CONTESTING THE WORLD AND THE DIVINE: BALTHASAR'S TRINITARIAN "RESPONSE" TO GIANNI VATTIMO'S SECULAR CHRISTIANITY

This essay joins the contemporary debate over the proper theological and philosophical hermeneutic for interpreting the phenomenon of secularism. The first part offers a sustained Balthasar-influenced critique of Gianni Vattimo's secular translation of Christianity. I argue that Vattimo's Heideggerian-Hegelian influenced reading of secularism as Christianity's proper telos is both philosophically and theologically problematic. Part Two of this article reads Balthasar's work as a response to the philosophical and theological underpinnings of Vattimo's thought. Balthasar would argue that it is in a more traditional, yet remarkably daring account of the Trinitarian relations that the "secular" finds both its ground and dignity.     

Approach motivation and the expansion of self in close relationships

The self‐expansion model posits that individuals are fundamentally motivated to expand their sense of self. It is proposed that approach—but not avoidance—motivation underlies self‐expansion and that approach‐motivated individuals should be especially interested in self‐expanding with a person who provides many novel resources, identities, and perspectives. In Studies 1, 2a, and 2b, correlational evidence that self‐expansion is associated with both relationship‐specific and global measures of approach motivation, but is unrelated to avoidance motivation, was found. In Study 3, experimental evidence that approach motivation increases sensitivity to self‐expansion opportunities, such that individuals high in approach motivation are especially attracted to targets who offer many expansion opportunities and unattracted to targets who offer few expansion opportunities was found. Taken together, these studies provide evidence that self‐expansion is rooted in approach motivation.     

Kingdom Education

Whether known as Christian or Kingdom education, its very nature is opened for examination in this article. From the assumption that Christ is to be at the center of Christian education, it assumedly would be patterned after his life and activities on earth. A review of the Scriptures about Jesus points to an education orientation that is not well represented in extant Christian/Kingdom education. Closer alignment with Christ is recommended.     

Reduced Repetition Blindness for One's Own Name

We report a series of studies demonstrating reduced repetition blindness (RB) for one's own name. Participants searched RSVP streams for their own name and another name, and reported how many times these names appeared in each stream. In half of the streams containing two names, the same name was repeated; in the other half, the two names were different. Half of the repetitions were the participant's own name, half were another name. The results showed large RB for the “other name” condition, and attenuated, but significant, RB for the “own name” condition. This reduction in RB for the participant's own name was found when participants searched for the target names among nouns, among other names, and when participants just detected the presence or absence of the second name. Reduced RB for one's own name helps to reduce previous uncertainty regarding the existence of lexical and conceptual RB for words.     

The role of additional information in the compliance,satisfaction, psychological,and emotion responses of non-surgical patients with low back pain: An exploratory investigation

Abstract

Noncompliance and the psychological and emotional states of patients with low back pain are major concerns for health professionals. The current study evaluated whether amount of information available to patients enhanced compliance to a medical regimen and whether it reduced negative emotions in patients with low back pain. Forty-five orthopaedic non-surgical patients with low back pain were randomly assigned to one of three information presentation conditions: 1) Standard, 2) Pre-examination, and 3) Post-examination. Patients were also separated by compensation and noncompensation within each information group. Patients completed questionnaires at their initial visit and at their follow-up which evaluated their: levels of compliance to a prescribed treatment program, psychological, and emotional states. Results indicated that some patients benefitted from receiving additional information as the Pre-examination and Post-examination groups demonstrated superior comprehension and recall as well as higher levels of compliance to a physical therapy program. In addition, compensation patients complained of more negative psychological and emotional behaviors in comparison to noncompensation patients. Implications of the research and future research considerations were discussed.     

A pilot study of performance in young and middle-aged adults on verbal recall

The objective was to explore whether middle-aged adults (M age = 48.9 yr.; n = 26) differed on verbal recall from young adults (M age = 26.3 yr.; n = 26). Little data exist on the performance of middle-aged, healthy adults. Groups of young and middle-aged adults recalled words from the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test across six trials during a single session. The same 15 words were used for recall in Trials 1-5. Prior to the sixth trial, 15 distractor words were presented. Participants then recalled the original set of 15 words. No significant differences occurred on any of the recall trials. Although the power of this study was low, the effect of age is apparently quite small.     

A META-ANALYSIS OF THE CRITERION-RELATED VALIDITY OF ASSESSMENT CENTER DIMENSIONS

We used meta-analytic procedures to investigate the criterion-related validity of assessment center dimension ratings. By focusing on dimension-level information, we were able to assess the extent to which specific constructs account for the criterion-related validity of assessment centers. From a total of 34 articles that reported dimension-level validities, we collapsed 168 assessment center dimension labels into an overriding set of 6 dimensions: (a) consideration/awareness of others, (b) communication, (c) drive, (d) influencing others, (e) organizing and planning, and (f) problem solving. Based on this set of 6 dimensions, we extracted 258 independent data points. Results showed a range of estimated true criterion-related validities from .25 to .39. A regression-based composite consisting of 4 out of the 6 dimensions accounted for the criterion-related validity of assessment center ratings and explained more variance in performance (20%) than Gaugler, Rosenthal, Thornton, and Bentson (1987) were able to explain using the overall assessment center rating (14%).     

中国祝圣主教也许是符合传统的

最近梵蒂冈和中国政府之间就祝圣五位新主教所产生的冲突,媒体普遍认为是世俗政权侵占教宗特权。西方评论家们通常认为,只有教宗享有任命主教的权力(见1月14日“美国天主教周报”,以下简称NCR)。然而,虽然中国祝圣主教可以完全认为是一种蔑视行为,但纵观教会历史会发现,任命主教问题,实际情况却要复杂得多。从历史上来讲,教宗拥有直接任命教区主教的权力还是后来的事。一方面,中国任命主教,发生在教廷与北京之间关系正常化期望值正升高的时刻,因而成为新闻。1951年,随着中国共产党政府的产生,上述关系就断绝了。据说,政府承认的天主教爱国…