Social psychology and changing technologies: Reality versus caricature.

Comments on D. Kipnis's (see record 199707781-001) article that critically analyzes social psychology's assumption that psychological states can explain social behavior. The present authors point out that there are many sources in social psychology that, in fact, have revealed a vibrant and rigorous discipline in which, contrary to Kipnis's "caricature," explanations are routinely empirically questioned, variables are directly manipulated and measured, often along with their physiological and neuro-electrical correlates, and multivariate approaches address the separate and joint impact of multiple predictors on multiple dependent variables. It is also noted that Kipnis ignored social psychological research in which experimenters have assessed the physiological correlates of cognitive states. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A stimulus–response social psychology?

Comments on D. Kipnis's (see record 199707781-001) article that critically analyzes social psychology's assumption that psychological states can explain social behavior. The present author suggests that, essentially, Kipnis is calling for a return to behavioral social psychology, in suggesting that social psychology be solely concerned with explanations of what social behavior arises in response to objective changes in technology. The author continues that it is certainly not the case that humans are merely reactive in response to environmental stimuli (including technology), but, rather, as Dewey and Mead argued, they are equally proactive, causal, influencing agents acting on the environment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

L. S. Vygotsky and contemporary developmental psychology.

Central themes from L. S. Vygotsky's writings that have particular relevance for contemporary developmental psychology are outlined, and these ideas are extended in light of recent theoretical advances in the social sciences and humanities. The discussion focuses primarily on Vygotsky's claims about the social origins and social nature of higher (i.e., uniquely human) mental functioning and on his understanding of culture. His claims about the social origins of individual mental functioning have implications for the definition of terms such as "cognition" and "memory" as well as for how empirical research on these processes can be pursued. His understanding of culture is shown to be derivative of his account of the "psychological tools" that mediate human mental functioning. It is argued that efforts need to be made to elaborate a notion of culture within a Vygotskian framework that takes into account contemporary ideas and findings in the social sciences and humanities. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Gold Medal Award for Life Achievement in the Science of Psychology.

The American Psychological Foundation Gold Medal Awards recognize distinguished and enduring records of accomplishments in 4 areas of psychology. The 2000 recipient of the Gold Medal Award for Life Achievement in the Science of Psychology is Roger N. Shepard. He is honored for advancing psychological science by rendering objective and quantitative what had seemed irremediably subjective and qualitative—particularly through his invention of nonmetric multidimensional scaling and his introduction of methods of probing nonverbal internal processes and representations with external test stimuli, as in his chronometric studies of imagery, mental rotation, and apparent motion. His proposal that fundamental psychological principles—such as his exponential law of generalization and his least-path principle of mental transformation—have arisen as adaptation to universal features of the world point toward a psychological science partaking of the mathematical elegance and universality of physical science. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"Behavior technologies" caricature of social psychology.

Comments that D. Kipnis's (see record 1994-29516-001) examination of present-day social psychology journals and textbooks ignored primary outlets in social psychology, widely taught mainstream texts, and "handbook" and "annual review" treatments. Fair use of these sources would have revealed that only a minor fraction of article titles and chapter topics can reasonably be subsumed under "Power and Behavior Technology." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Can social behavior be influenced by events that we are unaware of?

Responds to the comments of K. A. Markus (see record 199810886-007), T. D. Nelson (see record 199810886-008), and M. C. Green et al (see record 199810886-008) referring to D. Kipnis's (see record 199707781-001) article analyzing social psychology's assumption that psychological states can explain social behavior. In the present reply, Kipnis addresses the arguments contained in the 3 aforementioned comments, and concludes with the assumption that the content of consciousness is explained by people's interactions with events in their world, and, further, that the understanding of social behavior will progress when theory and empirical research are extended to include societal events. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The diagnosis and prevention of unfavorable mental states in the flight personnel of ship-based aviation

An anonymous questionnaire was filled out by 126 pilots and navigators. The goals of this study were to disclose their "hard" mental states (subjective discomfort) and concrete factors that influenced upon psychosomatic and moral status during long cruise. The article gives the analysis of professional, psychological and welfare factors which may originate these states. The authors gained data which substantiated the prophylactic ways against unfavourable mental states in long cruise.     

In the mood to get over yourself: Mood affects theory-of-mind use.

Understanding others' behavior often involves attributing mental states to them by using one's "theory of mind." We argue that using theory of mind to recognize differences between one's own perspective and another's perspective is a deliberate process of inference that may be influenced by incidental mood. Because sadness is associated with more systematic and deliberate processing whereas happiness is associated with more heuristic processing, we predicted that theory-of-mind use would be facilitated by sadness compared with happiness. Two experiments supported this prediction, demonstrating that participants were more likely to utilize knowledge about others to make inferences about their mental states when they were induced to feel sad than when they were induced to feel happy. These results provide both theoretical insight into the psychological mechanisms that govern theory of mind as well as practical insight into a common source of variability in its use. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The abduction of disorder in psychiatry.

