Sado-masochism as a defense against merging: Six case studies

This paper reports on several patients who use sado-masochism as a defense against an unconscious wish for and fear of merging. The sado-masochism can be expressed as a sexual perversion or in a difficult ungratifying interpersonal relationship. These relationships have some of the quality of addictions in that the patients have a compulsive need to continue them and find it extremely difficult to leave them. Therapy must focus on helping the patient become more separate, rather than on other problems which may also be present. Initially, the therapist needs to take an educational stance in regard to the process the patient must complete, rather than the more traditional analytic stance.     

Group Commitment and Resource Conservation: Two Field Experiments on Promoting Recycling1

Two experiments evaluated the effect of commitment on paper recycling. Using an ABA design, Experiment 1 asked 24 individuals in a retirement home to sign a 4-week group commitment pledge to recycle paper. During this intervention, the subjects recycled 47% more paper than they had during baseline. They continued to recycle at this level during a 4-week follow-up period, when the group commitment was removed. Experiment 2 evaluated the relative effectiveness of group commitment, individual commitment, and token reinforcers on paper recycling in a college dormitory. The students in all three experimental conditions recycled from three to five times more paper than those in the control group during the 4-week intervention. However, in the 3-week follow-up period, when the treatments were removed, only the individually committed subjects continued to recycle significantly more paper than the controls.     

Clinician preparation: Experiences with pseudostuttering : “It was the longest day of my life!”

The response of lay persons to pseudostuttering in approximately 200 spontaneous communication situations were reported and evaluated by 24 graduate students in an advanced class in fluency disorders. The students each spent a day as a “stutterer” in all speech contacts. They summarized their pseudostuttering efforts, the perceived auditor reactions, and their own feelings, in each situation. Results indicated that most lay reactions to any stuttering behavior were, at best, neutral or characterized by obvious changes in behavior. Many reactions were overtly and strongly negative. Student reactions were consistently ones of anxiety, fear, the desire to avoid, frustration, and irritation. Feelings of anger and humiliation were common. Discussion of results points out the value of pseudostuttering experience in clinician training, the possible importance of attitude and adjustment consideration in management of clients who stutter, and the apparent failure of (and need for) our profession to educate the lay public about communicative disorders.     

Need probability affects retention: A direct demonstration

Recent memory theory has emphasized the concept ofneed probability—that is, the probability that a given piece of learned information will be tested at some point in the future. It has been proposed that, in real-world situations, need probability declines over time and that the memory-loss rate is calibrated to match the progressive reduction in need probability (J. R. Anderson & Schooler, 1991). The present experiments were designed to examine the influence of the slope of the need-probability curve on the slope of the retention curve. On each of several trials, subjects memorized a list of digits, then retained the digits in memory for 1, 2, 4, 8, or 16 sec. Some trials ended with a recall test; other trials ended with the message, “no test.” In Experiment 1, the likelihood of encountering a memory test (i.e., the need probability) was made to either increase or decrease as the retention interval increased; in Experiment 2, need probability either was flat (invariant across retention intervals) or decreased as the retention interval increased. The results indicated that the shape of the need-probability curve influenced the slope of the retention curve (Experiment 1) and that the effect became larger as the experimental session progressed (Experiment 2). The findings support the notion that memory adapts to need probabilities and that the rate of forgetting is influenced by the slope of the need-probability curve. In addition, all of the forgetting curves approximated a power function, suggesting that need probability influences the slope but not the form of forgetting.     

Hippocampal synaptic plasticity during instrumental learning

present research examined the role of hippocampal NMDA-dependent synaptic potentiation on appetitive instrumental conditioning under a continuous reinforcement schedule. In the first experiment, low (.025 mg.kg) or moderate (.05 mg/kg) dosages of the NMDA receptor antagonist, MK801, failed to increase the number of training days required to reach acquisition criterion; number of training days required to reach criterion for extinction were also unaffected. In the second experiment, a higher dosage (.10 mg/kg) of MK801 or induction of long-term potentiation failed to alter the number of responses occurring during acquisition. These data suggest that hippocampal synaptic potentiation does not play a prominent role in instrumental learning with simple contingency conditions. It is suggested that hippocampal LTP reflects a perceptual process that contributes differentially to spatial cognition, classical and instrumental conditioning.     

Hippocampal synaptic plasticity during instrumental learning

present research examined the role of hippocampal NMDA-dependent synaptic potentiation on appetitive instrumental conditioning under a continuous reinforcement schedule. In the first experiment, low (.025 mg.kg) or moderate (.05 mg/kg) dosages of the NMDA receptor antagonist, MK801, failed to increase the number of training days required to reach acquisition criterion; number of training days required to reach criterion for extinction were also unaffected. In the second experiment, a higher dosage (.10 mg/kg) of MK801 or induction of long-term potentiation failed to alter the number of responses occurring during acquisition. These data suggest that hippocampal synaptic potentiation does not play a prominent role in instrumental learning with simple contingency conditions. It is suggested that hippocampal LTP reflects a perceptual process that contributes differentially to spatial cognition, classical and instrumental conditioning.