PSYCHOLOGY AND HEALTH: CONTRIBUTIONS OF PSYCHOLOGY TO THE IMPROVEMENT OF HEALTH AND HEALTH CARE

Psychology as both a science and a profession has been closely identified with other disciplines in the broad field of health since the turn of the century. Recent advances in health care have reinforced the growing belief that the promotion of health and the prevention and treatment of illness can be greatly enhanced by incorporating the scientific findings and modern technology of psychology into everyday practices. Outlining the contributions of psychology to health care throughout the world is the primary purpose of this report. In this brief survey, only some of the most timely and relevant issues can be mentioned, together with examples of current work in the field. The reader interested in pursuing these psychological contributions more thoroughly is encouraged to review pertinent references from the citations at the end of this report. After an introductory overview, special attention is given to each of the major areas within the broad field of health care where psychological applications have been particularly useful.     

Fusing Apples and Oranges: A Rejoinder to Carver & Scheier and to Fenigstein

ABSTRACT A simple parable is introduced that serves as an analogy to the private/public self-focus distinction The analogy elucidates that the reliability of the effects observed by the private/public research direction is not the focus of the Wicklund and Gollwitzer critique Rather, the critique questions the validity of the explanations offered More importantly, the analogy implies the conclusion that construing social dependency as an issue of self-focus does injustice to both the social dependency and self-focus concepts     

Galef’s Transfer-of-Information Effect Occurs in a Free-Foraging Situation

Galef and his colleagues have repeatedly shown that one rat may transfer information regarding the type of food it has consumed to other conspecifics. Such experiments typically have been conducted in wire-mesh cages or a wooden maze. The present experiments sought to extend this paradigm to the open-field foraging situation having six food patches to choose from. Following interaction with a demonstrator that had consumed either a cocoa or a cinnamon diet, single observers (Experiment 1) were tested in the foraging situation. Food-consumption scores indicated that observers consumed significantly more of their specific demonstrator’s diet than a second diet that was available also. Experiment 2 involved the simultaneous testing of two observers in the foraging laboratory. In Experiment 3 two observers were once again tested, but each had been provided a different food-type message prior to foraging. Positive results, mirroring those of Experiment 1, were obtained in both Experiments 2 and 3. The results of these three experiments underscore the robustness of this phenomenon and its generalizability to other testing conditions.

     

Anomalous dominance in sibling stutterers: Evidence from CT scan asymmetries, dichotic listening, neuropsychological testing, and handedness

Two left-handed siblings with developmental stuttering are comprehensively described. The methods of study included speech and language evaluation, neurological and neuropsychological examinations, dichotic listening, auditory evoked responses, electroencephalogram, and CT scan asymmetry measurements. The data from each sibling showed evidence of anomalous cerebral dominance on many of the variables investigated. The CT scan measurements showed atypical asymmetries, especially in the occipital regions. These findings support the theory that stuttering may be related to anomalous cerebral dominance, both on functional as well as structural bases. Implications of anomalous dominance and the resultant effect of hemispheric rivalry on speech fluency are discussed.     

Work site group meetings and the effectiveness of a televised smoking cessation intervention

At the work site, smoking accounts for increased health care expenses and worker absenteeism due to smoking-related illness and reduced productivity and lost wages. Developing comprehensive and accessible smoking cessation programs at the work site is an important objective for health care professionals. In this study, employees of 43 corporations participated in a televised smoking cessation program accompanied by self-help manuals. The media component involved presenting a smoking cessation program on a network television affiliate station during the 4:30 p.m. and 10:00 p.m. news for 20 days. Employees at half the corporations also had access to semiweekly self-help group meetings. Adding self-help support groups to a program involving self-help manuals and the media reports was found to significantly increase abstinence and its maintenance over time. The implications of using the media, self-help groups, and work site locations in large-scale community-based interventions are discussed.     

Teacher ratings of children's problem and competence behaviors: Normative and parametric characteristics

Teacher-rated adjustment differences among young elementary school children from (a) a recent sample and a 1974 cohort, and (b) urban/suburban, male/female, and grade-level subgroups were examined. A problem behavior checklist (Classroom Adjustment Rating Scale) and a school competence measure (Health Resources Inventory) for 974 children from 5 urban and 5 suburban schools were completed by 101 first- to fourth-grade teachers. Children from the more current cohort were rated as significantly more maladjusted than those from the earlier sample on 8 of 10 adjustment variables. In the recent sample, girls and suburban children evidenced a greater number of school competencies and fewer problem behaviors than boys and urban children, respectively. The implications of these findings for the future use of the teacher rating scales are discussed.     

Variations on the Ramsey test: More triviality results

The purpose of this note is to formulate some weaker versions of the so called Ramsey test that do not entail the following unacceptable consequenceIf A and C are already accepted in K, then if A, then C is also accepted in K. and to show that these versions still lead to the same triviality result when combined with a preservation criterion.     

The word frequency effect in lexical decision: Finding a frequency-based component

Subjects making lexical decisions are reliably faster in responding to high-frequency words than to low-frequency words. This is known as the word frequency effect. We wished to demonstrate that some portion of this effect was due to frequency differences between words rather than to other dimensions correlated with word frequency. Three groups of subjects (10 engineers, 10 nurses, and I0 law students) made lexical decisions about 720 items, half words and half nonwords, from six different categories (engineering, medical, low-frequency nontechnical, medium-frequency nontechnical, and two groups of high-frequency nontechnical). Results of two analyses of variance revealed a crossover interaction such that engineers were faster in responding to engineering words than to medical words, whereas nurses were faster in responding to medical words than to engineering words. The engineering and medical words were equally long and equally infrequent by standard word counts. We take this as support for a frequency-based component in the word frequency effect. The practical implications of this research for estimating the readability of technical text are discussed.     

Conceptual pragmatism

The paper puts forward the thesis of conceptual pragmatism: that there are pragmatic choices to be made between distinct but similar concepts within various contexts. It is argued that this thesis should be acceptable to all who believe in concepts, whether the believers are platonists, realists or anti-realists. It is argued that the truth of the thesis may help to resolve many long-standing debates, and that in any case it will lead to an extension of philosophical method. The paper then briefly considers the concepts of belief and desire as a case-study, and argues for the recognition of the practical reasoner's stance (to stand alongside Dennett's intentional stance), relative to which we should select concepts of belief and desire which are broadly cartesian.I am grateful to the following for their help (varying from detailed comments and criticisms on earlier drafts, to general advice and encouragement): David Archard, Simon Blackburn, Jack Copeland, Dan Dennett, Susan Levi, Christopher McKnight, Derek Parfit, Michael Slote, Tim Williamson, and Crispin Wright.     

Ethical dilemmas in forensic evaluations

Ethical issues emerging from forensic assessments are addressed from clinical and research perspectives. The relevance of agency, forensic identification, and attitudes toward defendants are explored within the framework of ethical practice. Finally, the ethical role of mental health professionals in the courtroom, the scope and basis of their testimony, and the rendering of conclusory opinions are discussed within a psycholegal context.