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Coherence therapy

Coherence therapy is a system of psychotherapy based in the theory that symptoms of mood, thought and behavior are produced coherently according to the person's current mental models of reality, most of which are implicit and unconscious. It was founded by Bruce Ecker and Laurel Hulley in the 1990s. It has been considered among the most well respected postmodern/constructivist therapies. General description The basis of coherence therapy is the principle of symptom coherence. This is the view that any response of the brain–mind–body system is an expression of coherent personal constructs (or schemas), which are nonverbal, emotional, perceptual and somatic knowings, not verbal-cognitive propositions. A therapy client's presenting symptoms are understood as an activation and enactment of specific constructs. The principle of symptom coherence can be found in varying degrees, explicitly or implicitly, in the writings of a number of historical psychotherapy theorists, including Sigmund Freud (1923), Harry Stack Sullivan (1948), Carl Jung (1964), R. D. Laing (1967), Gregory Bateson (1972), Virginia Satir (1972), Paul Watzlawick (1974), Eugene Gendlin (1982), Vittorio Guidano & Giovanni Liotti (1983), Les Greenberg (1993), Bessel van der Kolk (1994), Robert Kegan & Lisa Lahey (2001), Sue Johnson (2004), and others. The principle of symptom coherence maintains that an individual's seemingly irrational, out-of-control symptoms are actually sensible, cogent, orderly expressions of the person's existing constructions of self and world, rather than a disorder or pathology. Even a person's psychological resistance to change is seen as a result of the coherence of the person's mental constructions. Thus, coherence therapy, like some other postmodern therapies, approaches a person's resistance to change as an ally in psychotherapy and not an enemy. Coherence therapy is considered a type of psychological constructivism. It differs from some other forms of constructivism in that the principle of symptom coherence is fully explicit and rigorously operationalized, guiding and informing the entire methodology. The process of coherence therapy is experiential rather than analytic, and in this regard is similar to Gestalt therapy, Focusing or Hakomi. The aim is for the client to come into direct, emotional experience of the unconscious personal constructs (akin to complexes or ego-states) which produce an unwanted symptom and to undergo a natural process of revising or dissolving these constructs, thereby eliminating the symptom. Practitioners claim that the entire process often requires a dozen sessions or less, although it can take longer when the meanings and emotions underlying the symptom are particularly complex or intense. Symptom coherence Symptom coherence is defined by Ecker and Hulley as follows: A person produces a particular symptom because, despite the suffering it entails, the symptom is compellingly necessary to have, according to at least one unconscious, nonverbal, emotionally potent schema or construction of reality. Each symptom-requiring construction is cogent—a sensible, meaningful, well-knit, well-defined schema that was formed adaptively in response to earlier experiences and is still carried and applied in the present. The person ceases producing the symptom as soon as there no longer exists any construction of reality in which the symptom is necessary to have. There are several forms of symptom coherence. Some symptoms are necessary because they serve a crucial function (such as depression that protects against feeling and expressing anger), while others have no function but are necessary in the sense of being an inevitable effect, or by-product, caused by some other adaptive, coherent but unconscious response (such as depression resulting from isolation, which itself is a strategy for feeling safe). Both functional and functionless symptoms are coherent, according to the client's own material. In other words, the theory states that symptoms are produced by how the individual strives, without conscious awareness, to carry out self-protecting or self-affirming purposes formed in the course of living. This model of symptom production fits into the broader category of psychological constructivism, which views the person as having profound, if unrecognized, agency in shaping experience and behavior. Symptom coherence does not apply to those symptoms that are not directly or indirectly caused by implicit schemas or emotional learnings—for example, hypothyroidism-induced depression, autism, and biochemical addiction. Hierarchical organization of constructs As a tool for identifying all of a person's relevant schemas or constructions of reality, Ecker and Hulley defined several logically hierarchical domains or orders of construction (inspired by Gregory Bateson): The first order consists of a person's overt responses: thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. The second order consists of the person's specific meaning of the concrete situation to which they are responding. The third order consists of the person's broad purposes and strategies for construing that specific meaning (teleology). The fourth order consists of the person's general meaning of the nature of self, others, and the world (ontology and primal world beliefs). The fifth order consists of the person's broad purposes and strategies for construing that general meaning. Higher orders (beyond the fifth order) are rarely involved in psychotherapy. A person's first-order symptoms of thought, mood, or behavior follow from a second-order construal of the situation, and that second-order construal is powerfully influenced by the person's third- and fourth-order constructions. Hence the third and higher orders constitute what Ecker and Hulley call "the emotional truth of the symptom", which are the meanings and purposes that are intended to be discovered, integrated, and transformed in therapy. History Coherence therapy was developed in the late 1980s and early 1990s as Ecker and Hulley investigated why certain psychotherapy sessions seemed to produce deep transformations of emotional meaning and immediate symptom cessation, while most sessions did not. Studying many such transformative sessions for several years, they concluded that in these sessions, the therapist had desisted from doing anything to oppose or counteract the symptom, and the client had a powerful, felt experience of some previously unrecognized "emotional truth" that was making the symptom necessary to have. Ecker and Hulley began developing experiential methods to intentionally facilitate this process. They found that a majority of their clients could begin having experiences of the underlying coherence of their symptoms from the first session. In addition to creating a methodology for swift retrieval of the emotional schemas driving symptom production, they also identified the process by which retrieved schemas then undergo profound change or dissolution: the retrieved emotional schema must be activated while concurrently the individual vividly experiences something that sharply contradicts it. Neuroscientists subsequently determined that these same steps are precisely what unlocks and deletes the neural circuit in implicit memory that stores an emotional learning—the process of reconsolidation. Due to the swiftness of change that Ecker and Hulley began experiencing with many of their clients, they initially named this new system depth-oriented brief therapy (DOBT). In 2005, Ecker and Hulley began calling the system coherence therapy in order for the name to more clearly reflect the central principle of the approach, and also because many therapists had come to associate the phrase "brief therapy" with depth-avoidant methods that they regard as superficial. Evidence from neuroscience In a series of three articles published in the Journal of Constructivist Psychology from 2007 to 2009, Bruce Ecker and Brian Toomey presented evidence that coherence therapy may be one of the systems of psychotherapy which, according to current neuroscience, makes fullest use of the brain's built-in capacities for change. Ecker and Toomey argued that the mechanism of change in coherence therapy correlates with the recently discovered neural process of "memory reconsolidation", a process that can "unwire" and delete longstanding emotional conditioning held in implicit memory. The assertions that coherence therapy achieves implicit memory deletion align with the growing body of evidence supporting memory reconsolidation. Ecker and colleagues claim that: (a) their procedural steps match those identified by neuroscientists for reconsolidation, (b) their procedural steps result in effortless cessation of symptoms, and (c) the emotional experience of the retrieved, symptom-generating emotional schemas can no longer be evoked by cues that formerly evoked it strongly. The process of removing the neural basis of the symptom in coherence therapy (and in similar postmodern therapies) is different from the counteractive strategy of some behavioral therapies. In such behavioral therapies, new preferred behavioral patterns are typically practiced to compete against and hopefully override the unwanted ones; this counteractive process, like the "extinction" of conditioned responses in animals, is known to be inherently unstable and prone to relapse, because the neural circuit of the unwanted pattern continues to exist even when the unwanted pattern is in abeyance. Through reconsolidation, the unwanted neural circuits are "unwired" and cannot relapse. See also Client-centered therapy Emotionally focused therapy Immunity to change Method of levels Notes References Psychotherapy literature Neuroscience literature External links CoherenceTherapy.org — Coherence Therapy (Depth Oriented Brief Therapy) Constructivism (psychological school) Postmodern theory Psychotherapy by type

Spatial analysis

Spatial analysis is any of the formal techniques which studies entities using their topological, geometric, or geographic properties. Spatial analysis includes a variety of techniques using different analytic approaches, especially spatial statistics. It may be applied in fields as diverse as astronomy, with its studies of the placement of galaxies in the cosmos, or to chip fabrication engineering, with its use of "place and route" algorithms to build complex wiring structures. In a more restricted sense, spatial analysis is geospatial analysis, the technique applied to structures at the human scale, most notably in the analysis of geographic data. It may also be applied to genomics, as in transcriptomics data. Complex issues arise in spatial analysis, many of which are neither clearly defined nor completely resolved, but form the basis for current research. The most fundamental of these is the problem of defining the spatial location of the entities being studied. Classification of the techniques of spatial analysis is difficult because of the large number of different fields of research involved, the different fundamental approaches which can be chosen, and the many forms the data can take. History Spatial analysis began with early attempts at cartography and surveying. Land surveying goes back to at least 1,400 B.C in Egypt: the dimensions of taxable land plots were measured with measuring ropes and plumb bobs. Many fields have contributed to its rise in modern form. Biology contributed through botanical studies of global plant distributions and local plant locations, ethological studies of animal movement, landscape ecological studies of vegetation blocks, ecological studies of spatial population dynamics, and the study of biogeography. Epidemiology contributed with early work on disease mapping, notably John Snow's work of mapping an outbreak of cholera, with research on mapping the spread of disease and with location studies for health care delivery. Statistics has contributed greatly through work in spatial statistics. Economics has contributed notably through spatial econometrics. Geographic information system is currently a major contributor due to the importance of geographic software in the modern analytic toolbox. Remote sensing has contributed extensively in morphometric and clustering analysis. Computer science has contributed extensively through the study of algorithms, notably in computational geometry. Mathematics continues to provide the fundamental tools for analysis and to reveal the complexity of the spatial realm, for example, with recent work on fractals and scale invariance. Scientific modelling provides a useful framework for new approaches. Fundamental issues Spatial analysis confronts many fundamental issues in the definition of its objects of study, in the construction of the analytic operations to be used, in the use of computers for analysis, in the limitations and particularities of the analyses which are known, and in the presentation of analytic results. Many of these issues are active subjects of modern research. Common errors often arise in spatial analysis, some due to the mathematics of space, some due to the particular ways data are presented spatially, some due to the tools which are available. Census data, because it protects individual privacy by aggregating data into local units, raises a number of statistical issues. The fractal nature of coastline makes precise measurements of its length difficult if not impossible. A computer software fitting straight lines to the curve of a coastline, can easily calculate the lengths of the lines which it defines. However these straight lines may have no inherent meaning in the real world, as was shown for the coastline of Britain. These problems represent a challenge in spatial analysis because of the power of maps as media of presentation. When results are presented as maps, the presentation combines spatial data which are generally accurate with analytic results which may be inaccurate, leading to an impression that analytic results are more accurate than the data would indicate. Formal Problems Boundary problem Modifiable areal unit problem Modifiable temporal unit problem Neighborhood effect averaging problem Travelling salesman problem Uncertain geographic context problem Weber problem Spatial characterization The definition of the spatial presence of an entity constrains the possible analysis which can be applied to that entity and influences the final conclusions that can be reached. While this property is fundamentally true of all analysis, it is particularly important in spatial analysis because the tools to define and study entities favor specific characterizations of the entities being studied. Statistical techniques favor the spatial definition of objects as points because there are very few statistical techniques which operate directly on line, area, or volume elements. Computer tools favor the spatial definition of objects as homogeneous and separate elements because of the limited number of database elements and computational structures available, and the ease with which these primitive structures can be created. Spatial dependence Spatial dependence is the spatial relationship of variable values (for themes defined over space, such as rainfall) or locations (for themes defined as objects, such as cities). Spatial dependence is measured as the existence of statistical dependence in a collection of random variables, each of which is associated with a different geographical location. Spatial dependence is of importance in applications where it is reasonable to postulate the existence of corresponding set of random variables at locations that have not been included in a sample. Thus rainfall may be measured at a set of rain gauge locations, and such measurements can be considered as outcomes of random variables, but rainfall clearly occurs at other locations and would again be random. Because rainfall exhibits properties of autocorrelation, spatial interpolation techniques can be used to estimate rainfall amounts at locations near measured locations. As with other types of statistical dependence, the presence of spatial dependence generally leads to estimates of an average value from a sample being less accurate than had the samples been independent, although if negative dependence exists a sample average can be better than in the independent case. A different problem than that of estimating an overall average is that of spatial interpolation: here the problem is to estimate the unobserved random outcomes of variables at locations intermediate to places where measurements are made, on that there is spatial dependence between the observed and unobserved random variables. Tools for exploring spatial dependence include: spatial correlation, spatial covariance functions and semivariograms. Methods for spatial interpolation include Kriging, which is a type of best linear unbiased prediction. The topic of spatial dependence is of importance to geostatistics and spatial analysis. Spatial auto-correlation Spatial dependency is the co-variation of properties within geographic space: characteristics at proximal locations appear to be correlated, either positively or negatively. Spatial dependency leads to the spatial autocorrelation problem in statistics since, like temporal autocorrelation, this violates standard statistical techniques that assume independence among observations. For example, regression analyses that do not compensate for spatial dependency can have unstable parameter estimates and yield unreliable significance tests. Spatial regression models (see below) capture these relationships and do not suffer from these weaknesses. It is also appropriate to view spatial dependency as a source of information rather than something to be corrected. Locational effects also manifest as spatial heterogeneity, or the apparent variation in a process with respect to location in geographic space. Unless a space is uniform and boundless, every location will have some degree of uniqueness relative to the other locations. This affects the spatial dependency relations and therefore the spatial process. Spatial heterogeneity means that overall parameters estimated for the entire system may not adequately describe the process at any given location. Spatial association Spatial association is the degree to which things are similarly arranged in space. Analysis of the distribution patterns of two phenomena is done by map overlay. If the distributions are similar, then the spatial association is strong, and vice versa. In a Geographic Information System, the analysis can be done quantitatively. For example, a set of observations (as points or extracted from raster cells) at matching locations can be intersected and examined by regression analysis. Like spatial autocorrelation, this can be a useful tool for spatial prediction. In spatial modeling, the concept of spatial association allows the use of covariates in a regression equation to predict the geographic field and thus produce a map. The second dimension of spatial association The second dimension of spatial association (SDA) reveals the association between spatial variables through extracting geographical information at locations outside samples. SDA effectively uses the missing geographical information outside sample locations in methods of the first dimension of spatial association (FDA), which explore spatial association using observations at sample locations. Scaling Spatial measurement scale is a persistent issue in spatial analysis; more detail is available at the modifiable areal unit problem (MAUP) topic entry. Landscape ecologists developed a series of scale invariant metrics for aspects of ecology that are fractal in nature. In more general terms, no scale independent method of analysis is widely agreed upon for spatial statistics. Sampling Spatial sampling involves determining a limited number of locations in geographic space for faithfully measuring phenomena that are subject to dependency and heterogeneity. Dependency suggests that since one location can predict the value of another location, we do not need observations in both places. But heterogeneity suggests that this relation can change across space, and therefore we cannot trust an observed degree of dependency beyond a region that may be small. Basic spatial sampling schemes include random, clustered and systematic. These basic schemes can be applied at multiple levels in a designated spatial hierarchy (e.g., urban area, city, neighborhood). It is also possible to exploit ancillary data, for example, using property values as a guide in a spatial sampling scheme to measure educational attainment and income. Spatial models such as autocorrelation statistics, regression and interpolation (see below) can also dictate sample design. Common errors in spatial analysis The fundamental issues in spatial analysis lead to numerous problems in analysis including bias, distortion and outright errors in the conclusions reached. These issues are often interlinked but various attempts have been made to separate out particular issues from each other. Length In discussing the coastline of Britain, Benoit Mandelbrot showed that certain spatial concepts are inherently nonsensical despite presumption of their validity. Lengths in ecology depend directly on the scale at which they are measured and experienced. So while surveyors commonly measure the length of a river, this length only has meaning in the context of the relevance of the measuring technique to the question under study. Locational fallacy The locational fallacy refers to error due to the particular spatial characterization chosen for the elements of study, in particular choice of placement for the spatial presence of the element. Spatial characterizations may be simplistic or even wrong. Studies of humans often reduce the spatial existence of humans to a single point, for instance their home address. This can easily lead to poor analysis, for example, when considering disease transmission which can happen at work or at school and therefore far from the home. The spatial characterization may implicitly limit the subject of study. For example, the spatial analysis of crime data has recently become popular but these studies can only describe the particular kinds of crime which can be described spatially. This leads to many maps of assault but not to any maps of embezzlement with political consequences in the conceptualization of crime and the design of policies to address the issue. Atomic fallacy This describes errors due to treating elements as separate 'atoms' outside of their spatial context. The fallacy is about transferring individual conclusions to spatial units. Ecological fallacy The ecological fallacy describes errors due to performing analyses on aggregate data when trying to reach conclusions on the individual units. Errors occur in part from spatial aggregation. For example, a pixel represents the average surface temperatures within an area. Ecological fallacy would be to assume that all points within the area have the same temperature. Solutions to the fundamental issues Geographic space A mathematical space exists whenever we have a set of observations and quantitative measures of their attributes. For example, we can represent individuals' incomes or years of education within a coordinate system where the location of each individual can be specified with respect to both dimensions. The distance between individuals within this space is a quantitative measure of their differences with respect to income and education. However, in spatial analysis, we are concerned with specific types of mathematical spaces, namely, geographic space. In geographic space, the observations correspond to locations in a spatial measurement framework that capture their proximity in the real world. The locations in a spatial measurement framework often represent locations on the surface of the Earth, but this is not strictly necessary. A spatial measurement framework can also capture proximity with respect to, say, interstellar space or within a biological entity such as a liver. The fundamental tenet is Tobler's First Law of Geography: if the interrelation between entities increases with proximity in the real world, then representation in geographic space and assessment using spatial analysis techniques are appropriate. The Euclidean distance between locations often represents their proximity, although this is only one possibility. There are an infinite number of distances in addition to Euclidean that can support quantitative analysis. For example, "Manhattan" (or "Taxicab") distances where movement is restricted to paths parallel to the axes can be more meaningful than Euclidean distances in urban settings. In addition to distances, other geographic relationships such as connectivity (e.g., the existence or degree of shared borders) and direction can also influence the relationships among entities. It is also possible to compute minimal cost paths across a cost surface; for example, this can represent proximity among locations when travel must occur across rugged terrain. Types Spatial data comes in many varieties and it is not easy to arrive at a system of classification that is simultaneously exclusive, exhaustive, imaginative, and satisfying. -- G. Upton & B. Fingelton Spatial data analysis Urban and Regional Studies deal with large tables of spatial data obtained from censuses and surveys. It is necessary to simplify the huge amount of detailed information in order to extract the main trends. Multivariable analysis (or Factor analysis, FA) allows a change of variables, transforming the many variables of the census, usually correlated between themselves, into fewer independent "Factors" or "Principal Components" which are, actually, the eigenvectors of the data correlation matrix weighted by the inverse of their eigenvalues. This change of variables has two main advantages: Since information is concentrated on the first new factors, it is possible to keep only a few of them while losing only a small amount of information; mapping them produces fewer and more significant maps The factors, actually the eigenvectors, are orthogonal by construction, i.e. not correlated. In most cases, the dominant factor (with the largest eigenvalue) is the Social Component, separating rich and poor in the city. Since factors are not-correlated, other smaller processes than social status, which would have remained hidden otherwise, appear on the second, third, ... factors. Factor analysis depends on measuring distances between observations : the choice of a significant metric is crucial. The Euclidean metric (Principal Component Analysis), the Chi-Square distance (Correspondence Analysis) or the Generalized Mahalanobis distance (Discriminant Analysis) are among the more widely used. More complicated models, using communalities or rotations have been proposed. Using multivariate methods in spatial analysis began really in the 1950s (although some examples go back to the beginning of the century) and culminated in the 1970s, with the increasing power and accessibility of computers. Already in 1948, in a seminal publication, two sociologists, Wendell Bell and Eshref Shevky, had shown that most city populations in the US and in the world could be represented with three independent factors : 1- the « socio-economic status » opposing rich and poor districts and distributed in sectors running along highways from the city center, 2- the « life cycle », i.e. the age structure of households, distributed in concentric circles, and 3- « race and ethnicity », identifying patches of migrants located within the city. In 1961, in a groundbreaking study, British geographers used FA to classify British towns. Brian J Berry, at the University of Chicago, and his students made a wide use of the method, applying it to most important cities in the world and exhibiting common social structures. The use of Factor Analysis in Geography, made so easy by modern computers, has been very wide but not always very wise. Since the vectors extracted are determined by the data matrix, it is not possible to compare factors obtained from different censuses. A solution consists in fusing together several census matrices in a unique table which, then, may be analyzed. This, however, assumes that the definition of the variables has not changed over time and produces very large tables, difficult to manage. A better solution, proposed by psychometricians, groups the data in a « cubic matrix », with three entries (for instance, locations, variables, time periods). A Three-Way Factor Analysis produces then three groups of factors related by a small cubic « core matrix ». This method, which exhibits data evolution over time, has not been widely used in geography. In Los Angeles, however, it has exhibited the role, traditionally ignored, of Downtown as an organizing center for the whole city during several decades. Spatial autocorrelation Spatial autocorrelation statistics measure and analyze the degree of dependency among observations in a geographic space. Classic spatial autocorrelation statistics include Moran's , Geary's , Getis's and the standard deviational ellipse. These statistics require measuring a spatial weights matrix that reflects the intensity of the geographic relationship between observations in a neighborhood, e.g., the distances between neighbors, the lengths of shared border, or whether they fall into a specified directional class such as "west". Classic spatial autocorrelation statistics compare the spatial weights to the covariance relationship at pairs of locations. Spatial autocorrelation that is more positive than expected from random indicate the clustering of similar values across geographic space, while significant negative spatial autocorrelation indicates that neighboring values are more dissimilar than expected by chance, suggesting a spatial pattern similar to a chess board. Spatial autocorrelation statistics such as Moran's and Geary's are global in the sense that they estimate the overall degree of spatial autocorrelation for a dataset. The possibility of spatial heterogeneity suggests that the estimated degree of autocorrelation may vary significantly across geographic space. Local spatial autocorrelation statistics provide estimates disaggregated to the level of the spatial analysis units, allowing assessment of the dependency relationships across space. statistics compare neighborhoods to a global average and identify local regions of strong autocorrelation. Local versions of the and statistics are also available. Spatial heterogeneity Spatial interaction Spatial interaction or "gravity models" estimate the flow of people, material or information between locations in geographic space. Factors can include origin propulsive variables such as the number of commuters in residential areas, destination attractiveness variables such as the amount of office space in employment areas, and proximity relationships between the locations measured in terms such as driving distance or travel time. In addition, the topological, or connective, relationships between areas must be identified, particularly considering the often conflicting relationship between distance and topology; for example, two spatially close neighborhoods may not display any significant interaction if they are separated by a highway. After specifying the functional forms of these relationships, the analyst can estimate model parameters using observed flow data and standard estimation techniques such as ordinary least squares or maximum likelihood. Competing destinations versions of spatial interaction models include the proximity among the destinations (or origins) in addition to the origin-destination proximity; this captures the effects of destination (origin) clustering on flows. Spatial interpolation Spatial interpolation methods estimate the variables at unobserved locations in geographic space based on the values at observed locations. Basic methods include inverse distance weighting: this attenuates the variable with decreasing proximity from the observed location. Kriging is a more sophisticated method that interpolates across space according to a spatial lag relationship that has both systematic and random components. This can accommodate a wide range of spatial relationships for the hidden values between observed locations. Kriging provides optimal estimates given the hypothesized lag relationship, and error estimates can be mapped to determine if spatial patterns exist. Spatial regression Spatial regression methods capture spatial dependency in regression analysis, avoiding statistical problems such as unstable parameters and unreliable significance tests, as well as providing information on spatial relationships among the variables involved. Depending on the specific technique, spatial dependency can enter the regression model as relationships between the independent variables and the dependent, between the dependent variables and a spatial lag of itself, or in the error terms. Geographically weighted regression (GWR) is a local version of spatial regression that generates parameters disaggregated by the spatial units of analysis. This allows assessment of the spatial heterogeneity in the estimated relationships between the independent and dependent variables. The use of Bayesian hierarchical modeling in conjunction with Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) methods have recently shown to be effective in modeling complex relationships using Poisson-Gamma-CAR, Poisson-lognormal-SAR, or Overdispersed logit models. Statistical packages for implementing such Bayesian models using MCMC include WinBugs, CrimeStat and many packages available via R programming language. Spatial stochastic processes, such as Gaussian processes are also increasingly being deployed in spatial regression analysis. Model-based versions of GWR, known as spatially varying coefficient models have been applied to conduct Bayesian inference. Spatial stochastic process can become computationally effective and scalable Gaussian process models, such as Gaussian Predictive Processes and Nearest Neighbor Gaussian Processes (NNGP). Spatial neural networks Simulation and modeling Spatial interaction models are aggregate and top-down: they specify an overall governing relationship for flow between locations. This characteristic is also shared by urban models such as those based on mathematical programming, flows among economic sectors, or bid-rent theory. An alternative modeling perspective is to represent the system at the highest possible level of disaggregation and study the bottom-up emergence of complex patterns and relationships from behavior and interactions at the individual level. Complex adaptive systems theory as applied to spatial analysis suggests that simple interactions among proximal entities can lead to intricate, persistent and functional spatial entities at aggregate levels. Two fundamentally spatial simulation methods are cellular automata and agent-based modeling. Cellular automata modeling imposes a fixed spatial framework such as grid cells and specifies rules that dictate the state of a cell based on the states of its neighboring cells. As time progresses, spatial patterns emerge as cells change states based on their neighbors; this alters the conditions for future time periods. For example, cells can represent locations in an urban area and their states can be different types of land use. Patterns that can emerge from the simple interactions of local land uses include office districts and urban sprawl. Agent-based modeling uses software entities (agents) that have purposeful behavior (goals) and can react, interact and modify their environment while seeking their objectives. Unlike the cells in cellular automata, simulysts can allow agents to be mobile with respect to space. For example, one could model traffic flow and dynamics using agents representing individual vehicles that try to minimize travel time between specified origins and destinations. While pursuing minimal travel times, the agents must avoid collisions with other vehicles also seeking to minimize their travel times. Cellular automata and agent-based modeling are complementary modeling strategies. They can be integrated into a common geographic automata system where some agents are fixed while others are mobile. Calibration plays a pivotal role in both CA and ABM simulation and modelling approaches. Initial approaches to CA proposed robust calibration approaches based on stochastic, Monte Carlo methods. ABM approaches rely on agents' decision rules (in many cases extracted from qualitative research base methods such as questionnaires). Recent Machine Learning Algorithms calibrate using training sets, for instance in order to understand the qualities of the built environment. Multiple-point geostatistics (MPS) Spatial analysis of a conceptual geological model is the main purpose of any MPS algorithm. The method analyzes the spatial statistics of the geological model, called the training image, and generates realizations of the phenomena that honor those input multiple-point statistics. A recent MPS algorithm used to accomplish this task is the pattern-based method by Honarkhah. In this method, a distance-based approach is employed to analyze the patterns in the training image. This allows the reproduction of the multiple-point statistics, and the complex geometrical features of the training image. Each output of the MPS algorithm is a realization that represents a random field. Together, several realizations may be used to quantify spatial uncertainty. One of the recent methods is presented by Tahmasebi et al. uses a cross-correlation function to improve the spatial pattern reproduction. They call their MPS simulation method as the CCSIM algorithm. This method is able to quantify the spatial connectivity, variability and uncertainty. Furthermore, the method is not sensitive to any type of data and is able to simulate both categorical and continuous scenarios. CCSIM algorithm is able to be used for any stationary, non-stationary and multivariate systems and it can provide high quality visual appeal model., Geospatial and hydrospatial analysis Geospatial and hydrospatial analysis, or just spatial analysis, is an approach to applying statistical analysis and other analytic techniques to data which has a geographical or spatial aspect. Such analysis would typically employ software capable of rendering maps processing spatial data, and applying analytical methods to terrestrial or geographic datasets, including the use of geographic information systems and geomatics. Geographical information system usage Geographic information systems (GIS) — a large domain that provides a variety of capabilities designed to capture, store, manipulate, analyze, manage, and present all types of geographical data — utilizes geospatial and hydrospatial analysis in a variety of contexts, operations and applications. Basic applications Geospatial and Hydrospatial analysis, using GIS, was developed for problems in the environmental and life sciences, in particular ecology, geology and epidemiology. It has extended to almost all industries including defense, intelligence, utilities, Natural Resources (i.e. Oil and Gas, Forestry ... etc.), social sciences, medicine and Public Safety (i.e. emergency management and criminology), disaster risk reduction and management (DRRM), and climate change adaptation (CCA). Spatial statistics typically result primarily from observation rather than experimentation. Hydrospatial is particularly used for the aquatic side and the members related to the water surface, column, bottom, sub-bottom and the coastal zones. Basic operations Vector-based GIS is typically related to operations such as map overlay (combining two or more maps or map layers according to predefined rules), simple buffering (identifying regions of a map within a specified distance of one or more features, such as towns, roads or rivers) and similar basic operations. This reflects (and is reflected in) the use of the term spatial analysis within the Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) “simple feature specifications”. For raster-based GIS, widely used in the environmental sciences and remote sensing, this typically means a range of actions applied to the grid cells of one or more maps (or images) often involving filtering and/or algebraic operations (map algebra). These techniques involve processing one or more raster layers according to simple rules resulting in a new map layer, for example replacing each cell value with some combination of its neighbours’ values, or computing the sum or difference of specific attribute values for each grid cell in two matching raster datasets. Descriptive statistics, such as cell counts, means, variances, maxima, minima, cumulative values, frequencies and a number of other measures and distance computations are also often included in this generic term spatial analysis. Spatial analysis includes a large variety of statistical techniques (descriptive, exploratory, and explanatory statistics) that apply to data that vary spatially and which can vary over time. Some more advanced statistical techniques include Getis-ord Gi* or Anselin Local Moran's I which are used to determine clustering patterns of spatially referenced data. Advanced operations Geospatial and Hydrospatial analysis goes beyond 2D and 3D mapping operations and spatial statistics. It is multi-dimensional and also temporal and includes: Surface analysis — in particular analysing the properties of physical surfaces, such as gradient, aspect and visibility, and analysing surface-like data “fields”; Network analysis — examining the properties of natural and man-made networks in order to understand the behaviour of flows within and around such networks; and locational analysis. GIS-based network analysis may be used to address a wide range of practical problems such as route selection and facility location (core topics in the field of operations research), and problems involving flows such as those found in Hydrospatial and hydrology and transportation research. In many instances location problems relate to networks and as such are addressed with tools designed for this purpose, but in others existing networks may have little or no relevance or may be impractical to incorporate within the modeling process. Problems that are not specifically network constrained, such as new road or pipeline routing, regional warehouse location, mobile phone mast positioning or the selection of rural community health care sites, may be effectively analysed (at least initially) without reference to existing physical networks. Locational analysis "in the plane" is also applicable where suitable network datasets are not available, or are too large or expensive to be utilised, or where the location algorithm is very complex or involves the examination or simulation of a very large number of alternative configurations. Geovisualization — the creation and manipulation of images, maps, diagrams, charts, 3D views and their associated tabular datasets. GIS packages increasingly provide a range of such tools, providing static or rotating views, draping images over 2.5D surface representations, providing animations and fly-throughs, dynamic linking and brushing and spatio-temporal visualisations. This latter class of tools is the least developed, reflecting in part the limited range of suitable compatible datasets and the limited set of analytical methods available, although this picture is changing rapidly. All these facilities augment the core tools utilised in spatial analysis throughout the analytical process (exploration of data, identification of patterns and relationships, construction of models, and communication of results) Mobile geospatial and hydrospatial Computing Traditionally geospatial and hydrospatial computing has been performed primarily on personal computers (PCs) or servers. Due to the increasing capabilities of mobile devices, however, geospatial computing in mobile devices is a fast-growing trend. The portable nature of these devices, as well as the presence of useful sensors, such as Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receivers and barometric pressure sensors, make them useful for capturing and processing geospatial and hydrospatial information in the field. In addition to the local processing of geospatial information on mobile devices, another growing trend is cloud-based geospatial computing. In this architecture, data can be collected in the field using mobile devices and then transmitted to cloud-based servers for further processing and ultimate storage. In a similar manner, geospatial and hydrospatial information can be made available to connected mobile devices via the cloud, allowing access to vast databases of geospatial and hydrospatial information anywhere where a wireless data connection is available. Geographic information science and spatial analysis Geographic information systems (GIS) and the underlying geographic information science that advances these technologies have a strong influence on spatial analysis. The increasing ability to capture and handle geographic data means that spatial analysis is occurring within increasingly data-rich environments. Geographic data capture systems include remotely sensed imagery, environmental monitoring systems such as intelligent transportation systems, and location-aware technologies such as mobile devices that can report location in near-real time. GIS provide platforms for managing these data, computing spatial relationships such as distance, connectivity and directional relationships between spatial units, and visualizing both the raw data and spatial analytic results within a cartographic context. Subtypes include: Geovisualization (GVis) combines scientific visualization with digital cartography to support the exploration and analysis of geographic data and information, including the results of spatial analysis or simulation. GVis leverages the human orientation towards visual information processing in the exploration, analysis and communication of geographic data and information. In contrast with traditional cartography, GVis is typically three- or four-dimensional (the latter including time) and user-interactive. Geographic knowledge discovery (GKD) is the human-centered process of applying efficient computational tools for exploring massive spatial databases. GKD includes geographic data mining, but also encompasses related activities such as data selection, data cleaning and pre-processing, and interpretation of results. GVis can also serve a central role in the GKD process. GKD is based on the premise that massive databases contain interesting (valid, novel, useful and understandable) patterns that standard analytical techniques cannot find. GKD can serve as a hypothesis-generating process for spatial analysis, producing tentative patterns and relationships that should be confirmed using spatial analytical techniques. Spatial decision support systems (SDSS) take existing spatial data and use a variety of mathematical models to make projections into the future. This allows urban and regional planners to test intervention decisions prior to implementation. See also General topics Buffer analysis Cartography Complete spatial randomness Concepts and Techniques in Modern Geography Cost distance analysis Four traditions of geography GeoComputation Geospatial intelligence Geospatial predictive modeling Dimensionally Extended nine-Intersection Model (DE-9IM) Geographic information science Mathematical statistics Modifiable areal unit problem Modifiable temporal unit problem Neighborhood effect averaging problem Point process Proximity analysis Spatial descriptive statistics Spatial relation Technical geography Terrain analysis Tobler's first law of geography Tobler's second law of geography List of spatial analysis software Specific applications Boundary problem (in spatial analysis) Extrapolation domain analysis Fuzzy architectural spatial analysis Geodemographic segmentation Geographic information systems Geoinformatics Geostatistics Permeability (spatial and transport planning) Spatial econometrics Spatial epidemiology Suitability analysis Viewshed analysis References Further reading Abler, R., J. Adams, and P. Gould (1971) Spatial Organization–The Geographer's View of the World, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Anselin, L. (1995) "Local indicators of spatial association – LISA". Geographical Analysis, 27, 93–115. Benenson, I. and P. M. Torrens. (2004). Geosimulation: Automata-Based Modeling of Urban Phenomena. Wiley. Fotheringham, A. S., C. Brunsdon and M. Charlton (2000) Quantitative Geography: Perspectives on Spatial Data Analysis, Sage. Fotheringham, A. S. and M. E. O'Kelly (1989) Spatial Interaction Models: Formulations and Applications, Kluwer Academic MacEachren, A. M. and D. R. F. Taylor (eds.) (1994) Visualization in Modern Cartography, Pergamon. Levine, N. (2010). CrimeStat: A Spatial Statistics Program for the Analysis of Crime Incident Locations. Version 3.3. Ned Levine & Associates, Houston, TX and the National Institute of Justice, Washington, DC. Ch. 1-17 + 2 update chapters Miller, H. J. and J. Han (eds.) (2001) Geographic Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery, Taylor and Francis. O'Sullivan, D. and D. Unwin (2002) Geographic Information Analysis, Wiley. Fisher MM, Leung Y (2001) Geocomputational Modelling: techniques and applications. Springer Verlag, Berlin Openshaw S and Abrahart RJ (2000) GeoComputation. CRC Press Diappi Lidia (2004) Evolving Cities: Geocomputation in Territorial Planning. Ashgate, England Longley PA, Brooks SM, McDonnell R, Macmillan B (1998), Geocomputation, a primer. John Wiley and Sons, Chichester Murgante B., Borruso G., Lapucci A. (2009) "Geocomputation and Urban Planning" Studies in Computational Intelligence, Vol. 176. Springer-Verlag, Berlin. Fischer M., Leung Y. (2010) "GeoComputational Modelling: Techniques and Applications" Advances in Spatial Science. Springer-Verlag, Berlin. Murgante B., Borruso G., Lapucci A. (2011) "Geocomputation, Sustainability and Environmental Planning" Studies in Computational Intelligence, Vol. 348. Springer-Verlag, Berlin. External links ICA Commission on Geospatial Analysis and Modeling An educational resource about spatial statistics and geostatistics A comprehensive guide to principles, techniques & software tools Social and Spatial Inequalities National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis (NCGIA) International Cartographic Association (ICA) – the world body for mapping and GIScience professionals

Milieu therapy

Milieu therapy is a form of psychotherapy that involves the use of therapeutic communities. Patients join a group of around 30, for between 9 and 18 months. During their stay, patients are encouraged to take responsibility for themselves and the others within the unit, based upon a hierarchy of collective consequences. Patients are expected to hold one another to following rules, with more senior patients expected to model appropriate behavior for newer patients. If one patient violates the rules, others who were aware of the violation but did not intervene may also be punished to varying extents based upon their involvement. Milieu therapy is thought to be of value in treating personality disorders and behavioural problems, and can also be used with a goal of stimulating the patient's remaining cognitive-communicative abilities. Organizations known to use milieu therapy include Cassel Hospital, in London, Forest Heights Lodge in Evergreen, CO, the United States Veteran's Administration, and the Kansas Industrial School for Girls in Beloit, Kansas. References Varcarolis, E.M. (1990). Foundations of Psychiatric Mental Health Nursing. New York: W.B. Saunders Company, p. 30. External links Henderson Hospital Trust Psychotherapy by type Therapeutic community

