Reflections on Religion and Health Research: An Interview with Dr. Harold G. Koenig

In this interview renowned researcher Harold G. Koenig, MD, MHSc shares his perspective on religion and health research, drawing from his experiences as a researcher, educator and practitioner. Throughout the interview, he highlights significant advances and discusses the gaps and potential weaknesses in the current body of religion and health literature. He also outlines recommendations for the continued advancement of religion and health research. Guidelines are given to guide new investigators interested in becoming religion and health researchers.     

Physiological arousal in the context of a specified anticipatory period and experimentally induced expectancy for shock

Anticipatory and reactive components of skin conductance and heart rate were assessed under different levels of shock expectancy. Sixty college males received two shock and two nonshock trials of a 12-light count-up where shock occurred at the eighth light. Expectancies were experimentally induced via 20 preliminary trials during which a red light substituted for shock. The red light appeared on 18/20, 10/20, and 2/20 preliminary trials for 90, 50, and 10% expectancy groups, respectively. Prior to each test trial, subjects estimated the likelihood of receiving shock. Major findings were that: (a) mean probability estimates corresponded closely with values provided by preliminary trials; (b) tonic skin conductance during anticipation was higher with greater expectancy for shock; (c) phasic change in skin conductance to the count-up lights was greatest in the 90% group during anticipation; and (d) reactivity at impact tended to be greater with higher anticipatory arousal. The relationship of event probability to stress was discussed with respect to length of the anticipatory periods and methods used to establish expectancies.     

Harold Garfinkel and Edward Rose in the early years of ethnomethodology

This article documents the beginning of the intellectual companionship between the founder of ethnomethodology, Harold Garfinkel, and Edward Rose, who is most often associated with his program of “ethno-inquiries.” I present results from archival research focusing on the contacts and collaborations between Rose and Garfinkel in the years 1955–1965. First, I describe the review process for Rose and Felton's paper, submitted to the American Sociological Review in 1955, which Garfinkel reviewed and after Rose's rebuttal recommended for publication. The paper induced Garfinkel to write an extensive commentary that has remained unpublished. Second, I discuss the 1958 New Mexico conference sponsored by the Air Force, which was an opportunity for Rose and Garfinkel to work together on topics related to common-sense knowledge and scientific knowledge. Third, I give an overview of the ethnomethodological conferences in 1962 and 1963, supported by an Air Force grant written collaboratively by Rose and Garfinkel. Here I focus primarily on Rose's research on “small languages,” which stimulated many discussions among the early ethnomethodologists. Rose's work and exchanges with Garfinkel demonstrate the former's affinity for miniaturization as a research approach and search for ways to empiricize topics of sociological theory in locally observable settings.     

The effects of empathy and outcome on attribution: An examination of the divergent-perspectives hypothesis

Based on the theoretical ideas of Jones and Nisbett (Jones et al. Attribution: Perceiving the cause of behavior. New York: General Learning Press, 1971), and the recent findings of Regan and Totten (Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 32, 1975, 850–856), the present study assumed that from an attributional standpoint empathic observers and actors are functionally equivalent. On this basis it was predicted that empathic, relative to nonempathic, observers would make outcome attributions which have been typically found for actors themselves: They would attribute an actor's success to dispositional causes, but an actor's failure to situational causes. After instructions to empathize with the target, or to observe him, subjects watched a videotape of a target male attempting to make a good first impression on a female. Subjects later learned that the target had either succeeded or failed at making a good first impression, and were asked to make causal attributions for his outcome. As predicted, instructions to empathize led to dispositional attributions for success and situational attributions for failure, while standard observation instructions resulted in dispositional causal attributions regardless of outcome. The results were interpreted as supporting the contention that differential information processing may sufficiently account for the effects of outcome on causal attributions.     

Escape conditioning and goal punishment: Effects of acquisition trials,initial punishment trials,and CS extent

In the first of three experiments in which albino rats were given spaced shockescape trials in a straight runway, groups of 6 animals were given 6 or 24 trials followed by extinction, with or without goal-box punishment. Punishment facilitated behavior after 24 trials but did not significantly affect it after 6. Both punishment and 24 trials led to more “abrupt” extinction. In the second experiment, 6 groups of 6 animals received 6, 12, or 24 trials followed by 54 extinction trials with or without goal punishment on the first 18. All punished groups ran self-punitively, and acquisition trials effects were apparent during and after punishment. In the third experiment, buzzer extent, or duration, was manipulated, and longer extents produced stronger self-punitive effects. The results of all three experiments were interpreted in the context of presumed directive effects of aversive and conditioned aversive stimuli.     

Occupational knowledge and career development in adolescence

In an effort to extend our knowledge of career development, two indices of career maturity were investigated in a sample of 6029 high school seniors sampled from 57 Texas public school districts. The study investigated both the degree to which late adolescents choose occupations whose educational requirements match their stated educational goals and the degree to which students' vocational interests are compatible with their occupational choices. The correlations between educational plans and educational requirements of the chosen occupations were .41 or less. Of the subjects who claimed to have at least considerable understanding of their first choice career, only about half planned to achieve the amount of education appropriate to enter that occupation. Subjects' perceptions of how well they understood their occupational choices were also negligibly related to the compatibility of their vocational interests and their career choices. Although educational understanding and interest compatibility both contribute to realism of occupational choices, the correlation between these two indices of career maturity accounted for less than 1% of the variance.     

Reinforced practice and reduction of different kinds of fears in adults and children

The purpose of this study was to determine whether or not fears with different origins, course and chronicity could be reduced by a common treatment program. A number of therapeutic procedures that had been experimentally demonstrated to be individually important in prior behavior modification studies with neurotic disorders were combined into a single therapeutic program called ‘reinforced practice.’ The combined elements were: graduated and repeated practice in approaching actual phobic stimuli: reinforcement for gains in performance; feedback of measurable progress; and instructions designed to arouse expectations of gradual success. In each of four experiments involving four different fears, namely fear of heights, snakes and electric shock in adults, and fear of darkness in young children, Ss who expeienced the ‘reinforced practice’ procedure improved their performance by a significant and substantial margin as compared to untreated control Ss. These results suggest that regardless of different etiologies, regardless of whether or not the fears are ‘rational’ or ‘irrational,’ and regardless of whether or not the fears are transitory or long lasting, the same treatment procedure can be equally effective in reducing escape-avoidance behavior.