Indian Women’s Experience of a Narrative Intervention Using Art And Writing*

International and minority populations tend to underutilize mental health services, including marriage and family therapy. Models of marriage and family therapy developed in the West may reflect Western values and norms inappropriate for diverse cultural contexts. This article presents an exploratory, qualitative study of a narrative therapy approach with Asian Indian women. This study adds to the small body of narrative-based empirical studies, and has a unique focus on intercultural applications and the experience of participants. Participant experience was examined along four phenomenological dimensions. Findings indicate the suitability of narrative interventions and nontraditional treatment delivery for this population.*This research was presented in 2004 at the annual conference of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy.     

执行功能中认知灵活性发展的研究进展

近十多年以来,执行功能已成为研究的热点和前沿。认知灵活性是执行功能的主要成分,它对个体能力发展和对环境适应的方面起着重要作用。该文从认知灵活性的本质、发展、研究方法及其与教育的关系进行探讨。     

Using Methods That Matter: The Impact of Reflection,Dialogue, and Voice

In recent years, the field of community psychology has given considerable attention to how research and evaluation methods should be designed to support our goals of empowerment and social justice. Yet, as a field, we have given much less attention to whether the use of our methods actually achieves or supports our empowerment agenda. With the primary purpose of beginning to establish the norm of reporting on the impacts of our methods, this paper reports on the findings from interviews of 16 youth and adults who had participated in one participatory evaluation method (Photovoice). Two specific questions were examined: (1) What is the impact of participating in a Photovoice effort; and (2) How does the method of Photovoice foster these impacts? Overall, participants noted that they were significantly affected by their experiences as photographers and through their dialogue with neighbors during Photovoice group sessions. Impacts ranged from an increased sense of control over their own lives to the emergence of the kinds of awareness, relationships, and efficacy supportive of participants becoming community change agents. According to participants, Photovoice fostered these changes by (a) empowering them as experts on their lives and community, (b) fostering deep reflection, and (c) creating a context safe for exploring diverse perspectives. The implications of these findings for the science and practice of community psychology are discussed.     

Punctuated Equilibrium,Moral Panics and the Ethics Review Process

A review of the literature and ethnographic data from Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United States, and the United Kingdom on the research ethics review process suggest that moral panics can become triggers for punctuated equilibrium in the review process at both the macro and microlevel, albeit with significantly different levels of magnitude and impact. These data suggest that neither the development of the ethics review process nor the process itself proceeds gradually, but both are characterized by periodic major shifts evoked by particular events or situations that result in varying levels of moral panic. One way to deal with this moral panic is to increase the regulation of research and the depth or intensity of the scrutiny of applications under ethics review. Moral panics at the macrolevel influence those at the microlevel and, if the moral panic evoked at the local or microlevel is not satisfactorily resolved, it will evoke action at a higher level. Understanding the evolution of research ethics review processes from this perspective might help make actions by ethics committees and policy makers more understandable and help explain why attention to research ethics are heightened at particular points in time. It may also provide a basis for developing recommendations for adaptations to the ethics review process and policy at both the local and macrolevel.     

督导重要事件对新手咨询师专业成长的影响

目的：了解个别督导过程中重要事件的类型、内涵及对新手咨询师专业成长的影响。方法：采用重要事件法,访谈4对受督者和督导师,并用共识性质性研究法分析。结果：有益重要事件包括督导关系、概念化、历程化、个人化4大类;督导促进了新手咨询师干预技巧能力、治疗计划目标等8个专业领域的成长。结论：督导对于新手咨询师专业成长非常重要。各类督导事件对于新手咨询师的促进作用并不均衡。     

Beyond the Frontstage: Trust, Access, and the Relational Context in Research with Refugee Communities

This paper examines the role of trust and the concept of access as they affect the relational context in which community research, and research with refugee communities in particular, is conducted. Sociologist Irving Goffman's metaphor of frontstage and backstage behavior is used to illustrate the complexity and importance of developing of relations of trust, and thereby gaining "backstage" access, in communities that are generally closed to outsiders. It is argued that gaining authentic ("backstage") access to refugee communities, as well as other communities that have developed a self-protective insularity, is essential if we are to gather data that accurately reflect the actual beliefs, feelings, and experiences of community members. The paper then examines the puzzling lack of discussion regarding issues of trust, access, and the relational context in the literature on refugee mental health. Explanations for this apparent inattention are sought in the influence of the prevailing scientific paradigm that guides most research with refugees, and that shapes the values of the field's "gatekeepers," the editors and reviewers of scholarly journals. Throughout the paper, key points are illustrated with examples drawn from the author's research with refugees from Guatemala, Bosnia, and Afghanistan.     

文化与心理--研究维果茨基文化历史理论的现代意义

维果茨基文化历史理论对当今研究文化与心理关系问题的启示在于：坚持唯物的辨证方法论是研究文化与心理关系问题的基础;创造性地以符号为中介,以符号作为高级心理机能社会文化历史理论的基础,使文化与心理之间有了联系的桥梁;“实验发生法”为当今实验的生态有效性研究奠定了理论基础;强调从文化的维度来解释人的心理的产生和发展,推动了西方心理学的文化转向;强调社会文化对人的心理发展的决定作用,为心理学的后现代建构提供了理论基础。     

The morality of weapons research

I ask whether weapons research is ever justified. Weapons research is identified as the business of the engineer. It is argued that the engineer has responsibility for the uses to which the tools that he designs can be put, and that responsibility extends to the use of weapons. It is maintained that there are no inherently defensive weapons, and hence there is no such thing as ‘defensive’ weapons research. The issue then is what responsibilities as a professional the engineer has in regard to such research. An account is given to ground the injunction not to provide the means to harm as a duty for the engineers. This account is not, however, absolutist, and as such it allows justifiable exceptions. The answer to my question is thus not that weapons research is never justified but there must be a strong assurance that the results will only be used as a just means in a just cause.     

The placebo effect in popular culture

This paper gives an overview of the placebo effect in popular culture, especially as it pertains to the work of authors Patrick O’Brian and Sinclair Lewis. The beloved physician as placebo, and the clinician scientist as villain are themes that respectively inform the novels, The Hundred Days and Arrowsmith. Excerpts from the novels, and from film show how the placebo effect, and the randomized clinical trial, have emerged into popular culture, and evolved over time. An earlier version of this paper was presented at an international conference, “Placebo: Its Action and Place in Health Research Today,” held in Warsaw, Poland on 12–13 April, 2003.     

Review of studies evaluating psychotherapy in bulimia nervosa: the influence of research methods

The purpose of the study was to test if design and research methods of studies predict outcome results of bulimia nervosa. Fifty-seven articles on outcome of bulimia nervosa were found through MEDLINE and PSYCHINFO databases and 25 were included in the statistical analysis. Percentages of patients with a good outcome ranged from 24% to 74% with a mean of 51.1%. The variables best predicting outcome were time to follow-up and number of symptoms evaluated in definition of good outcome whereas dropout, design of studies, treatments, and sample characteristics did not predict significantly. The implications of these findings are discussed.