Autoethnography

Autoethnography is a form of ethnographic research in which a researcher connects personal experiences to wider cultural, political, and social meanings and understandings. It is considered a form of qualitative and/or arts-based research. Autoethnography has been used across various disciplines, including anthropology, arts education, communication studies, education, educational administration, English literature, ethnic studies, gender studies, history, human resource development, marketing, music therapy, nursing, organizational behavior, paramedicine, performance studies, physiotherapy, psychology, social work, sociology, and theology and religious studies. Definitions Historically, researchers have had trouble reaching a consensus regarding the definition of autoethnography. Whereas some scholars situate autoethnography within the family of narrative methods, others place it within the ethnographic tradition. However, it generally refers to research that involves critical observation of an individual's lived experiences and connecting those experience to broader cultural, political, and social concepts. Autoethnography can refer to research in which a researcher reflexively studies a group they belong to or their subjective experience. In the 1970s, autoethnography was more narrowly defined as "insider ethnography," referring to studies of the (culture of) a group of which the researcher is a member. According to Adams et al., autoethnography uses a researcher's personal experience to describe and critique cultural beliefs, practices, and experiences; acknowledges and values a researcher's relationships with others uses deep and careful self-reflection—typically referred to as “reflexivity”—to name and interrogate the intersections between self and society, the particular and the general, the personal and the political shows people in the process of figuring out what to do, how to live, and the meaning of their struggles balances intellectual and methodological rigor, emotion, and creativity strives for social justice and to make life better. Bochner and Ellis have also defined autoethnography as "an autobiographical genre of writing and research that displays multiple layers of consciousness, connecting the personal to the cultural." They further indicate that autoethnography is typically written in first-person and can "appear in a variety of forms," such as "short stories, poetry, fiction, novels, photographic essays, personal essays, journals, fragmented and layered writing, and social science prose." History Mid-1800s Anthropologists began conducting ethnographic research in the mid-1800s to study the cultures people they deemed "exotic" and/or "primitive." Typically, these early ethnographers aimed to merely observe and write "objective" accounts of these groups to provide others a better understanding of various cultures. They also "recognized and wrestled with questions of how to render textual accounts that would provide clear, accurate, rich descriptions of cultural practices of others" and "were concerned with offering valid, reliable, and objective interpretations in their writings." Early- to mid-1900s In the early to mid 1900s, it became clear that observation and fieldwork interfered with the cultural groups' natural and typical behaviors. Additionally, researchers realized the role they play in analyzing others' behaviors. As such, "serious questions arose about the possibility and legitimacy of offering purely objective accounts of cultural practices, traditions, symbols, meanings, premises, rituals, rules, and other social engagements." To help combat potential issues of validity, ethnographers began using what Gilbert Ryle refers to as thick description: a description of human social behavior in which the writer-researcher describes the behavior and provides "commentary on, context for, and interpretation of these behaviors into the text." By doing so, the researcher aims to "evoke a cultural scene vividly, in detail, and with care," so readers can understand and attempt to interpret the scene for themselves, much like in more traditional research methods. A few ethnographers, especially those related to the Chicago school, began incorporating aspects of autoethnography into their work, such as narrated life histories. While they created more lifelike representations of their subject than their predecessors, these researchers often "romanticized the subject" by creating narratives with "the three stages of the classic morality tale: being in a state of grace, being seduced by evil and falling from grace, and finally achieving redemption through suffering." Such researchers include Robert Parks, Nels Anderson, Everett Hughes, and Fred Davis. During this time period, new theoretical constructs, such as feminism, began to emerge and with it, grew qualitative research. However, researchers were trying to "fit the classical traditional model of internal and external validity to constructionist and interactionist conceptions of the research act." 1970s With the growth of qualitative research from the mid-1900s, "a few scholars were urging thicker descriptions, giving more attention to concrete details of everyday life, renouncing the ethics and artificiality of experimental studies, and complaining about the obscurity of jargon and technical language, ... but social scientists, for the most part, weren't all that concerned about the researcher's location in the text, the capacity of language to accurately represent reality, or the need for researcher reflexivity." The term autoethnography was first used in 1975, when Heider connected individuals' personal experiences to larger, cultural beliefs and traditions. In Heider's case, the individual self referred to the people he was studying rather than himself. Because the people he studied were providing their personal accounts and experiences, Heider considered the work autoethnographic. Later in the 1970s, researchers began more clearly stating their positionality and indicating how their mere presence altered the behaviors of the groups they studied. Further, researchers distinguished between people who researched groups of which they were a part (i.e., cultural insiders) and those who researched groups of which they were not a part (i.e., cultural outsiders). At this point, the term autoethnography began to refer to forms of ethnography in which the researcher is a cultural insider. Walter Goldschmidt proposed that all ethnography is, in some way, autobiographical, because "ethnographic representations privilege personal beliefs, perspectives, and observations." As an anthropologist, David Hayano was interested in the role that an individual's own identity had in their research. Unlike more traditional research methods, Hayano believed there was value in a researcher "conducting and writing ethnographies of their own people." While researchers recognized the part they played in understanding a group of people, none focused explicitly on the "inclusion and importance of personal experience in research." 1980s More generally in the 1980s, researchers began questioning and critiquing the role of the researcher, especially in social sciences. Multiple researchers aimed to make "research and writing more reflexive and called into question the issues of gender, class, and race." As a result of these concerns, researchers purposefully inserted themselves as characters in the ethnographic narrative as a way of navigating the problem of researcher interference. Additionally, some of the predmoninant ways of understanding truth were eroded, and "[i]ssues such as validity, reliability, and objectivity ... were once again problematic. Pattern and interpretive theories, as opposed to causal linear theories, were now more common as writers continued to challenge older models of truth and meaning." In addition to and perhaps because of the above, researchers became interested in the importance of culture and storytelling as they gradually became more engaged through the personal aspects in ethnographic practices. In 1988, John Van Maanen noted three predominant ways ethnographers write about culture: Realist Tales, in which the researcher uses a "dispassionate, third-person voice" and attempts to provide an "accurate" and "objective" account of the group studied without provider much researcher response Confessional Tales, which include the researchers' "highly personalized styles" and responses to the observed data Impressionist Tales, in which the researcher uses first-person to craft a "tightly focused, vibrant, exact, but necessarily imaginative rendering of fieldwork" At the end of the 1980s, scholars began to apply the term autoethnography to work that used confessional and impressionist forms as they recognized that "the richness of cultural lives and life practices of others cannot be fully captured or evoked in purely objective or descriptive language." 1990s to present In the early- to mid-1990s, researchers aimed to address the concerns raised in the previous decades regarding questions of legitimacy and reliability of ethnographic approaches. One way to do that was to directly place oneself into the research narrative, noting the positionality of the researcher. Here, the researcher could either insert themselves into the research narrative and/or increase participants' involvement in the research project, such as through participatory action research. Autoethnography became more popular in the 1990s for ethnographers who aimed to use "personal experience and reflexivity to examine cultural experiences." Series such as Ethnographic Alternatives and the first Handbook of Qualitative Research were published to better explain the importance of autoethnographic use, and key texts focused specifically on autoethnography were published, including Carolyn Ellis's Investigating Subjectivity, Final Negotiations, The Ethnographic I, and Revision, as well as Art Bochner's Coming to Narrative. In 2013, Tony Adams, Stacy Holman Jones, and Carolyn Ellis co-edited the first edition of the Handbook of Autoethnography. They published Autoethnography in 2015 and the second edition of the Handbook of Autoethnography in 2022. In 2020, Adams and Andrew Herrmann started the Journal of Autoethnography with the University of California Press. In 2021, Marlen Harrison started The Autoethnographer, a Literary & Arts Magazine. In the 2000s, major conferences began to regularly accept autoethnographic work, starting primarily with the International Congress of Qualitative Inquiry (2005). Other conferences that foreground autoethnographic research include the International Symposium on Autoethnography and Narrative (formerly Doing Autoethnography), the International Conference of Autoethnography (formerly British Autoethnography), and Critical Autoethnography. Today, ethnographers typically use a "kind of hybrid form of confessional-impressionist tale" that includes "performative, poetic, impressionistic, symbolic, and lyrical language" while also "focusing closely on the self-data inherent in confessional writing." Epistemological and theoretical basis Autoethnography differs from ethnography in that autoethnography embraces and foregrounds the researcher's subjectivity rather than attempting to limit it as in empirical research. As Carolyn Ellis explains, "autoethnography overlaps art and science; it is part auto or self and part ethno or culture."Importantly, it is also "something different from both of them, greater than its parts." In other words, as Ellingson and Ellis put it, "whether we call a work an autoethnography or an ethnography depends as much on the claims made by authors as anything else." In embracing personal thoughts, feelings, stories, and observations as a way of understanding the social context they are studying, autoethnographers are also shedding light on their total interaction with that setting by making their every emotion and thought visible to the reader. This is much the opposite of theory-driven, hypothesis-testing research methods that are based on the positivist epistemology. In this sense, Ellingson and Ellis see autoethnography as a social constructionist project that rejects the deep-rooted binary oppositions between the researcher and the researched, objectivity and subjectivity, process and product, self and others, art and science, and the personal and the political. Autoethnographers, therefore, tend to reject the concept of social research as an objective and neutral knowledge produced by scientific methods, which can be characterized and achieved by detachment of the researcher from the researched. Autoethnography, in this regard, is a critical "response to the alienating effects on both researchers and audiences of impersonal, passionless, abstract claims of truth generated by such research practices and clothed in exclusionary scientific discourse." Deborah Reed-Danahay (1997) also argues that autoethnography is a postmodernist construct: The concept of autoethnography...synthesizes both a postmodern ethnography, in which the realist conventions and objective observer position of standard ethnography have been called into question, and a postmodern autobiography, in which the notion of the coherent, individual self has been similarly called into question. The term has a double sense - referring either to the ethnography of one's own group or to autobiographical writing that has ethnographic interest. Thus, either a self- (auto-) ethnography or an autobiographical (auto-) ethnography can be signaled by "autoethnography. Process As a method, autoethnography combines characteristics of autobiography and ethnography. To form the autobiographical aspects of the autoethnography, the author will write retroactively and selectively about past experiences. Unlike other forms of research, the author typically did not live through such experiences solely to create a publishable document; rather, the experiences are assembled using hindsight. Additionally, authors may conduct formal or informal interview and/or consult relevant texts (e.g., diaries or photographs) to help with recall. The experiences are tied together using literary elements "to create evocative and specific representations of the culture/cultural experience and to give audiences a sense of how being there in the experience feels." Ethnography, on the other hand, involves observing and writing about culture. During the first stage, researchers will observe and interview individuals of the selected cultural group and take detailed fieldnotes. Ethnographers discover their findings through induction. That is, ethnographers don't go into the field looking for specific answers; rather, their observations, writing, and fieldnotes yield the findings. Such findings are conveyed to others through thick description so that readers may come to their own conclusions regarding the situation described. Autoethnography uses aspects of autobiography (e.g., personal experiences and recall) and ethnography (e.g., interviews, observations, and fieldnotes) to create vivid descriptions that connect to the personal to the cultural. Types of autoethnography Because autoethnography is a broad and ambiguous "category that encompasses a wide array of practices," autoethnographies "vary in their emphasis on the writing and research process (graphy), on culture (ethnos), and on self (auto)." More recently, autoethnography has been separated into two distinct subtypes: analytic and evocative. According to Ellingson and Ellis, "Analytic autoethnographers focus on developing theoretical explanations of broader social phenomena, whereas evocative autoethnographers focus on narrative presentations that open up conversations and evoke emotional responses."Scholars also discuss visual autoethnography, which incorporates imagery along with written analysis. Analytic autoethnography Analytic autoethnography focuses on "developing theoretical explanations of broader social phenomena" and aligns with more traditional forms of research that value "generalization, distanced analysis, and theory-building." This form has five key features: complete member researcher (CMR) status analytic reflexivity narrative visibility of the researcher's self dialogue with informants beyond the self commitment to theoretical analysis First, in all forms of autoethnography, the researcher must be a member of the cultural group they are study and thus, have CMR status. This cultural group may be loosely connected without knowledge of one another (e.g., people with disabilities) or tightly connected (e.g., members of a small church). CMR status helps the research "approximate the emotional stance of the people they study," thereby addressing some criticisms of ethnography. Like the evocative autoethnographer, the analytic autoethnographer "is personally engaged in a social group, setting, or culture as a full member and active participant." However, they "retains a distinct and highly visible identity as a self-aware scholar and social actor within the ethnographic text." Two CMR status types are recognized: opportunistic and convert. Opportunistic CMRs exist as part of the cultural group they aim to study prior to deciding to research the group. To receive this insider status, the researcher "may be born into a group, thrown into a group by chance circumstance (e.g., illness), or have acquired intimate familiarity through occupational, recreational, or lifestyle participation." Conversely, convert CMRs "begin with a purely data-oriented research interest in the setting but become converted to complete immersion and membership during the course of the research." Here, a researcher will opt to study a cultural group, then become ingrained into that culture throughout the research process. Second, when conducting analytic autoethnography, the researcher must utilize analytic reflexivity. That is, they must express their "awareness of their necessary connection to the research situation and hence their effects upon it," making themselves "visible, active, and reflexively engaged in the text." Thirdly and similarly, the researcher should be visibly present throughout the narrative and "should illustrate analytic insights through recounting their own experiences and thoughts as well as those of others." Beyond this, analytic autoethnographers "should openly discuss changes in their beliefs and relationships over the course of fieldwork, thus vividly revealing themselves as people grappling with issues relevant to membership and participation in fluid rather than static social worlds." Conversely, the fourth concept aims to prevent the text from "author saturation," which centers the author more than the culture being observed. While "analytic autoethnography is grounded inself-experience," it should "[reach] beyond it as well," perhaps including interviews with and/or observations of with others who are members of the culture studied. This connection to the culture moves the autoethnography beyond a mere autobiography or memoir. Lastly, analytic autoethnography should commit to an analytic agenda. That is, the analytic autoethnography should not merely "document personal experience," "provide an 'insider's perspective,'" or "evoke emotional resonance with the reader." Rather, it should "use empirical data to gain insight into some broader set of social phenomena than those provided by the data themselves." Although Leon Anderson (academic) conceptualized analytic autoethnography alongside evocative autoethnography, Anderson critiques the false dichotomy between analytic and evocative autoethnography in his chapter, "I Learn by Going: Autoethnographic Modes of Inquiry" (co-authored with Bonnie Glass-Coffin), the lead chapter in the first edition of the Handbook of Autoethnography. Evocative autoethnography Evocative autoethnography "focus[es] on narrative presentations that open up conversations and evoke emotional responses." According to Bochner and Ellis, the goal is for the readers to see themselves in the autoethnographer so they transform private troubles into public plight, making it powerful, comforting, dangerous, and culturally essential. Accounts are presented like novels or biographies and thus, fracture the boundaries that normally separate literature from social science. Symbiotic autoethnography Symbiotic Autoethnography (Beattie, 2022) suggests a way of reconciling the differences in various types of autoethnography through suggesting an innovative symbiotic approach. The author uses the concept of 'symbiosis' in its broader sense to denote close interdependence and interrelation between its suggested seven attributes, including temporality, researcher's omnipresence, evocative storytelling, interpretative analysis, political (transformative) focus, reflexivity and polyvocality. Auto-ethnographic Design Auto-ethnographic design is a materially-oriented practice that ties design research with expression. According to Schouwenberg and Kaethler, "There is a break here between the autoethnographic tradition and how it is taken up in design, where for the ‘graphy’ the act of reporting and reflection is replaced by creative production; design activates the knowledge component by directly engaging and altering the very world it seeks to make sense of". In contrast to other forms of design, auto-ethnographic designs are deeply personal and tend towards the artistic, using materiality as a way of understanding the self and communicating it. The hyphen that separates auto and ethnography represents the materiality that is needed to understand the self. It is critiqued for being excessively naval gazing. Minor Literature Autoethnography Minor Literature Autoethnography (MLA) draws on the concept of 'minor literature' as developed by Deleuze and Guattari, which refers to the use of a major language from a minoritarian perspective to challenge dominant cultural narratives. According to De Jong this type of autoethnography focuses on the experiences of marginalized groups and individuals who use the language of the majority to articulate their unique cultural positions and create new forms of expression. By doing so, minor literature autoethnography aims to reveal and critique power structures and give voice to perspectives that are often silenced or overlooked. Goals of autoethnography Adams, Ellis, and Jones recognize two primary purposes for practicing autoethnographic research. Given the complicated history of ethnography, "autoethnographers speak against, or provide alternatives to, dominant, taken-for-granted, and harmful cultural scripts, stories, and stereotypes" and "offer accounts of personal experience to complement, or fill gaps in, existing research."As with other forms of qualitative research, autoethnographic "accounts may show how the desire for, and practice of, generalization in research can mask important nuances of cultural issues." In addition to providing nuanced accounts of cultural phenomena, Adams, Ellis, and Jones argue that the goal of autoethnography "is to articulate insider knowledge of cultural experience." Underlying this argument is the assumption that "the writer can inform readers about aspects of cultural life that other researchers may not be able to know." Importantly, "[i]nsider knowledge does not suggest that an autoethnographer can articulate more truthful or more accurate knowledge as compared to outsiders, but rather that as authors we can tell our stories in novel ways when compared to how others may be able to tell them." Uses of autoethnography Autoethnography is utilized across a variety of disciplines and can be presented in many forms, including but not limited to "short stories, poetry, fiction, novels, photographic essays, personal essays, journals, fragmented and layered writing, and social science prose." Symbolic interactionists are particularly interested autoethnography, and examples can be found in a number of scholarly journals, such as Qualitative Inquiry, the Journal of the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interactionism, the Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, and the Journal of Humanistic Ethnography. In performance studies, autoethnography acknowledges the researcher and the audience having equal weight. Portraying the performed "self" through writing then becomes an aim to create an embodied experience for the writer and the reader. This area acknowledges the inward and outward experience of ethnography in experiencing the subjectivity of the author. Audience members may experience the work of ethnography through reading/hearing/feeling (inward) and then have a reaction to it (outward), maybe by emotion. Ethnography and performance work together to invoke emotion in the reader. Autoethnography is also used in film as a variant of the standard documentary film. It differs from the traditional documentary film in that its subject is the filmmaker. An autoethnographical film typically relates the life experiences and thoughts, views, and beliefs of the filmmaker, and as such, it is often considered to be rife with bias and image manipulation. Unlike other documentaries, autoethnographies do not usually make a claim of objectivity. Storyteller/narrator In different academic disciplines (particularly communication studies and performance studies), the term autoethnography itself is contested and is sometimes used interchangeably with or referred to as personal narrative or autobiography. Autoethnographic methods include journaling, looking at archival records - whether institutional or personal, interviewing one's own self, and using writing to generate a self-cultural understandings. Reporting an autoethnography might take the form of a traditional journal article or scholarly book, performed on the stage, or be seen in the popular press. Autoethnography can include direct (and participant) observation of daily behavior; unearthing of local beliefs and perception and recording of life history (e.g. kinship, education, etc.); and in-depth interviewing: "The analysis of data involves interpretation on the part of the researcher" (Hammersley in Genzuk). However, rather than a portrait of the Other (person, group, culture), the difference is that the researcher is constructing a portrait of the self. Autoethnography can also be "associated with narrative inquiry and autobiography" in that it foregrounds experience and story as a meaning-making enterprise. Maréchal argues that "narrative inquiry can provoke identification, feelings, emotions, and dialogue." Furthermore, the increased focus on incorporating autoethnography and Narrative Inquiry into qualitative research indicates a growing concern for how the style of academic writing informs the types of claims made. As Laurel Richardson articulates "I consider writing as a method of inquiry, a way of finding out about a topic...form and content are inseparable." For many researchers, experimenting with alternative forms of writing and reporting, including autoethnography, personal narrative, performative writing, layered accounts and writing stories, provides a way to create multiple layered accounts of a research study, creating not only the opportunity to create new and provocative claims but also the ability to do so in a compelling manner. Ellis (2004) says that autoethnographers advocate "the conventions of literary writing and expression" in that "autoethnographic forms feature concrete action, emotion, embodiment, self-consciousness, and introspection portrayed in dialogue, scenes, characterization, and plot" (p. xix). According to Bochner and Ellis (2006), an autoethnographer is "first and foremost a communicator and a storyteller." In other words, autoethnography "depicts people struggling to overcome adversity" and shows "people in the process of figuring out what to do, how to live, and the meaning of their struggles" (p. 111). Therefore, according to them, autoethnography is "ethical practice" and "gifts" that has a caregiving function (p. 111). In essence autoethnography is a story that re-enacts an experience by which people find meaning and through that meaning are able to be okay with that experience. In Dr. Mayukh Dewan's opinion, this can be a problem because many readers may see us as being too self-indulgent but they have to realise that our stories and experiences we share are not solely ours, but rather that they also represent the group we are autoethnographically representing. In this storytelling process, the researcher seeks to make meaning of a disorienting experience. A life example in which autoethnography could be applied is the death of a family member or someone close by. In this painful experience people often wonder how they will go about living without this person and what it will be like. In this scenario, especially in religious homes, one often asks "Why God?" thinking that with an answer as to why the person died they can go about living. Others, wanting to be able to offer up an explanation to make the person feel better, generally say things such as "At least they are in a better place" or "God wanted him/her home." People, who are never really left with an explanation as to why, generally fall back on the reason that "it was their time to go" and through this somewhat "explanation" find themselves able to move on and keep living life. Over time when looking back at the experience of someone close to you dying, one may find that through this hardship they became a stronger more independent person, or that they grew closer to other family members. With these realizations, the person has actually made sense of and has become fine with the tragic experience that occurred. And through this autoethnography is performed. Evaluation The main critique of autoethnography — and qualitative research in general — comes from the traditional social science methods that emphasize the objectivity of social research. In this critique, qualitative researchers are often called "journalists, or soft scientists," and their work, including autoethnography, is "termed unscientific, or only exploratory, or entirely personal and full of bias." Many quantitative researchers regard the materials produced by narrative as "the means by which a narrating subject, autonomous and independent...can achieve authenticity...This represents an almost total failure to use narrative to achieve serious social analysis." According to Maréchal, the early criticism of autobiographical methods in anthropology was about "their validity on grounds of being unrepresentative and lacking objectivity." She also points out that evocative and emotional genres of autoethnography have been criticized by mostly analytic proponents for their "lack of ethnographic relevance as a result of being too personal." As she writes, they are criticized "for being biased, navel-gazing, self-absorbed, or emotionally incontinent, and for hijacking traditional ethnographic purposes and scholarly contribution." The reluctance to accept narrative work as serious extends far beyond the realm of academia. In 1994, Arlene Croce refused to evaluate or even attend Bill T. Jones Still/Here performance. She echoed a quantitative stance towards narrative research by explaining I can't review someone I feel sorry or hopeless about...I'm forced to feel sorry because of the way they present themselves as: dissed blacks, abused women, or disenfranchised homosexuals - as performers, in short, who make victimhood victim art Croce illustrates what Adams, Jones, and Ellis refer to as "illusory boundaries and borders between scholarship and criticism." These "borders" are seen to hide or take away from the idea that autoethnographic evaluation and criticism present another personal story about the experience of an experience. Or as Craig Gingrich-Philbrook wrote, "any evaluation of autoethnography...is simply another story from a highly situated, privileged, empowered subject about something he or she experienced." Rethinking traditional criteria In her book's tenth chapter, titled "Evaluating and Publishing Autoethnography" (pp. 252~255), Ellis (2004) discusses how to evaluate an autoethnographic project, based on other authors' ideas about evaluating alternative modes of qualitative research. (See the special section in Qualitative Inquiry on "Assessing Alternative Modes of Qualitative and Ethnographic Research: How Do We Judge? Who Judges?") She presents several criteria for "good autoethnography," and indicates how these ideas resonate with each other. First, Ellis mentions Richardson who described five factors she uses when reviewing personal narrative papers that includes analysis of both evaluative and constructive validity techniques. The criteria are: (a) Substantive contribution. Does the piece contribute to our understanding of social life? (b) Aesthetic merit. Does this piece succeed aesthetically? Is the text artistically shaped, satisfyingly complex, and not boring? (c) Reflexivity. How did the author come to write this text? How has the author's subjectivity been both a producer and a product of this text? (d) Impactfulness. Does this affect me emotionally and/or intellectually? Does it generate new questions or move me to action? (e) Expresses a reality. Does this text embody a fleshed out sense of lived experience? Autoethnographic manuscripts might include dramatic recall, unusual phrasing, and strong metaphors to invite the reader to "relive" events with the author. These guidelines may provide a framework for directing investigators and reviewers alike. Further, Ellis suggests how Richardson's criteria mesh with criteria mentioned by Bochner who describes what makes him understand and feel with a story. (Bochner, 2000, pp. 264~266) He looks for concrete details (similar to Richardson's expression of lived experience), structurally complex narratives (Richardson's aesthetic merit), author's attempt to dig under the superficial to get to vulnerability and honesty (Richardson's reflexivity), a standard of ethical self-consciousness (Richardson's substantive contribution), and a moving story (Richardson's impact) (Ellis, 2004, pp. 253~254). In 2015, Adams, Jones, and Ellis collaborated to bring about a similar list of Goals for Assessing Autoethnography. The list takes encompasses descriptive, prescriptive, practical, and theoretical goals for evaluating autoethnographic work (2015, pp. 102–104). Make contributions to knowledge Value the personal and experiential Demonstrate the power, craft, and responsibilities of stories and storytelling Take a relationally responsible approach to research practice and representation Contributions to knowledge Adams, Jones, and Ellis define the first goal of autoethnography as a conscious effort to "extend existing knowledge and research while recognizing that knowledge is both situated and contested." As Adams explains in his critique of his work Narrating the Closet, I knew I had to contribute to knowledge about coming out by saying something new about the experience...I also needed a new angle toward coming out; my experience, alone, of coming out was not sufficient to justify a narrative. With the critic's general decree of narrative as narcissism, Adams, Jones, and Ellis use the first goal of assessing autoethnography to explain the importance of striving to combine personal experience and existing theory while remaining mindful of the "insider insight that autoethnography offers researchers, participants, and readers/audiences." Ellis' Maternal Connections can be considered a successful incorporation of the first goal in that she "questions the idea of care-giving as a burden, instead of portraying caregiving as a loving and meaning-making relationship." Value the personal and experiential Adams, Jones, and Ellis define the second goal for assessing autoethnography with four elements which include featuring the perspective of the self in context and culture, exploring experience as a means of insight about social life, embracing the risks of presenting vulnerable selves in research, and using emotions and bodily experience as means and modes of understanding. This goal fully recognizes and commends the "I" in academic writing and calls for analysis of the subjective experience. In Jones' Lost and Found essay she writes, I convey the sadness and the joy I feel about my relationships with my adopted child, the child I chose not to adopt, and my grandmother. I focus on the emotions and bodily experiences of both losing and memorializing my grandmother' The careful and deliberate incorporation of auto (the "I," the self) into research is considered one of the most crucial aspects of the autoethnography process. The exploration of the ethics and care of presenting vulnerable selves is addressed at length by Adams in A Review of Narrative Ethics. Stories and storytelling Autoethnography showcases stories as the means in which sensemaking and researcher reflexivity create descriptions and critiques of culture. Adams, Jones, and Ellis write: Reflexivity includes both acknowledging and critiquing our place and privilege in society and using the stories we tell to break long-held silences on power, relationships, cultural taboos, and forgotten and/or suppressed experiences. A focus is placed a writer's ability to develop writing and representation skills alongside other analytic abilities. Adams switches between first-person and second-person narration in Living (In) the Closet: The Time of Being Closeted as a way to "bring readers into my story, inviting them to live my experiences alongside me, feeling how I felt and suggesting how they might, under similar circumstances, act as I did." Similarly, Ellis in Maternal Connections chose to steer away from the inclusion of references to the research literature or theory instead opting to "call on sensory details, movements, emotions, dialogue, and scene setting to convey an experience of taking care of a parent." The examples included above are incomplete. Autoethnographers exploring different narrative structures can be seen in Andrew Herrmann's use of layered accounts, Ellis' use of haibun, and the use of autoethnographic film by Rebecca Long and Anne Harris. Addressing veracity and the art of story telling in his 2019 autoethnographic monograph Going All City: Struggle and Survival in LA's Graffiti Subculture, Stefano Bloch writes "I do rely on artful rendering, but not artistic license." Relationally responsible approach Among the concepts in qualitative research is "relational responsibility." Researchers should work to make research relationships as collaborative, committed, and reciprocal as possible while taking care to safeguard identities and privacy of participants. Included under this concept is the accessibility of the work to a variety of readers which allows for the "opportunity to engage and improve the lives of our selves, participants, and readers/audiences." Autoethnographers struggle with relational responsibility as in Adams' critique of his work on coming out and recognizing: ...how others can perceive my ideas as relationally irresponsible concessions to homophobic others and to insidious heteronormative cultural structures; by not being aggressively critical, my work does not do enough to engage and improve the lives of others. In the critique he also questions how relationally irresponsible he was by including several brief conversations in his work without consent and exploited other's experiences for his own benefit. Similar sentiments are echoed throughout Adams, Jones, and Ellis critiques of their own writing. From "validity" to "truth" As an idea that emerged from the tradition of social constructionism and interpretive paradigm, autoethnography challenges the traditional social scientific methodology that emphasizes the criteria for quality in social research developed in terms of validity. Carolyn Ellis writes, In autoethnographic work, I look at validity in terms of what happens to readers as well as to research participants and researchers. To me, validity means that our work seeks verisimilitude; it evokes in readers a feeling that the experience described is lifelike, believable, and possible. You also can judge validity by whether it helps readers communicate with others different from themselves or offers a way to improve the lives of participants and readers- or even your own. In this sense, Ellis emphasizes the "narrative truth" for autoethnographic writings. I believe you should try to construct the story as close to the experience as you can remember it, especially in the initial version. If you do, it will help you work through the meaning and purpose of the story. But it's not so important that narratives represent lives accurately – only, as Art(Arthur Bochner) argues, "that narrators believe they are doing so" (Bochner, 2002, p. 86). Art believes that we can judge one narrative interpretation of events against another, but we cannot measure a narrative against the events themselves because the meaning of the events comes clear only in their narrative expression. Instead, Ellis suggests to judge autoethnographic writings on the usefulness of the story, rather than only on accuracy. She quotes Art Bochner, who argues that the real questions is what narratives do, what consequences they have, to what uses they can be put. Narrative is the way we remember the past, turn life into language, and disclose to ourselves and others the truth of our experiences. In moving from concern with the inner veridicality to outer pragmatics of evaluating stories, Plummer [2001, p. 401] also looks at uses, functions, and roles of stories, and adds that they "need to have rhetorical power enhanced by aesthetic delight (Ellis, 2004, p. 126-127). Similarly, Laurel Richardson [1997, p. 92] uses the metaphor of a crystal to deconstruct traditional validity. A crystal has an infinite number of shapes, dimensions and angles. It acts as a prism and changes shape, but still has structure. Another writer, Patti Lather [1993, p. 674], proposes counter-practices of authority that rupture validity as a "regime of truth" and lead to a critical political agenda [Cf. Olesen, 2000, p. 231]. She mentions the four subtypes [pp. 685-686]: "ironic validity, concerning the problems of representation; paralogical validity, which honors differences and uncertainties; rhizomatic validity, which seeks out multiplicity; and voluptuous validity, which seeks out ethics through practices of engagement and self-reflexivity (Ellis, 2004, pp. 124~125). From "generalizability" to "resonance" With regard to the term of "generalizability," Ellis points out that autoethnographic research seeks generalizability not just from the respondents but also from the readers. Ellis says: I would argue that a story's generalizability is always being tested – not in the traditional way through random samples of respondents, but by readers as they determine if a story speaks to them about their experience or about the lives of others they know. Readers provide theoretical validation by comparing their lives to ours, by thinking about how our lives are similar and different and the reasons why. Some stories inform readers about unfamiliar people or lives. We can ask, after Stake [1994], "does the story have 'naturalistic generalization'?" meaning that it brings "felt" news from one world to another and provides opportunities for the reader to have vicarious experience of the things told. The focus of generalizability moves from respondents to readers.(p. 195) This generalizability through the resonance of readers' lives and "lived experience" (Richardson, 1997) in autoethnographic work, intends to open up rather than close down conversation (Ellis, 2004, p. 22). Benefits and concerns Denzin's criterion is whether the work has the possibility to change the world and make it a better place (Denzin, 2000, p. 256). This position fits with Clough, who argues that good autoethnographic writing should motivate cultural criticism. Autoethnographic writing should be closely aligned with theoretical reflection, says Clough, so that it can serve as a vehicle for thinking "new sociological subjects" and forming "new parameters of the social" (Clough, 2000, p. 290). Though Richardson and Bochner are less overtly political than Denzin and Clough, they indicate that good personal narratives should contribute to positive social change and move us to action (Bochner, 2000, p. 271). In addition to helping the researcher make sense of his or her individual experience, autoethnographies are political in nature as they engage their readers in political issues and often ask us to consider things, or do things differently. Chang argues that autoethnography offers a research method friendly to researchers and readers because autoethnographic texts are engaging and enable researchers to gain a cultural understanding of self in relation to others, on which cross-cultural coalition can be built between self and others. Also, autoethnography as a genre frees us to move beyond traditional methods of writing, promoting narrative and poetic forms, displays of artifacts, photographs, drawings, and live performances (Cons, p. 449). Denzin says autoethnography must be literary, present cultural and political issues, and articulate a politics of hope. The literary criteria he mentions are covered in what Richardson advocates: aesthetic value. Ellis elaborates her idea in autoethnography as good writing that through the plot, dramatic tension, coherence, and verisimilitude, the author shows rather than tells, develops characters and scenes fully, and paints vivid sensory experiences. While advocating autoethnography for its value, some researchers argue that there are also several concerns about autoethnography. Chang warns autoethnographers of pitfalls that they should avoid in doing autoethnography: (1) excessive focus on self in isolation from others; (2) overemphasis on narration rather than analysis and cultural interpretation; (3) exclusive reliance on personal memory and recalling as a data source; (4) negligence of ethical standards regarding others in self-narratives; and (5) inappropriate application of the label autoethnography.Also some qualitative researchers have expressed their concerns about the worth and validity of autoethnography. Robert Krizek (2003) contributed a chapter titled "Ethnography as the Excavation of Personal Narrative" (pp. 141–152) to the book of Expressions of Ethnography in which he expresses concern about the possibility for autoethnography to devolve into narcissism. Krizek goes on to suggest that autoethnography, no matter how personal, should always connect to some larger element of life. One of the main advantages of personal narratives is that they give us access into learners' private worlds and provide rich data (Pavlenko, 2002, 2007). Another advantage is the ease of access to data since the researcher calls on his or her own experiences as the source from which to investigate a particular phenomenon. It is this advantage that also entails a limitation as, by subscribing analysis to a personal narrative, the research is also limited in its conclusions. However, Bochner and Ellis (1996) consider that this limitation on the self is not valid, since, "If culture circulates through all of us, how can autoethnography be free of connection to a world beyond the self?." Criticisms and concerns Similar to other forms of qualitative and art-based research, autoethnography has faced many criticisms. As Sparkes stated, "The emergence of autoethnography and narratives of self…has not been trouble-free, and their status as proper research remains problematic." The most recurrent criticism of autoethnography is of its strong emphasis on self, which is at the core of the resistance to accepting autoethnography as a valuable research method. Thus, autoethnographies have been criticised for being self-indulgent, narcissistic, introspective and individualised. Another criticism is of the reality personal narratives or autoethnographies represent. As Geoffrey Walford states, "If people wish to write fiction, they have every right to do so, but not every right to call it research." This criticism originates from a statement by Ellis and Bochner (2000), conceiving autoethnography as a narrative that "is always a story about the past and not the past itself." To this, Walford asserts that "the aim of research is surely to reduce the distortion as much as possible." Walford's concerns are focused on how much of the accounts presented as autoethnographies represent real conversations or events as they happened and how much they are just inventions of the authors. Evaluation Several critiques exist regarding evaluating autoethnographical works grounded in interpretive paradigm. From within qualitative research, some researchers have posited that autoethnographers, along with others, fail to meet positivist standards of validity and reliability. Schwandt, for instance, argues that some social researchers have "come to equate being rational in social science with being procedural and criteriological." Building on quantitative foundations, Lincoln and Guba translate quantitative indicators into qualitative quality indicators, namely: credibility (parallels internal validity), transferability (parallels external validity), dependability (parallels reliability), and confirmability (parallels objectivity and seeks to critically examine whether the researcher has acted in good faith during the course of the research). Smith and Smith and Heshusius critique these qualitative translations and warn that the claim of compatibility (between qualitative and quantitative criteria) cannot be sustained, and by making such claims, researchers are in effect closing down the conversation. Smith points out that "the assumptions of interpretive inquiry are incompatible with the desire for foundational criteria. How we are to work out this problem, one way or another, would seem to merit serious attention. Secondly, some other researchers questions the need for specific criteria itself. Bochner and Clough both are concerned that too much emphasis on criteria will move us back to methodological policing and will takes us away from a focus on imagination, ethical issues in autographic work, and creating better ways of living. The autoethnographer internally judges its quality. Evidence is tacit, individualistic, and subjective. (see Ellis & Bochner, 2003). Practice-based quality is based in the lived research experience itself rather than in its formal evidencing per se. Bochner says: Self-narratives... are not so much academic as they are existential, reflecting a desire to grasp or seize the possibilities of meaning, which is what gives life its imaginative and poetic qualities... a poetic social science does not beg the question of how to separate good narrativization from bad... [but] the good ones help the reader or listener to understand and feel the phenomena under scrutiny. Finally, in addition to this anti-criteria stance of some researchers, some scholars have suggested that the criteria used to judge autoethnography should not necessarily be the same as traditional criteria used to judge other qualitative research investigations (Garratt & Hodkinson, 1999). They argue that autoethnography has been received with a significant degree of academic suspicion because it contravenes certain qualitative research traditions. The controversy surrounding autoethnography is in part related to the problematic exclusive use of the self to produce research (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994). This use of self as the only data source in autoethnography has been questioned (see, for example, Denzin & Lincoln, 1994; Sparkes, 2000; Beattie, 2022). Accordingly, autoethnographies have been criticized for being too self-indulgent and narcissistic. Sparkes (2000) suggested that autoethnography is at the boundaries of academic research because such accounts do not sit comfortably with traditional criteria used to judge qualitative inquiries. Holt associates this problem with this problem as two crucial issues in "the fourth moment of qualitative research" Denzin and Lincoln (2000) presented; the dual crises of representation and legitimation. The crisis of representation refers to the writing practices (i.e., how researchers write and represent the social world). Additionally, verification issues relating to methods and representation are (re)considered as problematic (Marcus & Fischer, 1986). The crisis of legitimation questions traditional criteria used for evaluating and interpreting qualitative research, involving a rethinking of terms such as validity, reliability, and objectivity. Holt says: Much like the autoethnographic texts themselves, the boundaries of research and their maintenance are socially constructed (Sparkes, 2000). In justifying autoethnography as proper research... ethnographers have acted autobiographically before, but in the past they may not have been aware of doing so, and taken their genre for granted (Coffey, 1999). Autoethnographies may leave reviewers in a perilous position.... the reviewers were not sure if the account was proper research (because of the style of representation), and the verification criteria they wished to judge this research by appeared to be inappropriate. Whereas the use of autoethnographic methods may be increasing, knowledge of how to evaluate and provide feedback to improve such accounts appears to be lagging. As reviewers begin to develop ways in which to judge autoethnography, they must resist the temptation to "seek universal foundational criteria lest one form of dogma simply replaces another" (Sparkes, 2002b, p. 223). However, criteria for evaluating personal writing have barely begun to develop. Notable autoethnographers Leon Anderson Liana Beattie Arthur P. Bochner Jesse Cornplanter Kimberly Dark Norman K. Denzin Carolyn Ellis Maaike de Jong Peter Pitseolak Ernest Spybuck Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Johnny Saldana See also Layered account References 59. Beattie,L. (2022). Symbiotic Autoethnography. Moving Beyond the Boundaries of Qualitative Methodologies. London: Bloomsbury Publishing Additional references Ellis, C. (2001). With Mother/With Child: A True Story. Qualitative Inquiry, 7 (5), 598–616. Ellis, C. (2009). Revision: Autoethnographic Reflections on Life and Work. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press. Herrmann, A. F., & Di Fate, K. (Eds.) (2014). The new ethnography: Goodall, Trujillo, and the necessity of storytelling. Storytelling Self Society: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Storytelling Studies, 10. Hodges, N. (2015). The Chemical Life. Health Communication, 30, 627–634. Hodges, N. (2015). The American Dental Dream. Health Communication, 30, 943–950. Holman Jones, S. (2005). Autoethnography: Making the personal political. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln. (Eds.) Handbook of Qualitative Research, (2nd ed., pp. 763–791). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Holman Jones, S., Adams, T. & Ellis, C. (2013). Handbook of Autoethnography. Walnut Creek CA: Left Coast Press Krizek, R. (2003). Ethnography as the Excavation of Personal Narrative. In R.P.Clair(Ed.), Expressions of ethnography: novel approaches to qualitative methods (pp. 141–152). New York: SUNY Press. Plummer, K. (2001). The call of life stories in ethnographic research. In P. Atkinson, A. Coffey, S. Delamont, J. Lofland, and L. Lofland (Eds.), Handbook of Ethnography (pp. 395–406). London: Sage. Richardson, L. (1997). Fields of play: Constructing an academic life. New Brunswick, N. J.: Rutgers University Press. Richardson, L. (2007). Writing: A method of inquiry. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln. (Eds.) Handbook of Qualitative Research, (2nd ed., pp. 923–948). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Stake, R. E. (1994). Case studies. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln. (Eds.) Handbook of Qualitative Research, (2nd ed., pp. 236–247). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications. Ethnography

Cognitive processing therapy

Cognitive processing therapy (CPT) is a manualized therapy used by clinicians to help people recover from posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and related conditions. It includes elements of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) treatments, one of the most widely used evidence-based therapies. A typical 12-session run of CPT has proven effective in treating PTSD across a variety of populations, including combat veterans, sexual assault victims, and refugees. CPT can be provided in individual and group treatment formats and is considered one of the most effective treatments for PTSD. The theory behind CPT conceptualizes PTSD as a disorder of non-recovery, in which a sufferer's beliefs about the causes and consequences of traumatic events produce strong negative emotions, which prevent accurate processing of the traumatic memory and the emotions resulting from the events. Because the emotions are often overwhelmingly negative and difficult to cope with, PTSD sufferers can block the natural recovery process by using avoidance of traumatic triggers as a strategy to function in day-to-day living. Unfortunately, this limits their opportunities to process the traumatic experience and gain a more adaptive understanding of it. CPT incorporates trauma-specific cognitive techniques to help individuals with PTSD more accurately appraise these "stuck points" and progress toward recovery. History Development of CPT began in 1988 with work by Patricia Resick. Initial randomized controlled trials for treatment of PTSD were conducted by Candice M. Monson. Phases of treatment The primary focus of the treatment is to help the client understand and reconceptualize their traumatic event in a way that reduces its ongoing negative effects on their current life. Decreasing avoidance of the trauma is crucial to this, since it is necessary for the client to examine and evaluate their meta-emotions and beliefs generated by the trauma. The first phase consists of education regarding PTSD, thoughts, and emotions. The therapist seeks to develop rapport with, and gain the co-operation of, the client by establishing a common understanding of the client's problems and outlining the cognitive theory of PTSD development and maintenance. The therapist asks the client to write an impact statement to establish a current baseline of the client's understanding of why the event occurred and the impact that it has had on their beliefs about themselves, others, and the world. This phase focuses on identifying automatic thoughts and increasing awareness of the relationship between a person's thoughts and feelings. A specific focus is on teaching the client to identify maladaptive beliefs ("stuck points") that interfere with recovery from traumatic experiences. The next phase involves formal processing of the trauma. The therapist asks the client to write a detailed account of their worst traumatic experience, which the client then reads to the therapist in session. This is intended to break the pattern of avoidance and enable emotional processing to take place, with the ultimate goal being for the client to clarify and modify their cognitive distortions. Clinicians often use Socratic questioning to gently prompt the client, based on the idea that the client's own arrival at new cognitions about their trauma, as opposed to unquestioning acceptance of the clinician's interpretations, which is critical to recovery. Alternatively, CPT can be conducted without the use of written accounts (in a variant known as CPT-Cognitive, or CPT-C), which some clinicians have found to be equally effective and perhaps more efficient. This alternative method relies almost entirely on Socratic dialogue between the therapist and client. The final phase of treatment focuses on helping the client reinforce the skills they learned in the previous phase, with the intent that they can use those skills to further identify, evaluate, and modify their beliefs concerning their traumatic events. The intent is to allow the clients to exit treatment with the confidence and ability to use adaptive coping strategies in their post-treatment lives. This phase focuses on five conceptual areas that traumatic experiences most frequently cause damage to: safety, trust, power/control, esteem, and intimacy. Clients practice recognizing how their traumatic experiences resulted in over-generalized beliefs, as well as the impact of these beliefs on current functioning and quality of life. Therapy elements Four essential parts Educating the patient about the specific post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms and the way the treatment will help them. Informing the patient about their thoughts and feelings. Imparting lessons to the patient to help them develop skills to challenge or question their own thoughts. Helping the patient to recognize changes in their beliefs that happened after going through the traumatic event. Structure of CPT individual sessions Twelve 50-minute structured sessions Sessions typically conducted once or twice weekly Patients complete out-of-session practice assignments 2 Formats: CPT includes a brief written trauma account component, along with ongoing practice of cognitive techniques CPT-C omits the written trauma account, and includes more practice of cognitive techniques Structure of CPT group sessions Twelve 90-120 minute structured group sessions Typically conducted by two clinicians 8-10 patients per group Patients complete out-of-session practice assignments 3 Formats: CPT includes a brief written trauma account component, along with ongoing practice of cognitive techniques. The details of the written accounts are not shared during sessions, but the emotional and cognitive reactions identified while writing the account are processed by the group. CPT-C omits the written trauma account, and includes more practice of cognitive techniques. Individual and Group Combined includes practice assignments and the written trauma account, which are processed in additional individual therapy sessions. See also Cognitive behavioral therapy Posttraumatic stress disorder References External links Official site National Center for PTSD International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies Well After War Introduction to CPT and Other Trauma-Focused Therapies Cognitive behavioral therapy

Experiential avoidance

Experiential avoidance (EA) has been broadly defined as attempts to avoid thoughts, feelings, memories, physical sensations, and other internal experiences — even when doing so creates harm in the long run. The process of EA is thought to be maintained through negative reinforcement — that is, short-term relief of discomfort is achieved through avoidance, thereby increasing the likelihood that the avoidance behavior will persist. Importantly, the current conceptualization of EA suggests that it is not negative thoughts, emotions, and sensations that are problematic, but how one responds to them that can cause difficulties. In particular, a habitual and persistent unwillingness to experience uncomfortable thoughts and feelings (and the associated avoidance and inhibition of these experiences) is thought to be linked to a wide range of problems, as opposed to deliberately choosing discomfort, which only results in discomfort. Background EA has been popularized by recent third-wave cognitive-behavioral theories such as acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). However, the general concept has roots in many other theories of psychopathology and intervention. Psychodynamic Defense mechanisms were originally conceptualized as ways to avoid unpleasant affect and discomfort that resulted from conflicting motivations. These processes were thought to contribute to the expression of various types of psychopathology. Gradual removal of these defensive processes are thought to be a key aspect of treatment and eventually return to psychological health. Process-experiential Process-experiential therapy merges client-centered, existential, and Gestalt approaches. Gestalt theory outlines the benefits of being fully aware of and open to one's entire experience. One job of the psychotherapist is to "explore and become fully aware of [the patient's] grounds for avoidance" and to "[lead] the patient back to that which he wishes to avoid" (p. 142). Similar ideas are expressed by early humanistic theory: "Whether the stimulus was the impact of a configuration of form, color, or sound in the environment on the sensory nerves, or a memory trace from the past, or a visceral sensation of fear or pleasure or disgust, the person would be 'living' it, would have it completely available to awareness…he is more open to his feelings of fear and discouragement and pain...he is more able fully to live the experiences of his organism rather than shutting them out of awareness." Behavioral Traditional behavior therapy utilizes exposure to habituate the patient to various types of fears and anxieties, eventually resulting in a marked reduction in psychopathology. In this way, exposure can be thought of as "counter-acting" avoidance, in that it involves individuals repeatedly encountering and remaining in contact with that which causes distress and discomfort. Cognitive In cognitive theory, avoidance interferes with reappraisals of negative thought patterns and schema, thereby perpetuating distorted beliefs. These distorted beliefs are thought to contribute and maintain many types of psychopathology. Third-wave cognitive-behavioral The concept of EA is explicitly described and targeted in more recent CBT modalities including acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), functional analytic psychotherapy (FAP), and behavioral activation (BA). Associated problems Distress is an inextricable part of life; therefore, avoidance is often only a temporary solution. Avoidance reinforces the notion that discomfort, distress and anxiety are bad, or dangerous. Sustaining avoidance often requires effort and energy. Avoidance limits one's focus at the expense of fully experiencing what is going on in the present. Avoidance may get in the way of other important, valued aspects of life. Empirical evidence Laboratory-based thought suppression studies suggest avoidance is paradoxical, in that concerted attempts at suppression of a particular thought often leads to an increase of that thought. Studies examining emotional suppression and pain suppression suggest that avoidance is ineffective in the long-run. Conversely, expressing the unpleasant emotions can lead to improvements in the long term, even though it increases negative reactions in the short term. Exposure-based therapy techniques have been shown to be effective in treating a wide range of psychiatric disorders. Numerous self-report studies have linked EA and related constructs (avoidance coping, thought suppression) to psychopathology and other forms of dysfunction. Relevance to psychopathology Seemingly disparate forms of pathological behavior can be understood by their common function (i.e., attempts to avoid distress). Some examples include: Relevance to quality of life Perhaps the most significant impact of EA is its potential to disrupt and interfere with important, valued aspects of an individual's life. That is, EA is seen as particularly problematic when it occurs at the expense of a person's deeply held values. Some examples include: Putting off an important task because of the discomfort it evokes. Not taking advantage of an important opportunity due to attempts to avoid worries of failure or disappointment. Not engaging in physical activity/exercise, meaningful hobbies, or other recreational activities due to the effort they demand. Avoiding social gatherings or interactions with others because of the anxiety and negative thoughts they evoke. Not being a full participant in social gatherings due to attempts to regulate anxiety relating to how others are perceiving you. Being unable to fully engage in meaningful conversations with others because one is scanning for signs of danger in the environment (attempting to avoid feeling "unsafe"). Inability to "connect" and sustain a close relationship because of attempts to avoid feelings of vulnerability. Staying in a "bad" relationship to try to avoid discomfort, guilt, and potential feelings of loneliness a break-up might entail. Losing a marriage or contact with children due to an unwillingness to experience uncomfortable feelings (e.g., achieved through drug or alcohol abuse) or symptoms of withdrawal. Not attending an important graduation, wedding, funeral, or other family event to try to avoid anxiety or symptoms of panic. Engaging in self-destructive behaviors in an attempt to avoid feelings of boredom, emptiness, worthlessness. Not functioning or taking care of basic responsibilities (e.g., personal hygiene, waking up, showing up to work, shopping for food) because of the effort they demand and/or distress they evoke. Spending so much time attempting to avoid discomfort that one has little time for anyone or anything else in life. Measurement Self-report The Acceptance and Action Questionnaire (AAQ) was the first self-report measure explicitly designed to measure EA, but has since been re-conceptualized as a measure of "psychological flexibility". The 62-item Multidimensional Experiential Avoidance Questionnaire (MEAQ) was developed to measure different aspects of EA. The Brief Experiential Avoidance Questionnaire (BEAQ) is a 15-item measure developed using MEAQ items, which has become the most widely used measure of experiential avoidance. See also Avoidant personality disorder Coping (psychology) Opposite concepts Acceptance Distress tolerance Psychological flexibility Related concepts Denial Expressive suppression Notes References External links Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT) Association for Contextual Behavioral Science (ACBS) Multidimensional Experiential Avoidance Questionnaire Cognitive behavioral therapy Behavior therapy Anxiety

Mental health counselor

A mental health counselor (MHC), or counselor (counsellor in British English), is a person who works with individuals and groups to promote optimum mental and emotional health. Such persons may help individuals deal with issues associated with addiction and substance abuse; family, parenting, and marital problems; stress management; self-esteem; and aging. The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics distinguishes "Mental Health Counselors" from "Social Workers", "Psychiatrists", and "Psychologists". Duties The legal definition of a counselor varies due to the different specializations within counseling. In their own jurisdictions, there are counselors, marriage and family therapists, and psychologists. In spite of such definitions, many mental health professionals reject the medical model (which assumes that clients are "disordered") in favor of broader viewpoints, such as those that emerged from systems psychology. Service users MHCs work with individuals, couples, families, and groups to address and treat emotional and mental disorders and to promote mental health. Most mental health counselors in the U.S. work in outpatient and residential care centers, individual and family services, and local governments. They are trained in a variety of therapeutic techniques used to address issues, including depression, anxiety, addiction and substance abuse, suicidal impulses, stress, problems with self-esteem, and grief. They also help with job and career concerns, educational decisions, issues related to mental and emotional health, and family, parenting, marital, or other relationship problems. Some career concerns include helping employees who have mental health conditions to manage their health condition whilst adhering to organizational demands to demonstrate performance and commitment to their work. MHCs also continue to play a growing role in the military mental health crisis, helping military personnel and their families deal with issues such as PTSD. MHCs often work closely with other mental health specialists, such as psychiatrists, psychologists, clinical social workers, psychiatric nurses, and school counselors. Many mental health counselors look to help their clients have a concise whole body treatment plan that addresses all the needs of the client. In the United States, MHCs diagnose as well as treat mental illness, though the scope of practice for mental health practitioners varies from state to state. There are some mental health counselors who are able to prescribe medication. There are psychiatrists and mental health practitioners. Recently, there have been a few states that have allowed licensed psychologists with additional training to be able to prescribe. And there is a recent motion that is allowing interstate practice, meaning that counselors can use their license in other states than the one they received their license in. Regulation United States Licensing requirements can vary depending on which state a mental health counselor practices in. Across the United States, mental health counseling licensure is required to independently practice, but can be practiced without a license if under close supervision of a licensed practitioner. Licensing titles for mental health counselors vary from state to state: Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC), Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC), Licensed Professional Clinical Counselor (LPCC), and various forms of these titles may list differently per state statues. The title "Mental Health Counselor" (or variation thereof) is often a protected title and thus it may be a violation of state law for persons to hold themselves as such without a proper credential. A licensed mental health counselor holds a minimum of a master's degree in counseling or another closely related field in mental health care. After obtaining a master's degree, mental health counselors complete two to three years (depending on various state statutes) of clinical work under the supervision of a licensed or certified mental health professional. The qualifications for licensure are similar to those for marriage and family therapists and for clinical social workers. Becoming a counselor and using it in daily life to help others to learn more about themselves is not a reason for someone to pursue a degree within this field. Ethics within this profession require the counselor to remain professional to be able to adequately treat patients. Remaining detached as the witness to a client's thought, feelings, and emotions can be a hard thing to do, but will ultimately reassure a patient that there are no judgement to what they will share. Guiding a patient to understand themselves and their choices is also another aspect of this profession. See also List of counseling topics Mental health professional Psychotherapist Nonviolent communication Social worker Psychologist Psychiatrist Occupational therapist Expressive therapy Behavior therapy Cognitive behavioral therapy Rational emotive behavior therapy Dialectical behavioral therapy References Citations General sources Prepared June 2008 by William J. Weikel. Ph.D., Howard Smith, Ed.D., Artis J. Palmo, Ph.D., and Edward Beck, Ed.D. External links American Counseling Association American Mental Health Counselors Association Mental health occupations Counseling

Desensitization (psychology)

In psychology, desensitization is a treatment or process that diminishes emotional responsiveness to a negative, aversive, or positive stimulus after repeated exposure. Desensitization can also occur when an emotional response is repeatedly evoked when the action tendency associated with the emotion proves irrelevant or unnecessary. The process of desensitization was developed by psychologist Mary Cover Jones and is primarily used to assist individuals in unlearning phobias and anxieties. Desensitization is a psychological process where a response is repeatedly elicited in circumstances where the emotion's propensity for action is irrelevant. Joseph Wolpe (1958) developed a hierarchal list of anxiety-evoking stimuli in order of intensity, which allows individuals to undergo adaptation. Although medication is available for individuals with anxiety, fear, or phobias, empirical evidence supports desensitization with high rates of cure, particularly in clients with depression or schizophrenia. Wolpe's "reciprocal inhibition" desensitization process is based on well-known psychology theories such as Hull's "drive-reduction" theory and Sherrington's concept of "reciprocal inhibition." Individuals are gradually exposed to anxiety triggers while using relaxation techniques to reduce anxiety. It is an effective treatment for anxiety disorders. Steps The hierarchical list is constructed between client and therapist in an ordered series of steps from the least disturbing to the most alarming fears or phobias. The therapist and the patient for acrophobia create a list of escalating exposure scenarios. The patient progresses from using a low step ladder to standing and taking the first step. The scenes are arranged in a commonly used version of this treatment to increase arousal. Secondly, the client is taught techniques that produce deep relaxation. This is repeated until the hierarchy element no longer causes anxiety or fear, at which point the next scene is shown. This procedure is repeated until the client has finished the hierarchy. It is impossible to feel both anxiety and relaxation simultaneously, so easing the client into deep relaxation helps inhibit any anxiety. Systematic desensitization (a guided reduction in fear, anxiety, or aversion) can then be achieved by gradually approaching the feared stimulus while maintaining relaxation. Desensitization works best when individuals are directly exposed to the stimuli and situations they fear, so anxiety-evoking stimuli are paired with inhibitory responses. This is done either by clients performing in real-life situations (vivo desensitization) or, if it is not practical to directly act out the steps of hierarchy, by observing models performing the feared behaviour (known as vicarious desensitization). Clients slowly move up the hierarchy, repeating performances if necessary, until the last item on the list is performed without fear or anxiety. According to research, it is not necessary for the hierarchy of scenes to be presented in a specific order, nor is it essential for the client to have mastered a relaxation response. Recent research suggests that none of the three conditions listed above are required for successful desensitization when taken as a whole. The only prerequisite appears to be the ability to imagine frightening scenes, which need not be ordered in a particular order or lead to the relaxation of the muscles. Suggested mechanisms Reciprocal inhibition Reciprocal inhibition is based on the idea that two opposing mental states cannot coexist and is used as both a psychological and biological mechanism. The theory that "two opposing states cannot occur simultaneously" i.e. relaxation methods that are involved with desensitization inhibit feelings of anxiety that come with being exposed to phobic stimuli. Deep muscle relaxation techniques are the primary method used by Wolpe to increase parasympathetic nervous system activity, the nervous system the body uses to relax. According to Tryon (2005), being relaxed does not always imply being anxious, and it is critical to avoid tautology when discussing reciprocal inhibition. This phenomenon is only observed when two events have a strong negative correlation. Reflex research has revealed the biological basis of reciprocal inhibition, which occurs when a tap on the patellar tendon results in muscle relaxation (inhibition) of the flexors and muscle activation (excitation) of the extensors. This is an example of coordinated inhibition and excitation in different muscles. One criticism is that reciprocal inhibition isn't a necessary part of the process of desensitizing people as other therapies that are along similar lines, such as flooding, work without pre-emptive, inhibitory relaxation techniques. A review of empirical evidence confirmed that therapy without relaxation was equally effective and gave birth to exposure therapy. A review of Taylor's (2002) classification of reciprocal inhibition as being short-term but with long-term effects within the understanding of desensitization doesn't make sense due to it being theoretically similar to reactive inhibition, which is longer-term as it develops conditioned inhibition. Counterconditioning Counterconditioning suggests that the anxiety response is replaced by a relaxation response through conditioning during the desensitization process. Counterconditioning is the behavioural equivalent of reciprocal inhibition which is understood as a neurological process. Wolpe (1958) used this mechanism to explain the long-term effects of systematic desensitization as it reduces avoidance responses and therefore excessive avoidance behaviours contributing to anxiety disorders. However, this explanation is not supported by empirical evidence. For similar reasons to reciprocal inhibition, counterconditioning is criticized as the underpinning mechanism for desensitization due to therapies that don't suggest a replacement emotion for anxiety being effective in desensitizing people. There would be no behavioural difference if reciprocal inhibition or counterconditioning were the functioning ×mechanisms. Habituation Habituation theory explains that with increased exposure to stimulus, there will be a decreased response from the phobic subject. There is empirical evidence to suggest that overall phobia responses are reduced in people who have specific phobias with in vivo exposure. However, empirical evidence does not support habituation as an explanation of desensitization due to its reversible and short-term nature. Extinction Phobic responses are decreased after exposure to stimuli without avoidance and with a lack of reinforcement. However, this cannot be used to explain why desensitization works, as it solely describes the functional relationship between absent reinforcement and phobic responses and lacks an actual mechanism for why such a relationship exists. Wolpe disagreed that extinction could be the explanatory mechanism of how desensitization occurs with therapies based on exposure, as he believed that repeated exposure was insufficient and had likely already happened during the lives of people with specific phobias. Two-factor model Exposure to phobic stimuli and then a subsequent avoidance response may strengthen the future anxiety as the avoidance response reduces the stress, which therefore reinforces the avoidant behaviour (prominent feature of specific phobias and anxiety disorders). Therefore, exposure with non-avoidance is seen as essential in the desensitization process. Self-efficacy Self-efficacy is an individual's personal assessment of their ability to successfully do something in a certain situation. A person's belief in themselves of being able to cope increases, especially when moving up the exposure hierarchy and having confirmatory experiences of coping from the lower levels. A high self-efficacy is shown to enhance the extinction of an unwanted behavior. This explanation for desensitization lacks an explanation for how heightened anticipation of fear reduction leads to reduced fear responses, and it does not address whether desensitization effectively occurs if an individual does not experience decreased fear responses, potentially leading their anxiety response to reaffirm their phobia instead. Expectancy theory Expectancy theory suggests that because people expect that the therapy is going to work and change their view on how they are going to receive the phobic stimuli after speaking with the therapist, their responses will align with that and display reduced anxiety. Marcia et al. (1969) found that those with high expectancy change (receiving full expectancy treatment) had comparable results to those who had systematic desensitization therapy suggesting its just a change in expectancy that reduces fear responses. Emotional processing theory R. J. McNally explains, "fear is represented in memory as a network comprising stimulus propositions that express information about feared cues, response propositions that express information about behavioural and physiologic responses to these cues, and meaning propositions that elaborate on the significance of other elements in the fear structure". Excessive fear such as phobias can be understood as a problem in this structure which leads to problems processing information leading to exaggerated fear responses. Using this information about fear networks, desensitization can be achieved accessing the fear network using matching stimuli to information in the fear network and then having the person engage with the stimuli to input new information into the network by disconfirming existing propositions. Neuroscience Medial prefrontal cortex The medial prefrontal cortex works with the amygdala,; when damaged, a phobic subject finds desensitization more difficult. Neurons in this area aren't fired during the desensitization process despite reducing spontaneous fear responses when artificially fired, suggesting the area stores extinction memories that reduce phobic responses to future stimuli related to the phobia (conditioned), which explains the long-term impact of desensitization. N-methyl-D-aspartate glutamatergic receptors NMDA receptors have been found to play a key role in the extinction of fear, and therefore, the use of an agonist would accelerate the reduction in fear responses during the process of desensitization. Self-control desensitization Self-control desensitization is a variant of systematic desensitization, which Joseph Wolpe pioneered. Instead of using a passive counter-conditioning model, it uses an active, mediational, coping skills change model. It uses coping mechanisms like relaxation as an alternative to an anxiety response when anxiety-inducing stimuli are present. In-person practise in actual anxiety-producing situations is encouraged. In many ways, it is comparable to other methods for controlling anxiety, like applied relaxation and anxiety management training. During self-control desensitization, clients are given a justification that is primarily coping skills oriented in nature. They are told that they have learned to react to certain situations by becoming anxious, tense, or nervous based on previous experience. Then it is explained to them that they will learn new coping skills to swap out their unfavorable reactions for more flexible ones. They are instructed to use relaxation techniques and other coping mechanisms in a hierarchy of anxiety-producing situations to reduce tensions and serve as covert rehearsal for eventualities. These techniques include breathing control, attention to internal sensations, and relaxation techniques. According to research, self-control desensitization is effective for various anxiety disorders but is not more effective than other cognitive or behavioural techniques. Criticism and developments With the widespread research and development of behavioural therapies and experiments being conducted in order to understand the mechanisms driving desensitization, a consensus often arises that exposure is the key element of desensitization. This suggests the steps leading up to the actual exposure such as relaxation techniques and the development of an exposure hierarchy are redundant steps for effective desensitization. It would seem that crucial elements for a successful therapeutic outcome in both desensitisation and more conventional forms of psychotherapy are the cognitive and social aspects of the therapeutic situation. These factors include the expectation of therapeutic benefit, the therapist's ability to foster social reinforcement, the information-feedback of approximations towards successful fear reduction, training in attention control, and the vicarious learning of contingencies of non-avoidance behaviour in the fear situation (via instructed imagination). Effects on animals Animals can also be desensitized to their rational or irrational fears. A race horse who fears the starting gate can be desensitized to the fearful elements (the creak of the gate, the starting bell, the enclosed space) one at a time, in small doses or at a distance. Clay et al. (2009) conducted an experiment whereby he allocated rhesus macaques to either a desensitization group or a control group, finding that those in the desensitization group showed a significant reduction in both the rate and duration of fearful behavior. This supports the use of PRT training. Desensitization is commonly used with simple phobias like insect phobia. In addition, desensitization therapy is a useful tool in training domesticated dogs. Systematic desensitization used in conjunction with counter-conditioning was shown to reduce problem behaviours in dogs, such as vocalization and property destruction. Effects on violence Desensitization also refers to the potential for reduced responsiveness to actual violence caused by exposure to violence in the media. However, this topic is debated in the scientific literature. Desensitization may arise from different media sources, including TV, video games, and movies. Some scholars suggest that violence may prime thoughts of hostility, possibly affecting how we perceive others and interpret their actions. Desensitization has been shown to lower arousal to violent scenes in heavy versus light television viewers at the physiological level. It has frequently been suggested that those who commit extreme violence have blunted sensibilities as a result of watching violent videos repeatedly. Desensitization to violence has been linked to a number of outcomes. It has been observed, for example, as less arousal and emotional disturbance when witnessing violence, as greater hesitancy to call an adult to intervene in a witnessed physical altercation, and as less sympathy for victims of domestic abuse. Recent school shootings have sparked a lot of discussion about the desensitizing effects of violent video games and the possible involvement of "shooter" games, which teach gun handling skills and provide intense desensitization training. It is hypothesized that initial exposure to violence in the media may produce a number of aversive responses, such as increased heart rate, fear, discomfort, perspiration, and disgust. However, prolonged and repeated exposure to violence in the media may reduce or habituate the initial psychological impact until violent images do not elicit these negative responses. Eventually, the observer may become emotionally and cognitively desensitized to media violence. In one experiment, participants who played violent video games showed lower heart rate and galvanic skin response readings, which the authors interpreted as displaying physiological desensitization to violence. However, other studies have failed to replicate this finding. Some scholars have questioned whether becoming desensitized to media violence specifically transfers to becoming desensitized to real-life violence. In addition, psychological research frequently focuses on how members of a group behave, and these studies demonstrate that media violence raises the likelihood that members of the group will become desensitized and act aggressively. However, more sensitive developmental studies might find that this effect can be moderated by some individual difference variables (such as empathy, perspective taking, or trait hostility). See also Sensitization Flooding (psychology) Extinction (psychology) Habituation Conditioning Alarm fatigue References Anxiety disorder treatment Behavior therapy Behaviorism

