Liberalism and the Privatised Family: The Legacy of Rousseau

This article argues that the intellectual legacy of Rousseau is at the root of the failure of 20th century egalitarian theorists such as Rawls and Dworkin to engage intellectually with feminist theorists working within the liberal tradition. Through an extended critique of Rousseau’s delineation of the relationship between liberal citizenship and the private family, it argues that the failure of such liberal theorists to take gender hierarchy seriously is a consequence of their attempt to place the private family outside the sphere not only of politics, but also of justice.     

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 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.     

Use of newsletters to promote environmental political action: an experimental analysis

The managers of beach businesses were randomly assigned to receive no intervention or two newsletters per week for 6 weeks that presented economic consequences of damage to coastal water quality and how to contact politicians. The percentage of proenvironmental political contacts was significantly greater in the experimental (newsletter) group than in the control group. Logistical regression showed that contacts in the newsletter group were more than five times that of controls after adjusting for history of contacts and predisposition to take such action. Results suggest that the intervention can promote political action that could influence environmental policies and human health.     

Emancipatory responses to oppression: the template of land-use planning and the Old Order Amish of Ontario

In this paper I discuss the clash of values between the Old Order Amish community of Ontario and the dominant social paradigm in agriculture. Land-use and agricultural regulations, designed for an industrial style of agriculture, are experienced as a threat to the survival of the Old Order Amish agricultural social economy and community. The paper describes how I have worked with the Old Order Amish to respond to these challenges and to create public policies that will allow them to maintain their human and agricultural diversity and small-scale sustainable farm practices. Four case studies illuminating the oppressive land-use regulations along with the emancipatory responses to the oppression are examined. The social transformation themes include principles and processes for community psychologists, land-use planners, and community economic development practitioners to consider. The article has heuristic value for a practice-based approach to social change.     

情境理论的迁移观及其教育意义

支撑—活动观、社会共享认知观以及实践共同体观是当前情境理论中具有代表性的迁移观点。这些观点分别从不同的角度强调情境特性对迁移的影响,并主张在常规的学校教育中突出情境、尤其是社会文化与社会实践情境的作用。     

Living with Contradictions: The Taken-for-Granted in Israeli Political Discourse

Two apparently contradictory ideas are closely linked in Israeli political discourse: Israel is powerful and independent and Israel is vulnerable and dependent. This study used content analysis and focus groups, as well as existing survey data analyzed by others, to explore how this paradox has been reflected in newspapers and conversations during six different time periods from 1948 to 1996. The goal was not to explain the paradox but to examine its consequences for Israeli perceptions of U.S. policy in the Middle East—and, in the process, to explore Israeli self-images. The nature of U.S. strategic interests was originally treated as problematic and in need of political discussion, but in the past 25 years these interests have become taken for granted. Surprisingly, even after the end of the Cold War, a critical discourse moment in which a reexamination of U.S. interests in the Middle East would seem inevitable, the U.S. role remains taken for granted and largely unexamined. The strong/vulnerable paradox explains this absence of discussion: Examining U.S. interests too closely upsets the delicate balance that keeps the sense of vulnerability in check.     

Psychological Safety and Appreciation of Differences in Counselor Training Programs: Examining Religion,Spirituality, and Political Beliefs

This study focused on the extent to which religion, spirituality, and political beliefs predicted counseling students' perceptions of psychological safety and appreciation of differences in their programs. The authors used hierarchical regression models to analyze data from 264 students from 4 different institutions. Results indicated that student age, political conservatism, extrinsic religiosity, and intrinsic spirituality were significant predictors of perceived psychological safety and appreciation of differences. The authors discuss implications of these findings.     

Cultural Effects Rather Than a Bilingual Advantage in Cognition: A Review and an Empirical Study

The bilingual advantage hypothesis contends that the management of two languages in the brain is carried out through domain‐general mechanisms, and that bilinguals possess a performance advantage over monolinguals on (nonlinguistic) tasks that tap these processes. Presently, there is evidence both for and against such an advantage. Interestingly, the evidence in favor has been thought strongest in children and older adults, leading some researchers to argue that young adults might be at peak performance levels, and therefore bilingualism is unable to confer an improvement. We conducted a large‐scale review of the extant literature and found that the weight of research pointed to an absence of positive evidence for a bilingual advantage at any age. We next gave a large number of young adult participants a task designed to test the bilingual advantage hypothesis. Reasoning from the literature that young adults from an East Asian (Korean) culture would likely outperform those from a Western (British) culture, we also compared participants on this factor. We found no evidence for a bilingual advantage but did find evidence for enhanced performance in the Korean group. We interpret these results as further evidence against the bilingual advantage hypotheses.