The structure of feared social situations among individuals with a lifetime diagnosis of social anxiety disorder in two independent nationally representative mental health surveys

The present study employed both exploratory and confirmatory factor analytic approaches with nationally representative samples of individuals with a lifetime diagnosis of social anxiety disorder (n=1123; n=3091, respectively) using split-halves of the National Comorbidity Replication Survey (n=9282) and cross-validated with the Canadian Community Health Survey on Mental Health and Wellbeing (n=36,984). Strong support was found for a three-factor solution. This model was obtained from exploratory factor analysis and was further evaluated using two confirmatory factor analytic investigations in the two national samples. The three social situational domains reflected (1) Social Interaction Fears, (2) Observation Fears, and (3) Public Speaking Fears. Individuals with generalized social anxiety disorder (i.e., those who endorsed 7 or more of 13 feared social situations assessed in the survey) were significantly more likely to report Social Interaction Fears and Observation Fears compared to individuals with non-generalized social anxiety disorder (i.e., those who endorsed only 6 or fewer of 13 feared social situations). Individuals with generalized social anxiety were particularly characterized by combinations of Public Speaking Fears plus Social Interaction Fears and Observation Fears. The clinical and classification implications of our study for DSM-V are discussed.     

心理授权研究进展

二十多年来,心理授权受到研究者的广泛重视。在以往研究中,研究者提出了心理授权的单维结构说、三维结构说、四维结构说和六维结构说,并在此基础上开发了相应的测量工具。在心理授权的影响因素方面,已有研究主要考察了个体变量和组织变量对心理授权的影响;在后果变量方面,主要探讨的是心理授权与工作满意度、组织承诺、职业承诺、绩效、心理健康等方面的关系。针对现有研究中存在的问题,本文在最后提出了未来研究的一些建议。     

共同体:一种想象出来的安全感——鲍曼对共同体主义的批评

共同体主义是以批判自由主义而著称的一个政治哲学流派,而鲍曼却从经验层面质疑共同体主义本身的意义。共同体是安全和谐的象征,但被现代民族国家摧毁和置换之后,成为一种人们想象出来的安全感。当代社会对共同体的强烈向往是人们对自由与安全失衡的心理反应,是由于人们在民族国家衰微之后拥有更多的自由但却又陷入社会的不稳定状态中。共同体主义并不能解决自由主义面临的危机,二者都无法解除当今全球化进程中人们遭遇的困境。     

Building capability throughout a change effort: leading the transformation of a police agency to community policing

This case describes a change effort to move a police agency to become a community policing organization. The community policing effort was seen as a means to make a transformational change to become a learning organization with the goal of improving the delivery of police services. The case describes the steps taken to meet the new vision of community policing as well as the steps taken to deal with the challenges or realities of trying to make change happen. The lens for this case is the leadership role across the stages of change (exploration, planning, implementation, monitoring and institutionalization) in building capacity within the organization to sustain the change effort. The capacity building focused on incorporating systems thinking into the mindset of the members of the organization, breaking down the command and control mindset by building a new norm around high involvement of committed teams, and developing skill sets to support continuous learning and improvement in order to align organizational systems. A key lesson learned is that effective leaders do not just prepare an organization prior to a change effort. They must have the patience to constantly build the capacity for change among organizational members throughout the various stages of the change effort.     

Getting the social organism thinking: strategy for systems change

The ability of community researchers/practitioners to facilitate systems change is constrained by social power--particularly the capacity to shape ideology [S. Lukes (1974). Power: A radical view. Hampshire: MacMillan] and frequently power molds ideologies which undermine systems thinking. Following what Mills [C. W. Mills, (1959). The sociological imagination. New York: Oxford University Press] (termed the "sociological imagination", this article makes the case for a strategy of systems change that promotes an integrated focus on systems and their constituent individuals. Both of these components are understood to continuously shape each other. The social imagination is introduced as a way to conceptualize the intersection between individuals' conceptions of systems and the ways that systems work to form individual identities and perceptions of social reality. Examples of attempts at systems change from community organizing and public health are used to illustrate both common fallacies and potential future directions for systems change efforts.     

Anxiety and coping with community disasters: The Israeli experience

This study compared anxiety levels and coping strategies in Israeli adults during the Al-Aqsa Intifada (n = 707) and under ballistic missile attacks targeted at Israeli civilians during the Persian Gulf War (n = 328). In view of the differences among the two disaster situations in terms of severity of impact, scope, duration, predictability, and controllability, it was hypothesized that higher levels of state anxiety would be observed for the terror attack than for the missile attack crisis. Furthermore, problem-focused coping was predicted to be more salient than emotion-focused coping during the Gulf War—at a time where more protective action could be taken. Overall, the data supported the hypotheses. The data are discussed and explicated in the context of stress and coping theory and research.     

The Giordano Bruno Practice

The educational practice of Giordano Bruno University is to use cyber-technology and active-learning teaching methods to deliver low cost, on-demand higher education. The result will be the empowerment of women and men who historically have not had access to this means of enhancing capability and self esteem.     

Substance-abuse prevention: Beyond the schoolyard

Substance-abuse prevention in children and youth has had limited success, possibly because the scope of traditional interventions, usually school based, is too narrow. Children who live in poverty and/or whose homes are dysfunctional need environmental changes beyond what traditional school-based programs can offer. Community psychologists need to expand their work in this area. School-based and community-based interventions are addressed. Ideas for broadening interventions to include elements such as family, media, and community collaboration are evaluated and discussed, along with successful examples of such interventions. Suggestions are made for further innovative work in this area.     

Developing empowering research practices with people who have learning disabilities

In this paper we report an exploratory attempt to design a practice that facilitates the extent to which ‘researched-upon’ and ‘researcher-on’ can be cooperatively involved in the planning, data collection and interpretation of research in the field of learning disability and community living. The informants were four people with learning disabilities who had been residents of long-stay mental hospitals but, at the time of the study, had all been living in the community for at least 1 year. After an extended period of informal familiarization, the research had three main phases. The first phase consisted of five individual, non-directive, depth interviews over a 2-month period. The second phase consisted of a meeting in which each participant became a paid co-researcher involved in the design and planning of the next phase of the research. The third phase consisted of three 1-hour guided neighbourhood tours led by the participants who had become co-researchers. Over the course of the three phases, the role of the researcher gradually became more a ‘newcomer-learner’ as he adopted the role of co-researcher and the role of participants with learning disabilities gradually became more ‘expert-teachers’ as they adopted the role of co-researchers. As the research progressed, the balance of power shifted, although modestly, in favour of those with learning disabilities. This led to an improvement in the quality and effectiveness of communication and understanding and an increase in the satisfaction with and enjoyment of the research process for all those involved. © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.