Personal trainer

A personal trainer is an individual who creates and delivers safe and effective exercise programs for healthy individuals and groups, or those with medical clearance to exercise. They motivate clients by collaborating to set goals, providing meaningful feedback, and by being a reliable source for accountability. Trainers also conduct a variety of assessments beginning with a preparticipation health-screening and may also include assessments of posture and movement, flexibility, balance, core function, cardio-respiratory fitness, muscular fitness, body composition, and skill-related parameters (e.g. power, agility, coordination, speed, and reactivity) to observe and gather relevant information needed to develop an effective exercise program and support client goal attainment. These assessments may be performed at the beginning of and after an exercise program to measure client progress toward improved physical fitness. Trainers create exercise programs following a progression model, using the baseline assessment as the starting point of a client's physical abilities and framing the program to fit the individual personally. They also provide education on many other aspects of wellness, including general health and nutrition guidelines. Helping clients to reach their full potential in various aspects of life requires a comprehensive client-centered approach along with a belief that clients are resourceful and capable of change. Qualified personal trainers or certified personal trainers (CPTs) recognize their own areas of expertise. If a trainer suspects that one of their clients has a medical condition that could prevent the client from safe participation in an exercise program, they must refer the client to the proper health professional for medical clearance. Purpose of personal training The scope of practice for a personal trainer has a primary focus on prevention and involves enhancing components of health and fitness for the general, healthy population or those cleared for exercise. Proper exercise prescription may result in improved body composition, physical performance, heart condition, and health outcomes. The decision to hire a personal trainer may be related to a perceived health threat, a lack of knowledge, a personal belief in one's ability to begin and adhere to an exercise program, or some sort of psychological effect. Often clients will seek the guidance of a personal trainer for factors related to motivation and adherence. A personal trainer pays close attention to the client's exercise technique, workout routine, goals, values, and nutrition. Personal training in men and women has been shown to improve the benefit-to-concern ratio for exercise (decisional balance), and increase confidence to choose exercise in the face of other time demands (scheduling self-efficacy). Personal training results in higher strength, higher workout intensities, and higher perceived exertion during exercise. Employment characteristics The profession is generally not restricted by the venue, and personal trainers may work in fitness facilities, in their own homes, in client homes, over live video (also called "virtual personal trainers"), or outdoors. Almost all exercise professionals work in physical fitness facilities, health clubs, and fitness centers located in the amusement and recreation industry or in civic and social organizations. Personal training is not regulated in any jurisdiction in the United States except for Washington D.C. which adopted registration requirements for personal fitness trainers in February 2014. Some employers, such as gyms, require personal trainers to be certified. However, this is not always the case and some personal trainers can find work without certification. Overall, personal trainers must possess certain skills, such as a passion for fitness and helping others achieve their goals, industry knowledge, leadership, and the ability to communicate effectively with their clients. Personal trainers may specialize in a certain training type, training philosophy, performance type, exercise modality, or client population. In general, most personal trainers develop exercise plans for aerobic exercise, resistance exercise, and/or flexibility training. With aerobic exercise prescription, personal trainers determine the type of exercise, duration of exercise, and frequency of exercise. For resistance exercise prescription, the type of exercise, total session volume, rest period, frequency, and intensity are determined. Personal trainers may also be involved in the prescription of stretching routines or other approaches. Personal trainers help clients to perform exercises with correct techniques, minimizing the risk of injury. While some discuss nutrition, ergogenic supplementation, and spiritual practices with clients, there is debate within the industry as to whether it fits within their scope of practice and training qualifications. Accreditation Personal trainer accreditation is a process that provides certification of competency. Qualification standards for personal trainers vary between countries. Personal trainer accreditation is also viewed as experience in the field with many client testimonials on their achievements working with their personal trainer. International The International Confederation of Registers for Exercise Professionals (ICREPs) is an international partnership between registration bodies around the world that register exercise professionals. Member countries conform to the international standards set by ICREPs for personal training (and other exercise education credentials) and are transferable to other member countries. The current members of ICREPs (as of 2019) are: Fitness Australia, NFLA Canada, REPs India, REPs Ireland, REPs New Zealand, REPs Poland, REPs South Africa, REPs United Arab Emirates, USREPs, and IranREPs. Australia In Australia, personal trainers may work independently with suitable insurance or choose to be a member of a registering body (Fitness Australia or Physical Activity Australia). The qualifications levels include; Level 1 - Certificate III in Fitness, Level 2 - Certificate IV in Fitness and Level 3 - Diploma of Fitness. These can be obtained from nationally accredited colleges (TAFE, Australian College of Sport & Fitness, Fitness Industry Training, Global Fitness Institute, Australian Institute of Fitness, Australian Fitness Academy). Once working in the industry, trainers who are members of associations are also required to complete short courses to obtain continuing education credit (CEC) points they need to keep their registration. A minimum of 20 CEC points every two years is required. Many personal trainers also have additional qualifications in weight loss, strength training, kid's fitness, and nutrition, which is in part due to the CEC program. CEC courses can cover a wide variety of topics such as different training techniques, nutrition, exercise styles, health conditions, physiology, lifestyle, and rehabilitation. Once members obtain their Australian Cert III & IV in Fitness, they can practice nationally. This can be done with this certification and using the Global Portability Matrix. The Global Portability Matrix was designed by ICREPS. This stands for International Confederation of Registers for Exercise Professionals, which allows all members to practice in other countries. Members can train in Belgium, The Netherlands, Hungary, The United Kingdom, Ireland, Lebanon, Poland, The United States, The Caribbean, South Africa, United Arab Emirates, Canada, and New Zealand. Brazil In Brazil, personal trainers must have a bachelor's degree in "Physical Education" (a degree that combines knowledge in the fields of Exercise Science and Healthcare science) and be registered with the Conselho Federal de Educação Física (Federal Council of Physical Education), and risk criminal charges if they operate without these two requirements. Canada In Canada, the main certifying bodies are Canadian Fitness Education Services (CFES), Canadian Fitness Professionals (CanFit Pro), Certified Personal Trainers Network, the Canadian Society of Exercise Physiology (CSEP), and the National Fitness Leadership Association (NFLA). CSEP requires a diploma or degree in the exercise field, most other organizations require experience and/or workshops to qualify for a credential. Many personal trainers receive a CFES, CanFit Pro, NFLA or an NCCA accredited certification, but there are no certifications required by law. Fitness instruction in Canada is an unregulated industry. Iran In Iran, the main certifying bodies are IranREPs and Bodybuilding Federation which these two organizations signed a memorandum of understanding in the beginning of 2019. IranREPs requires a diploma or degree in the exercise field from EuropeActive accredited providers or Sport universities. IranREPs joined the ICREPs in 2020. Europe In Europe, personal trainers may work independently, but will always need accreditation by one of the main certifying bodies such as: EREPS: The European Register of Exercise Professionals (EREPS) is an independent process for the registering of instructors, trainers and teachers working in the European health, fitness and physical activity sector. It is a pan-European system, based on independent national registers, which culminate in a central European database. New Zealand New Zealand has one major registration body for exercise professionals – REPs New Zealand. REPs New Zealand is recognised by both Exercise New Zealand (the industry association) and ICREPs. REPs NZ currently have three major registration categories 1: Exercise Prescription 2: Group Exercise 3: Yoga Teacher To be eligible to register for REPs you need to have one the below options a) Completed an initial qualification from a REPs registered Provider b) Complete a NZ University Degree with an Exercise focus c) Hold a NZ Certificate in Exercise 4 d) Hold current registration with an ICREPs partner To maintain your REPs registration you will need to a) Renew your registration yearly b) Keep your CPR and First Aid up to date and valid c) Complete 10CPD points per year United Kingdom In the UK, there are several ways to achieve a personal training qualification. Most personal training qualifications are accredited through awarding bodies like Active IQ, Focus Awards, YMCA Awards, VTCT and City and Guilds. These qualifications are generally delivered by Further Education (FE) establishments like colleges, or by private training providers. Upon successful completion of an accredited awarding body qualification, candidates become eligible for CIMSPA Practitioner status. There is no legal restriction on the title of Personal Trainer nor any formal body associated with regulating Personal Training. United States A number of certifications are available in the U.S., although a number are not accredited. Most require a high school diploma, cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and automated external defibrillator (AED) certification, and some type of examination. The United States Registry of Exercise Professionals (USREPS) is the official registry of exercise professionals in the United States and provides clients, employers, healthcare practitioners, policymakers, and insurance providers a single source for finding well-qualified exercise professionals or to verify credentials. In the United States, various certifications are available within the fitness industry, although not all are accredited. Most certifications typically require a high school diploma, CPR (cardiopulmonary resuscitation), AED (automated external defibrillator) certification, and may involve an examination process. A 2002 investigation evaluated a random sample of 115 personal trainers using the Fitness Instructors Knowledge Assessment (FIKA) (which measures knowledge in nutrition, health screening, testing protocols, exercise prescription, and special populations). The study described that: 70% of those surveyed did not have a degree in any field related to exercise science. Those who did not have a bachelor's degree in an exercise science-related field scored 31% less on average than those with a bachelor's degree or higher in the field. Those holding one of two specific certifications (the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) or the National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA) certification) scored 83% of the questions correctly on average. Those holding any certification other than ACSM or NSCA answered only 38% of the questions correctly. Years of experience was not found to be predictive of personal trainer knowledge. In partnership with the fitness industry, the International Health, Racquet & Sportsclub Association (IHRSA), which represents over 9,000 health and fitness facilities, started an initiative in 2002 to improve standards for both its own clubs and the industry as a whole. In January 2006, IHRSA implemented a recommendation that its facilities only accept personal trainers with certifications recognized by the National Commission for Certifying Agencies (NCCA) if recognized either by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA) and/or the U.S. Department of Education (USDE). As a result, the Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC) was recognized by IHRSA as a recognized accreditor of fitness professional certification organizations. Since then, the DEAC has accredited several personal trainer certification organizations, including the Athletics and Fitness Association of America (AFAA) and the International Sports Sciences Association (ISSA) among others. As of now, NASM, ISSA, AFAA, ACSM, ACE, and NSCA certifications are among the 16 accredited certifications recognized by IHRSA, three of which are accredited by the Distance Education Accrediting Commission (DEAC). Various organizations within the profession have lobbied for the adoption of more stringent criteria for certification developed by the NSF International. There remains no national legal restriction on the industry to date except for the District of Columbia (D.C.) which as of February 2014, passed legislation requiring personal fitness trainers to register in that jurisdiction. India Personal Trainers in India must hold an appropriate Certification in Personal Training from respected organizations such as Active IQ, National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM), National Strength and Conditioning Association (NSCA), National Exercise and Sports Trainer Association (NESTA), National Council on Strength and Fitness (NCSF) and The International Sports Sciences Association(ISSA). Apart from all these International certifications, if one holds any National Skill Qualification Framework Certifications (NSQF Certificates) such as Level 4 Fitness Trainer, Level 5 Personal Fitness Trainer, Level 6 Strength and Conditioning and Diploma in Personal Training from REPS India, will also provide an opportunity to work as a personal trainer in India. Any additional continuing educational courses such as Corrective Exercise Specialist, Special Population Trainer, Weight loss Specialist, Reebok Crossfit, LesMills Bodypump and Yoga Trainer will yield an individual further benefits of salary escalation. To work in India, Personal trainers do not have to register as an Exercise Professional to get employment. See also Physical exercise Physical fitness Physical training instructor Nutritionist Professional fitness coach References Training Sports coaches

Sympathy

Sympathy is the perception of, understanding of, and reaction to the distress or need of another life form. According to philosopher David Hume, this sympathetic concern is driven by a switch in viewpoint from a personal perspective to the perspective of another group or individual who is in need. Hume explained that this is the case because "the minds of all men are similar in their feelings and operations" and that "the motion of one communicates itself to the rest" so that as "affections readily pass from one person to another… they beget correspondent movements." Along with Hume, two other men, Adam Smith and Arthur Schopenhauer, worked to better define sympathy. Hume was mostly known for epistemology, Smith was known for his economic theory, and Schopenhauer for the philosophy of the will. American professor Brené Brown views sympathy as a way to stay out of touch with one's emotions. They attempt to make sense out of the situation and see it from the person receiving the sympathy's perception. Etymology The roots of the word sympathy are the Greek words , which means "together", and , which refers to feeling or emotion. See sympathy § Etymology for more information. Distinctions between sympathy and related concepts The related word empathy is often used interchangeably with sympathy. Empathy more precisely means that one is able to feel another's feelings. Compassion and pity are also related concepts. Causes Prerequisites for feeling sympathy include: attention to a subject, believing that a subject is in a state of need, and understanding the context of what is occurring in a subject's life. To feel sympathy for a person or group, you must first pay attention to them. When one is distracted, this severely limits one's ability to produce strong affective responses. When not distracted, people can attend to and respond to a variety of emotional subjects and experiences. The perceived need of an individual/group elicits sympathy. Different states of need (such as perceived vulnerability or pain) call for different sorts of reactions, including those that range from attention to sympathy. For example, a person with cancer might draw a stronger feeling of sympathy than a person with a cold. Depending on the circumstance of the subject, the way that sympathy is expressed can vary because of the given situation. Gestures of sympathy may also be seen as a social response to a crisis. Opinions about human deservingness, interdependence, and vulnerability motivate sympathy. A person who seems "deserving" of aid is more likely to be helped. A belief in human interdependence fuels sympathetic behavior. Sympathy is also believed to be based on the principle of the powerful helping the vulnerable (young, elderly, sick). This desire to help the vulnerable has been suggested by the American Psychological Association, among others, to stem from paternalistic motives to protect and aid children and the weak. In this theory, people help other people in general by generalizing the maternal as well as the paternal instincts to care for their own children or family. Moods, previous experiences, social connections, novelty, salience, and spatial proximity also influence the experience of sympathy. People experiencing positive mood states and people who have similar life experiences are more likely to express sympathy to those who are being sympathized with. People in spatial or geographic proximity (such as neighbors and citizens of a given country) are more likely to experience sympathy towards each other. Social proximity follows the same pattern: Members of certain groups (e.g. racial groups) are more sympathetic to people who are also members of the group. Social proximity is linked with in-group/out-group status. People within the same group are interconnected and share successes and failures and therefore experience more sympathy towards each other than to out-group members, or social outsiders. New and emotionally provoking situations also heighten empathic emotions, such as sympathy. People seem to habituate to events that are similar in content and type and strength of emotion. The first horrific event that is witnessed will elicit a greater sympathetic response compared to the subsequent experiences of the same horrific event. Evolutionary origins The evolution of sympathy is tied to the development of social intelligence: a broad range of behaviors and their associated cognitive skills, such as pair bonding, the creation of social hierarchies, and alliance formation. Researchers theorize that empathic emotions, or those relating to the emotions of others, arose due to reciprocal altruism, mother–child bonding, and the need to accurately estimate the future actions of conspecifics. Empathic emotions emerged from the need to create relationships that were mutually beneficial and to better understand the emotions of others that could avert danger or stimulate positive outcomes. Small groups of socially dependent individuals may develop empathic concerns, and later sympathy, if certain prerequisites are met. The people in this community must have a long enough lifespan to encounter several opportunities to react with sympathy. Parental care relationships, alliances during conflicts, and the creation of social hierarchies are associated with the onset of sympathy in human interactions. Sympathetic behavior originally came about during dangerous situations, such as predator sightings, and moments when aid was needed for the sick and/or wounded. The evolution of sympathy as a social catalyst can be seen in both other primate species and in human development. Communication Verbal communication is one way individuals communicate feelings of sympathy. People can express sympathy by addressing the emotions being felt by themselves and others involved and by acknowledging the current environmental conditions for why sympathy is the appropriate reaction. Nonverbal communication includes speech intonation, facial expression, body motions, person-to-person physical contact, nonverbal vocal behavior, how far people position themselves in relation to each other, posture, and appearance. Such forms of expression can convey messages related to emotion as well as opinions, physical states (e.g. fatigue), and understanding. People produce emotion-specific facial expressions that are often the same from culture to culture and are often reproduced by observers, which facilitates the observers' own understandings of the emotion and/or situation. There are six universal emotions: happiness, sadness, fear, surprise, disgust, and anger. Nonverbal communication cues are often subconscious and difficult to control. Deliberate regulation of emotion and nonverbal expression is often imperfect. Nonverbal gestures and facial expressions are also generally better understood by observers than by the person experiencing them first-hand. Communicating using physical touch has the unique ability to convey affective information upon contact. The interpretation of this information is context-sensitive. The touch of the hand on the shoulder during a funeral might be the fastest method of conveying sympathy. Patting a person on their back, arms, or head for a few seconds can effectively convey feelings of sympathy between people. Nonverbal communication seems to provide a more genuine communication of sympathy, because it is difficult to control nonverbal expressions and therefore difficult to be deliberately insincere in that medium. The combination of verbal and nonverbal communication facilitates the acknowledgment and comprehension of sympathy. Human behavior People make decisions by weighing costs against potential outcomes. Research on decision-making distinguishes two mechanisms, often labeled "System 1" (or "gut") and "System 2" (or "head"). System 1 uses affective cues to dictate decisions, whereas System 2 is based in logic and reason. For example, deciding on where to live based on how the new home feels would be a System 1 decision, whereas deciding based on the property value and personal savings would be a System 2 decision. Sympathy is a System 1 agent. It provides a means of understanding another person's experience or situation, good or bad, with a focus on their well-being. It is often easier to make decisions based on emotional information, because all people have general understanding of emotions. It is this understanding of emotions that allows people to use sympathy to make their decisions. Sympathy helps to motivate philanthropic, or aid-giving, behavior such as donations or community service. The choice to donate, and the subsequent decision of how much to give, can be separated into two emotion-driven decision-making processes: Mood management, or how people act to maintain their moods, influences the initial decision to donate because of selfish concerns (to avoid regret or feel better). However, how a person feels about the deservingness of the recipient determines how much to donate. Human sympathy in donation behavior can influence the amount of aid given to people and regions that are in need. Increasing how emotional a description is, presenting individual cases instead of large groups, and using less information and numerical data can positively influence giving behavior. Sympathy also plays a role in maintaining social order. Judging people's character helps to maintain social order, making sure that those who are in need receive the appropriate care. The notion of interdependence fuels sympathetic behavior; such behavior is self-satisfying because helping someone who is connected to you through some way (family, social capital) often results in a personal reward (social, monetary, etc.). Regardless of selflessness or selfishness, sympathy facilitates the cycle of give and take that is necessary for maintaining a functional society. Healthcare Sympathy impacts how doctors, nurses, and other members of society think about and treat people with different diseases and conditions. The level of sympathy exhibited by health care providers corresponds to patient characteristics and disease type. One factor that influences sympathy is controllability: the degree to which the afflicted individual could have avoided contracting the disease or medical condition. For example, people express less sympathy toward individuals who had control during the event when they acquired HIV. Homosexual men and prostitute women who have contracted HIV or AIDS are unlikely to receive as much sympathy as heterosexual men and women who contract HIV or AIDS. Sympathy in health-related decision-making is heavily influenced by disease stigma. Disease stigma can lead to discrimination in the workplace and in insurance coverage. High levels of stigma are also associated with social hostility. Several factors contribute to the development of disease stigmas, including the disease's time course, severity, and the dangers that the disease might pose to others. Sexual orientation of individual patients has also been shown to affect stigma levels in the case of HIV diagnoses. Sympathy is associated with low levels of disease stigma. Sympathy for HIV patients increased levels of knowledge regarding HIV and a lower likelihood of avoiding individuals with HIV. Neuroscience perspectives Social and emotional stimuli that relate to the well-being of another person can be studied with technology that tracks brain activity (such as Electroencephalograms and functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging). Amygdala and insula activation occur when a person experiences emotions, such as fear and disgust respectively. Primary motor regions also activate during sympathy. This could be caused by empathic motor reactions to emotional faces (reflecting the expressions on their own faces) which seem to help people better understand the other person's emotion. Researchers also suggest that the neural mechanisms that are activated when personally experiencing emotions are also activated when viewing another person experiencing the same emotions (via mirror neurons). Pain seems to activate a region known as the cingulate cortex, in addition to the activation of the neural mechanisms mentioned earlier. The temporal parietal junction, orbitofrontal cortex, and ventral striatum are also thought to play a role in the production of emotion. Generally, empathic emotions (including sympathy) require the activation of top-down and bottom-up activity. Top-down activity refers to cognitive processes that originate from the frontal lobe and require conscious thought whereas bottom-up activity begins from a sensation of stimuli in the environment. From that sensory level, people sense and experience the emotional cues of another. At the same time, top-down responses make sense of the emotional inputs streaming in and apply motive and environmental influence analyses to better understand the situation. Top-down processes include attention to emotion and emotion regulation. Child development Sympathy is a stage in social and moral development. It typically arises when a child is between two and three years old, although some instances of empathic emotion can be seen as early as 18 months. Basic sharing of emotions, a precursor for sympathy, can be seen in infants. For example, babies will often begin to cry when they hear another baby crying nearby. This suggests the infant can recognize emotional cues in its environment, even if it cannot fully comprehend the emotion. Another milestone in child development is the ability to mimic facial expressions. Both of these processes act on sensory and perceptual pathways; executive functioning for empathic emotions does not begin during these early stages. Because of this, children and young adults experience another person's pain differently: Young children tend to be negatively aroused more often in comparison to the older subjects. Sympathy can elicit prosocial and altruistic behaviour. Altruistic behaviour happens when people who experience emotional reactions consistent with the state of another person feel "other-oriented" (inclined to help other people in need or distressed). People are more inclined to help those in need when they cannot easily escape the situation. If exit is easy, an individual may instead reduce their own distress (distress caused by sympathy: feeling bad for the other) by avoiding contact with the other(s) in need. However sympathy is still experienced when it is easy to escape the situation, suggesting that humans are "other oriented" and altruistic. Sympathy can be used in altruistic situations. This can apply when the sympathy would benefit . This can be the case in parenting. Parenting styles (specifically, the level of affection) can influence the development of sympathy. Prosocial and moral development extends into adolescence and early adulthood as humans learn to better assess and interpret the emotions of others. Prosocial behaviours have been observed in children between one and two years old. It is difficult to measure emotional responses in children that young by means of self-report methods as they are not as able to articulate such responses as well as adults can. Theory of mind The development of theory of mind—the ability to view the world from perspectives of other people—is correlated with the development of sympathy and other complex emotions. These emotions are called "complex" because they involve more than just one's own emotional states; complex emotions involve the interplay of multiple people's varying and fluctuating thoughts and emotions within given contexts. The ability to experience vicarious emotion, or to imagine how another person feels, is essential for empathic concern. Moral development is similarly tied to the understanding of outside perspectives and emotions. Moral reasoning has been divided into five categories, beginning with a hedonistic self-orientation and ending with an internalized sense of needs of others, including empathic emotions. Innate feature One study sought to determine whether sympathy demonstrated by children was solely for personal benefit, or if the emotion was an innate part of development. Parents, teachers, and 1,300 children (aged six and seven) were interviewed regarding each child's behavior. Over the course of one year, questionnaires were filled out regarding the progress and behavior of each child. This was followed by an interview. The study concluded that children develop sympathy and empathy independently of parental guidance. The study also found that girls are more sympathetic, prosocial, and morally motivated than boys. Prosocial behavior has been noted in children as young as twelve months when showing and giving toys to their parents, without promoting or being reinforced by praise. See also Altruism Condolence Ishin-denshin, Japanese for sympathy (Some Japanese believe their country ) Mimpathy Moral emotions Superficial sympathy References Further reading Decety, J. and Ickes, W. (Eds.) (2009). The Social Neuroscience of Empathy. Cambridge: MIT Press, Cambridge. Decety, J. and Batson, C.D. (Eds.) (2007). Interpersonal Sensitivity: Entering Others' Worlds. Hove: Psychology Press. Eisenberg, N., & Strayer, J. (1987). Empathy and its Development. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. External links Mirrored emotion by Jean Decety from the University of Chicago. Emotions Interpersonal relationships Virtue

Equine-assisted therapy

Equine-assisted therapy (EAT) encompasses a range of treatments that involve activities with horses and other equines to promote human physical and mental health. Modern use of horses for mental health treatment dates to the 1990s. Systematic review of studies of EAT as applied to physical health date only to about 2007, and a lack of common terminology and standardization has caused problems with meta-analysis. Due to a lack of high-quality studies assessing the efficacy of equine-assisted therapies for mental health treatment, concerns have been raised that these therapies should not replace or divert resources from other evidence-based mental health therapies. The existing body of evidence does not justify the promotion and use of equine-related treatments for mental disorders. Terminology An overall term that encompasses all forms of equine therapy is equine-assisted activities and therapy (EAAT). Various therapies that involve interactions with horses and other equines are used for individuals with and without disabilities including those with physical, cognitive and emotional issues. Terminology within the field is not standardized, and the lack of clear definitions and common terminology presents problems in reviewing medical literature. Within that framework, the more common therapies and terminology used to describe them are: Therapeutic horseback riding uses a therapeutic team, usually including a certified therapeutic riding instructor, two or more volunteers, and a horse, to help an individual ride a horse and work with it on the ground. Hippotherapy involves an occupational therapist, a physiotherapist, or a speech and language therapist working with a client and a horse. Different movements of the horse present challenges to the client to promote different postural responses of the client by the horse influencing the client rather than the client controlling the horse. The word hippotherapy is also used in some contexts to refer to a broader realm of equine therapies. Equine-assisted learning (EAL) is described as an "experiential learning approach that promotes the development of life skills ... through equine-assisted activities." Equine-assisted psychotherapy (EAP) does not necessarily involve riding, but may include grooming, feeding and ground exercises. Mental health professionals work with one or more clients and one or more horses in an experiential manner to help the clients learn about themselves and others, while processing or discussing the client's feelings, behaviours, and patterns. The goal is to help the client in social, emotional, cognitive, or behavioral ways. Other terms for equine psychotherapy include equine-facilitated psychotherapy (EFP), equine-assisted therapy (EAT), equine-facilitated wellness (EFW), equine-facilitated counselling (EFC) and equine facilitated mental health (EFMH). Interactive vaulting involves vaulting activities in a therapeutic milieu. Therapeutic driving involves controlling a horse while driving from a carriage seat or from a wheelchair in a carriage modified to accommodate the wheelchair. Equine-assisted activities (EAA) incorporates all of the above activities plus horse grooming, and stable management, shows, parades, demonstrations, and the like. Types Most research has focused on physical benefit of therapeutic work with horses, though the most rigorous studies have only been subject to systematic review since about 2007. EAAT have been used to treat individuals with neurological diseases or disorders such as cerebral palsy, movement disorders, or balance problems. It is believed the rhythmical gait of a horse acts to move the rider's pelvis in the same rotation and side-to-side movement that occurs when walking; the horse's adjustable gait promotes riders to constantly adjust to encourage pelvic motion while promoting strength, balance, coordination, flexibility, posture, and mobility. EAAT have also been used to treat other disabilities, such as autism, behavioral disorders and psychiatric disorders. Due to a lack of rigorous scientific evidence, there is insufficient evidence to demonstrate if equine therapy for mental health treatment provides any benefit. Therapeutic horseback riding Therapeutic riding is used by disabled individuals who ride horses to relax, and to develop muscle tone, coordination, confidence, and well-being. Therapeutic horseback riding is considered recreational therapy where an individual is taught by a non-therapist riding instructor how to actively control a horse while riding. It is used as exercise to improve sensory and motor skills for coordination, balance, and posture. Most research has focused on the physical benefit of therapeutic work with horses, with the most rigorous studies being subject to systematic review since about 2007. Claims made as to the efficacy of equine therapies for mental health purposes have been criticized as lacking proper medical evidence due in large part to poor study design and lack of quantitative data. Ethical questions relating to its expense and its continued promotion have been raised in light of this lack of evidence. While such therapies do not appear to cause harm, it has been recommended they not be used as a mental treatment at this time unless future evidence shows a benefit for treating specific disorders. Hippotherapy Hippotherapy is an intervention used by a physical therapist, recreational therapist, occupational therapist, or speech and language pathologist. The movement of the horse affects a rider's posture, balance, coordination, strength and sensorimotor systems. It is thought that the warmth and shape of the horse and its rhythmic, three-dimensional movement along with the rider's interactions with the horse and responses to the movement of the horse can improve the flexibility, posture, balance and mobility of the rider. Learning to use verbal cues for the horse, and to speak with the therapist is key to practicing use of speech. It differs from therapeutic horseback riding because it is one treatment strategy used by a licensed physical therapist, occupational therapist, or speech and language pathologists. They guide the rider's posture and actions while the horse is controlled by a horse handler at the direction of the therapist. The therapist guides both the rider and horse to encourage specific motor and sensory inputs. Therapists develop plans to address specific limitations and disabilities such as neuromuscular disorders, walking ability, or general motor function. Equine-assisted psychotherapy Equine-assisted psychotherapy (EAP) or equine-facilitated psychotherapy (EFP) is the use of equines to treat human psychological problems in and around an equestrian facility. It is not the same as therapeutic riding or hippotherapy. Though different organizations may prefer one term over the other for various reasons, in practice, the two terms are used interchangeably. Other terms commonly used, especially in Canada, include equine-facilitated wellness (EFW), equine-facilitated counselling (EFC) and equine-facilitated mental health (EFMH). While some mental health therapies may incorporate vaulting and riding, some utilize groundwork with horses. Some programs only use ground-based work. There are also differences between programs over whether the horse is viewed as a co-facilitator, or simply as a tool. The field of equine-assisted psychotherapy did not publicly become a part of the equine-assisted therapy world until the 1990s, although individuals had been experimenting with the concept prior to that time. The first national group in the United States, the Equine-Facilitated Mental Health Association (EFMHA), now a part of PATH International, formed in 1996. The mental health area of equine-assisted therapy became subject to a major rift when a second group, the Equine Growth and Learning Association (EAGALA) formed in 1999, splitting from EFMHA (now PATH) over differences of opinion about safety protocols. Since that time, additional differences have arisen between the two groups over safety orientation, the therapeutic models used, training programs for practitioners, and the role of riding. EAGALA itself had a further split between its founders in 2006 due to legal issues, with yet another new organization formed. As a result, although PATH and EAGALA remain the two main certification organizations in the United States, there has been a significant amount of misunderstanding amongst practitioners, client, and within the scientific literature. To resolve these differences, an independent organization, the Certification Board for Equine Interaction Professionals (CBEIP) formed, beginning in 2007, to promote professional credibility in the field. However, the world of equine-assisted psychotherapy remains disorganized and has not standardized its requirements for education or credentialing. History Horses have been utilized as a therapeutic aid since the ancient Greeks used them for those people who had incurable illnesses. Its earliest recorded mention is in the writings of Hippocrates who discussed the therapeutic value of riding. The claimed benefits of therapeutic riding have been dated back to 17th century literature where it is documented that it was prescribed for gout, neurological disorder and low morale. In 1946 Equine Therapy was introduced in Scandinavia after an outbreak of poliomyelitis. Hippotherapy, as currently practiced was developed in the 1960s, when it began to be used in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland as an adjunct to traditional physical therapy. The treatment was conducted by a physiotherapist, a specially trained horse, and a horse handler. The physiotherapist gave directives to the horse handler as to the gait, tempo, cadence, and direction for the horse to perform. The first standardized hippotherapy curriculum would be formulated in the late 1980s by a group of Canadian and American therapists who travelled to Germany to learn about hippotherapy and would bring the new discipline back to North America upon their return. The discipline was formalized in the United States in 1992 with the formation of the American Hippotherapy Association (AHA). Since its inception, the AHA has established official standards of practice and formalized therapist educational curriculum processes for occupational, physical and speech therapists in the United States. At about 1952, in Germany, therapeutic riding was used to address orthopaedic dysfunctions such as scoliosis. The first riding centers in North America began in the 1960s and the North American Riding for the Handicapped Association (NARHA) was launched in 1969. Therapeutic riding was introduced to the United States and Canada in 1960 with the formation of the Community Association of Riding of the Disabled (CARD). In the United States riding for disabled people developed as a form of recreation and as a means of motivation for education, as well as its therapeutic benefits. In 1969 the Cheff Therapeutic Riding Center for the Handicapped was established in Michigan, and remains the oldest center specifically for people with disabilities in the United States. The North American Riding for Handicapped Association (NARHA) was founded in 1969 to serve as an advisory body to the various riding for disabled groups across the United States and its neighboring countries. In 2011, NARHA changed its name to the Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship (PATH) International. Horses used In most cases, horses are trained and selected specifically for therapy before being integrated into a program. Therapy programs choose horses of any breed that they find to be calm, even-tempered, gentle, serviceably sound, and well-trained both under saddle and on the ground. As most equine-assisted therapy is done at slow speeds, an older horse that is not in its athletic prime is sometimes used. Equine-assisted therapy programs try to identify horses that are calm but not lazy and physically suited with proper balance, structure, muscling and gaits. Muscling is not generally considered to be as important as the balance and structural correctness, but proper conditioning for the work it is to do is required. Suitable horses move freely and have good quality gaits, especially the walk. Unsound horses that show any signs of lameness are generally avoided. The welfare of the horse is taken into consideration. Each individual animal has natural biological traits but also has a unique personality with its own likes, dislikes and habits. Paying attention to what the animal is trying to communicate is helpful both in sessions of EAAT, but also to prevent burnout for the horse. Some programs refer to the therapy horse as an "equine partner". Other programs view the horse as a "metaphor" with no defined role other than to "be themselves." Equine-facilitated wellness programs, particularly those following the EFW-Canada certification route view the horse as 'sentient being': "The equine is a sentient being, partner and co-facilitator in the equine facilitated relationship and process". Effectiveness There is currently insufficient medical evidence to support the effectiveness of equine-related treatments for mental health. Multiple reviews have noted problems with the quality of research such as the lack of independent observers, rigorous randomized clinical trials, longitudinal studies, and comparisons to currently accepted and effective treatments. A 2014 review found these treatments did no physical harm, but found that all studies examined had methodological flaws, which led to questioning the clinical significance of those studies; the review also raised ethical concerns both about the marketing and promotion of the practice and the opportunity cost if patients in need of mental health services were diverted from evidence-based care. The review recommended that both individuals and organizations avoid this therapy unless future research establishes verifiable treatment benefits. There is some evidence that hippotherapy can help improve the posture control of children with cerebral palsy, although the use of mechanical hippotherapy simulators produced no clear evidence of benefit. A systematic review of studies on the outcomes of horseback riding therapy on gross motor function in children with cerebral palsy was concluded in 2012 with a recommendation for a "large randomized controlled trial using specified protocols" because the studies were too limited to be considered conclusive. Overall, reviews of equine-assisted therapy scientific literature indicate "there is no unified, widely accepted, or empirically supported, theoretical framework for how and why these interventions may be therapeutic". The journal Neurology published a 2014 study finding inadequate data to know whether hippotherapy or therapeutic horseback riding can help the gait, balance, or mood of people with multiple sclerosis. Newer studies have found hippotherapy paired with traditional treatment can increase balance and quality of life in individuals with multiple sclerosis. There is no evidence that therapeutic horseback riding is effective in treating children with autism. Accreditation and certification In Canada, centers and instructors for Therapeutic Riding are regulated by CanTRA, also known as The Canadian Therapeutic Riding Association. The field of equine-facilitated wellness is regulated by Equine Facilitated Wellness – Canada (EFW-Can) which provides a national certification program and certifies trainers and mentors to provide independent training at approved programs across Canada. In the UK there are a growing number of training providers offering externally accredited equine-assisted and facilitated qualifications. There is currently no overarching regulating body in the UK. Some organisations are specifically offering therapeutic or coaching based approaches; others offer skills-based approaches which building on existing professional skills and practices.   In the US, the Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship (PATH) accredits centers and instructors that provide equine-assisted therapy. The Equine Assisted Growth and Learning Association (EAGALA) focuses only on mental health aspects of human-equine interaction, and provides certification for mental-health and equine professionals. The American Hippotherapy Association offers certification for working as a hippotherapist. See also Occupational therapy Physiotherapy Riding for the Disabled Association (UK) Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship (PATH) (US) Horseback riding simulators Wagon-bed riding Notable examples Smoke the Donkey References Psychotherapy by type Equine therapies Mind–body interventions Animal-assisted therapy Physical therapy Occupational therapy

Definitions of education

Definitions of education aim to describe the essential features of education. A great variety of definitions has been proposed. There is wide agreement that education involves, among other things, the transmission of knowledge. But there are deep disagreements about its exact nature and characteristics. Some definitions see education as a process exemplified in events like schooling, teaching, and learning. Others understand it not as a but as the of such processes, i.e. as what characterizes educated persons. Various attempts have been made to give precise definitions listing its necessary and sufficient conditions. The failure of such attempts, often in the form of being unable to account for various counter examples, has led many theorists to adopt less precise conceptions based on family resemblance. On this view, different forms of education are similar by having overlapping features but there is no set of features shared by all forms. Clarity about the nature of education is central for various issues, for example, to coherently talk about the subject and to determine how to achieve and measure it. An important discussion in the academic literature is about whether evaluative aspects are already part of the definition of education and, if so, what roles they play. Thin definitions are value-neutral while thick definitions include evaluative and normative components, for example, by holding that education implies that the person educated has changed for the better. Descriptive conceptions try to capture how the term "education" is used by competent speakers. Prescriptive conceptions, on the other hand, stipulate what education be like or what constitutes education. Thick and prescriptive conceptions often characterize education in relation to the goals it aims to realize. These goals are sometimes divided into epistemic goods, like knowledge and understanding, skills, like rationality and critical thinking, and character traits, like kindness and honesty. Some theorists define education in relation to an overarching purpose, like socialization or helping the learner lead a good life. The more specific aims can then be understood as means to achieve this overarching purpose. Various researchers emphasize the role of critical thinking to distinguish education from indoctrination. Traditional accounts of education characterize it mainly from the teacher's perspective, usually by describing it as a process in which they transmit knowledge and skills to their students. Student-centered definitions, on the other hand, emphasize the student's experience, for example, based on how education transforms and enriches their subsequent experience. Some conceptions take both the teacher's and the student's point of view into account by focusing on their shared experience of a common world. General characteristics, disagreements, and importance Definitions of education try to determine the essential features of education. Many general characteristics have been ascribed to education. However, there are several disagreements concerning its exact definition and a great variety of definitions have been proposed by theorists belonging to diverse fields. There is wide agreement that education is a purposeful activity directed at achieving certain aims. In this sense, education involves the transmission of knowledge. But it is often pointed out that this factor alone is not sufficient and needs to be accompanied by other factors, such as the acquisition of practical skills or instilling moral character traits. Many definitions see education as a task or a process. In this regard, the conception of education is based on what happens during events like schooling, training, instructing, teaching, and learning. This process may in turn be understood either from the perspective of the teacher or with a focus on the student's experience instead. However, other theorists focus mainly on education as an achievement, a state, or a product that results as a consequence of the process of being educated. Such approaches are usually based on the features, mental states, and character traits exemplified by educated persons. In this regard, being educated implies having an encompassing familiarity with various topics. So one does not become an educated person just by undergoing specialized training in one specific field. Besides these two meanings, the term "education" may also refer to the academic field studying the methods and processes involved in teaching and learning or to social institutions employing these processes. Education is usually understood as a very general term that has a wide family of diverse instances. Nonetheless, some attempts have been made to give a precise definition of the essential features shared by all forms of education. An influential early attempt was made by R. S. Peters in his book "Ethics and Education", where he suggests three criteria that constitute the necessary and sufficient conditions of education: (1) it is concerned with the transmission of knowledge and understanding; (2) this transmission is worthwhile and (3) done in a morally appropriate manner in tune with the student's interests. This definition has received a lot of criticism in the academic literature. While there is wide agreement that many forms of education fall under these three criteria, opponents have rejected that they are true for all of them by providing various counterexamples. For example, in regard to the third criterion, it may be sometimes necessary to educate children about certain facts even though they are not interested in learning about these facts. And regarding the second criterion, not everyone agrees that education is always desirable. Because of the various difficulties and counterexamples with this and other precise definitions, some theorists have argued that there is no one true definition of education. In this regard, the different forms of education may be seen as a group of loosely connected topics and "different groups within a society may have differing legitimate conceptions of education". Some theorists have responded to this by defining education in terms of family resemblance. This is to say that there is no one precise set of features shared by all and only by forms of education. Instead, there is a group of many features characteristic of education. Some of these features apply to one form of education while slightly different ones are exemplified by another form of education. In this sense, any two forms of education are similar and their characteristic features overlap without being identical. This is closely related to the idea that words are like tools used in language games. On this view, there may be various language games or contexts in which the term "education" is used, in each one with a slightly different meaning. Following this line of thought, it has been suggested that definitions of education should limit themselves to a specific context without claiming to be true for all possible uses of the term. The most paradigmatic form of education takes place in schools. Many researchers have specifically this type of education in mind and some define it explicitly as the discipline investigating the methods of teaching and learning in a formal setting, like schools. But in its widest sense, it encompasses many other forms as well, including informal and non-formal education. Clarity about the nature of education is important for various concerns. In a general sense, it is needed to identify and coherently talk about education. In this regard, all the subsequent academic discourse on topics like the aims of education, the psychology of education, or the role of education in society, depends on this issue. For example, when trying to determine what good education is like, one has to already assume some idea of what education is to decide what constitutes a good instance. It is also central for questions about how to achieve and measure the results of educational processes. The importance of providing an explicit definition is further increased by the fact that education initially seems to be a straightforward and common-sense concept that people usually use outside the academic discourse without much controversy. This impression hides various conceptual confusions and disagreements that only come to light in the attempt to make explicit the common pre-understanding associated with the term. Many concrete definitions of education have been proposed. According to John Dewey, education involves the transmission of habits, ideals, hopes, expectations, standards, and opinions from one generation to the next. R. S. Peters revised his earlier definitions and understands education in his later philosophy as a form of initiation in which teachers share the experience of a common world with their students and convey worthwhile forms of thought and awareness to them. For Lawrence Cremin, "[e]ducation is the deliberate, systematic, and sustained effort to transmit, provoke or acquire knowledge, values, attitudes, skills or sensibilities as well as any learning that results from the effort". Another definition sees education as "a serious and sustained programme of learning, for the benefit of people qua people rather than only qua role-fillers or functionaries, above the level of what people might pick up for themselves in their daily lives'". The English word "education" has its etymological root in the Latin word "educare", which means "to train", "to mold", or "to lead out". Role of values There are various disagreements about whether evaluative and normative aspects should already be included in the definition of education and, if so, what roles they play. An important distinction in this regard is between thin and thick definitions. Thin definitions aim to provide a value-neutral description of what education is, independent of whether and to whom it is useful. Thick definitions, on the other hand, include various evaluative and normative components in their characterization, for example, the claim that education implies that the person educated has changed for the better. Otherwise, the process would not deserve the label "education". However, different thick definitions of education may still disagree with each other on what kind of values are involved and in which sense the change in question is an improvement. A closely related distinction is that between descriptive and prescriptive or programmatic conceptions. Descriptive definitions aim to provide a description of how the term "education" is actually used. They contrast with prescriptive definitions, which stipulate what education be like or what constitutes education. Some theorists also include an additional category for stipulative definitions, which are sometimes used by individual researchers as shortcuts for what they mean when they use the term without claiming that these are the essential features commonly associated with all forms of education. Thick and prescriptive conceptions are closely related to the aims of education in the sense that they understand education as a process aimed at a certain valuable goal that constitutes an improvement of the learner. Such improvements are often understood in terms of mental states fostered by the educational process. Role of aims Many conceptions of education, in particular thick and prescriptive accounts, base their characterizations on the aims of education, i.e. in relation to the purpose that the process of education tries to realize. The transmission of knowledge has a central role in this regard, but most accounts include other aims as well, such as fostering the student's values, attitudes, skills, and sensibilities. However, it has been argued that picking up certain skills and know-how without the corresponding knowledge and conceptual scheme does not constitute education, strictly speaking. But the same limitation may also be true for pure knowledge that is not accompanied by positive practical effects on the individual's life. The various specific aims are sometimes divided into epistemic goods, skills, and character traits. Examples of epistemic goods are truth, knowledge, and understanding. Skill-based accounts, on the other hand, hold that the goal of education is to develop skills like rationality and critical thinking. For character-based accounts, its main purpose is to foster certain character traits or virtues, like kindness, justice, and honesty. Some theorists try to provide a wide overarching framework. The various specific goals are then seen as aims of education to the extent that they serve this overarching purpose. When this purpose is understood in relation to society, education may be defined as the process of transmitting, from one generation to the next, the accumulated knowledge and skills needed to function as a regular citizen in a specific society. In this regard, education is equivalent to socialization or enculturation. More liberal or person-centered definitions, on the other hand, see the overarching purpose in relation to the individual learner instead: education is to help them develop their potential in order to lead a good life or the life they wish to lead, independently of the social ramifications of this process. Various conceptions emphasize the aim of critical thinking in order to differentiate education from indoctrination. Critical thinking is a form of thinking that is reasonable, reflective, careful, and focused on determining what to believe or how to act. It includes the metacognitive component of monitoring and assessing its achievements in regard to the standards of rationality and clarity. Many theorists hold that fostering this disposition distinguishes education from indoctrination, which only tries to instill beliefs in the student's mind without being interested in their evidential status or fostering the ability to question those beliefs. But not all researchers accept this hard distinction. A few hold that, at least in the early stages of education, some forms of indoctrination are necessary until the child's mind has developed sufficiently to assess and evaluate reasons for and against particular claims and thus employ critical thinking. In this regard, critical thinking may still be an important aim of education but not an essential feature characterizing all forms of education. Teacher- or student-centered Most conceptions of education either explicitly or implicitly hold that education involves the relation between teacher and student. Some theorists give their characterization mainly from the teacher's perspective, usually emphasizing the act of transmitting knowledge or other skills, while others focus more on the learning experience of the student. The teacher-centered perspective on education is often seen as the traditional position. An influential example is found in the early philosophy of R. S. Peters. In it, he considers education to be the transmission of knowledge and skills while emphasizing that teachers should achieve this in a morally appropriate manner that reflects the student's interests. A student-centered definition is given by John Dewey, who sees education as the "reconstruction or reorganization of experience which adds to the meaning of experience, and which increases the ability to direct the course of subsequent experience". This way, the student's future experience is enriched and the student thereby undergoes a form of growth. Opponents of this conception have criticized its lack of a normative component. For example, the increase of undesirable abilities, like learning how to become an expert burglar, should not be understood as a form of education even though it is a reorganization of experience that directs the course of subsequent experience. Other theories aim to provide a more encompassing perspective that takes both the teacher's and the student's point of view into account. Peters, in response to the criticism of his initially proposed definition, has changed his conception of education by giving a wider and less precise definition, seeing it as a type of initiation in which worthwhile forms of thought and awareness are conveyed from teachers to their students. This is based on the idea that both teachers and students participate in the shared experience of a common world. The teachers are more familiar with this world and try to guide the students by passing on their knowledge and understanding. Ideally, this process is motivated by curiosity and excitement on the part of the students to discover what there is and what it is like so that they may one day themselves become authorities on the subject. This conception can be used for answering questions about the contents of the curriculum or what should be taught: whatever the students need most for discovering and participating in the common world. The shared perspective of both teachers and students is also emphasized by Paulo Freire. In his influential Pedagogy of the Oppressed, he rejects teacher-centered definitions, many of which characterize education using what he refers to as the banking model of education. According to the banking model, students are seen as empty vessels in analogy to piggy banks. It is the role of the teacher to deposit knowledge into the passive students, thereby shaping their character and outlook on the world. Instead, Freire favors a libertarian conception of education. On this view, teachers and students work together in a common activity of posing and solving problems. The goal of this process is to discover a shared and interactive reality, not by consuming ideas created by others but by producing and acting upon one's own ideas. Students and teachers are co-investigators of reality and the role of the teacher is to guide this process by representing the universe instead of merely lecturing about it. References Definitions Education Education studies Philosophy of education

Reaction formation

In psychoanalytic theory, reaction formation is a defense mechanism in which emotions, desires and impulses that are anxiety-producing or unacceptable to the ego are mastered by exaggeration of the directly opposing tendency. Theory Reaction formation depends on the hypothesis that: Where reaction-formation takes place, it is usually assumed that the original, rejected impulse does not vanish, but persists, unconscious, in its original infantile form. Thus, where love is experienced as a reaction formation against hate, we cannot say that love is substituted for hate, because the original aggressive feelings still exist underneath the affectionate exterior that merely masks the hate to hide it from awareness. In a diagnostic setting, the existence of a reaction-formation rather than a 'simple' emotion would be suspected where exaggeration, compulsiveness and inflexibility were observed. For example, Reaction formation is an effective form of disguise, and can be utilized in many forms. For example, "solicitude may be a reaction-formation against cruelty, cleanliness against coprophilia". An analyst might explain a client's unconditional pacifism as a reaction formation against their sadism. In addition, Even more counter-intuitively, according to this model The concept of reaction formation has been used to explain responses to external threats as well as internal anxieties. In the phenomenon described as Stockholm syndrome, a hostage or kidnap victim 'falls in love' with the feared and hated person who has complete power over them. Similarly, paradoxical reports exist of powerless and vulnerable inmates of Nazi camps creating 'favourites' among the guards and even collecting objects discarded by them. The mechanism of reaction formation is often characteristic of obsessional neuroses. When this mechanism is overused, especially during the formation of the ego, it can become a permanent character trait. This is often seen in those with obsessional character and obsessive personality disorders. This does not imply that its periodic usage is always obsessional, but that it can lead to obsessional behavior. Research A few studies have found evidence for the existence of reaction formation. Women who scored high on sex-related guilt feelings claimed lower arousal when exposed to erotic stimulus, but physiological measures showed higher than average sexual responses. When Caucasians who actually showed non-racist, egalitarian tendencies were told they scored high for racist tendencies, they gave more money to an African-American panhandler when leaving the testing lab than those who were not accused of harboring racist sentiments. See also Counterphobic attitude Displacement Dunning-Kruger effect Projection Repression Rationalization Regression References Psychoanalytic terminology Defence mechanisms

Glasser's choice theory

The term "choice theory" is the work of William Glasser, MD, author of the book so named, and is the culmination of some 50 years of theory and practice in psychology and counselling. Characteristics Choice theory posits that the behaviors we choose are central to our existence. Our behavior (choices) is driven by five genetically driven needs in hierarchical order: survival, love, power, freedom, and fun. The most basic human needs are survival (physical component) and love (mental component). Without physical (nurturing) and emotional (love), an infant will not survive to attain power, freedom, and fun. “No matter how well-nourished and intellectually stimulated a child is, going without human touch can stunt his mental, emotional, and even physical growth”,which is proved by the research of livestrong on the influence of physical touch on a child's development “Touching Empathy: Lack of Physical Affection Can Actually Kill Babies”, Psychology Today, October 1, 2010. Survival needs include: Food Clothing Shelter Breathing personal safety security and sex, having children And four fundamental psychological needs: Belonging/connecting/love Power/significance/competence Freedom/autonomy Fun/learning Choice theory suggests the existence of a "quality world." The idea of a "quality world" in choice theory has been compared to Jungian archetypes, but Glasser's acknowledgement of this connection is unclear. Some argue that Glasser's "quality world" and what Jung would call healthy archetypes share similarities. Our "quality world" images are our role models of an individual's "perfect" world of parents, relations, possessions, beliefs, etc. How each person's "quality world" is somewhat unusual, even in the same family of origin, is taken for granted. Starting from birth and continuing throughout our lives, each person places significant role models, significant possessions, and significant systems of belief (religion, cultural values, icons, etc.) into a mostly unconscious framework Glasser called our "quality world". The issue of negative role models and stereotypes is not extensively discussed in choice theory. Glasser also posits a "comparing place," where we compare and contrast our perceptions of people, places, and things immediately in front of us against our ideal images (archetypes) of these in our Quality World framework. Our subconscious pushes us towards calibrating—as best we can—our real-world experience with our quality world (archetypes). Behavior ("total behavior" in Glasser's terms) is made up of these four components: acting, thinking, feeling, and physiology. Glasser suggests we have considerable control or choice over the first two of these, yet little ability to directly choose the latter two as they are more deeply sub- and unconscious. These four components remain closely intertwined, and the choices we make in our thinking and acting will greatly affect our feelings and physiology. Glasser frequently emphasizes that failed or strained relationships with significant individuals can contribute to personal unhappiness. spouses, parents, children, friends, and colleagues. The symptoms of unhappiness are widely variable and are often seen as mental illnesses. Glasser believed that "pleasure" and "happiness" are related but far from synonymous. Sex, for example, is a "pleasure" but may well be divorced from a "satisfactory relationship," which is a precondition for lasting "happiness" in life. Hence the intense focus on the improvement of relationships in counseling with choice theory—the "new reality therapy". Individuals who are familiar with both reality therapy and choice theory may have a preference for the latter, which is considered a more modern approach. According to choice theory, mental illness can be linked to personal unhappiness. Glasser champions how we are able to learn and choose alternate behaviors that result in greater personal satisfaction. Reality therapy is a choice theory-based counseling process focused on helping clients learn to make those self-optimizing choices. The Ten Axioms of Choice The only person whose behavior we can control is ourselves. All we can give another person is information. All long-lasting psychological problems are relationship problems. The problem relationship is always part of our present life. What happened in the past has everything to do with who we are today, but we can only satisfy our basic needs right now and plan to continue satisfying them in the future. We can only satisfy our needs by satisfying the pictures in our quality world. All we do is behave. All behavior is total behavior and is made up of four components: acting, thinking, feeling, and physiology. All of our total behavior is chosen, but we only have direct control over the acting and thinking components. We can only control our feelings and physiology indirectly through how we choose to act and think. All total behavior is designated by verbs and named by the part that is the most recognizable. In Classroom Management William Glasser's choice theory begins: Behavior is not separate from choice; we all choose how to behave at any time. Second, we cannot control anyone's behavior but our own. Glasser emphasized the importance of classroom meetings as a means to improve communication and solve classroom problems. Glasser suggested that teachers should assist students in envisioning a fulfilling school experience and planning the choices that would enable them to achieve it. For example, Johnny Waits is an 18-year-old high school senior and plans on attending college to become a computer programmer. Glasser suggests that Johnny could be learning as much as he can about computers instead of reading Plato. Glasser proposed a curriculum approach that emphasizes practical, real-world topics chosen by students based on their interests and inclinations. This approach is referred to as the quality curriculum. The quality curriculum places particular emphasis on topics that have practical career applications. According to Glasser's approach, teachers facilitate discussions with students to identify topics they are interested in exploring further when introducing new material. In line with Glasser's approach, students are expected to articulate the practical value of the material they choose to explore. Education Glasser did not endorse Summerhill, and the quality schools he oversaw typically had conventional curriculum topics. The main innovation of these schools was a deeper, more humanistic approach to the group process between teachers, students, and learning. Critiques In a book review, Christopher White writes that Glasser believes everything in the DSM-IV-TR is a result of an individual's brain creatively expressing its unhappiness. White also notes that Glasser criticizes the psychiatric profession and questions the effectiveness of medications in treating mental illness. White points out that the book does not provide a set of randomized clinical trials demonstrating the success of Glasser's teachings. See also Cognitive psychology Introspection illusion Léopold Szondi References Bourbon, W. Thomas and Ford, Ed. (1994) Discipline at Home and at School. Brandt: New York. Personal observations (1996–2005). Teacher. Centennial High School, Champaign, Illinois. Weinstein, Jay. (2000). "The Place of Theory in Applied Sociology: A Reflection." Theory and Science 1, 1. External links The William Glasser Institute official website The Sudbury Valley School official website Cognitive science

Systems neuroscience

Systems neuroscience is a subdiscipline of neuroscience and systems biology that studies the structure and function of various neural circuits and systems that make up the central nervous system of an organism. Systems neuroscience encompasses a number of areas of study concerned with how nerve cells behave when connected together to form neural pathways, neural circuits, and larger brain networks. At this level of analysis, neuroscientists study how different neural circuits analyze sensory information, form perceptions of the external world, make decisions, and execute movements. Researchers in systems neuroscience are concerned with the relation between molecular and cellular approaches to understanding brain structure and function, as well as with the study of high-level mental functions such as language, memory, and self-awareness (which are the purview of behavioral and cognitive neuroscience). Systems neuroscientists typically employ techniques for understanding networks of neurons as they are seen to function, by way of electrophysiology using either single-unit recording or multi-electrode recording, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), and PET scans. The term is commonly used in an educational framework: a common sequence of graduate school neuroscience courses consists of cellular/molecular neuroscience for the first semester, then systems neuroscience for the second semester. It is also sometimes used to distinguish a subdivision within a neuroscience department in a university. See also Example systems Ascending reticular activating system Auditory system Gustatory system Motor system Olfactory system Reward system Sensory system Somatosensory system Visual system Related concepts Sensory neuroscience Neural oscillation Neural correlate Neural substrate References Bear, M. F. et al. Eds. (1995). Neuroscience: Exploring The Brain. Baltimore, Maryland, Williams and Wilkins. Hemmen J. L., Sejnowski T. J. (2006). 23 Problems in Systems Neuroscience. Oxford University Press. Branches of neuroscience Systems biology

