Role of clarity of other's feelings for dyadic coping

Dyadic coping has repeatedly been associated with positive outcomes in intimate relationships. However, less is known about the prospective predictors of dyadic coping. This study investigates clarity of other's feelings (CoF) as a potential predictor of supportive dyadic coping in a longitudinal study. In a sample of 368 couples, self‐reported CoF and supportive dyadic coping perceived by the partner were assessed annually over 3 years. Results revealed that interpersonal differences in men and women's CoF are positively associated with interpersonal differences in supportive dyadic coping. Moreover, interpersonal differences in men's CoF predicted long‐term intrapersonal changes in supportive dyadic coping of both partners. Couple intervention programs might strengthen couple's dyadic coping skills by targeting men's understanding of their partner's feelings.     

THE SELF AND THE OTHERS: COMMON TOPICS FOR HUSSERL AND WITTGENSTEIN

Several commentators have argued that Husserl's phenomenological project is compromised or even destroyed by Wittgenstein's critical inquiries into our use of psychological concepts. In contrast to oppositional interpretations, this paper explicates certain crucial connections between Husserl's phenomenology and Wittgenstein's late thinking—shared views that concern the embodied nature of selfhood and our relations to other selves. In line with certain recent contributions, I argue that there are important similarities between Husserl's analysis of these phenomena and Wittgenstein's remarks on our use of language and that these connections, when noticed and explicated, can help us avoid simplified, barren contrasts and get clear about our actual philosophical alternatives.     

Gender Differences in Healthcare Utilization: The Mediating Effect of Utilization Propensity

To evaluate the mediating effect of utilization propensity (UP) on gender differences in healthcare utilization (HCU), a representative sample of the German general population (N = 2,510) was assessed with questionnaires. Gender differences in HCU, UP, and the mediating effect of UP were investigated using regression analyses. UP was significantly associated with HCU. The explanatory power of gender for UP, and of UP for HCU was prevailingly weak. UP had a mediating effect on gender differences in HCU, but the effect was very small. This is partly attributable to common problems in the prediction of behavior by attitudes and the operationalization of UP.     

Social skills of aggressive and nonaggressive adolescents

Abstract.— Forty 14-year-old boys were selected on the basis of peer ratings to represent characteristic aggressive, controlled extravert, anxious, and controlled introvert patterns of behaviour. Each boy was asked to play the role of either a son or a chum with the corresponding father's or chum's role played by the male E in four tape recorded dialogues. The topics were "getting more pocket money", "holiday making", "choosing a TV channel", and "agreeing on a favourite make of car". The boys' ability to persuade the opponent and to express their disagreement in a socially acceptable manner was studied. In accordance with the hypotheses the results showed that the controlled extraverts were sensible negotiators while the aggressive belittled the other's proposals and showed disagreement and indifference. The controlled introverts conformed passively and the anxious had signs of blocking in their speech. A discriminant analysis revealed that the differences were also very clear on the individual level.     

The behaviour of children during a first encounter

Abstract.— The behaviour of unacquainted children in a two-child play situation was compared with the behaviour of well acquainted children. Observations were made through a one-way-screen, mainly in accord with categories adopted from ethological child studies. Tape-recorded speech was coded into 27 content categories. Choice of activity and content of play seemed to be determined mostly by the children's sex, whereas nonverbal acts and also some aspects of speech showed considerable differences between strangers and acquaintances. Looking at the other's face, gaze avoidance, immobility, and automanipulation were more frequent among unacquainted children, and walking was less frequent among them. Longer initial silence, smaller total verbal output, and scarcity of suggestions, orders, and negative reactions were characteristic of unacquainted children at the initial stage of meeting. Personal talk (telling about oneself and asking quesrions about the other) was more common among unacquainted children, especially girls.     

