THE ILLUSION OF SYSTEMATIC DISTORTION

This reply to Sypher argues that neither his data nor his analysis provide good evidence for confirming the systematic distortion hypothesis in general or showing that it is operative in the communicator style measure in particular. At best, Sypher's research provides additional construct validity for the communicator style domain. It is maintained that “difficult memory conditions” do not prevail for the self-report of style behaviors. Three studies are briefly reported supporting this conclusion. Finally, necessary conditions are identified in order for self-report data to be increasingly useful. Although the results of factor analyses (and related methods) of sets of ratings are often of immediate and intrinsic interest, there are few personality psychologists today who would claim that obtained factor structures represent inexorable verities (cf. Lykenn, 1971). It is now well recognized that by varying the mix of variables included in a clustering analysis, one can fundamentally alter both the number and nature of the summarizing dimensions subsequently obtained.     

Implications of a Person's Level of Cognitive Development for Cognitive Approaches to Counseling

Using a cognitive-developmental model of processing self-evaluations, this article presents specific counseling strategies at different levels of abstract thinking.     

Abortion, Personhood and the Potential for Consciousness

The view that the fetus' potential for human consciousness confers upon it the right to life has been widely criticised on the basis that the notion of potentiality is so vague as to be meaningless, and on the basis that actual rights cannot be deduced from the mere potential for personhood. It has also been criticised, although less commonly, on the basis that it is not the potential to assume consciousness, but rather the potential to resume consciousness which is morally significant, and on the basis that the fetus does not really possess the potential for consciousness. In response, I argue that these criticisms are mistaken and that the potential for human consciousness is a sufficient condition not simply of potential, but actual, personhood. Since it possesses this potential from the moment of conception, the fetus should be considered an actual person from the moment of its conception.