Digital media use and mental health

The relationships between digital media use and mental health have been investigated by various researchers—predominantly psychologists, sociologists, anthropologists, and medical experts—especially since the mid-1990s, after the growth of the World Wide Web and rise of text messaging. A significant body of research has explored "overuse" phenomena, commonly known as "digital addictions", or "digital dependencies". These phenomena manifest differently in many societies and cultures. Some experts have investigated the benefits of moderate digital media use in various domains, including in mental health, and the treatment of mental health problems with novel technological solutions. The delineation between beneficial and pathological use of digital media has not been established. There are no widely accepted diagnostic criteria, although some experts consider overuse a manifestation of underlying psychiatric disorders. The prevention and treatment of pathological digital media use is also not standardized, although guidelines for safer media use for children and families have been developed. The 2013 fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) and the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11) do not include diagnoses for problematic internet use and problematic social media use; the ICD-11 includes a diagnosis for gaming disorder (commonly known as video game addiction), whereas the DSM-5 does not. Debate over how and when to diagnose these conditions is ongoing as of 2023. The use of the term addiction to refer to these phenomena and diagnoses has been questioned. Digital media and screen time amongst modern social media apps such as Instagram, Tiktok, Snapchat and Facebook have changed how children think, interact and develop in positive and negative ways, but researchers are unsure about the existence of hypothesized causal links between digital media use and mental health outcomes. Those links appear to depend on the individual and the platforms they use. Several large technology firms have made commitments or announced strategies to try to reduce the risks of digital media use. History and terminology The relationship between digital technology and mental health has been investigated from many perspectives. Benefits of digital media use in childhood and adolescent development have been found. Concerns have been expressed by researchers, clinicians and the public in regard to apparent compulsive behaviors of digital media users, as correlations between technology overuse and mental health problems become apparent. Terminologies used to refer to compulsive digital-media-use behaviours are not standardized or universally recognised. They include "digital addiction", "digital dependence", "problematic use", or "overuse", often delineated by the digital media platform used or under study (such as problematic smartphone use or problematic internet use). Unrestrained use of technological devices may affect developmental, social, mental and physical well-being and may result in symptoms akin to other psychological dependence syndromes, or behavioral addictions. The focus on problematic technology use in research, particularly in relation to the behavioural addiction paradigm, is becoming more accepted, despite poor standardization and conflicting research. Internet addiction has been proposed as a diagnosis since the 1998 and social media and its relation to addiction has been examined since 2009. A 2018 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report stated there were benefits of structured and limited internet use in children and adolescents for developmental and educational purposes, but that excessive use can have a negative impact on mental well-being. It also noted an overall 40% increase in internet use in school-age children between 2010 and 2015, and that different OECD nations had marked variations in rates of childhood technology use, as well as differences in the platforms used. Hence, why it is so important for adolescents' to be trained to use social media, as it will ensure that users have developed psychologically-informed competencies and skills that will maximize the chances for balanced, safe, and meaningful social media use. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders has not formally codified problematic digital media use in diagnostic categories, but it deemed internet gaming disorder to be a condition for further study in 2013. Gaming disorder, commonly known as video game addiction, has been recognised in the ICD-11. Different recommendations in the DSM and the ICD are due partly to the lack of expert consensus, the differences in emphasis in the classification manuals, as well as difficulties using animal models for behavioural addictions. The utility of the term addiction in relation to the overuse of digital media has been questioned, in regard to its suitability to describe new, digitally mediated psychiatric categories, as opposed to overuse being a manifestation of other psychiatric disorders. Usage of the term has also been criticised for drawing parallels with substance use behaviours. Careless use of the term may cause more problems—both downplaying the risks of harm in seriously affected people, as well as overstating risks of excessive, non-pathological use of digital media. The evolution of terminology relating excessive digital media use to problematic use rather than addiction was encouraged by Panova and Carbonell, psychologists at Ramon Llull University, in a 2018 review. Due to the lack of recognition and consensus on the concepts used, diagnoses and treatments are difficult to standardize or develop. Heightened levels of public anxiety around new media (including social media, smartphones and video games) further obfuscate population-based assessments, as well as posing management dilemmas. Radesky and Christakis, the 2019 editors of JAMA Paediatrics, published a review that investigated "concerns about health and developmental/behavioral risks of excessive media use for child cognitive, language, literacy, and social-emotional development." Due to the ready availability of multiple technologies to children worldwide, the problem is bi-directional, as taking away digital devices may have a detrimental effect, in areas such as learning, family relationship dynamics, and overall development. Problematic use Though associations have been observed between digital media use and mental health symptoms or diagnoses, causality has not been established; nuances and caveats published by researchers are often misunderstood by the general public, or misrepresented by the media. Females are more likely to overuse social media, and males video games. Following from this, problematic digital media use may not be singular constructs, may be delineated based on the digital platform used, or reappraised in terms of specific activities (rather than addiction to the digital medium). Access to means of communication In 1999, 58% of Finnish citizens had a mobile phone, including 75% of 15-17 year olds. In 2000, a majority of U.S. households had at least one personal computer and internet access the following year. In 2002, a majority of U.S. survey respondents reported having a mobile phone. In September and December 2006 respectively, Luxembourg and the Netherlands became the first countries to completely transition from analog to digital television, while the United States commenced its transition in 2008. In September 2007, a majority of U.S. survey respondents reported having broadband internet at home. In January 2013, a majority of U.S. survey respondents reported owning a smartphone. An estimated 40% of U.S. households in 2006 owned a dedicated home video game console, and by 2015, 51 percent of U.S. households owned a dedicated home video game console. In April 2015, one survey of U.S. teenagers ages 13 to 17 reported that nearly three-quarters of them either owned or had access to a smartphone, and 92 percent went online daily, with 24 percent saying they went online "almost constantly." Screen time and mental health Some types of potentially problematic internet use are associated with psychiatric or behavioural problems such as depression, anxiety, hostility, aggression and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The studies could not determine if causal relationships exist; it was unclear, for example, whether people with depression might overuse the internet because they were already depressed, or if using the internet too much triggered the depression. While overuse of digital media has been associated with depressive symptoms, digital media may also be used in some situations to improve mood. Symptoms of ADHD have been positively correlated with digital media use in a large prospective study. The ADHD symptom of hyperfocus may cause affected individuals to overuse video games, social media, or online chatting; however the correlation between hyperfocus and problematic social media use is weak. A 2018 review found associations between the self-reported mental health symptoms by users of the Chinese social media platform WeChat and excessive platform use. However, the motivations and usage patterns of WeChat users affected overall psychological health, rather than the amount of time spent using the platform. An analysis of data from the Monitoring the Future survey, the Millennium Cohort Study, and the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System found that digital technology use (including, playing video games, watching television, using social media, etc.) accounted for only 0.4% of the variation in adolescent well-being. Additional research found little evidence for substantial negative associations for digital screen engagement and adolescent well-being. However, looking exclusively at the effect social media usage has on girls, there was a strong association between using social media and poor mental health. The evidence, although of mainly low to moderate quality, shows an correlation between heavy screen time and a variety of health physical and mental health problems. However, moderate use of digital media is also correlated with benefits for young people in terms of social integration, mental health, and overall well-being. A 2017 UK large-scale study of the "Goldilocks hypothesis"—of avoiding both too much and too little digital media use—was described as the "best quality" evidence to date by experts and non-government organisations (NGOs) reporting to a 2018 UK parliamentary committee. That study concluded that modest digital media use may have few adverse affects, and some positive associations in terms of well-being. Social media and mental health Excessive time spent on social media may be more harmful than digital screen time as a whole, especially for young people. Some research found a "substantial" association between social media use and mental health issues, but most found only a weak or inconsistent relationship. Social media can have both positive and negative effects on mental health; whether the overall affect is harmful or helpful may depend on a variety of factors, including the quality and quantity of social media usage. In the case of over 65s, studies have found high levels of social media usage was associated with postives outcomes overall, such as flourishing, though it remains unclear if social media use is a causative factor. There is a significant association between social media use and depression, with the association especially high for adolescent girls. Proposed diagnostic categories Gaming disorder has been considered by the DSM-5 task force as warranting further study (as the subset internet gaming disorder), and was included in the ICD-11. Concerns have been raised by Aarseth and colleagues over this inclusion, particularly in regard to stigmatization of heavy gamers. Christakis has asserted that internet addiction may be "a 21st century epidemic". In 2018, he commented that childhood Internet overuse may be a form of "uncontrolled experiment[s] on ... children". International estimates of the prevalence of internet overuse have varied considerably, with marked variations by nation. A 2014 meta-analysis of 31 nations yielded an overall worldwide prevalence of six percent. A different perspective in 2018 by Musetti and colleagues reappraised the internet in terms of its necessity and ubiquity in modern society, as a social environment, rather than a tool, thereby calling for the reformulation of the internet addiction model. Some medical and behavioural scientists recommend adding a diagnosis of "social media addiction" (or similar) to the next Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders update. A 2015 review concluded there was a probable link between basic psychological needs and social media addiction. "Social network site users seek feedback, and they get it from hundreds of people—instantly. It could be argued that the platforms are designed to get users 'hooked'." Internet sex addiction, also known as cybersex addiction, has been proposed as a sexual addiction characterized by virtual internet sexual activity that causes serious negative consequences to one's physical, mental, social, and/or financial well-being. It may be considered a form of problematic internet use. Related phenomena Online problem gambling A 2015 review found evidence of higher rates of mental health comorbidities, as well as higher amounts of substance use, among internet gamblers, compared to non-internet gamblers. Causation, however, has not been established. The review postulates that there may be differences in the cohorts between internet and land-based problem gamblers. Cyberbullying Cyberbullying, bullying or harassment using social media or other electronic means, has been shown to have effects on mental health. Victims may have lower self-esteem, increased suicidal ideation, decreased motivation for usual hobbies, and a variety of emotional responses, including being scared, frustrated, angry, anxious or depressed. These victims may also begin to distance themselves from friends and family members. According to the EU Kids Online project, the incidence of cyberbullying across seven European countries in children aged increased from 8% to 12% between 2010 and 2014. Similar increases were shown in the United States and Brazil. Media multitasking Concurrent use of multiple digital media streams, commonly known as media multitasking, has been shown to be associated with depressive symptoms, social anxiety, impulsivity, sensation seeking, lower perceived social success and neuroticism. A 2018 review found that while the literature is sparse and inconclusive, overall, heavy media multitaskers also have poorer performance in several cognitive domains. One of the authors commented that the data does not "unambiguously show that media multitasking causes a change in attention and memory", therefore it is possible to argue that it is inefficient to multitask on digital media. Distracted road use In March 2023, Accident Analysis & Prevention published a systematic review of 47 samples across 45 studies investigating associations between problematic mobile phone use and road safety outcomes (including 32 samples of drivers, 9 samples of pedestrians, 5 samples with road use type unspecified, and 1 sample of motorcyclists and bicyclists) that found that problematic mobile phone use was associated with greater risk of simultaneous mobile phone use and road use and risk of vehicle collisions and pedestrian collisions or falls. Noise-induced hearing loss Assessment and treatment Rigorous, evidence-based assessment of problematic digital media use is yet to be comprehensively established. This is due partially to a lack of consensus around the various constructs and lack of standardization of treatments. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has developed a Family Media Plan, intending to help parents assess and structure their family's use of electronic devices and media more safely. It recommends limiting entertainment screen time to two hours or less per day. The Canadian Paediatric Society produced a similar guideline. Ferguson, a psychologist, has criticised these and other national guidelines for not being evidence-based. Other experts, cited in a 2017 UNICEF Office of Research literature review, have recommended addressing potential underlying problems rather than arbitrarily enforcing screen time limits. Different methodologies for assessing pathological internet use have been developed, mostly self-report questionnaires, but none have been universally recognised as a gold standard. For gaming disorder, both the American Psychiatric Association and the World Health Organization (through the ICD-11) have released diagnostic criteria. There is some limited evidence of the effectiveness of cognitive behavioral therapy and family-based interventions for treatment. In randomized controlled trials, medications have not been shown to be effective. A 2016 study of 901 adolescents suggested mindfulness may assist in preventing and treating problematic internet use. A 2019 UK parliamentary report deemed parental engagement, awareness and support to be essential in developing "digital resilience" for young people, and to identify and manage the risks of harm online. Treatment centres have proliferated in some countries, and China and South Korea have treated digital dependence as a public health crisis, opening 300 and 190 centres nationwide, respectively. Other countries have also opened treatment centres. NGOs, support and advocacy groups provide resources to people overusing digital media, with or without codified diagnoses, including the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. A 2022 study outlines the mechanisms by which media-transmitted stressors affect mental well-being. Authors suggest a common denominator related to problems with the media's construction of reality is increased uncertainty, which leads to defensive responses and chronic stress in predisposed individuals. Associated psychiatric disorders ADHD In April 2018, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a systematic review of 24 studies researching associations between internet gaming disorder (IGD) and various psychopathologies that found an 85% correlation between IGD and ADHD. In October 2018, PNAS USA published a systematic review of four decades of research on the relationship between children and adolescents' screen media use and ADHD-related behaviours and concluded that a statistically small relationship between children's media use and ADHD-related behaviours exists. In November 2018, Cyberpsychology published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 5 studies that found evidence for a relationship between problematic smartphone use and impulsivity traits. In October 2020, the Journal of Behavioral Addictions published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 40 studies with 33,650 post-secondary student subjects that found a weak-to-moderate positive association between mobile phone addiction and impulsivity. In January 2021, the Journal of Psychiatric Research published a systematic review of 29 studies including 56,650 subjects that found that ADHD symptoms were consistently associated with gaming disorder and more frequent associations between inattention and gaming disorder than other ADHD scales. In July 2021, Frontiers in Psychiatry published a meta-analysis reviewing 40 voxel-based morphometry studies and 59 functional magnetic resonance imaging studies comparing subjects with IGD or ADHD to control groups that found that IGD and ADHD subjects had disorder-differentiating structural neuroimage alterations in the putamen and orbitofrontal cortex (OFC) respectively, and functional alterations in the precuneus for IGD subjects and in the rewards circuit (including the OFC, the anterior cingulate cortex, and striatum) for both IGD and ADHD subjects. In March 2022, JAMA Psychiatry published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 87 studies with 159,425 subjects 12 years of age or younger that found a small but statistically significant correlation between screen time and ADHD symptoms in children. In April 2022, Developmental Neuropsychology published a systematic review of 11 studies where the data from all but one study suggested that heightened screen time for children is associated with attention problems. In July 2022, the Journal of Behavioral Addictions published a meta-analysis of 14 studies comprising 2,488 subjects aged 6 to 18 years that found significantly more severe problematic internet use in subjects diagnosed with ADHD to control groups. In December 2022, European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry published a systematic literature review of 28 longitudinal studies published from 2011 through 2021 of associations between digital media use by children and adolescents and later ADHD symptoms and found reciprocal associations between digital media use and ADHD symptoms (i.e. that subjects with ADHD symptoms were more likely to develop problematic digital media use and that increased digital media use was associated with increased subsequent severity of ADHD symptoms). In May 2023, Reviews on Environmental Health published a meta-analysis of 9 studies with 81,234 child subjects that found a positive correlation between screen time and ADHD risk in children and that higher amounts of screen time in childhood may significantly contribute to the development of ADHD. In December 2023, the Journal of Psychiatric Research published a meta-analysis of 24 studies with 18,859 subjects with a mean age of 18.4 years that found significant associations between ADHD and problematic internet use, while Clinical Psychology Review published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 48 studies examining associations between ADHD and gaming disorder that found a statistically significant association between the disorders. Anxiety In April 2018, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a systematic review of 24 studies researching associations between internet gaming disorder (IGD) and various psychopathologies that found a 92% correlation between IGD and anxiety and a 75% correlation between IGD and social anxiety. In August 2018, Wiley Stress & Health published a meta-analysis of 39 studies comprising 21,736 subjects that found a small-to-medium association between smartphone use and anxiety. In December 2018, Frontiers in Psychiatry published a systematic review of 9 studies published after 2014 investigating associations between problematic social networking sites (SNS) use and comorbid psychiatric disorders that found a positive association between problematic SNS use and anxiety. In March 2019, the International Journal of Adolescence and Youth published a systematic review of 13 studies comprising 21,231 adolescent subjects aged 13 to 18 years that found that social media screen time, both active and passive social media use, the amount of personal information uploaded, and social media addictive behaviors all correlated with anxiety. In February 2020, Psychiatry Research published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 14 studies that found positive associations between problematic smartphone use and anxiety and positive associations between higher levels of problematic smartphone use and elevated risk of anxiety, while Frontiers in Psychology published a systematic review of 10 studies of adolescent or young adult subjects in China that concluded that the research reviewed mostly established an association between social networks use disorder and anxiety among Chinese adolescents and young adults. In April 2020, BMC Public Health published a systematic review of 70 cross-sectional and longitudinal studies investigating moderating factors for associations for screen-based sedentary behaviors and anxiety symptoms among youth that found that while screen types was the most consistent factor, the body of evidence for anxiety symptoms was more limited than for depression symptoms. In October 2020, the Journal of Behavioral Addictions published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 40 studies with 33,650 post-secondary student subjects that found a weak-to-moderate positive association between mobile phone addiction and anxiety. In November 2020, Child and Adolescent Mental Health published a systematic review of research published between January 2005 and March 2019 on associations between SNS use and anxiety symptoms in subjects between ages of 5 to 18 years that found that increased SNS screen time or frequency of SNS use and higher levels of investment (i.e. personal information added to SNS accounts) were significantly associated with higher levels of anxiety symptoms. In January 2021, Frontiers in Psychiatry published a systematic review of 44 studies investigating social media use and development of psychiatric disorders in childhood and adolescence that concluded that the research reviewed established a direct association between levels of anxiety, social media addiction behaviors, and nomophobia, longitudinal associations between social media use and increased anxiety, that fear of missing out and nomophobia are associated with severity of Facebook usage, and suggested that fear of missing out may trigger social media addiction and that nomophobia appears to mediate social media addiction. In March 2021, Computers in Human Behavior Reports published a systematic review of 52 studies published before May 2020 that found that social anxiety was associated with problematic social media use and that socially anxious persons used social media to seek social support possibly to compensate for a lack of offline social support. In June 2021, Clinical Psychology Review published a systematic review of 35 longitudinal studies published before August 2020 that found that evidence for longitudinal associations between screen time and anxiety among young people was lacking. In August 2021, a meta-analysis was presented at the 2021 International Conference on Intelligent Medicine and Health of articles published before January 2011 that found evidence for a negative impact of social media on anxiety. In January 2022, The European Journal of Psychology Applied to Legal Context published a meta-analysis of 13 cross-sectional studies comprising 7,348 subjects that found a statistically significant correlation between cybervictimization and anxiety with a moderate-to-large effect size. In March 2022, JAMA Psychiatry published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 87 studies with 159,425 subjects 12 years of age or younger that found a small but statistically significant correlation between screen time and anxiety in children, while Adolescent Psychiatry published a systematic review of research published from June 2010 through June 2020 studying associations between social media use and anxiety among adolescent subjects aged 13 to 18 years that established that 78.3% of studies reviewed reported positive associations between social media use and anxiety. In April 2022, researchers in the Department of Communication at Stanford University performed a meta-analysis of 226 studies comprising 275,728 subjects that found a small but positive association between social media use and anxiety, while JMIR Mental Health published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 18 studies comprising 9,269 adolescent and young adult subjects that found a moderate but statistically significant association between problematic social media use and anxiety. In May 2022, Computers in Human Behavior published a meta-analysis of 82 studies comprising 48,880 subjects that found a significant positive association between social anxiety and mobile phone addiction. In August 2022, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 16 studies comprising 8,077 subjects that established a significant association between binge-watching and anxiety. In November 2022, Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking published a systematic review of 1,747 articles on problematic social media use that found a strong bidirectional relationship between social media use and anxiety. In March 2023, the Journal of Public Health published a meta-analysis of 27 studies published after 2014 comprising 120,895 subjects that found a moderate and robust association between problematic smartphone use and anxiety. In July 2023, Healthcare published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 16 studies that established correlation coefficients of 0.31 and 0.39 between nomophobia and anxiety and nomophobia and smartphone addiction respectively. In September 2023, Frontiers in Public Health published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 37 studies comprising 36,013 subjects aged 14 to 24 years that found a positive and statistically significant association between problematic internet use and social anxiety, while BJPsych Open published a systematic review of 140 studies published from 2000 through 2020 found that social media use for more than 3 hours per day and passive browsing was associated with increased anxiety. In January 2024, the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication published a meta-analysis of 141 studies comprising 145,394 subjects that found that active social media use was associated with greater symptoms of anxiety and passive social media use was associated with greater symptoms of social anxiety. In February 2024, Addictive Behaviors published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 53 studies comprising 59,928 subjects that found that problematic social media use and social anxiety are highly and positively correlated, while The Egyptian Journal of Neurology, Psychiatry and Neurosurgery published a systematic review of 15 studies researching associations between problematic social media use and anxiety in subjects from the Middle East and North Africa (including 4 studies with subjects exclusively between the ages of 12 and 19 years) that established that most studies found a significant association. Autism In September 2018, the Review Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders published a systematic review of 47 studies published from 2005 to 2016 that concluded that associations between autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and screen time was inconclusive. In May 2019, the Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics published a systematic review of 16 studies that found that children and adolescents with ASD are exposed to more screen time than typically developing peers and that the exposure starts at a younger age. In April 2021, Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders published a systematic review of 12 studies of video game addiction in ASD subjects that found that children, adolescents, and adults with ASD are at greater risk of video game addiction than those without ASD, and that the data from the studies suggested that internal and external factors (sex, attention and oppositional behavior problems, social aspects, access and time spent playing video games, parental rules, and game genre) were significant predictors of video game addiction in ASD subjects. In March 2022, the Review Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders published a systematic review of 21 studies investigating associations between ASD, problematic internet use, and gaming disorder where the majority of the studies found positive associations between the disorders. In August 2022, the International Journal of Mental Health and Addiction published a review of 15 studies that found that high rates of video game use in boys and young males with ASD was predominantly explained by video game addiction, but also concluded that greater video game use could be a function of ASD restricted interest and that video game addiction and ASD restricted interest could have an interactive relationship. In December 2022, the Review Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders published a systematic review of 10 studies researching the prevalence of problematic internet use with ASD that found that ASD subjects had more symptoms of problematic internet use than control group subjects, had higher screen time online and an earlier age of first-time use of the internet, and also greater symptoms of depression and ADHD. In July 2023, Cureus published a systematic review of 11 studies that concluded that earlier and longer screen time exposure for children was associated with higher probability of a child "developing" ASD. In December 2023, JAMA Network Open published a meta-analysis of 46 studies comprising 562,131 subjects that concluded that while screen time may be a developmental cause of ASD in childhood, associations between ASD and screen time were not statistically significant when accounting for publication bias. Bipolar disorder In November 2018, Cyberpsychology published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 5 studies that found evidence for a relationship between problematic smartphone use and impulsivity traits. In October 2020, the Journal of Behavioral Addictions published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 40 studies with 33,650 post-secondary student subjects that found that a weak-to-moderate positive association between mobile phone addiction and impulsivity. In April 2021, a meta-analysis of 3 studies comprising 9,142 subjects was presented at the International Conference on Big Data and Informatization Education that found that problematic internet use is a risk factor for bipolar disorder. In December 2023, the Journal of Psychiatric Research published a meta-analysis of 24 studies with 18,859 subjects with a mean age of 18.4 years that found significant associations between problematic internet use and impulsivity. Depression In April 2018, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a systematic review of 24 studies researching associations between internet gaming disorder (IGD) and various psychopathologies that found an 89% correlation between IGD and depression. In July 2018, JMIR Mental Health published a systematic review of 11 studies investigating social media use and depression among lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) users that found that while qualitative research found that social media use could lead to greater social support and less loneliness for LGB users, LGB users were more likely to be cyberbullied than heterosexual users, that cyberbullying of LGB users was associated with depression among victims, and constant monitoring of accounts by LGB users was also found to be a stressor associated with depression. In December 2018, Frontiers in Psychiatry published a systematic review of 9 studies published after 2014 investigating associations between problematic SNS use and comorbid psychiatric disorders that found a positive association between problematic SNS use and depression. In March 2019, the International Journal of Adolescence and Youth published a systematic review of 13 studies comprising 21,231 adolescent subjects aged 13 to 18 years that found that social media screen time, both active and passive social media use, the amount of personal information uploaded, and social media addictive behaviors all correlated with depression. In April 2019, the Journal of Affective Disorders published a meta-analysis assessing associations between SNS use and higher levels of depression that found that greater SNS screen time and frequency of checking SNS accounts had small but statistically significant associations with higher levels of depression, that greater general social comparisons on SNS had a small to moderate association, and greater upward social comparisons on SNS had a moderate association. In November 2019, BMC Public Health published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 12 cross-sectional studies and 7 longitudinal studies that found that screen time-based sedentary behavior is associated with depression risk. In January 2020, Translational Psychiatry published a meta-analysis of 12 prospective studies comprising 128,553 subjects that found that while sedentary behavior and depression risk had a significant positive association, television viewing and other mentally passive sedentary behaviors were positively associated with depression risk but computer use and other mentally active sedentary behaviors were not. In February 2020, Psychiatry Research published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 14 studies that found positive associations between problematic smartphone use and depression and positive associations between higher levels of problematic smartphone use and elevated risk of depression. Also in February 2020, Frontiers in Psychology published a systematic review of 10 studies of adolescent or young adult subjects in China that concluded that the research reviewed mostly established an association between social networks use disorder and depression among Chinese adolescents and young adults. In March 2020, the Review of General Psychology published a meta-analysis that found a small association between social networking service (SNS) use and self-reported depression. In April 2020, BMC Public Health published a systematic review of 70 cross-sectional and longitudinal studies investigating moderating factors for associations for screen-based sedentary behaviors and depression symptoms among youth that found that the most consistent factor was for screen type since television viewing was not as strongly associated with depression symptoms as other screen types. In August 2020, the Journal of Medical Internet Research published an umbrella review of 7 systematic reviews on research investigating associations between depression and use of mobile technologies and social media by adolescents that concluded that while mobile technology and social media may promote social support, excess social comparison and personal involvement (i.e. increased exposure in general, exposure to specific content that promotes depressive symptoms, and the degree of personal information posted on social media) could be associated with symptoms of depression. In October 2020, the Journal of Affective Disorders published a meta-analysis of 12 studies with subjects aged 11 to 18 years that found a small but statistically significant positive correlation between social media use and depressive symptoms among adolescents, while the Journal of Behavioral Addictions published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 40 studies with 33,650 post-secondary student subjects that found a weak-to-moderate positive association between mobile phone addiction and depression. In November 2020, Child and Adolescent Mental Health published a systematic review of research published between January 2005 and March 2019 on associations between SNS use and depression in subjects between ages of 5 to 18 years that found that increased SNS screen time or frequency of SNS use and problematic and addictive SNS use were significantly associated with higher levels of depression symptoms. In January 2021, Frontiers in Psychiatry published a systematic review of 44 studies investigating social media use and development of psychiatric disorders in childhood and adolescence that concluded that passive social media use (e.g. browsing other user photos or scrolling through comments or news feeds) and depression are bidirectionally associated and that problematic social media use and depressive symptoms are mediated by social comparisons. In February 2021, Research on Child and Adolescent Psychopathology published a meta-analysis of 62 studies comprising 451,229 subjects that found SNS screen time and SNS use intensity to have weak but statistically significant associations with depression symptoms, while problematic SNS use was found to have a moderate association with depression symptoms. In March 2021, Youth & Society published a systematic review of 9 studies that found an association between SNS use and adolescent subjective well-being including mood, but that the results over whether the association was positive or negative were mixed. In April 2021, the Journal of Affective Disorders published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 92 studies comprising 15,148 subjects across 25 countries investigating associations between depression and internet gaming disorder found that one-third of the IGD subjects had been diagnosed with depression and major severe depressive symptoms were found in IGD subjects globally without a formal diagnosis in comparison to the general population. In May 2021, Current Psychology published a meta-analysis of 55 studies comprising 80,533 subjects that found a small but positive and statistically significant association between SNS use and self-reported depression symptoms. In June 2021, Clinical Psychology Review published a systematic review of 35 longitudinal studies published before August 2020 that found that an association between screen time and subsequent depressive symptoms among young people was small and varied by device type and use. In July 2021, Translational Medicine Communications published a systematic review of 9 studies published between October 2010 and December 2018 with Instagram user subjects between the ages of 19 and 35 years that found an association between Instagram use and depression symptoms. In January 2022, The European Journal of Psychology Applied to Legal Context published a meta-analysis of 13 cross-sectional studies comprising 7,348 subjects that found a statistically significant correlation between cybervictimization and depression with a moderate-to-large effect size. In February 2022, the International Journal of Social Psychiatry published a meta-analysis of 131 studies comprising 244,676 subjects that found a moderate mean correlation between problematic social media use and depression. In March 2022, Computers in Human Behavior published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 531 cross-sectional or longitudinal studies with subjects aged 10 to 24 years that found a small bidirectional association between online media use and depressive symptoms and that the effect size did not differ between general internet use, smartphone use, social media use, or online gaming, but also found that studies that measured online media use with media addiction scales rather than by screen time found significantly greater associations. Also in March 2022, JAMA Psychiatry published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 87 studies with 159,425 subjects 12 years of age or younger that found a small but statistically significant correlation between screen time and depression in children, while Adolescent Psychiatry published a systematic review of research published from June 2010 through June 2020 studying associations between social media use and depression among adolescent subjects aged 13 to 18 years that established that 82.6% of studies reviewed reported positive associations between social media use and depression. In April 2022, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a meta-analysis of 21 cross-sectional studies and 5 longitudinal studies comprising 55,340 adolescent subjects that found that social media screen time had a linear dose–response association with depression risk among adolescents and that depression risk increased by 13% for each additional hour of social media screen time. Also in April 2022, researchers in the Department of Communication at Stanford University performed a meta-analysis of 226 studies comprising 275,728 subjects that found a small but positive association between social media use and depression, while JMIR Mental Health published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 18 studies comprising 9,269 adolescent and young adult subjects that found a moderate but statistically significant association between problematic social media use and depression. In August 2022, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 16 studies comprising 8,077 subjects that established a significant association between binge-watching and depression and a stronger association between binge-watching and depression was found during the COVID-19 pandemic than pre-pandemic. In November 2022, Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking published a systematic review of 1,747 articles on problematic social media use that found a strong bidirectional relationship between social media use and depression. In December 2022, Frontiers in Psychiatry published a meta-analysis of 18 cohort studies comprising 241,398 subjects that found that screen time is a predictor of depressive symptoms. In March 2023, the Journal of Public Health published a meta-analysis of 27 studies published after 2014 comprising 120,895 subjects that found a moderate and robust association between problematic smartphone use and depression. In April 2023, Trauma, Violence, & Abuse published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 17 studies comprising 79,202 adolescent subjects between the ages of 10 and 19 years that found that depression was three times more common among cyberbullying victims than control groups. In July 2023, Current Psychology published a meta-analysis of 38 studies comprising 14,935 subjects in Turkey that found a small but positive association between problematic social media use and depression. In September 2023, Clinical Psychological Science published a preregistered review and meta-analysis of 34 articles published between 2018 and 2020 studying associations between adolescent depression and social media use to identify the proportion of samples taken from the Global North and Global South, and found that more than 70% examined Global North populations and that associations in the Global North were positive and significant while associations in the Global South were null and non-significant. In September 2023, BJPsych Open published a systematic review of 140 studies published from 2000 through 2020 that found that social media use for more than 3 hours per day and passive browsing was associated with increased depression in children, adolescents, and young adults. In February 2024, The Egyptian Journal of Neurology, Psychiatry and Neurosurgery published a systematic review of 15 studies researching associations between problematic social media use and depression in subjects from the Middle East and North Africa (including 4 studies with subjects exclusively between the ages of 12 and 19 years) that established that most studies found a significant association. Insomnia In August 2018, Sleep Science and Practice published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 19 studies comprising 253,904 adolescent subjects that found that excessive technology use had a strong and consistent association with reduced sleep duration and prolonged sleep onset latency for adolescents 14 years of age or older. Also in August 2018, Sleep Science published a systematic review of 12 studies investigating associations between exposure to video games, sleep outcomes, and post-sleep cognitive abilities that found the data present in the studies indicated associations between a reduction in sleep duration, increased sleep onset latency, modifications to rapid eye movement sleep and slow-wave sleep, increased sleepiness and self-perceived fatigue, and impaired post-sleep attention span and verbal memory. In October 2019, Sleep Medicine Reviews published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 23 studies comprising 35,684 subjects that found a statistically significant odds ratio for sleep problems and reduced sleep duration for subjects with internet addiction. In February 2020, Psychiatry Research published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 14 studies that found positive associations between problematic smartphone use and poor sleep quality and between higher levels of problematic smartphone use and elevated risk of poor sleep quality. Also in February 2020, Sleep Medicine Reviews published a systematic review of 31 studies examining associations between screen time and sleep outcomes in children younger than 5 years and found that screen time is associated with poorer sleep outcomes for children under the age of 5, with meta-analysis only confirming poor sleep outcomes among children under 2 years. In March 2020, Developmental Review published a systematic review of 9 studies that found a weak-to-moderate association between sleep quantity and quality and problematic smartphone use among adolescents. In October 2020, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 80 studies that found that greater screen time was associated with shorter sleep duration among toddlers and preschoolers, while the Journal of Behavioral Addictions published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 40 studies with 33,650 post-secondary student subjects that found a weak-to-moderate positive association between mobile phone addiction and poor sleep quality. In April 2021, Sleep Medicine Reviews published a systematic review of 36 cross-sectional studies and 6 longitudinal studies that found that 24 of the cross-sectional studies and 5 of the longitudinal studies established significant associations between more frequent social media use and poor sleep outcomes. In June 2021, Frontiers in Psychiatry published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 34 studies comprising 51,901 subjects that established significant associations between problematic gaming and sleep duration, poor sleep quality, daytime sleepiness, and other sleep problems. In September 2021, BMC Public Health published a systematic review of 49 studies investigating associations between electronic media use and various sleep outcomes among children and adolescents 15 years of age or younger that found a strong association with sleep duration and stronger evidence for an association with sleep duration between the ages of 6 and 15 years than for 5 years of age or younger, while evidence for associations between electronic media use with other sleep outcomes was more inconclusive. In December 2021, Frontiers in Neuroscience published a systematic review of 12 studies published from January 2000 to April 2020 that found that adult subjects with higher gaming addiction scores were more likely to have shorter sleep quantity, poorer sleep quality, delayed sleep timing, and greater daytime sleepiness and insomnia scores than subjects with lower gaming addiction scores and non-gamer subjects. In January 2022, Early Childhood Research Quarterly published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 26 studies that found a weak but statistically significant association with increased smartphone and tablet computer use and poorer sleep in early childhood. In May 2022, the Journal of Affective Disorders published a meta-analysis of 29 studies comprising 20,041 subjects that found a weak-to-moderate association between mobile phone addiction and sleep disorder and that adolescents with mobile phone addiction were at higher risk of developing sleep disorder. In August 2022, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 16 studies comprising 8,077 subjects that established a significant association between binge-watching and sleep problems and a stronger association between binge-watching and sleep problems was found during the COVID-19 pandemic than pre-pandemic. In October 2022, Reports in Public Health published a systematic review of 23 studies that found that excessive use of digital screens by adolescents was associated with poor sleep quality, nighttime awakenings, long sleep latency, and daytime sleepiness. In December 2022, Sleep Epidemiology published a systematic review of 18 studies investigating associations between sleep problems and screen time during COVID-19 lockdowns that found that the increased screen time during the lockdowns negatively impacted sleep duration, sleep quality, sleep onset latency, and wake time. In March 2023, the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 17 studies comprising 36,485 subjects that found that smartphone overuse was closely associated with self-reported poor sleep quality, sleep deprivation, and prolonged sleep latency. In April 2023, Sleep Medicine Reviews published a systematic review of 42 studies that found digital media use to be associated with shorter sleep duration and poorer sleep quality and bedtime or nighttime use with poor sleep outcomes, but only found associations for general screen use, mobile phone use, computer and internet use, internet, and social media and not for television, game console, and tablet use. In July 2023, Healthcare published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 16 studies that established a correlation coefficient of 0.56 between nomophobia and insomnia. In September 2023, PLOS One published a systematic review and meta-analysis of 16 studies of smartphone addiction and sleep among medical students found that 57% of subjects had poor sleep and 39% of subjects had smartphone addiction with a correlation index of 0.3, while Computers in Human Behavior published a meta-analysis of 23 longitudinal studies comprising 116,431 adolescent subjects that found that adolescent screen time with computers, smartphones, social media, and television are positively associated with negative impacts on sleep health later in life. Narcissism In April 2018, a meta-analysis published in the Journal of Personality found that the positive correlation between grandiose narcissism and social networking sites (SNS) usage was replicated across platforms (including Facebook and Twitter). In July 2018, a meta-analysis published in Psychology of Popular Media found that grandiose narcissism positively correlated with time spent on social media, frequency of status updates, number of friends or followers, and frequency of posting self-portrait digital photographs. In March 2020, the Review of General Psychology published a meta-analysis that found a small-to-moderate association between SNS use and narcissism. In June 2020, Addictive Behaviors published a systematic review finding a consistent, positive, and significant correlation between grandiose narcissism and problematic social media use. OCD In April 2018, the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health published a systematic review of 24 studies researching associations between internet gaming disorder (IGD) and various psychopathologies that found a significant correlation between IGD and obsessive–compulsive disorder symptoms in 3 of 4 studies. Mental health benefits Individuals with mental illness can develop social connections over social media, that may foster a sense of social inclusion in online communities. People with mental illness may share personal stories in a perceived safer space, as well as gaining peer support for developing coping strategies. People with mental illness are likely to report avoiding stigma and gaining further insight into their mental health condition by using social media. This comes with the risk of unhealthy influences, misinformation, and delayed access to traditional mental health outlets. Other benefits include connections to supportive online communities, including illness or disability specific communities, as well as the LGBTQIA community. Young cancer patients have reported an improvement in their coping abilities due to their participation in an online community. The uses of social media for healthcare communication include providing reducing stigma and facilitating dialogue between patients and between patients and health professionals. Furthermore, in children, the educational benefits of digital media use are well established. For example, screen-based programs can help increase both independent and collaborative learning. A variety of quality apps and software can also decrease learning gaps and increase skill in certain educational subjects. Other disciplines Digital anthropology Daniel Miller from University College London has contributed to the study of digital anthropology, especially ethnographic research on the use and consequences of social media and smartphones as part of the everyday life of ordinary people around the world. He notes the effects of social media are very specific to individual locations and cultures. He contends "a layperson might dismiss these stories as superficial. But the anthropologist takes them seriously, empathetically exploring each use of digital technologies in terms of the wider social and cultural context." Digital anthropology is a developing field which studies the relationship between humans and digital-era technology. It aims to consider arguments in terms of ethical and societal scopes, rather than simply observing technological changes. Brian Solis, a digital analyst and anthropologist, stated in 2018, "we've become digital addicts: it's time to take control of technology and not let tech control us". Digital sociology Digital sociology explores how people use digital media using several research methodologies, including surveys, interviews, focus groups, and ethnographic research. It intersects with digital anthropology, and studies cultural geography. It also investigates longstanding concerns, and contexts around young people's overuse of "these technologies, their access to online pornography, cyber bullying or online sexual predation". A 2012 cross-sectional sociological study in Turkey showed differences in patterns of internet use that related to levels of religiosity in 2,698 subjects. With increasing religiosity, negative attitudes towards internet use increased. Highly religious people showed different motivations for internet use, predominantly searching for information. A study of 1,296 Malaysian adolescent students found an inverse relationship between religiosity and internet addiction tendency in females, but not males. A 2018 review published in Nature considered that young people may have different experiences online, depending on their socio-economic background, noting lower-income youths may spend up to three hours more per day using digital devices, compared to higher-income youths. They theorized that lower-income youths, who are already vulnerable to mental illness, may be more passive in their online engagements, being more susceptible to negative feedback online, with difficulty self-regulating their digital media use. It concluded that this may be a new form of digital divide between at-risk young people and other young people, pre-existing risks of mental illness becoming amplified among the already vulnerable population. Neuroscience A 2018 neuroscientific review published in Nature found the density of the amygdala, a brain region involved in emotional processing, is related to the size of both offline and online social networks in adolescents. They considered that this and other evidence "suggests an important interplay between actual social experiences, both offline and online, and brain development". The authors postulated that social media may have benefits, namely social connections with other people, as well as managing impressions people have of other people such as "reputation building, impression management, and online self-presentation". It identified "adolescence [as] a tipping point in development for how social media can influence their self-concept and expectations of self and others", and called for further study into the neuroscience behind digital media use and brain development in adolescence. Although brain-imaging modalities are under study, neuroscientific findings in individual studies often fail to be replicated in future studies, similar to other behavioural addictions; as of 2017, the exact biological or neural processes that could lead to excessive digital media use are unknown. Impact on cognition There is research and development about the cognitive impacts of smartphones and digital technology. A group reported that, contrary to widespread belief, scientific evidence does not show that these technologies harm biological cognitive abilities and that they instead only change predominant ways of cognition – such as a reduced need to remember facts or conduct mathematical calculations by pen and paper outside contemporary schools. However, some activities – like reading novels – that require long focused attention-spans and do not feature ongoing rewarding stimulation may become more challenging in general. How extensive online media usage impacts cognitive development in youth is under investigation and impacts may substantially vary by the way and which technologies are being used – such as which and how digital media platforms are being used – and how these are designed. Impacts may vary to a degree such studies have not yet taken into account and may be modulatable by the design, choice and use of technologies and platforms, including by the users themselves. A study suggests that in children aged 8–12 during two years, time digital gaming or watching digital videos can be positively correlated with measures intelligence, albeit correlations with overall screen time (including social media, socializing and TV) were not investigated and 'time gaming' did not differentiate between categories of video games (e.g. shares of games' platform and genre), and digital videos did not differentiate between categories of videos. Impact on social life Worldwide adolescent loneliness in contemporary schools and depression increased substantially after 2012 and a study found this to be associated with smartphone access and Internet use. Mitigation Industry Several technology firms have implemented changes intending to mitigate the adverse effects of excessive use of their platforms. In December 2017, Facebook admitted passive consumption of social media could be harmful to mental health, although they said active engagement can have a positive effect. In January 2018, the platform made major changes to increase user engagement. In January 2019, Facebook's then head of global affairs, Nick Clegg, responding to criticisms of Facebook and mental health concerns, stated they would do "whatever it takes to make this environment safer online especially for youngsters". Facebook admitted "heavy responsibilities" to the global community, and invited regulation by governments. In 2018 Facebook and Instagram announced new tools that they asserted may assist with overuse of their products. In 2019, Instagram, which has been investigated specifically in one study in terms of addiction, began testing a platform change in Canada to hide the number of "likes" and views that photos and videos received in an effort to create a "less pressurised" environment. It then continued this trial in Australia, Italy, Ireland, Japan, Brazil and New Zealand before extending the experiment globally in November of that year. The platform also developed artificial intelligence to counter cyberbullying. In 2018, Alphabet Inc. released an update for Android smartphones, including a dashboard app enabling users to set timers on application use. Apple Inc. purchased a third-party application and then incorporated it in iOS 12 to measure "screen time". Journalists have questioned the functionality of these products for users and parents, as well as the companies' motivations for introducing them. Alphabet has also invested in a mental health specialist, Quartet, which uses machine learning to collaborate and coordinate digital delivery of mental health care. Two activist investors in Apple Inc voiced concerns in 2018 about the content and amount of time spent by youth. They called on Apple Inc. to act before regulators and consumers potentially force them to do so. Apple Inc. responded that they have, "always looked out for kids, and [they] work hard to create powerful products that inspire, entertain, and educate children while also helping parents protect them online". The firm is planning new features that they asserted may allow them to play a pioneering role in regard to young people's health. Public sector In China, Japan, South Korea and the United States, governmental efforts have been enacted to address issues relating to digital media use and mental health. China's Ministry of Culture has enacted several public health efforts from as early as 2006 to address gaming and internet-related disorders. In 2007, an "Online Game Anti-Addiction System" was implemented for minors, restricting their use to 3 hours or less per day. The ministry also proposed a "Comprehensive Prevention Program Plan for Minors' Online Gaming Addiction" in 2013, to promulgate research, particularly on diagnostic methods and interventions. China's Ministry of Education in 2018 announced that new regulations would be introduced to further limit the amount of time spent by minors in online games. In response, Tencent, the owner of WeChat and the world's largest video game publisher, restricted the amount of time that children could spend playing one of its online games, to one hour per day for children 12 and under, and two hours per day for children aged . Effective 2 September 2023, those under the age of 18 can no longer access the Internet on their mobile device between 10 pm and 6 am without parental bypass. Smartphone usage is similarly capped by default at 40 minutes a day for children younger than eight and at two hours for 16- and 17-year-olds. Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications coordinates Japanese public health efforts in relation to problematic internet use and gaming disorder. Legislatively, the Act on Development of an Environment that Provides Safe and Secure Internet Use for Young People was enacted in 2008, to promote public awareness campaigns, and support NGOs to teach young people safe internet use skills. South Korea has eight government ministries responsible for public health efforts in relation to internet and gaming disorders. A review article published in Prevention Science in 2018 stated that the "region is unique in that its government has been at the forefront of prevention efforts, particularly in contrast to the United States, Western Europe, and Oceania." Efforts are coordinated by the Ministry of Science and ICT, and include awareness campaigns, educational interventions, youth counseling centres, and promoting healthy online culture. In May 2023, the United States' Surgeon general took the rare measure of issuing an advisory on Social media and mental health. In October, 41 U.S. states commenced legal proceedings against Meta. This included the attorneys general of 33 states filing a combined lawsuit over concerns about the addictive nature of Instagram and its impact on the mental health of young people. Digital mental health care Digital technologies have also provided opportunities for delivery of mental health care online; benefits have been found with computerized cognitive behavioral therapy for depression and anxiety. Mindfulness based online intervention has been shown to have small to moderate benefits on mental health. The greatest effect size was found for the reduction of psychological stress. Benefits were also found regarding depression, anxiety, and well-being. The Lancet commission on global mental health and sustainability report from 2018 evaluated both benefits and harms of technology. It considered the roles of technologies in mental health, particularly in public education; patient screening; treatment; training and supervision; and system improvement. A study in 2019 published in Front Psychiatry in the National Center for Biotechnology Information states that despite proliferation of many mental health apps there has been no "equivalent proliferation of scientific evidence for their effectiveness." Steve Blumenfield and Jeff Levin-Scherz, writing in the Harvard Business Review, claim that "most published studies show telephonic mental health care is as effective as in-person care in treating depression, anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder." The also cite a 2020 study done with the Veterans Administration as evidence of this as well. See also Evolutionary psychiatry Instagram Screen time Social aspects of television References Further reading Woods, H. C., & Scott, H. (2016). #Sleepyteens: Social media use in adolescence is associated with poor sleep quality, anxiety, depression and low self‐esteem. Journal of Adolescence, 51(1), 41–49. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.adolescence.2016.05.008 Jones, A., Hook, M., Podduturi, P., McKeen, H., Beitzell, E., & Liss, M. (2022). Mindfulness as a mediator in the relationship between social media engagement and depression in young adults. Personality and Individual Differences, 185. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2021.111284 White-Gosselin, C.-É., & Poulin, F. (2022). Associations between young adults' social media addiction, relationship quality with parents, and internalizing problems: A path analysis model. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science / Revue Canadienne Des Sciences Du Comportement. https://doi.org/10.1037/cbs0000326 Hammad, M. A., & Alqarni, T. M. (2021). Psychosocial effects of social media on the Saudi society during the Coronavirus Disease 2019 pandemic: A cross-sectional study. PLoS ONE, 16(3). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0248811 External links Anthropology of Social Media: Why We Post, University College London, Free online five-week course, asking "What are the consequences of social media?" Social Media Use and Mental Health: A Review – ongoing review curated by Jean Twenge & Jonathan Haidt. Cultural anthropology Cyberspace Digital media Technology in society Child and adolescent psychiatry Educational psychology

Psychosociology

Psychosociology or psycho-sociology is the study of problems common to psychology and sociology, particularly the way individual behavior is influenced by the groups the person belongs to. For example, in the study of criminals, psychology studies the personality of the criminal shaped by the criminal's upbringing. Sociology studies the behavior of the entire group itself: the methods the criminal group uses to recruits members and the way the group changes over time. Psychosociology studies the criminal's behavior, which is created by the group they belong to, such as the young people living in the same neighborhood block. Factors There are many social factors that can affect the psychology of others. An example of this is social cliques. Whether one gets accepted into their desired clique or not, it changes the way they think of themselves, and the people around them. Friendships at young ages while growing up also have much to do with not only psychological development, but social skills and social behavior as well. The same goes for common laws in society. Whether an individual's group decides to obey by them or not, it affects that individual's outlook on the law and their group as a whole. The way people may act or speak dictates the way others see them in a society. For example, individuals can see authority in many different ways depending on their experiences and what others have told them. Because of this, based on people's social knowledge of authority, their opinions and ideas are very different. Individuals Every individual has their own unique and personal psychological thought process in which they use to analyze the world around them. People internalize and process sociological factors in ways relative to their psychological thought process. This relationship is reciprocated with one another as society can alter and morph the ways that people think while at the same time, society can be influenced by the externalized psychological thinking of the individuals within the society itself. Due to this, one could see how psychology is instrumental in helping the sociologist to view the wide spread effects of social facts within an individual's behavior. References Interdisciplinary branches of psychology Interdisciplinary subfields of sociology

Associationism

Associationism is the idea that mental processes operate by the association of one mental state with its successor states. It holds that all mental processes are made up of discrete psychological elements and their combinations, which are believed to be made up of sensations or simple feelings. In philosophy, this idea is viewed as the outcome of empiricism and sensationism. The concept encompasses a psychological theory as well as comprehensive philosophical foundation and scientific methodology. History Early history The idea is first recorded in Plato and Aristotle, especially with regard to the succession of memories. Particularly, the model is traced back to the Aristotelian notion that human memory encompasses all mental phenomena. The model was discussed in detail in the philosopher's work, Memory and Reminiscence. This view was then widely embraced until the emergence of British associationism, which began with Thomas Hobbes. Associationist School Members of the Associationist School, including John Locke, David Hume, David Hartley, Joseph Priestley, James Mill, John Stuart Mill, Alexander Bain, and Ivan Pavlov, asserted that the principle applied to all or most mental processes. John Locke The phrase association of ideas was first used by John Locke in 1689 in Chapter 33 of An Essay Concerning Human Understanding entitled “Of the Association of Ideas″, he describes the ways that ideas can be connected to each other. He writes “Some of our ideas have a natural correspondence and connection with one another”. Although he believed that some associations were natural and justified, he believed that others were illogical, causing errors in judgment. He also explains that one can associate some ideas together based on their education and culture, saying, “there is another connection of ideas wholly owing to chance or custom”. The term associationism later became more prominent in psychology and the psychologists that subscribed to the idea became known as the associationists. Locke's view that the mind and body are two aspects of the same unified phenomenon can be traced back to Aristotle's ideas on the subject. David Hume In his 1740 book Treatise on Human Nature David Hume outlines three principles for ideas to be connected to each other: resemblance, continuity in time or place, and cause or effect. He argues that the mind uses these principles, rather than reason, to traverse from idea to idea. He writes “When the mind, therefore, passes from the idea or impression of one object to the idea or belief of another, it is not determined by reason, but by certain principles, which associate together the ideas of these objects, and unite them in the imagination.” These connections are formed in the mind by observation and experience. Hume does not believe that any of these associations are “necessary’ in a sense that ideas or object are truly connected, instead he sees them as mental tools used for creating a useful mental representation of the world. Later members Later members of the school developed very specific principles elaborating how associations worked and even a physiological mechanism bearing no resemblance to modern neurophysiology. For a fuller explanation of the intellectual history of associationism and the "Associationist School", see Association of Ideas. Applications Associationism is often concerned with middle-level to higher-level mental processes such as learning. For instance, the thesis, antithesis, and synthesis are linked in one's mind through repetition so that they become inextricably associated with one another. Among the earliest experiments that tested the applications of associationism, involve Hermann Ebbinghaus' work. He was considered the first experimenter to apply the associationist principles systematically, and used himself as subject to study and quantify the relationship between rehearsal and recollection of material. Some of the ideas of the Associationist School also anticipated the principles of conditioning and its use in behavioral psychology. Both classical conditioning and operant conditioning use positive and negative associations as means of conditioning. See also Calculus of relations Connectionism Family resemblance Prototype theory References Further reading Pre-History of Cognitive Science. Metaphysics of mind Psychological theories History of psychology Socialism ca:Ateneu Suecà del Socors

