Do readers make inferences about conversational topics?

When we read that two protagonists in a story chatted together for a couple of minutes, do we draw inferences about the topic of the conversation on the basis of information presented earlier in the text? Participants read passages in which protagonists part and later reunite; the passages ended with a sentence either that implied conversation or did not. In Experiment 1, participants' continuation sentences indicated that inferences about the topic of conversation were drawn. Recognition probe data in Experiment 2 provided more immediate evidence of such inferences. Experiment 3 addressed a possible confound in Experiment 2 and again provided evidence that readers inferred the continuation of the conversation. In Experiments 4 and 5, we investigated the effect of having the targeted conversational topic be a secret that should not be shared between the protagonists. The results are discussed in terms of the collaboration between passive, memory-based text processing and schema-driven comprehension processes.     

Personality Dimensions in Recalled Dream Content

Tests with fifth-grade pupils of Zulliger's hypothesis that children giving texture responses on the Rorschach profit more from education than those who do not suggest that, at least in the present sample, the reverse is true.     

Familism, family environment, and suicide attempts among Latina youth

In this study, we examined the relationship between familism and family environment type as well as the relationship between family environment type and suicide attempts among Latina youth. Latina teen attempters (n = 109) and nonattempters (n = 107) were recruited from the New York City area. Latent class analysis revealed three family environment types: tight-knit, intermediate-knit, and loose-knit. Tight-knit families (high cohesion and low conflict) were significantly less likely to have teens who attempted suicide as compared with intermediate-knit families or loose-knit families. Moreover, familism increased the odds of being in a tight-knit family versus a loose-knit family and the odds of being in a tight-knit family versus a intermediate-knit. The results suggest that familism may protect against suicide behavior among Latinas via its influence on family environment.     

Mental representations of attachment figures facilitate recovery following upsetting autobiographical memory recall

A growing literature shows that even the symbolic presence of an attachment figure facilitates the regulation of negative affect triggered by external stressors. Yet, in daily life, pernicious stressors are often internally generated--recalling an upsetting experience reliably increases negative affect, rumination, and susceptibility to physical and psychological health problems. The present research provides the first systematic examination of whether activating the mental representation of an attachment figure enhances the regulation of affect triggered by thinking about upsetting memories. Using 2 different techniques for priming attachment figure representations and 2 types of negative affect measures (explicit and implicit), activating the mental representation of an attachment figure (vs. an acquaintance or stranger) after recalling an upsetting memory enhanced recovery--eliminating the negative effects of the memory recall (Studies 1-3). In contrast, activating the mental representation of an attachment figure before recalling an upsetting memory had no such effect (Studies 1 and 2). Furthermore, activating the mental representation of an attachment figure after thinking about upsetting memories reduced negative thinking in a stream of consciousness task, and the magnitude of the attachment-induced affective recovery effects as assessed with explicit affect measures predicted mental and physical health in daily life (Study 3). Finally, a meta-analysis of the 3 studies (Study 4) showed that the regulatory benefits conferred by the mental representation of an attachment figure were weaker for individuals high on attachment avoidance. The implications of these findings for attachment, emotion regulation, and mental and physical health are discussed.     

The six most essential questions in psychiatric diagnosis: a pluralogue part 3: issues of utility and alternative approaches in psychiatric diagnosis

In face of the multiple controversies surrounding the DSM process in general and the development of DSM-5 in particular, we have organized a discussion around what we consider six essential questions in further work on the DSM. The six questions involve: 1) the nature of a mental disorder; 2) the definition of mental disorder; 3) the issue of whether, in the current state of psychiatric science, DSM-5 should assume a cautious, conservative posture or an assertive, transformative posture; 4) the role of pragmatic considerations in the construction of DSM-5; 5) the issue of utility of the DSM ?C whether DSM-III and IV have been designed more for clinicians or researchers, and how this conflict should be dealt with in the new manual; and 6) the possibility and advisability, given all the problems with DSM-III and IV, of designing a different diagnostic system. Part 1 of this article took up the first two questions. Part 2 took up the second two questions. Part 3 now deals with Questions 5 & 6. Question 5 confronts the issue of utility, whether the manual design of DSM-III and IV favors clinicians or researchers, and what that means for DSM-5. Our final question, Question 6, takes up a concluding issue, whether the acknowledged problems with the earlier DSMs warrants a significant overhaul of DSM-5 and future manuals. As in Parts 1 & 2 of this article, the general introduction, as well as the introductions and conclusions for the specific questions, are written by James Phillips, and the responses to commentaries are written by Allen Frances.     

The six most essential questions in psychiatric diagnosis: a pluralogue. Part 4: general conclusion

In the conclusion to this multi-part article I first review the discussions carried out around the six essential questions in psychiatric diagnosis – the position taken by Allen Frances on each question, the commentaries on the respective question along with Frances’ responses to the commentaries, and my own view of the multiple discussions. In this review I emphasize that the core question is the first – what is the nature of psychiatric illness – and that in some manner all further questions follow from the first. Following this review I attempt to move the discussion forward, addressing the first question from the perspectives of natural kind analysis and complexity analysis. This reflection leads toward a view of psychiatric disorders – and future nosologies – as far more complex and uncertain than we have imagined.     

SPIRITUALITY FOR NATURALISTS

Abstract The views of eleven writers who develop a naturalized spirituality, from Baruch Spinoza and George Santayana to Sam Harris, André Comte‐Sponville, Ursula Goodenough, and Sharon Welch and others are presented. Then the writer's own theory is developed. This is a pluralistic notion of sacredness, an adjective referring to unmanipulable events of overriding importance. The difficulties in using traditional religious words, such as God and spiritual are addressed.