Partly versus Completely Out of Your Mind: Effects of Incubation and Distraction on Resolving Fixation

Incubation has long been proposed as a mechanism in creative problem solving (Wallas, 1926). A new trial‐by‐trial method for observing incubation effects was used to compare the forgetting fixation hypothesis with the conscious work hypothesis. Two experiments examined the effects of incubation on initially unsolved Remote Associates Test (RAT) problems. Following exposure to misleading clues designed to induce initial fixation on RAT problems, versus no clues, participants were retested on problems either immediately after their first attempt (no‐incubation), or after a 40‐second incubation period. Resolution of initially unsolved RAT problems (fixated versus non‐fixated) was examined as a function of complete interruption (Experiment 1) or partial distraction (Experiment 2). An incubation effect, that is, better resolution of initially unsolved problems retested after a delay rather than retesting immediately, was seen only in Experiment 1, in which unsolved problems were completely removed from sight. Furthermore, an incubation effect was found only for initially fixated problems, and not for problems that were not accompanied by misleading clues. The results are consistent with the forgetting fixation hypothesis (Smith & Blankenship, 1989), which states that putting unsolved problems completely out of mind allows initial fixation to dissipate, and the results indicate that the opportunity for some conscious work during incubation periods may not be optimal for resolving fixation.     

Beliefs And Creative Performance: Relationships Across Three Tasks

Creative work occurs on novel, ill‐defined tasks. By virtue of their ambiguity and complexity, however, creative tasks allow the situation to be construed in a number of ways. Accordingly, one might argue that beliefs, as interpretive structures, would be related to performance on creative problem‐solving tasks. To test this proposition, a battery of measures was developed to assess people's beliefs. Subsequently, 195 undergraduates were asked to work on three creative problem‐solving tasks. When quality and originality ratings, reflecting performance on the creative problem‐solving tasks, were regressed on the beliefs, multiple correlations in the low .40s were obtained. It was found that beliefs consistent with the nature of the task were those most likely to be related to performance. The implications of these findings are discussed with respect to the role of beliefs in shaping people's creative problem‐solving activities.     

Measuring Evangelicalism: Consequences of Different Operationalization Strategies

Several investigations of American evangelicalism have been conducted in recent decades, yet they conceptualize evangelicalism in different ways. It is not surprising, therefore, that different profiles of the evangelical movement and its adherents emerge from these studies. This research reviews major studies on the subject undertaken since 1976, when evangelicals first attracted national attention. Using data collected in a single data set—the 1998 General Social Survey—we show how measurement strategies employed in different studies yield drastically different pictures of evangelicalism. Conservative measures indicate that only one in 20 Americans is evangelical while one in two is evangelical according to a combination of more expansive measures. The demographic, cultural, and religious characteristics of evangelicals, as well as theories about them, hinge upon how the population is defined.     

Addressing parts of the self

In this paper the author addresses the problem of framing an interpretation that properly takes account of the degree of splitting and projection the analyst encounters in a patient at a particular time. If the patient has needed to split off and project unacceptable parts of the self, the analyst has to consider how useful it is to describe this situation to the patient, who may no longer be in contact with the disavowed parts. The disadvantage of this situation is that an interpretation that refers to different parts of the personality may make sense intellectually, but may in fact reinforce the patient's defensive structure. The author describes one case in which such a situation prevailed, and contrasts this with a second case in which a greater degree of integration had developed, with accompanying internal conflict and pain. In this latter case it seems paradoxically more appropriate for the analyst to include, in his interpretations, references to the struggle between different parts of the personality.     

Exploring perceptions of online infidelity

This study examines the similarities, differences, and potential linkages between perceptions of online infidelity and traditional infidelity using a sample of 123 individuals in committed relationships. Respondents nominated both sexually and emotionally based behaviors as unfaithful and expressed greater distress in response to hypothetical emotional, as compared to sexual, online infidelity. Unlike traditional infidelity, men generally were not more upset by sexual online infidelity than were women. Both men and women believed that emotional and sexual online infidelities were likely to co‐occur. A face‐to‐face meeting was perceived to be more likely following emotional, as compared to sexual, online infidelity and men were viewed as more likely than women to engage in sexual intercourse, given a face‐to‐face meeting with the online contact.