Impression formation

Impression formation in social psychology refers to the processes by which different pieces of knowledge about another are combined into a global or summary impression. Social psychologist Solomon Asch is credited with the seminal research on impression formation and conducted research on how individuals integrate information about personality traits. Two major theories have been proposed to explain how this process of integration takes place. The Gestalt approach views the formation of a general impression as the sum of several interrelated impressions. As an individual seeks to form a coherent and meaningful impression of another individual, previous impressions significantly influence the interpretation of subsequent information. In contrast to the Gestalt approach, the cognitive algebra approach asserts that individuals' experiences are combined with previous evaluations to form a constantly changing impression of a person. A related area to impression formation is the study of person perception, making dispositional attributions, and then adjusting those inferences based on the information available. Methods Impression formation has traditionally been studied using three methods pioneered by Asch: free response, free association, and a check-list form. In addition, a fourth method based on a Likert scale with anchors such as “very favorable” and “very unfavorable”, has also been used in recent research. A combination of some or all of these techniques is often employed to produce the most accurate assessment of impression formation. Free response Free response is an experimental method frequently used in impression formation research. The participant (or perceiver) is presented with a stimulus (usually a short vignette or a list of personality descriptors such as assured, talkative, cold, etc.) and then instructed to briefly sketch his or her impressions of the type of person described. This is a useful technique for gathering detailed and concrete evidence on the nature of the impression formed. However, the difficulty of accurately coding responses often necessitates the use of additional quantitative measures. Free association Free association is another commonly used experimental method in which the perceiver creates a list of personality adjectives that immediately come to mind when asked to think about the type of person described by a particular set of descriptor adjectives. Check-list A check-list consisting of assorted personality descriptors is often used to supplement free response or free association data and to compare group trends. After presenting character-qualities of an imagined individual, perceivers are instructed to select the character adjectives from a preset list that best describe the resulting impression. While this produces an easily quantifiable assessment of an impression, it forces participants' answers into a limited, and often extreme, response set. However, when used in conjunction with the above-mentioned techniques, check-list data provides useful information about the character of impressions. Likert-type rating scales With Likert scales, perceivers are responding to a presentation of discrete personality characteristics. Common presentation methods include lists of adjectives, photos or videos depicting a scene, or written scenarios. For example, a participant might be asked to answer the question "Would an honest (trait) person ever search for the owner of a lost package (behavior)?" by answering on a 5-point scale ranging from 1 "very unlikely" to 5 "very likely." Specific results Primacy-recency effect Asch stressed the important influence of an individual's initial impressions of a person's personality traits on the interpretation of all subsequent impressions. Asch argued that these early impressions often shaped or colored an individual's perception of other trait-related details. A considerable body of research exists supporting this hypothesis. For example, when individuals were asked to rate their impression of another person after being presented a list of words progressing from either low favorability to high favorability (L - H) or from high favorability to low favorability (H - L), strong primacy effects were found. In other words, impressions formed from initial descriptor adjectives persisted over time and influenced global impressions. In general, primacy can have three main effects: initial trait-information can be integrated into an individual's global impression of a person in a process of assimilation effects, it can lead to a durable impression against which other information is compared in a process of anchoring, and it can cause people to actively change their perception of others in a process of correction. Valence The emotionality of certain personality traits, such as "warm" versus "cold" characteristics, can influence how subsequent traits are interpreted and ultimately the type of impression formed. Information inconsistent with a person's global impression of another individual is especially prominent in memory. The process of assimilation can lead to causal attributions of personality as this inconsistent information is integrated into the whole. This effect is especially influential when the behavior is perceived as negative. Consistent with negativity bias, negative behaviors are seen as more indicative of an individual's behavior in situations involving moral issues. Extreme negative behavior is also considered more predictive of personality traits than less extreme behavior. History Classic experiments In a classic experiment, Solomon Asch's principal theoretical concern revolved around understanding the mechanisms influencing a person's overall impression of others, principally trait centrality and trait valence of various personality characteristics. His research illustrated the influential roles of the primacy effect, valence, and causal attribution on the part of the individual. Based on the findings of ten experiments studying the effect of various personality adjectives on the resulting quality and character of impressions, several key principles of impression formation have been identified: Individuals have a natural inclination to make global dispositional inferences about the nature of another person's personality. Individuals expect observed behaviors to reflect stable personality traits. Individuals attempt to fit information about different traits and behaviors into a meaningful and coherent whole. Individuals attempt to explain and rationalize inconsistencies when the available information does not fit with the global perception. Theoretical development In psychology Fritz Heider's writings on balance theory emphasized that liking or disliking a person depends on how the person is positively or negatively linked to other liked or disliked entities. Heider's later essay on social cognition, along with the development of "psycho-logic" by Robert P. Abelson and Milton J. Rosenberg, embedded evaluative processes in verbal descriptions of actions, with the verb of a descriptive sentence establishing the kind of linkage existing between the actor and object of the sentence. Harry Gollob expanded these insights with his subject-verb-object approach to social cognition, and he showed that evaluations of sentence subjects could be calculated with high precision from out-of-context evaluations of the subject, verb, and object, with part of the evaluative outcome coming from multiplicative interactions among the input evaluations. In a later work, Gollob and Betty Rossman extended the framework to predicting an actor's power and influence. Reid Hastie wrote that "Gollob's extension of the balance model to inferences concerning subject-verb-object sentences is the most important methodological and theoretical development of Heider's principle since its original statement." Gollob's regression equations for predicting impressions of sentence subjects consisted of weighted summations of out-of-context ratings of the subject, verb, and object, and of multiplicative interactions of the ratings. The equations essentially supported the cognitive algebra approach of Norman H. Anderson's Information integration theory. Anderson, however, initiated a heated technical exchange between himself and Gollob, in which Anderson argued that Gollob's use of the general linear model led to indeterminate theory because it could not completely account for any particular case in the set of cases used to estimate the models. The recondite exchange typified a continuing debate between proponents of contextualism who argue that impressions result from situationally specific influences (e.g., from semantics and nonverbal communication as well as affective factors), and modelers who follow the pragmatic maxim, seeking approximations revealing core mental processes. Another issue in using least-squares estimations is the compounding of measurement error problems with multiplicative variables. In sociology David R. Heise relabeled Gollob's framework from subject-verb-object to actor-behavior-object in order to allow for impression formation from perceived events as well as from verbal stimuli, and showed that actions produce impressions of behaviors and objects as well as of actors on all three dimensions of Charles E. Osgood's semantic differential—Evaluation, Potency, and Activity. Heise used equations describing impression-formation processes as the empirical basis for his cybernetic theory of action, Affect control theory. Erving Goffman's book The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life and his essay "On Face-work" in the book Interaction Ritual focused on how individuals engage in impression management. Using the notion of face as identity is used now, Goffman proposed that individuals maintain face expressively. "By entering a situation in which he is given a face to maintain, a person takes on the responsibility of standing guard over the flow of events as they pass before him. He must ensure that a particular expressive order is sustained-an order that regulates the flow of events, large or small, so that anything that appears to be expressed by them will be consistent with his face." In other words, individuals control events so as to create desired impressions of themselves. Goffman emphasized that individuals in a group operate as a team with everyone committed to helping others maintain their identities. Impression-formation processes in the US Ratings of 515 action descriptions by American respondents yielded estimations of a statistical model consisting of nine impression-formation equations, predicting outcome Evaluation, Potency, and Activity of actor, behavior, and object from pre-event ratings of the evaluation, potency, and activity of actor, behavior, and object. The results were reported as maximum-likelihood estimations. Stability was a factor in every equation, with some pre-action feeling toward an action element transferred to post-action feeling about the same element. Evaluation, Potency, and Activity of behaviors suffused to actors so impressions of actors were determined in part by the behaviors they performed. In general objects of action lost Potency. Interactions among variables included consistency effects, such as receiving Evaluative credit for performing a bad behavior toward a bad object person, and congruency effects, such as receiving evaluative credit for nice behaviors toward weak objects or bad behaviors toward powerful objects. Third-order interactions included a balance effect in which actors received a boost in evaluation if two or none of the elements in the action were negative, otherwise a decrement. Across all nine prediction equations, more than half of the 64 possible predictors (first-order variables plus second- and third-order interactions) contributed to outcomes. Studies of event descriptions that explicitly specified behavior settings found that impression-formation processes are largely the same when settings are salient, but the setting becomes an additional contributor to impression formation regarding actor, behavior, and object; and the action changes the impression of the setting. Actor and object are the same person in self-directed actions such as "the lawyer praised himself" or various kinds of self-harm. Impression-formation research indicates that self-directed actions reduce the positivity of actors on the Evaluation, Potency, and Activity dimensions. Self-directed actions therefore are not an optimal way to confirm the good, potent, lively identities that people normally want to maintain. Rather self-directed actions are a likely mode of expression for individuals who want to manifest their low self-esteem and self-efficacy. Early work on impression formation used action sentences like, "The kind man praises communists," and "Bill helped the corrupt senator," assuming that modifier-noun combinations amalgamate into a functional unit. A later study found that a modifier-noun combination does form an overall impression that works in action descriptions like a noun alone. The action sentences in that study combined identities with status characteristics, traits, moods, and emotions. Another study in 1989 focused specifically on emotion descriptors combined with identities (e.g., an angry child) and again found that emotion terms amalgamate with identities, and equations describing this kind of amalgamation are of the same form as equations describing trait-identity amalgamation. Cross-cultural studies Studies of various kinds of impression formation have been conducted in Canada, Japan, and Germany. Core processes are similar cross-culturally. For example, in every culture that has been studied, Evaluation of an actor was determined by-among other things-a stability effect, a suffusion from the behavior Evaluation, and an interaction that rewarded an actor for performing a behavior whose Evaluation was consistent with the Evaluation of the object person. On the other hand, each culture weighted the core effects distinctively. For example, the impact of behavior-object Evaluation consistency was much smaller in Germany than in the United States, Canada, or Japan, suggesting that moral judgments of actors have a somewhat different basis in Germany than in the other cultures. Additionally, impression-formation processes involved some unique interactions in each culture. For example, attribute-identity amalgamations in Germany involved some Potency and Activity interactions that did not appear in other cultures. The 2010 book Surveying Cultures reviewed cross-cultural research on impression-formation processes, and provided guidelines for conducting impression-formation studies in cultures where the processes are unexplored currently. Recent studies Impression formation is based on the characteristics of both the perceivers and targets. However, research has not been able to quantify the extent to which these two groups contribute to impression. The research was conducted to determine the extent of how impressions originate from ‘our mind’ and ‘target face’. Results demonstrated that perceiver characteristics contribute more than target appearance. Impressions can be made from facial appearance alone and assessments on attributes such as nice, strong, and smart based on variations of the targets’ face. The results show that subtle facial traits have meaningful consequences on impressions, which is true even for young children of 3 years old. Studies have been conducted to study impression formation in social situations rather than situations involving threat. Research reveals that social goals can drive the formation of impressions and that there is flexibility in the possible impressions formed on target faces. See also First impression (psychology) Notes References Interpersonal relationships

Psychology of self and identity

The psychology of self and identity is a subfield of Psychology that moves psychological research “deeper inside the conscious mind of the person and further out into the person’s social world.” The exploration of self and identity subsequently enables the influence of both inner phenomenal experiences and the outer world in relation to the individual to be further investigated. This is particularly necessary following the topic's prevalence within the domain of social psychology. Furthermore, research suggests that self and identity have significant impacts on well-being, behaviour, self-esteem and interpersonal relationships within a society and culture. Therefore, research into self and identity in humans is crucial to acknowledge, as few other species demonstrate behaviours relating to self-recognition and identity. The key areas involved in the investigation of self and identity include self-concept, self-esteem, and self-control. What distinguishes the psychology of self and identity as a domain is its scientific character. Emphasis is placed on the empirical testing of systematic theories about relevant phenomena. Hence, its methodological approach differs from both philosophy and sociology. The psychology of self and identity incorporates elements from different areas of psychology. However, it owes particularly large debt to personality psychology and social psychology. Self The self refers to the reflective perspective from which a thing encounters itself, in particular, the hierarchical ordering of concepts born of self-reflection. The self includes the aspects of “thinking, being aware of thinking and talking to the self as an object for thinking” and is connected to motivators such as agency and communion. Furthermore, the self is manifested through both personal and social identities. Identity Identity refers to a “tool by which individuals or groups categorize themselves and present themselves to the world." Thus, identities such as gender, race or age are used in the hierarchical organisation of concepts of self. Influence of culture on Self and Identity Research suggests that an individual’s perspective of self is predominately influenced by the culture they are socialised in, with culture referring to the level of cooperation, competition, or individualism a society emphasises. This suggests that self and identity are significantly dependent on whether the culture one associates with is individualist or collectivist, specifically due to the difference in normative rule and the structure of these societies. Collectivist cultures tend to be more interdependent societies, which is likely to result in “the individual (being) connected to significant others”, thus creating fluidity of self and identity across time and contexts. This contrasts individualistic societies, where members perceive themselves as more independent and distinct from others. This research follows Tajfel and Turner’s (1979) Social Identity Theory, which suggests that people derive a portion of their identity from the group they belong to. This is because individuals are more likely to adopt the identity of their ingroup, which results in the widespread adoption of norms, values, and behaviours. This has been presented through cross-cultural – individualistic versus collectivist society – comparisons of the self-concept through the use of structured inventories, which demonstrated numerous cultural differences in self for self-statements and self-esteem statements. The participants in individualistic societies reported higher global self-esteem than those from collectivist cultures. Rosenberg (1965) defines self-esteem as an individual’s overall positive evaluation of self, which has the capacity to change depending on an individual’s outlook on life. The change in individual self-esteem, particularly in collectivist societies, is related to relationships with significant others, and it has the capacity to improve collective self-esteem by increasing the level of belonging. Influence of gender on Self and Identity The cultural differences relating to self-esteem were also found to mirror those of gender differences. This was demonstrated by research that suggested women develop more of an interdependent self through the prioritisation of qualities that align them with others. This interdependence and, subsequently, higher levels of interpersonal communication among women have been demonstrated to increase their self-esteem. Men, on the other hand, often develop an independent self and identity. This results from men often being taught to “prioritise the qualities that distinguish and differentiate themselves from others,” which leads to reduced self-esteem. The contrast within the self between men and women is further amplified through the presence of gender stereotypes within many societies. Influence of intergroup and outgroup relations The treatment of minority groups by their own ingroup, and the way in which they treat and are treated by other groups has significant implications on self and identity. Negative treatment between groups can lead to adverse outcomes, while positive interactions can increase individual collective self-esteem. Therefore, positive interactions are critical in the formation of cross-group and cross-race friendships, as well as the positive relationships between intergroups. This was demonstrated by a study which suggested cross-group friendships provide "a sense of collective self-esteem among minority group members. In turn, collective self-esteem is likely to fuel collective action tendencies". High quality, positive relations among minority group members is necessary for the promoting of both collective self-esteem and well-being. The establishment of intergroup friendships is also necessary for the relationship self, which pertains to aspects of the self-concept that are rooted in interpersonal attachments that consist of shared aspects developed through relationships with significant others, such as family or friends. Conversely, the collective self pertains to aspects of self, derived from membership in social groups, such as ethnic groups or social classes. Therefore, these relationships shared from one person to the next can be described as one's self and identity. Self-knowledge Self-knowledge has the capacity to influence self and identity due to the information that is stored or made available at a specific time, depending on the context of the situation. Within self-knowledge, there are two components: episodic self-knowledge and personal semantic memory. Episodic self-knowledge refers to the experiences one encounters over time, whereas personal semantic memory refers to “factual knowledge about the self”. Both episodic and semantic self-knowledge contribute to the present self, as well as past and possible future selves. These forms of self-knowledge and, subsequently, self as a whole are impacted by social groups through their providing of context and meaning to inform emotion and behaviour. This causes individuals to assimilate to those in their in-group. The extent to which self-knowledge is present changes throughout life. This is particularly the case with children, who have been demonstrated to not display all emotions presented in adults, such as empathy and embarrassment until their self-awareness is developed. Nevertheless, despite this malleability of self, self-knowledge is essential. This is because self-knowledge enables the formation of self and identity, as highlighted by research conducted on amnesic patients, which demonstrated that the preservation of semantic self-knowledge is essential for the maintenance of identity. This was discovered following patients suffering from Alzheimer’s losing their identity once the disease caused the loss of personally relevant knowledge. This is likely to occur as individuals use knowledge about the world and themselves to construct their own identity. Analysis of the self: cultural and individual There are levels of analysis that one can look at in terms of self and identity. The first level of analysis is the self on an individual level, for example; self-states, self-motives, self-esteem, self-efficacy. These self-states are self-process that include unbiased self-awareness. However, self-motives are more serious impulses to action, something that is innate and societal or cultural analysis of the self. The second level of analysis is on the societal or cultural level, for example, the cultural conception of a person, cultural arrangements that make the person who they are and the cultural concept of self. This cultural analysis demonstrates the idea that the self is a social product created through social interactions within a cultural community. This occurs through the recognition of patterns of others' responses to behaviours in order to coordinate the self to the perceived social patterns of the in-group. Over time these generalised patterns of communication among group members create social norms and cause "each individual self (to be) a collaborative output of the entire cultural community". This further demonstrates the notion that self and identity are highly contingent upon culture. Key theories Social Identity theory One of the most influential theories relating to the formation of self and identity is Tajifel & Turner’s (1979) Social identity theory. This psychological theory highlights the role that self-conception and behaviour has in group processes. The theory suggests that an individual's identity is formed and strengthened through the identification with their in-group. With in-group referring to the categorisation of individuals into a group based on correlated dimensions or values, such as that of ethnicity. The formation of in-groups and out-groups by individuals results in intergroups dynamics through the difference in social influence and norms across groups. This can lead to negative connotations and stereotyping of different out-groups. References Further reading External links Homepage of the International Society for Self and Identity Homepage of Self and Identity, a flagship journal Ego psychology Identity (social science)

Coaching psychology

Coaching psychology is a field of applied psychology that applies psychological theories and concepts to the practice of coaching. Its aim is to increase performance, self-actualization, achievement and well-being in individuals, teams and organisations by utilising evidence-based methods grounded in scientific research. Coaching psychology is influenced by theories in various psychological fields, such as humanistic psychology, positive psychology, learning theory and social psychology. Coaching psychology formally began as psychological sub-discipline in 2000 when the first "coaching psychology" course was offered at the University of Sydney. Since then, learned societies dedicated to coaching psychology have been formed, and peer-reviewed journals publish research in coaching psychology. Applications of coaching psychology range from athletic and educational coaching to leadership and corporate coaching. History Early history Early applications of psychological theory and practice to coaching (in particular, athletic coaching) can be traced to the 1920s. In 1926, Coleman Griffith published The Psychology of Coaching: A Study of Coaching Methods in the Point of View of Psychology. Based on observations of football and basketball teams, Griffith discussed a wide variety of aspects of coaching, such as spectator effects, over-coaching problems, principles of learning. Griffith has been noted as "America's first sport psychologist" and a pioneer applying the science of psychology to coaching. Years later, more texts on coaching psychology began to emerge. In 1951, John Lawther of Penn State University published Psychology of Coaching. The earliest book in WorldCat with the term "coaching psychology" in the title is Modern Coaching Psychology by Curtiss Gaylord, published in 1967. 21st century Despite these early developments, contemporary coaching psychology was only formally established at the beginning of the 21st century. In January 2000, Anthony Grant implemented the first "coaching psychology" unit of study at the University of Sydney and his doctoral dissertation set the stage for further research to establish the field of coaching psychology as an evidence-based discipline. Many coaching psychologists consider Grant as a pioneer in the field. Further development began in 2006 when the Australian Psychological Society (APS) held a conference that founded the Interest Group in Coaching Psychology (IGCP). Outside Australia, Stephen Palmer of the British Psychological Society (BPS) formed the Special Group in Coaching Psychology (SGCP). Both the IGCP and the SGCP aimed to further develop the profession of coaching psychology in terms of theory and application by providing a platform for sharing relevant research and experiences among coaching psychologists. Since the establishment of the IGCP and SGCP, more international societies dedicated to coaching psychology have been established in Europe, the Middle East and South Africa. On December 18, 2006, the International Society for Coaching Psychology (ISCP) was founded in order to promote the international development of the field. Currently, there are a number of peer-reviewed journals dedicated to literature and research on coaching psychology. For instance, The Coaching Psychologist (since 2005) is provided by the SGCP. The IGCP and IGCP jointly publish the International Coaching Psychology Review (since 2006). Coaching Psychology International (since 2009) is published by International Society of Coaching Psychology. Theoretical influences Humanistic psychology The humanistic approach to psychology is regarded as a large contributor to coaching psychology. Both humanistic and coaching psychology share the common view of the human as self-actualising. That is, whenever given the opportunity, humans will seize the capacity to improve themselves. Coaching psychology looks at this development as a process consisting of concrete positive changes in one's life. Furthermore, this process of growth is undertaken by both the client and the coach who facilitates self-actualisation in their clients. In Carl Rogers' person-centered therapy, the client-therapist relationship is a key element in facilitating growth. Thus, the relationship between the coach (the facilitator) and the client (the learner) is crucial. In particular, Rogers identified three key qualities in a good coach-client relationship: "realness" (genuineness), trust, and empathetic understanding. Additionally, an important distinction is made between working on the client and working with the client. A coach must be willing to collaborate and actively engage with the client in order to understand their experiences and make choices that promote growth. When this is achieved, the coach-client relationship becomes an active partnership. Additionally, according to Rogers, growth in a client is attained through unconditional positive regard. Coaches must empathise with their clients in order to understand their experiences and viewpoints. To achieve this, the coach must be able to understand their clients not only on an intellectual level, but also on an emotional level. Along with empathy, coaches must be able to accept their clients for who they really are since individuals need to feel valued for their "true selves" in order to self-actualise. Positive psychology Positive psychology (developed by Martin Seligman and others) dwells on the positive aspects of human characteristics such as strength and competency. At its core, coaching psychology shares this focus; effective coaching entails improving the performance and well-being of the client. Positive psychology thus provides a foundation for coaching. Coaching psychology has been considered a type of applied positive psychology. Positive emotions motivate individuals to enhance their abilities and competencies. The broaden-and-build theory by Barbara Fredrickson posits that positive emotions can play a role in sparking not just motivation, but also actions that are productive and beneficial. In coaching, encouraging positive emotions is emphasised in order to inspire clients to take concrete action towards their goals. Aside from emotions, full engagement in activity is also a factor in maximising one's performance. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi described this level of maximal involvement in a task as flow. In other words, individuals experiencing flow are "in the zone". Coaches play a role in setting an environment that induces flow. This can be achieved through clear and consistent goal-setting. Providing clear and immediate feedback also keeps the client informed about whether their actions are helping achieve their goals. Coaches also help strike a balance between challenge and skills as tasks that are too easy or too difficult for the client may hinder goal-achievement. Theories of learning Operant conditioning (as described by B. F. Skinner) views learning as a process involving reinforcement and punishment. Coaches are encouraged to always reinforce healthy and productive behaviours through verbal reinforcement, such as motivational words and images. Intrinsic reinforcement (i.e. reinforcement from within the individual) can also play a huge role in improving performance and encouraging goal-directed action. Though punishment can direct clients towards desired behaviours, performance may be hindered by unwarranted side effects, such as anxiety and resentment towards the coach. David A. Kolb's experiential learning theory posits that individuals learn through their experiences. Experiential learning is facilitated by self-reflection, self-assessment and action. Coaches can encourage critical self-reflection of experiences through "coaching logs" wherein coachees analyse their thoughts and emotions in various incidents and circumstances. This helps clients examine and challenge their own beliefs, attitudes and behaviours. Insight gained from this aids in transformative learning where trainees develop an action plan for further self-improvement and increased performance based on their own experiences. Lev Vygotsky described the zone of proximal development (ZPD) as a space between what a person knows (an action that can be performed easily) and what a person doesn't know (what is considered difficult). Vygotsky theorised that learning is most effective within this zone. Coaches facilitate effective learning by providing coachees with activities within the ZPD, which are neither too easy nor too challenging (this is a process called scaffolding). Social learning theory also influenced coaching psychology. According to Albert Bandura, observational learning occurs when individuals learn from the people around them (called models). Coaches should be aware of their coachee's models as this can shape their attitudes and behaviour. Additionally, coaches should assess factors affecting observational learning in their trainees, such as attention and the frequency of the observed behaviour. Other influences Gestalt theory explains that people perceive events around us in a way that conforms to their personal ideas, beliefs and experiences. Coachees must be guided in their awareness of their own attitudes and experiences, which shape their perception of the world. Concepts in social psychology such as interpersonal influence and compliance emphasise the powerful role that social interactions play in shaping thinking, performance, and behaviour in coachees. Cultural psychology assists coaches in facilitating growth and learning in clients from various cultural backgrounds. Study of psychopathology may also be important in developing the proper methods of coaching for mentally unhealthy individuals. Models Coaching psychology has a large number of models and frameworks derived from psychological theories and evidence. These models are used in order to guide the practice of coaching psychology and to ensure that coaching is informed by scientifically-proven concepts. GROW The GROW model is considered one of the most popular behavioural coaching models. Its four stages outline the process of problem-solving, goal-setting and improvement of performance. The name of each stage varies slightly depending on the source. This model has also been expanded upon with the inclusion of TGROW and GROWTH frameworks. PRACTICE Stephen Palmer developed the PRACTICE model as a guide to problem-solving and solution-seeking. The issues are identified during first stage is Problem identification. Next, Realistic goals are developed with regards to the issues. Afterwards, Alternate solutions that work towards the goals are brainstormed. The possible outcomes of the solutions are then critically evaluated during the Consideration of consequences. Following this, the best options are chosen during Targeting the most feasible solution(s). Then comes the Implementation of the Chosen solution(s). The final step is the Evaluation where coaches and coachees discuss the effectiveness of the solution and any lessons learned from the experience. SPACE The SPACE model is a bio-psycho-social framework based on cognitive-behavioural psychology. Its purpose is to guide the coach in assessing and understanding the behaviour of their clients during specific situations. SPACE is an acronym that stands for Social context, Physiology, Action, Cognition and Emotion. It can be further subdivided into smaller frameworks: ACE and PACE. The ACE framework examines the relationships between the action, emotions and cognitions of the individual. The PACE framework then takes the ACE model and considers the physiological or biological response that accompanies cognitions, emotions and behaviour. Finally, the main SPACE model takes into account the social context in which the behaviour occurs. Other models Other approaches such as the ABCDE cognitive model for problem-solving have been developed. The OSKAR, ACHIEVE and POSITIVE models stem from the GROW model that focuses on goal-setting, solution-seeking, as well as nurturing coaching relationship. For leadership coaching, LASER (which stands for Learning, Assessing, Story-making, Enabling and Reframing) outlines a five-step process for effective coaching. The transtheoretical model of change (developed by James O. Prochaska and others) and appreciative inquiry focus on understanding the process of change and encouraging clients to act towards positive change. Coaching education Applications Athlete coaching Coaching psychology influences training methods for athlete development. It aims not only to improve performance in sports, but also to develop athletes holistically. Thus, factors affecting development such as athlete motivation have been studied through cognitive, social and emotional theories. One study found that athlete narcissism impacts the effectiveness of performance expectations set by the coach. Physical and mental skill enhancement are also studied with cognitive-behavioural theories. Research has shown that effective goal-setting improves performance in sport. Additionally, self-efficacy is also an important factor affecting athlete development. Thus, coaches are encouraged to increase self-efficacy in athletes through positive feedback and being a model of self-confidence themselves. Even coaches' own beliefs about their skill level in coaching affect the development of self-efficacy in athletes. In education Coaching psychology can also be applied in schools. It examines the most effective ways of educating students grounded in psychological theory. For instance, theories on motivation focus on the effects of self-efficacy and motivation on student performance. Improving teacher confidence and self-efficacy is also an area of study for coaching psychologists. Coaching psychology also guides students, teachers and staff in effective goal-setting and goal-attainment. Additionally, coaching methods like reciprocal peer coaching (the process of teachers evaluating each other's performance) are encouraged because they cultivate support and trust among educators. Peer coaching in the classroom also provides a collaborative environment for students, which is conducive for learning. Professional ethics and regulation See also Consulting psychology Counseling psychology References External links Coaching psychology societies International Society for Coaching Psychology (ISCP) Australian Psychological Society Interest Group in Coaching Psychology (APS IGCP) British Psychological Society Special Group in Coaching Psychology (BPS SGCP) Swedish Coaching Psychology Group Society for Industrial and Organisational Psychology of South Africa Coaching Psychology Special Interest Group (SIOPSA CPSG) Society for Coaching Psychology Italy (SCP Italy) International Centre for Coaching Psychology Research Coaching psychology periodicals Coaching Psychology: The Danish Journal of Coaching Psychology Coaching Psychology International International Coaching Psychology Review The Coaching Psychologist Coaching at Work Self-Coaching Practices and Meditations The International Journal of Evidence Based Coaching & Mentoring Coaching: An International Journal of Theory, Research and Practice International Journal of Mentoring and Coaching in Education Coaching Applied psychology

Social consciousness

Social consciousness or social awareness, is collective consciousness shared by individuals within a society. Social consciousness is linked to the collective self-awareness and experience of collectively shared social identity. From this viewpoint, social consciousness denotes conscious awareness of being part of an interrelated community of others. The “we feeling” or the “sense of us” may be experienced in members of various cultures and social groups. By the experience of collectively shared social identity, individuals may experience social unity. Social consciousness may also stimulate working towards a common goal. According to Karl Marx, human beings enter into certain productive, or economic, relations and these relations lead to a form of social consciousness. Marx said: See also References Further reading Awakening to Race: Individualism and Social Consciousness in America Children's Social Consciousness and the Development of Social Responsibility Class Structure in the Social Consciousness, Volume 102 Language, ideology and social consciousness: developing a sociohistorical approach Literature, social consciousness, and polity Theology and the social consciousness: a study of the relations of the social consciousness to theology Sociological terminology Marxist terminology Marxism Historical materialism

Isolation to facilitate abuse

Isolation (physical, social or emotional) is often used to facilitate power and control over someone for an abusive purpose. This applies in many contexts such as workplace bullying, elder abuse, domestic abuse, child abuse, and cults. Isolation reduces the opportunity of the abused to be rescued or escape from the abuse. It also helps disorient the abused and makes the abused more dependent on the abuser. The degree of power and control over the abused is contingent upon the degree of their physical or emotional isolation. Isolation of the victim from the outside world is an important element of psychological control. Isolation includes controlling a person's social activity: whom they see, whom they talk to, where they go and any other method to limit their access to others. It may also include limiting what material is read. It can include insisting on knowing where they are and requiring permission for medical care. The abuser exhibits hypersensitive and reactive jealousy. Isolation can be aided by: economic abuse thus limiting the victim's actions as they may then lack the necessary resources to resist or escape from the abuse smearing or discrediting the abused amongst their community so the abused does not get help or support from others divide and conquer In cults Various isolation techniques may be used by cults: separating from family and community taking control of the handling of the victim's resources and property undoing (mind control) physical isolation extortion/dependency tactics controlling victim's access to necessities. In workplace bullying Isolation is a common element of workplace bullying. It includes preventing access to opportunities, physical or social isolation, withholding necessary information, keeping the target "out of the loop", ignoring or excluding. Workplace isolation is a defined category in the workplace power and control wheel. References Power (social and political) concepts Control (social and political) Abuse Workplace harassment and bullying Psychological abuse Domestic violence

Cognitive appraisal

Cognitive appraisal (also called simply 'appraisal') is the subjective interpretation made by an individual to stimuli in the environment. It is a component in a variety of theories relating to stress, mental health, coping, and emotion. It is most notably used in the transactional model of stress and coping, introduced in a 1984 publication by Richard Lazarus and Susan Folkman. In this theory, cognitive appraisal is defined as the way in which an individual responds to and interprets stressors in life. A variety of mental disorders have been observed as having abnormal patterns of cognitive appraisal in those affected by the disorder. Other work has detailed how personality can influence the way in which individuals cognitively appraise a situation. The reframing of stimuli and experiences, called cognitive reappraisal, has been found "one of the most effective strategies for emotion regulation." Cognitive appraisal also began to play an enormous role in the development of Economic Theory after the marginal revolution. During which, the classical objective “Labour theory of value” was displaced by the “Subjective theory of value,” where cognitive appraisals on behalf of acting agents became the basis of all price signals and exchange ratios observed in the market. Conceptualizations and theories Lazarus' transactional model of stress This model uses cognitive appraisal as a way to explain responses to stressful events. According to this theory, two distinct forms of cognitive appraisal must occur in order for an individual to feel stress in response to an event; Lazarus called these stages "primary appraisal" and "secondary appraisal". During primary appraisal, an event is interpreted as dangerous to the individual or threatening to their personal goals. During the secondary appraisal, the individual evaluates their ability or resources to be able to cope with a specific situation . Scherer's component process model The component process model proposed by Klaus Scherer utilizes cognitive appraisal to explain an individual's psychological and physiological response to situations. Scherer's model makes additions to the Lazarus’ transactional model regarding how many appraisals occur. Rather than just two levels of appraisal in response to an event (primary and secondary), Scherer's model suggests four distinct appraisals occur: (a) the direct effects or relevance that an individual perceives an event being to them (b) the consequences an event has both immediately and long-term to an individual and their goals (c) the ability an individual perceives they can cope with the consequences of an event (d) the ways in which the events are perceived to result from an individual's values and self-concept. This model and additional work by Scherer notably highlights not only psychological responses, but many physiological responses according to how events are appraised by an individual. Roseman's appraisal theory of emotions Ira Roseman utilized the concept of cognitive appraisal to build an explanatory theory that encompasses a wider range of emotions (when compared with Lazarus' transactional model). According to Roseman (1996), positive emotions result from events that an individual appraises as consistent with their motives, while negative emotions result from events that individuals appraise as inconsistent with their motives. More specific emotions are based on if the event is perceived to be as caused by others, the individual, or due to an uncontrollable circumstance. Strategies Cognitive reappraisal is one of the most studied mechanisms of the emotion regulation form referred to as cognitive change. It encompasses a variety of different strategies, such as positive reappraisal (creating and focusing on a positive aspect of the stimulus), decentering (reinterpreting an event by broadening one's perspective to see "the bigger picture"), or fictional reappraisal (adopting or emphasizing the belief that event is not real, that it is for instance "just a movie" or "just my imagination"). Practical applications The way in which stress is cognitively appraised has been found to influence mental health. Cognitive styles of perceiving the world and interpreting events have been suggested as factors that may make certain individuals more prone to depression, such as Aaron Beck's cognitive theory (1967). A variety of studies have linked panic disorder with attentional biases and catastrophization. References Psychological stress

Sociogeny

Sociogeny (French: sociogénie, from the Latin socius, i.e., "association" or "social," and the Greek γένεσις, denoting "origin") or sociogenesis is the development of a social phenomenon. That a phenomenon is sociogenetic thus indicates that it is socially produced, as opposed to ontologically given, immutable, or static. The concept was developed by Frantz Fanon in his 1952 book Black Skin, White Masks. Fanon was a Martinican writer, revolutionary, and psychoanalyst whose work focused on the pathologies and neuroses produced through European colonialism. In Black Skin, White Masks, Fanon expanded upon Freud's concepts of ontogeny and phylogeny, alongside which Fanon placed sociogeny. Freud employed ontogeny, a term borrowed from the field of biology, to describe the natural development of the individual subject; phylogeny, Freud proposed, could be used to understand the development of groups of subjects, such as families or societies. Building upon Freud's work, Fanon developed the concept of sociogeny, which he employed to articulate how socially produced phenomena, such as poverty or crime, are linked to certain population groups as if those groups were biologically or ontogenetically predisposed towards those phenomena. The conflation of sociogeny and ontogeny - i.e., the conflation of a sociogenetic phenomena with an ontogenetic or "natural" predilection - plays an important role in the social construction of race, according to Fanon. Since the time of Fanon's writing, the concept of sociogeny has been taken up by many scholars in disciplines such as sociology, psychology, Black studies, Women's studies, and Postcolonial studies. In particular, sociogeny has been a cornerstone in the thinking of Sylvia Wynter. References Sociological terminology Frantz Fanon

Bioecological model

The bioecological model of development is the mature and final revision of Urie Bronfenbrenner's ecological system theory. The primary focus of ecological systems theory is on the systemic examination of contextual variability in development processes. It focuses on the world outside the developing person and how they were affected by it. After publication of The Ecology of Human Development, Bronfenbrenner's first comprehensive statement of ecological systems theory, additional refinements were added to the theory. Whereas earlier statements of ecological systems theory focused on characteristics of the environment, the goal of the bioecological model was to explicate how characteristics of the developing person influenced the environments to which the person was exposed and how they were affected by the environment. The bioecological model is strongly influenced by Bronfenbrenner's collaborations with Stephen Ceci. Whereas much of Bronfenbrenner's work had focused on social development and the influence of social environments on development, Ceci's work focuses on memory and intelligence. The bioecological model reflects Ceci's work on contextual variability in intelligence and cognition and Bronfenbrenner's interest in developmentally instigative characteristics - how people help to create their own environments. Evolution of Bronfenbrenner's theory Bronfenbrenner's initial investigations into contextual variability in developmental processes can be seen in the 1950s in the analysis of differences in methods of parental discipline as a function of historical time and social class. It was further developed in his work on the differential effects of parental discipline on boys and girls in the 1960s and of convergence of socialization processes in the US and USSR in the 1970s. These works were expressed in the experimental variations built in the development and implementation of the HeadStart program. informally discussed new ideas concerning Ecological Systems Theory throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s during lectures and presentations to the psychological community. Bronfenbrenner published a major statement of ecological systems theory in American Psychologist, articulated it in a series of propositions and hypotheses in his most cited book, The Ecology of Human Development and further developing it in The Bioecological Model of Human Development and later writings. Bronfenbrenner's early thinking was strongly influenced by other developmentalists and social psychologists who studied developmental processes as contextually bound and dependent on the meaning of experience as defined by the developing person. One strong influence was Lev Vygotsky, a Russian psychologist who emphasized recognized that learning always occurs and cannot be separated from a social context. A second influence was Kurt Lewin, a German forerunner of ecological systems models who focused on a person's psychological activities that occur within a kind of psychological field, including all the events in the past, present, and future that shape and affect an individual. The centrality of the person's interpretation of their environment and phenomenological nature was built on the work of Thomas & Thomas: “(i)f men define situations as real they are real in their consequences”. Bronfenbrenner was also influenced by his colleague, Stephen J. Ceci, with whom he co-authored the article “Nature-nurture reconceptualized in developmental perspective: A bioecological theory” in 1994. Ceci is a developmental psychologist who redefined modern developmental psychology's approach to intellectual development. He focused on predicting a pattern of associations among ecological, genetic, and cognitive variables as a function of proximal processes. Together, Bronfenbrenner and Ceci published the beginnings of the bioecological model and made it an accessible framework to use in understanding developmental processes. History The history of bioecological systems theory is divided into two periods. The first period resulted in the publication of Bronfenbrenner's theory of ecological systems theory, titled The Ecology of Human Development, in 1979. Bronfenbrenner described the second period as a time of criticism and evaluation of his original work. The development of ecological systems theory arose because Bronfenbrenner noted a lack of focus on the role of context in terms of development. He argued the environment in which children operate is important because development may be shaped by their interactions with the specific environment. He urged his colleagues to study development in terms of ecological contexts, that is the normal environments of children (schools, homes, daycares). Researchers heeded his advice and a great deal of research flourished in the early 1980s that focused on context. However, where prior research was ignoring context, Bronfenbrenner felt current research focused too much on context and ignored development. In his justification for a new theory, Bronfenbrenner wrote he was not pleased with the direction of research in the mid 1980s and that he felt there were other realms of development that were overlooked. In comparison to the original theory, bioecological systems theory adds more emphasis to the person in the context of development. Additionally, Bronfenbrenner chose to leave out key features of the ecological systems theory (e.g., ecological validity and ecological experiments) during his development of bioecological systems theory. As a whole, Bronfenbrenner's new theory continued to go through a series of transformations as he continuously analyzed different factors in human development. Critical components of bioecological systems theory did not emerge all at once. Instead, his ideas evolved and adapted to the research and ideas of the times. For example, the role of proximal processes, which is now recognized as a key feature of bioecological systems theory, did not emerge until the 1990s. This theory went through a series of transformations and elaborations until 2005 when Bronfenbrenner died. Process–Person–Context–Time Bronfenbrenner further developed the model by adding the chronosystem, which refers to how the person and environments change over time. He also placed a greater emphasis on processes and the role of the biological person. The Process–Person–Context–Time Model (PPCT) has since become the bedrock of the bioecological model. PPCT includes four concepts. The interactions between the concepts form the basis for the theory. 1. Process – Bronfenbrenner viewed proximal processes as the primary mechanism for development, featuring them in two central propositions of the bioecological model. Proposition 1: [H]uman development takes place through processes of progressively more complex reciprocal interaction between an active, evolving biopsychological human organism and the persons, objects, and symbols in its immediate external environment. To be effective, the interaction must occur on a fairly regular basis over extended periods of time. Such enduring forms of interaction in the immediate environment are referred to as proximal processes. Proximal processes are the development processes of systematic interaction between person and environment. Bronfenbrenner identifies group and solitary activities such as playing with other children or reading as mechanisms through which children come to understand their world and formulate ideas about their place within it. However, processes function differently depending on the person and the context. Proposition 2: The form, power, content, and direction of the proximal processes effecting development vary systematically as a joint function of the characteristics of the developing person; of the environment—both immediate and more remote—in which the processes are taking place; the nature of the developmental outcomes under consideration; and the social continuities and changes occurring over time through the life course and the historical period during which the person has lived. 2. Person – Bronfenbrenner acknowledged the role that personal characteristics of individuals play in social interactions. He identified three personal characteristics that can significantly influence proximal processes across the lifespan. Demand characteristics such as age, gender or physical appearance set processes in motion, acting as “personal stimulus” characteristics. Resource characteristics are not as immediately recognizable and include mental and emotional resources such as past experiences, intelligence, and skills as well as material resources such as access to housing, education, and responsive caregivers. Force characteristics are related to variations in motivation, persistence and temperament. Bronfenbrenner notes that even when children have equivalent access to resources, their developmental courses may differ as a function of characteristics such as drive to succeed and persistence in the face of hardship. In doing this, Bronfenbrenner provides a rationale for how environments (i.e., the systems mentioned above under “The Original Model: Ecological Systems Theory”) influence personal characteristics, yet also suggests personal characteristics can change environments. 3. Context – Context involves five interconnected systems, which are based on Bronfenbrenner’s original model, ecological systems theory. The microsystem describes environments such as home or school in which children spend significant time interacting. Mesosystems are interrelations between microsystems. The exosystem describes events that have important indirect influence on development (e.g., a parent consistently working late). The macrosystem is a feature of any group (culture, subculture) that share values and belief systems. The chronosystem describes historical circumstances that affect contexts at all other levels. 4. Time – Time has a prominent place in this developmental model. It is constituted at three levels: micro, meso, and macro. Micro-time refers to what is happening during specific episodes of proximal processes. Meso-time refers to the extent to which the processes occur in the person’s environment, such as over the course of days, weeks or years. Macro-time (or the chronosystem) focuses on the shifting expectancies in wider culture. This functions both within and across generations and affects proximal processes across the lifespan. Thus, the bioecological model highlights the importance of understanding a person's development within environmental systems. It further explains that both the person and the environment affect one another bidirectionally. Although even Bronfenbrenner himself critiqued the falsifiability of the model, the bioecological model has real world applications for developmental research, practice, and policies (as demonstrated below). Research implications In addition to adding to the theoretical understanding of human development, the bioecological model lends itself to changes in the conceptualization of the research endeavor. In some of his earliest comments on the state of developmental research, Bronfenbrenner lamented that developmental research concerned itself with studying “strange behavior of children in strange situations for the briefest possible period of time”. He proposed, rather, that developmental science should take as its goal a study of children in context in order to best determine which processes are naturally “developmentally generative” (promote development) and which are naturally “developmentally disruptive” (prevent development). Bronfenbrenner set up a contrast to the traditional “confirmatory” approach to hypothesis testing (in which research is done to “confirm” that a hypothesis is correct or incorrect) when specifying the types of research needed to support the bioecological model of development. In Bronfenbrenner's view, the dynamic nature of the model calls for “primarily generative” research designs that explore interactions between proximal processes (see Proposition 1) and the developing person, environment, time, and developmental outcome (Proposition 2). Bronfenbrenner called this type of research the “discovery mode” of developmental science. To best capture such dynamic processes, developmental research designs would ideally be longitudinal (over time), rather than cross-sectional (a single point in time), and conducted in children's natural environments, rather than a laboratory. Such designs would thus occur in schools, homes, day-care centers, and other environments in which proximal processes are most likely to occur. The bioecological model also proposes that the most scientifically rich studies would include more than one distinct but theoretically related proximal process in the same design. Indeed, studies that claim to be based upon bioecological theory should include elements of process, person, context, and time, and should include explicit explanation and acknowledgement if one of the elements is lacking. Based on the interactions of proposed elements of the PPCT model, appropriate statistical analyses of PPCT data would likely include explorations of mediation and moderation effects, as well as multilevel modeling of data to account for the nesting of different components of the model. Moreover, research that includes both genetic and environmental components would capture even more of the bioecological model's elements. Ecological techno-subsystem The ecological systems theory emerged before the advent of Internet revolution and the developmental influence of then available technology (e.g., television) was conceptually situated in the child's microsystem. Johnson and Puplampu, for instance, proposed in 2008 the ecological techno-subsystem, a dimension of the microsystem. This microsystem comprises both child interaction with living (e.g., peers, parents, teachers) and non-living (e.g., hardware, gadgets) elements of communication, information, and recreation technologies in immediate or direct environments. Johnson published a validation study in 2010. Neo-ecological Theory Whereas the theory of the techno-subsystem merely highlights the influence that digital technologies have on the development of an individual within the microsystem, Navarro and Tudge argue that the virtual world be given its own consideration throughout the Bioecological model. They suggest two key modifications as a way to incorporate Bonfenbrenner's theory into our technologized world: The microsystem should be delineated to include distinct forms in which an individual lives: physical microsystem and virtual microsystem. The role of the macrosystem, specifically the cultural influence of digital technology, should be emphasized in understanding human development. See also Ecological systems theory Diathesis-stress model References Genetics Developmental psychology Systems psychology

Mean world syndrome

Mean world syndrome is a proposed cognitive bias wherein people may perceive the world to be more dangerous than it is. This is due to long-term moderate to heavy exposure to violence-related content in mass media. In the early stages of research, mean world syndrome was only discussed as an effect of watching television. However, it became clear that social media platforms also play a major role in the spread of mean world syndrome. Proponents of the syndrome, coined by communications professor George Gerbner in the 1970s, assert that viewers who are exposed to violence-related content can experience increased fear, anxiety, pessimism, and a heightened state of alert in response to perceived threats. Through the study of mean world syndrome, it was found that media of all sorts has the power to directly influence and inform people's attitudes, beliefs, and opinions about the world. History The term mean world syndrome was coined by U.S. communications professor George Gerbner, whose life's work explored the effects of television on viewers, particularly violent media. Cultural Indicators Project and cultivation theory In 1968, Gerbner established the Cultural Indicators Project (CIP), which was a pioneering analysis of the influence of television on people's attitudes and perceptions of the world. Gerbner held a database of more than 3,000 television programs and 35,000 characters which documented the trends in television content and how these changes affect viewers' perceptions of the world. The CIP would notably be used to analyze Gerbner's cultivation theory, which suggests that exposure to media over time, "cultivates" viewers' perceptions of reality through images and ideological messages viewed on primetime or popular television. This content heavily influences the perception of events and thus can skew one's perception of the real world. Cultivation theory asserts that "the more time people spend 'living' in the television world, the more likely they are to believe social reality aligns with reality portrayed on television." In 1968, Gerbner conducted a survey to validate cultivation theory and his hypothesis that watching extensive TV affects the attitudes and beliefs of an individual toward the world. Categorizing survey respondents into three groups—"light viewers" (less than 2 hours a day), "medium viewers" (2–4 hours a day), and "heavy viewers" (more than 4 hours a day)—Gerbner found that the latter group held beliefs and opinions similar to those portrayed on television rather than ones based in real-world circumstances, demonstrating the compound effect of media influence. These "heavy viewers" experienced shyness, loneliness, and depression much more than those who did not watch television or did not watch it nearly as much. Accordingly, cultivation theory laid the theoretical groundwork for the mean world syndrome, which Gerbner defined in the CIP. It is the phenomenon in which people who watch moderate to large amounts of television are more likely to perceive the world as a dangerous and frightening place. Research findings The findings of the Cultural Indicators Project confirmed several aspects of Gerbner's hypotheses. Gerbner found a direct correlation between the amount of television an individual watches and the amount of fear that same individual tends to have about being victimized in everyday life. That is, people who watched moderate to high levels of television perceived the world to be a more intimidating and unforgiving place than viewers who watched less television. Furthermore, viewers who consumed television at a higher rate also believed that greater protection by law enforcement is needed and reported that most people "cannot be trusted" and are "just looking out for themselves". These findings amplified Gerbner's concerns about exposure to media violence. He stated, "The consequence of regular or heavy viewing of television is a normalization of unhealthy and violent behavior. It is a cultivation that the concept [of violence] is normal and accepted in society." Gerbner was particularly concerned about the impact violent media was having on children. During the CIP, Gerbner found that children had seen about 8,000 murders on television by the end of elementary school, and about 200,000 violent acts by the age of 18. Gerber stated.Our studies have shown that growing up from infancy with this unprecedented diet of violence has three consequences, which, in combination, I call the 'mean world syndrome'. What this means is that if you are growing up in a home where there is more than say three hours of television per day, for all practical purposes you live in a meaner world - and act accordingly - than your next-door neighbor who lives in the same world but watches less television. The programming reinforces the worst fears and apprehensions and paranoia of people. In 1981, Gerbner took his findings and testified before a congressional subcommittee about the damage he believed violent media was inflicting on Americans, particularly children. "Fearful people are more dependent, more easily manipulated and controlled, more susceptible to deceptively simple, strong, tough measures and hard-line measures," he explained. Since then, hundreds of studies and countless congressional hearings have looked at the issue of media violence and the same conclusion is always drawn—television can propagate violent conduct and skew people's perceptions of violence and crime. The Mean World Index The findings of the cultivation theory study led Gerbner and Larry Gross to further develop it in 1976 using findings from their other large-scale research projects. Believing that those "who tell the stories of a culture really govern human behavior," Gerbner claimed that a major cultural shift was taking place, wherein those storytellers "used to be the parent, the school, the church, the community," but are now "a handful of global conglomerates that have nothing to tell, but a great deal to sell." Using the theory, Gerbner would explore the effects of TV violence-related content on the attitudes and beliefs of an individual about crime and violence in the world, which he dubbed "The Mean World Index". Since TV was becoming an ever-increasing presence in the average American household and the amount of violence on TV was growing exponentially, Gerbner conducted several large-scale studies that upheld his hypothesis: those who watched moderate to large amounts of TV believed the world to be a more dangerous place. Later research Since the 1970s, numerous studies have corroborated Gerbner's findings that moderate-to-heavy viewing of violence-related content on TV increased depression, fear, anxiety, anger, pessimism, post-traumatic stress, and substance use. In 2009, the American Academy of Pediatrics released a policy statement on media violence which concluded that "extensive research evidence indicates that media violence can contribute to aggressive behavior, desensitization to violence, nightmares, and fear of being harmed." A study conducted in 2018 by researchers at the University of Oklahoma found that there is "good evidence establishing a relationship between disaster television viewing and various psychological outcomes." In 2022, another research article was published by students in the Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy, and Early Intervention at the Medical University of Lublin, Poland in which the researchers assessed connections between binge-watching different types of media and sociological phenomena. Researchers found that when binge-watching media, different types of violent media impacted how the viewer saw the world. Evolution of mass media Although the focus of Gerbner's research was television viewing, cultivation theory has been validated in studies exploring different forms of media, such as newspapers, film, and even photographs, essentially in any context social observation occurs in any form outside of one's natural environment. Gerbner's research focused on TV, as social media was just blossoming in 2006 when he died. However, increasingly, researchers are expanding their assessments of mass media, specifically looking at the effects of social media as well as television. Research continues to explore the effects of violence-related content on heavy TV consumers but has also branched out to explore the role that social media is playing in consumption of violent content. In society, there is an increase in the similarity of questions being asked about the impact of social media on our emotions and perceptions of the world. Although it is too new to draw definitive conclusions, a growing body of literature suggests that social media can have similar psychological effects to that of television providing further support for Gerbner's theory. Jean Kim, a psychiatrist for the U.S. State Department, said that social media "is not as visceral as seeing an event on television…but if you're overly getting caught up in troll wars or controversy online, you might be getting a skewed view and be prone to being directly affected." COVID-19 and mean world syndrome Beginning in 2019, the COVID-19 pandemic spread across the world, causing extreme social disruption. The pandemic led individuals to spend more time inside and online, consuming countless different forms of media content. Gaining popularity on Twitter in 2020 at the peak of the pandemic, the term "doomscrolling" emerged to describe the act of excessively consuming negative content on social media. During the pandemic, in order to stay up to date and close the information gap regarding COVID-19, many people engaged heavily in the act of doomscrolling. According to a study conducted in 2021, even minimal exposure to negative COVID-19 news led to an immediate decline in optimism and positive emotions for participants. Social movements such as the Black Lives Matter movement inspired new studies connecting mean world syndrome, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Black Lives Matter movement. One study done in 2020 found that feelings of anxiety were tied to violent or troublesome news media on the Black Lives Matter movement. The Mean World Syndrome documentary In 2010, the Media Education Foundation filmed a documentary titled The Mean World Syndrome: Media Violence & the Cultivation of Fear summarizing the work of Gerbner and others about the effects of violent media on people's opinions, attitudes, and beliefs. The documentary features Gerbner himself speaking about his research on violence in media and the effects this has had on the American public since the addition of sound to television in the 1930s. The film is narrated by Michael Morgan who worked closely with Gerbner on his research about cultivation theory and mean world syndrome. See also Appeal to fear Availability heuristic Crime rate Cultivation theory Culture of fear Cognitive bias Deviancy amplification spiral Doomscrolling Fascination with death Fear, uncertainty and doubt For the children (politics) Just-world fallacy Negativity bias Sensationalism References 1970s neologisms Cognitive biases Communication theory Fear Media bias Media studies Syndromes Television controversies

