The meaning of money: A psychiatric-psychological evaluation

Summary In summary, we have reviewed some psychoanalytic formulations about the symbolic meanings of money, such as its equation with feces, semen, life, and love. Money becomes a sublimated interest so that we may avoid more primitive desires. Nevertheless, it also is an interest upon which is focused guilty feelings for more basic wishes from the past, so that seeking money is both pleasurable and anxiety-provoking. The helper of suffering humanity who demands money for his services is in a particularly conflicted position. As a result, he finds it necessary to develop a rationalization system that concludes that his demand for money is good for the sufferer. While this is true in some circumstances, it is better to face one's basic selfishness and realistic needs for money. The pastoral counselor experiences a different conflict, faced as he is with his need to be altruistic, and his lack of a good system of rationalization as possessed by the psychiatrist.     

The Ethics of Teaching Rhetorical Intertextuality

Journal of Academic Ethics - Three approaches to intertextual writing are available to college instructors: mechanical, ethical, and rhetorical. The mechanical approach, a staple of writing...     

The problem of empty names and Russellian Plenitude

‘Ahab is a whaler’ and ‘Holmes is a whaler’ express different propositions, even though neither ‘Ahab’ nor ‘Holmes’ has a referent. This seems to constitute a theoretical puzzle for the Russellian view of propositions. In this paper, I develop a variant of the Russellian view, Plenitudinous Russellianism. I claim that ‘Ahab is a whaler’ and ‘Holmes is a whaler’ express distinct gappy propositions. I discuss key metaphysical and semantic differences between Plenitudinous Russellianism and Traditional Russellianism and respond to objections that stem from those differences.     

Explanatory exclusion and mental explanation

Jaegwon Kim once refrained from excluding distinct mental causes of effects that depend upon the sufficient physical cause of the effect (Kim, 1984 Kim, J. (1984). "Epiphenomenal and Supervenient Causation", Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 9, p. 257–270.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). At that time, Kim also refrained from excluding distinct mental explanations of effects that depend upon complete physical explanations of the effect (Kim, 1988 Kim, J. (1988). Explanatory realism, causal realism, and explanatory exclusion. Midwest Studies in Philosophy, 12, 225–239.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 1989 Kim, J. (1989). Mechanism, purpose, and explanatory exclusion. Philosophical Perspectives, 3, 77–108.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). More recently, he has excluded distinct mental causes of effects that depend upon the sufficient cause of the effect, since the physical cause is individually sufficient for the effect (Kim, 2005 Kim, J. (2005). Physicalism, or something near enough. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. [Google Scholar]). But there has been, to this point, no parallel shift in the explanatory realm, such that distinct mental explanations of effects that depend upon complete physical explanations of the effect are excluded since the physical explanation is objectively complete. In this paper I consider, defend, and apply this update to the principle of explanatory exclusion—an update, which, in the final analysis, demonstrates a significant advantage that non-reductive physicalism has over reductive physicalism.     

The Neurotherapy of Anxiety Disorders

Only five studies of patients met criteria for this review. Four of the five had a good clinical outcome. The only one without efficacy reported no enhancement of the target waveform. Of the other four, two reported some enhancement, whereas two gave no details about changes in the target waveform. There were 10 studies of nonpatients with generalized anxiety, of which eight had a good outcome. The decrease of anxiety in these eight studies was correlated with enhancement of the target waveform in five. Three of the eight had no increase of alpha, showing placebo plays a part in neurotherapy. There were nine studies of nonpatients with phobic anxiety, of which six had enhancement of the target waveform accompanied by good outcome. The remaining three studies had poor outcome in spite of enhancement of the target waveform.     

Math weaknesses in survivors of acute lymphoblastic leukemia compared to healthy children.

Difficulties in math are the most frequently reported area of academic deficit in survivors of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and the most frequent academic complaint among parents of ALL survivors. However, previous studies that included measures of math skills have been limited by the use of only a single measure of math skills, most often a measure of written calculations, without any assessment of math reasoning or math application skills. Further, the nature of these math difficulties has not been adequately investigated. The purpose of this study was to examine the performance of ALL survivors using multiple measures of math skills. Performance was compared to a group of healthy controls matched for age and sex as well as to normative levels. Other measures of neuropsychological function were also administered, and the relationships between these measures and the math measures were explored. Converging evidence for math difficulties in ALL survivors compared to healthy controls and normative levels was found. While ALL survivors generally performed within the average range on measures of math skills, math performance was mostly related to memory function and dominant-hand psychomotor speed. By contrast, math performance of healthy children was mostly related to basic reading skills and visual-motor integration. These findings shed light on the nature of math difficulties in ALL survivors and have implications for intervention.     

Preschoolers' Understanding of Simple and Complex Emotions: Links with Gender and Language

In this study we assessed individual differences among preschoolers' emotion understanding, verbal ability, and gender role behavior. Fifty-three children (M = 3 years, 5 months; 26 girls, 27 boys) participated in task that used puppets to assess their understanding of simple (happy, sad) and complex emotions (proud, embarrassed) and a standard vocabulary task. Parents completed a questionnaire on the frequency of their children's gender-typed behavior. Results indicated positive associations between children's total emotion understanding and both general verbal ability (particularly for boys) and parents' perceptions of stereotypic feminine behaviors. Gender analysis revealed that, independent of vocabulary ability, girls scored higher than boys on emotion labeling and understanding of complex emotions, especially the concept of pride. Results are discussed in relation to individual differences and effects of sociocultural context.     

Fishing For Feelings? Hooking Viewers Helps!

To better understand individual variation in emotional responses to advertising, the authors recommend considering 3 general factors: characteristics of the individual who sees the ad, characteristics of the ad itself, and the nature of the ad–individual interface. This article examines 1 aspect of the individual, affect intensity (AI); one aspect of the ad, the degree to which the ad tells a story; and 1 aspect of the ad–individual interface, whether the individual is hooked by the ad. Experimental results reveal that an individual's being hooked by an ad has a positive relation with upbeat and warm feelings, a negative relation with disinterested feelings, and significantly enhances the viewer's attitude toward the ad. We find that AI has a positive relation with upbeat and warm feelings, and AI moderates the effect of being hooked on upbeat and warm feelings. Findings also reveal that narrative ad structure has a positive relation with upbeat and warm feelings, a negative relation with disinterested feelings, and that being hooked moderates the effect of narrative ad structure on upbeat and warm feelings responses.