Religiosity, psychoticism, and schizotypal traits

In the present study we investigated the relationship between scores on the Francis Scale of Attitudes towards Christianity [FSAC (Francis & Stubbs, Personality and Individual Differences, 8, 741–743, 1987)], Eysenck's Personality Questionnaire [EPQ (Eysenck & Eysenck, Manual of the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, 1975)], Eckblad and Chapman's Magical Ideation Scale [MgI (Eckblad & Chapman, Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 51, 215–225, 1983)], and Claridge's STQ (Claridge & Broks, Personality and Individual Differences, 5, 633–648, 1984). A first Principal Components Analysis with the FSAC and the EPQ confirmed previous work which has shown a negative association between religiosity and psychoticism. A second Principal Components Analysis with all scales yielded a four factor solution:

1. (1) aberrant perceptions and beliefs;

2. (2) social anxiety and suspiciousness;

3. (3) asociality and low religiosity; and

4. (4) social desirability.

Some evidence is also presented for an association between higher religiosity and higher scores on unusual perceptual experiences in men although not in women. Implications for the assessment of religiosity in future research are discussed.     

Four reasons to prefer Bayesian analyses over significance testing

Inference using significance testing and Bayes factors is compared and contrasted in five case studies based on real research. The first study illustrates that the methods will often agree, both in motivating researchers to conclude that H1 is supported better than H0, and the other way round, that H0 is better supported than H1. The next four, however, show that the methods will also often disagree. In these cases, the aim of the paper will be to motivate the sensible evidential conclusion, and then see which approach matches those intuitions. Specifically, it is shown that a high-powered non-significant result is consistent with no evidence for H0 over H1 worth mentioning, which a Bayes factor can show, and, conversely, that a low-powered non-significant result is consistent with substantial evidence for H0 over H1, again indicated by Bayesian analyses. The fourth study illustrates that a high-powered significant result may not amount to any evidence for H1 over H0, matching the Bayesian conclusion. Finally, the fifth study illustrates that different theories can be evidentially supported to different degrees by the same data; a fact that P-values cannot reflect but Bayes factors can. It is argued that appropriate conclusions match the Bayesian inferences, but not those based on significance testing, where they disagree.     

Taking responsibility for health in an epistemically polluted environment

Proposals for regulating or nudging healthy choices are controversial. Opponents often argue that individuals should take responsibility for their own health, rather than be paternalistically manipulated for their own good. In this paper, I argue that people can take responsibility for their own health only if they satisfy certain epistemic conditions, but we live in an epistemic environment in which these conditions are not satisfied. Satisfying the epistemic conditions for taking responsibility, I argue, requires regulation of this environment. I describe some proposals for such regulation and show that we cannot reject all regulation in the name of individual responsibility. We must either regulate individuals’ healthy choices or regulate the epistemic environment.     

Thinking emergence as interaffecting: approaching and contextualizing Eugene Gendlin’s Process Model

Prior to A Process Model, Gendlin’s theoretical and practical work focused on the interfacing of bodily-felt meaningfulness and symbolization. In A Process Model, Gendlin does something much wider and more philosophically primary. The hermeneutic and pragmatist distinction between the concept of experience, on the one hand, and actual experiential process, on the other, becomes for Gendlin the methodological basis for a radical reconceptualization of the body. Wittgenstein’s formulation of “meaning” as “language-use in situations” is spelled out by Gendlin in embodied terms, yielding a profound new grasp of language, meaning, situation, language-use and culture as interactional body-process. Gendlin, in building his text, answers the pragmatist critique of a wrong progression of thinking where the results of an inquiry are read back to be its premises. With his central concept “eveving” (“everything interaffected by everything”) Gendlin shows how the seeming determinacy of preceding structure is opened in the actual occurring. He thereby elaborates a new conception of continuity where the possibility for responsive novelty is emergent in the event itself. The conceptual development of the text itself instances this kind of emergent novelty. We will somewhat follow Gendlin’s own path in using language-in-situations as entry-point into his more fundamental process-thinking, thereby asking ourselves how to engage his new kind of model. In the last part, we introduce some of the philosophical roots of Gendlin’s A Process Model.     

Conflict Transformation: Relinquishing or Maintaining Social Identity Among Former Loyalist Combatants in Northern Ireland

This study explored the accounts of former loyalist combatants now involved in conflict transformation, preventing violent extremism and peace-building work. To understand how former loyalist combatants negotiate their dramatic change in context and function, we analyzed accounts of peace building through thematic analysis. The themes demonstrated that conducting conflict transformation is expressively linked to former combatant identity. The themes also demonstrate that former combatants construct identity continuity by viewing their current transformative actions as an evolution of their militant activity during the Troubles. The article concludes on the implications of these identity maintenance strategies for former combatants and, more widely, what implications this has for other militants transitioning from conflict or extremism towards peace.     

Concepts of Health-Related Quality of Life of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children: Parent Perceptions

Applied Research in Quality of Life - Health-related quality of life (HR-QoL) is a valued patient-related outcome measure. HR-QoL is typically measured using a psychometric tool. Although there are...