Estimating, testing, and comparing specific effects in structural equation models: the phantom model approach

The phantom model approach for estimating, testing, and comparing specific effects within structural equation models (SEMs) is presented. The rationale underlying this novel method consists in representing the specific effect to be assessed as a total effect within a separate latent variable model, the phantom model that is added to the main model. The following favorable features characterize the method: (a) It enables the estimation, testing, and comparison of arbitrary specific effects for recursive and nonrecursive models with latent and manifest variables; (b) it enables the bootstrapping of confidence intervals; and (c) it can be applied with all standard SEM programs permitting latent variables, the specification of equality constraints, and the bootstrapping of total effects. These features along with the fact that no manipulation of matrices and formulas is required make the approach particularly suitable for applied researchers. The method is illustrated by means of 3 examples with real data sets.     

Verbesserung psychischer Allgemeinfunktionen durch Psychotherapie

Zusammenfassung  Im Rahmen einer bundesweiten Fragebogenuntersuchung, die eine systematische Replikation der 1994 in den USA durchgeführten Consumer-Reports-Study für Deutschland darstellte, wurden mit Hilfe des ins Deutsche übersetzten Originalfragebogens Psychotherapiepatienten, u. a. nach einer Verbesserung der Zielsymptomatik sowie nach Veränderungen unspezifischer psychischer Allgemeinfunktionen, wie Beziehungsfähigkeit, Arbeitsfähigkeit, Fähigkeit zur Stressbewältigung, körperliches Wohlbefinden, Lebensfreude, persönliche Entwicklung, Verständnis für andere, Selbstwertgefühl und Stimmungslage, durch die Behandlung befragt. Bei der Auswertung der Antworten zeigte sich, dass eine psychotherapeutische Behandlung nicht nur zu einer deutlichen Symptombesserung, sondern auch zu einer Besserung dieser unspezifischen psychischen Allgemeinfunktionen führt. Und je länger die Behandlung erfolgt war, desto größer fielen die Besserungsraten aus. Der Vergleich der unterschiedlichen psychotherapeutischen Verfahren offenbarte marginale Unterschiede zwischen Psychoanalyse, tiefenpsychologisch-fundierter Psychotherapie und Verhaltenstherapie.

Rediscovering a missing link: The sensory physiologist and comparative psychologist Mathilde Hertz (1891-1975)

Although her work was greatly respected by scholars from both psychology and biology, such as Wolfgang K?hler, Max Wertheimer, and Karl von Frisch, the life and work of the German sensory physiologist and comparative psychologist Mathilde Hearz (1891-1975) have remained relatively obscure until recently. Her research represented a combination of biological principles fused with a psychological-phenomenological perspective. After a prolific career within a short time span, Hertz's career came to an abrupt end in 1933, despite the intervention efforts of Max Planck. Hertz's personal and professional fates are in many ways representative of the field of comparative psychology in Germany prior to the middle of the 20th century, both of its history and its demise.     

Are prosocials unique in their egalitarianism? The pursuit of equality in outcomes among individualists

The present research aims to elucidate to what extent the motive to ensure equality in outcomes is general and to what extent it interacts with other important motives such as maximizing own or collective gains. Because individuals may have different considerations and motivations in decision-making situations, it is likely that people with a different social value orientation will respond differently to an unequal distribution of outcomes. Contrary to expectations, not only prosocials care about equality in outcomes. In Study 1, the authors found that individualists choose to forego personal gains, despite obvious selfish reasons to cooperate, when outcomes were distributed unequally. In a second experiment, this finding was replicated and shows that individualists, just as prosocials, demand equality in outcomes in interdependent situations. The studies suggest that typifying individualists as solely being concerned about enhancing personal outcomes is too limited and that fairness norms may trump social value orientation.     

Pharmacotherapy of seasonal affective disorder

Seasonal affective disorder is a common variant of recurrent major depressive disorder or bipolar disorder. Treatment with bright artificial light has been found to be effective in this condition. However, for patients who do not respond to light therapy or those who lack compliance, conventional drug treatment with antidepressants also has been proposed. Substances with selective serotonergic or noradrenergic mechanisms should be preferred over older antidepressants. Although there are a number of open and controlled studies evaluating different compounds, these studies were often limited by relatively small sample sizes. Furthermore, there are no studies specifically addressing bipolar seasonal depression. This article will review the published literature on pharmacotherapy of seasonal affective disorder.     

Situated embodied cognition: Monitoring orientation cues affects product evaluation and choice

Consumers generally prefer products that are easy to interact with. In three studies, we show that this preference arises from the fit between product orientation and monitored situational constraints. Flexible right-handers, who monitor situational constraints, recall product orientations better and prefer products for which the handle is oriented in the direction of the hand used for grasping. When their ability to monitor situational constraints is impaired, the preference for easy-to-grasp products is attenuated. The findings highlight that motor fluency is a relevant cue for decision making when consumers assess how to interact with a product. The implications of these results for embodiment and fluency research are discussed.     

Engaging in self‐regulation results in low‐level construals

Previous research has suggested that self‐regulation results in low‐level construals but has inferred construal levels after self‐regulation only indirectly, through construal‐dependent judgments and choices. In the present paper, we demonstrate a direct link between engaging in self‐regulation and low‐level construals, by manipulating self‐regulation and subsequently assessing construal levels using well‐established and straightforward measures of construal level in three studies. Participants who engaged in self‐regulation subsequently provided lower egocentric spatial distance estimates (Studies 1A and 1B), formed more groups when categorizing objects (Study 2), and used more concrete language when describing cartoon main characters' behavior (Study 3) than participants who did not engage in self‐regulation. These findings provide direct evidence that low‐level construals result from engaging in self‐regulation. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Einige Gedanken über Rationalisierung und Intellektualisierung

Within the framework of Freud??s defence concept the question is examined whether rationalization and intellectualization should be regarded as separate mechanisms of defence. It is argued that both of them represent a specific handling of substitutive formations produced by other mechanisms of defence. Rationalization refers to the usage of substitutive formations as the reason for action. In the guise of these ego-syntonic and socially approved substitutive motives the original motives are hidden and appear encrypted in consciousness. Intellectualization names the handling of the outcome of a process in which instinctual wishes are isolated from their accompanying feelings and by virtue of further mechanisms of defence, these wishes are transferred in highly abstract substitutive formations where they also represent themselves in a mystified manner.