The Impact of Team Identification on Biased Predictions of Player Performance

The Psychological Record - The current investigation examined sport fans’ impressions of an athlete described as a potential member of their team or a potential member of a rival team. In...     

Poetry in Existential Psychotherapy with Couples and Families

The use of poetry during the process of existential psychotherapy with couples and families is described and illustrated. In this approach, poems can be utilized to help the couple and/or family notice meaning potentials in the future, actualize and make use of such meaning potentials in the here and now, and re-collect and honor meanings previously actualized and deposited in the past.     

Anomic depression and the migrating family

Anomic family depression is a form of depression which occurs in reaction to a disruption in a family's ability to discover a sense of meaning and purpose in life. Anomic depression often occurs during times of family migration where there is an increased danger of a disruption in the family's traditional methods of discovering and experiencing meaning. Existential family therapy utilizing network intervention, social skills training, and existential reflection is frequently a useful form of treatment in this kind of practice situation.James Lantz, PhD, and Karen Harper, PhD, are assistant professors at The Ohio State University College of Social Work and serve as family therapy practitioners and consultants at The Midwest Institute for Advanced Study in Existential Family Study.     

Learning to utilize information presented over two sensory channels

In three separate experiments, Ss were provided with auditory, visual, or simultaneous auditory and visual information in a classification task. Difficulty of classification was manipulated by varying the stimulus exposure duration. Consistent bisensory facilitation effects were noted for later trials, with interference evident on earlier trials. Exposure duration influenced rate and not amount of learning, with bisensory performance being most affected by duration. A transfer paradigm was used in Experiment III, and little if any transfer was noted between unisensory and bisensory stimulus conditions. It was concluded that Ss were extracting the most salient bisensory stimulus components from the auditory and visual modes of information into a unidimensional information configuration.     

Addressing Weight Suppression to Improve Treatment Outcome for Bulimia Nervosa

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is regarded as the gold-standard treatment for bulimia nervosa (BN), yet despite impressive empirical support for its effectiveness, over 50% of patients fail to achieve abstinence from binge eating and purging by the end of treatment. One factor that may contribute to reduced efficacy rates in CBT is weight suppression (WS; the difference between a person's highest weight ever at their adult height and current weight). A growing body of research indicates that WS in patients with BN may have a clinically significant effect on symptomatology and prognosis. However, the current cognitive behavioral framework for BN does not explicitly acknowledge the role of WS in the onset or maintenance of BN symptoms and does not provide guidance for clinicians on how to address WS during treatment. The relationship between WS, biological pressure to regain lost weight, and the maintenance of BN symptoms suggest that current cognitive behavioral models of BN may be improved by considering the role of WS and exploring needed treatment modifications. Indeed, a reconceptualization of existing models may offer insight into potential strategies that can be used to reduce the susceptibility to treatment dropout, nonresponse, and relapse. It is therefore necessary to consider whether, and how, clinicians' consideration of WS during case conceptualization and treatment planning could serve to improve CBT outcomes. The current review explores ways in which high WS could contribute to poor CBT outcomes, provides preliminary clinical recommendations for incorporating WS into existing cognitive behavioral treatments based on extant data and clinical wisdom, and proposes suggestions for future research needed in this domain.     

Viktor Frankl and Interactional Group Therapy

Although Viktor Frankl's Logotherapy concepts have been described as a basis for support groups and for small sharing groups, they have seldom been reported in the literature as a basis for the practice of interpersonal group psychotherapy. In this article the author overviews and outlines the treatment elements and dynamics of a Logotherapy approach to interpersonal group therapy. Clinical material is provided to give a flavor of the described treatment approach.