Grief counseling

Grief counseling is a form of psychotherapy that aims to help people cope with the physical, emotional, social, spiritual, and cognitive responses to loss. These experiences are commonly thought to be brought on by a loved person's death, but may more broadly be understood as shaped by any significant life-altering loss (e.g., divorce, home foreclosure, or job loss). Grief counselors believe that everyone experiences and expresses grief in personally unique ways that are shaped by family background, culture, life experiences, personal values, and intrinsic beliefs. They believe that it is not uncommon for a person to withdraw from their friends and family and feel helpless; some might be angry and want to take action. Some may laugh while others experience strong regrets or guilt. Tears or the lack of crying can both be seen as appropriate expressions of grief. Grief counselors know that one can expect a wide range of emotion and behavior associated with grief. Some counselors believe that in virtually all places and cultures, the grieving person benefits from the support of others. Further, grief counselors believe that where such support is lacking, counseling may provide an avenue for healthy resolution. Grief counselors also believe that where the process of grieving is interrupted, for example, by the one who is grieving having to simultaneously deal with practical issues of survival or by their having to be the strong one who is striving to hold their family together, grief can remain unresolved and later resurface as an issue for counseling. Counseling Grief counseling is commonly recommended for individuals who experience difficulties dealing with a personally significant loss. Grief counseling facilitates expression of emotion and thought about the loss, including their feeling sad, anxious, angry, lonely, guilty, relieved, isolated, confused etc. Grief counseling facilitates the process of coming to terms with the loss that the individual has experienced, and processing through the natural progression of feelings that might come with different stages of coping with the loss. Grief counselling sessions also encompass segments on increasing an individual's personal and social resources to cope better with grief. There are considerable resources online covering grief or loss counseling such as the Grief Counseling Resource Guide from the New York State Office of Mental Health. Types of grief There are various types of grief that individuals might go through. The most commonly seen types of grief fall into these four categories: Anticipatory grief Anticipatory grief refers to a sense of loss before the actual occurrence of loss. This can occur when a loved one has a terminal illness, or one is personally being diagnosed with a chronic illness, or when one faces the imminent loss of some human function. Normal grief Normal grief is the natural experience of loss and emotions accompanies the death of a loved one, and usually subsides in intensity over time. Normal grief is usually accompanied by the symptoms of a depressed mood, sleep disturbances, and crying. Complicated grief Grief that is prolonged and resultant in severe behavioral concerns such as suicidal ideation, addictions, risk-taking behavior, or displaying symptoms of mental health concerns. Research shows up to 10% of bereaved adults may experience prolonged grief. In these situations, more in-depth counseling and psychotherapy would be important in helping the individual recover from the traumatic loss. Disenfranchised grief Disenfranchised grief is grief that is not made known to, or not recognized by, others. An example could be the case of an extramarital lover whose lover passed on. In these cases, the grieving process is compromised as they are unable to process through this grief with others and receive the social support they need to overcome their grief. Theories on the grief cycle Joanne Jozefowski in 1999 through The Phoenix Phenomenon: Rising from the Ashes of Grief summarizes five stages to rebuild a shattered life: Impact: shock, denial, anxiety, fear, and panic. Chaos: confusion, disbelief, actions out of control, irrational thoughts and feelings, feeling despair, feeling helpless, desperate searching, losing track of time, difficulty sleeping and eating, obsessive focus on the loved one and their possessions, agony from imagining their physical harm, shattered beliefs. Adapting: bringing order back into daily life while you continue to grieve: take care of basic needs (personal grooming, shopping, cooking, cleaning, paying bills), learn to live without the loved one, accept help, focus on helping children cope, connect with other grieving families for mutual support, take control of grieving so that grief does not control you, slowly accept the new reality. Equilibrium: attaining stability and routines: reestablish a life that works alright, enjoy pleasant activities with family members and good times with friends, do productive work, choose a positive new direction in life while honoring the past, learn how to handle people who ask questions about what you've been through. Transformation: rethinking your purpose in life and the basis for your identity; looking for meaning in tragic, senseless loss; allowing yourself to have both painful and positive feelings about your loss and become able to choose which feelings you focus on; allowing yourself to discover that your struggle has led you to develop a stronger, better version of yourself than you expected could exist; learning how to talk with others about your heroic healing journey without exposing them to your pain; becoming supportive of others trying to deal with their losses. The most commonly acknowledged and cited grief model is the Five Stages of Grief by Dr. Elizabeth Kübler-Ross, which posits that individuals who experience grief tend to go through a cycle of these five stages: Denial – Arises as a result of the shock experienced by individuals, and can manifest in the form of numbness, nonchalence, or avoidance. This is a survival instinct of the mind to help individuals pace out the emotional impact that the loss has on the individual. Anger – After the reality of the individual's death has set in, anger sets in as well, as individuals starts placing the blame on others or themselves. They might also question their religion. Bargaining – At the stage, individuals might begin to ask many "If Only" and "What If" questions, imagining what could have been, should surrounding circumstances be different. Depression – This stage is when sadness and feelings of hopelessness sets in, as one realises the irreversibility of death. The emptiness experienced as a result of the gap that is left when the loved one passed on becomes apparent, and the grieving individual questions whether he/she would be able to live a happy life without the deceased. A common question asked at this point is, "Is there really a point in living?". It is important, however, to note that depression in this context does not refer to the mental disorder but rather strong feelings of sadness and hopelessness. Acceptance – After some time, the individual might adjust to life without the deceased. At this point, the individual might make the conclusion that this is a reality that he/she would have to manage, and make an effort to engage in new hobbies, activities, or create new memories with other friends and family members who are good emotional support to the grieving person. Grief therapy There is a distinction between grief counseling and grief therapy. Counseling involves helping people move through uncomplicated, or normal, grief to health and resolution. Grief therapy involves the use of clinical tools for traumatic or complicated grief reactions. This could occur where the grief reaction is prolonged or manifests itself through some bodily or behavioral symptom, or by a grief response outside the range of cultural or psychiatrically defined normality. Grief therapy is a kind of psychotherapy used to treat severe or complicated traumatic grief reactions, which are usually brought on by the loss of a close person (by separation or death) or by community disaster. The goal of grief therapy is to identify and solve the psychological and emotional problems which appeared as a consequence. They may appear as behavioral or physical changes, psychosomatic disturbances, delayed or extreme mourning, conflictual problems or sudden and unexpected mourning. Grief therapy may be available as individual or group therapy. A common area where grief therapy has been extensively applied is with the parents of cancer patients. Controversies Efficacy and iatrogenesis At present (as of 2008), a controversy exists in the scholarly literature regarding grief therapy's relative efficacy and the possible harm from it (iatrogenesis). Researchers have suggested that people may resort to receiving grief therapy in the absence of complicated (or abnormal) grief reactions and that, in such cases, grief therapy may cause a normal bereavement response to turn pathological. Others have argued that grief therapy is highly effective for people who suffer from unusually prolonged and complicated responses to bereavement. In March 2007, an article in the APS journal, Perspectives on Psychological Science, included grief counseling and grief therapy on a list of treatments with the potential to cause harm to clients. In particular, individuals experiencing "relatively normal bereavement reactions" were said to be at risk of a worse outcome (i.e., an abnormally prolonged or difficult grieving process) after receiving grief counseling. The APS journal article in turn has been criticized in the British Psychological Society's publication the psychologist as lacking scientific rigour. Validity of "complicated grief" Some mental health professionals have questioned whether complicated grief exists. New diagnostic criteria for "complicated grief" have been proposed for the new DSM, the DSM-V. One argument against creating a classification for "complicated grief" holds that it is not a unique mental disorder. Rather it is a combination of other mental disorders, such as depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, and personality disorders. Empirical studies have been attempting to convincingly establish the incremental validity of complicated grief. In 2007, George Bonanno and colleagues published a paper describing a study that supports the incremental validity of complicated grief. The paper cautions, "the question of how complicated grief symptoms might be organized diagnostically is still very much open to debate." As this is a current debate in the field, new research on this topic is likely to appear in the scientific literature. Trauma counseling Anticipating the impact of loss or trauma (to the extent than anyone can), and during and after the events of loss or trauma, each person has unique emotional experiences and ways of coping, of grieving and of reacting or not. Sudden, violent or unexpected loss or trauma imposes additional strains on coping. When a community is affected such as by disaster both the cost and sometimes the supports are greater. Weeping, painful feelings of sadness, anger, shock, guilt, helplessness and outrage are not uncommon. These are particularly challenging times for children who may have had little experience managing strong affects within themselves or in their family. These feelings are all part of a natural healing process that draws on the resilience of the person, family and community. Time and the comfort and support of understanding loved ones and once strangers who come to their aid, supports people healing in their own time and their own way. Research shows that resilience is ordinary rather than extraordinary. The majority of people who survive loss and trauma do not go on to develop PTSD. However, some remain overwhelmed and trapped in their fight-or-flight state. This article addresses counseling with complex grief and trauma, not only complex post-traumatic stress disorder but those conditions of traumatic loss and psychological trauma that for a number of reasons are enduring or disabling. For example, where an adult is periodically immobilized by unwelcome and intrusive recall of the sudden and violent death of a parent in their childhood. The post-trauma self Because of the interconnectedness of trauma, PTSD, human development, resiliency and the integration of the self, counseling of the complex traumatic aftermath of a violent death in the family, for example, require an integrative approach, using a variety of skills and techniques to best fit the presentation of the problem. The post-traumatic self may not be the same person as before. Personality changes due to the effects of trauma can be the source of intense shame, secondary shocks after the event and of grief for the lost unaltered self, which impacts on family and work. Counseling in these circumstances is designed to maximize safety, trauma processing, and reintegration regardless of the specific treatment approach. Post-trauma individuals must have space to safely face and process the event. There is no specific treatment approach for each individual, but processing and reintegration must be the focus. See also References Sources Hammerschlag, Carl A. The Dancing Healers. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1988. Staudacher, Carol. A Time to Grieve: Mediations for Healing after the Death of a Loved One. San Francisco: Harper San Francisco, 1994. Further reading Yarbrough, Julie (2015). Grief Light: Reflections on Grief. . Counseling Death customs Grief Psychotherapy by type

Course (education)

In higher education, a course is a unit of teaching that typically lasts one academic term, is led by one or more instructors (teachers or professors), and has a fixed roster of students. A course usually covers an individual subject. Courses generally have a fixed program of sessions every week during the term, called lessons or classes. Students may receive a grade and academic credit after completion of the course. Courses can either be compulsory material or "elective". An elective is usually not a required course, but there are a certain number of non-specific electives that are required for certain majors. The entire collection of courses required to complete an academic degree is called a program (or programme) of studies. The term is used in various countries, such as Vietnam, Canada, Nigeria, and the United States. In India, the United Kingdom, Australia and Singapore, as well as parts of Canada, the word "unit" or "module" would be used to refer to an academic course as used in North America and the rest of Europe. In the Philippines, a course can be an individual subject (usually referred to by faculty and school officials) or the entire programme (usually referred to by students and outsiders). Types of courses Courses are made up of individual sessions, typically on a fixed weekly schedule. There are different formats of course in universities: the lecture course, where the instructor gives lectures with minimal interaction; the seminar, where students prepare and present their original written work for discussion and critique; the colloquium or reading course, where the instructor assigns readings for each session which are then discussed by the members; the tutorial course, where one or a small number of students work on a topic and meet with the instructor weekly for discussion and guidance. the Directed Individual Study course, where a student requests to create and title an area of study for themselves which is more concentrated and in-depth than a standard course. It is directed under a tenured faculty member and approved by a department chair or possibly the dean within that specific college; the laboratory course, where most work takes place in a laboratory. Many courses combine these formats. Lecture courses often include weekly discussion sections with smaller groups of students led by the principal instructor, another instructor, or teaching assistant. Laboratory courses often combine lectures, discussion sections, and laboratory sessions. Students are expected to do various kinds of work for a course: Attending course sessions. Reading and studying course readings assigned in the course syllabus. Discussing material they have read. Writing short and long papers based on assigned reading and their own library research. Completing homework or problem sets. Completing laboratory exercises. Taking quizzes and examinations. The exact work required depends on the discipline, the course, and the particular instructor. Unlike most European university courses, grades are generally determined by all of these kinds of work, not only the final examination. Elective and required courses An elective course is one chosen by a student from a number of optional subjects or courses in a curriculum, as opposed to a required course which the student must take. While required courses (sometimes called "core courses" or "general education courses") are deemed essential for an academic degree, elective courses tend to be more specialized. Elective courses usually have fewer students than the required courses. The term elective is also used for a period of medical study conducted away from the student's home medical school, often abroad. Motivations for choosing such a program include a wish to experience other cultures and to learn how to work in the clinical situations in other countries. Typically, North American universities require students to achieve both breadth of knowledge across disciplines and depth of knowledge in a particular chosen subject area, known as a major. Thus, students of the Arts or Humanities are required to take some science courses, and vice versa. Normally, students are free to choose their particular electives from among a wide range of courses offered by their university, as long as the students possess the prerequisite knowledge to understand the subject matter being taught. An English major, for example, might also study one or two years of chemistry, biology or physics as well as mathematics and a foreign language. Elective courses are also offered in the third and fourth years of university, though the choice is more restrictive and will depend upon the particular major the student has chosen. For example, at the University of British Columbia, students intending to specialize in Sanskrit as part of a major in Asian language and culture will usually have to complete several Sanskrit and Hindustani or Punjabi courses during the first two years of university, as well as additional courses in other languages of India in the third and fourth years of study. In addition to these required courses, however, students would choose among several third- and fourth-year elective courses on topics not directly related to India, such as the history and culture of China, Japan or Indonesia. US course numbering system In the United States, most colleges and universities use a course numbering system where each course is identified by the name of the major (or an abbreviation thereof) followed by a 3- or 4-digit number − for example, "French 213" (pronounced "two thirteen") or "CS 123" (pronounced "one twenty-three"). This common numbering system began to be used in the 1920s and was designed to make transfer between colleges easier. In theory, any numbered course in one academic institution should bring a student to the same standard as a similarly numbered course at other institutions. However, this is not a strict rule, and each institution is free to choose its own course numbers. Other countries may use very different numbering schemes or even no numbering system at all. In general, the equivalence between courses at different universities must be established by comparing their stated contents. The first digit of the course number usually designates its level, or relative difficulty, of the course, and may roughly correspond the year of study in which the course is likely to be taken (e. g. 1 for freshman, 2 for sophomore, 3 for junior, 4 for senior in undergraduate courses, and 5 and above for graduate courses). Correspondingly, "a 200-level course" (pronounced "two hundred") would mean a sophomore-level course. The attribution of digits other than the first is even less standardized, but in general, sequences of related courses tend to have consecutive numbers, indicating prerequisites or recommended sequence. So, for instance, a college may not allow students to enroll in English 201 before they have passed English 101 and 102. It is common for the middle digit(s) to indicate the subfield in the department within which the course is offered − for example, in a Physics department, all courses numbered "PHYS 47xx" may be about magnetism, while all "PHYS 48xx" courses may be about optics. The course number 101 (pronounced "one oh one") is often used for a first or introductory course in a particular topic. This number appears to have been first used by the University of Buffalo in 1929. It eventually gave the US slang term "101" used to designate elementary knowledge in any subject, academic or not; as in "boiling potatoes is cooking 101". There is a record of usage in this generic sense in 1986. The University of Northern Iowa changed its course numbering system from 3 digits to 4 digits at the start of the fall 2011 semester. The University of Northern Iowa offers classes up to 7999. The College of William and Mary uses 5 digits for course reference numbers (CRNs). The CRN's first digit is 2 for a spring class, 3 for a summer class, and 1 for a fall class. Sometimes the same course is taught by different faculty and/or at different times. In this case, a section number is used to differentiate between the different classes. See also Course allocation Course credit References External links Curricula

Diagnosis

Diagnosis (: diagnoses) is the identification of the nature and cause of a certain phenomenon. Diagnosis is used in many different disciplines, with variations in the use of logic, analytics, and experience, to determine "cause and effect". In systems engineering and computer science, it is typically used to determine the causes of symptoms, mitigations, and solutions. Computer science and networking Bayesian network Complex event processing Diagnosis (artificial intelligence) Event correlation Fault management Fault tree analysis Grey problem RPR problem diagnosis Remote diagnostics Root cause analysis Troubleshooting Unified Diagnostic Services Mathematics and logic Bayesian probability Block Hackam's dictum Occam's razor Regression diagnostics Sutton's law Medicine Medical diagnosis Molecular diagnostics Methods CDR computerized assessment system Computer-aided diagnosis Differential diagnosis Retrospective diagnosis Tools DELTA (taxonomy) DXplain List of diagnostic classification and rating scales used in psychiatry Organizational development Organizational diagnostics Systems engineering Five whys Eight disciplines problem solving Fault detection and isolation Problem solving References External links Medical terminology

Ego-state therapy

Ego state therapy is a parts-based psychodynamic approach to treat various behavioural and cognitive problems within a person. It uses techniques that are common in group and family therapy, but with an individual patient, to resolve conflicts that manifest in a "family of self" within a single individual. History The concept of segmentation of personality has been around for many years, and that of ego states was highlighted by the psychoanalyst Paul Federn. The creation of ego-state therapy is attributed to John G. Watkins, an analysand of Edoardo Weiss who was himself analysed by Federn. The first research on the efficacy of Ego state therapy was conducted by Gordon Emmerson. Emmerson conducted his research during a sabbatical from Victoria University. In this research he showed that the therapy could reduce menstrual migraines 5-fold in just 4 weekly sessions. It further indicated that Ego state therapy could not only reduce the occurrence to menstrual migraine, but participants also showed a significant reduction in both Anger and Depression on the MMPI-2. This quasi-experimental study was the only causal study included in the Watkins, book, Ego States: Theory and Therapy. Ego states Distinct ego states—in the most rigorous sense—do not normally develop except in cases of dissociative identity disorder. However, Ego state therapy identifies and names facets of a patient's personality, e.g., the "frightened child" or "control freak". After the characteristics and function of each ego state are identified, the therapist uses various psychotherapeutic techniques (e.g. behavioral, cognitive, analytic, or humanistic therapies) to achieve a kind of integration or internal diplomacy. Ego state therapy may use hypnosis, but is not necessarily required to do so, employing conversational technique instead. Psychological process In the development of the human personality, there are two processes that are essential: integration and differentiation. Through integration a person learns to put concepts together, like a shirt and a pair of trousers, to build more complex units known as clothes. By differentiation the person separates general concepts into specific meaning, such as the differences between a comfortable shirt and an uncomfortable shirt. Such differentiation allows humans to experience one set of behaviours in a different situation to another. Psychological processes do not exist on an either/or basis. Things such as moods and emotions like depression, anxiety, and fear exist on a continuum with differing degrees of intensity. It is the same with differentiation-dissociation. Disorders such as dissociative identity disorder are often in the extreme end of the continuum that begins with normal differentiation. It is a matter of intensity. Therefore, the general principle of personality formation in which the process of separation has resulted in discrete segments, called ego states, with boundaries that are more or less permeable. Where however an ego state is a response to psychological trauma, it may remain completely walled-off from the rest of the personality. Ego states exist as a collection of perceptions, cognitions and affects in organised clusters. An ego state may be defined as an organized system of behavior and experience, whose elements are bound together by common principle. When one of these states is invested with ego energy, it becomes "the self" in the here and now. This state is executive, and experiences the other states which are then invested with object energy. Ego states vary in their volume. A large ego state may include all the various behaviors activated in one's occupation. A small ego state are the behaviours one experiences in a simple action, such as using a mobile phone. They may represent current modes of behavior and experiences or, as with hypnotic age regression, include many memories, postures, feelings, etc. that were apparently learned at an earlier age. They may be organised into different dimensions. For example, an ego state may be built around the age of 10. Another one may represent patterns of behavior toward a father or authority figures and thus overlap with experiences from the age of 10. Behaviors to accomplish a similar goal may be uniquely different from one ego state to another, especially in true multiple personalities. See also References Family therapy Ego psychology

Self-realization

Self-realization is a term used in Western philosophy, psychology, and spirituality; and in Indian religions. In the Western understanding, it is the "fulfillment by oneself of the possibilities of one's character or personality" (see also self-actualization). In Jainism, self realization is called Samyak darshan (meaning right perception) in which a person attains extrasensory and thoughtless blissful experience of the soul. In the Hindu understanding, self-realization is liberating knowledge of the true self, either as the permanent undying Purusha or witness-consciousness, which is atman (essence), or as the absence (sunyata) of such a permanent self. Western understanding Merriam Webster's dictionary defines self-realization as: In the Western world "self-realization" has gained great popularity. Influential in this popularity were psycho-analysis, humanistic psychology, the growing acquaintance with Eastern religions, and the growing popularity of Western esotericism. Psychoanalysis Though Sigmund Freud was skeptical of religion and esotericism, his theories have had a lasting influence on Western thought and self-understanding. His notion of repressed memories, though based on assumptions that some later thinkers have questioned, has become part of mainstream thought. Freud's ideas were further developed by his students and neo-psychoanalysts. Carl Jung, Erik Erikson, Karen Horney and Donald Winnicott have been especially important in the Western understanding of the self, though alternative theories have also been developed by others. Jung developed the notion of individuation, the lifelong process in which the center of psychological life shifts from the ego to the self. Erikson described human development throughout one's lifespan in his theory of psychosocial development. Winnicott developed the notion of the true self, while Horney had two views of our self: the "real self" and the "ideal self". Gerda Boyesen, the founder of biodynamic psychology, developed her salutogenic view on the primary personality and the secondary personality. Roberto Assagioli developed his approach of psychosynthesis, an original approach to psychology. Assagioli's original approach is one that is dynamic and continuous, rather than one that can be reached at a "final destination" or completed. Indian religious perspectives Jainism Jain philosophy is one of the oldest world philosophies that separates body (matter) from the soul (consciousness) completely. Individual conscience and individual consciousness are central in the Jain philosophy. Self-realization is one of the major pre-requisites to attain ultimate enlightenment and liberation (moksha). Self-realization means peeling away fabricated layers of one's own personality to understand and experience the true self,the unchanging soul and hence the true nature of reality. The path to extrasensory experience of soul is termed as Bhed Vigyān in scriptures like Samayasāra, Gyaansaar and works of Shrimad Rajchandra. Bhed Nasti refers to the initial step in spiritual awareness where one distinguishes between the self (soul) and non-self (body, mind, soul's transient paryāys, instincts, etc). In this stage, the aspirant becomes a witness to the external world, body, thoughts, emotions, and beliefs, rather than identifying with them. For instance, instead of saying, "I ate food," the aspirant would perceive the action as "I witnessed matter (food) entering matter (body)." This awareness helps to understand that the body and its experiences are temporary and separate from the true self. Asti is the deeper awareness that follows, where one recognizes and becomes aware of the true nature of the soul itself. It involves a deeper reflection on the unchanging, eternal self beyond all external and internal transient phenomena. Bhed Asti allows the aspirant to connect with its true infinite knowledge-bliss consciousness. The atmārthi (aspirant) consciously reminds himself that the body is temporary and not the true self. This is done through regular reflection on the nature of the body as a vessel for the soul. In Jainism, karma is portrayed as invisible particles of subtle matter that adhere to a living organism or Jiva. These particles come together to form a film of negativity and darkness around the soul that obscures the true consciousness, making the Jiva lose touch with its original essence as a soul. These karmic particles tend to attract similar particles which cause the inflow of auspicious and inauspicious karmic matter into the soul (Āsrava). This leads the organism to fall into the bondage of lust, worldly pleasures, ego, hatred, jealousy, anger, etc. Thus self-realization paves the way to simply reverse this process and help the seeker to decipher absolute truth on their own. Jainism firmly rejects the belief of a creator, and that one being is solely responsible for his thoughts, actions, and their consequences. Hinduism In Hinduism, self-realization (atma-jnana or atmabodha) is knowledge of witness-consciousness, the true self which is separate from delusion and identification with mental and material phenomena. Shaivism In Shaivism, self-realization is the direct knowing of the Self God Parashiva. Self-realization (nirvikalpa samadhi, which means "ecstasy without form or seed," or asamprajñata samādhi) is considered the ultimate spiritual attainment. Self-realization is considered the gateway to moksha, liberation/freedom from rebirth. This state is attained when the Kundalini force pierces through the Sahasrara chakra at the crown of the head. The realization of Self, Parashiva, considered to be each soul's destiny, is attainable through renunciation, sustained meditation and preventing the germination of future karma (the phrase "frying the seeds of karma" is often used) Advaita Vedanta Ātman is the first principle in Advaita Vedanta, along with its concept of Brahman, with Atman being the perceptible personal particular and Brahman the inferred unlimited universal, both synonymous and interchangeable. The soteriological goal, in Advaita, is to gain self-knowledge and complete understanding of the identity of Atman and Brahman. Correct knowledge of Atman and Brahman leads dissolution of all dualistic tendencies and to liberation. Moksha is attained by realizing one's true identity as Ātman, and the identity of Atman and Brahman, the complete understanding of one's real nature as Brahman in this life. This is stated by Shankara as follows: Buddhism Since Buddhism denies the existence of a separate self, as explicated in the teachings of anatman and sunyata, self-realization is a contradictio in terminis for Buddhism. Though the tathagatagarbha-teachings seem to teach the existence of a separate self, they point to the inherent possibility of attaining awakening, not to the existence of a separate self. The dharmadhatu-teachings make this even more clear: reality is an undivided whole; awakening is the realization of this whole. Sikhism Sikhism propounds the philosophy of Self-realization. This is possible by "aatam-cheennea" or "Aap Pashaanae", purifying the self from the false ego: Guru Nanak says, See also Atma bodha Dark Night of the Soul Henosis New religious movement Nondualism Self-discovery Self-fulfillment Self-realization in Jungian psychology Simran Theoria Vision quest References Citations Works cited . . . Further reading . External links Mysticism Religious practices Self Spiritual evolution

Affection

Affection or fondness is a "disposition or state of mind or body" commonly linked to a feeling or type of love. It has led to multiple branches in philosophy and psychology that discuss emotion, disease, influence, and state of being. Often, "affection" denotes more than mere goodwill or friendship. Writers on ethics generally use the word to refer to distinct states of feeling, both lasting and temporary. Some contrast it with passion as being free from the distinctively sensual element. Affection can elicit diverse emotional reactions such as embarrassment, disgust, pleasure, and annoyance. The emotional and physical effect of affection also varies between the giver and the receiver. Restricted definition Sometimes the term is restricted to emotional states directed towards living entities, including humans and animals. Affection is often compared with passion, stemming from the Greek word . Consequently, references to affection are found in the works of philosophers such as René Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, and early British ethicists. Despite these associations, it is commonly differentiated from passion on various grounds. Some definitions of affection exclude feelings of anxiety or heightened excitement, elements typically linked to passion. In this narrower context, the term holds significance in ethical frameworks, particularly concerning social or parental affections, forming a facet of moral duties and virtue. Ethical perspectives may hinge on whether affection is perceived as voluntary. Expression Affection can be communicated by looks, words, gestures, or touches. It conveys love and social connection. The five love languages explains how couples can communicate affections to each other. Affectionate behavior may have evolved from parental nurturing behavior due to its associations with hormonal rewards. Such affection has been shown to influence brain development in infants, especially their biochemical systems and prefrontal development. Affectionate gestures can become undesirable if they insinuate potential harm to one's welfare. However, when welcomed, such behavior can offer several health benefits. Some theories suggest that positive sentiments enhance individuals' inclination to engage socially, and the sense of closeness fostered by affection contributes to nurturing positive sentiments among them. Benefits of affection Affection exchange is an adaptive human behavior that benefits well-being. Expressing affection brings emotional, physical, and relational gains for people and their close connections. Sharing positive emotions yields health advantages like reduced stress hormones, lower cholesterol, lower blood pressure, and a stronger immune system. Expressing affection, not merely feeling affection, is internally rewarding. Even if not reciprocated, givers still experience its effects. Parental relationships Affectionate behavior is frequently considered an outcome of parental nurturing, tied to hormonal rewards. Both positive and negative parental actions may health issues in later life. Neglect and abuse result in poorer well-being and mental health, contrasting with affection's positive effects. A 2013 study highlighted the impact of early child abuse and lack of affection on physical health. Affectionism Affectionism is a school of thought that considers affections to be of central importance. Although it is not found in mainstream Western philosophy, it does exist in Indian philosophy. See also References External links Emotions Love Personal life Phrenology

Environmental sociology

Environmental sociology is the study of interactions between societies and their natural environment. The field emphasizes the social factors that influence environmental resource management and cause environmental issues, the processes by which these environmental problems are socially constructed and define as social issues, and societal responses to these problems. Environmental sociology emerged as a subfield of sociology in the late 1970s in response to the emergence of the environmental movement in the 1960s. It represents a relatively new area of inquiry focusing on an extension of earlier sociology through inclusion of physical context as related to social factors. Definition Environmental sociology is typically defined as the sociological study of socio-environmental interactions, although this definition immediately presents the problem of integrating human cultures with the rest of the environment. Different aspects of human interaction with the natural environment are studied by environmental sociologists including population and demography, organizations and institutions, science and technology, health and illness, consumption and sustainability practices, culture and identity, and social inequality and environmental justice. Although the focus of the field is the relationship between society and environment in general, environmental sociologists typically place special emphasis on studying the social factors that cause environmental problems, the societal impacts of those problems, and efforts to solve the problems. In addition, considerable attention is paid to the social processes by which certain environmental conditions become socially defined as problems. Most research in environmental sociology examines contemporary societies. History Environmental sociology emerged as a coherent subfield of inquiry after the environmental movement of the 1960s and early 1970s. The works of William R. Catton, Jr. and Riley Dunlap, among others, challenged the constricted anthropocentrism of classical sociology. In the late 1970s, they called for a new holistic, or systems perspective, which lead to a marked shift in the field’s focus. Since the 1970s, general sociology has noticeably transformed to include environmental forces in social explanations. Environmental sociology has now solidified as a respected, interdisciplinary field of study in academia. Concepts Existential dualism The duality of the human condition rests with cultural uniqueness and evolutionary traits. From one perspective, humans are embedded in the ecosphere and co-evolved alongside other species. Humans share the same basic ecological dependencies as other inhabitants of nature. From the other perspectives, humans are distinguished from other species because of their innovative capacities, distinct cultures and varied institutions. Human creations have the power to independently manipulate, destroy, and transcend the limits of the natural environment. According to Buttel (2004), there are five major traditions in environmental sociology today: the treadmill of production and other eco-Marxisms, ecological modernization and other sociologies of environmental reform, cultural-environmental sociologies, neo-Malthusianisms, and the new ecological paradigm. In practice, this means five different theories of what to blame for environmental degradation, i.e., what to research or consider as important. These ideas are listed below in the order in which they were invented. Ideas that emerged later built on earlier ideas, and contradicted them. Neo-Malthusianism Works such as Hardin's "Tragedy of the Commons" (1969) reformulated Malthusian thought about abstract population increases causing famines into a model of individual selfishness at larger scales causing degradation of common pool resources such as the air, water, the oceans, or general environmental conditions. Hardin offered privatization of resources or government regulation as solutions to environmental degradation caused by tragedy of the commons conditions. Many other sociologists shared this view of solutions well into the 1970s (see Ophuls). There have been many critiques of this view particularly political scientist Elinor Ostrom, or economists Amartya Sen and Ester Boserup. Even though much of mainstream journalism considers Malthusianism the only view of environmentalism, most sociologists would disagree with Malthusianism since social organizational issues of environmental degradation are more demonstrated to cause environmental problems than abstract population or selfishness per se. For examples of this critique, Ostrom in her book Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action (1990) argues that instead of self-interest always causing degradation, it can sometimes motivate people to take care of their common property resources. To do this they must change the basic organizational rules of resource use. Her research provides evidence for sustainable resource management systems, around common pool resources that have lasted for centuries in some areas of the world. Amartya Sen argues in his book Poverty and Famines: An Essay on Entitlement and Deprivation (1980) that population expansion fails to cause famines or degradation as Malthusians or Neo-Malthusians argue. Instead, in documented cases a lack of political entitlement to resources that exist in abundance, causes famines in some populations. He documents how famines can occur even in the midst of plenty or in the context of low populations. He argues that famines (and environmental degradation) would only occur in non-functioning democracies or unrepresentative states. Ester Boserup argues in her book The Conditions of Agricultural Growth: The Economics of Agrarian Change under Population Pressure (1965) from inductive, empirical case analysis that Malthus's more deductive conception of a presumed one-to-one relationship with agricultural scale and population is actually reversed. Instead of agricultural technology and scale determining and limiting population as Malthus attempted to argue, Boserup argued the world is full of cases of the direct opposite: that population changes and expands agricultural methods. Eco-Marxist scholar Allan Schnaiberg (below) argues against Malthusianism with the rationale that under larger capitalist economies, human degradation moved from localized, population-based degradation to organizationally caused degradation of capitalist political economies to blame. He gives the example of the organized degradation of rainforest areas which states and capitalists push people off the land before it is degraded by organizational means. Thus, many authors are critical of Malthusianism, from sociologists (Schnaiberg) to economists (Sen and Boserup), to political scientists (Ostrom), and all focus on how a country's social organization of its extraction can degrade the environment independent of abstract population. New Ecological Paradigm In the 1970s, the New Ecological Paradigm (NEP) conception critiqued the claimed lack of human-environmental focus in the classical sociologists and the sociological priorities their followers created. This was critiqued as the Human Exemptionalism Paradigm (HEP). The HEP viewpoint claims that human-environmental relationships were unimportant sociologically because humans are 'exempt' from environmental forces via cultural change. This view was shaped by the leading Western worldview of the time and the desire for sociology to establish itself as an independent discipline against the then popular racist-biological environmental determinism where environment was all. In this HEP view, human dominance was felt to be justified by the uniqueness of culture, argued to be more adaptable than biological traits. Furthermore, culture also has the capacity to accumulate and innovate, making it capable of solving all natural problems. Therefore, as humans were not conceived of as governed by natural conditions, they were felt to have complete control of their own destiny. Any potential limitation posed by the natural world was felt to be surpassed using human ingenuity. Research proceeded accordingly without environmental analysis. In the 1970s, sociological scholars Riley Dunlap and William R. Catton, Jr. began recognizing the limits of what would be termed the Human Excemptionalism Paradigm. Catton and Dunlap (1978) suggested a new perspective that took environmental variables into full account. They coined a new theoretical outlook for sociology, the New Ecological Paradigm, with assumptions contrary to HEP. The NEP recognizes the innovative capacity of humans, but says that humans are still ecologically interdependent as with other species. The NEP notes the power of social and cultural forces but does not profess social determinism. Instead, humans are impacted by the cause, effect, and feedback loops of ecosystems. The Earth has a finite level of natural resources and waste repositories. Thus, the biophysical environment can impose constraints on human activity. They discussed a few harbingers of this NEP in 'hybridized' theorizing about topics that were neither exclusively social nor environmental explanations of environmental conditions. It was additionally a critique of Malthusian views of the 1960s and 1970s. Dunlap and Catton's work immediately received a critique from Buttel who argued to the contrary that classical sociological foundations could be found for environmental sociology, particularly in Weber's work on ancient "agrarian civilizations" and Durkheim's view of the division of labor as built on a material premise of specialization/specialization in response to material scarcity. This environmental aspect of Durkheim has been discussed by Schnaiberg (1971) as well. Treadmill of Production Theory The Treadmill of Production is a theory coined and popularized by Schnaiberg as a way to answer for the increase in U.S. environmental degradation post World War II. At its simplest, this theory states that the more product or commodities are created, the more resources will be used, and the higher the impact will be. The treadmill is a metaphor of being caught in the cycle of continuous growth which never stops, demanding more resources and as a result causing more environmental damage. Eco-Marxism In the middle of the HEP/NEP debate Neo-Marxist ideas of conflict sociology were applied to environmental conflicts. Therefore, some sociologists wanted to stretch Marxist ideas of social conflict to analyze environmental social movements from the Marxist materialist framework instead of interpreting them as a cultural "New Social Movement", separate from material concerns. So "Eco-Marxism" was developed based on using Neo-Marxist Conflict theories concepts of the relative autonomy of the state and applying them to environmental conflict. Two people following this school were James O'Connor (The Fiscal Crisis of the State, 1971) and later Allan Schnaiberg. Later, a different trend developed in eco-Marxism via the attention brought to the importance of metabolic analysis in Marx's thought by John Bellamy Foster. Contrary to previous assumptions that classical theorists in sociology all had fallen within a Human Exemptionalist Paradigm, Foster argued that Marx's materialism lead him to theorize labor as the metabolic process between humanity and the rest of nature. In Promethean interpretations of Marx that Foster critiques, there was an assumption his analysis was very similar to the anthropocentric views critiqued by early environmental sociologists. Instead, Foster argued Marx himself was concerned about the Metabolic rift generated by capitalist society's social metabolism, particularly in industrial agriculture—Marx had identified an "irreparable rift in the interdependent process of social metabolism," created by capitalist agriculture that was destroying the productivity of the land and creating wastes in urban sites that failed to be reintegrated into the land and thus lead toward destruction of urban workers health simultaneously. Reviewing the contribution of this thread of eco-marxism to current environmental sociology, Pellow and Brehm conclude, "The metabolic rift is a productive development in the field because it connects current research to classical theory and links sociology with an interdisciplinary array of scientific literatures focused on ecosystem dynamics." Foster emphasized that his argument presupposed the "magisterial work" of Paul Burkett, who had developed a closely related "red-green" perspective rooted in a direct examination of Marx's value theory. Burkett and Foster proceeded to write a number of articles together on Marx's ecological conceptions, reflecting their shared perspective More recently, Jason W. Moore, inspired by Burkett's value-analytical approach to Marx's ecology and arguing that Foster's work did not in itself go far enough, has sought to integrate the notion of metabolic rift with world systems theory, incorporating Marxian value-related conceptions. For Moore, the modern world-system is a capitalist world-ecology, joining the accumulation of capital, the pursuit of power, and the production of nature in dialectical unity. Central to Moore's perspective is a philosophical re-reading of Marx's value theory, through which abstract social labor and abstract social nature are dialectically bound. Moore argues that the emergent law of value, from the sixteenth century, was evident in the extraordinary shift in the scale, scope, and speed of environmental change. What took premodern civilizations centuries to achieve—such as the deforestation of Europe in the medieval era—capitalism realized in mere decades. This world-historical rupture, argues Moore, can be explained through a law of value that regards labor productivity as the decisive metric of wealth and power in the modern world. From this standpoint, the genius of capitalist development has been to appropriate uncommodified natures—including uncommodified human natures—as a means of advancing labor productivity in the commodity system. Societal-environment dialectic In 1975, the highly influential work of Allan Schnaiberg transfigured environmental sociology, proposing a societal-environmental dialectic, though within the 'neo-Marxist' framework of the relative autonomy of the state as well. This conflictual concept has overwhelming political salience. First, the economic synthesis states that the desire for economic expansion will prevail over ecological concerns. Policy will decide to maximize immediate economic growth at the expense of environmental disruption. Secondly, the managed scarcity synthesis concludes that governments will attempt to control only the most dire of environmental problems to prevent health and economic disasters. This will give the appearance that governments act more environmentally consciously than they really do. Third, the ecological synthesis generates a hypothetical case where environmental degradation is so severe that political forces would respond with sustainable policies. The driving factor would be economic damage caused by environmental degradation. The economic engine would be based on renewable resources at this point. Production and consumption methods would adhere to sustainability regulations. These conflict-based syntheses have several potential outcomes. One is that the most powerful economic and political forces will preserve the status quo and bolster their dominance. Historically, this is the most common occurrence. Another potential outcome is for contending powerful parties to fall into a stalemate. Lastly, tumultuous social events may result that redistribute economic and political resources. In 1980,the highly influential work of Allan Schnaiberg entitled The Environment: From Surplus to Scarcity (1980) was a large contribution to this theme of a societal-environmental dialectic. Ecological modernization and reflexive modernization By the 1980s, a critique of eco-Marxism was in the offing, given empirical data from countries (mostly in Western Europe like the Netherlands, Western Germany and somewhat the United Kingdom) that were attempting to wed environmental protection with economic growth instead of seeing them as separate. This was done through both state and capital restructuring. Major proponents of this school of research are Arthur P.J. Mol and Gert Spaargaren. Popular examples of ecological modernization would be "cradle to cradle" production cycles, industrial ecology, large-scale organic agriculture, biomimicry, permaculture, agroecology and certain strands of sustainable development—all implying that economic growth is possible if that growth is well organized with the environment in mind. Reflexive modernization The many volumes of the German sociologist Ulrich Beck first argued from the late 1980s that our risk society is potentially being transformed by the environmental social movements of the world into structural change without rejecting the benefits of modernization and industrialization. This is leading to a form of 'reflexive modernization' with a world of reduced risk and better modernization process in economics, politics, and scientific practices as they are made less beholden to a cycle of protecting risk from correction (which he calls our state's organized irresponsibility)—politics creates ecodisasters, then claims responsibility in an accident, yet nothing remains corrected because it challenges the very structure of the operation of the economy and the private dominance of development, for example. Beck's idea of a reflexive modernization looks forward to how our ecological and social crises in the late 20th century are leading toward transformations of the whole political and economic system's institutions, making them more "rational" with ecology in mind. Neo-Liberalism Neo-liberalism includes deregulation, free market capitalism, and aims at reducing government spending. These Neo-liberal policies greatly affect environmental sociology. Since Neo-liberalism includes deregulation and essentially less government involvement, this leads to the commodification and privatization of unowned, state-owned, or common property resources. Diana Liverman and Silvina Vilas mentions that this results in payments for environmental services; deregulation and cuts in public expenditure for environmental management; the opening up of trade and investment; and transfer of environmental management to local or nongovernmental institutions. The privatization of these resources have impacts on society, the economy, and to the environment. An example that has greatly affected society is the privatization of water. Social construction of the environment Additionally in the 1980s, with the rise of postmodernism in the western academy and the appreciation of discourse as a form of power, some sociologists turned to analyzing environmental claims as a form of social construction more than a 'material' requirement. Proponents of this school include John A. Hannigan, particularly in Environmental Sociology: A Social Constructionist Perspective (1995). Hannigan argues for a 'soft constructionism' (environmental problems are materially real though they require social construction to be noticed) over a 'hard constructionism' (the claim that environmental problems are entirely social constructs). Although there was sometimes acrimonious debate between the constructivist and realist "camps" within environmental sociology in the 1990s, the two sides have found considerable common ground as both increasingly accept that while most environmental problems have a material reality they nonetheless become known only via human processes such as scientific knowledge, activists' efforts, and media attention. In other words, most environmental problems have a real ontological status despite our knowledge/awareness of them stemming from social processes, processes by which various conditions are constructed as problems by scientists, activists, media and other social actors. Correspondingly, environmental problems must all be understood via social processes, despite any material basis they may have external to humans. This interactiveness is now broadly accepted, but many aspects of the debate continue in contemporary research in the field. Events Modern environmentalism United States The 1960s built strong cultural momentum for environmental causes, giving birth to the modern environmental movement and large questioning in sociologists interested in analyzing the movement. Widespread green consciousness moved vertically within society, resulting in a series of policy changes across many states in the U.S. and Europe in the 1970s. In the United States, this period was known as the "Environmental Decade" with the creation of the United States Environmental Protection Agency and passing of the Endangered Species Act, Clean Water Act, and amendments to the Clean Air Act. Earth Day of 1970, celebrated by millions of participants, represented the modern age of environmental thought. The environmental movement continued with incidences such as Love Canal. Historical studies While the current mode of thought expressed in environmental sociology was not prevalent until the 1970s, its application is now used in analysis of ancient peoples. Societies including Easter Island, the Anaszi, and the Mayans were argued to have ended abruptly, largely due to poor environmental management. This has been challenged in later work however as the exclusive cause (biologically trained Jared Diamond's Collapse (2005); or more modern work on Easter Island). The collapse of the Mayans sent a historic message that even advanced cultures are vulnerable to ecological suicide—though Diamond argues now it was less of a suicide than an environmental climate change that led to a lack of an ability to adapt—and a lack of elite willingness to adapt even when faced with the signs much earlier of nearing ecological problems. At the same time, societal successes for Diamond included New Guinea and Tikopia island whose inhabitants have lived sustainably for 46,000 years. John Dryzek et al. argue in Green States and Social Movements: Environmentalism in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and Norway (2003) that there may be a common global green environmental social movement, though its specific outcomes are nationalist, falling into four 'ideal types' of interaction between environmental movements and state power. They use as their case studies environmental social movements and state interaction from Norway, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Germany. They analyze the past 30 years of environmentalism and the different outcomes that the green movement has taken in different state contexts and cultures. Recently and roughly in temporal order below, much longer-term comparative historical studies of environmental degradation are found by sociologists. There are two general trends: many employ world systems theory—analyzing environmental issues over long periods of time and space; and others employ comparative historical methods. Some utilize both methods simultaneously, sometimes without reference to world systems theory (like Whitaker, see below). Stephen G. Bunker (d. 2005) and Paul S. Ciccantell collaborated on two books from a world-systems theory view, following commodity chains through history of the modern world system, charting the changing importance of space, time, and scale of extraction and how these variables influenced the shape and location of the main nodes of the world economy over the past 500 years. Their view of the world was grounded in extraction economies and the politics of different states that seek to dominate the world's resources and each other through gaining hegemonic control of major resources or restructuring global flows in them to benefit their locations. The three volume work of environmental world-systems theory by Sing C. Chew analyzed how "Nature and Culture" interact over long periods of time, starting with World Ecological Degradation (2001) In later books, Chew argued that there were three "Dark Ages" in world environmental history characterized by periods of state collapse and reorientation in the world economy associated with more localist frameworks of community, economy, and identity coming to dominate the nature/culture relationships after state-facilitated environmental destruction delegitimized other forms. Thus recreated communities were founded in these so-called 'Dark Ages,' novel religions were popularized, and perhaps most importantly to him the environment had several centuries to recover from previous destruction. Chew argues that modern green politics and bioregionalism is the start of a similar movement of the present day potentially leading to wholesale system transformation. Therefore, we may be on the edge of yet another global "dark age" which is bright instead of dark on many levels since he argues for human community returning with environmental healing as empires collapse. More case oriented studies were conducted by historical environmental sociologist Mark D. Whitaker analyzing China, Japan, and Europe over 2,500 years in his book Ecological Revolution (2009). He argued that instead of environmental movements being "New Social Movements" peculiar to current societies, environmental movements are very old—being expressed via religious movements in the past (or in the present like in ecotheology) that begin to focus on material concerns of health, local ecology, and economic protest against state policy and its extractions. He argues past or present is very similar: that we have participated with a tragic common civilizational process of environmental degradation, economic consolidation, and lack of political representation for many millennia which has predictable outcomes. He argues that a form of bioregionalism, the bioregional state, is required to deal with political corruption in present or in past societies connected to environmental degradation. After looking at the world history of environmental degradation from very different methods, both sociologists Sing Chew and Mark D. Whitaker came to similar conclusions and are proponents of (different forms of) bioregionalism. Related journals Among the key journals in this field are: Environmental Sociology Human Ecology Human Ecology Review Nature and Culture Organization & Environment Population and Environment Rural Sociology Society and Natural Resources See also Bibliography of sociology Ecological anthropology Ecological design Ecological economics Ecological modernization theory Enactivism Environmental design Environmental design and planning Environmental economics Environmental policy Environmental racism Environmental racism in Europe Environmental social science Ethnoecology Political ecology Sociology of architecture Sociology of disaster Climate change References Notes Dunlap, Riley E., Frederick H. Buttel, Peter Dickens, and August Gijswijt (eds.) 2002. Sociological Theory and the Environment: Classical Foundations, Contemporary Insights (Rowman & Littlefield, ). Dunlap, Riley E., and William Michelson (eds.) 2002.Handbook of Environmental Sociology (Greenwood Press, ) Freudenburg, William R., and Robert Gramling. 1989. "The Emergence of Environmental Sociology: Contributions of Riley E. Dunlap and William R. Catton, Jr.", Sociological Inquiry 59(4): 439–452 Harper, Charles. 2004. Environment and Society: Human Perspectives on Environmental Issues. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc. Humphrey, Craig R., and Frederick H. Buttel. 1982.Environment, Energy, and Society. Belmont, California: Wadsworth Publishing Company. Humphrey, Craig R., Tammy L. Lewis and Frederick H. Buttel. 2002. Environment, Energy and Society: A New Synthesis. Belmont, California: Wadsworth/Thompson Learning. Mehta, Michael, and Eric Ouellet. 1995. Environmental Sociology: Theory and Practice, Toronto: Captus Press. Redclift, Michael, and Graham Woodgate, eds. 1997.International Handbook of Environmental Sociology (Edgar Elgar, 1997; ) Schnaiberg, Allan. 1980. The Environment: From Surplus to Scarcity. New York: Oxford University Press. Further reading Hannigan, John, "Environmental Sociology", Routledge, 2014. Zehner, Ozzie, Green Illusions: The Dirty Secrets of Clean Energy and the Future of Environmentalism, University of Nebraska Press, 2012. An environmental sociology text forming a critique of energy production and green consumerism. External links ASA Section on Environment and Technology ESA Environment & Society Research Network ISA Research Committee on Environment and Society (RC24) Canadian Sociological Association (CSA) Environment Research Cluster

Personality clash

A personality clash occurs when two (or more) people find themselves in conflict not over a particular issue or incident, but due to a fundamental incompatibility in their personalities, their approaches to things, or their style of life. A personality clash may occur in work-related, school-related, family-related, or social situations. Types Carl Jung saw the polarity of extraversion and introversion as a major potential cause of personality conflicts in everyday life, as well as underlying many past intellectual and philosophical disputes. He also opposed thinking and feeling types, intuitive and sensation types, as potential sources of misunderstanding between people; while other typologies can and have been developed since. In the workplace The issue of personality clashes in the workplace is controversial. According to the Australian government, the two types of workplace conflicts are when people's ideas, decisions or actions relating directly to the job are in opposition, or when two people just don't get along. Turner and Weed argue that in a conflict situation, don’t ask who, ask what and why. Managers should avoid blaming interpersonal conflicts on personality clashes. Such a tactic is an excuse to avoid addressing the real causes of conflict, and the department’s performance will suffer as a result. Managers must be able to recognize the signs of conflict behaviors and deal with the conflict in a forthright fashion. Approaching conflicts as opportunities to improve departmental policies and operations rather as ailments to be eradicated or ignored will result in a more productive work force and greater departmental efficiency. However, in order to avoid recognizing harsher business bullying situations, employers are more likely to refer to these actions as a personality clash. In therapy Sigmund Freud thought a harmonious match of therapist and patient was essential for psychotherapy; but subsequent experience has demonstrated that success can follow even where there is an underlying personality clash. Neville Symington indeed saw a patient's willingness to proceed with therapy, despite her dislike of him, as a positive sign of health, and as a beginning repudiation of her narcissism. Remedies Some suggest that the only answer to a personality clash is the folk remedy of distancing - reducing contact with the clashing personality involved. Other recommendations are to focus on the positives in the other person, and to examine one's own psychodynamics for clues as to why one is finding them so difficult - perhaps due to a projection of some unacknowledged part of one's own personality. Howard Gardner saw a major part of what he called interpersonal intelligence as the ability to mediate and resolve such personality clashes from the outside. Examples Actual Circumstances conspired to produce a painful personality clash between the ordered, cerebral, emotionally contained A. J. P. Taylor, and the spendthrift, bohemian, expansive Dylan Thomas. The clash between the cautious, moderate Harley and the mercurial, extremist Bolingbroke at the close of Queen Anne's reign did much to usher in the long Whig ascendency that followed. The personality clash between Henry Tizard and Frederick Lindemann had adverse effects on the Allied conduct of World War Two. Literary C. P. Snow in his semi-autobiographical novel on the corridors of power described caballing with someone whose temperament "clashed right at the roots with mine: even if he was not being offensive, he would have tempted me to say something hard. But I was doing a job, and I couldn't afford luxuries, certainly not the luxury of being myself". See also References Further reading C. G. Jung, Psychological Types (London 1971) Ronald W. Clark, Tizard (London 1965) External links Philip Landau, 'When personalities clash' 'Workplace conflict' Personality Organizational conflict

Coding (social sciences)

In the social sciences, coding is an analytical process in which data, in both quantitative form (such as questionnaires results) or qualitative form (such as interview transcripts) are categorized to facilitate analysis. One purpose of coding is to transform the data into a form suitable for computer-aided analysis. This categorization of information is an important step, for example, in preparing data for computer processing with statistical software. Prior to coding, an annotation scheme is defined. It consists of codes or tags. During coding, coders manually add codes into data where required features are identified. The coding scheme ensures that the codes are added consistently across the data set and allows for verification of previously tagged data. Some studies will employ multiple coders working independently on the same data. This also minimizes the chance of errors from coding and is believed to increase the reliability of data. Directive One code should apply to only one category and categories should be comprehensive. There should be clear guidelines for coders (individuals who do the coding) so that code is consistent. Quantitative approach For quantitative analysis, data is coded usually into measured and recorded as nominal or ordinal variables. Questionnaire data can be pre-coded (process of assigning codes to expected answers on designed questionnaire), field-coded (process of assigning codes as soon as data is available, usually during fieldwork), post-coded (coding of open questions on completed questionnaires) or office-coded (done after fieldwork). Note that some of the above are not mutually exclusive. In social sciences, spreadsheets such as Excel and more advanced software packages such as R, Matlab, PSPP/SPSS, DAP/SAS, MiniTab and Stata are often used. Qualitative approach For disciplines in which a qualitative format is preferential, including ethnography, humanistic geography or phenomenological psychology a varied approach to coding can be applied. Iain Hay (2005) outlines a two-step process beginning with basic coding in order to distinguish overall themes, followed by a more in depth, interpretive code in which more specific trends and patterns can be interpreted. Much of qualitative coding can be attributed to either grounded or a priori coding. Grounded coding refers to allowing notable themes and patterns emerge from the document themselves, where as a priori coding requires the researcher to apply pre-existing theoretical frameworks to analyze the documents. As coding methods are applied across various texts, the researcher is able to apply axial coding, which is the process of selecting core thematic categories present in several documents to discover common patterns and relations. Coding is considered a process of discovery and is done in cycles. Prior to constructing categories, a researcher might apply a first and second cycle coding methods. There are a multitude of methods available, and a researcher will want to pick one that is suited for the format and nature of their documents. Not all methods can be applied to every type of document. Some examples of first cycle coding methods include: In Vivo Coding: codes terms and phrases used by the participants themselves. The objective is to attempt to give the participants a voice in the research. Process Coding: this method uses gerunds ("-ing" words) only to describe and display actions throughout the document. It is useful for examining processes, emotional phases and rituals. Versus Coding: uses binary terms to describe groups and processes. The goal is to see which processes and organizations are in conflict with each other throughout the document. These can be both conceptual and grounded objects. Values Coding: codes that attempt to exhibit the inferred values, attitudes and beliefs of participants. In doing so, the research may discern patterns in world views. Sub-coding: Other names of this method are embedded coding, nested coding or joint coding. This involves assigning primary and second order codes to a word or phrase. It serves the purpose of adding detail to a code. The primary and secondary codes are often called parent and children codes. Simultaneous Coding: When same parts of the data have different meanings and two or more codes are applied to the same parts, then this kind of coding is called Simultaneous Coding. The process can be done manually, which can be as simple as highlighting different concepts with different colours, or fed into a software package. Some examples of qualitative software packages include Atlas.ti, MAXQDA, NVivo, QDA Miner, and RQDA. After assembling codes it is time to organize them into broader themes and categories. The process generally involves identifying themes from the existing codes, reducing the themes to a manageable number, creating hierarchies within the themes and then linking themes together through theoretical modeling. Memos Creating memos during the coding process is integral to both grounded and a priori coding approaches. Qualitative research is inherently reflexive; as the researcher delves deeper into their subject, it is important to chronicle their own thought processes through reflective or methodological memos, as doing so may highlight their own subjective interpretations of data. It is crucial to begin memoing at the onset of research. Regardless of the type of memo produced, what is important is that the process initiates critical thinking and productivity in the research. Doing so will facilitate easier and more coherent analyses as the project draws on. Memos can be used to map research activities, uncover meaning from data, maintaining research momentum and engagement and opening communication. See also Codebook Human Relations Area Files Transcription (linguistics) References Literature Hay, I. (2005). Qualitative research methods in human geography (2nd ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Grbich, Carol. (2013). "Qualitative Data Analysis" (2nd ed.). The Flinders University of South Australia: SAGE Publications Ltd. Saldaña, Johnny. (2015). "The Coding Manual for Qualitative Researchers" (3rd ed.). SAGE Publications Ltd. Research Statistical data coding Social statistics Data coding framework

Flooding (psychology)

Flooding, sometimes referred to as in vivo exposure therapy, is a form of behavior therapy and desensitization—or exposure therapy—based on the principles of respondent conditioning. As a psychotherapeutic technique, it is used to treat phobia and anxiety disorders including post-traumatic stress disorder. It works by exposing the patient to their painful memories, with the goal of reintegrating their repressed emotions with their current awareness. Flooding was invented by psychologist Thomas Stampfl in 1967. It is still used in behavior therapy today. Flooding is a psychotherapeutic method for overcoming phobias. In order to demonstrate the irrationality of the fear, a psychologist would put a person in a situation where they would face their phobia. Under controlled conditions and using psychologically-proven relaxation techniques, the subject attempts to replace their fear with relaxation. The experience can often be traumatic for a person, but may be necessary if the phobia is causing them significant life disturbances. The advantage to flooding is that it is quick and usually effective. There is, however, a possibility that a fear may spontaneously recur. This can be made less likely with systematic desensitization, another form of a classical condition procedure for the elimination of phobias. How it works "Flooding" works on the principles of classical conditioning or respondent conditioning—a form of Pavlov's classical conditioning—where patients change their behaviors to avoid negative stimuli. According to Pavlov, people can learn through associations, so if one has a phobia, it is because one associates the feared stimulus with a negative outcome. Flooding uses a technique based on Pavlov's classical conditioning that uses exposure. There are different forms of exposure, such as imaginal exposure, virtual reality exposure, and in vivo exposure. While systematic desensitization may use these other types of exposure, flooding uses in vivo exposure, actual exposure to the feared stimulus. A patient is confronted with a situation in which the stimulus that provoked the original trauma is present. The psychologist there usually offers very little assistance or reassurance other than to help the patient to use relaxation techniques in order to calm themselves. Relaxation techniques such as progressive muscle relaxation are common in these kinds of classical conditioning procedures. The theory is that the adrenaline and fear response has a time limit, so a person should eventually have to calm down and realize that their phobia is unwarranted. Flooding can be done through the use of virtual reality and has been shown to be fairly effective in patients with flight phobia. Psychiatrist Joseph Wolpe (1973) carried out an experiment which demonstrated flooding. He took a girl who was scared of cars, and drove her around for hours. Initially the girl was panicky but she eventually calmed down when she realized that her situation was safe. From then on she associated a sense of ease with cars. Psychologist Aletha Solter used flooding successfully with a 5-month-old infant who showed symptoms of post-traumatic stress following surgery. Flooding therapy is not for every individual, and the therapist will discuss with the patient the levels of anxiety they are prepared to endure during the session. It may also be true that exposure is not for every therapist and therapists seem to shy away from use of the technique. See also Attachment therapy, a controversial autism treatment intended to induce long-term behavioral compliance in children by combining nonconsensual flooding and sensory-overload techniques with the traumatic bonding relationship also manifested in Stockholm syndrome Behavior modification Desensitization (psychology) Habituation Immersion therapy Punishment Sensitization Systematic desensitization References Anxiety disorder treatment Behavior therapy Behaviorism

