Time perspective as a predictor of problematic Internet use: A study of Facebook users

Time perspective (TP) has been related to different problematic human behaviors. The work presented in this paper assesses the role of time perspective in predicting problematic Internet use (PIU) by studying a sample (n = 149) of Facebook users. Participants (79 male, 70 female, mean age = 32.40, SD = 11.80) completed electronic versions of the Zimbardo Time Perspective Inventory (ZTPI) to assess their TP, and the Generalized Problematic Internet Use Scale 2 (GPIUS2) to assess their PIU. Results show that Past Negative and Present Fatalistic temporal frames are predictors of problematic Internet use, suggesting that time perspective is an individual difference construct that should be taken into consideration in the context of PIU.     

A Planetary Crisis of Consciousness: The End of Ego-based Cultures and Our Dimensional Shift Toward A Sustainable Global Civilization

This essay presents central themes from my forthcoming book, The Awakening of the Global Mind. This book seeks to open a new frontier of Global Consciousness that has been long emerging in human evolution through the ages. When we step back from our more localized perspectives and expand into a more integral, holistic, and global space through the awakening of the global mind we are able to discern striking mega-trends in cultural evolution across diverse cultural and religious worldviews and perspectives through time. One striking finding through this global lens is that the collective wisdom of humanity is quite clear that we make our living realities through the conduct of our consciousness: our technology of minding. And when we make ourselves and worlds through egocentric patterns of thinking we get polarized and fragmented worlds that are not sustainable. This essay joins a growing chorus of visionary thinkers and futurists which recognizes that in the 21st Century we face grave planetary crises and that our ego-based cultures are at a tipping point and not sustainable. The primary crisis on the planet now is a crisis of consciousness, and our global wisdom suggests that humanity is in a painful transformation toward a more healthful integral technology of mind that ushers in a new sustainable global civilization wherein the whole human family may flourish together on our sacred planet.     

社会服务实践对中学生公民行动意向的影响——社会服务观念的中介作用

本研究对6203名参与过不同形式的社会服务实践的中学生进行调查,考察了中学生参与社会服务实践的现状及其对公民行动意向的影响机制。结果发现:(1)我国中学社会服务实践的质量各维度差异较大,内外调控、深化与拓展、课程关联和自主性得分依次显著降低。(2)中学生参与的社会服务实践在城乡、学校类型、年级上存在显著差异,学校类型和年级的交互作用显著。城市、示范学校、低年级的学生参与的社会服务实践的质量较好,示范学校的优势主要体现在低年级阶段。(3)中学生的社会服务实践经历影响其公民行动意向,而社会服务观念在其中起到部分中介作用。高质量的社会服务实践经历有助于改进中学生的社会服务观念,进而增强其公民行动意向。     

The Self As a Complex Adaptive System Part II: Levels of Analysis and the Position of the Observer

This article continues the project begun in the previous article titled: “The Self as a Complex Adaptive System. Part I: Complexity, Metapsychology, and Developmental Theories” (Palombo, 2013). Using systems theory and a complexity perspective, that article provided a critique of psychoanalytic developmental theories. This contribution addresses some of the methodological issues related to data collection on development and the effects of the observer on the observed. It introduces the Level of Analysis perspective as a heuristic that permits the use of a complexity view applicable to the construct of the self as a complex adaptive system. It proposes three levels, each of which is associated with a platform from which phenomena are observed, a neuropsychological level (L-1), an introspective level (L-2), and an interpersonal level (L-3). The article concludes with a plea for a unifying psychoanalytic paradigm that brings together the data from these three levels and that would lay the groundwork for a clinical theory that would bring together the major existing psychoanalytic theories.     

Family Violence and Health Among Elderly in Croatia

This article presents the research carried out on a sample of 303 elderly men and women. In the last year they reported experiencing violence in the family as follows: psychological abuse (24.1%), financial exploitation (6.4%), physical abuse (4.4%), and sexual abuse (2.1%). The abusers were most often husbands (30.15%), sons (16.64%), daughters (14.01%), and wives (9.21%). In the partner relationship, 44%?of the women and 35%?of the men had experienced at least some form of violence. The results showed that elderly men and women who were victims of family abuse had poorer psychological health than those without such experiences. Elderly who had experienced partner violence consumed alcohol more often than those who had experienced violence by other household members.     

