Sex education for parents using behavior rehearsal

Abstract

In reviewing the family assessment literature, there appears to be a need for behaviorally based report procedures capable of describing important aspects of family functioning. Thus far, most activity in this direction has involved the development of methods of evaluating marital relationships with relatively little attention to parent-adolescent assessment. This article introduces an adaptation of the Areas of Change Questionnaire (originally developed for work with marital pairs) for the assessment of parent-adolescent relationships. The potential utility of this instrument in clinical and research efforts is described, and initial psychometric evaluations are presented.     

Deepening our counseling

Abstract

The counselor deepens his therapeutic work by analyzing what happens during the counseling session. Subtle details in the off ice interactions are used to refer to personality traits and behavioral patterns manifesting themselves in the client's daily life. The counselor must also be sensitive to his own feelings and reactions and employ these as indicators to objective elements in the client's personality.     

Interracial Couples: Situational Factors in White Male Reactions

Two problems in the measurement of prejudice are the theoretical orientation underlying its measurement and the sensitivity of prejudice measures to social desirability. Most previous studies of prejudice have either not attempted to use sexual threat as a measurement model or have been plagued by other measurement problems. By introducing an unobtrusive procedure that overcomes those measurement problems, this study has tested a sexual-threat model as well as an incentive-conflict model. It was found that sexual threat does affect responses to interracial couples but that those responses are also affected by the value support that interracial couples provide for white norms, as predicted by incentive conflict.     

Fundamentos filosóficos de las terapias de la atribución

RESUMEN

La teoría de la atribución trata de las reflexiones conscientes de las personas sobre sus propias acciones y las de los demás, y las explicaciones que se inventan para justificar estas acciones. Este trabajo está escrito con el convencimiento de que la teoría tiene un papel práctico que jugar en estos y otros campos de la problemática social, pero que para comprender, desarrollar y consolidar este papel es esencial apreciar qué tipo de innovaciones hay esta teoría y cuáles son sus límites. La teoría se basa en dos presupuestos básicos, 1) que las personas hacen atribuciones, 2) que es posible hacer distinciones y generalizaciones en los tipos de explicaciones que, por lo general, se inventan, esto es, podemos clasificar de forma exhaustiva los tipos de ideas concebidas por la gente para explicar acciones.     

Seeing the Whole Picture

Much of what we need to plan for our survival is already known, but what we know, how we know, and who knows is divided up between disciplines. Thus much of the problem of ensuring our survival is a matter of learning across the disciplines. We identify four modes through which we bring disciplinary knowledge together: the unity of science, integrated assessment, heuristic models, and distributed learning networks. Although none of them are perfect, we can learn how to put our knowledge together across the disciplines much better than we do.     

Energy,Complexity, and Strategies of Evolution: As Illustrated by Maya Indians of Guatemala

Using free energy rate density (Φ_m) I differentiate two evolutionary strategies common to cosmic, biological, and cultural systems: the horizontal when energy increases proportional to mass, with no increase in complexity; and the vertical when it increases disproportionately to the mass and complexity increases. The vertical process is a continuing increase in complexity such that the system becomes vulnerable to collapse when energy sources fail. This is illustrated by a comparison of four Mayan Indian groups in Guatemala.     

The psychotic wavelength

In this paper I have endeavoured to draw attention to what is meant when we refer to a patient as psychotic. It is argued that it is not enough just to be ordinarily sensitive to our patients; we need to tune into the psychotic wavelength with all its implications for understanding and management. Illustrative case-histories are presented from everyday psychiatric work.     

The relation of young children's vicarious emotional responding to social competence,regulation, and emotionality

Abstract

The relation of preschool and kindergarten children's vicarious emotional responding to their social competence, regulation (attentional and coping styles), and emotionality (negative emotional intensity and dispositional negative affect) was examined. Vicarious responding was assessed by means of facial reactions to a film about a peer in a social conflict and children's reported negative affect to viewing peers' real-life negative emotion. Mothers and teachers reported on children's regulation and emotionality, social competence was assessed with sociometric nominations, teachers' reports, and observations of children's real-life anger reactions. Facial concerned attention during the film was associated with various measures of social competence, regulation, and low or moderate negative emotionality. Although negative vicarious emotional responding in real contexts was infrequently related to measures of interest, girls who reported intense negative vicarious emotional responses were relatively unregulated and low in social competence. Finally, with age, regulation of vicarious emotional responding was increasingly related to children's sociometric status and to girls' coping at school. Thus, as they get older, children's abilities to regulate emotions may take on increasing importance in others' evaluations of their social competencies.     

The effect of very brief exposure on experienced fear after in vivo exposure

Two experiments tested the effect of exposure to masked phobic stimuli at a very brief stimulus onset asynchrony on reducing the subjective experience of fear caused by in vivo exposure to a feared object. In the main experiment, 35 spider-fearful and 35 non-fearful participants were identified with a questionnaire and a Behavioural Avoidance Test (BAT) with a live tarantula. One week later, they were individually administered one of two continuous series of masked images: spiders or flowers. They engaged in the BAT again immediately thereafter. They provided ratings of subjective fear at the end of each BAT (pre- and post-manipulation). Very brief exposure to images of spiders reduced the fearful group's and not the non-fearful group's experience of fear at the end of the BAT. This effect was replicated with another sample of 26 spider-fearful participants from the same population. Theoretical implications are discussed.