Learning to tell apples from oranges

Recognizing images requires sorting them into the correct perceptual categories. Without categories, apples could not be discriminated from oranges. A fundamental question is whether categories are innate or learned, and if learned, how well such discriminations generalize. A recent finding by Notman et al. demonstrates that certain categorical discriminations are learned fast but vanish for slightly rotated stimuli. Rather than higher "cognitive" learning, this indicates involvement of "early" mechanisms, which cannot generalize across different stimulus orientations.     

Die Artistik der Psychoanalyse

Zusammenfasssung  Die Psychoanalyse wird im Rückgriff auf die Praxis Freuds als artistisches Handwerk begriffen, das der Phantasie als Erkenntnismittel und -zweck die entscheidende Bedeutung zuweist. Sie ist eine Imaginationslehre und der Phantasieschlüssel, die produktive Einbildungskraft eines Therapeuten, der Zentralbegriff für dessen Güte: Gegen das Klischee des Standardsettings werden die Fähigkeit und das Ausmaß phantastischer Induktion durch den Therapeuten gestellt, gegen die Fiktion von rekonstruktiver Arbeit der produktive Konstruktivismus der Psychoanalyse. Die antizipatorische Kompetenz des Therapeuten erweist sich als Quelle der Heilkraft, die dem Patienten eine sinnvolle Benennung für seine unerklärlichen und fremden Erfahrungen der Symptome gibt. Der Analytiker ist, wie der Künstler, ein Experte phantasierenden Umdenkens und Umgestaltens der vorfindlichen Wahrnehmungsrealität. Seine kompositorischen Fähigkeiten sind die Bedingung, dem Patienten das Noch-Nicht-Bekannte, Nichterfahrene aus dem Fundus seines Phantasievermögens hinzuzufügen. In diesem hermeneutischen Ergänzungsprinzip der Psychoanalyse, ihrem gestaltschaffenden Entdeckungsprinzip, liegt die Hauptquelle der therapeutischen Wirksamkeit. Die von uns entwickelte Technik der korrigierenden kognitiven Erfahrung ist eine Methode zur produktiven Sinnbestimmung der Symptome und wird in ihrer klinischen Bedeutung für alle Strukturen dargestellt. Die Wahrheit der psychoanalytischen Methode offenbart sich gleichwie das Wahre in der Kunst durch eine andere und neue Selbst- und Weltanschauung des Patienten.

---

The artistic quality of psychoanalysisIngeniousity and the corrective cognitive experience

Taking up the practice of Freud, psychoanalysis is regarded here as an artistic skill attaching central importance to phantasy as a means and also goal of insight. Psychoanalysis is a science of imagination. The key, the productive imaginative ability of the therapist is the central concept for its quality. The clichee of the standard setting is contrasted with the ability and the extent of phantasy induction by the therapist, as well as the fiction of reconstructive work with the productive contructivism of psychoanalysis. The anticipatory competence of the therapist is the source of the healing force offering a meaningful designation to the patients inexplicable and strange experiences and symptoms. The psychoanalyst is in the same way as an artist an expert of imaginative rethinking and reshaping of the given perceptional reality. His compositional abilities are the pre-condition for amplifying out of his imaginative resources the patients experience by still unknown and new experiences. The main source of therapeutic effectivity is this hermeneutic completion principle of psychoanalysis by which it creates through discovery new Gestalts. Our technique of the corrective cognitive experience is a method of productive sense-giving to the symptoms and is presented in its importance for all structures. The truth of the psychoanalytic method reveals itself just as the truth of arts in the patients new and different view of the self and the world.

---

---

Prof. Dr. Manfred Pohlen ist emeritierter Direktor der Klinik für Psychotherapie der Philipps-Universität, Marburg.* Der vorliegende Exkurs über die Artistik der Psychoanalyse folgt den umfassenderen Ausführungen zu diesem Thema in der von M. Polen und M. Bautz-Holzherr vorgelegten Monographie: Eine andere Psychodynamik - Psychotherapie als Programm zur Selbstbemächtigung des Subjekts (Huber 2001), in der wir eine psychodynamische Praxistheorie unter der Perspektive der Selbstbemächtigung des therapeutischen Subjekts veröffentlicht haben.

