‘I didn’t realise I was such a sausage’: men’s accounts of whole-body scanning,body image,and expected changes in health-related behaviours

Objective: Whole-body scanning is now available in stores to assist buyers in choosing well-fitting clothes. This study was designed to investigate men’s accounts of scanning, body image and expectations of behaviour change. Design: Ten men aged 18–39 years without histories of eating disorders or previous experience of whole-body scanning, took part in semi-structured interviews before and after scanning. Data were analysed using inductive thematic analysis. Results: Pre-scan, men’s body ideals were tall, slender and relatively muscular. Post-scan, seven reported looking shorter, fatter, thinner and/or less symmetrical than they hoped; three were pleasantly surprised by the images. Men were interested in scans as an objective view of their bodies and as a ‘wake-up call’ to motivate healthy behaviours. Five men intended to change their behaviour as a result of scanning, and repeat scanning was seen as a good way to monitor behavioural changes. Participants suggested that scanning may raise body concerns in other men, though downplayed impacts on their own body image. Conclusion: Whole-body scanning may encourage men to exercise and eat more healthily. However, men became more negative about their bodies as a result of seeing their body scans, so scanning needs to be carried out with supervision and support.     

The dynamic and recursive interplay of embodiment and narrative identity

Although there is an increase in research into how narrative identity interrelates with embodiment, the mechanisms underlying this interplay are hardly addressed. In this paper, I target this hiatus in the literature by proposing two mechanisms that can help to (non-exhaustively) elucidate the dynamic interplay of narrative identity and embodiment. I start by briefly sketching the debate so far and then go on to argue that the way narrative self-understanding affects our embodiment can be understood on the model of narrative self-programming. After that I turn to the other side of the interaction. Drawing on research in ecological psychology and phenomenology, I show how embodiment affects our narrative self-understanding through the way in which we engage with affordances in our narrative background. After that I highlight the dynamic and recursive character of this interplay. I end with some conclusions and unresolved issues.     

DOWN TO EARTH WITH NIETZSCHE: The ethical effects of attitudes toward time and body

This paper is about the effects on people's lives of their attitudes towards time and their own embodiment. People commonly see time as biform; there is the time of bodily life and the eternal time which transcends mortal life. This division is deeply implicated in the dualistic values that pervade western thought. So, when Nietzsche substitutes a monist notion of time, he profoundly unsettles our cherished values (which, of course, are gendered). Nietzsche's major thrust, I argue, is to elucidate and advocate the more appropriate values that emerge when human existence is understood as entirely earthborn.I use two contrasting literary characters to show concretely how people's lives and relationships are affected negatively or positively according to the temporal perspectives they adopt (and thus the significance they give to their corporeality). I explain how acceptance of human finitude enables a fruitful and rewarding life, while its refusal is life-diminishing. This also makes conceivable a realm beyond gender.     

Is `Property' Necessary? On Owning the Human Body and its Parts

Courts usually treat control over human bodies and body parts as a property issue and find that people do not have property rights in themselves. This contradicts the liberal philosophical principle that people should be able to perform any self-regarding actions that do not cause harm to others. The philosophical inconsistencies under pinning the legal treatment of body parts arguably stem from a misplaced judicial preoccupation with‘property’. A better approach would be to hold a policy inquiry into the degree of liberty a society wishes to grant its inhabitants. Only once this substantive issue has been addressed should property be raised as a possible method of implementing the policy. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Control and legacy as functions of perceived criticality in major incidents