Insulting the sacred in a multicultural society: the conviction of Jussi Halla-aho under the Finnish religious insult section

This article analyses the most well-known and legally important contemporary Finnish religious insult case: the case of the politician Jussi Halla-aho. Concluded in 2012, the said legal process resulted in a conviction due to Halla-aho’s blog post about Islam and its sacred figures. Using a discursive framing, the article argues that the contemporary religious insult cases can, in fact, be political struggles involving various interests in a multicultural society. Building on broadly Durkheimian theorisation of the sacred, it also argues, that besides the Islamic objects set apart as sacred in the process, ‘secular’ ideals or values, such as the public order, tolerance, equality, and freedom of religion are also constructed as such and protected by the officials. By protecting Islam, the courts, in fact, aimed to protect a ‘secular sacred order’ against societal threats.     

Personality – a resource or risk for successful development

Personality as a resource or risk for development was discussed in the light of the results of the ongoing Finnish Jyväskylä Longitudinal Study of Personality and Social Development (FJYLS) which the author has conducted since 1968 when the participants (N = 369, b. 1959) were 8 years of age. A general hypothesis presented within a two‐dimensional framework of self‐control and activity was that the child’s high self‐control of emotions and behavior would be associated with adaptive behavior in adulthood. The results have provided evidence in support for and limitations to the hypothesis. High self‐control was a resource and low self‐control was a risk for development, but there were gender differences that came out consistently in variable‐oriented and person‐oriented analyses. A resource factor for male adult social functioning was, compared to females, a broader construct of self‐control in childhood covering both more passive (compliant) and active (constructive) behavior; only active well‐controlled (constructive) behavior was a resource for female functioning. A risk factor for female functioning was low self‐control combined with passivity (internalizing behavior), whereas low self‐control combined with activity (externalizing behavior) was a risk factor for male functioning. Childhood self‐control was not directly associated with adult psychological functioning such as well‐being but indirectly through social functioning such as career development. Low self‐control in childhood was an antecedent of criminal behavior but only for those male offenders who committed offences in adulthood, not for those who had limited their offending to adolescence.     

An Experiment on the Numerical Modelling of Verbal Ratio Statements

Verbal statements are intuitively attractive for preference elicitation. In the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) the verbal responses to pairwise comparisons of relative importance are converted into real numbers according to the nine-point integer scale. Several alternative scales have been proposed for the conversion, but sufficient empirical evidence has not been produced to support the choice among these scales. We performed a comparative study in which subjects were requested to quantify verbal ratio statements by adjusting the heights of visually displayed bars. Subjects were also asked to employ verbal expressions in pairwise comparisons of areas of figures with different shapes. The principal result of the experiment was that the perceived meaning of the verbal expressions varies from one subject to the next and also depends on the set of elements involved in the comparison. Our results indicate that there are alternative numerical scales which yield more accurate estimates than the usual 1-to-9 scale and reduce the inconsistency of the comparison matrices. Alternative ways of using verbal preference statements are suggested to overcome the difficulties that arise from the context dependence of verbal pairwise comparisons. © 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The stability of alexithymia during work in a high‐stress environment: A prospective study of Swedish peacekeepers serving in Kosovo

Larsson, M. R., Bäckström, M., Michel, P.‐O. & Lundh, L.‐G. (2010). The stability of alexithymia during work in a high‐stress environment: A prospective study of Swedish peacekeepers serving in Kosovo. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology. We applied a prospective design to reinvestigate the issue whether the sub‐domains of alexithymia could be considered stable traits or distress‐related states. Assessments of alexithymia and subjective distress were conducted before deployment to Kosovo in a sample of male peacekeepers. A second assessment was conducted approximately six months later during the final phase of service. The results showed evidence of moderate to high relative stability in all alexithymic sub‐domains. It was also found that a relative change in subjective distress predicted a relative change in difficulty identifying feelings and difficulty describing feelings but not in externally oriented thinking. We suggest therefore that the alexithymic sub‐domains could be considered relatively stable traits but that the level of difficulty identifying and describing feeling varies with the level of subjective distress.