Cognitive distortions in sexual aggressors against children: An examination of the Abel and Becker Cognition Scale (ABCS)

IntroductionCognitive distortions are generally considered a key factor in the evaluation and treatment of sexual aggressors against children.AimThe aim of this study was to examine the discriminant properties of the Abel and Becker Cognition Scale.Method and resultsThe results of analyses of covariance, in a sample of 265 aggressors against children, do not support ABCS's discriminating properties.ConclusionLimits and implications for future researches are discussed.     

Therapeutic Assessment with couples

Therapeutic Assessment can be helpful to many types of couples, including (1) those who are considering marriage and wish to know each other more deeply, (2) long-term couples who are in distress and considering separating, and (3) couples who have decided to separate but wish to better understand why they were unable to stay together. This article comprises the first complete case study of Therapeutic Assessment (TA) with couples. I describe how those steps common to all forms of TA (initial sessions, extended inquiries, assessment intervention sessions, and summary/discussion sessions) differ when applied to couples. I also discuss the use of the Consensus Rorschach as an assessment intervention with long-term distressed couples engaged in problematic projective identification. The case example involves a young heterosexual couple married for 12 years who were at an impasse in couples therapy. The assessment helped the partners explore mutual conflicts around the expression of anger and dependency needs, and to resolve a power imbalance within the couple. Long-term follow-up showed that the Therapeutic Assessment helped the couple have more compassion for each other and move beyond the destructive role-lock they had fallen into. Also, the referring therapist reported that the TA helped resolve the impasse in the couples’ therapy.     

Domination et impérialisme en psychologie

We offer some arguments in support of the idea that the only goal the teaching and research system of the United States can serve is that of the global system to which it belongs, namely, domination. We show how, within the last few decades, French research in psychology - its issues, its institutions, its practices, its ethics - has undergone a process of Americanization that has turned it into a mainstream Western (and basically American) psychology. We point out some research trends that have contested this mainstream psychology, either because it appears too male chauvinist or liberal (opposition psychologies) or because it is grounded in the individualist and liberalist postulates of Western cultures (indigenous psychologies). Unfortunately, because dominant epistemology is governed by a principle of continuity, these contesting trends have not increased our scientific requirements; on the contrary, they have often led to anti-scientific approaches. It is still the task of psychology to break away from kwoledges and values of common sense.     

La fonction évaluative de la personnologie, vers la mise en évidence de deux dimensions de la valeur : la désirabilité sociale et l'utilité sociale

It is now widely recognized that Evaluation is a very powerful and fundamental dimension underlying trait structures, but what is Evaluation? In this paper we review various models (and empirical data) related to the signification of the Evaluative factor in personality traits. This review will lead us to defend the hypothesis that personality traits communicate two dimensions of value: (1) social desirability (SD) which refers to affective valence or motivation and (2) social utility (SU) which corresponds to the fundamental principle of evaluation in a society. We'll present empirical data supporting this conception.     

The badness of discrimination

The most blatant forms of discrimination are morally outrageous and very obviously so; but the nature and boundaries of discrimination are more controversial, and it is not clear whether all forms of discrimination are morally bad; nor is it clear why objectionable cases of discrimination are bad. In this paper I address these issues. First, I offer a taxonomy of discrimination. I then argue that discrimination is bad, when it is, because it harms people. Finally, I criticize a rival, disrespect-based account according to which discrimination is bad regardless of whether it causes harm.     

Représentations sociales des compétences et processus d'évaluation

In this paper, the results of two sets of studies show the impact that social representations of competences may have on professional assessment processes. People who belong to different occupational categories make different inferences about the competences required by activities submitted to them for analysis. Differences are also found when respondents analyse the activities of their own occupational category vs another category. The assessment of motivation letters to get a job is correlated with the beliefs of the writer that intrinsic or extrinsic motives would be better assessed. These beliefs are supposed to be some kinds of representations of competences. Implications of these results for assessment practices are given.     

Plaidoyer pour une neuropsychologie interculturelle en France

By referring to historical, empirical and ethical data, this article aims primarily at encouraging the emergence of cross-cultural neuropsychology in France. In the second part of the article, we extracted meaningful data in the literature and referred to clinical practices in other countries, to propose recommendations targeting student training, clinical practice and scientific research. We also insist on the importance of privileging interactions between these three axes in order to propose training and tools in adequacy with the reality of clinical practice. These recommendations cannot as such response directly to difficulties encountered by clinicians. However, they can contribute to the reflection for rendering French neuropsychology effective in supporting ethnically diverse populations.     

Favoriser le développement professionnel avec le feedback : les engagements affectif et calculé envers l’objectif comme modérateurs de la relation intention–comportement

The purpose of this study is to investigate the moderating role of affective and continuance goal commitment in the relationship between motivational intention to act on feedback and behavioural integration of feedback. In an individual psychological assessment context, 74 candidates who received feedback were recruited. Moderation analyses using hierarchical multiple regressions showed that affective and continuance goal commitments moderate the relationship between motivational intention to act on feedback and behavioural changes, three months later. This relationship is significant and positive only when the level of affective or continuance goal commitment is low. The relationship between motivational intention to change and engagement in developmental activities is not moderated by goal commitment.     

Le TASC200, une épreuve d’attention et de saillance visuelle : fidélité, validité et normes préliminaires

In the clinical setting, attention is classically assessed by tasks that do not take into account theoretically important aspects, such as the salience-based guidance of visual search. The aim of this study was to develop a paced paper-and-pencil task for clinical use based on strong theoretical accounts that would assess salience-based visual search and that would meet the psychometric requirements for the assessment of attention. Participants were required to search and cancel targets of varying visual saliences as quickly and as accurately as possible during a predefined short period of time. The targets were intermixed with distractors. In agreement with theories of salience-based visual search, the results showed that the most salient targets were detected more easily than less salient targets. The task exhibited a quite acceptable test-retest reliability, and two construct validity studies showed that different scores involve different processes. This new task fully complies with the major theories of salience-based guidance of attention during visual search. It also meets the requirements of a plausible clinical task since its psychometric qualities are quite good. Preliminary normative data (n = 863) are presented for clinical use.