Evidence-based training in cognitive-behavioural coaching: can personal development bring less distress and better performance?

Coaching has become during the past years an emergent guidance profession. Cognitive-behavioural coaching (CBC) emphasises the importance of enhancing the emotion–regulation abilities of clients and replacing their non-productive behaviours. Qualified professionals are needed in order to effectively facilitate the desired changes in their clients. We aimed to investigate the effectiveness of the personal development component within a training programme in CBC. Pre- to post-training comparisons showed a reduction in the participants’ level of depressed mood, as well as an improvement in their work performance. The active components were the emotion–regulation skills acquired and the quality of their homework tasks. Implications are discussed underlying the use of an evidence-based approach for training professionals in the field of CBC.     

What personal selling and sales management recommendations from developed markets are relevant in emerging markets?

As emerging markets continue to grow, research on personal selling and sales management in these settings is coming to the fore, as this special issue of Journal of Personal Selling and Sales Management attests. With an in-depth review of extant research, this contribution addresses three key research questions. First, are there differences between established/recommended theories or styles or paradigms for effective personal selling and sales management in developed markets and emerging markets? The survey suggests there are. Second, are culture variables, traditionally used in extant research, sufficient to differentiate between developed and emerging markets? The presented analysis suggests that culture must be combined with economic variables to establish clear contexts that reflect developed and emerging markets. Third, what classification framework can serve to examine personal selling and sales management strategies in terms of their applicability in both developed and emerging markets? This article derives such a classification framework by organizing extant sales research into categories where either small differences in research findings between developed and emerging markets are expected, or where large differences in research findings are expected. Propositions for the category of selling process and technique are derived. Overall, these findings suggest the need for substantial research that examines the differences between developed and emerging markets, because of the vast implications for theory, research, and practice.     

Fieldwork Using the Professional Development Schools Model: Developing a Social Justice Orientation and Multicultural Competency

Practicum fieldwork was conducted in an urban high school setting using a Professional Development Schools (PDS) model, with a focus on multicultural and social justice counseling competencies (MSJCC). Interpretative phenomenological analysis was used to analyze the journal responses of 16 counseling students to ascertain MSJCC development during fieldwork. Themes emerged related to multicultural counseling skills, self‐awareness, understanding educational inequities, and serving as agents of change. Implications of using a PDS model in counselor training are explored. Se llevó a cabo un trabajo de campo en práctica clínica en una escuela secundaria usando un modelo de Escuelas de Desarrollo Profesional (PDS, por sus siglas en inglés), con un enfoque en las competencias en consejería multicultural y de justicia social (MSJCC, por sus siglas en inglés). Se empleó un análisis fenomenológico interpretativo para analizar las respuestas registradas de 16 estudiantes de consejería para determinar el desarrollo de las MSJCC durante el trabajo de campo. Surgieron temas relacionados con las habilidades en consejería multicultural, la autoconciencia, la comprensión de desigualdades educativas, y la actuación como agentes de cambio. Se exploran las implicaciones de usar un modelo PDS en la formación de consejeros.     

A process model of buyer responses to salesperson transgressions and recovery efforts: the impact of salesperson orientation

Despite the damaging effects often associated with salesperson transgressions, our understanding of how buyers respond to these transgressions and the recovery efforts that typically follow is limited. The authors address this shortcoming across two studies of professional buyers. In the first, the authors examine buyers’ responses to salesperson ethical and service transgressions as moderated by their perceptions of the salesperson (i.e. whether they perceive the salesperson as being selling-oriented (SO) or customer-oriented (CO)). In the second study, the authors contrast the effects of an apology versus compensation in examining buyers’ responses to the overall transgression and recovery episode. Although study results indicate that a customer orientation amplifies buyers’ responses to the initial transgression, they also indicate that buyers’ responses to the overall episode are primarily a function of whether the recovery effort conforms to their expectations. Hence, while favorable salesperson perceptions (i.e. being perceived as CO) are detrimental in the context of the initial transgression, they are beneficial in the context of the overall transgression and recovery episode.     

