The miniaturization of expression in the development of emotional self-regulation

This study tested an internalization model of emotional development proposing that emotional expression decreases during childhood in situations in which emotions serve only self-regulation. This model was tested by inducing joy and disappointment in solitary versus interpersonal conditions in 3 gender-matched, 20-member groups of 6-, 7-, and 8-year-olds. Results supported the model: Expression--but not self-reported feeling--decreased in solitary conditions as a function of increasing age, whereas both expression and feeling remained stable in the interpersonal condition. This effect also correlated positively with the ability to discriminate between expression and feeling on a conceptual level. Results are discussed in relation to the major developmental trend toward creating a mental level of self-regulation--first described by Vygotsky.     

Processes linked to contact changes in adoptive kinship networks

The purpose of this study was to reveal underlying processes in adoptive kinship networks that experienced increases or decreases in levels of openness during the child's adolescent years. Intensive case study analyses were conducted for 8 adoptive kinship networks (each including an adoptive mother, adoptive father, adopted adolescent, and birth mother), half of whom had experienced an increase in openness from indirect (mediated) to direct (fully disclosed) contact and half of whom had ceased indirect contact between Waves 1 and 2 of a longitudinal study. Adoptive mothers tended to be more involved in contact with the birth mother than were adoptive fathers or adopted adolescents. Members of adoptive kinship networks in which a decrease in level of contact took place had incongruent perspectives about who initiated the stop in contact and why the stop took place. Birth mothers were less satisfied with their degree of contact than were adoptive parents. Adults' satisfaction with contact was related to feelings of control over type and amount of interactions and permeability of family boundaries. In all adoptive kinship networks, responsibility for contact had shifted toward the adopted adolescent regardless of whether the adolescent was aware of this change in responsibility.     

Rebuilding reality: A phenomenology of aspects of chronic schizophrenia

Schizophrenia, like other pathological conditions of mental life, has not been systematically included in the general study of consciousness. By focusing on aspects of chronic schizophrenia, we attempt to remedy this omission. Basic components of Husserl’s phenomenology (intentionality, synthesis, constitution, epoche, and unbuilding) are explicated and then employed in an account of chronic schizophrenia. In schizophrenic experience, basic constituents of reality are lost and the subject must try to explicitly re-constitute them. “Automatic mental life” is weakened such that much of the world that is normally taken-for-granted cannot continue to be so. The subject must actively re-lay the ontological foundations of reality.     

A meta-analysis on the correlation between the implicit association test and explicit self-report measures

Theoretically, low correlations between implicit and explicit measures can be due to (a) motivational biases in explicit self reports, (b) lack of introspective access to implicitly assessed representations, (c) factors influencing the retrieval of information from memory, (d) method-related characteristics of the two measures, or (e) complete independence of the underlying constructs. The present study addressed these questions from a meta-analytic perspective, investigating the correlation between the Implicit Association Test (IAT) and explicit self-report measures. Based on a sample of 126 studies, the mean effect size was .24, with approximately half of the variability across correlations attributable to moderator variables. Correlations systematically increased as a function of (a) increasing spontaneity of self-reports and (b) increasing conceptual correspondence between measures. These results suggest that implicit and explicit measures are generally related but that higher order inferences and lack of conceptual correspondence can reduce the influence of automatic associations on explicit self-reports.     

Liebe Leserin, lieber Leser,

In eigener Sache

Liebe Leserin, lieber Leser,     

How to study the ‘quality of psychoanalytic treatments’ and their long‐term effects on patients' well‐being: A representative,multi‐perspective follow‐up study3

How can we study the ‘quality of psychoanalytic treatments’? The authors attempt to answer this question by discussing a naturalistic, multi‐perspective and representative follow‐up study of psychoanalyses and long‐term psychoanalytic psychotherapies. We studied a representative sample (n = 401) of all the patients who had terminated their psychoanalytic treatments with members of the German Psychoanalytical Association (DPV) between 1990 and 1993. Between 70 and 80 per cent of the patients achieved (average 6.5 years after the end of treatment) good and stable psychic changes according to the evaluations of the patients themselves, their analysts, independent psychoanalytic and non‐psychoanalytic experts, and questionnaires commonly applied in psychotherapy research. The evaluation of mental health costs showed a cost reduction through fewer days of sick leave during the seven years following the end of long‐term psychoanalytic treatments. The results achieved using non‐psychoanalytical instruments are complemented by the richness of the idiosyncratic findings, gained by the psychoanalytic research instruments.     

Neue Felder in der Operationalisierten Psychodynamischen Diagnostik

After the operationalized psychodynamic diagnostics (OPD) system became well established in clinical as well as research contexts, especially in German speaking countries, the OPD task force now focuses on issues, such as modules and new manuals which are related to various clinical contexts. In this article new modules and manuals are presented and discussed in summarized form: the modules for addiction disorders and for forensic patients, the new OPD-2 manual for children and adolescents, an OPD-based manual for formulating initial assessment reports for insurance companies as well as a conceptualization for an operationalized psychodynamic therapy (OPT).     

Anger as driving factor of moral courage in comparison with guilt and global mood: A multimethod approach

Although moral courage is a highly desirable behavior whose determinants need to be understood, research has largely neglected the emotions involved in moral courage. Does anger about the norm violation or (anticipated) guilt enhance such interventions even if general mood does not? As previous studies have often failed to overcome the limitations of self‐reported emotions and the use of behavior intention measures, we used a multimethod emotion measurement while observing real behavior. By realizing a real theft scenario in the laboratory (N = 68), we found that anger but neither guilt nor general mood predicted intervention behavior. Our findings complement and expand previous studies by showing that people who experience and express anger more strongly are able to overcome the psychological barrier of potential negative (social) consequences in a situation in which a fast and immediate intervention is needed, whereas others stand and watch. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.