Posttraumatic Growth and Subjective Well-Being among Caregivers of Chronic Patients: A Preliminary Study

This preliminary study focused on positive phenomena among Israeli family caregivers (spouse, adult child, or parent) of patients with chronic illness hospitalized in a medical rehabilitation hospital. We investigated these caregivers’ posttraumatic growth (PTG) and subjective well-being (positive and negative emotions, life satisfaction), and their associations with the demographic and illness characteristics of the caregivers and patients, respectively. Participants included 74 adult primary caregivers: 28 were the patient’s spouse; 21 were the patient’s child; and 25 were the patient’s parent. Caregivers completed four self-report questionnaires. No significant association emerged between caregivers’ PTG and their negative affect or life satisfaction. Nevertheless, caregivers’ positive affect correlated with their PTG and also predicted it. Moreover, different patterns emerged for the caregiver subgroups (spouse, adult child, or parent): Patients’ children reported lower negative affect and greater life satisfaction than patients’ parents or spouses. Various explanations were discussed, alongside implications for giving recognition and assistance from the medical system to patients’ caregivers.     

Correlates of colorectal cancer screening compliance and stage of adoption among siblings of individuals with early onset colorectal cancer.

Concepts from the health belief, transtheoretical, and dual process models were used to examine how siblings of individuals diagnosed with colorectal cancer (CRC) before age 56 made decisions about CRC screening. Siblings (N = 504) were assessed for CRC screening practices and intentions, pros, cons, processes-of-change, perceived risk of CRC, perceived severity of CRC, preventability of CRC, cancer-related distress, and sibling relationship closeness. Physician and family recommendation and knowledge were also assessed. Fifty-seven percent of participants (n = 287) were compliant with CRC screening. Logistic regression indicated that perceived pros and cons, perceived risk, commitment to screening, health care avoidance, and sibling closeness were associated with screening compliance. Physician and family recommendation were also strong correlates. A similar set of factors was associated with stage of adoption of CRC screening.     

A Fine Risk To Be Run? The Ambiguity of Eros and Teacher Responsibility

Teachers are often placed in a space of tensionbetween responding to students as persons andresponding to students through theirinstitutionally-defined roles. Particularlywith respect to eros, which has becomeincreasingly the subject of strictinstitutional legislation and regulation,teachers have little recourse to a language ofresponsibility outside an institutional frame. By studying the significance of communicativeambiguity for responsibility, this paperexplores what is ethically at stake forteachers in erotic forms of communication. Specifically, it is Levinas's own ambiguousunderstanding of the ethical significance oferos, and what we have to learn from it, thatoffers a way of reading the place of eros inresponsibility. I conclude my discussion withsome thoughts on what a renewed understandingof responsibility might mean at the personaland institutional levels.     

Concurrent validity of the Cognitive Abilities Scale and Binet IV for nonvocal 2- and 3-year-olds

The concurrent validity of the Nonvocal Cognitive Quotient (NVCQ) of the Cognitive Abilities Scale (CAS) and the Binet IV was examined for 2- and 3-year-olds referred to Project Find. Adequate concurrent validity was found for the CAS NVCQ and the Binet IV Verbal Comprehension at both age levels as well as for the Nonverbal Reasoning/ Visualization factor of the Binet IV at age 3. A significant, but moderate correlation was obtained with 2-year-olds for the NVCQ and the Binet IV Nonverbal Reasoning/ Visualization factor, the Binet IV scores being significantly higher scores. Differences in the results for the 2-year-olds are discussed. The implications of the results are presented.     

Military and Civilian Undergraduates: Attitudes Toward Women,Masculinity, and Authoritarianism

The influence of civilian and military college environments and undergraduates' sex on gender role attitudes and authoritarianism was investigated. Three hundred thirteen male and 69 female, primarily white middle-class students at the United States Naval Academy, United States Air Force Academy, Reserve Officer Training Corps, and a civilian university participated. Approximately 7% were Hispanic, 6% African-American, and 5% Asian-American. Military students had the most traditional authoritarian beliefs and gender role attitudes. When men only were analyzed, USNA males were the most traditional in their attitudes toward women and in antifemininity attitudes. ROTC men were the most traditional in authoritarianism and in status beliefs. All military-affiliated men held more traditional toughness attitudes than did civilian men. USNA men had the most traditional attitudes toward women as compared to the USNA females and civilian females and males.     

Epistemic closure under deductive inference: what is it and can we afford it?

The idea that knowledge can be extended by inference from what is known seems highly plausible. Yet, as shown by familiar preface paradox and lottery-type cases, the possibility of aggregating uncertainty casts doubt on its tenability. We show that these considerations go much further than previously recognized and significantly restrict the kinds of closure ordinary theories of knowledge can endorse. Meeting the challenge of uncertainty aggregation requires either the restriction of knowledge-extending inferences to single premises, or eliminating epistemic uncertainty in known premises. The first strategy, while effective, retains little of the original idea—conclusions even of modus ponens inferences from known premises are not always known. We then look at the second strategy, inspecting the most elaborate and promising attempt to secure the epistemic role of basic inferences, namely Timothy Williamson’s safety theory of knowledge. We argue that while it indeed has the merit of allowing basic inferences such as modus ponens to extend knowledge, Williamson’s theory faces formidable difficulties. These difficulties, moreover, arise from the very feature responsible for its virtue- the infallibilism of knowledge.