Is Psychology Losing Status as an Academic Discipline?

The recent attack on higher education in America has stimulated many psychologists to examine the role of psychology in higher education. Many critics have labeled universities as being "supermarkets" or "service stations." Some of the attacks have specifically referred to courses in personal adjustment and mental hygiene as being "service" courses. Some critics have questioned the justification of including such courses in an undergraduate program. I am not concerned here with the justification of such criticism. I do feel, however, that the attacks point up the trend toward overemphasis in psychology on the service functions of our field of study. In the eyes of the public and in the thinking of leaders in other academic disciplines, I fear that we are losing the position as an academic discipline that we enjoyed perhaps twenty or thirty years ago. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

On the Issue "What Is a Science?"

Item expresses the author's very strong feeling that the entire argument of whether or not any particular profession or occupational area is or is not a science is invalid and needless. He submits that there is no such thing as a science; only Science, with a capital "S." Science is a method and a philosophy and is not related to whichever area it is applied. And that a true Scientist may apply himself to any problem whatsoever without lessening his position as a Scientist. There are no such things as sciences; there is only Science and there are only Scientists. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is clinical psychology a science?

"Science is a matter of degree of systematic logical organization of phenomena; clinical psychology is a science to a degree that will rise in proportion to such systematization," but its development depends upon creative thinking and a vital matrix of pervasive, sympathetic, and qualitative experiences. A "science of personal human behavior seems more feasible in the domain of deviant (neurotic, psychic) behavior than in mentally healthy behavior. One may predict and logically systematize compulsive (neurotic) behavior, whereas the mentally healthy man is more spontaneous, free, and creative in his personal behavior—hence, in detail, less predictable or logically organizable. A science of clinical psychology seems more realizable (as to detailed prediction) than a science of general healthy personalityp" (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is the first course a monster?

Author comments on his increasing concern regarding introductory undergraduate psychology courses as reflections upon the discipline. He suggests that the discipline needs a thorough, nationwide, and representative-sample survey of the relationship of the first course to the undergraduate student. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is Matric Suction a Stress Variable?

The writer attempts to clarify and address two fundamental questions regarding the appropriate use of matric suction in unsaturated soil mechanics: Is matric suction a stress variable? and Is matric suction a stress state variable? These questions are examined by employing the universally accepted mechanical equilibrium principle, the concept of representative elementary volume (REV) for air-water-solid multiphase porous media, and physical and logical reasoning. It is clarified that matric suction is not a stress variable at a typical air-water-solid REV level, and it can be considered as a stress state variable. However, when it is considered as a stress state variable, there is an interdependency or coupling between matric suction and the net normal stress if both of them are concurrently used to describe the state of stress in unsaturated soils. It is illustrated that the answers to these questions bear important implications for the conceptualization, theorization, and application of unsaturated soil mechanics.     

Is there a Gulf War syndrome?

BACKGROUND: UK veterans of the Gulf War report more ill health than servicemen who were not deployed to the Gulf War. We investigated whether the pattern of symptom reporting by veterans of the Gulf War differed from that in active servicemen who had not fought in the Gulf War or who had fought in other conflicts. METHODS: We used a population-based cross-sectional design. We sent a standardised survey that asked about 50 physical symptoms to three UK military cohorts; men who had served in the Gulf War, those who had served in the Bosnia conflict, and men who had been in active service but not deployed to the Gulf War (Era cohort). We used exploratory factor analysis to identify underlying factors and describe the factor structure of the symptoms reported in the Gulf War cohort. Confirmatory factor analysis was used to test the fit of this factor structure in the Bosnia and Era cohorts. FINDINGS: Three factors in the Gulf War cohort together accounted for about 20% of the common variance. We labelled the factors mood, respiratory system, and peripheral nervous system, according to the symptoms that loaded on to them. In the confirmatory factor analysis, the factor structure identified in the Gulf War cohort fitted reasonably well in the Bosnia and Era cohorts. INTERPRETATION: Although results from complex modelling procedures need to be interpreted with caution, our findings do not support a unique Gulf War syndrome. The mechanisms behind increased self-reporting of symptoms need further investigation.     

