Las aportaciones de la Psicología al II Congreso de Teoría y Metodología de las Ciencias

RESUMEN

El presente artículo es una recopilación de las aportaciones relevantes provenientes de la psicología al II Congreso de Teoría y Metodología de las Ciencias. Este análisis no pretende a través de unos apuntes, dar una imagen con un mínimo de coherencia epistemológica de la menos parte de la gran cantidad de problemas y matices que el “apartado psicológico” del Congreso puso en la palestra. Se ha escogido para ello un camino que implica las propias posiciones epistemológicas del autor de este trabajo. y que ponen en juego reflexiones oportunas sobre las relaciones de la Psicología y la Filosofía, sacando a la luz la posibilidad de un entendimiento fructífero.     

Los niveles de análisis de la emoción: James,cien años después

RESUMEN

En este artículo se analizan las implicaciones de la teoría de James con un siglo de perspectiva y, se realiza un amplio estudio de la noción de emoción y su significación psicológica y epistemológica. Se exponen los principios fundamentales de la Teoría de James-Lange, además de exponer la teoría de Canon que se enfrentaba a la Teoría de James-Lange, se recogen también, aquellas teorías que se sitúan en un punto intermedio de estas dos teorías. Finalmente se analiza en mayor profundidad la teoría de James en la actualidad y sus implicaciones epistemológicas.     

Contribution of parents' adult attachment and separation attitudes to parent‐adolescent conflict resolution

This study examined the contribution to parent‐adolescent conflict resolution of parental adult attachment styles and attitudes toward adolescent separation. Questionnaires were completed by 295 couples with early to late adolescent children. Structural equation models were used to test self and partner influences on conflict resolution for three attachment orientations: confidence (model A), anxiety (model B) and avoidance (model C). Model A showed self influences between parents' confidence orientation and negotiation and also via positive attitudes towards separation. Also, the fathers' use of negotiation was facilitated by the mothers' confidence orientation and vice versa, indicating partner influences as well. Model B showed self influences between parents' anxiety orientation and the use of dominance and withdrawal and also via negative attitudes towards separation. Model C showed self influences between parents' avoidance orientation and dominance and withdrawal, and a partner influence between fathers' avoidance and mothers' use of dominance. The results indicated that the parents' adult attachment system and the parenting system were related in the area of conflict resolution, and that self influences were stronger than partner influences.     

Social comparison,coping and depression in people with spinal cord injury

The present study among 70 people with spinal cord injury examined the prevalence and correlates of identification (seeing others as a potential future) and contrast (seeing others in competitive terms) in social comparison as related to coping and depression. The most prevalent social comparison strategy was downward contrast (a positive response to seeing others who were worse-off), followed by upward identification (a positive response to perceiving better-off others as a potential future), downward identification (a negative response to perceiving worse-off others as a potential future), and upward contrast (a negative response to seeing others who were better-off). Those with less severe lesions reported the highest levels of upward contrast, coping through blaming others, and depression. Downward contrast was particularly related to constructive coping, and upward identification to wishful thinking. The less adaptive social comparison strategies, i.e., upward contrast and downward identification, were quite strongly related to wishful thinking and blaming others. Particularly upward contrast, i.e., feeling bad as response to seeing that others are better-off, was related to depression.     

