The future lies open

Recently retired as Dean of Students and Professor of Psychology at the University of Minnesota, he has held offices in many organizations in the student personnel field. He was president of apga in 1967–1968.     

What makes it a heap?

On the epistemic view of vagueness, a vague expression has sharp boundaries whose location speakers of the language cannot recognize. The paper argues that one of the deepest sources of resistance to the epistemic view is the idea that all truths are cognitively accessible from truths in a language for natural science, conceived as precise, in a sense explained. The implications of the epistemic view for issues about the relations between vague predicates and scientific predicates are investigated.     

Youth's Dilemma: To Be or To Become

Youth should be engaged in three basic intellectual and moral activities: (a) selecting life purposes, (b) limiting their concern for immediate satisfaction, and (c) striving to become their highest and best potentiality. Teachers and counselors have a responsibility to aid growth in confronting the dilemmas inherent in these problems.     

Psychological profiles of adult children of alcoholics in search of therapy

Adult children of alcoholics (ACOAs) and adults from dysfunctional families of origin are increasingly recognized as high risk groups for psychiatric disorders. However, there has been little empirical investigation of the psychological characteristics of these populations. This study compares clinical samples of these two groups using the Symptom Checklist-90, (SCL-90), the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), and the Irrational Beliefs Test (IBT), as well as DSM-III-R diagnoses and demographic information. The two groups did not differ significantly on the psychological tests and showed similar demographics and diagnoses. Both groups showed levels of psychopathology comparable to other psychiatric populations. It was concluded that clinical samples of ACOAs and adults from dysfunctional families of origin have many problems of clinical proportion. Assessment and treatment of these groups is best done by properly trained professional staff and because of their similar problems and treatment needs the two groups may be treated together.     

Relationship orientation, quality of prior relationship, and distress among caregivers of Alzheimer's patients

Communal orientation and closeness of the caregiver-patient relationship were investigated as predictors of distress among caregivers of Alzheimer's patients. Persons high in communal orientation were less depressed than those low in communal orientation. Caregivers reporting a close relationship with the patient before illness onset felt less burdened than those whose relationship had not been close. Communal orientation interacted with closeness when data were analyzed separately for men and women. Among men, being low in communal orientation and having a relatively poor prior relationship were associated with the highest levels of depression, levels that put them at risk for clinical depression. Among women low in communal orientation, higher levels of depression were related to having a close prior relationship with the patient.     

Reliability and validity of children's reports of migraine headache symptoms

The present study was concerned with whether children's responses to a questionnaire correspond with parents' reports of the child's headache symptoms and whether these responses correlate with self-monitored headache activity. Twenty-eight children, ages 7 years–16 years, participated in the study. Using a questionnaire format, data on a wide variety of headache characteristics were gathered from parents and children. During the subsequent 4 weeks, children monitored their headache activity and medication usage. Results were generally supportive of the validity and reliability of children's reports via a questionnaire format. The responses to the frequency of headache and medication usage were found to predict the responses over the next month, whereas the response on the duration of headache did not. Significant correlations for most headache-symptom items indicated that children and parents agree on their presence and severity. This investigation is the first step in developing a systematic assessment procedure for childhood headache.     

The Effect of Exercise on Body Satisfaction and Self-Esteem as a Function of Gender and Age

The study investigated the relationship between amount of exercise and psychological well-being in a broadly based sample. A questionnaire assessing amount of exercise, reasons for exercise, body satisfaction, and self-esteem was completed by 252 participants between the ages of 16 and 60 years. Almost all participants (>95%) were White. Participants were divided into four groups on the basis of gender and age, resulting in 70 young women, 48 young men, 73 mature women, and 61 mature men. Significant negative relationships between amount of exercise and body satisfaction and self-esteem were found for young women, and positive relationships for the remainder of the sample. Women exercised more for reasons of weight control, tone, and mood enhancement than men. For the whole sample, the first two of these reasons were associated with lower body satisfaction, while exercising for health and fitness reasons was associated with increased self-esteem. It was concluded that reasons for exercising did not provide an adequate explanation for the obtained difference in correlations across gender and age.     

Forgiveness aversion: developing a motivational state measure of perceived forgiveness risks

Given the demonstrated psychological, physical, and social benefits of forgiveness, it is striking that there are still strong impediments to its attainment. In this paper, we introduce the multi-dimensional construct of forgiveness aversion, an offense-specific motivational state based on perceived forgiveness risks. The construct and our proposed measure (the Forgiveness Aversion Scale) are composed of three related dimensions: unreadiness, self-protection, and face concerns. Unreadiness refers to the ongoing emotional turmoil that keeps victims from sincerely forgiving. Self-protection refers to the concerns about how offenders will interpret forgiveness. Finally, face concerns reflect victims’ concerns for their reputation. Four studies were completed to develop a state measure of forgiveness aversion through correlation, structural equations modeling, longitudinal analysis, and a hypothetical scenario experiment. Results of four studies reveal differential predictors of the three dimensions of forgiveness aversion and demonstrate that our understanding of the forgiveness process and impediments thereto is enhanced by addressing situation-specific impediments to forgiveness.     

Modelling mechanisms with causal cycles

Mechanistic philosophy of science views a large part of scientific activity as engaged in modelling mechanisms. While science textbooks tend to offer qualitative models of mechanisms, there is increasing demand for models from which one can draw quantitative predictions and explanations. Casini et al. (Theoria 26(1):5–33, 2011) put forward the Recursive Bayesian Networks (RBN) formalism as well suited to this end. The RBN formalism is an extension of the standard Bayesian net formalism, an extension that allows for modelling the hierarchical nature of mechanisms. Like the standard Bayesian net formalism, it models causal relationships using directed acyclic graphs. Given this appeal to acyclicity, causal cycles pose a prima facie problem for the RBN approach. This paper argues that the problem is a significant one given the ubiquity of causal cycles in mechanisms, but that the problem can be solved by combining two sorts of solution strategy in a judicious way.     

Posttraumatic growth and religion in Rwanda: individual well-being vs. collective false consciousness

Some scholars include changes in spirituality, such as a greater commitment to their religious beliefs or an enhanced understanding of spiritual matters, in the definition of posttraumatic growth; others conclude that questions of spirituality should be excluded from this definition. This article highlights the fundamental difference of religion to other domains of posttraumatic growth because religions are ideologies (and other domains of growth are not). As ideologies, it is argued that religions can affect different levels of identity in different ways. Based on testimonial evidence from Rwandan genocide survivors, the article demonstrates that although religious beliefs can bring existential comfort at the individual level, they can also lead to a state of false consciousness at the collective level. In Rwanda, the dominant religious ideology facilitated the spiritual and moral climate in which genocide became possible. Today, religious interpretations of the Rwandan Patriotic Front's (RPF) leadership provide spiritual backing to a government which has become increasingly authoritarian.