The narcissistic personality in group psychotherapy

The author presents an interesting version of the Narcissus myth which she combines with the legend of Peter Pan for a better understanding of the narcissistic personality in group therapy. A lively case is presented of a young man named Jeffrey, whose narcissistic defenses were dismantled during a three-year group participation. A particular encounter between Jeffrey and another client and a powerful intervention by the therapist is described. The therapeutic importance of the group therapist as a firm but protective parent for these clients is emphasized. Definitions of narcissistic are given and some generalizations about these personalities in group therapy are explored.She has completed a book entitledChange in the Context of Group Therapy to be published by Brunner/Mazel in 1984.     

Food-searching behavior of cats in a multiple-choice elimination problem

Twelve cats were individually exposed to a four-point elimination problem for 50 consecutive days. The problem for the animals consisted of choosing a series of different points where they found, and were allowed to eat, a piece of meat, without returning to any previously visited point. The order of elimination was not controlled in any way by the experimenter. Results indicated that cats were able to solve this problem. All subjects showed a strong tendency to make successive runs toward points situated as far apart as possible. Moreover, a relation was shown between performance and the tendency to follow this high divergence principle. This result is discussed in terms of subjects' ability to process information about the spatial characteristics of the experimental situation. This ability might in fact be related to the behavioral plasticity of animals in spatial problems according to the difficulty of the task.     

Intervention in the Library: The Effect of Increased Responsibility on Bystanders' Willingness To Prevent a Theft

Two field experiments tested the hypothesis that a bystander's increased responsibility to act increases the likelihood of his helping the victim of an emergency. In Experiment 1, an individual asked or did not ask the bystander to protect his property in his absence. In Experiment 2, the presence/absence of an unattentive confederate was varied orthogonally to the request/no request manipulation. The results of both experiments indicated that bystanders who received a prior request for protective assistance felt more personally responsible for protecting the individual's property and were more likely to prevent a theft of that property than were bystanders who received no request. The presence of a confederate in Experiment 2 decreased bystanders' felt responsibility and their willingness to intervene on the victim's behalf. The results were interpreted as support for the "felt responsibility" proposition of the Latané and Darley (1970) model of bystander intervention.     

Implications of measurement of eye fixations for a psychophysics of form perception

It was suggested that insights into feature analysis of processes involved in form identification might be gained from an analysis of eye movements made by Ss as they identified patterns. Fixations were measured during identifications of histoforms, polygons, and Vargus 10 figures. Eye fixations were measured, and Ss rated sections of the figures in terms of their importance. Eye fixations were measured in terms of number of changes and duration of fixations. The number of changes in fixation were found to reflect only individual differences. Duration of fixation was found to vary significantly with location within figures, with fixations being longest where changes of contour occurred. There was also a tendency to look longer at the top of polygons and Vargus 10 figures and at the center of histoforms. Ratings of importance were highest for sections of figures fixated for longer duration-generally areas in which changes of contour were present.     

Motivation concepts and sexual identity

The association dimension of the Picture Identification Test (PIT) was used to investigate the motivation concepts of male and female university students classified as Declared Homosexual, Sexually Uncertain, Clinical Control, and Normal Control. The t test was used to identify Need Association Dyads which discriminated (p < .01) groups. Greater than chance numbers of variables discriminated each of the pairs of groups within each sex except the Sexually Uncertain versus Clinical Control Male groups, the Declared Homosexual versus Clinical Control Female groups, and the Declared Homosexual versus Normal Control Female groups. PIT Need Association Dyads were discussed as a type of implicit personality theory assessment with emphasis on the beliefs subjects hold about the simultaneous expression of needs.     

Book Reviews

J oseph B. W heelwright (Ed): The analytic process: aims, analysis, training
A. A lvarez : The savage god
B ernard A aronson and H umphrey O smond (Eds.): Psychedelics: the uses and implications of hallucinogenic drugs
E rnst B ernhard : Mitobiografia
B arbara H annah : Striving towards wholeness
C raig R. E isendraht : The unifying moment: the psychological philosophy of William James and Alfred North Whitehead     

A HULLIAN CONSTANT AS AN INDEX OF INTELLIGENCE: TWO EMPIRICAL INVESTIGATIONS

Following Clark Hull, it is widely considered that the asymptote of the learning curve represents motivational factors, but that rate of approach to asymptote ('i') represents associational factors. The suggestion that i may be a measure of intelligence was tested empirically in two studies. An initial exploratory study yielded a positive correlation between i and IQ. A more rigorous replication did not. The results are discussed briefly.