Ecstasy Use,Outcome Expectancies,and Sexual Risk Taking

Ecstasy has become one of the most widely used illicit drugs in Australia. This study investigated outcome expectancies as possible motivating and maintaining factors in ecstasy use and sexual risk‐taking behaviour. A sample of regular ecstasy users (N = 220) from Sydney and Canberra, Australia, was recruited for structured face‐to‐face interviews. They also completed an Ecstasy Expectancy Questionnaire. Seven of eight subscales significantly differentiated regular users from non‐users. Interestingly, light and heavier users held similar outcome expectancies, except that light users endorsed items on the sexual enhancement subscale more strongly than heavier users. Further investigation showed that the level of sexual risk taking observed in this sample was high, with the majority of participants reporting multiple partners, “casual” sexual encounters, sex under the influence of substances, and inconsistent condom use. Using logistic regression analyses, a key finding was that positive sex‐related ecstasy outcome expectancies were associated with involvement in disinhibited sexual behaviour under the influence of ecstasy. These effects persisted after statistically controlling for the frequency of ecstasy use. The findings suggest that sexual risk taking is related not only to the disinhibiting properties of ecstasy but also to beliefs that users hold about the effects of the drug.     

Output order reflects the cognitive accessibility of goals

Goal accessibility--the ease or speed with which a goal is activated--increases the likelihood that it will be acted on. The present studies validate output order as a measure of goal accessibility that can be applied to goal lists in both laboratory and naturalistic settings. In three studies, output order (the order in which goals are listed in a free-response format) was related to self-reported goal value but was not redundant with it. Furthermore, output order was affected by motivational priming whereas value was not, and order associated with typical student goals (e.g., achievement) compared with atypical goals (e.g., power). Output order is well suited to bring the study of accessibility to naturalistic studies of goals and goal pursuit.     

Presidential Leadership Style and the Political Use of Force

A growing body of work seeks to explain the lack of clear evidence for the diversionary use of force by casting doubt on such strategies' attractiveness for policy makers: while domestic political and economic problems may provide incentives for diversion, such strategies involve political and military risks that frequently outweigh these incentives. Such theories correctly identify the objective risks involved in diversion but do not account for variation in leaders' risk‐taking propensities. We develop a “first image” theory of diversion that suggests a key psychological variable (locus of control) shapes leaders' willingness to engage in risky diversionary strategies. A statistical analysis of the American use of force, 1953–2000, finds strong support for this model. We conclude that the lack of clear evidence for diversion in general is a reflection of the contingent nature of the phenomenon and call for greater attention to how agents and structures interact to produce policy behavior.     

The Compromise Effect in Choosing for Others

Most research into the compromise effect focuses on cognitive factors related to choosing for oneself. However, there are daily opportunities to make choices for others, from helping friends to buy merchandise to choosing souvenirs for relatives. Although it is a common practice, choosing for others is rarely discussed in the literature. Hence, this research is directed to determine whether (i) the compromise effect is greater for people choosing for others with whom one has a distant relationship compared to choosing for themselves, (ii) the decision maker's susceptibility to interpersonal relationships, accountability, and anticipated regret moderate the relationship between choosing for others versus choosing for themselves and the compromise effect, and (iii) the confidence of the decision maker mediates the relationship between deciding for others and the compromise effect. Five hypotheses are proposed and they are supported by the results from four experiments. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

THE TOTALITARIAN STATE OF MIND

The paper describes the development of Dynamic Interpersonal Therapy for use with complex depression (DITCC), and a pilot study testing DITCC’s effectiveness. The pilot found large pre-post improvements in well-being and distress; moderate rates of reliable improvement and clinically significant change; and curvilinear declines in depression and anxiety. Treatment completers and near-completers (N= 19) showed a significant curvilinear decline in symptoms of depression (PHQ-9) and anxiety (GAD-7). The results provide preliminary evidence that DITCC can be used as an effective treatment approach for complex depression. However, further research is needed to test its effectiveness in different settings with a larger sample size, using appropriate comparison groups under controlled conditions to further elaborate the short-term and long-term effects.     

THE ‘OTHER 23 HOURS’: SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF PSYCHOTHERAPY IN A ‘SPECIAL’ HOSPITAL

In this paper, I describe and discuss the complexities of being a therapist in a maximum security forensic psychiatric hospital, working with patients who have committed acts of serious violence, and who also suffer from severe mental illness and personality disorders. I suggest that profound disturbances in the patient's inner world get played out in triangular disputes between the patient, the therapist and other professionals working in the hospital. I also describe how real events in the life of the institution impact on the therapeutic process, and the importance for the therapist of reflection on the ‘other 23 hours’ that the patient lives outside of therapy. Finally, I raise some ethical dilemmas that arise for therapists working in such settings, where the stated therapeutic aim is not only treatment but also the containment and prevention of future violence.     

Book Review Correspondence

Stanley Rothman, David J. Rothman, and Stephen P. Powers, Reply to TomBryder's Review of Hollywood's America
Tom Bryder, Rejoinder to Rothman, Rothman, and Powers     

Governing religious diversity in cities: critical perspectives

ABSTRACT

This collection addresses the question of how cities govern and regulate religious diversity. Its main goals are: 1) to take stock of current research regarding the municipal governance of religious diversity; 2) to put forward new concepts and empirical analyses to enhance this field of study; and 3) to identify potential lines for future enquiry that help move the field forward. The contributions cover a wide variety of topics, such as the roles of laws, state contracts, and urbanism in governing religious diversity, comparisons of diverging governance trajectories in various cities within one country, and the controversies surrounding the celebration of religious events in urban spaces. The contributions also identify factors that influence governance processes at the urban level and their consequences for the practice of religion. The collection covers studies of cities in various European countries as well as in Canada.     

Special Treatment? Flexibilities in the Politics of Regenerative Medicine’s Gatekeeping Regimes in the UK

ABSTRACT

Emerging flexibilities are apparent in gatekeeping regimes applicable to regenerative medicine products, raising issues about the extent to which and forms in which such flexibilities might promote emerging products as a sector warranting special treatment, in the context of recent policy developments in the UK and wider European Union. Concepts of ‘gatekeeping’, ‘gatekeeping regimes’ and ‘gateways’ can point to the ways in which regulatory institutions, health technology assessment organisations, and national planners and purchasers of health services together define and control entry to the medical product marketplace and the adoption of products into the public health-care system. Flexibilities in existing regimes and new gateways are a way of maintaining ‘connection’ between gatekeeping regimes and technoscientific innovation in order to steer innovation pathways. The gateways concept has affinity with that of Callon’s ‘obligatory passage points’. A wide set of recent policy documents show that the measures promoted exhibit a range of alternative gateways that are being constructed around central, legal, restrictive gatekeeping regimes. However, it would be easy to overestimate the significance of these developments as relaxations that would favour innovative producers and their products on a large scale with wide public health impacts. The concepts of gatekeeping regimes and gateways enable understanding of hybrid developments of exceptions and exemptions to dominant regimes which bridge across the arenas of market regulation, health technology assessment and health-care system planning. These arenas are being drawn closer together as a means of politically managing stakeholders’ aims in the UK, EU and other innovating biomedical health systems globally.