Taking religion to heart: the relationship between the Five Factor Model and the New Indices of Religious Orientation among religious students

The relationship between religious orientation and personality has been investigated using several different measures and diverse samples. As part of a larger study, 114 undergraduate students were given the Duke University Religion Index (DUREL) to include only those participants who were considered religious. The final sample of 80 participants were given the NEO Personality Inventory-Revised (NEO PI-R) and the New Indices of Religious Orientation (NIRO). Based on the results of the bivariate correlations, higher levels of intrinsic religious orientation were associated with greater Agreeableness and Conscientiousness. Multivariate analyses further revealed that Agreeableness was the most important personality variable when predicting intrinsic and quest religious orientations, with higher levels of Agreeableness predicting greater intrinsic and lower quest orientations. While lower levels of Neuroticism predicted greater intrinsic orientation, higher levels of Neuroticism predicted greater quest orientations. Higher Conscientiousness predicted greater intrinsic and lower quest orientations. Implications of these findings are discussed.     

Extinction of conditioned inhibition through nonreinforced presentation of the inhibitor

In previous studies that have tried to extinguish conditioned inhibition through nonreinforced presentations of the inhibitor, researchers have repeatedly failed to find evidence for such extinction. The present study revealed that extinction can be achieved through nonreinforcement of the inhibitor, depending on properties of the reinforcer. In a human causal learning experiment, we found complete extinction in a scenario in which the reinforcer could take on negative values. Thereby, this scenario reflected the assumed symmetrical continuum on which associative strength can vary, according to the Rescorla-Wagner theory of associative learning. In contrast to this, the inhibitory cue retained its inhibitory potential in another condition, in which the scenario did not allow negative values of the reinforcer. nt]mis|Klaus G. Melchers has previously published under the surname “Lober.” Susann Wolff is now working at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig, Germany     

‘Translation’ and ‘transformation’ in the analytic situation: Freud – Bion – Laplanche

Following a short introduction to the core theses of Jean Laplanche’s theory of a ‘general seduction’ the author presents the resultant clinical position of the analyst. In the same way that an adult sends ‘enigmatic messages’ to the child, it is the analyst’s task to reopen this primal situation so that the patient can find new ‘translations’ for these messages. Laplanche distinguishes between the function of the analytic frame – which represents and supports attachment – and the ‘sexual’– which is the repressed and constitutes the unconscious. Only the focus on this unconscious facilitates the deconstruction of ‘incorrect’ translations. Accordingly, the analyst, says Laplanche, should not take part in construction – this is a self‐construction of the patient – but only in reconstruction. The author compares this clinical model with Freud’s notions and the ‘transformation processes’ through the alpha function as described by Bion. She illustrates Laplanche’s model and the interpretation strategy with case material.     

Infantile bisexuality and the 'complete oedipal complex': Freudian views on heterosexuality and homosexuality

In the psychoanalytical discussion of what is 'mature' sexuality we speak of the 'genital' stage and the 'resolution' of the oedipal complex in the form of identification with the parent of the same sex and a heterosexually-directed object choice. A close reading of Freud's texts about sexuality shows that such a normative view cannot be corroborated by his viewpoint. He suggests that infantile sexuality is bisexually orientated, the final object choice due to repression of either homosexual or heterosexual desires. As Freud puts it, genital heterosexuality occurs out of necessity for procreation. In order to enrich the present psychoanalytical discussion about homosexuality and bisexuality the author returns to Freud's theories in this context.     

Trauma exposure is associated with increased context-dependent adjustments of cognitive control in patients with posttraumatic stress disorder and healthy controls

Recent evidence has suggested that posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is associated with alterations in prefrontal-cortex-dependent cognitive processes (e.g., working memory, cognitive control). However, it remains unclear whether these cognitive dysfunctions are related to PTSD symptomatology or trauma exposure. Furthermore, regarding cognitive control, research has only focused on the integrity of selected control functions, but not their dynamic regulation in response to changing environmental demands. Therefore, the present study investigated dynamic variations in interference control, in addition to overall interference susceptibility and working memory (WM) performance in matched groups of 24 PTSD patients and 26 traumatized and 30 nontraumatized healthy controls. The Simon task was used to measure overall interference susceptibility and the flexible adjustment of cognitive control, on the basis of the occurrence of response conflicts (conflict adaptation effect). WM performance was assessed with the forward and backward digit span tasks. Since we have previously shown that trauma exposure per se is associated with reduced hair cortisol concentrations (HCC), we further explored whether PTSD/trauma-related cognitive alterations are related to HCC in proximal 3-cm hair segments. The results revealed that PTSD patients and traumatized controls showed significantly more pronounced conflict adaptation effects than nontraumatized controls. Moreover, the conflict adaptation effect was positively related to the number of lifetime traumatic events and the frequency of traumatization. The groups did not differ in overall interference susceptibility or WM performance. Exploratory analyses revealed no association between HCC and the observed cognitive differences. These results suggest that context-driven control adjustments constitute a sensitive correlate of trauma exposure, irrespective of PTSD.     