Brief treatment with alprazolam and behavioral guidance in panic disorder

Abstract

Thirty-two patients with panic disorder, with or without agoraphobic limitations, were treated with alprazolam (mean dose 3.5 mg/d) plus brief behavioral guidance in an open study during eight weeks. The sample had a notorious severity in the frequency of panics and phobic avoidance but was only mildly depressed. Before starting treatment the presence of demoralized mood and extensive avoidance were significant indicators of clinical severity, whereas the presence of dizziness as a relevant somatic complaint was not related to higher severity. After eight weeks of treatment a clinical improvement equal to or exceeding 80% of change was obtained in all cases (29) who completed treatment. Ninety-two percent of the patients were panic free at the end of treatment. There were significant reductions in all the scales with comparable declines in the subgroups formed according to the presence or absence of agoraphobic avoidance and demoralization. The data suggested that moderate doses of alprazolam could be a quick and effective treatment for panic-agoraphobic patients in the short term. The behavioral guidance probably helped in reducing agoraphobic avoidance and in obtaining global good effectiveness although this awaits controlled tests. Finally, the similarity in the response to treatment regardless of the presence of extensive avoidance or demoralized mood argues in favor of not considering the different variants of panic-agoraphobic syndrome differently, at least in samples with similar severity to the present one.     

Work Meaning Patterns in Early Career

Abstract

Work meaning patterns combine dimensions such as work centrality, expressive versus economic work goals, and entitlement versus obligation societal norms into a holistic picture of the evolution over time of the meaning of work. Data from a longitudinal study in eight countries are used to establish major work meaning patterns and to study their stability during early career paths. Further, some potential determinants of these work meaning patterns are analysed and their consequences for later careers are considered. Statistical analyses include: cluster analysis, multiple discriminant analysis, analysis of covariance combined with multiple classification analysis, analysis of variance, and chi-square analysis. Five cross-national work meaning patterns are identified for machine operators in their third year in the labour market. One-third of the sample had remained in the same work meaning pattern for 2 years, while two-thirds had changed their work pattern. Respondents' age, country, prior work environment, and prior work socialization behaviours and outcomes have an impact on work meanings held 2 years later. In addition the respondent's work meaning pattern allows subsequent career enhancing strategies and effort expenditure at the job to be predicted.     

Transforming roles to support student development of academic literacies: a reflection on one team’s experience

Social work is a discipline that attracts students from diverse academic backgrounds. Many are first in family to attend university, and come to university through alternative pathways such as vocational education. As a result, there are higher levels of attrition compared to other disciplines, especially in the first year. To address this, and in keeping with a commitment to provide accessible education, one school of social work undertook a project to embed academic literacies into the curriculum. This paper used Gibb’s reflective process to explore how this was experienced by team members. Data were collected via staff focus groups at two different points in time across the project and compared. The reflection unpacked a number of tensions experienced by team members, including concerns about potential loss of resources as a result of academics adopting new roles, and concerns about implementing what was seen as Westernised academic skills which may not fit with students’ ways of thinking and creating knowledge. Overfull curricula and constant change also appeared to be of concern. The reflection highlighted that to achieve effective and sustainable change, action was required at multiple levels.     

Counterintuitive Religious Ideas and Metaphoric Thinking: An Event‐Related Brain Potential Study

It has been shown that counterintuitive ideas from mythological and religious texts are more acceptable than other (non‐religious) world knowledge violations. In the present experiment we explored whether this relates to the way they are interpreted (literal vs. metaphorical). Participants were presented with verification questions that referred to either the literal or a metaphorical meaning of the sentence previously read (counterintuitive religious, counterintuitive non‐religious and intuitive), in a block‐wise design. Both behavioral and electrophysiological results converged. At variance to the literal interpretation of the sentences, the induced metaphorical interpretation specifically facilitated the integration (N400 amplitude decrease) of religious counterintuitions, whereas the semantic processing of non‐religious counterintuitions was not affected by the interpretation mode. We suggest that religious ideas tend to operate like other instances of figurative language, such as metaphors, facilitating their acceptability despite their counterintuitive nature.     

Goal programming with dynamic goals

The aim of this paper is to present a dynamic goal programming scheme. Throughout the revised literature, most of the dynamic goal programming approaches use target values on the final value of the objective functionals. In this paper, dynamic target values are assumed, so that they control not only the final values of the corresponding functionals, but their evolution along the planning period. As a result, the scalar problems are also dynamic ones, where the evolution of the deviation variables is minimized. A lexicographic dynamic goal programming algorithm is developed on these basis, and some considerations are made on the efficiency of the final solutions. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.