When faces and voices come together: Face width-to-height ratio and voice pitch contribute independently to social perception

Prior research has shown that the face's width-to-height ratio (fWHR) and the voice's pitch influence social perception. Yet, the relative contribution of either cue has been largely unexplored. We examined the simultaneous effects of fWHR and pitch on social evaluations. Experiment 1 (N = 102) tested how such cues shaped global impressions. Experiment 2 (N = 121) tested fWHR and pitch's effect on behavioural affiliative intentions, framing social interaction as a physical or an intellectual competition. Experiment 3 (N = 57) assessed whether variations in fWHR and pitch could influence trait attribution (i.e., physical formidability and intelligence). Individuals with large faces or low-pitched voices elicited negative impressions, positive behavioural intentions in a physical competition, and the attribution of stronger formidability but lower intelligence. Across the studies, cues exerted independent effects. The implications of these findings for research on cross-modal social perception are discussed.     

Effects of Acute Stress or Centrally Injected Interleukin-1beta on Neuropeptide Expression in the Immune System

Acute stress stimulates the expression and release of corticotropin-releasing hormone (CRH) and arginine vasopressin (AVP) from the hypothalamus, and the pro-opiomelanocortin products beta-endorphin and ACTH from the anterior pituitary. These neuropeptides are also expressed in immune tissues, and it has been proposed that they may modulate immune responses to stress through paracrine mechanisms. We subjected rats to restraint stress or central injection of interleukin (IL)-1beta to determine whether these acute stimuli can alter the expression of neuropeptides in the spleen and thymus. Restraint stress significantly increased the contents of all these neuropeptides in thymic, but not splenic, extracts. A single icv injection of IL-1beta increased contents of CRH, AVP, ACTH and beta-endorphin in the spleens of both sham-operated and adrenalectomised (ADX) rats. IL-1beta increased thymic contents of CRH and ACTH in sham-operated rats but these increases were not observed in ADX rats. These results suggest that the effects of IL-1beta on neuropeptide expression in the spleen are independent of glucocorticoids, whereas IL-1beta stimulation of neuropeptide expression in the thymus is dependent on circulating glucocorticoids. There were significant correlations between increases in CRH, ACTH and beta-endorphin in the spleen, and between CRH and ACTH in the thymus, consistent with the suggestion that IL-1beta-induced increases in ACTH and beta-endorphin may be mediated through CRH. These results provide evidence that stressors can directly influence neuropeptide expression in immune tissues. Thus stress may influence immune functions through paracrine mechanisms involving locally synthesised neuropeptides as well as through activation of the hypothalamo-pituitary-adrenal axis.     

Herbert Rosenfeld in Italy, 1978–1985

Abstract

In this paper, the author attempts to shed some light on Herbert Rosenfeld’s thought and his way of working when was in Italy during 1978–1985. In particular, the author would like to show, in a sketchy way, the evolution of his thought, with specific regard for the new way in which he looked at clinical practice at that time. In the author’s opinion, the Rosenfeld that he and his group met and got to know in Italy was able to open new horizons in clinical practice, implicitly questioning some of his own or his circle’s previous viewpoints.     

On positive psychological outcomes: what helps groups with a history of conflict to forgive and reconcile with each other?

Three studies examined the roles of traditional and novel social psychological variables involved in intergroup forgiveness. Study 1 (N = 480) revealed that among the pro-Pinochet and the anti-Pinochet groups in Chile, forgiveness was predicted by ingroup identity (negatively), common ingroup identity (positively), empathy and trust (positively), and competitive victimhood (the subjective sense of having suffered more than the outgroup, negatively). Political ideology (Right vs. Left) moderated the relationship between empathy and forgiveness, trust and forgiveness, and between the latter and competitive victimhood. Study 2 (N = 309), set in the Northern Irish conflict between Protestants and Catholics, provided a replication and extension of Study 1. Finally, Study 3 (N = 155/108) examined the longitudinal relationship between forgiveness and reconciliation in Northern Ireland, revealing that forgiveness predicted reconciliation intentions. The reverse direction of this relationship was also marginally significant. Results are discussed in terms of their theoretical and practical implications.     

THE MEANING OF DREAMS IN THE PSYCHOTIC STATE: THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS AND CLINICAL APPLICATIONS

The authors consider that the Freudian theory of dreams is not directly applicable to psychotic and borderline patients with their constantly varying states of mental integration. Because these patients' dreams lack associations, the usual psychoanalytic approach cannot be used to ascertain their meaning. After reviewing the literature on the specific quality of dreams in the psychotic state, the authors point out that such dreams have nothing to do with the metaphorical language of the dream work but instead express the concreteness of the hallucinatory construction. For this reason, a dream's meaning may fail to be understood by the patient even if it seems clear to an observer. Yet the analyst's reception of a 'psychotic dream' is a unique and essential source of valuable information on the manner of construction of the delusional system, allowing analytic work on the psychotic nucleus. In the authors'view, such dreams may help the analyst and the patient— while still lucid—to acquire insight, thus affording a stable foundation for emergence from psychosis. The paper includes some case histories, in one of which a psychotic female patient is enabled by work on dreams to reconstruct a psychotic episode and thereby to ward off an imminent fresh lapse into psychosis.     

To connect is to be influenced: What determines a third‐party's forgiveness attitudes to conflicting groups' violent partisan members?

The present research seeks to answer the question of what determines an uninvolved third party's forgiveness attitudes toward conflicting groups' violent partisan members. Specifically, Bangladeshi participants read a fictitious interview with a radicalized Palestinian who declared his intention to avenge himself against Israelis for his personal and collective plight by carrying out a suicide bombing attack. Findings reveal that an empathy manipulation (high empathy = other focused or low empathy = objective focused) influenced participants' forgiveness attitudes towards the radicalized Palestinian such that in the high empathy condition participants were more forgiving of the target than participants in the low empathy condition. Moreover, while the strength of their religious identification (Islam) played no significant role, participants' tendency to attribute the target's decision to situational factors fully mediated the effects of empathy on forgiveness.     

��ber das Wesen der psychotischen Wahnbildung

The aim of this paper is to explore the nature of the delusional construction so as to render it susceptible to a therapeutic approach. Particular attention is devoted to the nature and structure of delusion and its relation to the healthy part of the personality. In the author??s view, delusion is a psychopathological construction that makes it impossible for the patient to understand his own experience. The delusional construction is similar to a dream-like sensorial production but, unlike a real dream, it remains in the waking memory and creates characters which live independently of the ??dreamer??s?? awareness. It is a dream that never ends. The delusional imagination is so deeply rooted in the patient??s mental functioning that, even after systematic analysis, the delusional world, which had seemed to disappear, re-emerges under new configurations. This paper particularly deals with the difficulty in working through the psychotic episode and in ??deconstructing?? the delusional experience because of the terror connected with it.