Apatheia

In Stoic philosophy, apatheia (; ) refers to a state of mind in which one is not disturbed by the passions. It might better be translated by the word equanimity than the word indifference. The meaning of the word apatheia is quite different from that of the modern English apathy, which has a distinctly negative connotation that includes feelings of inertness, indifference, and impassiveness. According to the Stoics, apatheia was the quality that characterized the sage. Philosophy Whereas Aristotle had claimed that virtue was to be found in the golden mean between an excess and a deficiency of emotion (metriopatheia), the Stoics thought that living virtuously provided freedom from the passions, resulting in apatheia. It meant eradicating the tendency to react emotionally or egotistically to external events, the things that cannot be controlled. For Stoics, it was the optimally rational response to the world, for things cannot be controlled if they are caused by the will of others or by Nature; only one's own will can be controlled. That did not mean a loss of feeling, or total disengagement from the world. The Stoic who performs correct (virtuous) judgments and actions as part of the world order experiences contentment (eudaimonia) and good feelings (eupatheia). Rivals of Apatheia Followers of Epicurus were the main opponents of Stoicism and apatheia. Instead of apatheia, they believed in a similar form of living which is ataraxia, a related concept in Epicureanism. Some Latin Stoic authors, such as Seneca used the term interchangeably with apatheia. In Epicureanism, ataraxia comes from freedom from pain and fear and results in a life full of tranquility, imperturbability, and without trouble. The main difference between these terms is how it is achieved. Apatheia was seen as a byproduct of living a virtuous life and was not a goal for Stoics to directly attempt to achieve. For followers of Epicurus, ataraxia was a goal that could be achieved through the avoidance of pain which comes primarily from social and political life. Religion The term was later adopted by Plotinus in his development of Neoplatonism, in which apatheia was the soul's freedom from emotion achieved when it reaches its purified state. It passed into early Christian teaching in which apatheia meant freedom from unruly urges or compulsions and instead replace them with new and better energy. This practice often times leads to asceticism. Apatheia and asceticism are often times connected to each other. It is believed that apatheia is the precondition for beginning the pursuit of an intimate and direct knowledge of God that initiates us into sanctity while asceticism is the direct seeking of this knowledge. Apatheia has been used to describe God in as early as the 1st century by Ignatius of Antioch. It is still used in that sense in Orthodox Christian spirituality, and especially in monastic practice. Apatheia has many different interpretations and uses in the religious world that cause for debate over which viewpoint is the best one. Evagrius Ponticus believed there to be eight passions that the soul must be free of which include lust, gluttony, pride, envy, greed, boredom, anger, and self-love. These passions were described to be unnatural movements of the souls. Apatheia would be used to help reach the point where the mind is independent of the bodily senses. Maximus the Confessor believed in the same eight unnatural passions but he instead uses apatheia to transform the passions into agape, or non-egoistic love. See also Hesychia, or stillness Upekkha, a related concept described in Buddhism Vairagya, a related concept in Hindu philosophy References Concepts in ancient Greek ethics Concepts in ancient Greek philosophy of mind Stoicism Theories in ancient Greek philosophy

Systematic desensitization

Systematic desensitization, or graduated exposure therapy, is a behavior therapy developed by the psychiatrist Joseph Wolpe. It is used when a phobia or anxiety disorder is maintained by classical conditioning. It shares the same elements of both cognitive-behavioral therapy and applied behavior analysis. When used in applied behavior analysis, it is based on radical behaviorism as it incorporates counterconditioning principles. These include meditation (a private behavior or covert conditioning) and breathing (a public behavior or overt conditioning). From the cognitive psychology perspective, cognitions and feelings precede behavior, so it initially uses cognitive restructuring. The goal of the therapy is for the individual to learn how to cope with and overcome their fear in each level of an exposure hierarchy. The process of systematic desensitization occurs in three steps. The first step is to identify the hierarchy of fears. The second step is to learn relaxation or coping techniques. Finally, the individual uses these techniques to manage their fear during a situation from the hierarchy. The third step is repeated for each level of the hierarchy, starting from the least fear-inducing situation. Three steps of desensitization There are three main steps that Wolpe identified to successfully desensitize an individual. Establish anxiety stimulus hierarchy. The individual should first identify the items that are causing the anxiety problems. Each item that causes anxiety is given a subjective ranking on the severity of induced anxiety. If the individual is experiencing great anxiety to many different triggers, each item is dealt with separately. For each trigger or stimulus, a list is created to rank the events from least anxiety-provoking to most anxiety-provoking. Learn the mechanism response. Relaxation training, such as meditation, is one type of best coping strategies. Wolpe taught his patients relaxation responses because it is not possible to be both relaxed and anxious at the same time. In this method, patients practice tensing and relaxing different parts of the body until the patient reaches a state of serenity. This is necessary because it provides the patient with a means of controlling their fear, rather than letting it increase to intolerable levels. Only a few sessions are needed for a patient to learn appropriate coping mechanisms. Additional coping strategies include anti-anxiety medicine and breathing exercises. Another example of relaxation is cognitive reappraisal of imagined outcomes. The therapist might encourage patients to examine what they imagine happening when exposed to the anxiety-inducing stimulus and then allowing for the client to replace the imagined catastrophic situation with any of the imagined positive outcomes. Connect stimulus to the incompatible response or coping method by counter conditioning. In this step the client completely relaxes and is then presented with the lowest item that was placed on their hierarchy of severity of anxiety phobias. When the patient has reached a state of serenity again after being presented with the first stimuli, the second stimuli that should present a higher level of anxiety is presented. This will help the patient overcome their phobia. This activity is repeated until all the items of the hierarchy of severity anxiety is completed without inducing any anxiety in the client at all. If at any time during the exercise the coping mechanisms fail or became a failure, or the patient fails to complete the coping mechanism due to the severe anxiety, the exercise is then stopped. When the individual is calm, the last stimuli that is presented without inducing anxiety is presented again and the exercise is then continued depending on the patient outcomes. Example A client may approach a therapist due to their great phobia of snakes. This is how the therapist would help the client using the three steps of systematic desensitization: Establish anxiety stimulus hierarchy. A therapist may begin by asking the patient to identify a fear hierarchy. This fear hierarchy would list the relative unpleasantness of various levels of exposure to a snake. For example, seeing a picture of a snake might elicit a low fear rating, compared to live snakes crawling on the individual—the latter scenario becoming highest on the fear hierarchy. Learn coping mechanisms or incompatible responses. The therapist would work with the client to learn appropriate coping and relaxation techniques such as meditation and deep muscle relaxation responses. Connect the stimulus to the incompatible response or coping method. The client would be presented with increasingly unpleasant levels of the feared stimuli, from lowest to highest—while utilizing the deep relaxation techniques (i.e. progressive muscle relaxation) previously learned. The imagined stimuli to help with a phobia of snakes may include: a picture of a snake; a small snake in a nearby room; a snake in full view; touching of the snake, etc. At each step in the imagined progression, the patient is desensitized to the phobia through exposure to the stimulus while in a state of relaxation. As the fear hierarchy is unlearned, anxiety gradually becomes extinguished. Uses Specific phobias Specific phobias are one class of mental disorder often treated via systematic desensitization. When persons experience such phobias (for example fears of heights, dogs, snakes, closed spaces, etc.), they tend to avoid the feared stimuli; this avoidance, in turn, can temporarily reduce anxiety but is not necessarily an adaptive way of coping with it. In this regard, patients' avoidance behaviors can become reinforced – a concept defined by the tenets of operant conditioning. Thus, the goal of systematic desensitization is to overcome avoidance by gradually exposing patients to the phobic stimulus, until that stimulus can be tolerated. Wolpe found that systematic desensitization was successful 90% of the time when treating phobias. Test anxiety Between 25 and 40 percent of students experience test anxiety. Children can suffer from low self-esteem and stress-induced symptoms as a result of test anxiety. The principles of systematic desensitization can be used by children to help reduce their test anxiety. Children can practice the muscle relaxation techniques by tensing and relaxing different muscle groups. With older children and college students, an explanation of desensitization can help to increase the effectiveness of the process. After these students learn the relaxation techniques, they can create an anxiety inducing hierarchy. For test anxiety these items could include not understanding directions, finishing on time, marking the answers properly, spending too little time on tasks, or underperforming. Teachers, school counselors or school psychologists could instruct children on the methods of systematic desensitization. Recent use Desensitization is widely known as one of the most effective therapy techniques. In recent decades, systematic desensitization has become less commonly used as a treatment of choice for anxiety disorders. Since 1970 academic research on systematic desensitization has declined, and the current focus has been on other therapies. In addition, the number of clinicians using systematic desensitization has also declined since 1980. Those clinicians that continue to regularly use systematic desensitization were trained before 1986. It is believed that the decrease of systematic desensitization by practicing psychologist is due to the increase in other techniques such as flooding, implosive therapy, and participant modeling. History In 1947, Wolpe discovered that the cats of Wits University could overcome their fears through gradual and systematic exposure. Wolpe studied Ivan Pavlov's work on artificial neuroses and the research done on elimination of children's fears by Watson and Jones. In 1958, Wolpe did a series of experiments on the artificial induction of neurotic disturbance in cats. He found that gradually deconditioning the neurotic animals was the best way to treat them of their neurotic disturbances. Wolpe deconditioned the neurotic cats through different feeding environments. Wolpe knew that this treatment of feeding would not generalize to humans and he instead substituted relaxation as a treatment to relieve the anxiety symptoms. Wolpe found that if he presented a client with the actual anxiety inducing stimulus, the relaxation techniques did not work. It was difficult to bring all of the objects into his office because not all anxiety inducing stimuli are physical objects, but instead are concepts. Wolpe instead began to have his clients imagine the anxiety inducing stimulus or look at pictures of the anxiety inducing stimulus, much like the process that is done today. See also Flooding (psychology) Immersion therapy Sensitization References External links Self-administered Systematic Desensitization Anxiety disorder treatment Behavior therapy Behaviorism

Biosynthesis

Biosynthesis, i.e., chemical synthesis occurring in biological contexts, is a term most often referring to multi-step, enzyme-catalyzed processes where chemical substances absorbed as nutrients (or previously converted through biosynthesis) serve as enzyme substrates, with conversion by the living organism either into simpler or more complex products. Examples of biosynthetic pathways include those for the production of amino acids, lipid membrane components, and nucleotides, but also for the production of all classes of biological macromolecules, and of acetyl-coenzyme A, adenosine triphosphate, nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide and other key intermediate and transactional molecules needed for metabolism. Thus, in biosynthesis, any of an array of compounds, from simple to complex, are converted into other compounds, and so it includes both the catabolism and anabolism (building up and breaking down) of complex molecules (including macromolecules). Biosynthetic processes are often represented via charts of metabolic pathways. A particular biosynthetic pathway may be located within a single cellular organelle (e.g., mitochondrial fatty acid synthesis pathways), while others involve enzymes that are located across an array of cellular organelles and structures (e.g., the biosynthesis of glycosylated cell surface proteins). Elements of biosynthesis Elements of biosynthesis include: precursor compounds, chemical energy (e.g. ATP), and catalytic enzymes which may need coenzymes (e.g. NADH, NADPH). These elements create monomers, the building blocks for macromolecules. Some important biological macromolecules include: proteins, which are composed of amino acid monomers joined via peptide bonds, and DNA molecules, which are composed of nucleotides joined via phosphodiester bonds. Properties of chemical reactions Biosynthesis occurs due to a series of chemical reactions. For these reactions to take place, the following elements are necessary: Precursor compounds: these compounds are the starting molecules or substrates in a reaction. These may also be viewed as the reactants in a given chemical process. Chemical energy: chemical energy can be found in the form of high energy molecules. These molecules are required for energetically unfavourable reactions. Furthermore, the hydrolysis of these compounds drives a reaction forward. High energy molecules, such as ATP, have three phosphates. Often, the terminal phosphate is split off during hydrolysis and transferred to another molecule. Catalysts: these may be for example metal ions or coenzymes and they catalyze a reaction by increasing the rate of the reaction and lowering the activation energy. In the simplest sense, the reactions that occur in biosynthesis have the following format: Reactant ->[][enzyme] Product Some variations of this basic equation which will be discussed later in more detail are: Simple compounds which are converted into other compounds, usually as part of a multiple step reaction pathway. Two examples of this type of reaction occur during the formation of nucleic acids and the charging of tRNA prior to translation. For some of these steps, chemical energy is required: {Precursor~molecule} + ATP <=> {product~AMP} + PP_i Simple compounds that are converted into other compounds with the assistance of cofactors. For example, the synthesis of phospholipids requires acetyl CoA, while the synthesis of another membrane component, sphingolipids, requires NADH and FADH for the formation the sphingosine backbone. The general equation for these examples is: {Precursor~molecule} + Cofactor ->[][enzyme] macromolecule Simple compounds that join to create a macromolecule. For example, fatty acids join to form phospholipids. In turn, phospholipids and cholesterol interact noncovalently in order to form the lipid bilayer. This reaction may be depicted as follows: {Molecule~1} + Molecule~2 -> macromolecule Lipid Many intricate macromolecules are synthesized in a pattern of simple, repeated structures. For example, the simplest structures of lipids are fatty acids. Fatty acids are hydrocarbon derivatives; they contain a carboxyl group "head" and a hydrocarbon chain "tail". These fatty acids create larger components, which in turn incorporate noncovalent interactions to form the lipid bilayer. Fatty acid chains are found in two major components of membrane lipids: phospholipids and sphingolipids. A third major membrane component, cholesterol, does not contain these fatty acid units. Eukaryotic phospholipids The foundation of all biomembranes consists of a bilayer structure of phospholipids. The phospholipid molecule is amphipathic; it contains a hydrophilic polar head and a hydrophobic nonpolar tail. The phospholipid heads interact with each other and aqueous media, while the hydrocarbon tails orient themselves in the center, away from water. These latter interactions drive the bilayer structure that acts as a barrier for ions and molecules. There are various types of phospholipids; consequently, their synthesis pathways differ. However, the first step in phospholipid synthesis involves the formation of phosphatidate or diacylglycerol 3-phosphate at the endoplasmic reticulum and outer mitochondrial membrane. The synthesis pathway is found below: The pathway starts with glycerol 3-phosphate, which gets converted to lysophosphatidate via the addition of a fatty acid chain provided by acyl coenzyme A. Then, lysophosphatidate is converted to phosphatidate via the addition of another fatty acid chain contributed by a second acyl CoA; all of these steps are catalyzed by the glycerol phosphate acyltransferase enzyme. Phospholipid synthesis continues in the endoplasmic reticulum, and the biosynthesis pathway diverges depending on the components of the particular phospholipid. Sphingolipids Like phospholipids, these fatty acid derivatives have a polar head and nonpolar tails. Unlike phospholipids, sphingolipids have a sphingosine backbone. Sphingolipids exist in eukaryotic cells and are particularly abundant in the central nervous system. For example, sphingomyelin is part of the myelin sheath of nerve fibers. Sphingolipids are formed from ceramides that consist of a fatty acid chain attached to the amino group of a sphingosine backbone. These ceramides are synthesized from the acylation of sphingosine. The biosynthetic pathway for sphingosine is found below: As the image denotes, during sphingosine synthesis, palmitoyl CoA and serine undergo a condensation reaction which results in the formation of 3-dehydrosphinganine. This product is then reduced to form dihydrospingosine, which is converted to sphingosine via the oxidation reaction by FAD. Cholesterol This lipid belongs to a class of molecules called sterols. Sterols have four fused rings and a hydroxyl group. Cholesterol is a particularly important molecule. Not only does it serve as a component of lipid membranes, it is also a precursor to several steroid hormones, including cortisol, testosterone, and estrogen. Cholesterol is synthesized from acetyl CoA. The pathway is shown below: More generally, this synthesis occurs in three stages, with the first stage taking place in the cytoplasm and the second and third stages occurring in the endoplasmic reticulum. The stages are as follows: 1. The synthesis of isopentenyl pyrophosphate, the "building block" of cholesterol 2. The formation of squalene via the condensation of six molecules of isopentenyl phosphate 3. The conversion of squalene into cholesterol via several enzymatic reactions Nucleotides The biosynthesis of nucleotides involves enzyme-catalyzed reactions that convert substrates into more complex products. Nucleotides are the building blocks of DNA and RNA. Nucleotides are composed of a five-membered ring formed from ribose sugar in RNA, and deoxyribose sugar in DNA; these sugars are linked to a purine or pyrimidine base with a glycosidic bond and a phosphate group at the 5' location of the sugar. Purine nucleotides The DNA nucleotides adenosine and guanosine consist of a purine base attached to a ribose sugar with a glycosidic bond. In the case of RNA nucleotides deoxyadenosine and deoxyguanosine, the purine bases are attached to a deoxyribose sugar with a glycosidic bond. The purine bases on DNA and RNA nucleotides are synthesized in a twelve-step reaction mechanism present in most single-celled organisms. Higher eukaryotes employ a similar reaction mechanism in ten reaction steps. Purine bases are synthesized by converting phosphoribosyl pyrophosphate (PRPP) to inosine monophosphate (IMP), which is the first key intermediate in purine base biosynthesis. Further enzymatic modification of IMP produces the adenosine and guanosine bases of nucleotides. The first step in purine biosynthesis is a condensation reaction, performed by glutamine-PRPP amidotransferase. This enzyme transfers the amino group from glutamine to PRPP, forming 5-phosphoribosylamine. The following step requires the activation of glycine by the addition of a phosphate group from ATP. GAR synthetase performs the condensation of activated glycine onto PRPP, forming glycineamide ribonucleotide (GAR). GAR transformylase adds a formyl group onto the amino group of GAR, forming formylglycinamide ribonucleotide (FGAR). FGAR amidotransferase catalyzes the addition of a nitrogen group to FGAR, forming formylglycinamidine ribonucleotide (FGAM). FGAM cyclase catalyzes ring closure, which involves removal of a water molecule, forming the 5-membered imidazole ring 5-aminoimidazole ribonucleotide (AIR). N5-CAIR synthetase transfers a carboxyl group, forming the intermediate N5-carboxyaminoimidazole ribonucleotide (N5-CAIR). N5-CAIR mutase rearranges the carboxyl functional group and transfers it onto the imidazole ring, forming carboxyamino- imidazole ribonucleotide (CAIR). The two step mechanism of CAIR formation from AIR is mostly found in single celled organisms. Higher eukaryotes contain the enzyme AIR carboxylase, which transfers a carboxyl group directly to AIR imidazole ring, forming CAIR. SAICAR synthetase forms a peptide bond between aspartate and the added carboxyl group of the imidazole ring, forming N-succinyl-5-aminoimidazole-4-carboxamide ribonucleotide (SAICAR). SAICAR lyase removes the carbon skeleton of the added aspartate, leaving the amino group and forming 5-aminoimidazole-4-carboxamide ribonucleotide (AICAR). AICAR transformylase transfers a carbonyl group to AICAR, forming N-formylaminoimidazole- 4-carboxamide ribonucleotide (FAICAR). The final step involves the enzyme IMP synthase, which performs the purine ring closure and forms the inosine monophosphate intermediate. Pyrimidine nucleotides Other DNA and RNA nucleotide bases that are linked to the ribose sugar via a glycosidic bond are thymine, cytosine and uracil (which is only found in RNA). Uridine monophosphate biosynthesis involves an enzyme that is located in the mitochondrial inner membrane and multifunctional enzymes that are located in the cytosol. The first step involves the enzyme carbamoyl phosphate synthase combining glutamine with CO2 in an ATP dependent reaction to form carbamoyl phosphate. Aspartate carbamoyltransferase condenses carbamoyl phosphate with aspartate to form uridosuccinate. Dihydroorotase performs ring closure, a reaction that loses water, to form dihydroorotate. Dihydroorotate dehydrogenase, located within the mitochondrial inner membrane, oxidizes dihydroorotate to orotate. Orotate phosphoribosyl hydrolase (OMP pyrophosphorylase) condenses orotate with PRPP to form orotidine-5'-phosphate. OMP decarboxylase catalyzes the conversion of orotidine-5'-phosphate to UMP. After the uridine nucleotide base is synthesized, the other bases, cytosine and thymine are synthesized. Cytosine biosynthesis is a two-step reaction which involves the conversion of UMP to UTP. Phosphate addition to UMP is catalyzed by a kinase enzyme. The enzyme CTP synthase catalyzes the next reaction step: the conversion of UTP to CTP by transferring an amino group from glutamine to uridine; this forms the cytosine base of CTP. The mechanism, which depicts the reaction UTP + ATP + glutamine ⇔ CTP + ADP + glutamate, is below: Cytosine is a nucleotide that is present in both DNA and RNA. However, uracil is only found in RNA. Therefore, after UTP is synthesized, it is must be converted into a deoxy form to be incorporated into DNA. This conversion involves the enzyme ribonucleoside triphosphate reductase. This reaction that removes the 2'-OH of the ribose sugar to generate deoxyribose is not affected by the bases attached to the sugar. This non-specificity allows ribonucleoside triphosphate reductase to convert all nucleotide triphosphates to deoxyribonucleotide by a similar mechanism. In contrast to uracil, thymine bases are found mostly in DNA, not RNA. Cells do not normally contain thymine bases that are linked to ribose sugars in RNA, thus indicating that cells only synthesize deoxyribose-linked thymine. The enzyme thymidylate synthetase is responsible for synthesizing thymine residues from dUMP to dTMP. This reaction transfers a methyl group onto the uracil base of dUMP to generate dTMP. The thymidylate synthase reaction, dUMP + 5,10-methylenetetrahydrofolate ⇔ dTMP + dihydrofolate, is shown to the right. DNA Although there are differences between eukaryotic and prokaryotic DNA synthesis, the following section denotes key characteristics of DNA replication shared by both organisms. DNA is composed of nucleotides that are joined by phosphodiester bonds. DNA synthesis, which takes place in the nucleus, is a semiconservative process, which means that the resulting DNA molecule contains an original strand from the parent structure and a new strand. DNA synthesis is catalyzed by a family of DNA polymerases that require four deoxynucleoside triphosphates, a template strand, and a primer with a free 3'OH in which to incorporate nucleotides. In order for DNA replication to occur, a replication fork is created by enzymes called helicases which unwind the DNA helix. Topoisomerases at the replication fork remove supercoils caused by DNA unwinding, and single-stranded DNA binding proteins maintain the two single-stranded DNA templates stabilized prior to replication. DNA synthesis is initiated by the RNA polymerase primase, which makes an RNA primer with a free 3'OH. This primer is attached to the single-stranded DNA template, and DNA polymerase elongates the chain by incorporating nucleotides; DNA polymerase also proofreads the newly synthesized DNA strand. During the polymerization reaction catalyzed by DNA polymerase, a nucleophilic attack occurs by the 3'OH of the growing chain on the innermost phosphorus atom of a deoxynucleoside triphosphate; this yields the formation of a phosphodiester bridge that attaches a new nucleotide and releases pyrophosphate. Two types of strands are created simultaneously during replication: the leading strand, which is synthesized continuously and grows towards the replication fork, and the lagging strand, which is made discontinuously in Okazaki fragments and grows away from the replication fork. Okazaki fragments are covalently joined by DNA ligase to form a continuous strand. Then, to complete DNA replication, RNA primers are removed, and the resulting gaps are replaced with DNA and joined via DNA ligase. Amino acids A protein is a polymer that is composed from amino acids that are linked by peptide bonds. There are more than 300 amino acids found in nature of which only twenty two, known as the proteinogenic amino acids, are the building blocks for protein. Only green plants and most microbes are able to synthesize all of the 20 standard amino acids that are needed by all living species. Mammals can only synthesize ten of the twenty standard amino acids. The other amino acids, valine, methionine, leucine, isoleucine, phenylalanine, lysine, threonine and tryptophan for adults and histidine, and arginine for babies are obtained through diet. Amino acid basic structure The general structure of the standard amino acids includes a primary amino group, a carboxyl group and the functional group attached to the α-carbon. The different amino acids are identified by the functional group. As a result of the three different groups attached to the α-carbon, amino acids are asymmetrical molecules. For all standard amino acids, except glycine, the α-carbon is a chiral center. In the case of glycine, the α-carbon has two hydrogen atoms, thus adding symmetry to this molecule. With the exception of proline, all of the amino acids found in life have the L-isoform conformation. Proline has a functional group on the α-carbon that forms a ring with the amino group. Nitrogen source One major step in amino acid biosynthesis involves incorporating a nitrogen group onto the α-carbon. In cells, there are two major pathways of incorporating nitrogen groups. One pathway involves the enzyme glutamine oxoglutarate aminotransferase (GOGAT) which removes the amide amino group of glutamine and transfers it onto 2-oxoglutarate, producing two glutamate molecules. In this catalysis reaction, glutamine serves as the nitrogen source. An image illustrating this reaction is found to the right. The other pathway for incorporating nitrogen onto the α-carbon of amino acids involves the enzyme glutamate dehydrogenase (GDH). GDH is able to transfer ammonia onto 2-oxoglutarate and form glutamate. Furthermore, the enzyme glutamine synthetase (GS) is able to transfer ammonia onto glutamate and synthesize glutamine, replenishing glutamine. The glutamate family of amino acids The glutamate family of amino acids includes the amino acids that derive from the amino acid glutamate. This family includes: glutamate, glutamine, proline, and arginine. This family also includes the amino acid lysine, which is derived from α-ketoglutarate. The biosynthesis of glutamate and glutamine is a key step in the nitrogen assimilation discussed above. The enzymes GOGAT and GDH catalyze the nitrogen assimilation reactions. In bacteria, the enzyme glutamate 5-kinase initiates the biosynthesis of proline by transferring a phosphate group from ATP onto glutamate. The next reaction is catalyzed by the enzyme pyrroline-5-carboxylate synthase (P5CS), which catalyzes the reduction of the ϒ-carboxyl group of L-glutamate 5-phosphate. This results in the formation of glutamate semialdehyde, which spontaneously cyclizes to pyrroline-5-carboxylate. Pyrroline-5-carboxylate is further reduced by the enzyme pyrroline-5-carboxylate reductase (P5CR) to yield a proline amino acid. In the first step of arginine biosynthesis in bacteria, glutamate is acetylated by transferring the acetyl group from acetyl-CoA at the N-α position; this prevents spontaneous cyclization. The enzyme N-acetylglutamate synthase (glutamate N-acetyltransferase) is responsible for catalyzing the acetylation step. Subsequent steps are catalyzed by the enzymes N-acetylglutamate kinase, N-acetyl-gamma-glutamyl-phosphate reductase, and acetylornithine/succinyldiamino pimelate aminotransferase and yield the N-acetyl-L-ornithine. The acetyl group of acetylornithine is removed by the enzyme acetylornithinase (AO) or ornithine acetyltransferase (OAT), and this yields ornithine. Then, the enzymes citrulline and argininosuccinate convert ornithine to arginine. There are two distinct lysine biosynthetic pathways: the diaminopimelic acid pathway and the α-aminoadipate pathway. The most common of the two synthetic pathways is the diaminopimelic acid pathway; it consists of several enzymatic reactions that add carbon groups to aspartate to yield lysine: Aspartate kinase initiates the diaminopimelic acid pathway by phosphorylating aspartate and producing aspartyl phosphate. Aspartate semialdehyde dehydrogenase catalyzes the NADPH-dependent reduction of aspartyl phosphate to yield aspartate semialdehyde. 4-hydroxy-tetrahydrodipicolinate synthase adds a pyruvate group to the β-aspartyl-4-semialdehyde, and a water molecule is removed. This causes cyclization and gives rise to (2S,4S)-4-hydroxy-2,3,4,5-tetrahydrodipicolinate. 4-hydroxy-tetrahydrodipicolinate reductase catalyzes the reduction of (2S,4S)-4-hydroxy-2,3,4,5-tetrahydrodipicolinate by NADPH to yield Δ'-piperideine-2,6-dicarboxylate (2,3,4,5-tetrahydrodipicolinate) and H2O. Tetrahydrodipicolinate acyltransferase catalyzes the acetylation reaction that results in ring opening and yields N-acetyl α-amino-ε-ketopimelate. N-succinyl-α-amino-ε-ketopimelate-glutamate aminotransaminase catalyzes the transamination reaction that removes the keto group of N-acetyl α-amino-ε-ketopimelate and replaces it with an amino group to yield N-succinyl-L-diaminopimelate. N-acyldiaminopimelate deacylase catalyzes the deacylation of N-succinyl-L-diaminopimelate to yield L,L-diaminopimelate. DAP epimerase catalyzes the conversion of L,L-diaminopimelate to the meso form of L,L-diaminopimelate. DAP decarboxylase catalyzes the removal of the carboxyl group, yielding L-lysine. The serine family of amino acids The serine family of amino acid includes: serine, cysteine, and glycine. Most microorganisms and plants obtain the sulfur for synthesizing methionine from the amino acid cysteine. Furthermore, the conversion of serine to glycine provides the carbons needed for the biosynthesis of the methionine and histidine. During serine biosynthesis, the enzyme phosphoglycerate dehydrogenase catalyzes the initial reaction that oxidizes 3-phospho-D-glycerate to yield 3-phosphonooxypyruvate. The following reaction is catalyzed by the enzyme phosphoserine aminotransferase, which transfers an amino group from glutamate onto 3-phosphonooxypyruvate to yield L-phosphoserine. The final step is catalyzed by the enzyme phosphoserine phosphatase, which dephosphorylates L-phosphoserine to yield L-serine. There are two known pathways for the biosynthesis of glycine. Organisms that use ethanol and acetate as the major carbon source utilize the glyconeogenic pathway to synthesize glycine. The other pathway of glycine biosynthesis is known as the glycolytic pathway. This pathway converts serine synthesized from the intermediates of glycolysis to glycine. In the glycolytic pathway, the enzyme serine hydroxymethyltransferase catalyzes the cleavage of serine to yield glycine and transfers the cleaved carbon group of serine onto tetrahydrofolate, forming 5,10-methylene-tetrahydrofolate. Cysteine biosynthesis is a two-step reaction that involves the incorporation of inorganic sulfur. In microorganisms and plants, the enzyme serine acetyltransferase catalyzes the transfer of acetyl group from acetyl-CoA onto L-serine to yield O-acetyl-L-serine. The following reaction step, catalyzed by the enzyme O-acetyl serine (thiol) lyase, replaces the acetyl group of O-acetyl-L-serine with sulfide to yield cysteine. The aspartate family of amino acids The aspartate family of amino acids includes: threonine, lysine, methionine, isoleucine, and aspartate. Lysine and isoleucine are considered part of the aspartate family even though part of their carbon skeleton is derived from pyruvate. In the case of methionine, the methyl carbon is derived from serine and the sulfur group, but in most organisms, it is derived from cysteine. The biosynthesis of aspartate is a one step reaction that is catalyzed by a single enzyme. The enzyme aspartate aminotransferase catalyzes the transfer of an amino group from aspartate onto α-ketoglutarate to yield glutamate and oxaloacetate. Asparagine is synthesized by an ATP-dependent addition of an amino group onto aspartate; asparagine synthetase catalyzes the addition of nitrogen from glutamine or soluble ammonia to aspartate to yield asparagine. The diaminopimelic acid biosynthetic pathway of lysine belongs to the aspartate family of amino acids. This pathway involves nine enzyme-catalyzed reactions that convert aspartate to lysine. Aspartate kinase catalyzes the initial step in the diaminopimelic acid pathway by transferring a phosphoryl from ATP onto the carboxylate group of aspartate, which yields aspartyl-β-phosphate. Aspartate-semialdehyde dehydrogenase catalyzes the reduction reaction by dephosphorylation of aspartyl-β-phosphate to yield aspartate-β-semialdehyde. Dihydrodipicolinate synthase catalyzes the condensation reaction of aspartate-β-semialdehyde with pyruvate to yield dihydrodipicolinic acid. 4-hydroxy-tetrahydrodipicolinate reductase catalyzes the reduction of dihydrodipicolinic acid to yield tetrahydrodipicolinic acid. Tetrahydrodipicolinate N-succinyltransferase catalyzes the transfer of a succinyl group from succinyl-CoA on to tetrahydrodipicolinic acid to yield N-succinyl-L-2,6-diaminoheptanedioate. N-succinyldiaminopimelate aminotransferase catalyzes the transfer of an amino group from glutamate onto N-succinyl-L-2,6-diaminoheptanedioate to yield N-succinyl-L,L-diaminopimelic acid. Succinyl-diaminopimelate desuccinylase catalyzes the removal of acyl group from N-succinyl-L,L-diaminopimelic acid to yield L,L-diaminopimelic acid. Diaminopimelate epimerase catalyzes the inversion of the α-carbon of L,L-diaminopimelic acid to yield meso-diaminopimelic acid. Siaminopimelate decarboxylase catalyzes the final step in lysine biosynthesis that removes the carbon dioxide group from meso-diaminopimelic acid to yield L-lysine. Proteins Protein synthesis occurs via a process called translation. During translation, genetic material called mRNA is read by ribosomes to generate a protein polypeptide chain. This process requires transfer RNA (tRNA) which serves as an adaptor by binding amino acids on one end and interacting with mRNA at the other end; the latter pairing between the tRNA and mRNA ensures that the correct amino acid is added to the chain. Protein synthesis occurs in three phases: initiation, elongation, and termination. Prokaryotic (archaeal and bacterial) translation differs from eukaryotic translation; however, this section will mostly focus on the commonalities between the two organisms. Additional background Before translation can begin, the process of binding a specific amino acid to its corresponding tRNA must occur. This reaction, called tRNA charging, is catalyzed by aminoacyl tRNA synthetase. A specific tRNA synthetase is responsible for recognizing and charging a particular amino acid. Furthermore, this enzyme has special discriminator regions to ensure the correct binding between tRNA and its cognate amino acid. The first step for joining an amino acid to its corresponding tRNA is the formation of aminoacyl-AMP: {Amino~acid} + ATP <=> {aminoacyl-AMP} + PP_i This is followed by the transfer of the aminoacyl group from aminoacyl-AMP to a tRNA molecule. The resulting molecule is aminoacyl-tRNA: {Aminoacyl-AMP} + tRNA <=> {aminoacyl-tRNA} + AMP The combination of these two steps, both of which are catalyzed by aminoacyl tRNA synthetase, produces a charged tRNA that is ready to add amino acids to the growing polypeptide chain. In addition to binding an amino acid, tRNA has a three nucleotide unit called an anticodon that base pairs with specific nucleotide triplets on the mRNA called codons; codons encode a specific amino acid. This interaction is possible thanks to the ribosome, which serves as the site for protein synthesis. The ribosome possesses three tRNA binding sites: the aminoacyl site (A site), the peptidyl site (P site), and the exit site (E site). There are numerous codons within an mRNA transcript, and it is very common for an amino acid to be specified by more than one codon; this phenomenon is called degeneracy. In all, there are 64 codons, 61 of each code for one of the 20 amino acids, while the remaining codons specify chain termination. Translation in steps As previously mentioned, translation occurs in three phases: initiation, elongation, and termination. Step 1: Initiation The completion of the initiation phase is dependent on the following three events: 1. The recruitment of the ribosome to mRNA 2. The binding of a charged initiator tRNA into the P site of the ribosome 3. The proper alignment of the ribosome with mRNA's start codon Step 2: Elongation Following initiation, the polypeptide chain is extended via anticodon:codon interactions, with the ribosome adding amino acids to the polypeptide chain one at a time. The following steps must occur to ensure the correct addition of amino acids: 1. The binding of the correct tRNA into the A site of the ribosome 2. The formation of a peptide bond between the tRNA in the A site and the polypeptide chain attached to the tRNA in the P site 3. Translocation or advancement of the tRNA-mRNA complex by three nucleotides Translocation "kicks off" the tRNA at the E site and shifts the tRNA from the A site into the P site, leaving the A site free for an incoming tRNA to add another amino acid. Step 3: Termination The last stage of translation occurs when a stop codon enters the A site. Then, the following steps occur: 1. The recognition of codons by release factors, which causes the hydrolysis of the polypeptide chain from the tRNA located in the P site 2. The release of the polypeptide chain 3. The dissociation and "recycling" of the ribosome for future translation processes A summary table of the key players in translation is found below: Diseases associated with macromolecule deficiency Errors in biosynthetic pathways can have deleterious consequences including the malformation of macromolecules or the underproduction of functional molecules. Below are examples that illustrate the disruptions that occur due to these inefficiencies. Familial hypercholesterolemia: this disorder is characterized by the absence of functional receptors for LDL. Deficiencies in the formation of LDL receptors may cause faulty receptors which disrupt the endocytic pathway, inhibiting the entry of LDL into the liver and other cells. This causes a buildup of LDL in the blood plasma, which results in atherosclerotic plaques that narrow arteries and increase the risk of heart attacks. Lesch–Nyhan syndrome: this genetic disease is characterized by self- mutilation, mental deficiency, and gout. It is caused by the absence of hypoxanthine-guanine phosphoribosyltransferase, which is a necessary enzyme for purine nucleotide formation. The lack of enzyme reduces the level of necessary nucleotides and causes the accumulation of biosynthesis intermediates, which results in the aforementioned unusual behavior. Severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID): SCID is characterized by a loss of T cells. Shortage of these immune system components increases the susceptibility to infectious agents because the affected individuals cannot develop immunological memory. This immunological disorder results from a deficiency in adenosine deaminase activity, which causes a buildup of dATP. These dATP molecules then inhibit ribonucleotide reductase, which prevents of DNA synthesis. Huntington's disease: this neurological disease is caused from errors that occur during DNA synthesis. These errors or mutations lead to the expression of a mutant huntingtin protein, which contains repetitive glutamine residues that are encoded by expanding CAG trinucleotide repeats in the gene. Huntington's disease is characterized by neuronal loss and gliosis. Symptoms of the disease include: movement disorder, cognitive decline, and behavioral disorder. See also Lipids Phospholipid bilayer Nucleotides DNA DNA replication Proteinogenic amino acid Codon table Prostaglandin Porphyrins Chlorophylls and bacteriochlorophylls Vitamin B12 References Biochemical reactions Metabolism

Behavioral activation

Behavioral activation (BA) is a third-generation behavior therapy for treating mood disorders. Behavioral activation primarily emphasizes engaging in positive and enjoyable activities to enhance one's mood. The Beck Institute describes BA as a way by which mood can be improved through the active engagement and planning of potentially mood-boosting activities. BA also involves the understanding of an individual's specific behaviors and the use of specific methods to enable them to overcome avoidance. Behavioral activation is often used from a cognitive behavioral therapy framework. It is also regarded as one form of functional analytic psychotherapy, which is based on a Skinnerian psychological model of behavior change, generally referred to as applied behavior analysis. This area is also a part of what is called clinical behavior analysis and makes up one of the most effective practices in the professional practice of behavior analysis. Theory Behavioral activation is a form of clinical behavior analysis, which is also known as third-generation behavior therapy. Other behavior therapies are acceptance and commitment therapy, dialectical behavior therapy and functional analytic psychotherapy. BA can be integrated into other psychotherapies, and its inclusion in these third-generation therapies reflects its effectiveness and versatility in addressing psychological challenges from different angles. Behavioral activation owes its basis to Charles Ferster's Functional Analysis of Depression (1973) which developed B.F. Skinner's idea of depression, within his analysis of motivation, as a lack of reinforcement. Ferster's basic model has been strengthened by further development in the study of reinforcement principles which led to the matching law and continuing theoretical advances in the possible functions of depression, as well as a look at behavior analysis of child development in order to determine long-term patterns which may lead to dysthymia. Behavioral activation utilizes positive reinforcements to increase good behavior and reduces negative outcomes from avoidance in order to increase an individual's self-control and personal regulation. Behavioral activation emerged from a component analysis of cognitive behavioral therapy. This analysis found that any cognitive component added little to the overall treatment of depression. The behavioral component had existed as a standalone treatment in the early work of Peter Lewinsohn and thus a group of behaviorists decided that it might be more efficient to pursue a purer behavioral treatment for the disorder. The theory holds that not enough environmental reinforcement or too much environmental punishment can contribute to depression. The goal of the intervention is to increase environmental reinforcement and reduce punishment. Methods One behavioral activation approach to depression had participants create a hierarchy of reinforcing activities, rank-ordered by difficulty. Participants then tracked goals along with clinicians who used a token economy to reinforce success in moving through the hierarchy of activities, being measured before and after by the Beck Depression Inventory. A markedly greater effect on their depression was found as a result of their treatment, as compared to a control group who did not receive the same treatment. Multiple clinics have since piloted and developed the method of treatment. Another behavioral activation approach is known as ACTION (Assess behavior/mood, Choose alternate responses, Try out those alternate responses, Integrate these alternatives, Observe results and (Now) evaluate). The goal of ACTION is the understanding of the relationship between actions and emotional consequences and a systematic replacement of dysfunctional patterns with adaptive ones. Additionally, focus is given to quality sleep, and improving social functioning. The ACTION method has clients develop an understanding of the relationship between actions and emotions, with actions being seen as the cause of emotions. An hourly self-monitoring chart is created to track activities and the impact on the mood they create for a full week, with the intention of identifying depression loops. When patterns of dysfunctional responding, or loops, are identified, alternative coping responses are attempted to break the loop. This method is described with the acronyms "TRAP" (Trigger, Response, Avoidance Pattern) and "TRAC" (Trigger, Response, Alternate Coping response). As rumination is identified as a particularly common avoidance behavior which worsens mood, another common acronym is RCA (Rumination Cues Action). The client is to evaluate the rumination in terms of it having improved the thing being ruminated about, providing understanding, and its emotional effects on the client. Attending to experience is suggested as an alternative to rumination as well as other possible distracting or mood improving actions. Research support Depression Reviews of behavioral activation studies for depression found that it had a positive measurable effect and that policy makers should consider it an effective treatment. A large-scale treatment study found behavioral activation to be more effective than cognitive therapy and on par with medication for treating depression. A meta-analysis study comprising 34 randomized controlled trials found that while behavioral activation treatment of adults with depression showed significantly greater beneficial effect compared with control participants, compared to participants treated with CT/CBT, at post treatment there were no statistically significant differences between treatment groups. Another meta-analysis comprising 25 randomized controlled trials found a large effect size for behavioral activation compared to controls at post-treatment. A 2009 meta-analysis showed a medium post-treatment effect size compared to psychotherapy and other treatments. In a 2020 Cochrane review covering fifty-three studies and 5495 subjects it was suggested (limited confidence) that behavioral activation was more effective than treatment as usual and medication and no less effective than CBT, psychodynamic therapy or being placed on a waiting list. Anxiety Behavioral activation strategies are utilized for clients who primarily experience anxiety. The core focus of these strategies is to address and disrupt patterns of anxious avoidance, which can often manifest as excessive worry. The ultimate goal is to motivate and encourage clients to actively engage in rewarding experiences and positive behaviors. A 2006 study of behavioral activation being applied to anxiety appeared to give promising results. One study found it to be effective with fibromyalgia-related pain anxiety. In another, researchers observed a notable improvement in the quality of life and a reduction in anxiety levels as a result of BA treatment. Virtual reality use Due to a lack of access to trained providers, physical constraints or financial reasons, many patients are not able to attend BA therapy. Researchers are trying to overcome these challenges by providing BA via Virtual Reality. The idea of the concept is to enable especially elderly adults to participate in engaging activities that they would not attend it without VR. Possibly, the so-called "BA-inspired VR protocols" will mitigate the lower mood, life satisfaction, and likelihood of depressions. One strategy is exposure therapy, VR can be utilized to create realistic and controlled environments where individuals can gradually confront situations that trigger anxiety or avoidance. By exposing individuals to these situations in a virtual setting, therapists can help them develop more adaptive coping strategies and reduce anxiety. Another strategy is through role-playing and social skills training, VR environments can be used to facilitate role-playing exercises, helping individuals practice and improve their social skills and interactions in a safe and non-threatening space. References Behavior therapy Behavior modification Cognitive behavioral therapy Depression (mood)

Dysexecutive syndrome

Dysexecutive syndrome (DES) consists of a group of symptoms, usually resulting from brain damage, that fall into cognitive, behavioural and emotional categories and tend to occur together. The term was introduced by Alan Baddeley to describe a common pattern of dysfunction in executive functions, such as planning, abstract thinking, flexibility and behavioural control. It is thought to be Baddeley's hypothesized working memory system and the central executive that are the hypothetical systems impaired in DES. The syndrome was once known as frontal lobe syndrome; however 'dysexecutive syndrome' is preferred because it emphasizes the functional pattern of deficits (the symptoms) over the location of the syndrome in the frontal lobe, which is often not the only area affected. Symptoms and signs Symptoms of DES fall into three broad categories: cognitive, emotional and behavioural. Many of the symptoms can be seen as a direct result of impairment to the central executive component of working memory, which is responsible for attentional control and inhibition. Although many of the symptoms regularly co-occur, it is common to encounter patients who have several, but not all symptoms. The accumulated effects of the symptoms have a large impact on daily life. Cognitive symptoms Cognitive symptoms refer to a person's ability to process thoughts. Cognition primarily refers to memory, the ability to learn new information, speech, and reading comprehension. Deficits within this area cause many problems with everyday life decisions. One of the main difficulties for an individual with DES is planning and reasoning. Impaired planning and reasoning affect the individual's ability to realistically assess and manage the problems of everyday living. New problems and situations may be especially poorly handled because of the inability to transfer previous knowledge to the new event. An individual that has DES may have a short attention span due to impairment in attentional control. This may alter the individual's ability to focus, and as such have difficulty with reading and following a storyline or conversation. For instance, they can easily lose track of conversations which can make it difficult to hold a meaningful conversation and may result in avoiding social interactions. Individuals with DES will have very poor working memory and short term memory due to executive dysfunction. The dysfunction can range from mild and subtle to severe and obvious. There is a tremendous variability in the manifestations of executive dysfunction with strong influences often apparent from the affected person's personality, life experiences and intellect. Individuals with DES may experience confabulation, which is the spontaneous reporting of events that never happened. This can affect their autobiographical memory. It is thought that patients may not be able to assess the accuracy of memory retrieval and therefore elaborate on implausible memories. Individuals with dementia, delirium or other severe psychiatric illnesses combined with DES often have disturbed sleep patterns. Some will not recognize that it is night-time and may become upset when someone tries to correct them. Emotional symptoms The emotional symptoms that individuals with DES experience may be quite extreme and can cause extensive problems. They may have difficulty inhibiting many types of emotions such as anger, excitement, sadness, or frustration. Due to multiple impairments of cognitive functioning, there can be much more frustration when expressing certain feelings and understanding how to interpret everyday situations. Individuals with DES may have higher levels of aggression or anger because they lack abilities that are related to behavioural control. They can also have difficulty understanding others' points of view, which can lead to anger and frustration. Behavioural symptoms Behavioural symptoms are evident through an individual's actions. People with DES often lose their social skills because their judgments and insights into what others may be thinking are impaired. They may have trouble knowing how to behave in group situations and may not know how to follow social norms. The central executive helps control impulses; therefore when impaired, patients have poor impulse control. This can lead to higher levels of aggression and anger. DES can also cause patients to appear self-centered and stubborn. Utilization behaviour is when a patient automatically uses an object in the appropriate manner, but at an inappropriate time. For example, if a pen and paper are placed in front of an individual with DES they will start to write or if there is a deck of cards they will deal them out. Patients showing this symptom will begin the behaviour in the middle of conversations or during auditory tests. Utilization behaviour is thought to occur because an action is initiated when an object is seen, but patients with DES lack the central executive control to inhibit acting it out at inappropriate times. Perseveration is also often seen in patients with DES. Perseveration is the repetition of thoughts, behaviours, or actions after they have already been completed. For instance, continually blowing out a match, after it is no longer lit is an example of perseveration behaviour. There are three types of perseveration: continuous perseveration, stuck-in-set perseveration, and recurrent perseveration. Stuck-in-set perseveration is most often seen in dysexecutive syndrome. This type of perseveration refers to when a patient cannot get out of a specific frame of mind, such as when asked to name animals they can only name one. If you ask them to then name colours, they may still give you animals. Perseveration may explain why some patients appear to have obsessive-compulsive disorder. Comorbid disorders DES often occurs with other disorders, which is known as comorbidity. Many studies have examined the presence of DES in patients with schizophrenia. Results of schizophrenic patients on the Behavioural Assessment of the Dysexecutive Syndrome (BADS) test (discussed below) are comparable to brain injured patients. Further, results of BADS have been shown to correlate with phases of schizophrenia. Patients in the chronic phase of the disorder have significantly lower scores than those who are acute. This is logical due to the similarities in executive disruptions that make everyday life difficult for those with schizophrenia and symptoms that form DES. Patients with Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia have been shown to exhibit impairment in executive functioning as well. The effects of DES symptoms on the executive functions and working memory, such as attentiveness, planning and remembering recently learned things, are some of the earliest indicators of Alzheimer's disease and dementia with Lewy bodies. Studies have also indicated that chronic alcoholism (see Korsakoff's syndrome) can lead to a mild form of DES according to results of BADS. Causes The most frequent cause of the syndrome is brain damage to the frontal lobe. Brain damage leading to the dysexecutive pattern of symptoms can result from physical trauma such as a blow to the head or a stroke or other internal trauma. It is important to note that frontal lobe damage is not the only cause of the syndrome. It has been shown that damage, such as lesions, in other areas of the brain may indirectly affect executive functions and lead to similar symptoms (such as ventral tegmental area, basal ganglia and thalamus). There is not one specific pattern of damage that leads to DES, as multiple affected brain structures and locations have led to the symptoms. This is one reason why the term frontal lobe syndrome is not preferred. Diagnosis Assessment of patients with DES can be difficult because traditional tests generally focus on one specific problem for a short period of time. People with DES can do fairly well on these tests because their problems are related to integrating individual skills into everyday tasks. The lack of everyday application of traditional tests is known as low ecological validity. Behavioural The Behavioural Assessment of the Dysexecutive Syndrome (BADS) was designed to address the problems of traditional tests and evaluate the everyday problems arising from DES. BADS is designed around six subtests and ends with the Dysexecutive Questionnaire (DEX). These tests assess executive functioning in more complex, real-life situations, which improves their ability to predict day-to-day difficulties of DES. The six tests are as follows: Rule Shift Cards - Assesses the subject's ability to ignore a prior rule after being given a new rule to follow. Action Program - This test requires the use of problem solving to accomplish a new, practical task. Key Search - This test reflects the real-life situation of needing to find something that has been lost. It assesses the patient's ability to plan how to accomplish the task and monitor their own progress. Temporal Judgment - Patients are asked to make estimated guesses to a series of questions such as, "how fast do racehorses gallop?". It tests the ability to make sensible guesses. Zoo Map - Tests the ability to plan while following a set of rules. Modified Six Elements - This test assesses the subject's ability to plan, organize and monitor behaviour. The Dysexecutive Questionnaire (DEX) is a 20-item questionnaire designed to sample emotional, motivational, behavioural and cognitive changes in a subject with DES. One version is designed for the subject to complete and another version is designed for someone who is close to the individual, such as a relative or caregiver. Instructions are given to the participant to read 20 statements describing common problems of everyday life and to rate them according to their personal experience. Each item is scored on a 5-point scale according to its frequency from never (0 point) to very often (4 points). Treatment There is no cure for individuals with DES, but there are therapies to help them cope with their symptoms. DES can affect a number of functions in the brain and vary from person to person. Because of this variance, it is suggested that the most successful therapy would include multiple methods. Researchers suggest that a number of factors in the executive functioning need to be improved, including self-awareness, goal setting, planning, self-initiation, self-monitoring, self-inhibition, flexibility, and strategic behaviour. One method for individuals to improve in these areas is to help them plan and carry out actions and intentions through a series of goals and sub-goals. To accomplish this, therapists teach patients a three-step model called the General Planning Approach. The first step is Information and Awareness, in which the patients are taught about their own problems and shown how this affects their lives. The patients are then taught to monitor their executive functions and begin to evaluate them. The second stage, Goal Setting and Planning, consists of patients making specific goals, as well as devising a plan to accomplish them. For example, patients may decide they will have lunch with a friend (their goal). They are taught to write down which friend it may be, where they are going for lunch, what time they are going, how they will get there, etc. (sub-goals). They are also taught to make sure the steps go in the correct order. The final stage, named Initiation, Execution, and Regulation, requires patients to implement their goals in their everyday lives. Initiation can be taught through normal routines. The first step can cue the patient to go to the next step in their plan. Execution and regulation are put into action with reminders of how to proceed if something goes wrong in the behavioural script. This treatment method has resulted in improved daily executive functioning, however no improvements were seen on formal executive functioning tests. Since planning is needed in many activities, different techniques have been used to improve this deficit in patients with DES. Autobiographical memories can be used to help direct future behaviour. You can draw on past experiences to know what to do in the future. For example, when you want to take a bus, you know from past experience that you have to walk to the bus stop, have the exact amount of change, put the change in the slot, and then you can go find a seat. Patients with DES seem to not be able to use this autobiographical memory as well as a normal person. Training for DES patients asks them to think of a specific time when they did an activity previously. They are then instructed to think about how they accomplished this activity. An example includes "how would you plan a holiday". Patients are taught to think of specific times they went on a holiday and then to think how they may have planned these holidays. By drawing on past experiences patients were better able to make good decisions and plans. Cognitive Analytic Therapy (CAT) has also been used to help those with DES. Because individuals with this syndrome have trouble integrating information into their actions it is often suggested that they have programmed reminders delivered to a cell phone or pager. This helps them remember how they should behave and discontinue inappropriate actions. Another method of reminding is to have patients write a letter to themselves. They can then read the letter whenever they need to. To help patients remember how to behave, they may also create a diagram. The diagram helps organize their thoughts and shows the patient how they can change their behaviour in everyday situations. The use of auditory stimuli has been examined in the treatment of DES. The presentation of auditory stimuli causes an interruption in current activity, which appears to aid in preventing "goal neglect" by increasing the patients' ability to monitor time and focus on goals. Given such stimuli, subjects no longer performed below their age group average IQ. Controversy Some researchers have suggested that DES is mislabelled as a syndrome because it is possible for the symptoms to exist on their own. Also, there is not a distinct pattern of damage that leads to the syndrome. Not all patients with frontal lobe damage have DES and some patients with no damage at all to the frontal lobe exhibit the necessary pattern of symptoms. This has led research to investigate the possibility that executive functioning is broken down into multiple processes that are spread throughout the frontal lobe. Further disagreement comes from the syndrome being based on Baddeley and Hitch's model of working memory and the central executive, which is a hypothetical construct. The vagueness of some aspects of the syndrome has led researchers to test for it in a non-clinical sample. The results show that some dysexecutive behaviours are part of everyday life, and the symptoms exist to varying degrees in everyone. For example, absent-mindedness and lapses in attention are common everyday occurrences for most people. However, for the majority of the population such inattentiveness is manageable, whereas patients with DES experience it to such a degree that daily tasks become difficult. See also ADHD Executive dysfunction FASD Schizophrenia References Neurobiological brain disorders Syndromes affecting the nervous system Frontal lobe

