Representations of celebrities' weight and shape during pregnancy and postpartum: a content analysis of three entertainment magazine websites

Entertainment magazine websites provide a continuous stream of celebrity news accessed by over 13 million unique viewers each month. Celebrities’ experiences of pregnancy and new motherhood appear to be popular topics within these media outlets; however, little research has investigated the content of this coverage. In this study, investigators coded articles (N = 387) published between August 1, 2007 and August 1, 2008 on three popular entertainment magazine websites. Relatively few articles about celebrities’ pregnancies discussed weight (13%) or shape (30%), and an even smaller proportion (6.2%) included any discussion of postpartum body dissatisfaction. This suggests a gap between portrayal of celebrities’ pregnancies and postpartum experiences and those of non-celebrity women. This disparity is concerning as it might lead to unrealistic expectations about pregnancy and postpartum for both pregnant readers and a more general audience. This study provides important initial information about the messages these media provide regarding pregnancy-related appearance.     

青少年心目中的理想父母形象研究

以690名初一、高一和大一学生为被试,采用自制的词表,运用因素分析方法研究青少年心目中的理想父母形象,并比较不同青少年理想父母形象之差异。结果发现:(1)当代青少年心目中理想父母形象应具备的五项主要特征是:尊重沟通、与子为友,能力强、善于交际,正义乐群,正视现实,品德好、有原则;(2)女孩比男孩更重视父母与她们的沟通与相处;(3)随着年龄的增长,孩子对父母与自己相处态度的要求逐渐提高,而对父母的能力、生活态度、品德的要求逐渐降低;(4)是否独生子女、家庭收入水平对青少年心目中的理想父母形象也有一定影响,不同家庭结构青少年心目中的理想父母形象则没有差异。     

Positive fantasies or negative contrasts: The effect of media body ideals on restrained eaters’ mood,weight satisfaction,and food intake

Although viewing media body ideals promotes body dissatisfaction and problematic eating among women (e.g., extreme restraint/overeating), some argue that women only report such negative effects because they think that they are meant to (i.e., demand characteristics). Because restrained eaters are trying to lose weight, they might be vulnerable to such media exposure. However, because of demand characteristics, evidence is mixed. Therefore, we minimized demand characteristics and explored whether media body ideals would trigger restrained eaters to report negative (negative mood, weight dissatisfaction) or positive (positive mood, weight satisfaction) effects. We also hypothesized that this change (negative or positive) would encourage food intake. Restrained and unrestrained eaters (n = 107) memorized media or control images. Restrained eaters exposed to media images reported decreased weight satisfaction and increased negative mood, but their food intake was not significantly affected. Perhaps paying advertent attention to the images caused goal-related negative affect, which triggered restraint.     

Body ideals in women after viewing images of typical and healthy weight models

Viewing thin models, pervasive in popular culture, is correlated with body dissatisfaction and anxiety in women. Whether or not the same is true when viewing healthy weight models is unknown. In this study we tested whether viewing healthy weight models increases the ideal female body size. Body image, anxiety, happiness and depression were measured in 44 female participants following viewing of images of thin or healthy weight models (within-subject separated by two weeks). We found that after viewing images of healthy weight models, women's body ideals (as measured by a participant-adjusted virtual model) were significantly larger than when the same women viewed images of very thin models. This effect was greatest in those women with the highest levels of baseline anxiety (as measured by the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale). These results suggest that viewing healthy weight models results in more healthy body ideals than those typically promoted through media.     

Superego and perversion

Contemporary debates about the Freudian notion of superego are presented highlighting the importance of this notion for both psychoanalytic theory of culture and clinical work. Different versions of the relationship between superego and moral conscience, as well as between superego and ego ideal are identified, which may account for the contradictory positive and negative aspects that the superego assumes in Freudian theory. Points of convergence and divergence between Kantian categorical imperative and the superego are discussed.     

‘Nachträglichkeit’: The intermediary of an unassimilated impression and experience

In this paper, Freud's recommendations regarding the timing of interventions are reviewed, especially the work of pointing out and interpreting resistance-phenomena. This is compared to recent developments in psychoanalytic technique. Interventions, their timing and effect are illustrated by clinical material from three psychoanalyses. The possibility of integrating the different recommendations is discussed. An overall experience is that the most demanding work is that of making resistance-phenomena observable for both parties in the analytic situation. It is demonstrated how this precondition can be developed through the analyst's experience of the interaction, and thus give the time for intervention.     

Unfolding the Measurement of the Creative Personality

Gough's Creative Personality Scale (CPS) is a self‐report personality inventory for creativity assessment. We investigated the undimensionality and the response process on the CPS from an ideal point (unfolding) perspective. The Graded Unfolding Model (GUM) was used to model binary responses and participants were 228 engineering students who completed a Greek version of the CPS. Results support the undimensionality of the CPS construct and suggest that unfolding measurement models may provide new insights to the assessment of creativity.     

Getting it right: a reply to baum

In this reply to Baum, I emphasize that the failure to understand the processes associated with scientific verbal behavior may result in scientific statements like the generalized matching law that do not accurately reflect cause-and-effect relations.     

外圆内方,刚柔相济——试论《周易》塑造的理想人格模式

《周易》作为五经之首,对于中华民族性格有着重要的影响,其中很重要的一个方面是通过诠释古老的天圆地方宇宙观,塑造了中华民族外圆内方的理想人格模式:效法天道,刚健自强,圆转不穷;效法地道,守正固本,崇德广业;刚柔立本,变通趋时,方智圆神。但是,中国人在现实生活中却很难实现外圆内方、圆神方智的理想,总是处于非圆即方的状态:多数人却走向了世故圆滑,那些始终坚持内在品质和理想的少数人才是中华民族的脊梁。