The evolutionary cornerstone of J. C. Wakefield's (see record 1999-03409-002) harmful dysfunction thesis is a faulty assumption of comparability between mental and biological processes that overlooks the unique plasticity and openness of the brain's functioning design. This omission leads Wakefield to an idealized concept of natural mental functions, illusory interpretations of mental disorders as harmful dysfunctions, and exaggerated claims for the validity of his explanatory and stipulative proposals. The authors argue that there are numerous ways in which evolutionarily intact mental and psychological processes, combined with striking discontinuities within and between evolutionary and contemporary social/cultural environments, may cause nondysfunction variants of many widely accepted major mental disorders. These examples undermine many of Wakefield's arguments for adopting a harmful dysfunction concept of mental disorder. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Assessing mental retardation in death penalty cases: Critical issues for psychology and psychological practice.

In 2002, the United States Supreme Court decided the Atkins case, which held that mentally retarded defendants could not be executed. The opinion gave no guidance on the definition of mental retardation, preferring to leave to individual states the task of determining not only the definition of mental retardation but also the assessment procedures to be used in making the diagnosis. This lack of guidance has resulted in many issues, including varying definitions of what constitutes mental retardation across states, use of different assessment procedures to make the determination that a person has mental retardation, and numerous psychometric concerns regarding the provision of psychological assessment services to the courts in capital cases that involve a defendant who may have mental retardation. This article examines these latter issues in detail from both psychological and legal perspectives and makes recommendations for practicing psychologists. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Computer simulation of thinking.

"The nub of the simulation problem involves the use of similar types of 'programs' of 'instructions' to the machine in order to reproduce the steps an individual goes through in thinking out the solution to a difficult problem." Simulation methods "have a tremendous role in sharpening our formulations concerning mental processes and phenomena." The "simulation of human responses has the same overwhelming advantages for our understanding of behavioral phenomena as similar methods in other sciences." Research "on simulation of complex psychological processes is yielding results of increasing importance." From Psyc Abstracts 36:02:2CM87H. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Religious experience and psychological conflict.

"I shall center my attention upon the constructive aspects of the profounder variety of psychological conflict to which we give the name of 'schizophrenia.' I shall submit and defend the position that psychological conflict, even in its schizophrenic manifestations, has religious significance." There are "forms of mental illness which are manifestations of healing power analogous to fever or inflammation of the body." An illustrative case history is presented. "Fundamental mental disorder is best understood as an attempt to deal with an intolerable sense of personal failure and guilt… . Other things being equal, the outcome of an acute schizophrenic episode is likely to be constructive insofar as it represents an honest attempt on the part of the patient to grapple with his real difficulties… . In order to understand either mental disorder or religious experience, the one should be studied in the light of the other." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A better philosophy for a better psychology: Comment on Slaney and Racine (2011).

In their thought-provoking article, Slaney and Racine (2011) put forth several criticisms of the traditional view that concepts are mental representations used in the cognitive processes that underlie human higher cognitive competences (categorization, induction, etc.). Considerations of a broadly Wittgensteinian nature underlie their criticisms. In this article, I argue that the considerations advanced by Slaney and Racine do not undermine the clear account of the nature of mental states and psychological processes developed in the 1960s and 1970s and endorsed in my book Doing without Concepts (Machery, 2009). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Review of Theory and problems of adolescent development.

Reviews "Theory and problems of adolescent development," by David P. Ausubel (see record 1955-00581-000). Unlike most other books in this area, this book offers a systematic presentation of psychological knowledge woven around a dynamic point of view. It is a scholarly book written in language that makes for easy and interesting reading. The author opens his book with an organized set of arguments designed to convince his readers that there is justification for a book on the "Psychology of Adolescent Development." His major premise states that "adolescence is treated as a separate developmental period not because it covers a decade but because it spans an interval in which distinctive changes occur in a biosocial status of the human organism. The author has marshaled his psychological knowledge and psychiatric experience into a well-organized book. Dr. Ausubel quotes freely from other authors and from his own writings and research. There are extensive references contained in the bibliography at the end of each chapter. Although the author states that "this book is primarily intended as an advanced textbook in adolescent psychology for graduate students in psychology and education," it would appear that this book is written with sufficient clarity and nontechnical language to be used in any college course dealing with adolescent behavior. It would be especially desirable in clinically-oriented courses. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Development and evaluation of the Balanced Index of Psychological Mindedness (BIPM).

