Paradise Lost and the Question of Legitimacy

This paper reconstructs the deficiencies of formal democracies to explain the internal injustices of the modern state, the self‐righteous swaggering foreign policy of Western powers, and the dangerously over‐simplified, polar logic characterizing the war rhetoric of the modern era. In a brief tour through the non‐liberal tradition of democratic thought, drawing connections between the tragic mythological origins of Western understandings of self and world, the paper attempts to demonstrate that a failure to find alternate, healthier means of value‐creation has caused Westerners, in their constructive identity work, to adhere themselves to their systems with a ritualized, ‘religious’ fervour. Legitimacy in the world becomes, in the final analysis, a simple matter of might. The possession of firearms and bread render self‐sanctifying myths legitimating aggressions on the argument of ‘good’ powers fighting the battle against ‘evil’ contaminants.     

Colic and fussing in infancy,and sensory processing at 3 to 8 years of age

The purpose of this follow‐up study was to examine whether a group of 28 clinic‐referred infants with colic, excessive crying, or both at 4 to 12 weeks demonstrated sensory processing, coping, and behavioral/attention regulation difficulties at 3 to 8 years of age. Seventy‐five percent of the sample demonstrated atypical behavioral responses to sensory experiences. Hours of fussing during infancy significantly correlated with inattention, emotional reactivity, touch processing, environmental coping, and externalizing behavior at 3 to 8 years, but not hours of crying. The most striking result was that children with more hours of early fussing showed less efficient sensory processing, poorer coping with the environment, and more attention/hyperactivity problems compared to those with less hours of fussing. Results suggest that hours of fussing rather than crying could be an early marker for infants at risk.     

Developmental Trajectories of Girls’ and Boys’ Delinquency and Associated Problems

Developmental trajectories in delinquency through adolescence were studied along with family and peer relationship problems. Drawing from eight waves of data over seven years, we conducted trajectory analyses with a sample of 746 students (402 girls; 344 boys). Analyzing girls and boys together, a five-class model emerged: 60% of the adolescents rarely reported delinquency; 27.7% reported low initial levels with moderate levels of delinquency over time; 6% in the late onset group reported initially low and rising levels of delinquency; 5% in the early onset group reported moderate initial levels which increased and then decreased in later adolescence. A small group of only boys (1.3%) labeled chronic reported high initial levels of delinquency that increased over time. Group comparisons revealed problems in internalizing, parent and peer relationship problems. The findings provide direction for early identification and interventions to curtail the development of delinquency.     

Self-regulation of Gendered Behavior in Everyday Life

The present research tested whether gender self-concepts influence behavior through self-regulatory processes, with emotions and self-esteem signaling that people’s responses meet or fail to meet their gender standards. In the first study, cross-sectional survey data from 3,174 young adults living in the United States revealed that esteem increased with behavioral conformity to gender standards for personality. In the second study, an experience-sampling diary design provided a dynamic view of regulation to gender standards for personality and romance. One hundred seventy-seven American undergraduates reported their emotions and esteem immediately following everyday social interactions. As anticipated, students became more positive when they acted in ways that confirmed rather than disconfirmed personal gender standards.     

Reviewing psychologists' qualifications for career development practice in Australia

Vocational psychology and the practice of career development are important dimensions of the psychology discipline and profession. This paper contains an overview of Australian career development practice in light of recent trends, particularly the formalisation of career development practice among professions other than psychologists. Given the advent of professional standards for Australian career development practitioners, a review of postgraduate degrees in organisational, developmental and educational, and counselling psychology was conducted to determine their correspondence with the competencies presented in the Standards. The review found significant consistency with generic competencies. Degrees in organisational psychology provided the broadest correspondence, while degrees in counselling, developmental and educational psychology had lower levels of correspondence on specific competencies. The implications of the review are discussed in light of the evolution of the career development industry and psychologists' standing in this field.     

Stigma and Client Satisfaction in Mental Health Services

Numerous studies have revealed that stigmatization of persons with mental health problems has a large array of negative consequences. One outcome that has been largely neglected is client satisfaction. In this empirical study, the link between 3 types of stigma experiences and client satisfaction is explored in a sample of clients (N = 741) of professional mental health services in Belgium. This relationship is compared with the link between stigma and general life satisfaction; and the role of the self‐concept in these relationships is explored. The results reveal that the association depends on the dimension of stigma under study. The findings stress the importance of studying multiple dimensions of stigma experiences, in addition to multiple outcomes.     

Age‐related differences in delay discounting: Immediate reward,reward magnitude,and social influence

Delay discounting refers to the tendency of individuals to subjectively devalue rewards that are to be received in the future, with high rates of delay discounting being associated with a variety of maladaptive life outcomes (e.g., unhealthy dietary and exercise behaviors). The current study explored the psychological and social processes involved in adult age‐related differences in delay discounting of monetary rewards. Younger adults exhibited higher levels of delay discounting than older adults. This increased level of patience in older adults was found whether smaller‐sooner rewards were to be received immediately or in the future. However, there was an interaction with reward magnitude, whereby younger adults exhibited higher levels of delay discounting for smaller reward magnitudes but not larger reward magnitudes. Social influence on delay discounting was investigated by having participants complete three phases of the delay‐discounting task: an individual precollaboration phase, a collaboration phase in age‐group‐matched dyads, and an individual postcollaboration phase. A convergence effect was observed in that dyad members' postcollaboration choices were significantly more similar compared to their baseline choices during the precollaboration phase. Moreover, levels of convergence were comparable between younger and older adults, suggesting age invariance in social influence on delay discounting. The current results demonstrate a degree of malleability in delay discounting that extends into older adulthood, making interventions targeting the construct a promising avenue for future research.     

The Cornell Institute for Research on Children: A vision of integrated developmental science

The Cornell Institute for Research on Children (CIRC) is an intellectual infrastructure funded by the National Science Foundation under the aegis of the Children's Research Initiative, which was spearheaded by Rodney R. Cocking. Cocking's vision of integrated developmental science is an integral part of CIRC's philosophy. CIRC aims to integrate knowledge and paradigms from a variety of fields (e.g., developmental psychology, economics, neuroscience, and pediatrics), which take different perspectives on similar issues (e.g., the effects of toxins on cognitive development), making it explicitly interdisciplinary. The object of CIRC studies is to apply research findings to social policy. To accomplish this, CIRC provides resources to enable teams of scholars from diverse fields to collaborate on policy-relevant questions. CIRC's approach begins by asking policy-makers to define questions for researchers to address, then shepherds the process by which scholars from various relevant disciplines are commissioned to work as a team to answer such questions. To demonstrate the strengths of this approach we describe the six components that comprise CIRC and provide an actual example of a project that CIRC has commissioned as well as a hypothetical example of a project that CIRC could undertake. This article is a progress report, written in an effort to disseminate information about CIRC's agenda.