Is homeopathy more than a placebo?

Homeopathy can be characterized by three axioms "treating like with like" (law of similars), "increasing effects with increasing potency" (potentization) and "effects on the basis of ultra-high dilutions" (beyond-molecular effects), where it is unlikely that the dilutions contain a single molecule of the original substance. On the basis of these tenets and the clinical evidence further research priorities are developed. Current reviews indicate small homeopathic verum effects, even after adjustment for internal validity and publication-bias. However, the results remain disputable, because reproducibility isn't assured by independent examiners. For further validation, independent replication of studies with high quality, including specially treatment with high-potencies according to law of similars, seem to be important. The prerequisites for a homeopathy-specific study methodology (inclusion of populations according to their homeopathic diagnosis) still are not fulfilled today. There is neither convincing evidence for specific drug pictures by placebo-controlled drug provings, nor is the reliability of homeopathic diagnosis proven. By reason of extensive, individual interviews, preceeding every classical homeopathic remedy finding, placebo-effects could play an important therapeutical role. The relevance of homeopathic placebo-effects should be explored against other sham treatments and an untreated group.     

Is Einstellung rigidity a general trait?

"The purpose of this research was to study the relation between the Einstellung type of rigidity and certain personality traits. The hypothesis that this kind of rigidity is an aspect of a generalized tendency to respond rigidly that would be reflected in other phases of personality structure was a basis for this study… It was concluded that the results obtained in the present study did not support the hypothesis of a generalized rigidity factor." 21 references. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is there a discipline of community medicine?

Community Medicine is a distinct and definable discipline. Through Community Medicine Departments of medical schools and hospitals, patient care, teaching and research programs are conducted in an integrated fashion, concerned with a broad definition of health which is beyond the range of other clinical departments. Because Community Medicine is a developing field, and Departments of Community Medicine are not rigidly tied to traditional approaches, there exist unusual opportunities for new design and fresh insight. Community Medicine is in the fore of Medicine's ability to evolve with the society around us. Community Medicine both identifies the need for change, and acts as an agent for the change. There are obstacles. The most difficult challenges we face are obtaining curriculum time for a new discipline which, to those caught in "the vice-like irrational grip of tradition" (18), may not appear worthy; and ridding ourselves of the sterotype that the hospital can be the single unified source of health care for all community people. These problems are being resolved, however, and the inherent value of community medicine as a new body of theory and practice becomes increasingly clear.     

Science or ideology?

Responds to the comments by D. McKay (see record 2011-02175-008); B. D. Thombs, L. R. Jewett, and M. Bassel (see record 2011-02175-009); M. D. Anestis, J. C. Anestis, and S. O. Lilienfeld (see record 2011-02175-010); and W. W. Tryon and G. S. Tryon (see record 2011-02175-011) on the current author's original article, "The efficacy of psychodynamic psychotherapy" (see record 2010-02208-012). The academic psychology literature is filled with pronouncements about psychodynamic theory, often stated in authoritative tones, that present a picture of psychodynamic treatment that is unrecognizable to me and to other contemporary psychodynamic practitioners. Several of the comments about my article perpetuate this tradition and, I am sorry to say, introduce disinformation into the pages of the American Psychologist. Before addressing some specifics, I want to say a few words about my understanding of how such misrepresentations can find their way into scholarly academic journals. Three of the four comments on my article appear to have the intent of reasserting the master narrative by creating a smokescreen of doubt and confusion (Anestis, Anestis, & Lilienfeld, 2011; McKay, 2011; Thombs, Jewett, & Bassel, 2011). Two of the four comments (McKay, 2011; Tryon & Tryon, 2011) cite a metaanalysis indicating that there is no empirical support for the concept of “symptom substitution.” Two of the comments (Anestis et al., 2011; Thombs et al., 2011) note that the effect size from the meta-analysis by Leichsenring and Rabung (2008)—one of eight meta-analyses showing substantial benefits for psychodynamic therapy reported in my Table 1 (Shedler, 2010)—has been the target of criticism and reflects a computational error. Three of the comments (Anestis et al., 2011; McKay, 2011; Thombs et al., 2011) imply that the methods used in empirical studies of psychodynamic therapies are somehow inadequate relative to studies of other evidence-based therapies. Unlike the other comments, the comment of Tryon and Tryon (2011) appears to be a sincere effort to engage with my arguments. What disturbs me about the three other comments is not that the authors disagree with my conclusions but that they portray themselves as objective investigators who desire only to promote good science. While Anestis et al. (2011), McKay (2011), and Thombs et al. (2011) imply or explicitly state that I am the one who marshals evidence selectively, from my angle of vision they appear to value only evidence that supports an a priori agenda while ignoring, dismissing, or attacking evidence that does not. If so, this is not science, but ideology masquerading as science. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Is satisfaction with self a measure of adjustment?

