Summa psychologiae: A special review

In the first section of the review, the general features of this large reference work are described as well as the manner in which “eminence” has been defined. The principles of the selection of the references for the two volumes are noted and the potential uses of the bibliography are discussed. The second section is devoted to a critique of some stylistic matters (diacritical signs, symbols, and abbreviations) and of certain practices (choice of the edition of books, treatment of the secondary references published in several journals, translations) regarded as open to debate. The review closes with considerations of problems of professional identification of the eminent contributors, and the correctness and relevance of some of the entries. The bibliography is regarded by the reviewer as a sine qua non reference work indispensable to students, teachers, and scholars in or out of psychology.     

Investigation into Complementary and Integrative Health Approaches for Turkish Patients with Gastrointestinal Cancer

Journal of Religion and Health - The study was conducted to determine the levels of usage of complementary and integrative health (CIH) approaches and the symptoms experienced by Turkish patients...     

Gödel’s Natural Deduction

This is a companion to a paper by the authors entitled “Gödel on deduction”, which examined the links between some philosophical views ascribed to Gödel and general proof theory. When writing that other paper, the authors were not acquainted with a system of natural deduction that Gödel presented with the help of Gentzen’s sequents, which amounts to Ja?kowski’s natural deduction system of 1934, and which may be found in Gödel’s unpublished notes for the elementary logic course he gave in 1939 at the University of Notre Dame. Here one finds a presentation of this system of Gödel accompanied by a brief reexamination in the light of the notes of some points concerning his interest in sequents made in the preceding paper. This is preceded by a brief summary of Gödel’s Notre Dame course, and is followed by comments concerning Gödel’s natural deduction system.     

Optimizing Exposure Therapy for Pathological Health Anxiety: Considerations From the Inhibitory Learning Approach

Exposure therapy has demonstrated its efficacy in the treatment of pathological health anxiety—however, psychotherapy research reveals that many patients do not show a clinically significant change. Therefore, improvements are necessary to optimize psychotherapy for pathological health anxiety. Most treatment rationales refer to habituation during exposure as the central mechanism of change. However, there is evidence that extinction learning is mediated by inhibitory learning processes. Targeting these processes may help to improve treatment outcomes in pathological health anxiety. The aim of this review was to adapt, from the inhibitory learning approach and empirical findings, the most promising strategies for the exposure-based treatment of pathological health anxiety. The exposure-optimizing strategies adapted are expectancy violation, combination, variability in contexts and stimuli, affect labeling, and removal of safety signals. A case example illustrates how to implement these methods for patients with pathological health anxiety.     

Positive Representation of Gay Characters in Movies for Reducing Homophobia

This study addresses the effect of narratives offering a positive depiction of gay men on the audience’s change in attitude towards homosexuality. Specifically, it analyzes the relationship of character identification, inter-group contact, religiosity and gender with homophobia reduction. One hundred and fifty students of a Serbian University (M_Age = 22.13, SD = 2.28) filled in a questionnaire measuring socio-demographic information and the instrument H25 assessing homophobia. Two months later, they watched a movie depicting gay men in a positive manner and completed a questionnaire containing the homophobia scale and questions related to identification with the main character, inter-group contact and religiosity. The results showed that watching the movie is related to a reduction of homophobia and that character identification and inter-group contact are negatively correlated with homophobia, whereas religiosity is positively correlated with it. Results also show that there is a negative correlation between religiosity and the attitude change induced by the movie, and that men express higher level of homophobia than women. The study contributes to the knowledge of the mechanisms reducing homophobia through media.     

The Polish adaptation of the Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire (ECBQ): Psychometric properties,age and gender differences and convergence between the questionnaire and the observational data

The main aim of the study was to determine the psychometric properties of the version of the Early Childhood Behavior Questionnaire (ECBQ) adapted to Polish culture. Since temperament in toddlers was being observed in a laboratory, an external validity of the ECBQ was also provided. Kagan’s observational paradigm was used to test 215 18-month-old children. Their parents completed the ECBQ twice, when the children were 26 and 30 months old. The results showed good internal consistency and confirmed the longitudinal stability of the scale. The same three-factor solution was found in the structure of the scale as in the original American study. The convergence between the observational and parent report data supported the ECBQ’s external validity. Similarities in the structure of the scale observed between the Polish and American data are discussed from a cross-cultural perspective. The usefulness of the Polish ECBQ and the limitations of the obtained results are discussed.     

Development and validation of a brief self-report measure of trauma exposure: the Trauma History Screen

Although information about individuals' exposure to highly stressful events such as traumatic stressors is often very useful for clinicians and researchers, available measures are too long and complex for use in many settings. The Trauma History Screen (THS) was developed to provide a very brief and easy-to-complete self-report measure of exposure to high magnitude stressor (HMS) events and of events associated with significant and persisting posttraumatic distress (PPD). The measure assesses the frequency of HMS and PPD events, and it provides detailed information about PPD events. Test-retest reliability was studied in four samples, and temporal stability was good to excellent for items and trauma types and excellent for overall HMS and PPD scores. Comprehensibility of items was supported by expert ratings of how well items appeared to be understood by participants with relatively low reading levels. In five samples, construct validity was supported by findings of strong convergent validity with a longer measure of trauma exposure and by correlations of HMS and PPD scores with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms. The psychometric properties of the THS appear to be comparable or better than longer and more complex measures of trauma exposure.