---

Synergistic person x situation interaction in distributive justice behavior

A person x situation interaction is synergistic when a personality trait amplifies the effect of a situational factor. The present study tested how individuals' justice attitudes and situational factors jointly affect the allocation of financial burdens. Six insurance cases were described to 80 participants. Economic status of client (high, low) and responsibility of client for damage of the insured (high, low) were manipulated between subjects. Participants suggested a percentage of the total costs that they considered a fair contribution by the client. In accordance with the synergistic model, justice attitude (person factor) and responsibility for damage (situation factor) interacted and explained 5% of the variance of the dependent variable. With increasing negativity of attitude toward equality, the effect of responsibility was larger. Several cognitive mechanisms, such as motivated perception, selective attention, and the availability of attitude congruent situation schemas, that may account for synergistic interactions in justice behavior and in other domains were discussed.     

On the Art of Finding Arguments: What Ancient and Modern Masters of Invention Have to Tell Us About the "Ars Inveniendi"

This paper deals with what has been called "ars inveniendi" (art of finding) in antiquity, medieval and early modern times. A survey of different techniques of finding tenable and relevant arguments is presented (among them, the Topical tradition, Status theory, Debate theory, Encyclopedic systems, Creativity techniques). Their advantages and disadvantages are critically compared. It is suggested that a mixture of strategies of finding arguments should be used. Finally, a few remarks showing the relationship beween the strategies of finding arguments and creativity in general are given.     

Social-consensual conceptions concerning the progress of aggressive interactions

The present study investigated social consensual conceptions concerning the appropriateness relation between an initiative aggressive action and the reaction to it. To this end subjects were asked to choose between four configurations of mediatory information between B's initial act and A's reaction (i.e. ‘A's offence at B's behaviour’, ‘inappropriateness of B's behaviour’, ‘A's personal standards’, ‘A's fear of negative consequences’), so as to combine identical initial acts with incompatible reactions (i.e. ‘escalation’, ‘breaking’ of, and ‘compensation’) into meaningful episodes. The statistical procedure used, configural frequency analysis, shows that as compared with the number of theoretically possible configurations, very few were selected by subjects (with a high degree of unanimaty) as being specific to a particular type of reaction. Apparently subjects have definite and uniform conceptions about the appropriateness of incompatible reactions to certain aggressive actions in interpersonal conflicts.     

Classification of situations specific to field and behaviour: The context of aggressive interactions in schools

Based on a social psychological concept of aggression, in which the processes of definition and judgement of acts of behaviour are credited with central meaning, the situational context of aggressive interactions was systematized for a specific field (school). It is assumed that the particular circumstances of a situation provide information for the interpretation of a particular action, and that this interpretation varies depending on these circumstances. In the following study, norm deviation, intent and injury, are used as central criteria for judging on action as aggressive in order to establish a taxonomy of social situations, presented as verbal scenarios, that is both field-and behaviour-specific. 686 school children aged between 13 and 19 years participated in this study. By using a multivariate analysis procedure, groups of situations were identified in which similar judgements of a particular action emerged. Both typical judgement patterns and corresponding situation characteristics were used in the interpretation of the resulting situation taxonomy.     

Religious Knowledge and Its Use in Psychiatry

Clinicians' knowledge of and sensitivity to religious issues have been questioned. The present study measures religious knowledge and willingness to utilize such knowledge in clinical practice. We administered a 41-item questionnaire testing religious knowledge and willingness to utilize such knowledge to 28 psychiatric clinicians. The mean religious knowledge score was 61% of the total possible score. In spite of low scores, only 33% of clinicians consistently refrained from initiating discussions of religious issues. Results support a low level of religious knowledge but do not support a contention that clinicians are insensitive to religious issues.     

Two observations about human reason

The first observation is that existential reason has two principal strata. While the function of lower reason is primarily reasoning or logic, upper reason ponders emotions, the meaning of existence, the transcendent. Those whose understanding of reason is confined to lower reason are handicapped in coping with emotional and spiritual suffering. Upper reason is a necessary intellectual facility in the resolution of such suffering. The second observation is of thedialectical nature of reason, with which clinicians and theologians trade when pondering reality and in dealing with those they counsel. Yet, many people, especially Americans, are oblivious to the “both-and” reality of existence. Consequently they are not realistic about life nor are they skillful in dealing with their resulting existential conflicts. They are lost when psychological problems cannot be satisfactorily resolved by lower reason; for only upper reason can perceive and creatively integrate the dialectical tensions of existential problems.