This paper outlines a model that captures the experiences of 28 Senior Officers who have managed some of the most significant police incidents in the UK in the past 5 years. The process for capturing the model rests on ‘pragmatic psychology’ (Fishman, 1999; Alison, West & Goodwill, 2003), a paradigm that recognizes practitioners' experiences as a central component of research and policy development. We utilized a set of connected electronic notebooks to enable each critical incident manager to log their experiences and views of the case that they managed. As each individual logs this information, it is simultaneously distributed to all participants. Thus, information is rapidly shared, stimulating further thought and discussion. Following the initial knowledge‐sharing phase, participants reorder the material into themed categories that can then be scored against specific criteria (in this case ‘impact’ and ‘ease’). This session revealed that senior officers consider a combination of two co‐occurring issues as most significant in defining the ‘criticality’ of the incident: (i) how direct an impact the facet has on the enquiry at hand; and (ii) whether that issue will influence how the service will be judged (by the community, the victims and the media). These issues were perceived as the most complex and difficult to deal with. We argue that this perception is a joint function of perceived lack of control alongside the belief that judgment and blame regarding the incident will ultimately reside with them as managers. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Can heterosexual counsellors or generic agencies help same‐sex couples? An exploratory study

Gay men and women were interviewed in single‐sex focus groups in order to learn more about the therapeutic help that could be offered to people in same‐sex relationships. Interviews were analysed using the constant comparative method. Among the various themes that emerged was the need to have their relationships valued and accepted and the damaging effects of living in a heterosexist and homophobic society. The need for men, in particular, to identify a set of developmental stages for gay relationships was important. Difficulties in seeking help from mainstream organisations are discussed and recommendations made for both counsellors and agencies.     

Planning, personality, and prediction: The role of future focus in optimistic time predictions

The present studies examined cognitive processes underlying the tendency to underestimate project completion times. Two experiments tested the hypothesis that people generate overly optimistic predictions, in part, because they focus narrowly on their future plans for the target task and thus neglect other useful sources of information. Consistent with the hypothesis, instructing participants to adopt a “future focus”—in which they generated concrete, specific plans for the task at hand—led them to make more optimistic predictions about when they would complete their intended Christmas shopping (Study 1) and major school assignments (Study 2). The future focus manipulation did not have a corresponding effect on actual completion times, and thus increased the degree of optimistic bias in prediction. The studies also demonstrated that the optimistic prediction bias generalized across different task domains, relevant individual differences (i.e., trait optimism and procrastination), and other contextual variations.     

Across the Martian Frontier? Thoughts on Planet B,a Martian Safety Valve,and the Earth as Our Body

Even though we are on the precipice of a “bad Anthropocene,” humankind should not colonize Mars. Mars is often depicted as our “Planet B”—an evacuation plan for Earth. But in this time of ecological crisis, theologian Sallie McFague suggests that we think of the Earth as God’s body and take our obligation to care for our common home seriously. Likewise, in contrast to calls for colonization, I contend that two American historical anecdotes—the safety valve theory and the Yellowstone—illustrate why humanity should think less about becoming Martians and instead find meaning and purpose in remaining Earthlings.     

问责能否抑制个体非伦理行为？——调节定向和自我损耗的作用机制

根据以往研究,问责对于非伦理行为的影响可能产生混淆的结论,它既可能降低,也可能促进非伦理行为的产生,即出现“问责失灵”的情况。鉴于此,本文通过实验研究来探究问责失灵的理论边界和内在机制。结果发现：（1）促进定向启动下的个体,问责对于非伦理行为有促进作用;预防定向下的个体,问责对于非伦理行为有抑制作用;（2）促进定向启动下,问责通过增加个体的自我损耗增强了其非伦理行为,即促进定向下个体的自我损耗中介了问责与非伦理行为的关系。     

The man who lost his body: Suboptimal multisensory integration yields body awareness problems after a right temporoparietal brain tumour

Reports on patients who lack ownership over their entire body are extremely rare. Here, we present patient SA who suffered from complete body disownership after a tumour resection in the right temporoparietal cortex. Neuropsychological assessment disclosed selective bilateral ownership problems, despite intact primary visual and somatosensory senses. SA's disownership seems to stem from a suboptimal multimodal integration, as shown by the rubber hand illusion and the beneficial effect during and after simple exercises aiming at multisensory recalibration.