An interview on energy,Christian theology,and ethics with Larry Rasmussen

An interview with Larry Rasmussen on his and others' work on Christian energy ethics. The introduction to the interview gives a brief outline of Christian energy ethics. Rasmussen then reflects on this body of scholarship, where it has been, where it needs to go, and what perspectives or methods it should draw on.     

Christ,Country, and Conspiracies? Christian Nationalism,Biblical Literalism,and Belief in Conspiracy Theories

When misinformation is rampant, “fake news” is rising, and conspiracy theories are widespread, social scientists have a vested interest in understanding who is most susceptible to these false narratives and why. Recent research suggests Christians are especially susceptible to belief in conspiracy theories in the United States, but scholars have yet to ascertain the role of religiopolitical identities and epistomological approaches, specifically Christian nationalism and biblical literalism, in generalized conspiracy thinking. Because Christian nationalists sense that the nation is under cultural threat and biblical literalism provides an alternative (often anti-elite) source of information, we predict that both will amplify conspiracy thinking. We find that Christian nationalism and biblical literalism independently predict conspiracy thinking, but that the effect of Christian nationalism increases with literalism. Our results point to the contingent effects of Christian nationalism and the need for the religious variables in understanding conspiracy thinking.     

Medical hermeneutics: Where is the “text” we are interpreting?

The present paper is a commentary on an article by Drew Leder [1]. Leder identifies a series of texts in the clinical encounter, emphasizes the central role of interpretation in making sense of each of these texts, and articulates ordering principles to guide the interpretive work.The metaphor of clinical work as textual explication, however, creates the expectation that there is a text somewhere to be found. Such an expectation invites doctors and patients to search for the text and runs the risk of conceptualizing patients as more static than they are. If one is to use the textual metaphor, one must appreciate the radical extent to which the clinical encounter is a mutually produced and shifting entity. The qualities of mutuality and indeterminacy are not those one usually associates with texts. One might ultimately be better served by a different metaphor based more directly on uncertainty.     

The Future of Psychology in Family Medicine

Psychology has been integral to the field of family medicine since its inception as a medical specialty in the 1960s. Psychologists and other behavioral scientists contribute to family medicine in teaching clinical skills, in defining research questions, in developing research methodology, and in creating integrated physical/mental health care delivery systems. Future developments in the field of psychology in family medicine are likely to emphasize development and evaluation of screening measures which identify mental health problems in primary care, development of early intervention for those mental health problems, and more precise measurement of process and quality of care and health outcomes. Psychologists have an important role to fulfill in educating physicians on alternatives to pharmacologic and medical interventions for common presenting problems in primary care. However, current economic forces shaping the practice of medicine may work against further enhancing the efficacy of the physician in dealing with psychosocial issues. The future role of psychology in family medicine is not yet delineated, and while the move toward parity of reimbursement for mental and physical health care delivery may enhance this collaboration, there is a need to continue to evaluate how the psychological well-being of patients is influenced in the evolution of new models of care delivery.     

Pediatric Psychology: Child Psychological Health in the Next Century

The future of pediatric psychology is reviewed and placed in brief historical context in relation to children's psychological health care. Contemporary trends affecting the delivery of psychological services, research, and clinical training are highlighted, with suggestions for future development. Pediatric psychology is a child-based, developmentally-focused multidisciplinary practice directed toward psychosocial and neuropsychological issues of health and illness in children and youth. Pediatric psychologists need to develop strong professional identities as health care psychologists combined with a collegial and collaborative arrangement with physicians to ensure the future growth and development of pediatric psychology in the next century as a major vehicle to promote children's health care.     

IDENTIFYING THE EDUCATIVE AND SUPPRESSIVE EFFECTS OF POSITIVE PRACTICE AND RESTITUTIONAL OVERCORRECTION

Two major features of the overcorrection procedure, restitution and positive practice, were analyzed for their educative and suppressive properties in the treatment of profoundly retarded adults. Positive practice techniques that were topographically similar and dissimilar to the target behavior were studied. Eating behavior and puzzle performance were observed. Restitutional overcorrection and both forms of positive practice were effective for suppressing inappropriate behaviors. Even when appropriate behaviors had been acquired by positive practice, restitution and dissimilar positive practice were generally ineffective for increasing their rate of occurrence. However, topographically similar positive practice was successful as a means of teaching new appropriate behaviors.     

Reaction times of younger and older men and temporal contingencies of reinforcement

Influences of extended training and temporal contingencies on reaction time were studied in relation to developmental differences. Older and younger men were trained on a chained schedule in which completion of a variable interval produced a terminal link in which reaction time was measured. The reaction-time procedure involved a conditional discrimination with matching to sample in one component and oddity matching in the other. During baseline training, no time limit was placed on the response to the discrimination choice stimuli. Subsequently, increasingly severe time limits were imposed over a series of sessions. Older and younger men showed increased speeds (decreased reaction times) when temporal contingencies were imposed, and these changes were maintained during post-training baseline sessions when there was unlimited time in which to respond. The younger men generally responded faster than the older ones, and age differences were not appreciably reduced during the course of the experiment. The results indicated the feasibility of studying reaction time in human subjects using operant procedures analogous to those developed for the study of nonverbal organisms.