How a Mental Health Professional Handles Referrals and Fees

Summary

The choice of referral and the relationship between referral sources can pose clinical and ethical dilemmas, due to the potential that the relationship between the psychologist and the referral source will interfere with the treatment relationship. Once the referral has been made, the referring psychologist must be sensitive to a second, and often a more problematic level of risk: conflicts that occur between the patient and the referral recipient. The situation becomes even more problematic when a psychologist is giving or receiving any form of compensation in connection with the referral. In addition to clouding the clinical relationship, the giving or receiving of such compensation, whether it is characterized as “referral fees” or otherwise, has important legal consequences, and may well result in license revocation proceedings or even criminal liability.     

Gender Differences in PTSD diagnostic Criteria and Suicidal Ideation in a South African Police Sample

The study examined gender effects on PTSD symptoms to predict of suicidal ideation in a sample of South African police. A male (N = 161) and a female group (N = 56) of South African police officers were assessed by means of the Posttraumatic Diagnostic Scale and a short version of the Adult Suicide Ideation Questionnaire. Linear and stepwise regressions were used to determine which PTSD symptom criteria best predict suicide ideation. Hyperarousal was the primary predictor of suicide ideation in males. For females, intrusive memories was the primary predictor of suicide ideation, and of general problems.     

Calvin and the Ecclesiastical Power of Jurisdiction

Abstract

This study offers a hypothesis that the two marks of the Church in the Calvinist Reformed tradition, together with its disciplinary power, restate the twin classical powers granted to the Church in Catholic tradition, namely the powers of order and jurisdiction. Unlike Luther, for whom the chief ecclesiastical power was the authority to preach and teach, Calvin not only acknowledges the teaching and sacramental functions of the Church, but also stressed a jurisdictional power (jurisdictio fori) with autonomous legislative and judicial competence. This jurisdictional dimension is the key to explaining the role played by Geneva-inspired Reformed churches vis-à-vis the State and differences from other other Protestant traditions.     

Influence of Speed and Accuracy Constraints on Motor Learning for a Trajectory-Based Movement

This study investigated the influences of task constraint on motor learning for a trajectory-based movement considering the speed–accuracy relationship. In the experiment, participants practiced trajectory-based movements for five consecutive days. The participants were engaged in training with time-minimization or time-matching constraints. The results demonstrated that the speed–accuracy tradeoff was not apparent or was weak in the training situation. When the participants practiced the movement with a time-minimization constraint, movement errors did not vary, whereas the movement time decreased. With the time-matching constraint, the errors decreased as a session proceeded. These results were discussed in terms of the combination of signal-dependent noises and exploratory search noises. It is suggested that updating spatial and temporal factors does not appear to occur simultaneously in motor learning.     

Subjective Difficulty of Movements With Ongoing Visual Control

Objective difficulty of a single-component visually controlled movement may be defined by Fitts's (1954) Index of Difficulty, which is a measure of difficulty in the sense that movement time is linearly related to the objective measure. For movements that have multiple components, it becomes difficult to determine an objective measure of task difficulty due to unknown interactions between components of the movement and interactions with other factors. Thus, it may be necessary to use indirect methods for allocating a measure of task difficulty. The purpose of the study was to determine whether participants could validly construct a subjective measure of the movement difficulty and whether this measure was related to the known objective measure of difficulty. Experiments showed that for single-component movements, there was a close relationship between measures of subjective and objective difficulty. With two-component visually controlled movements it was found that subjective difficulty could be related to objective difficulty, but not as simply as for single-component tasks.     

The Activity-Set Hypothesis For Warm-Up Decrement in a Movement-Speed Task

The activity-set hypothesis that warm-up decrement (WUD) is caused by loss over rest of a generalized readiness to respond was tested using a right-hand movement-time task. 34 university males practiced 20 trials of the right-hand task, and then had a 10-min. no-practice period during which they either rested (Condition REST) or rested plus practiced a left-hand movement-time task, (Condition ACT). When Ss were transferred to the right-hand task, Condition REST produced large WUD which was quickly eliminated, whereas Condition ACT produced no WUD. This supported the hypothesis that the left-hand task reinstated the activity set for movement speed, and that WUD is the loss of a generalized non-habit readiness to respond. Implications for rival hypotheses for WUD were discussed.     

Planning Maximally Smooth Hand Movements Constrained to Nonplanar Workspaces

The article characterizes hand paths and speed profiles for movements performed in a nonplanar, 2-dimensional workspace (a hemisphere of constant curvature). The authors assessed endpoint kinematics (i.e., paths and speeds) under the minimum-jerk model assumptions and calculated minimal amplitude paths (geodesics) and the corresponding speed profiles. The authors also calculated hand speeds using the 2/3 power law. They then compared modeled results with the empirical observations. In all, 10 participants moved their hands forward and backward from a common starting position toward 3 targets located within a hemispheric workspace of small or large curvature. Comparisons of modeled observed differences using 2-way RM-ANOVAs showed that movement direction had no clear influence on hand kinetics (p < .05). Workspace curvature affected the hand paths, which seldom followed geodesic lines. Constraining the paths to different curvatures did not affect the hand speed profiles. Minimum-jerk speed profiles closely matched the observations and were superior to those predicted by 2/3 power law (p < .001). The authors conclude that speed and path cannot be unambiguously linked under the minimum-jerk assumption when individuals move the hand in a nonplanar 2-dimensional workspace. In such a case, the hands do not follow geodesic paths, but they preserve the speed profile, regardless of the geometric features of the workspace.     

The Cascade Neural Network Model and a Speed-Accuracy Trade-Off of Arm Movement

We propose a hybrid neural network model of aimed arm movements that consists of a feedforward controller and a postural controller. The cascade neural network of Kawato, Maeda, Uno, and Suzuki (1990) was employed as a computational implementation of the feedforward controller. This network computes feedforward motor commands based on a minimum torque-change criterion. If the weighting parameter of the smoothness criterion is fixed and the number of relaxation iterations is rather small, the cascade model cannot calculate the exact torque, and the hand does not reach the desired target by using the feedforward control alone. Thus, one observes an error between the final position and the desired target location. By using a fixed weighting parameter value and a limited iteration number to simulate target-directed arm movements, we found that the cascade model generated a planning time–accuracy trade-off, and a quasi–power-law type of speed–accuracy trade-off. The model provides a candidate neural mechanism to explain the stochastic variability of the time course of the feedforward motor command. Our approach also accounts for several invariant features of multijoint arm trajectories, such as roughly straight hand paths and bell-shaped speed profiles.