Mindreading abilities in sexual offenders: an analysis of theory of mind processes

The paper aims to assess the theory of mind (ToM) of sexual offenders. We administered to 21 sexual offenders and to 21 nonoffenders two classical first- and second-order ToM tasks, a selection of six Strange Stories, and a semi-structured interview, the Theory of Mind Assessment Scale (Th.o.m.a.s), which provides a multi-dimensional evaluation of ToM, investigating first- vs. third-person and egocentric vs. allocentric perspectives. Results show that sexual offenders performed worse than controls on second-order ToM tasks, on Strange Stories and on each of the Th.o.m.a.s dimensions, whereas they did as well as the control group on first-order ToM tasks. A detailed analysis of participants’ performance on Th.o.m.a.s. showed that sex offenders performed worse on the third-person than on the first-person ToM scale, and worse on the allocentric than on the egocentric perspective; these findings did not apply to the controls. Implications for future research and treatment are discussed.     

The effects of time perspective and level of construal on social distance

Psychological causes of social distance were examined from the perspective of Construal Level Theory (CLT; Liberman, Trope, & Stephan, 2007), which predicts that temporal distance from and abstract construal of a social target would create perception of social distance. Our studies demonstrate that expectations for temporally remote (versus proximal) social interaction produce greater social distance from a target person, measured as reduced familiarity (Study 1) and as reduced similarity to the self (Study 2). We also show that a more abstract, higher level construal of a social target results in less familiarity (Study 3) and in less allocation of resources (Study 4). The research sheds light on how social closeness can be promoted or hindered by previously unaddressed psychological factors.     

Can't get over me: Ego depletion attenuates prosocial effects of perspective taking

Many studies attest to the beneficial and prosocial effects of perspective taking. The present research tests the notion that such perspective taking is a process involving active self‐regulation and, hence, that effects of perspective taking on prosocial behaviour are more pronounced when self‐control resources are high, rather than low. Results confirmed this hypothesis. Across two experiments using acts of compliance as a specific form of prosocial behaviour, perspective‐taking participants were more willing to comply with a request for help by the experimenter (experiment 1) and donated more time to a charitable cause (experiment 2) than participants who did not engage in perspective taking, but only when self‐regulatory resources were in sufficient supply. Under conditions of ego depletion, the impact of perspective taking on compliance was attenuated. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Eye movement suppression interferes with construction of object-centered spatial reference frames in working memory

The brain’s frontal eye fields (FEF), responsible for eye movement control, are known to be involved in spatial working memory (WM).In a previous fMRI experiment (Wallentin, Roepstorff & Burgess, Neuropsychologia, 2008) it was found that FEF activation was primarily related to the formation of an object-centered, rather than egocentric, spatial reference frame. In this behavioral experiment we wanted to demonstrate a causal relationship between eye movement control and manipulation of spatial reference frames. Sixty-two participants recalled either spatial (“Was X in front of Y?”) or non-spatial (“Was X darker than Y?”) relations in a previously shown image containing two to four objects, each with an intrinsic orientation and unique luminance. During half of all recall trials a moving visual stimulus was presented, which participants had to ignore, thus suppressing eye movement. Response times were significantly slower for spatial relations with distraction while there was no effect on non-spatial relations. There was no effect on accuracy, i.e. WM maintenance. This is consistent with the hypothesis that in spatial representations the FEFs are involved in WM content manipulation, such as establishing an object-centered spatial frame of reference.     

Internationalizing counselling: A Southeast Asian perspective

To learn about our Southeast Asian colleagues’ views on internationalizing counselling psychology to Asian cultures, we interviewed eight counselling psychologists who had received their doctoral training in the United States. Four of the participants were currently practicing and teaching in their native countries and four in the United States. Using the basic principles of Grounded Theory [Glaser, B., & Strauss, A. (1967). The discovery of grounded theory. Chicago, IL: Aldine.], we derived two themes from the data: (1) major assumptions in US counselling psychology that may limit its transferability to Southeast Asian cultures and (2) practices in learning, training, and cultural adjusting for future development and internationalization of counselling psychology. The participants emphasized the need for indigenization and knowledge sharing in the efforts to internationalize counselling psychology.