Phenomenological note on belief-feeling and the relation between affect and belief

It is asserted that there are two kinds of belief-feeling, i.e., feeling (confident) that something is true or real. The difference between α-feeling and β-feeling of belief is analogous to the difference between having a sensory impression and merely imagining the impression. An α-belief is a concomitant correlate of affect and it tends to be stronger than the corresponding β-belief.     

The incongruent color-words paradigm and language lateralization: An EEG-study

The present study utilizes an incongruent color-words paradigm, where color-words are briefly flashed either to the left or to the right of the center of futation. The hypothesis is that a greater conflict between the word and the color the word is written in will occur in the left hemisphere than in the right hemisphere, if the task of the subject is to report only the color. In previous studies, however, only behavioral measures, like vocal reaction time and error frequency, have been used to assess asymmetry. In the presented experiment we have added analysis of the 8–13 Hz EEG alpha difference between the hemispheres, predicting greater alpha reduction to the color-words in the left hemisphere, but not to the control stimuli. Twenty intact, male, dextrals participated. Results supported the prediction, witha 8.3% reduction of alpha activity in the left hemisphere to the color words, compared to a 1.9% reduction in the right hemisphere. No difference was found to the control stimuli.     

Social support in spouses of cancer patients: What do they get and to what end?

Using a retrospective design, the authors assessed several different aspects of social support (perceived, received, satisfaction with received, and support seeking) in 95 spouses of cancer survivors. The goals of the investigation were to (a) describe in detail the differences between husbands and wives on these support dimensions and (b) explore whether the relation between support and adjustment was different for husbands as compared to wives. While husbands and wives were generally similar-in their general perceptions of available support and in the amount of support they reported seeking, consistent with our hypothesis, compared to husbands of breast cancer victims, wives of prostate cancer victims reported receiving more support and being more satisfied with the support they received. Measures of social support predicted husbands’reports of marital satisfaction and adjustment, but not wives’reports. Partial correlation analyses indicated that sex differences in these support-adjustment links were not attributable to differences in age, or in the time between completing treatment and participating in the study. Sex differences observed in the present study are interpreted as highlighting the need for theory development to account for the complex mechanisms underlying links between supportive transactions and marital satisfaction and adjustment.     

Difficulties in Family Therapy Evaluation I. A Comparison of Insight vs. Problem-Solving Approaches II. Design Critique and Recommendations

In Part 1, an outcome study comparing two methods of family treatment, is reported. Families were randomly assigned to one of two forms of conjoint therapy: an Insight-oriented treatment (N = 10 ) or a Problem-Solving intervention (N = 10 ). The results on self-report measures of family functioning indicate that the Problem-Solving intervention produced more favorable changes after three months. Experienced therapists did better than inexperienced therapists in the Insight-treatment condition but level of experience did not make a difference in the Problem-Solving therapy. A group of eight families who dropped out of the Insight-treatment group provided data on correlates of premature termination. In Part II, the study is critically reviewed. The practical obstacles to implementing an experimental design in a clinic setting are considered. Special attention is given to issues involving the selection of treatment and control conditions: sampling and the measurement of outcome. Alternatives to experimental designs are considered.     

Outline and description of an electronic system for lateralization of visual stumuli in studies of hemispheric asymmetry

An automatic electronic systenm for lateralization of visual stimuli research on hemispheric asymmetry is described. The system consists of three different units: 1) A stimulas projection- unit; 2)an electronic control-unit; and 3)a programming-unit. Necessary characteristics of apparatus for studies using lateralized visual stimuli are described in the paper. Among the listed requirements are: range of stimulus-duration, rise- and fall-time for onset and offset to full intensity of the stimulus, stimulus-eccentricity, and eye-fixation control. The system described in the paper has been in use in our laboratory for the last two years. It is concluded that the system meets the requirements for apparatus used in studies with laterlized visual input. A block-diagram of the electronics and a schematic outline according to scale of the stimulus projection-unit are enclosed with the paper.     

Schizophrenia and the Family: II. Adverse Effects of Family Therapy

Theoretical formulations of the past thirty years have championed the hypothesis that family interaction contributes heavily to the etiology of schizophrenia, a position that has dominated contemporary family therapy even in the absence of solid empirical confirmation. The possibility that sociogenic modeling of schizophrenia is not only incorrect but even harmful to families, and to the relationship between families and clinicians, has never been taken seriously, despite its implications for the practice of family therapy. The author describes untoward effects of the sociogenic hypothesis in his own ten-year experience with families of chronic schizophrenics and examines pertinent reports in the family therapy literature, offering the reinterpretation that many communicational aberrations are adaptations to two therapist attributes: (a) failure to absolve the family of initial causal responsibility, and (b) failure to inform the family about the nature of the illness.     

SOURCES OF VARIATION IN JOB SATISFACTION: JOB SIZE EFFECTS IN A SAMPLE OF THE U. S. LABOR FORCE

Survey data were used to examine hypotheses about job size and satisfaction in a broad spectrum of jobs. Job size, higher-order need importance, urban-rural residence, and blue- or white-collar job category were tested as predictors of satisfaction ( N = 2,094). Job size, need importance, and job category all related to job satisfaction. In constrast to earlier findings among blue-collar workers, there was no evidence that either the urban-rural variable or need importance moderated the job size-satisfaction relation. Job category did not moderate these results, indicating that the present results extend to white-collar workers. It was possible to control for income in a subsample ( N = 753). Controlling for income's effect, job size, need importance, and job category still related to satisfaction; again, no moderating effects were observed. Results are discussed in terms of three potential sources of variation in satisfaction: job, person, and interaction of job and person.