Taxonomy of Spiritual Experiences

Spiritual experiences are often associated with health crises, with little information about the structure of the experience. A taxonomic analysis was conducted on data from a group of healers, unveiling a structural model of spiritual experience comprised of three domains: circumstances, manifestation and interpretation. Circumstances included the aspects of setting, situation, and timing. Manifestation incorporated the modes of awareness and the phenomena of the experience. Components of interpretation included personal meaning and congruence with social norms. The examples reflected the orientation of the study population. Further research could examine the applicability of the taxonomy to other religious or spiritual orientations and may assist in clinical assessment of spiritual experiences.Diane Wind Wardell, Ph.D., R.N.C., H.N.C., C.H.T.P./I., and Joan C. Engebretson, Dr.P.H., R.N., H.N.C., are Associate Professors in the School of Nursing at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston. Correspondence to Diane Wind Wardell, Diane.Wardell@uth.tmc.edu.     

The Basics of Brain Development

Over the past several decades, significant advances have been made in our understanding of the basic stages and mechanisms of mammalian brain development. Studies elucidating the neurobiology of brain development span the levels of neural organization from the macroanatomic, to the cellular, to the molecular. Together this large body of work provides a picture of brain development as the product of a complex series of dynamic and adaptive processes operating within a highly constrained, genetically organized but constantly changing context. The view of brain development that has emerged from the developmental neurobiology literature presents both challenges and opportunities to psychologists seeking to understand the fundamental processes that underlie social and cognitive development, and the neural systems that mediate them. This chapter is intended to provide an overview of some very basic principles of brain development, drawn from contemporary developmental neurobiology, that may be of use to investigators from a wide range of disciplines.     

Are Women More Likely than Men Are to Care Excessively about Maintaining Positive Social Relationships? A Meta-Analytic Review of the Gender Difference in Sociotropy

Sex Roles - Sociotropy is defined as the tendency to overemphasize maintaining positive social relationships (Beck 1983). Although the stereotype that women care more about interpersonal...     

Psychosocial mediators of antiretroviral nonadherence in HIV-positive adults with substance use and mental health problems.

This study used data from 1,889 HIV-positive patients on antiretroviral (ARV) medications who participated in the HIV Cost and Services Utilization Study to investigate whether nonadherence to ARV medications among patients with mental health and substance use problems could be explained by difficulty getting and negative attitudes toward ARV medications, poor fit of the regimen with lifestyle, lack of instruction and cues for remembering the regimen from a health care provider, and poor support from others for taking ARV medications. Difficulty getting ARV medications and poor fit with lifestyle were significant mediators of nonadherence for patients with a probable psychiatric disorder. Difficulty getting medication was a mediator for heavy drinkers, and poor fit with lifestyle was a mediator for drug users who drank heavily. Further research is needed to identify and address the barriers to adherence in these populations.     

Organization of the bilingual lexicon: Categorical versus alphabetic cuing in Russian-English bilinguals

The mechanism by which Russian native speakers store and retrieve Russian and English words from lexical memory was investigated in two experiments in which fluency of retrieval was compared for categorical and alphabetic cues. We hypothesized that fluency in Russian would be higher for categorical cues but that fluency in English would be higher for alphabetical cues because native language words would have been stored by meaning, while second-language words would have been stored according to dictionary usage. Subjects retrieved more Russian than English words with categorical cues, but their retrieval was the same for the two languages with alphabetic cues. In addition, fluency was greater overall with alphabetical than categorical cues. We attributed the greater fluency in Russian with the categorical cues to the early age at which the concepts were acquired, which made them more accessible in the native language. These findings support the idea that access codes for words may vary depending upon how they are originally learned.This research was supported by Research Grants AFOSR 89-0442 and F49620-92-J-0119 from the U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research to Joan Gay Snodgrass. We are indebted to an anomymous reviewer for constructive comments on an earlier version of this article.     

Realismbei Frege: Reply to Burge

Frege is celebrated as an arch-Platonist and arch-realist. He is renowned for claiming that truths of arithmetic are eternally true and independent of us, our judgments and our thoughts; that there is a third realm containing nonphysical objects that are not ideas. Until recently, there were few attempts to explicate these renowned claims, for most philosophers thought the clarity of Frege's prose rendered explication unnecessary. But the last ten years have seen the publication of several revisionist interpretations of Frege's writings — interpretations on which these claims receive a very different reading. In Frege on Knowing the Third Realm, Tyler Burge attempts to undermine this trend. Burge argues that Frege is the very Platonist most have thought him — that revisionist interpretations of Frege's Platonism, mine among them, run afoul of the words on Frege's pages. This paper is a response to Burge's criticisms. I argue that my interpretation is more faithful than Burge's to Frege's texts.     

Care as a Basis for Radical Political Judgments

The best framework for moral and political thought is the one that creates the best climate for good political judgments. I argue that universalistic theories of justice fall short in this regard because they cannot distinguish idealization from abstraction. After describing how an ethic of care guides judgments, I suggest the practical effects that make this approach preferable. The ethic of care includes more aspects of human life in making political judgments.     

Childhood Psychosocial Predictors of Adulthood Smoking,Alcohol Consumption,and Physical Activity1

This study prospectively addresses whether aspects of the childhood home environment (SES and parental divorce) and personality are predictive of smoking, alcohol consumption, and physical activity in middle adulthood. Subjects were 972 males and females who participated in the Terman Life-Cycle Study. Results of hierarchical regression analyses indicated that childhood unconscientiousness, cheerfulness, and parental divorce predicted adult smoking. Childhood unconscientiousness and sociability predicted adult alcohol consumption. Physical activity was predicted by a higher energy/activity level in childhood. Results suggest that the previously found associations between childhood characteristics and health-related behaviors over shorter periods are not simply reflective of early experimentation with such behaviors, but may be indicative of long-term lifestyle patterns.