Representing Versus Generalizing: Two Approaches to External Validity and Their Implications for the Study of Prejudice

Autobiographical memories are often suspect. For example, a surprisingly large number of people report having been abducted by extraterrestrials. We offer a prototype of the abduction experience and an assessment of the frequency of such reports. These accounts are hard to dismiss on the basis of mendacity or insanity, but there are ample reasons to doubt their literal accuracy. We offer a cognitive-motivational explanation for how spurious memories of unidentified flying object (UFO) abductions can be created and maintained. The motivational roots lie in the desire to escape from ordinary self-awareness, and this explanation is supported by parallels between UFO abduction accounts and masochistic fantasies. The cognitive bases involve the integration and elaboration of hallucinations, general knowledge, and contextual cues into full-blown accounts, usually with the aid of hypnosis. Due to the pitfalls of hypnosis, people develop a high degree of confidence in the veridicality of spurious UFO abduction memories.     

Analytical Psychology after Jung with Clinical Case Material from Stephen Mitchell's Influence and Autonomy in Psychoanalysis

This discussion focuses on the contributions of Drs. Loew and Richman, both children of Holocaust survivors and hidden children in the Holocaust, and the transformation of their traumatic experiences of loss and disconnection through sculpture and memoir writing. The influence of the analyst's disclosure of his or her personal self exploration on clinical work is also explored.     

Structuring Case-Based Ethics Training: How Comparing Cases and Structured Prompts Influence Training Effectiveness

This study examined how structuring case-based ethics training, either through (a) case presentation or (b) prompt questions, influences training outcomes. Results revealed an interaction between case presentation and prompt questions such that some form of structure improved effectiveness. Specifically, comparing cases led to greater sensemaking strategy use and decision-ethicality when trainees considered unstructured rather than structured prompts. When cases were presented sequentially, structuring prompts improved training effectiveness. Too much structure, however, decreased future ethical decision making, suggesting that there can be too much of a good thing when structuring case-based ethics education. Implications for designing ethics training programs are discussed.     

The Effects of Note-Taking and Review on Sensemaking and Ethical Decision Making

The effectiveness of case-based learning in ethics education varies widely regarding how cases are presented. Case process instruction may impact case-based ethics education to promote sensemaking processes, ethical sensemaking strategy use, and ethical decision making (EDM) quality. This study examined two teaching techniques, notes and review, and participants completed note-taking and review activities examining a case-based scenario during an ethics education course. Results suggest that providing case notes in outline form improves sensemaking processes, strategy use, and EDM quality. In addition, combining processes of provided notes and passive review results in incremental, additive performance via certain ethical sensemaking strategies and EDM quality.     

Unconscious and out of control: Subliminal priming is insensitive to observer expectations

We asked whether the influence of an invisible prime on movement is dependent on conscious movement expectations. Participants reached to a central target, which triggered a directional prime–mask arrow sequence. Participants were instructed that the visible arrows (masks) would most often signal a movement modification in a specific (biased) direction. Kinematic analyses revealed that responses to the visible mask were influenced by participants’ intentional bias, as movements were fastest when the more probable mask was displayed. In addition, responses were influenced by the invisible prime without regard to its relationship to the more probable mask. Analysis of the time of initial trajectory modifications revealed that both primes influenced responses in a similar manner after accounting for participants’ bias. These results imply that invisible stimuli automatically activate their associated responses and that unconscious priming of the motor system is insensitive to the conscious expectations of the participant making the pointing movements.     

Historical objectivity and value neutrality

To resolve the impasse between skeptic, idealist and positivist as to whether or not historical inquiry can be objective, an affirmative answer is argued by exposing, clarifying and challenging the common presupposition: the thesis of scientific value neutrality. The argument applies a more explicit version of the Braithwaite— Churchman‐Rudner position to history and thus challenges the prevalent claim that history, unlike the law, has but one goal, the establishment of truth about the past. The important yet neglected residual issue concerns what ‘objectivity’ means when inquiry (historical or scientific) is construed as a goal‐directed activity controlled by epistemic and pragmatic utilities.     

The importance of being in earnest

Certain remarks in the Tractatus, taken together with a passage in a letter Wittgenstein wrote to Russell, suggest that at one time Wittgenstein inclined toward a psychologistic theory of language. But textual considerations with regard to the former and a special interpretation of the latter allow us to interpret these statements in a way that is consistent with Wittgenstein's later views.     

Operational Sequence in Group Therapy with Young Offenders

Abstract

Attachment has increasingly been identified as central to therapy process and outcome. Attachment theory proposes that an individual’s prior interactions with attachment figures develop into templates that will guide the way they form connections and perceive their relationships with others. This study examined clients’ ratings of their relationship with the therapist as well as their ratings of group climate at multiple discrete points during treatment. These variables were examined in relation to attachment classification prior to therapy. Participants were 62 women attending the Women Recovering from Abuse Program (WRAP), a primarily group-based day-treatment program for childhood interpersonal trauma, at Women’s College Hospital in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Results demonstrated that clients’ perceptions of relationships in group therapy varied as a function of attachment classification.     

The Efficacy of Group Therapy in a Case of Marriage Neurosis

Abstract

Corruptogenic organizational dynamics have been largely ignored in reporting about recent corporate scandals. Using a large group framework, the author identifies factors within an organization that create a breeding ground for unethical or illegal behavior and attract individuals unconsciously looking for ways to damage themselves or others. An organizational culture that promotes questionable attitudes and behaviors along with subgroups that produce powerful corruptive forces can destroy a firm and damage the economy. Enron and the Madoff investment group are identified as corruptogenic organizations put together by founders and a leadership core bent on self-destruction and traumatizing the community–outcomes beyond that which are usually linked to greed. Suggestions are provided to organizational consultants and policy makers as to how to determine the potential for corruption hidden in their midst and to implement countervailing structures and processes.