Proximate Exposure to Conflict and the Spatiotemporal Correlates of Social Trust

How does exposure to conflict events shape social trust? Research in political psychology predicts that conflict exacerbates group divisions, enhancing ingroup solidarities while simultaneously reducing outgroup trust. Experimental research has found support for these predictions, and yet measuring the impact of conflict on trust beyond the laboratory is difficult. For example, questions about the lasting salience of experimental treatments remain a challenge in the study of conflict. We develop an empirical strategy using geo-coded individual-level survey data from the Afrobarometer project and geo-coded conflict-event data. We draw spatial and temporal buffers around each survey respondent that allow us to test whether proximate exposure to conflict events correlates with lower social trust, as well as how far and long that salience lasts. We find that exposure to conflict reduces generalized and outgroup trust, as predicted. Contrary to our expectations, we find that it reduces ingroup trust. We investigate further and find that ingroup trust suffers most when respondents live in homogenous ethnic enclaves. Furthermore, we advance an argument that the effects of exposure to conflict are mitigated over distance and time. Our results indicate that the effect diminishes over both time and space.     

Randomized controlled trial of a prenatal focused coparenting consultation for unmarried black fathers and mothers: One-year infant and family outcomes

In the infant mental health field, scant conceptual attention has been given to coparenting and family adaptations of non-white family systems, with no evidence-based, community-informed coparenting interventions responsive to unmarried Black mothers’ and fathers’ life circumstances. This study examined 1-year post-partum child and family outcomes of a novel, modest dosage (six sessions) prenatal focused coparenting consultation (FCC) using randomized controlled trial methodology. One-hundred-thirty-eight expectant families (one or both parents identified as Black/African American) were randomized to an intervention (N = 70) or treatment-as-usual (TAU; control) condition (N = 68). TAU families received navigational support in accessing existing community services for pregnant families. Intervention families received TAU plus 6 dyadic FCC sessions led by a Black male-female Community Mentor team. When infants were three and 12 months old, parents reported on coparenting, father engagement, interparental aggression, depressive symptoms, and infant social and emotional adjustment. Intent-to-treat analyses focusing on 12-month post-partum data indicated significant intervention effects on coparenting, interparental psychological aggression, and infants’ emotional adjustment. Improvement was also seen in depression and father engagement, with gains for both groups. Results suggest FCC delivered by same-race Community Mentors to unmarried Black coparents transitioning to parenthood supports infant and family adaptation during the first year of life.     

Cross-cultural Differences in Self-reported Decision-making Style and Confidence

The Melbourne Decision Making Questionnaire (Mann, Burnett, Radford, & Ford, 1997) measures self-reported decision-making coping patterns. The questionnaire was administered to samples of University students in the US (N = 475), Australia (N = 262), New Zealand (N = 260), Japan (N = 359), Hong Kong (N = 281), and Taiwan (N = 414). As predicted, students from the three Western, individualistic cultures (US, Australia, and New Zealand) were more confident of their decision-making ability than students from the three East Asian, group-oriented cultures (Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan). No cross-cultural differences were found in scores on decision vigilance (a careful decision-making style). However, compared with Western students, the Asian students tended to score higher on buck-passing and procrastination (avoidant styles of decision making) as well as hypervigilance (a panicky style of decision making). Japanese students scored lowest on decision self-esteem and highest on procrastination and hypervigilance. It was argued that the conflict model and its attendant coping patterns is relevant for describing and comparing decision making in both Western and Asian cultures.     

Scientific Meetings of the Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis-Horney Applied: Alienation from the Self and the Quality of the Analyst's Responsiveness in Trauma Treatment

