Forgiveness,Reconciliation, and Mechila: Integrating the Jewish Concept of Forgiveness Into Clinical Practice

The professional literature diverges in defining the role of forgiveness and reconciliation in counseling regarding how forgiveness and reconciliation are conceptualized from a professional and secular perspective. The Jewish conceptualization of forgiveness is multifaceted; mechila, the forgiveness of debt, is particularly important in providing a framework for forgiveness when the issue of reconciliation is involved. The authors offer an explanation of the Jewish conceptualization of forgiveness and discuss a way to infuse the concept of mechila into counseling practice on a broader level with all clients.     

French categorization norms for 70 semantic categories and comparison with Van Overschelde et al.’s (2004) English norms

The present methodological note provides categorization norms for 70 semantic categories collected from 200 participants. The categories were mainly derived from a French translation of the Van Overschelde, Rawson, and Dunlosky (2004) inductor terms including a large set of semantic categories. Our study also extends recent French norms (Léger, Boumlak, & Tijus, 2008; Marchal & Nicolas, 2003) and tests their stability. These 70 categories constitute the widest French categorization norms to date and will be of use to studies in the fields of both linguistics and psycholinguistics. A cross-linguistic comparison, with both quantitative and qualitative results, is also performed, which should prove useful for bilingual and/or cross-linguistic studies. The norms collected for all 70 categories are available for download as supplemental materials from http://brm.psychonomic-journals.org/content/supplemental.     

The Supernatural and the Miraculous

Both intention-based and causation-based definitions of the miraculous make reference to the term ‘supernatural’. Philosophers who define the miraculous appear to use this term in a loose way, perhaps meaning the nonnatural, perhaps meaning a subcategory of the nonnatural. Here I examine the aetiology of the term ‘supernatural’. I consider three outstanding issues regarding the meaning of the term and conclude that the supernatural is best understood as a subcategory of the nonnatural. In light of this clarification, I argue that a prominent causation-based definition of the miraculous should be revised so as not refer to the supernatural. I further argue that authors of intention-based definitions of the miraculous need to consider whether or not they should continue to refer to the supernatural, in their definitions of the miraculous, in light of the conclusions discerned here.

Helping to improve the group stereotype: on the strategic dimension of prosocial behavior

Three studies consider a basis for intergroup helping. Specifically, they show that group members may help others to disconfirm a stereotype of their own group as mean. Study 1 shows that Scots believe they are seen as mean by the English, resent this stereotype, are motivated to refute it, and believe out-group helping is a particularly effective way of doing so. Study 2 shows that increasing the salience of the English stereotype of the Scottish as mean leads Scots to accentuate the extent to which Scots are depicted as generous. Study 3 shows that increasing the salience of the stereotype of the Scots as mean results in an increase in the help volunteered to out-group members. These results highlight how strategic concerns may result in out-group helping. In turn, they underscore the point that helping others may be a means to advance a group's interest.     

Praying Alone? Church-Going in Britain and the Putnam Thesis

The decline in British church-going has conventionally been taken as evidence of a decline in religious interest. There is another possibility. Davie and Brierley have suggested that declining church membership may be seen as part of a wider unwillingness to associate. This article examines that alternative.