Memory and mineness in personal identity

Stanley Klein and Shaun Nichols (2012) describe the case of patient R.B., whose memories (they claim) lacked the sense of “mineness” usually conveyed by memory. Klein and Nichols take R.B.’s case to show that the sense of mineness is merely a contingent feature of memory, which they see as raising two problems for memory-based accounts of personal identity. First, they see it as potentially undermining the appeal of memory-based accounts. Second, they take it to show that the conception of quasi-memory that underpins many memory-based accounts is inadequate. I argue that Klein and Nichols’ characterization of R.B.’s experience is implausible; as a result, the problems that they describe for memory-based accounts of personal identity do not arise.     

Determinants of pro‐environmental consumption intention in rural China: The role of traditional cultures,personal attitudes and reference groups

This study aimed to identify social‐psychological predictors of pro‐environmental consumption intention in rural China. To this end, a proposed conceptual model was tested by analyzing the survey data derived from 972 rural respondents in Jiangxi province in south‐eastern China. Results showed that the endorsement of traditional cultures (man–nature orientation and collectivism) was linked with pro‐environmental consumption behaviuor, but was mediated by intentions. Personal attitudes (environmental cognition and environmental affect) and reference groups influenced both intention and behaviour. The results also provided good evidence of the intention–behaviour relationship. These findings provided a better understanding of the process in which Chinese rural residents developed their pro‐environmental consumption behaviours.     

Ease‐of‐retrieval effects on procedural justice judgements under conditions of informational and personal uncertainty

This study tests whether individuals' reliance on ease‐of‐retrieval processes when forming procedural justice judgements are moderated by informational and personal uncertainty. In Studies 1 and 2 we examined the predicted effects of informational uncertainty. Results indicated that participants in information‐uncertain conditions relied on ease‐of‐retrieval, whereas those in information‐certain conditions relied on content information to make procedural justice judgements. In Study 3 we examined the combined effects of informational uncertainty and personal uncertainty on reliance on ease‐of‐retrieval when forming procedural justice judgements. The findings of Study 3 indicated that personal uncertain participants who were in informational certain conditions based their procedural justice judgements on content information, whereas all other participants based their procedural justice judgements on ease‐of‐retrieval. This is the first paper to demonstrate that the joint effect of informational uncertainty and personal uncertainty on reliance on ease‐of‐retrieval is different from the two uncertainties acting alone.     

A call for dialogue: psychotherapists and psychologists specialising in psychotherapy

The development of psychotherapy as an independent discipline in many countries in Europe has stimulated debate within the field of psychology as to what constitutes psychotherapy as a specialism of psychology. The authors, both clinical psychologists who pursued further training in psychotherapy, offer a reflection in this paper on the historical battle between psychiatry and psychology for ‘ownership’ of psychotherapy, describe recent developments in Europe to clarify this specialism within psychology and discuss the distinctive contributions that psychologists offer in developing psychotherapy as a specialism within the discipline. The aim of the paper is to begin a dialogue both within the profession of psychology and outside the profession, with our psychotherapy colleagues, that can develop into an interdisciplinary discourse and a more mutually respectful professional environment.     

Dissociative identity disorder and ambivalence

While many theorists have argued that dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a case of multiple selves or persons in a single body, I maintain that DID instead should be understood as involving a single self who suffers from significant disruptions to self-consciousness. Evidence of overlapping abilities and memories, as well as the very logic of dissociation, supports the claim that DID results from internal conflict endured by a single self. Along these lines, I will maintain that alter-formation should be understood as the result of extreme emotional ambivalence. While it is true that subjects with DID exhibit volitional conflict, as Frankfurt [1988. The Importance of What We Care About. New York: Cambridge University Press; 1999. Necessity, Volition, and Love. New York: Cambridge University Press] maintains, I argue that these incompatible volitions have a deeper source: conflicting desires and affective stances concerning basic emotional needs that are not easily abandoned. A single subject turns to different alter-personalities as a way to cope with pervasive inner conflict while at the same time hiding contradictory impulses from herself.