The American Journal of Psychoanalysis -     

Equity, justice, and altruism

According to traditional equity theory, justice is motivated by selfishness. However, critics of equity have argued that it is only one rule of justice that people can apply, and that sometimes other rules of justice are used, such as equality and need, that appear to be altruistically based; that is, they involve sharing and caring in a way that ignores contributions or “inputs” and the probability of receiving outcomes in return. Disagreements have arisen, however, as to the status of these alternative rules as elements of justice, the roles of altruism and selfishness within them, and the relative status of altruism and justice as moral principles. The main aim of this article is to help resolve some of these difficulties by examining the relationship between altruism and justice from the perspective of Wagstaff s theory of Equity as Desert (EAD). This theory integrates a number of allocation rules (including those related to the treatment of offenders) with the concepts of equal opportunity and personal responsibility. One of the advantages of this position is that it enables a conceptual and an empirical distinction to be made between helping and responsiveness to need as altruistic norms, and helping and responsiveness to need as justice norms. It is concluded that there may be something to be gained from viewing core rules of justice in the form of EAD as the sophisticated descendants of the sociobiological concept of reciprocal altruism, that is, a set of algorithms designed to limit both unbridled selfishness and indiscrimi-nate altruism.     

Book notes

First Nations Faith and Ecology. Freda Rajotte, 1998 London: Cassell x +117 pp., £8.99 (pb) ISBN 0–304–70312–5

Religious Pluralism in the West. David George Mullan, ed., 1998 Oxford: Blackwell 350 pp., £50.00/US$64.95 (hb), £15.99/US$29.95 (pb) ISBN 0–631–20669–8 (hb), ISBN 0–631–20670–1 (pb)

Hinduism: A Very Short Introduction. Kim Knott, 1998 Oxford: Oxford University Press 139 pp., £5.99 ISBN 0–19–285341–4

Psychoanalytic Studies of Religion: A Critical Assessment and Annotated Bibliography. Benjamin Beit‐Hallahmi, 1996 Westport, Connecticut/London: Greenwood Press 188 pp., £55.50 ISBN 0–313–27362–6

The Psychology of Religion: Theoretical Approaches. Bernard Spilka & Daniel N. Mcintosh, eds., 1996 Boulder, Colorado/Oxford: Westview Press 282 pp., £48.50 (hb), £16.95 (pb) ISBN )‐8133–2946–9 (hb), ISBN 0–8133–2947–7 (pb)

The Religious Function of the Psyche. Lionel Corbett, 1996 London/New York: Routledge 264 pp., £45.00 (hb), £14.99 (pb) ISBN 0–415–14400–0 (hb), ISBN 0–415–14401–9 (pb)

The Possibility of Resurrection and Other Essays in Christian Apologetics. Peter Van Inwagen, 1998 Boulder, Colorado/Oxford: Westview Press 118 pp., £41.50 ISBN 0–8133–2731–8

Every Living Thing: Daily Use of Animals in Ancient Israel. Oded Borowski, 1998 Walnut Creek/London/New Dehli: Altamira Press/Sage 296 pp., £35.00 (hb), £16.50 (pb) ISBN 0–7619–8918–8 (hb), ISBN 0–7619–8919–6 (pb)

A Critical Review. Michael Milston, 1997 London/Los Angeles/Sydney: Minerva Press 50 pp., £3.99 ISBN 1–86106–341–5

I Communiste Una religione dell'aldiquà. Michele Straniero, 1997 Milan: Mondadori 141 pp., Lire 12.000 ISBN 88–04–38672‐X

Bulgaria in the Circles of Anontie. Jelio Vladimirov, Todor Todorov, Ivan Katzarski, & Momtchil Badjakov, 1998 Neuchâtel, Switzerland: Swiss Institute for Development 121 pp., no price indicated no ISBN indicated     

Towards a Clarification of the Association Between Religiosity and Life Satisfaction

Following recent contradictory findings, the present aim was to further examine the association between religiosity and life satisfaction. The Francis Scale of Attitude Towards Christianity (Francis & Stubbs, 1987) and the Satisfaction With Life Scale (Diener, Emmons, Larsen & Griffin, 1985) were completed by 55 (31 male and 24 female) Northern Irish adults and 141 (50 male and 91 female) Northern Irish students. Among the adult sample, a significant association was found between scores on the Francis Scale of Attitude Towards Christianity and the Satisfaction With Life Scale for both males and females. However, among the student sample, no significant association was found for either males or females. These data are consistent with previous findings with evidence that, among Northern Irish adults, but not among Northern Irish students, those with a more positive attitude towards Christianity are more satisfied with life.     

Book Reviews

Pastoral Psychology -