a more outward focus and hence to direct more positive other-directed comments to an interaction partner who was a member of an out-group. In contrast, the color-blind prompt fostered a prevention orientation in dominant-group members that led them to express negative affect toward their out-group interaction partner. The antiracist prompt had no consistent effects. Implications for efforts to improve intergroup relations are discussed.     

Dominant group members in intergroup interaction: safety or vulnerability in numbers?

An experiment examined how low- and high-prejudice dominant group members' (LPs' and HPs') reactions to intergroup contact were affected by whether they were accompanied by fellow ingroup members who exhibited prejudice-relevant behavior. Participants answered questions alone or in a group and then estimated how they were viewed by an observer who was an ingroup or an outgroup member. HPs believed that they were viewed more negatively by an outgroup member in the individual than the group condition. LPs showed the opposite effect, which led them to evaluate the outgroup member more negatively in the group condition. All participants in the group condition expected an outgroup member to exaggerate their similarity to the other ingroup members present, and LPs evaluated the other ingroup members more negatively when the observer was an outgroup member. The results suggest that intergroup attitudes guide the types of intergroup contact situations that are experienced most positively.     

Recontextualising moral injury among military veterans: An integrative theoretical review

Moral injury was originally conceived as a socially-inflicted wound of betrayal experienced by military veterans (Shay, 1994). However, moral injury has since been redefined by psychological researchers as an individualised, predominantly perpetration-driven, and psychopathological phenomenon (e.g., Currier et al., 2015; Jinkerson, 2016). However, social scientific researchers (e.g., Hodgson & Carey, 2017; Molendijk, 2019; Wiinikka-Lydon, 2017) have contested mainstream psychology's medicalisation and decontextualisation of moral injury. This theoretical review integrates insights from across these discourses, and brings them into dialogue with ideas from moral psychology, evolutionary science, and community psychology. The aim of this cross-disciplinary review is to promote a more holistic understanding of moral injury that does justice to its individual and social dimensions. Drawing on these different theoretical strands, this paper proposes that moral injury can be best understood as a psychological wound to basic human needs for social belonging and cohesion. The implications of this integrative understanding of moral injury for applied psychologists and other societal actors are explored. While the relevance of moral injury to civilian populations such as health and social care professionals is clear (e.g., Dombo et al., 2013; French et al., 2021), this paper focuses on military veterans, whose experiences originally prompted the coinage of the term. Please refer to the Supplementary Material section to find this article's Community and Social Impact Statement.