Miscarriages of psychoanalytic treatment with suicidal patients2

The author describes a particularly perilous frontier on the psychoanalytic landscape‐ namely, the treatment of suicidal patients with serious personality disorders. Using a clinical example of egregious boundary violations by an analyst, he describes specific countertransference pitfalls that lead to mishandling the patients' expressions of suicidal despair. These include disidentification with the aggressor, failure of mentalization, collapse of the analytic play space, reactions to loss in the analyst's personal life, omnipotence, envy of the patient and masochistic surrender. The author emphasizes the unique vulnerabilities that accompany analytic treatment of such patients.     

Traffic Offences: Planned or Habitual? Using the Theory of Planned Behaviour and habit strength to explain frequency and magnitude of speeding and driving under the influence of alcohol

This study addresses the socio‐cognitive determinants of traffic offences, in particular of speeding and drinking and driving. It has two aims: (1) to test the hypothesis of a direct effect of habits on offences (i.e., independent of intentions) by employing a specific measure of habits (i.e., the SRIH) and (2) to analyse the offences by taking account of three distinct parameters: Frequency, usual magnitude (i.e., the most frequent deviation from the law) and maximal magnitude (i.e., the greatest deviation occasionally adopted) in order to represent more accurately the variability of the offending behaviours. A total of 642 drivers replied to a questionnaire. The results corroborate the idea that intention and habit are distinct and direct determinants of offences. The use of the SRIH dismisses the criticisms made with regard to the measure of past behaviour. The distinction between the three behavioural parameters proves to be relevant, as their determinants are not exactly similar. Finally, attitude and subjective norm had direct effects on the maximal magnitude and/or on the frequency of the offence. The discussion concerns the contribution of this study to the analysis of offences as well as its limitations and addresses the theoretical plausibility of the direct effects of attitude and the subjective norm.     

Traffic congestion,driver stress,and driver aggression

Drivers were interviewed over cellular telephones in high‐ and low‐congestion conditions during a single commute. During each interview, state measures of driver stress and driver behaviors were obtained. Behavior responses were subdivided into six categories: aggressive, information seeking, planning, minor self‐destructive, distraction, and relaxation techniques. Both state driver stress and aggression were greater in high‐ than in low‐congestion conditions. No other behavior category differed between low and high congestion. Multiple regressions were calculated to determine the predictors of state driver stress. In low congestion, time urgency predicted state driver stress, while aggression predicted driver stress in high congestion. In both conditions, a trait susceptibility toward viewing driving as generally stressful was predictive of state driver stress levels, which further strengthens the use of the Driving Behaviour Inventory—General as a predictor of “trait” driver stress. Females and males did not differentiate on state stress or any behavior category. Aggr. Behav. 25:409–423, 1999. © 1999 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Morally Relevant Features

This article summarizes the account of morality presented in Morality: Its Nature and Justification (Oxford, 1998), with emphasis on that aspect of morality that deals with justifying violations of the moral rules. Such justification requires a two-step procedure; the first is describing the situation using only morally relevant features. I list these features, noting how diverse they are, and describe their characteristics. The second step is estimating the consequences of publicly allowing a violation with the same morally relevant features, that is, allowing a violation when everyone knows that it is allowed to violate the rule in the same circumstances, and comparing this to the estimated consequences of not publicly allowing that kind of violation. I then explain why fully informed, impartial rational persons can sometimes disagree about whether a violation should be publicly allowed and note that such weakly justified violations are the controversial cases.     

Aristotle,Kant, and …Facebook? A Look at the Implications of Social Media on Ethics

The purpose of this study was to explore if and how social media might come to bear on people’s understanding of ethics. Participants were asked to complete online surveys regarding social media interaction and respond to 14 scenarios depicting ethical dilemmas. Our results suggest that social media and people’s perceptions of ethics do share a relationship. Specifically, we found that people who reported being exposed to ethical violations on social media were more likely to find our unethical scenarios to be personally unacceptable, to be of lower ethicality, and to react negatively to the content. These findings suggest that mere exposure to ethical violations is enough to produce awareness in people regarding ethical issues, which carries significant implications for ethics education.     

The protective role of higher intellectual functioning on violence in the household population of Great Britain

Despite compelling evidence of the effect of intelligence on delinquency and violent crime, there is limited data on its impact on population violence. We aimed to determine the association of categories of intelligence with violent behaviors in the general population and the extent of the impact of social class on these associations. A randomly selected sample of 14,738 individuals was derived from 2 British national surveys of adults aged 16 years and older. We measured self-reported violent behavior in the past 5 years, including: repetition, injury, violence while intoxicated, familial and extra-familial victim types and intimate partner violence. We examined the moderating role of social class on all outcomes. The increased risk of violence among persons of below average IQ was explained by social class at population level. High IQ had an overall protective effect on all outcomes except violence towards family members, irrespective of socio-economic circumstances. Social class moderated the association of IQ with violence by decreasing its protective effect among those in the lowest socio-economic positions. Our findings suggest that the association of IQ and violence is not linear but protective on population level. Social class has both an explaining and a moderating role in this association.     