Two hypotheses tested in this experiment are "(a) degree of self-satisfaction is curvilinearly related to the social dimension of adjustment and (b) degree of self-satisfaction is ordinarily related to the conceptual dimension of ego-control." Both hypotheses are supported when tested on a sample of 56 college students by comparing their MMPI scores with their ratings of self relevance on a list of 80 adjectives. Implications are drawn with regard to an index of effectiveness of psychotherapy proposed by Rogers. The concept of metastability of adjustment is discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Adverse impact: Is it a viable concept?

It appears that those federal agencies responsible for enforcement persist in the belief that a given test score can mean one thing in one subgroup and something else in another and/or that inferences from a set of test scores can be valid for one subgroup but not for another. First surfacing in early agency regulations in connection with the now discontinued "differential validity" requirement, the belief still manifests itself in the concepts of "unfairness" and "adverse impact." Furthermore, the determination of the presence or absence of adverse impact on the basis of the impact ratio involves numerous statistical and measurement issues. Use of the impact ratio to establish the prosecutorial posture of an enforcement agency is clearly flawed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Neurosis and religiosity. Is there a causal correlation?

The interrelation between religiosity, mental health and psychopathology is reviewed on the basis of the current literature. Attributional labels, such as the German term "ecclesiogenic neurosis" are submitted to a critical reevaluation, and their validity as a construct is questioned. Neurotic symptomatology in religious patients has to be seen against the background of their underlying pathology, their biography, and the way in which they integrate religion into their life styles. The religiosity of a patient cannot be singled out as a causative and thus primary pathogenetic factor. Rather religion has to be seen as one forming element among others contributing to the content of a neurotic process. Therapists working with religious patients should try to understand the religious background of their patients in order to help them integrate their religiosity in a larger framework of therapeutic goals.     

Is there a mutual relationship between opposite attentional biases underlying anxiety?

Current models that account for attentional processes in anxiety have proposed that high-trait anxious individuals are characterized by a hypervigilant-avoidant pattern of attentional biases to threat. We adopted a laboratory conditioning procedure to induce concomitant hypervigilance and avoidance to threat, emphasizing a putative relationship between lower-level reactive and upper-level controlled attentional mechanisms as the core account of attentional processes involved in the development and maintenance of anxiety. Eighty high- and low-trait anxious participants underwent Pavlovian conditioning to a human face. Eye tracking was used to monitor attentional changes to the conditioned stimulus (CS+) face and the neutral stimulus (CS?) face, presented at 200, 500, and 800 ms durations. The high-anxious participants developed the expected attentional bias toward the CS+ at 200 ms presentation time and attentional avoidance at 500 and 800 ms durations. Hypervigilance to aversive stimuli at 200 ms and later avoidance to the same stimuli at 500 and 800 ms were associated with higher levels of galvanic skin conductance to the CS+. The low-anxious individuals developed the opposite attentional pattern with an initial tendency to orient attention away from the aversive stimuli in the 200 ms condition and to orient attention toward aversive stimuli in the remaining time. The differential modulation between hypervigilance and avoidance elicited in the two groups by the conditioning procedure suggests that vulnerability to anxiety is characterized by a latent relationship between diverse attentional mechanisms. Within this relationship, hypervigilance and avoidance to threat operate at different stages of information processing suggesting fuzzy boundaries between early reactive and later-strategic processing of threat. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)