How common is sexual attraction towards clients? The experiences of sexual attraction of counselling psychologists toward their clients and its impact on the therapeutic process

This study investigated counselling psychologists' experiences of sexual attraction to their clients. Self-reported incidence of this phenomenon, the reaction that it provokes in therapists, the way they manage their feelings, and the potential impact of their sexual attraction on the therapeutic process, were assessed. On the basis of previous studies of psychotherapists, it was hypothesized that sexual attraction toward clients is common, and that these perceived feelings are not necessarily negative to the therapeutic process or professional relationship; also, it was hypothesized that the disclosure of these feelings to the client could nevertheless lead to a positive therapeutic outcome. Questionnaires were sent to the 286 chartered counselling psychologists included in the British Psychological Society Register. The results showed that significantly more therapists were attracted to at least one client than not. Furthermore, half of the respondents who reported attraction to clients believed that their feelings had a positive impact on the therapeutic process. Therapists who had disclosed their feelings to their clients found significantly more frequently that the impact of their sexual attraction had been positive to the therapeutic process (87.5%), than therapists who did not disclose their sexual attraction (47.1%). The implications of these results for training, supervision and professional issues are discussed.     

Dissociating effects of stimulus identity and load on working memory attentional guidance: Lengthening encoding time eliminates the effect of load but not identity

Effects of the identity and load of items in working memory (WM) on visual attention were examined. With a short interval between the WM item and a subsequent search task, there were effects of both load (slowed overall reaction times, RTs, in a WM condition relative to a mere repetition baseline) and identity (search RTs were affected by re-presentation of the item in WM in the search display). As the time to encode the initial display increased, the effects of load decreased while the effect of identity remained. The data indicate that the identity of stimuli in WM can affect the subsequent deployment of attention even when time is allowed for consolidation of the stimuli in WM, and that the WM effects are not causally related to the presence of cognitive load. The results are consistent with the identity of stimuli in WM modulating attention post the memory consolidation stage.     

The Effect of Attachment Insecurity in the Development of Eating Disturbances across Gender: The Role of Body Dissatisfaction

The present study examined the effects of insecure attachment on the development of negative body image as a contributing factor to the development of disturbed-eating patterns in male and female university students. Participants were nonclinical male (n = 100) and female (n = 381) university students. Administering self-report questionnaires, the authors assessed demographic information (gender, age), anthropometric data (Body Mass Index [BMI], age), romantic attachment (ECRS-R; R. C. Fraley, N. G. Waller, & K. A. Brennan, 2000), body dissatisfaction (BSQ), and disturbed eating (EAT-26). The authors found body dissatisfaction to fully mediate the relationship between attachment anxiety and disordered eating in women. Body dissatisfaction mediated anxious attachment and dieting in men. In addition, attachment avoidance had a direct impact on eating behaviors for both genders, without the mediation of any variables measured in this study. The findings of the present study suggest that the anxiety and avoidance dimensions of attachment insecurity affect eating behaviors differently, and the effects are different across genders. The authors discuss results in the context of therapeutic interventions design.     

Matching therapeutic interventions to drug and alcohol abusers’ stage of motivation: The clients’ perspective

The present study aims to explore the issue of matching the appropriate therapeutic intervention according to the stage of readiness for change in addictive clients, following the model proposed by Prochaska and DiClemente in the 1980s. The study focuses solely on the perspectives of people with drug and alcohol problems, in contrast to previous ones which have been concerned with the researchers’ understandings and postulations of the issue under exploration. One of the most important findings of this study is that participants in the “early” stages of their readiness to change their addictive behaviour, irrespective of their gender or whether they had seen a therapist significantly prefer non-action-oriented therapeutic interventions than action-oriented interventions. Similarly, participants in the “later” stages, showed a significant preference to action-oriented than non-action interventions, irrespective of their gender or previous experience of counselling. It is suggested then that careful assessment of the stage of motivation and individual-tailored intervention should be an essential element of any treatment program for drug and alcohol addicted clients.     

Heuristic Reasoning and the Observer's View: The Influence of Example-Availability on ad-hoc Frequency Judgments in Sport

Drawing upon evidence from broader social psychology, and an illustrative study of frequency-estimation during a simple, sport-specific observe-and-recall task, this paper makes the case for the more thorough investigation of the availability heuristic (Tversky & Kahneman, 1973 Tversky, A. and Kahneman, D. 1973. Availability: A heuristic for judging frequency and probability. Cognitive Psychology, 5: 207–232. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) on practical state-of-play reasoning in largely observational sporting activities. It is argued that this evidence particularly substantiates a need for a more robust body of research in two primary domains: (a) the gatekeeping tasks pertinent (and usually preliminary) to an individual's sporting performance such as talent scouting, team selection, and substitution decisions, and (b) the business of officiating in high-tempo environments.     

Intimate Partner Acceptance–Rejection and Subjective Well-Being: What is the Role of Resilience?

The present study investigated: (a) the relationship between perceived intimate partner rejection and subjective well-being and (b) the mediating effect of resilience in the relationship between perceived intimate partner rejection and subjective well-being and (c) the differences between married and unmarried participants regarding their perceived intimate partner rejection. The sample consisted of 316 individuals (50?% males, M _age?=?38.72 years, SD?=?13.07) and data collection was made with self-report questionnaires measuring demographic characteristics, perceived intimate partner rejection, resilience, and subjective well-being. Hierarchical multiple regression showed that participants’ educational status, intimate partner rejection, and resilience predicted subjective well-being. The indirect (mediation) effects were examined using the PROCESS program. Results showed that resilience mediated fully the relationship between perceived intimate partner rejection and subjective well-being in both males and females of our sample. We also found that married participants and married women in particular reported rejection by their partners to a higher extent comparing to unmarried ones. Implications for future research and effective counseling interventions are discussed.     

Competitive Dynamics in Forecasting: The Interaction of Skill and Uncertainty

The outcomes in many competitive tasks depend upon both skill and luck. Behavioral theories on risk taking in tournaments indicate that low‐skilled individuals may have incentives to take more risks than high‐skilled ones. We build on these theories and suggest, in addition, that when luck is more important in determining outcomes, the increase in risk taking is larger for low‐skilled than high‐skilled individuals. We test this hypothesis by analyzing stock analysts' forecasts of companies' earnings per share under market conditions that vary in volatility and thus imply different levels of luck in outcomes. Specifically, noting that forecasts that deviate widely from the consensus—which is observable by the analyst—potentially carry career‐related rewards but also reputational risks, we examine the degree of deviation from consensus exhibited by analysts of different skill levels (measured by both past forecasting accuracy and education) in different market conditions. We find that average deviations from consensus increase as markets become more volatile. At the same time, under conditions of high volatility, low‐skilled analysts exhibit larger increases in deviations from consensus than high‐skilled analysts. These field data results support our hypothesis based on of risk taking in tournaments. We discuss alternative interpretations such as, for example, self‐serving attributions and indicate directions for future research. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.