Effects of relational transgressions on idealization of and disillusionment with one's romantic partner: A three‐wave longitudinal study

In this three‐wave study (n = 121 couples), we tested whether one couple‐member's relational transgressions (high and low severity) at Wave 1 predicted less idealization on warmth and competence traits and greater disillusionment by the partner at the next two waves. It was hypothesized that (a) greater frequency of the target partner's severe transgressions in 1 month would be needed to reduce how much the other partner idealized the target in the competence domain, (b) higher frequency of even relatively less severe transgressions would lower the partner's idealization of the target in the warmth domain, and (c) any transgressions would raise perceivers' disillusionment. Longitudinal analyses (controlling for earlier idealization and disillusionment) substantially supported predictions.     

Meaning in life and violations of beliefs and goals: reciprocal relations among individuals with congestive heart failure

Background and objectives: In the context of highly stressful experiences, violations of beliefs and goals and meaning in life may have a reciprocal relationship over time. More violations may lead to lowered meaning, whereas higher meaning may lead to lowered violations. The present study examines this relationship among congestive heart failure (CHF) patients.

Design: A cross-lagged panel design was used.

Methods: CHF patients (N?=?142) reported twice, six months apart, on their meaning in life and the extent to which CHF violates their beliefs and goals.

Results: Overall, results were consistent with a reciprocal relationship, showing that greater goal violations led to negative subsequent changes in meaning, whereas greater meaning led to favorable subsequent changes in violations of beliefs and goals.

Conclusions: Meaning in life and violations may contribute to one another, and therefore, in understanding the adjustment process, it is important to consider their interrelationship. The results are also broadly informative regarding the experience of meaning, showing that disruption of beliefs and goals may undermine meaning.     

Narrow lanes and their effect on drivers’ behaviour at motorway roadworks

In recent years, more use of narrow lanes as a temporary traffic management scheme (TTMS) on UK motorway roadwork sections has been made. The rationale is to free up carriageway space, especially for sites with high traffic demands needing repairs. What remains to be determined is the impact of this work on traffic operation. This is important due to the need to manage traffic operational turbulence which could affect the capacity as well as safety levels in roadwork sections. Site observations (mainly using camcorders from overhead bridges) were made which uncovered two discernible patterns of driving behaviour where narrow lanes are implemented at roadworks, especially when heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) are present: (i) “avoiding” passing/overtaking HGVs travelling in the adjacent lanes and (ii) lane “repositioning” while passing/overtaking which might cause some turbulence to traffic operation. From one site, almost half of the passenger car drivers (including small vans) who were following a HGV on the adjacent lanes were avoiding passing that HGV. Also, nearly three quarters of the observed passenger cars, the passenger car drivers tried to position their vehicles as far away as possible, laterally, from the adjacent HGV while passing/overtaking that HGV in order to widen the lateral gap between their vehicles and the HGV. This resulted in driving too close to the edge of the road markings of their current lane away from the HGV. Therefore, this paper aims to report on the “avoiding” and lane “repositioning” behaviours to help inform traffic management teams/designers using narrow lanes as TTMS and make them aware of such behaviours (especially for motorway sections carrying high percentages of HGVs). Also, the finding from these observations were used in the development of a new micro-simulation model in order to evaluate the effect of such turbulence.     

The unfolding and healing of analytic boundary violations: personal, clinical and cultural considerations

Jungian analysts are not exempt from an unconscious engagement in a group complex. The author hypothesizes that there is a silent, dark legacy of belief in the superiority of men's judgment and the inferiority of women's, left by Jung, that has had a wounding impact on some Jungian analysands. Conscious and public mourning may be needed to heal our cultural complex. The author, a woman, traces the origins of her own patriarchal complexes and reveals how in her first analysis these mingled with the patriarchal complex shared by Jungian institute, her two male analysts and their former analyst, a pillar of the institute's community. Her first analyst aborted her analysis to begin a personal partnership with her. Her second analyst unconsciously colluded with the first analyst in not exploring this outcome as a violation. This resulted in a second compromised treatment. The senior analyst who had been these two analysts' own analyst was consulted, and he too failed to address the transgression. After experiencing severe symptomatology, the patient entered a third analysis with a woman where transference and regression were the focus. Eventually, meaning was found in the confrontations with the particular Jungian organization and its ethics committee, who acknowledged the first analyst's behaviour to be unethical. The author sees this process as a paradigm for the enactment and healing of a group complex.