Better not to deal with two tasks at the same time when stressed? Acute psychosocial stress reduces task shielding in dual-task performance

A major control demand in successful dual-task performance is the task-specific separation of task-goal representations and of the related stimulus-response translation processes. In the present study, we investigated how these cognitive control processes of task shielding are affected by acute psychosocial stress. Fifty-six healthy participants were exposed to either an acute psychosocial stressor (the Trier Social Stress Test) or a standardized control situation prior to a dual task. Task shielding was assessed by analyzing the interference of Task 2 processing on prioritized Task 1 performance. Following successful stress induction, as indicated by increases in salivary α-amylase (sAA) and cortisol that reflect increases in sympathetic nervous system and hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis activity, respectively, stressed individuals displayed reduced task shielding relative to controls. This result was further substantiated by a correlation between treatment-related increase in cortisol, but not sAA, and between-task interference, suggesting a potential role of the HPA stress response for the development of the observed effects. As an additional finding, when the volunteers were categorized with regard to their action-state orientation, their orientation did not interact with stress but did reveal generally increased between-task interference, and thus inferior task shielding, for state-oriented as compared to action-oriented individuals.     

The destiny of an unacknowledged trauma: the deferred retroactive effect of après-coup in the hidden Jewish children of wartime Belgium

For almost 45 years, the experience of Jewish children who were hidden during World War II was considered to be of little importance, particularly with respect to what had taken place in the concentration camps. Their very history was ignored in the many accounts of the Holocaust. It was only at the end of the 1980s that their experience began to be thought of as potentially traumatic. In this paper, the authors report on their psychoanalytical research project concerning the psychological outcomes of those experiences that had remained concealed for such an extraordinarily long latency period. The results are based on the analysis of 60 accounts and on psychoanalytically-oriented group work. The authors show that the trauma experienced by those hidden children was triggered by the retroactive effect of a deferred action [après-coup].     

The cognitive capabilities of farm animals: categorisation learning in dwarf goats (Capra hircus)

The ability to establish categories enables organisms to classify stimuli, objects and events by assessing perceptual, associative or rational similarities and provides the basis for higher cognitive processing. The cognitive capabilities of farm animals are receiving increasing attention in applied ethology, a development driven primarily by scientifically based efforts to improve animal welfare. The present study investigated the learning of perceptual categories in Nigerian dwarf goats (Capra hircus) by using an automated learning device installed in the animals' pen. Thirteen group-housed goats were trained in a closed-economy approach to discriminate artificial two-dimensional symbols presented in a four-choice design. The symbols belonged to two categories: category I, black symbols with an open centre (rewarded) and category II, the same symbols but filled black (unrewarded). One symbol from category I and three different symbols from category II were used to define a discrimination problem. After the training of eight problems, the animals were presented with a transfer series containing the training problems interspersed with completely new problems made from new symbols belonging to the same categories. The results clearly demonstrate that dwarf goats are able to form categories based on similarities in the visual appearance of artificial symbols and to generalise across new symbols. However, the goats had difficulties in discriminating specific symbols. It is probable that perceptual problems caused these difficulties. Nevertheless, the present study suggests that goats housed under farming conditions have well-developed cognitive abilities, including learning of open-ended categories. This result could prove beneficial by facilitating animals' adaptation to housing environments that favour their cognitive capabilities.     

Social Value Orientation and information search in social dilemmas: An eye-tracking analysis

Previous work has demonstrated that Social Value Orientation (SVO) is related to cooperative behavior in social dilemmas. However, little is known concerning the underlying processes. In two eye-tracking studies investigating decisions in money allocation tasks (Experiment 1) and Public Good Dilemmas (Experiment 2), we show that differences in SVO are accompanied by consistent differences in information search. Decision time, number of fixations, the proportion of inspected information, the degree of attention towards the others’ payoffs, and the number of transitions from and towards others’ payoffs gradually increase with absolute SVO deviation from a pure selfish orientation. Overall these effects seem to be similar for individuals caring positively (i.e., cooperative) or negatively (i.e., competitive) about others. The fact that changes are gradual instead of abrupt indicates that differences in SVO seem to be related to gradual changes in weights given to outcomes for self and others.