Psychological mindedness (PM) refers to a person's interest and ability to be in touch with and reflect on his or her psychological states and processes. In this multipart study, the authors present the Balanced Index of Psychological Mindedness (BIPM). The psychometric properties and clinical relevance of this 14-item self-report scale were examined in 2 community samples and a mental health patient sample in the Netherlands (total N = 1,211). The 7-item Interest and Insight subscales of the BIPM showed good internal consistency (Cronbach's αs = .85 and .76, respectively), test–retest reliability (r = .63 and .71, respectively), and construct validity (e.g., r > .40 with related constructs). PM was higher in women than in men. Relatively low PM was found among poorly educated people and in mental health patients (ps r = ?.21 to ?.36, p     

Metarepresentation in action: 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds' developing theories of mind in parent–child conversations.

Using a cross-sectional natural language database, the authors investigated the parent–child conversations of 36 three-, 4-, and 5-year-olds to explore 2 issues regarding the development of metarepresentation. First, children's uses of explicit contrastives (ECs), utterances that explicitly contrast 2 differing mental states, were explored. Four-year-olds and, to a greater extent, 5-year-olds were found to reliably use ECs. Second, parents' responses to children's uses of "I don't know" and implicit contrastives (e.g., contradictions) were examined to determine whether parents took these opportunities to highlight the representational nature of mental states. All children regularly elicited mentalistic responses from their parents and, in some cases, these parental responses were positively related to children's production of mental talk. Findings are discussed in terms of how theory of mind development may be guided by scaffolding processes. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dysmentia.

Comments on the calling of certain types of retardation dysmentia. The author states that emotional deprivation in early childhood is a well known cause of simulated retardation. At the present time the idea of functional retardation (as shown by psychological testing) with better or normal inherent capacities is expressed by such terms as "pseudoretardation," "apparent feeblemindedness," or "mental deficiency," or other similar combinations. The author suggests that these cases be called dysmentia to indicate disturbance in mental functioning as it applies to the intellectual spheres, and which may be temporary. This would give a more hopeful attitude towards such patients and ipso facto call for further follow-up and/or testing. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Queueing network modeling of elementary mental processes.

This article examines the use of reaction time (RT) to infer the possible configurations of mental systems and presents a class of queueing network models of elementary mental processes. The models consider the temporal issue of discrete versus continuous information transmission in conjunction with the architectural issue of serial versus network arrangement of mental processes. Five elementary but important types of queueing networks are described in detail with regard to their predictions for RT behavior, and they are used to re-examine existing models for psychological processes. As continuous-transmission networks in the general form, queueing network models include the existing discrete and continuous serial models and discrete network models as special cases, cover a broader range of temporal and architectural structures that mental processes might assume, and can be subjected to empirical tests. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Classifications and salaries of psychologists in state mental hospital systems.

Afour-and-a-half page table summarizes job classifications and salaries of psychologists in the state mental hospital systems of 42 states. The data were acquired by means of a 3-page questionnaire directed to the various mental hospital authorities. "Although functions within state systems vary, indications are that the psychologist continues to find his role in this facet of public service administratively defined as one in which psychodiagnostic skills are primary." Noteworthy, however, "was the extent to which active involvement of the psychologist was also anticipated in the treatment process, research, and teaching of other institutional personnel." 2 states "specified that candidates for their top level positions must possess an ABEPP diploma, and two more expressed the desirability for such… . Twenty-five… states evidenced some enhancement of salary in the form of maintenance or residential perquisites." Major headings in the table refer to: state, job title, educational requirement, professional experience, annual salary, and residential perquisites. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The end of the end of ideology.

The "end of ideology" was declared by social scientists in the aftermath of World War II. They argued that (a) ordinary citizens' political attitudes lack the kind of stability, consistency, and constraint that ideology requires; (b) ideological constructs such as liberalism and conservatism lack motivational potency and behavioral significance; (c) there are no major differences in content (or substance) between liberal and conservative points of view; and (d) there are few important differences in psychological processes (or styles) that underlie liberal versus conservative orientations. The end-of-ideologists were so influential that researchers ignored the topic of ideology for many years. However, current political realities, recent data from the American National Election Studies, and results from an emerging psychological paradigm provide strong grounds for returning to the study of ideology. Studies reveal that there are indeed meaningful political and psychological differences that covary with ideological self-placement. Situational variables--including system threat and mortality salience--and dispositional variables--including openness and conscientiousness--affect the degree to which an individual is drawn to liberal versus conservative leaders, parties, and opinions. A psychological analysis is also useful for understanding the political divide between "red states" and "blue states." (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)