Theory and Method of Social Representations

This paper gives an overview of social representation theory, definitions of the key terms and of the social processes leading to a representation and to social identity. Six empirical studies are presented and details of their methods and findings are given to illustrate this social psychological approach. These studies are about the ontogenesis of gender, the public sphere in Brazil, madness on British television, images of androgyny in Switzerland, individualism and democracy in post-communist Europe and metaphorical thinking about conception. The methods are ethnography, interviews, focus-groups, content analysis of media, statistical analysis of word associations, questionnaires and experiments. Finally, social representation theory is compared to theories of attitudes, schemata and social cognition.     

Memory Strategy Development: Lessons from Longitudinal Research

Most research in memory strategy development involves cross-sectional studies, with the implicit assumption that the patterns found in these studies are an accurate reflection of intraindividual changes over time. In this article, we review briefly the development of rehearsal and organizational strategies based on cross-sectional research and then review the findings from the few longitudinal studies assessing intraindividual change in these strategies, focusing on results from the Munich Longitudinal Study (LOGIC). Although average, age-related patterns obtained from longitudinal samples provide similar development functions as those obtained from cross-sectional samples, there is much greater individual variability in strategy acquisition observed in the longitudinal data. This suggests that the canonical development patterns inferred from cross-sectional studies often obfuscate actual intraindividual patterns. Longitudinal evidence also indicates that utilization deficiencies are observed less frequently than assumed in cross-sectional research.     

Epistemologische betrachtungen zu [S4, S5]

Zusammenfassung Die zahlreichen modallogischen Systeme zwischen den Standardkalkülen S4 und S5 werden vom epistemologischen Standpunkt aus untersucht, indem Notwendigkeit wahlweise als Wissen bzw. als Überzeugt-sein gedeutet wird. Dabei stellt sich heraus, daß — unter gewissen andernorts begründeten Voraussetzungen über epistemische Logik-S4.4 als Logik der wahren Überzeugungen aufgefaßt werden kann, während die Systeme S4.3.2 und S4.2 als Logiken für solche Leute erscheinen, die das Schema Wissen = wahre Überzeugung nur eingeschränkt für ganz spezielle rein doxastische bzw. rein epistemische Sätze akzeptieren. S4.2 ist dabei allem Anschein nach die Logik des Wissens.

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The numerous modal systems between S4 and S5 are investigated from an epistemological point of view by interpreting necessity either as knowledge or as (strong) belief. It is shown that-granted some assumptions about epistemic logic for which the author has argued elsewhere-the system S4.4 may be interpreted as the logic of true belief, while S4.3.2 and S4.2 may be taken to represent epistemic logic systems for individuals who accept the scheme knowledge = true belief only for certain special instances. There is strong evidence in favor of the assumption that S4.2 is the logic of knowledge.

     

Concepts and aims of functional interpretations: towards a functional interpretation of constructive set theory

The aim of this article is to give an introduction to functional interpretations of set theory given by the authorin Burr (2000a). The first part starts with some general remarks on Gödel's functional interpretation with a focus on aspects related to problems that arise in the context of set theory. The second part gives an insight in the techniques needed to perform a functional interpretation of systems of set theory. However, the first part of this article is not intended to be a complete survey of functional interpretations and here we recommend, for example, Avigad and Feferman (1998),Troelstra (1990) and Troelstra (1973).     

Psychotherapie mit Migranten

After an introduction and presentation of the influence of immigration on psychological health, the present overview focuses on several models of psychological development in immigration. Cross-cultural psychodynamics and culturally conditioned transference in ethnically mixed cultural psychotherapy settings are explored. The effectiveness of Western therapy methods based on Christian – Jewish values is discussed with regard to the therapy of patients from different ethnic backgrounds, i. e. so-called traditional societies. In Western cultures, proximity in object relations is based on autonomy whereas in traditional societies proximity is based on relatedness. Knowledge of specific cultural issues are considered to be an important instrument in cross-cultural therapies. Joining, activation of ethnic resources, and culture-sensitive interventions are considered to be helpful psychotherapeutic interventions. Specialized therapy settings, e.g. integration of ethnic therapists in established institutions, mono-cultural ethnic settings and collaborative projects are described. Last but not least, the authors point out the necessity of cross-cultural therapeutic competence because of an expanding cultural heterogeneity of society.     

Bindung und Liebe in den Partnerschaften von Psychotherapiepatienten

Based on attachment theory and love style typology, this study focuses on the relation between experiences in romantic relationships and mental health in a clinical sample. 117 outpatients of a psychosomatic clinic took part in the study. Self-report measures were used to assess relationship quality, attachment dimensions, love styles and correlates of mental disorders. Compared to a student sample, the patients’ reports refer to lower relationship quality. They experience more anxiety and less romantic feelings in their relationships which is especially true for women. Furthermore, anxiety, jealousy and altruism in the patients’ relationships are related to a variety of correlates of mental disorders including psychosomatic complaints. Results indicate that experiences in romantic relationships are strongly associated with general psychological well-being.     

What to do and how to do it: sequence learning of action effects and transformation rules

Many goal-oriented actions, for example in tool use, can be characterized by the involvement of two components: The effect that the acting person wants to achieve and the transformation rule that defines the relationship between a bodily movement and the associated action effect. Both in conjunction specify the concrete action that has to be executed. In our experiments, we utilized a sequence learning paradigm to investigate whether these components are represented separately or are bound together to form a more holistic representation of the action. Participants switched between different transformation rules to achieve certain action effects. In one group, there was a fixed sequence of action effects, with randomly varying transformation rules. In the other group, the sequence of transformation rules was fixed, whereas the action effects were randomly varying. Results indicate that both kinds of sequences can be learned and provide evidence for the notion that transformation rules and action effects are represented separately.