Pre-Hispanic perspectives on the modern Mexican psyche; contemporary subjects and ancient objects. A Mayan text of evolution: the stages of creation in the Popol Vuh or sacred book of the Mayans

The ancestral tribes of Mexico, like any people living within a certain culture, may be affected by the archetypal images and values of their surroundings. Access to the imagery of the Mayan creation myth, the Popol Vuh, has provided an orientation in my analytical work with Mexican patients as they attempt to recreate themselves by engaging their conflicts around their reality, individuality and capacity to relate. I will address the psychological meaning of the different stages of creation: the original creative event, the man of mud, the man of wood, the false sun and the man of corn. With these images, I will illustrate their clinical application in analytic work with three Mexican middle age male patients dealing with different issues of identity and with a young female patient struggling to separate from a manipulative and destructive family system.     

Coping, Conflictual Social Interactions, Social Support, and Mood Among HIV-Infected Persons

This study considers the interrelationships among coping, conflictual social interactions, and social support, as well as their combined associations with positive and negative mood. Research has shown that each of these variables affects adjustment to stressful circumstances. Few studies, however, examine this full set of variables simultaneously. One hundred forty HIV-infected persons completed a questionnaire containing measures of coping, social support, conflictual social interactions, and positive and negative mood. Factor analyses showed that perceived social support and conflictual social interactions formed separate factors and were not strongly related. Compared to perceived social support, social conflict was more strongly related to coping behaviors, especially to social isolation, anger, and wishful thinking. Conflictual social interactions were more strongly related to negative mood than was perceived social support. Coping by withdrawing socially was significantly related to less positive and greater negative mood. The findings point to the importance of simultaneously considering coping, supportive relationships, and conflictual relationships in studies of adjustment to chronic illness. In particular, a dynamic may occur in which conflictual social interactions and social isolation aggravate each other and result in escalating psychological distress.     

Hemingway's Aging Heroes and the Concept of Phronesis

This article explores the concept of phronesis (practical wisdom) in four aging protagonists in Ernest Hemingway's works ranging from the short story A Clean Well-Lighted Place to the novella The Old Man and the Sea. Phronesis represents an understanding of the ways of the world, an acute sensitivity to a critical logic of human existence that can be attained only through extensive experience and suffering. The four aging protagonists are examples of Hemingway's definition of aging productively and profitably by purchasing an inner peace that consists of an intuitive system of continuous adjustment to the exigencies of daily living.     

论自尊的心理意义

自尊以其对人类社会生活和个体精神生活的独特作用和贡献而倍受心理学家的关注。自尊作为起中介作用的人格变量,对儿童的情感、动机、社会适应性行为、认知活动及其品德等有着重要的制约作用;它的发展有助于个体心理健康和良好个性的形成。     

Can there be a science of the symbolic?

Science means not just 'knowing', but knowing verified by replicability. Science is particularly hard to bring to depth psychology because the individual uniquenesses that can't be repeated are what make people most deeply themselves. Everyone, including the analytic investigator, however, has a science, in the sense of a world-view that is replicated by experience. Jung offered hermeneutics as an alternative mode to science for getting to know the psychological subject. But as Heidegger emphasized, hermeneutics always begins with the projection of a world-view, i.e., the science of the would-be interpreter. In the analytic situation, dialogue is available to test the world-view and enlarge its horizon, in accord with Gadamer's expansion of hermeneutics, 'the classical discipline concerned with the art of understanding texts', into a method of inquiry open to the possibilities of otherness. An example is given from an analytic training seminar, in which the author began by projecting his version of the theory of psychological types onto the dream material a candidate offered in response to the seminar. A dialogue with the candidate ensued which enabled the teacher to correct his original, somewhat rigid, application of his scientific viewpoint. In such a dialogue, psyche emerges as the final interpreter of what is, generating hypotheses that can fruitfully be applied to the understanding of other cases.     

Appraised psychological workload, musculoskeletal symptoms, and the mediating effect of fatigue: a structural equation modeling approach

The aim of the present study was to test two structural models of the relationship between appraised psychological workload and musculoskeletal symptoms from the neck, shoulder, and upper and lower back with different aspects of perceived fatigue as mediating variables. In this cross-sectional study a questionnaire survey was conducted among employees at three Swedish assembly plants (n= 305). The proposed models were tested for one general fatigue dimension--lack of energy--and four specific fatigue dimensions--physical discomfort, physical exertion, lack of motivation, and sleepiness--using structural equation modeling. The results indicate that the role of perceived fatigue in the relationship between appraised workload and musculoskeletal symptoms is different for different aspects of fatigue. The general fatigue dimension, lack of energy, does not mediate the relationship. As regards the specific fatigue dimensions, the relationship is partially mediated by physical discomfort and lack of motivation but not by physical exertion or sleepiness. Appraised psychological workload has a unique effect on musculoskeletal symptoms not mediated by fatigue.     

Correlates of Employment Among Welfare Recipients: Do Psychological Characteristics and Attitudes Matter?

This study examines whether and how a wide range of potential barriers to work,including psychological characteristics and attitudes, are associated with current employment in a recent sample of welfare recipients in Michigan (N = 672). Psychological factors include measures of depressive symptoms, work attitudes, and perceived risks associated with leaving welfare. Over and above demographic, economic, and contextual factors, positive psychological characteristics and attitudes were found to be moderately associated with currently being employed. Implications for welfare-to-work programs and policy are discussed.     

个人取向勇气对中学生学业成就的影响:问题解决和求助应对方式的中介作用

采用整群抽样法选取山西、云南、重庆地区的1100名中学生作为研究对象,通过心理量表和学科测验获取其个人取向勇气、应对方式、学业成就的数据,探讨个人取向勇气对中学生学业成就的影响及其中介机制。结构方程建模结果表明：中学生的个人取向勇气与学业成就之间显著正相关,问题解决应对方式、求助应对方式在个人取向勇气影响中学生学业成就的过程中起中介作用。研究结果揭示了勇气水平较高的中学生更倾向采用问题解决和求助两种应对方式,从而取得较大的学业成就,这对中学教育工作者开展勇气品格培养和学业成就提升的教育实践有重要启示。     

亲子和同伴依恋对初中生心理素质发展的影响:个人中心分析视角

本研究旨在考察初中生心理素质的发展轨迹以及亲子和同伴依恋对其的影响。三所中学的442名初一学生和501名初二学生参加了三轮追踪调查,初测平均年龄M =12.83,SD =0.74。结果发现,初一学生,心理素质发展轨迹可分为中-降组（79%）和高-升组（21%）两个亚群组;且初一上父子依恋或母子依恋水平越高,心理素质发展轨迹为高-升组的概率大于中-降组。初二学生,心理素质发展轨迹可分为低-稳组（84%）和高-升组（16%）两个亚群组;且初二上父子依恋水平越高,心理素质发展轨迹为高-升组的概率大于低-稳组。结果表明初中生心理素质发展轨迹可以分为不同的亚群组类型,父子依恋和母子依恋对初中生心理素质发展有积极作用,这些发现对于初中生心理素质的培养具有一定的指导意义。