Working memory and reasoning: An individual differences perspective

This article reports three experiments that investigated the relationship between working memory capacity and syllogistic and five-term series spatial inference. A series of complex and simple verbal and spatial working memory measures were employed. Correlational analyses showed that verbal and spatial working memory span tasks consistently predicted syllogistic and spatial reasoning performance. A confirmatory factor analysis showed that three factors best accounted for the data—a verbal, a spatial, and a general factor. Syllogistic reasoning performance loaded all three factors, whilst spatial reasoning loaded only the general factor. The implications of these findings are discussed in the context of reasoning theories and contemporary accounts of the structure of working memory.     

Predicting the difficulty of complex logical reasoning problems

The aim of the present research was to develop a difficulty model for logical reasoning problems involving complex ordered arrays used in the Graduate Record Examination. The approach used involved breaking down the problems into their basic cognitive elements such as the complexity of the rules used, the number of mental models required to represent the problem, and question type. Weightings for these different elements were derived from two experimental studies and from the reasoning literature. Based on these weights, difficulty models were developed which were then tested against new data. The models had excellent predictive validity and showed the relative influence of rule based factors and factors relating to the number of underlying models. Different difficulty models were needed for different question types, suggesting that people used a variety of approaches and, at a wider level, that both mental models and mental rules may be used in reasoning.     

Friendship, Justice, and Aristotle: Some Reasons to Be Sceptical

It is sometimes held that modern institutionally-focussed conceptions of social justice are lacking in one essential respect: they ignore the importance of civic friendship or solidarity. It is also, typically simultaneously, held that Aristotle’s thought provides a fertile ground for elucidating an account of civic friendship. I argue, first, that Aristotle is no help on this score: he has no conception of distinctively civic friendship. I then go on to argue that the Kantian distinction between perfect and imperfect duties is more useful than talk of civic friendship in capturing the non-institutional demands of social justice.     

Psychotherapy without the self–a Buddhist perspective,by Mark Epstein

This article seeks to explore how John Rolland's Family Systems Illness Model can be utilized by counselling psychologists working with individuals or families experiencing medical problems. Based on systemic theory the model provides a psychosocial typology of illness and examines how the demands of an illness over time can provide a number of hurdles to be overcome by the client and his/her family. Specific examples and techniques are described to illustrate how the application of the model can be used to guide the interventions employed in a counselling session. the model applies a biopsychosocial approach to health care, and the applicability of this within a British NHS healthcare setting is discussed with the conclusion that such an approach may be in its infancy in this country. Limitations and ideas for expansion of the model from chronic physical illness into spheres of mental health are discussed.     

Psychogenic death: individual effects of sorcery and taboo violation

Can social causes directly effect physiological processes? In many parts of the world, there are reports that those who have broken a ritual prohibition or hold that they are victims of sorcery give up and die, a phenomenon labelled by anthropologists as voodoo death. The mechanisms for this remain controversial. The features include: lethargy, lack of motivation, extreme guilt, social withdrawal, reduced appetite and thirst, and ultimately death. Although a belief in the power of sorcery is rare among indigenous white British people, it is not uncommon among ethnic minorities and may be diagnosed as a delusion. The author reports two cases from his own clinical experience in a Western setting that raise the question as to whether the phenomenon is similar to depression and what can be done about it. In one case, the victim made a rapid recovery once the curse was removed. Is death really an individual or a social phenomenon?     

Religiosity,coping, and suicidality within the religious Zionist community of Israela thematic qualitative analysis

The relationship between religion and mental health has been the subject of extensive research, particularly in recent years. The issues of coping and suicidality have also been widely studied. Significantly, however, how religious people cope with harsh life situations is an area which has been overlooked. The present study based on 18 semi-structured interviews, analyses have members of the Religious Zionist community in Israel cope with harsh life situations. Although the study confirms the conclusions of previous research – in general religion creates a buffer to suicide – the results showed a relatively low impact of religiosity on coping: in general these religious interviewees found it difficult to access their religiosity during harsh life situations. The paper suggests a range of explanations, for example the complexity of personal and collective identities which characterise this group, or – more significantly – the possibilty that religious coping is not actually absent but is only available in a second, later stage of coping.     

When soft voices die: auditory verbal hallucinations and a four letter word (love)

Understandings of auditory verbal hallucinations (also referred to as “hearing voices”), and help for people distressed by them, are dominated by a biomedical framework. Yet, many people who have sought help for the distress and/or impairment caused by hearing voices express dissatisfaction with treatment solely within this framework, highlighting the need for a more rounded, biopsychosocial-spiritual approach. This paper examines the neglected role of a fundamental part of human experience, love, in the experience of hearing voices. First, we argue a lack of love is likely to play a causal role in voice-hearing experiences. Second, we demonstrate that a lack of love is central to the distress and dysfunction often caused by hearing voices. Finally, we show that love plays a core role in recovery. Given this centrality of love, we argue that an interdisciplinary approach to hearing voices involving the mind sciences and theology/religion may be fruitful. The relevance of this for psychotherapeutic interventions for people who hear voices is discussed.     

Body size and body esteem in women: The mediating role of possible self expectancy

We predicted that an expectancy of acquiring a feared fat self and an expectancy of acquiring a hoped-for thin self both mediate the impact of body size on women's body esteem. We also predicted that the mediating pathway through the feared fat self would be stronger than that through the hoped-for thin self. A community sample of 251 women reported their age, height, weight, and completed measures of body esteem and expectancy perceptions of acquiring the feared fat and hoped-for thin selves. Bayesian Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) demonstrated that expectancies about the feared fat self and about the hoped-for thin self mediated the relationship between body size and body esteem. Bayesian SEM also revealed that the pathway through the feared fat self was stronger than that through the hoped-for thin self. Implications for future research and the development of eating pathology are discussed.     

Information underpinning anticipation of goal-directed throwing

We identified the information used to anticipate throw direction in handball. In two experiments, we examined how anticipation performance is affected when the information from one of five body areas (right arm, shoulders, hips, trunk, or total throw side) was either neutralized or decoupled from the motion of other body segments. In the first experiment, performance was significantly reduced when information from the throwing arm was neutralized, irrespective of skill levels. Skilled participants were negatively affected when the shoulders, hips, and trunk were neutralized, whereas less-skilled participants showed trends toward improvement under identical conditions. In the second experiment, partially disrupting relative motion via decoupling was not enough to reduce the anticipation performance among skilled participants to chance levels, whereas less-skilled participants lost their ability to anticipate in three conditions. Our findings suggest that skilled and less-skilled participants employ different information extraction strategies, yet information from the throwing arm is critical to anticipation for both groups. The two experiments suggest that relative motion mediated by both the absolute displacement trajectories of individual marker locations and their relative timings are important in informing anticipation, irrespective of skill level.     

No time-stretching illusion when a tone is followed by a noise

A sine tone is perceived as longer when it is preceded by a more intense noise than when presented in isolation. This is the time-stretching illusion. We conducted an experiment where the method of constant stimuli was used to examine whether a tone would also be stretched when it was followed by a noise. The duration of a tone was overestimated when it was preceded by a noise, but not when followed by a noise or when located between two consecutive noises. Moreover, the increasing of the noise intensity (from ?6 to +6 dB) relative to the tone intensity resulted in larger overestimations, but only in the condition where a tone was preceded by a noise. In brief, the duration of a tone is stretched when this tone is preceded by a noise and if this tone is not followed by a noise.