Posttraumatic Growth: Spouses’ Relationship Quality and Psychological Distress

While research links interpersonal processes to posttraumatic growth (PTG; Calhoun &; Tedeschi, 2006a Calhoun, L. G., &; Tedeschi, R. G. (2006a). Expert companions: Posttraumatic growth in clinical practice. In L. G. Calhoun, &; R. G. Tedeschi (Eds.), Handbook of posttraumatic growth: Research &; practice (pp. 291–310). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. [Google Scholar]), little is known about whether partners’ PTG has consequences for people’s (i.e., actors’) relationship functioning and psychological distress. Sixty-one married couples who had experienced severe flooding completed measures of PTG, perceptions of spouses’ PTG, relationship quality, and psychological distress 6 and 12 months following the event. Partners’ increased PTG predicted actors’ increased perceptions of partners’ PTG, which predicted actors’ increased relationship quality, which, in turn, predicted actors’ decreased psychological distress. Thus, partners’ PTG can benefit spouses’ evaluations of their relationship and, ultimately, actors’ psychological well-being.     

From Hohenschönhausen to Guantanamo Bay: Psychology's role in the secret services of the GDR and the United States

This paper presents a historical analysis of the genesis, context, and function of “Operative Psychology,” a little‐known branch of applied psychology developed by employees of the Ministry of State Security in the German Democratic Republic. For 25 years, theories and practices of Operative Psychology were taught to elite agents at the Juridical Academy in Potsdam, introducing them to various “silent” psychological techniques of persuasion, interrogation, and repression. After highlighting the economic and political context that increased the need for “silent” techniques of observation and repression, an overview of the topics that were taught and researched at the chair for Operative Psychology is given. Examples of how these techniques were put into practice are provided and the consequences for the victims of Operative Psychology are discussed. Furthermore, commonalities and differences between Operative Psychology and the use of psychological torture by the CIA during the “war on terror” are discussed and questions regarding the relation between methodological and moral strategies of justification are addressed.     

On how (not) to define modality in terms of essence

Philosophical Studies - In his influential article ‘Essence and Modality’, Fine proposes a definition of (conceptual, logical and metaphysical) necessity in terms of the primitive...     

The relationship between psychoanalysis and schizophrenia by Richard Lucas-A commentary

Psychoanalysis provides a framework for understanding human experience, which can be of great value to persons suffering from psychiatric disorders, and to their caretakers. There are also, of course, other useful frameworks. In past years, some have inferred that the value of psychoanalysis with these patients implies that it helps us to understand the aetiology of their disorders, that it may offer a 'cure', or that it has some special relevance to their problems. There is no evidence for any of these. Further progress in this area should be based on new evidence.     

The limits of non-standard contingency

Philosophical Studies - Gideon Rosen has recently sketched an argument which aims to establish that the notion of metaphysical modality is systematically ambiguous. His argument contains a crucial...