Stressor

A stressor is a chemical or biological agent, environmental condition, external stimulus or an event seen as causing stress to an organism. Psychologically speaking, a stressor can be events or environments that individuals might consider demanding, challenging, and/or threatening individual safety. Events or objects that may trigger a stress response may include: environmental stressors (hypo or hyper-thermic temperatures, elevated sound levels, over-illumination, overcrowding) daily "stress" events (e.g., traffic, lost keys, money, quality and quantity of physical activity) life changes (e.g., divorce, bereavement) workplace stressors (e.g., high job demand vs. low job control, repeated or sustained exertions, forceful exertions, extreme postures, office clutter) chemical stressors (e.g., tobacco, alcohol, drugs) social stressors (e.g., societal and family demands) Stressors can cause physical, chemical and mental responses internally. Physical stressors produce mechanical stresses on skin, bones, ligaments, tendons, muscles and nerves that cause tissue deformation and (in extreme cases) tissue failure. Chemical stresses also produce biomechanical responses associated with metabolism and tissue repair. Physical stressors may produce pain and impair work performance. Chronic pain and impairment requiring medical attention may result from extreme physical stressors or if there is not sufficient recovery time between successive exposures. Stressors may also affect mental function and performance. Mental and social stressors may affect behavior and how individuals respond to physical and chemical stressors. Social and environmental stressors and the events associated with them can range from minor to traumatic. Traumatic events involve very debilitating stressors, and oftentimes these stressors are uncontrollable. Traumatic events can deplete an individual's coping resources to an extent where the individual may develop acute stress disorder or even post-traumatic stress disorder. People who have been abused, victimized, or terrorized are often more susceptible to stress disorders. Most stressor-stress relationships can be evaluated and determined - either by the individual or by a psychologist. Therapeutic measures are often taken to help replenish and rebuild the individual's coping resources while simultaneously aiding the individual in dealing with current stress. Psychological stressors Stressors occur when an individual is unable to cope with the demands of their environment (such as crippling debt with no clear path to resolving it). Generally, stressors take many forms, such as: traumatic events, life demands, sudden medical emergencies, and daily inconveniences, to name a few. There are also a variety of characteristics that a stressor may possess (different durations, intensity, predictability, and controllability). Measuring psychological stress Due to the wide impact and the far-reaching consequences of psychological stressors (especially their profound effects on mental well-being), it is particularly important to devise tools to measure such stressors. Two common psychological stress tests include the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) devised by American psychologist Sheldon Cohen, and the Social Readjustment Rating Scale (SRRS) or the Holmes-Rahe Stress Scale. While the PSS is a traditional Likert scale, the SRRS assigns specific predefined numerical values to stressors. Biological responses to stressors Traumatic events or any type of shock to the body can cause an acute stress response disorder (ASD). The extent to which one experiences ASD depends on the extent of the shock. If the shock was pushed past a certain extreme after a particular period in time ASD can develop into what is commonly known as Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). There are two ways that the body responds biologically in order to reduce the amount of stress an individual is experiencing. One thing that the body does to combat stressors is to create stress hormones, which in turn create energy reservoirs that are there in case a stressful event were to occur. The second way our biological components respond is through an individual's cells. Depending on the situation our cells obtain more energy in order to combat any negative stressor and any other activity those cells are involved in seize. One possible mechanism of stressors influencing biological pathways involves stimulation of the hypothalamus, CRF (corticotropin release factor) causing the pituitary gland to releases ACTH (adrenocorticotropic hormone), which causes the adrenal cortex to secrete various stress hormones (e.g., cortisol). Stress hormones travel in the blood stream to relevant organs, e.g., glands, heart, intestines, triggering a flight-or-fight response. Between this flow there is an alternate path that can be taken after the stressor is transferred to the hypothalamus, which leads to the sympathetic nervous system; after which the adrenal medulla secretes epinephrine. Predictability and controllability When individuals are informed about events before they occur, the magnitude of the stressor is less than when compared to individuals who were not informed of the stressor. For example, an individual would prefer to know when they have a deadline ahead of time in order to prepare for it in advance, rather than find out about the deadline the day of. In knowing that there is a deadline ahead of time, the intensity of the stressor is smaller for the individual, as opposed to the magnitude of intensity for the other unfortunate individual who found out about the deadline the day of. When this was tested, psychologists found that when given the choice, individuals had a preference for the predictable stressors, rather than the unpredictable stressors. Additionally, the degree to which the stressor can be controlled plays a variable in how the individual perceives stress. Research has found that if an individual is able to take some control over the stressor, then the level of stress will be decreased. During this study, it was found that the individuals become increasingly anxious and distressed if they were unable to control their environment. As an example, imagine an individual who detests baths in the Middle Ages, taking a bath. If the individual was forced to take the bath with no control over the temperature of the bath (one of the variables), then their anxiety and stress levels would be higher than if the individual was given some control over the environment (such as being able to control the temperature of the water). Based on these two principles (predictability and control), there are two hypotheses that attempt to account for these preferences; the preparatory response hypothesis and safety hypothesis attempt to accommodate these preferences. Preparatory response hypothesis The idea behind this hypothesis is that an organism can better prepare for an event if they are informed beforehand, as this allows them to prepare for it (biologically). In biologically preparing for this event beforehand, the individual is able to better decrease the event's aversiveness. In knowing when a potential stressor will occur (such as an exam), the individual could, in theory, prepare for it in advance, thus decreasing the stress that may result from that event. Safety hypothesis In this hypothesis, there are two time periods, one in which is deemed safe (where there is no stressor), and one which is deemed unsafe (in which the stressor is present). This is similar to procrastination and cramming; during the safe intervals (weeks before an exam) the individual is relaxed and not anxious, and during the unsafe intervals (the day or night before the exam) the individual most likely experiences anxiety. See also Disturbance (ecology) References Further reading National Research Council. Work-Related Musculoskeletal Disorders: Report, Workshop Summary, and Workshop Papers. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press, 1999. Physiology Stress (biological and psychological) Anxiety

Stimulus–response model

The stimulus–response model is a conceptual framework in psychology that describes how individuals respond to external stimuli. According to this model, an external stimulus triggers a reaction in an organism, often without the need for conscious thought. This model emphasizes the mechanistic aspects of behavior, suggesting that behavior can often be predicted and controlled by understanding and manipulating the stimuli that trigger responses. Fields of application Stimulus–response models are applied in international relations, psychology, risk assessment, neuroscience, neurally-inspired system design, and many other fields. Pharmacological dose response relationships are an application of stimulus-response models. Another field this model can be applied to is psychological problems/disorders such as Tourette syndrome. Research shows Gilles de la Tourette syndrome (GTS) can be characterized by enhanced cognitive functions related to creating, modifying and maintaining connections between stimuli and responses (S‐R links). Specifically, two areas, procedural sequence learning and, as a novel finding, also event file binding, show converging evidence of hyperfunctioning in GTS. Previous research on E-learning has proven that studying online can be even more daunting for lecturers and students who suddenly change their learning patterns from the classrooms to the virtual ones. This is mainly because the suddenness of this change makes it difficult for lecturers to fully prepare to lecture in the virtual learning environment. In light of the above-mentioned facts, this research proposes a novel model and integrates flow theory into the theory of technology acceptance model (TAM), based on stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) theory, the SOR model has been widely used in previous studies of online customer behavior, and the model theory includes three components: stimulus, organism, and response. Assuming that stimuli contained in the external environment cause people to change, which affects their behavior. Mathematical formulation The object of a stimulus–response model is to establish a mathematical function that describes the relation f between the stimulus x and the expected value (or other measure of location) of the response Y: A common simplification assumed for such functions is linear, thus we expect to see a relationship like Statistical theory for linear models has been well developed for more than fifty years, and a standard form of analysis called linear regression has been developed. Bounded response functions Since many types of response have inherent physical limitations (e.g. minimal maximal muscle contraction), it is often applicable to use a bounded function (such as the logistic function) to model the response. Similarly, a linear response function may be unrealistic as it would imply arbitrarily large responses. For binary dependent variables, statistical analysis with regression methods such as the probit model or logit model, or other methods such as the Spearman–Kärber method. Empirical models based on nonlinear regression are usually preferred over the use of some transformation of the data that linearizes the stimulus-response relationship. One example of a logit model for the probability of a response to the real input (stimulus) , is where are the parameters of the function. Conversely, a Probit model would be of the form where is the cumulative distribution function of the normal distribution. Hill equation In biochemistry and pharmacology, the Hill equation refers to two closely related equations, one of which describes the response (the physiological output of the system, such as muscle contraction) to Drug or Toxin, as a function of the drug's concentration. The Hill equation is important in the construction of dose-response curves. The Hill equation is the following formula, where is the magnitude of the response, [A] is the drug concentration (or equivalently, stimulus intensity), is the drug concentration that produces a half-maximal response and is the Hill coefficient. The Hill equation rearranges to a logistic function with respect to the logarithm of the dose (similar to a logit model). Founder of the Model Ivan Pavlov Pavlov started studying the digestive system in dogs by performing chronic implants of fistulas in the stomach, by which he was able to show with extreme clarity that the nervous system plays a dominant role in the regulation of the digestive process. Experiments on digestion led to the development of the first experimental model of learning, in which a neutral stimulus acquires the capacity to evoke a specific response further to repeated pairing with another stimulus that evokes the response. Edward Thorndike Thorndike, who proposed the model, believed that learning stemmed from stimulus and response. Pavlov popularized and revolutionized the theory though by experimenting on the dogs. References Further reading Behavioral concepts Psychological models

Natural history of disease

The natural history of disease is the course a disease takes in individual people from its pathological onset ("inception") until its resolution (either through complete recovery or eventual death). The inception of a disease is not a firmly defined concept. The natural history of a disease is sometimes said to start at the moment of exposure to causal agents. Knowledge of the natural history of disease ranks alongside causal understanding in importance for disease prevention and control. Natural history of disease is one of the major elements of descriptive epidemiology. As an example, the cartilage of the knee, trapeziometacarpal and other joints deteriorates with age in most humans (osteoarthritis). There are no disease-modifying treatments for osteoarthritis---no way to slow, arrest, or reverse this pathophysiological process. There are only palliative/symptomatic treatments such as analgesics and exercises. In contrast, consider rheumatoid arthritis, a systemic inflammatory disease that damages articular cartilage throughout the body. There are now treatments that can modify that auto-immune inflammatory process (immune modulating drugs) that can slow the progression of the disease. Because these medications can alter the natural history of disease, they are referred to as disease-modifying antirheumatic drugs. The subclinical (pre-symptomatic) and clinical (symptomatic) evolution of disease is the natural progression of a disease without any medical intervention. It constitutes the course of biological events that occurs during the development of the origin of the diseases (etiologies) to its outcome, whether that be recovery, chronicity, or death. In regards to the natural history of disease, the goal of the medical field is to discover all of the different phases and components of each pathological process in order to intervene as early as possible and change the course of the disease before it leads to the deterioration of a patient's health. There are two complementary perspectives for characterizing the natural history of disease. The first is that of the family doctor, who, by means of detailed clinical histories of each patient, can determine the presence of and characteristics of any new health problems. In contrast to this individualized view, the second perspective is that of the epidemiologist, who, through a combination of health records and biostatistical data, can discover new diseases and their respective evolutions, which is more of a population view. Phases of disease Pre-pathogenic period In the pre-pathogenic period, the disease originates, but the patient does not yet present clinical symptoms or changes in his/her cells, tissues, or organs. This phase is defined by the host conditions, the disease agent (such as microorganisms and pathogens), and the environment. Pathogenic period The pathogenic period is the phase in which there are changes in the patient's cells, tissues, or organs, but the patient still does not notice any symptoms or signs of disease. This is a subclinical phase that can be subdivided into two more phases: Incubation period vs. latency period In transmissible diseases (like the flu), we refer to this phase as the incubation period because it's the time in which microorganisms are multiplying and producing toxins. It's fast-evolving and can last hours to days. However, in degenerative and chronic diseases (like osteoarthritis and dementia), we refer to this phase as the latency period because it has a very slow evolution that can last months to years. Clinical period The clinical period is when the patient finally presents clinical signs and symptoms. That is: when the disease is clinically expressed and the affected seek health care. During this phase, if the pathological process keeps evolving spontaneously without medical intervention, it will end in one of three ways: recovery, disability, or death. Additionally, this phase can be broken down into three different periods: Prodromal: the first signs or symptoms appear, which indicates the clinical start of the disease. Clinical: specific signs and symptoms appear, which allows the doctor to not only identify the disease but also determine the appropriate treatment in hopes of curing the patient or at least preventing long-term damages. Resolution: the final phase in which the disease disappears, becomes chronic, or leads to death. Types of prevention The medical field has developed many different interventions to diagnose, prevent, treat, and rehabilitate the natural course of disease. In artificially changing this evolution of disease, doctors hope to prevent the death of their patients by either curing them or reducing their long-term effects. Primary prevention Primary prevention is a group of sanitary activities that are carried out by the community, government, and healthcare personnel before a particular disease appears. This includes: Promotion of health, which is the encouragement and defense of the population's health through actions that fall upon individuals of the community, like, for example, anti-tobacco campaigns for preventing lung cancer and other illnesses associated with tobacco. Specific protection of health, including environmental safety and food safety. While vaccinations are carried out by medical and nursing personnel, health promotion and protection activities that influence the environment are carried out by other public health professionals. Chemical treatment, which consists of drug administration to prevent diseases. One example of this is the administration of estrogen in menopausal women to prevent osteoporosis. According to WHO, one of the instruments of health promotion and prevention is health education, which further deals with the transmission of information, the personal skills, and the self-esteem necessary to adopt measures intended to improve health. Health education involves the spreading of information related not only to underlying social, economic, and environmental conditions that influence health but also to factors and behaviors that put patients at risk. In addition to this, communication about the use of the healthcare system is becoming increasingly more important to primary prevention. Secondary prevention Secondary prevention, also called premature diagnosis or premature screening, is an early detection program. More specifically, it's an epidemiological program of universal application that is used to detect serious illnesses in particular, asymptomatic populations during the pre-pathogenic period. This form of prevention can be associated with an effective or curative treatment, and its goal is to reduce the mortality rate. Secondary prevention is based on population screenings, and, in order to justify these screenings, the following predetermined conditions defined by Frame and Carlson in 1975 must be met: That the disease represents an important health problem that produces noticeable effects on the quality and duration of one's life. That the disease has a prolonged initial, asymptomatic phase and that its natural history is known. That an effective treatment is available and accepted by the population in case the disease is found in the initial phase. That a rapid, reliable, and easily conducted screening test is available, is well-accepted by doctors and patients, and has high sensitivity, specificity, and validity. That the screening test is cost-effective. That the early detection of the disease and its treatment during the asymptomatic period reduces global morbidity and/or mortality. Tertiary prevention Tertiary prevention is the patient's recovery once the disease has appeared. A treatment is administered in an attempt to cure or palliate the disease or some of its specific symptoms. The recovery and treatment of the patient is carried out both in primary care and in hospital care. Tertiary prevention also occurs when a patient avoids a new contagion as a result of knowledge that he/she gained from having a different illness in the past. Quaternary prevention Quaternary prevention is the group of sanitary activities that mitigates or entirely bypasses the consequences of the health system's unnecessary or excessive interventions. They are "the actions that are taken to identify patients at risk of overtreatment, to protect them from new medical interventions, and to suggest ethically acceptable alternatives." This concept is coined by the Belgian general physician, Marc Jamoulle, and is included in WONCA's Dictionary of General/Family Practice. Example: Musculoskeletal diseases of senescence Pre-pathogenic period Musculoskeletal pathologies such as osteoarthritis of the knee or shoulder (rotator cuff) tendinopathy are aspects of normal human aging. Most humans eventually have evidence of these disease on imaging. In other words, they are diseases of senescence. In a sense, all humans are in the "pre-pathogenic period" for these diseases. Pathogenic period Latency period Osteoarthritis and tendinopathy can remain unnoticed (asymptomatic) for years or even decades. For instance, when one shoulder with tendinopathy develops painful movement, imaging of the opposite symptom-free shoulder tends to identify comparable pathology. Clinical period Prodromal: The first time a person notices pain or stiffness associated with osteoarthritis or tendinopathy, it may be misperceived as a new pathology and even as an injury. Clinical: There comes a time when the disease is symptomatic on most days and there may be deformity or stiffness (reduced motion). The person is now aware of the changes in their body. This may be a time of seeking medical advice or treatment. Resolution: As with all diseases of senescence, there is an accommodation phase a person redefines their sense of self and no longer perceives the disease as needing active care. Another example would be presbyopia, or the need for reading glasses. Once a person understands that they need glasses to read, they adjust and this is no longer a medical problem. Types of prevention The concept of prevention does not apply to musculoskeletal diseases of senescence, because there are no disease modifying treatments, and the pathology seems relatively independent of environmental exposures such as activity level. References Bibliography Cause (medicine) Epidemiology

Mental mapping

In behavioral geography, a mental map is a person's point-of-view perception of their area of interaction. Although this kind of subject matter would seem most likely to be studied by fields in the social sciences, this particular subject is most often studied by modern-day geographers. They study it to determine subjective qualities from the public such as personal preference and practical uses of geography like driving directions. Mass media also have a virtually direct effect on a person's mental map of the geographical world. The perceived geographical dimensions of a foreign nation (relative to one's own nation) may often be heavily influenced by the amount of time and relative news coverage that the news media may spend covering news events from that foreign region. For instance, a person might perceive a small island to be nearly the size of a continent, merely based on the amount of news coverage that he or she is exposed to on a regular basis. In psychology, the term names the information maintained in the mind of an organism by means of which it may plan activities, select routes over previously traveled territories, etc. The rapid traversal of a familiar maze depends on this kind of mental map if scents or other markers laid down by the subject are eliminated before the maze is re-run. Background Mental maps are an outcome of the field of behavioral geography. The imagined maps are considered one of the first studies that intersected geographical settings with human action. The most prominent contribution and study of mental maps was in the writings of Kevin Lynch. In The Image of the City, Lynch used simple sketches of maps created from memory of an urban area to reveal five elements of the city; nodes, edges, districts, paths and landmarks. Lynch claimed that “Most often our perception of the city is not sustained, but rather partial, fragmentary, mixed with other concerns. Nearly every sense is in operation, and the image is the composite of them all.” (Lynch, 1960, p 2.) The creation of a mental map relies on memory as opposed to being copied from a preexisting map or image. In The Image of the City, Lynch asks a participant to create a map as follows: “Make it just as if you were making a rapid description of the city to a stranger, covering all the main features. We don’t expect an accurate drawing- just a rough sketch.” (Lynch 1960, p 141) In the field of human geography mental maps have led to an emphasizing of social factors and the use of social methods versus quantitative or positivist methods. Mental maps have often led to revelations regarding social conditions of a particular space or area. Haken and Portugali (2003) developed an information view, which argued that the face of the city is its information . Bin Jiang (2012) argued that the image of the city (or mental map) arises out of the scaling of city artifacts and locations. He addressed that why the image of city can be formed , and he even suggested ways of computing the image of the city, or more precisely the kind of collective image of the city, using increasingly available geographic information such as Flickr and Twitter . Using mental maps, we will be able to predict individual decision making and spatial selection, as well as evaluate their routing and navigation. A cognitive maps utility as a mnemonic and metaphorical device is precisely one of its other benefits as a shaper of the world and local attitudes. The first major field of study within the domain of memory maps is geography, spatial cognition and neurophysiology. This aims to understand how routes are drawn by subject from his or her set of subjects out into space which lead to memorization and internal representations. Overall these representations take the form of drawings, positioning in a graph, or oral/textual narratives, but are reflected as behavior is space that can be recorded as tracking items. Research applications Mental maps have been used in a collection of spatial research. Many studies have been performed that focus on the quality of an environment in terms of feelings such as fear, desire and stress. A study by Matei et al. in 2001 used mental maps to reveal the role of media in shaping urban space in Los Angeles. The study used Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to process 215 mental maps taken from seven neighborhoods across the city. The results showed that people's fear perceptions in Los Angeles are not associated with high crime rates but are instead associated with a concentration of certain ethnicities in a given area. The mental maps recorded in the study draw attention to these areas of concentrated ethnicities as parts of the urban space to avoid or stay away from. Mental maps have also been used to describe the urban experience of children. In a 2008 study by Olga den Besten mental maps were used to map out the fears and dislikes of children in Berlin and Paris. The study looked into the absence of children in today's cities and the urban environment from a child's perspective of safety, stress and fear. Peter Gould and Rodney White have performed prominent analyses in the book “Mental Maps.” This book is an investigation into people's spatial desires. The book asks of its participants: “Suppose you were suddenly given the chance to choose where you would like to live- an entirely free choice that you could make quite independently of the usual constraints of income or job availability. Where would you choose to go?” (Gould, 1974, p 15) Gould and White use their findings to create a surface of desire for various areas of the world. The surface of desire is meant to show people's environmental preferences and regional biases. In an experiment done by Edward C. Tolman, the development of a mental map was seen in rats. A rat was placed in a cross shaped maze and allowed to explore it. After this initial exploration, the rat was placed at one arm of the cross and food was placed at the next arm to the immediate right. The rat was conditioned to this layout and learned to turn right at the intersection in order to get to the food. When placed at different arms of the cross maze however, the rat still went in the correct direction to obtain the food because of the initial mental map it had created of the maze. Rather than just deciding to turn right at the intersection no matter what, the rat was able to determine the correct way to the food no matter where in the maze it was placed. The idea of mental maps is also used in strategic analysis. David Brewster, an Australian strategic analyst, has applied the concept to strategic conceptions of South Asia and Southeast Asia. He argues that popular mental maps of where regions begin and end can have a significant impact on the strategic behaviour of states. A collection of essays, documenting current geographical and historical research in mental maps is published by the Journal of Cultural Geography in 2018. See also Spatial cognition References Knowledge representation Cognitive psychology Human geography Spatial cognition

IBS

IBS most commonly refers to: Irritable bowel syndrome, a disorder of the bowel IBS may also refer to: Academia and education Indiana Boys School, a former name of Plainfield Juvenile Correctional Facility Institute for Basic Science, a research institute in Daejeon, South Korea Institute of Bangladesh Studies, a research institute in Rajshahi University International Bilingual School, a former Japanese private school in the Los Angeles area International Biometric Society, an academic statistical association for mathematical and statistical methods in the biosciences International Business School, Budapest, a partnership with Oxford Brookes University based in Hungary dating from 1991 International Business School, Germany, a private institution of post-secondary education located in Nuremberg Iowa Braille School International Boys' Schools Coalition Associations Institute of Professional Sound, formerly Institute of Broadcast Sound, a UK broadcasting professional association , the Institute for Structural Research in Warsaw, Poland Intercollegiate Broadcasting System, an organization of non-profit, education-affiliated radio stations International Bible Society, a former name of Biblica, a group that translates and publishes the Bible International Boy Scouts, Troop 1, a historic Boy Scout Group in Japan Business International Builders' Show, an annual trade show organized by the National Association of Home Builders Iptor Supply Chain Systems, formerly International Business Systems, a supply chain management company Internet Broadcasting, a web design firm focused on broadcast television Fiction IBS, a satirical news channel on the BBC's programme Broken News International Brotherhood of Stevedores, a dockworkers union in season two of the TV show The Wire Statistics Integrated Brier score, a statistical rate Medical Ichthyosis bullosa of Siemens, a genetic skin disorder Science and technology Ideal Body Size, a component of the figure rating scale Identical By State, a genetic term also known as non-identical by type (NIBT) Instruction-based sampling, an implementation of a hardware performance counter used to collect performance data in a superscalar microprocessor Integrated bridge system, a navigation related system on ships Intrabeam scattering, a collective effect arising in high-intensity particle beams Ion-beam sputtering, a type of sputter deposition Iron-based superconductor Israel Broadcasting Service, former (1951–1965) name of the Israel Broadcasting Authority Other uses Isaac Bashevis Singer, a Jewish American novelist Iman Budhi Santosa, an Indonesian poet Industrialised Building System (IBS), a term used in Malaysia for a technique of construction Inflatable Boat, Small

Adolescent medicine

Adolescent medicine, also known as adolescent and young adult medicine, is a medical subspecialty that focuses on care of patients who are in the adolescent period of development. This period begins at puberty and lasts until growth has stopped, at which time adulthood begins. Typically, patients in this age range will be in the last years of middle school up until college graduation (some doctors in this subspecialty treat young adults attending college at area clinics, in the subfield of college health). In developed nations, the psychosocial period of adolescence is extended both by an earlier start, as the onset of puberty begins earlier, and a later end, as patients require more years of education or training before they reach economic independence from their parents. Medicine is often categorized most simply as pediatric and adult, with the pediatric category covering from infancy through both childhood and adolescence. However, such categorization is further divided in some contexts, such that adolescent medicine can be a more specific focus within pediatrics and geriatrics can be a more specific focus within adult medicine. Issues with a high prevalence during adolescence are frequently addressed by providers. These include: Sexually transmitted disease (working with specialists in pediatric endocrinology, adolescent obstetrics and gynecology, immunology infectious diseases, and urology and reproductive medicine) Unintended pregnancy (working with specialists in adolescent obstetrics and gynecology, especially in neonatology and maternal-fetal medicine; many – though not all – are medically risky or high-risk cases or to those with psychosocial, environmental, and socioeconomic challenges) Birth control (access to prescription or non-prescription contraceptive methods) Sexual activity (such as masturbation, sexual intercourse and sexual abuse) Substance abuse Menstrual disorders (such as amenorrhea, dysmenorrhea and dysfunctional uterine bleeding) Acne (working with specialists in dermatology who treat adolescents) Eating disorders like anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa (working with nutritionists and dieticians, and also specialists in pediatric mental health counseling, clinical psychology, and pediatric psychiatry, who work with adolescents) Certain mental illnesses (especially personality disorders, anxiety disorders, major depression and suicide, bipolar disorder, and certain types of schizophrenia; in concert with mental health counselors, clinical psychologists, and pediatric psychiatrists specializing in adolescent health care) Delayed or precocious puberty (often working with specialists in adolescent pediatric endocrinology, urology, and andrology) Gay, lesbian and bisexual young people Adolescents who are gay, lesbian or bisexual tend to demonstrate more risky health behaviors and have worse health outcomes compared to heterosexual youth, including: Substance abuse Suicidality Eating disorders and body image Sexual behaviors, including unintended pregnancy involvement (Contrary to assumptions, gay, bisexual or lesbian youth are more likely to report involvement in pregnancy compared to their heterosexual peers) Homelessness, which affects health and access to care Chronic conditions Chronic conditions often cause delay in onset of puberty and temporary or permanent impediments to growth; conversely the growth and hormonal changes can destabilize treatment for the chronic condition. An increase in independence can lead to gaps in self-management, for example, in the decreased management of diabetes. Young peoples' access to health care In addition, issues of medical ethics, particularly related to confidentiality and the right to consent for medical care, are pertinent to the practice of adolescent medicine. Marginalised young people’s access is affected by their ability to recognize and understand health issues; service knowledge and attitudes toward help seeking; structural barriers; professionals' knowledge, skills, attitudes; service environments and structures; ability to navigate the health system; youth participation; and technology opportunities. Marginalised young people’s healthcare journeys can be supported by advocates that help them navigate the health system. The particular needs of young people when accessing healthcare have also led the WHO to publishing guidelines for adolescent-friendly health care, in an effort to increase adolescents utilization of the healthcare system. Training Adolescent medicine providers are generally drawn from the specialties of pediatrics, internal medicine, med/peds or family medicine. The certifying boards for these different specialties have varying requirements for certification, though all require successful completion of a fellowship and a passing score on a certifying exam. The American Board of Pediatrics and the American Board of Internal Medicine require evidence of scholarly achievement by candidates for subspecialty certification, usually in the form of an original research study. In the United States, subspecialty medical board certification in adolescent medicine is available through the specialty boards of American Board of Internal Medicine, the American Osteopathic Board of Neurology and Psychiatry, the American Board of Family Medicine, the American Osteopathic Board of Family Physicians, the American Board of Pediatrics, and the American Osteopathic Board of Pediatrics. List of adolescent health centers in the United States San Antonio, Texas Adolescent and Young Adult Medicine Clinic at Fort Sam Houston Dallas, Texas Adolescent and Young Adult Clinic at Children's Medical Center (Dallas) Windhaven Adolescent Medicine Clinic at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital (Plano) Girls to Women Health and Wellness (North Dallas) Young Men's Health and Wellness (North Dallas) U.S. Air Force Academy, Colorado Spring, Colorado Cadet Medicine Clinic at U.S. Air Force Academy Kansas City, Missouri Adolescent Clinic at Children's Mercy Hospital (Kansas City, Missouri) Indianapolis, Indiana Section of Adolescent Medicine, Department of Pediatrics, Indiana University School of Medicine New York City, New York The Adolescent Health Center at Mount Sinai Medical Center (Manhattan) Adolescent clinic at Children's Hospital at Montefiore Medical Center (the Bronx) The Door - Adolescent Health Center (Manhattan) www.door.org Dayton, Ohio Division of Adolescent Young Adult Medicine at Dayton Children’s Hospital Rochester, New York The Adolescent Health Clinic at University of Rochester Los Angeles, California Teenage and Young Adult Health Center at Children's Hospital Los Angeles San Francisco area Adolescent Medicine Clinic at Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford Adolescent Medicine Clinic at UCSF Massachusetts Adolescent Center Boston Medical Center Cambridge Rindge & Latin High School Teen Health Center CHA Cambridge Teen Health Center Center for Adolescent & Young Adult Health, Milford Division of Adolescent Medicine at Children's Hospital Boston Everett Teen Health Somerville High School Somerville Teen Connection Teen Health Center in Boston Tufts Children's Hospital Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Adolescent Medicine at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia Adolescent Medicine at St. Christopher's Hospital for Children Teen Health Center at Temple University Children's Medical Center Teen Health Center at Albert Einstein Medical Center Columbus, Ohio Adolescent Health at Nationwide Children's Hospital Seattle, Washington Department of Adolescent Medicine at Seattle Children's Hospital Cincinnati, Ohio Division of Adolescent Medicine at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center Richmond, Virginia Adolescent Medicine at Children's Hospital of Richmond Fayetteville, North Carolina Adolescent Medicine at Womac Army Medical Center List of adolescent health centers in Australia Sydney The Department of Adolescent Medicine at The Children's Hospital at Westmead The Department of Adolescent Medicine at Westmead Hospital Youth Consultancy & the Chill, at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital Melbourne The Centre For Adolescent Health Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne Relationship with college health In the United States, the subspecialty of college health is closely affiliated with adolescent medicine. Many adolescent medicine fellowships include rotations in college-based student health clinics and many adolescent medicine physicians work in college health clinics. Professional organizations Founded in 1987, the International Association for Adolescent Health (IAAH) is a multidisciplinary, non-government organization with a broad focus on youth health. Publications Journal of Adolescent Health (published by Elsevier on behalf of the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine) Journal of Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology (published by the North American Society for Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology) Adolescent Medicine: State of the Art Reviews (published by the American Academy of Pediatrics) See also Adolescent and young adult oncology Adolescent Health Adolescent sexuality Teen pregnancy Youth Health References Further reading External links Office of Adolescent, U.S. Department of Health, Health and Human Services Adolescent Medicine: State of the Art Reviews The Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine International Association for Adolescent Health The North American Society for Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology The American Board of Pediatrics The American Board of Internal Medicine The American Board of Family Medicine The American College Health Association Teens Homepage, Nemours Foundation Pediatrics Adolescent medicine

Rasch model

The Rasch model, named after Georg Rasch, is a psychometric model for analyzing categorical data, such as answers to questions on a reading assessment or questionnaire responses, as a function of the trade-off between the respondent's abilities, attitudes, or personality traits, and the item difficulty. For example, they may be used to estimate a student's reading ability or the extremity of a person's attitude to capital punishment from responses on a questionnaire. In addition to psychometrics and educational research, the Rasch model and its extensions are used in other areas, including the health profession, agriculture, and market research. The mathematical theory underlying Rasch models is a special case of item response theory. However, there are important differences in the interpretation of the model parameters and its philosophical implications that separate proponents of the Rasch model from the item response modeling tradition. A central aspect of this divide relates to the role of specific objectivity, a defining property of the Rasch model according to Georg Rasch, as a requirement for successful measurement. Overview The Rasch model for measurement In the Rasch model, the probability of a specified response (e.g. right/wrong answer) is modeled as a function of person and item parameters. Specifically, in the original Rasch model, the probability of a correct response is modeled as a logistic function of the difference between the person and item parameter. The mathematical form of the model is provided later in this article. In most contexts, the parameters of the model characterize the proficiency of the respondents and the difficulty of the items as locations on a continuous latent variable. For example, in educational tests, item parameters represent the difficulty of items while person parameters represent the ability or attainment level of people who are assessed. The higher a person's ability relative to the difficulty of an item, the higher the probability of a correct response on that item. When a person's location on the latent trait is equal to the difficulty of the item, there is by definition a 0.5 probability of a correct response in the Rasch model. A Rasch model is a model in one sense in that it represents the structure which data should exhibit in order to obtain measurements from the data; i.e. it provides a criterion for successful measurement. Beyond data, Rasch's equations model relationships we expect to obtain in the real world. For instance, education is intended to prepare children for the entire range of challenges they will face in life, and not just those that appear in textbooks or on tests. By requiring measures to remain the same (invariant) across different tests measuring the same thing, Rasch models make it possible to test the hypothesis that the particular challenges posed in a curriculum and on a test coherently represent the infinite population of all possible challenges in that domain. A Rasch model is therefore a model in the sense of an ideal or standard that provides a heuristic fiction serving as a useful organizing principle even when it is never actually observed in practice. The perspective or paradigm underpinning the Rasch model is distinct from the perspective underpinning statistical modelling. Models are most often used with the intention of describing a set of data. Parameters are modified and accepted or rejected based on how well they fit the data. In contrast, when the Rasch model is employed, the objective is to obtain data which fit the model. The rationale for this perspective is that the Rasch model embodies requirements which must be met in order to obtain measurement, in the sense that measurement is generally understood in the physical sciences. A useful analogy for understanding this rationale is to consider objects measured on a weighing scale. Suppose the weight of an object A is measured as being substantially greater than the weight of an object B on one occasion, then immediately afterward the weight of object B is measured as being substantially greater than the weight of object A. A property we require of measurements is that the resulting comparison between objects should be the same, or invariant, irrespective of other factors. This key requirement is embodied within the formal structure of the Rasch model. Consequently, the Rasch model is not altered to suit data. Instead, the method of assessment should be changed so that this requirement is met, in the same way that a weighing scale should be rectified if it gives different comparisons between objects upon separate measurements of the objects. Data analysed using the model are usually responses to conventional items on tests, such as educational tests with right/wrong answers. However, the model is a general one, and can be applied wherever discrete data are obtained with the intention of measuring a quantitative attribute or trait. Scaling When all test-takers have an opportunity to attempt all items on a single test, each total score on the test maps to a unique estimate of ability and the greater the total, the greater the ability estimate. Total scores do not have a linear relationship with ability estimates. Rather, the relationship is non-linear as shown in Figure 1. The total score is shown on the vertical axis, while the corresponding person location estimate is shown on the horizontal axis. For the particular test on which the test characteristic curve (TCC) shown in Figure 1 is based, the relationship is approximately linear throughout the range of total scores from about 13 to 31. The shape of the TCC is generally somewhat sigmoid as in this example. However, the precise relationship between total scores and person location estimates depends on the distribution of items on the test. The TCC is steeper in ranges on the continuum in which there are more items, such as in the range on either side of 0 in Figures 1 and 2. In applying the Rasch model, item locations are often scaled first, based on methods such as those described below. This part of the process of scaling is often referred to as item calibration. In educational tests, the smaller the proportion of correct responses, the higher the difficulty of an item and hence the higher the item's scale location. Once item locations are scaled, the person locations are measured on the scale. As a result, person and item locations are estimated on a single scale as shown in Figure 2. Interpreting scale locations For dichotomous data such as right/wrong answers, by definition, the location of an item on a scale corresponds with the person location at which there is a 0.5 probability of a correct response to the question. In general, the probability of a person responding correctly to a question with difficulty lower than that person's location is greater than 0.5, while the probability of responding correctly to a question with difficulty greater than the person's location is less than 0.5. The Item Characteristic Curve (ICC) or Item Response Function (IRF) shows the probability of a correct response as a function of the ability of persons. A single ICC is shown and explained in more detail in relation to Figure 4 in this article (see also the item response function). The leftmost ICCs in Figure 3 are the easiest items, the rightmost ICCs in the same figure are the most difficult items. When responses of a person are sorted according to item difficulty, from lowest to highest, the most likely pattern is a Guttman pattern or vector; i.e. {1,1,...,1,0,0,0,...,0}. However, while this pattern is the most probable given the structure of the Rasch model, the model requires only probabilistic Guttman response patterns; that is, patterns which tend toward the Guttman pattern. It is unusual for responses to conform strictly to the pattern because there are many possible patterns. It is unnecessary for responses to conform strictly to the pattern in order for data to fit the Rasch model. Each ability estimate has an associated standard error of measurement, which quantifies the degree of uncertainty associated with the ability estimate. Item estimates also have standard errors. Generally, the standard errors of item estimates are considerably smaller than the standard errors of person estimates because there are usually more response data for an item than for a person. That is, the number of people attempting a given item is usually greater than the number of items attempted by a given person. Standard errors of person estimates are smaller where the slope of the ICC is steeper, which is generally through the middle range of scores on a test. Thus, there is greater precision in this range since the steeper the slope, the greater the distinction between any two points on the line. Statistical and graphical tests are used to evaluate the correspondence of data with the model. Certain tests are global, while others focus on specific items or people. Certain tests of fit provide information about which items can be used to increase the reliability of a test by omitting or correcting problems with poor items. In Rasch Measurement the person separation index is used instead of reliability indices. However, the person separation index is analogous to a reliability index. The separation index is a summary of the genuine separation as a ratio to separation including measurement error. As mentioned earlier, the level of measurement error is not uniform across the range of a test, but is generally larger for more extreme scores (low and high). Features of the Rasch model The class of models is named after Georg Rasch, a Danish mathematician and statistician who advanced the epistemological case for the models based on their congruence with a core requirement of measurement in physics; namely the requirement of invariant comparison. This is the defining feature of the class of models, as is elaborated upon in the following section. The Rasch model for dichotomous data has a close conceptual relationship to the law of comparative judgment (LCJ), a model formulated and used extensively by L. L. Thurstone, and therefore also to the Thurstone scale. Prior to introducing the measurement model he is best known for, Rasch had applied the Poisson distribution to reading data as a measurement model, hypothesizing that in the relevant empirical context, the number of errors made by a given individual was governed by the ratio of the text difficulty to the person's reading ability. Rasch referred to this model as the multiplicative Poisson model. Rasch's model for dichotomous data – i.e. where responses are classifiable into two categories – is his most widely known and used model, and is the main focus here. This model has the form of a simple logistic function. The brief outline above highlights certain distinctive and interrelated features of Rasch's perspective on social measurement, which are as follows: He was concerned principally with the measurement of individuals, rather than with distributions among populations. He was concerned with establishing a basis for meeting a priori requirements for measurement deduced from physics and, consequently, did not invoke any assumptions about the distribution of levels of a trait in a population. Rasch's approach explicitly recognizes that it is a scientific hypothesis that a given trait is both quantitative and measurable, as operationalized in a particular experimental context. Thus, congruent with the perspective articulated by Thomas Kuhn in his 1961 paper The function of measurement in modern physical science, measurement was regarded both as being founded in theory, and as being instrumental to detecting quantitative anomalies incongruent with hypotheses related to a broader theoretical framework. This perspective is in contrast to that generally prevailing in the social sciences, in which data such as test scores are directly treated as measurements without requiring a theoretical foundation for measurement. Although this contrast exists, Rasch's perspective is actually complementary to the use of statistical analysis or modelling that requires interval-level measurements, because the purpose of applying a Rasch model is to obtain such measurements. Applications of Rasch models are described in a wide variety of sources. Invariant comparison and sufficiency The Rasch model for dichotomous data is often regarded as an item response theory (IRT) model with one item parameter. However, rather than being a particular IRT model, proponents of the model regard it as a model that possesses a property which distinguishes it from other IRT models. Specifically, the defining property of Rasch models is their formal or mathematical embodiment of the principle of invariant comparison. Rasch summarised the principle of invariant comparison as follows: The comparison between two stimuli should be independent of which particular individuals were instrumental for the comparison; and it should also be independent of which other stimuli within the considered class were or might also have been compared. Symmetrically, a comparison between two individuals should be independent of which particular stimuli within the class considered were instrumental for the comparison; and it should also be independent of which other individuals were also compared, on the same or some other occasion. Rasch models embody this principle because their formal structure permits algebraic separation of the person and item parameters, in the sense that the person parameter can be eliminated during the process of statistical estimation of item parameters. This result is achieved through the use of conditional maximum likelihood estimation, in which the response space is partitioned according to person total scores. The consequence is that the raw score for an item or person is the sufficient statistic for the item or person parameter. That is to say, the person total score contains all information available within the specified context about the individual, and the item total score contains all information with respect to item, with regard to the relevant latent trait. The Rasch model requires a specific structure in the response data, namely a probabilistic Guttman structure. In somewhat more familiar terms, Rasch models provide a basis and justification for obtaining person locations on a continuum from total scores on assessments. Although it is not uncommon to treat total scores directly as measurements, they are actually counts of discrete observations rather than measurements. Each observation represents the observable outcome of a comparison between a person and item. Such outcomes are directly analogous to the observation of the tipping of a beam balance in one direction or another. This observation would indicate that one or other object has a greater mass, but counts of such observations cannot be treated directly as measurements. Rasch pointed out that the principle of invariant comparison is characteristic of measurement in physics using, by way of example, a two-way experimental frame of reference in which each instrument exerts a mechanical force upon solid bodies to produce acceleration. Rasch stated of this context: "Generally: If for any two objects we find a certain ratio of their accelerations produced by one instrument, then the same ratio will be found for any other of the instruments". It is readily shown that Newton's second law entails that such ratios are inversely proportional to the ratios of the masses of the bodies. The mathematical form of the Rasch model for dichotomous data Let be a dichotomous random variable where, for example, denotes a correct response and an incorrect response to a given assessment item. In the Rasch model for dichotomous data, the probability of the outcome is given by: where is the ability of person and is the difficulty of item . Thus, in the case of a dichotomous attainment item, is the probability of success upon interaction between the relevant person and assessment item. It is readily shown that the log odds, or logit, of correct response by a person to an item, based on the model, is equal to . Given two examinees with different ability parameters and and an arbitrary item with difficulty , compute the difference in logits for these two examinees by . This difference becomes . Conversely, it can be shown that the log odds of a correct response by the same person to one item, conditional on a correct response to one of two items, is equal to the difference between the item locations. For example, where is the total score of person n over the two items, which implies a correct response to one or other of the items. Hence, the conditional log odds does not involve the person parameter , which can therefore be eliminated by conditioning on the total score . That is, by partitioning the responses according to raw scores and calculating the log odds of a correct response, an estimate is obtained without involvement of . More generally, a number of item parameters can be estimated iteratively through application of a process such as Conditional Maximum Likelihood estimation (see Rasch model estimation). While more involved, the same fundamental principle applies in such estimations. The ICC of the Rasch model for dichotomous data is shown in Figure 4. The grey line maps the probability of the discrete outcome (that is, correctly answering the question) for persons with different locations on the latent continuum (that is, their level of abilities). The location of an item is, by definition, that location at which the probability that is equal to 0.5. In figure 4, the black circles represent the actual or observed proportions of persons within Class Intervals for which the outcome was observed. For example, in the case of an assessment item used in the context of educational psychology, these could represent the proportions of persons who answered the item correctly. Persons are ordered by the estimates of their locations on the latent continuum and classified into Class Intervals on this basis in order to graphically inspect the accordance of observations with the model. There is a close conformity of the data with the model. In addition to graphical inspection of data, a range of statistical tests of fit are used to evaluate whether departures of observations from the model can be attributed to random effects alone, as required, or whether there are systematic departures from the model. Polytomous extensions of the Rasch model There are multiple polytomous extensions to the Rasch model, which generalize the dichotomous model so that it can be applied in contexts in which successive integer scores represent categories of increasing level or magnitude of a latent trait, such as increasing ability, motor function, endorsement of a statement, and so forth. These polytomous extensions are, for example, applicable to the use of Likert scales, grading in educational assessment, and scoring of performances by judges. Other considerations A criticism of the Rasch model is that it is overly restrictive or prescriptive because an assumption of the model is that all items have equal discrimination, whereas in practice, items discriminations vary, and thus no data set will ever show perfect data-model fit. A frequent misunderstanding is that the Rasch model does not permit each item to have a different discrimination, but equal discrimination is an assumption of invariant measurement, so differing item discriminations are not forbidden, but rather indicate that measurement quality does not equal a theoretical ideal. Just as in physical measurement, real world datasets will never perfectly match theoretical models, so the relevant question is whether a particular data set provides sufficient quality of measurement for the purpose at hand, not whether it perfectly matches an unattainable standard of perfection. A criticism specific to the use of the Rasch model with response data from multiple choice items is that there is no provision in the model for guessing because the left asymptote always approaches a zero probability in the Rasch model. This implies that a person of low ability will always get an item wrong. However, low-ability individuals completing a multiple-choice exam have a substantially higher probability of choosing the correct answer by chance alone (for a k-option item, the likelihood is around 1/k). The three-parameter logistic model relaxes both these assumptions and the two-parameter logistic model allows varying slopes. However, the specification of uniform discrimination and zero left asymptote are necessary properties of the model in order to sustain sufficiency of the simple, unweighted raw score. In practice, the non-zero lower asymptote found in multiple-choice datasets is less of a threat to measurement than commonly assumed and typically does not result in substantive errors in measurement when well-developed test items are used sensibly Verhelst & Glas (1995) derive Conditional Maximum Likelihood (CML) equations for a model they refer to as the One Parameter Logistic Model (OPLM). In algebraic form it appears to be identical with the 2PL model, but OPLM contains preset discrimination indexes rather than 2PL's estimated discrimination parameters. As noted by these authors, though, the problem one faces in estimation with estimated discrimination parameters is that the discriminations are unknown, meaning that the weighted raw score "is not a mere statistic, and hence it is impossible to use CML as an estimation method". That is, sufficiency of the weighted "score" in the 2PL cannot be used according to the way in which a sufficient statistic is defined. If the weights are imputed instead of being estimated, as in OPLM, conditional estimation is possible and some of the properties of the Rasch model are retained. In OPLM, the values of the discrimination index are restricted to between 1 and 15. A limitation of this approach is that in practice, values of discrimination indexes must be preset as a starting point. This means some type of estimation of discrimination is involved when the purpose is to avoid doing so. The Rasch model for dichotomous data inherently entails a single discrimination parameter which, as noted by Rasch, constitutes an arbitrary choice of the unit in terms of which magnitudes of the latent trait are expressed or estimated. However, the Rasch model requires that the discrimination is uniform across interactions between persons and items within a specified frame of reference (i.e. the assessment context given conditions for assessment). Application of the model provides diagnostic information regarding how well the criterion is met. Application of the model can also provide information about how well items or questions on assessments work to measure the ability or trait. For instance, knowing the proportion of persons that engage in a given behavior, the Rasch model can be used to derive the relations between difficulty of behaviors, attitudes and behaviors. Prominent advocates of Rasch models include Benjamin Drake Wright, David Andrich and Erling Andersen. See also Mokken scale Guttman scale References Further reading Andrich, D. (1978a). A rating formulation for ordered response categories. Psychometrika, 43, 357–74. Andrich, D. (1988). Rasch models for measurement. Beverly Hills: Sage Publications. Baker, F. (2001). The Basics of Item Response Theory. ERIC Clearinghouse on Assessment and Evaluation, University of Maryland, College Park, MD. Available free with software included from IRT at Edres.org Fischer, G.H. & Molenaar, I.W. (1995). Rasch models: foundations, recent developments and applications. New York: Springer-Verlag. Goldstein H & Blinkhorn S (1977). Monitoring Educational Standards: an inappropriate model. . Bull.Br.Psychol.Soc. 30 309–311 Goldstein H & Blinkhorn S (1982). The Rasch Model Still Does Not Fit. BERJ 82 167–170. Hambleton RK, Jones RW. "Comparison of classical test theory and item response," Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice 1993; 12(3):38–47. available in the ITEMS Series from the National Council on Measurement in Education Harris D. Comparison of 1-, 2-, and 3-parameter IRT models. Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice;. 1989; 8: 35–41 available in the ITEMS Series from the National Council on Measurement in Education von Davier, M., & Carstensen, C. H. (2007). Multivariate and Mixture Distribution Rasch Models: Extensions and Applications. New York: Springer. von Davier, M. (2016). Rasch Model. In Wim J. van der Linden (ed.): Handbook of Item Response Theory (Boca Raton: CRC Press), Routledge Handbooks. Wright, B.D., & Stone, M.H. (1979). Best Test Design. Chicago, IL: MESA Press. Wu, M. & Adams, R. (2007). Applying the Rasch model to psycho-social measurement: A practical approach. Melbourne, Australia: Educational Measurement Solutions. Available free from Educational Measurement Solutions External links Institute for Objective Measurement Online Rasch Resources Pearson Psychometrics Laboratory, with information about Rasch models Journal of Applied Measurement Journal of Outcome Measurement (all issues available for free downloading) Berkeley Evaluation & Assessment Research Center (ConstructMap software) Directory of Rasch Software – freeware and paid IRT Modeling Lab at U. Illinois Urbana Champ. National Council on Measurement in Education (NCME) Rasch Measurement Transactions The Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing The Trouble with Rasch Psychometrics Educational psychology Statistical models Personality theories

Focusing (psychotherapy)

Focusing is an internally oriented psychotherapeutic process developed by psychotherapist Eugene Gendlin. It can be used in any kind of therapeutic situation, including peer-to-peer sessions. It involves holding a specific kind of open, non-judging attention to an internal knowing which is experienced but is not yet in words. Focusing can, among other things, be used to become clear on what one feels or wants, to obtain new insights about one's situation, and to stimulate change or healing of the situation. Focusing is set apart from other methods of inner awareness by three qualities: something called the "felt sense", a quality of engaged accepting attention, and a research-based technique that facilitates change. Origin At the University of Chicago, beginning in 1953, Eugene Gendlin did 15 years of research analyzing what made psychotherapy either successful or unsuccessful. His conclusion was that it is not the therapist's technique that determines the success of psychotherapy, but rather the way the patient behaves, and what the patient does inside himself during the therapy sessions. Gendlin found that, without exception, the successful patient intuitively focuses inside himself on a very subtle and vague internal bodily awareness—or "felt sense"—which contains information that, if attended to or focused on, holds the key to the resolution of the problems the patient is experiencing. "Focusing" is a process and learnable skill developed by Gendlin which re-creates this successful-patient behavior in a form that can be taught to other patients. Gendlin detailed the techniques in his book Focusing which, intended for the layperson, is written in conversational terms and describes the six steps of Focusing and how to do them. Gendlin stated: "I did not invent Focusing. I simply made some steps which help people to find Focusing." "Felt sense" and "felt shift" Gendlin gave the name "felt sense" to the unclear, pre-verbal sense of "something"—the inner knowledge or awareness that has not been consciously thought or verbalized—as that "something" is experienced in the body. It is not the same as an emotion. This bodily felt "something" may be an awareness of a situation or an old hurt, or of something that is "coming"—perhaps an idea or insight. Crucial to the concept, as defined by Gendlin, is that it is unclear and vague, and it is always more than any attempt to express it verbally. Gendlin also described it as "sensing an implicit complexity, a wholistic sense of what one is working on". According to Gendlin, the Focusing process makes a felt sense more tangible and easier to work with. To help the felt sense form and to accurately identify its meaning, the focuser tries out words that might express it. These words can be tested against the felt sense: The felt sense will not resonate with a word or phrase that does not adequately describe it. Gendlin observed clients, writers, and people in ordinary life ("Focusers") turning their attention to this not-yet-articulated knowing. As a felt sense formed, there would be long pauses together with sounds like "uh...." Once the person had accurately identified this felt sense in words, new words would come, and new insights into the situation. There would be a sense of felt movement—a "felt shift"—and the person would begin to be able to move beyond the "stuck" place, having fresh insights, and also sometimes indications of steps to take. Learning and using Focusing One can learn the Focusing technique from one of several books, or from a Focusing trainer, practitioner, or therapist. Focusing is easiest to sense and do in the presence of a "listener"—either a Focusing trainer, a therapist, or a layperson trained in Focusing. However, the practice can be done alone. Gendlin's book details the six steps of Focusing, however it emphasizes that the essence of Focusing is not adhering to these steps, but following the organic process. When the person learns the basics, they are able to weave through the process increasingly more and more organically. Focusing is now practiced all over the world by thousands of people—both in professional settings with Focusing trainers, and informally between laypersons. As a stand-alone process, a Focusing session can last from approximately 10 minutes to an hour, on average—with the "focuser" being listened to, and their verbalized thoughts and feelings being reflected back by the "listener". Generally speaking, but not always, the focuser has their eyes closed, in order to more accurately focus inwardly on their "felt sense" and the shifts that take place from it. Subsequent developments In 1996, Gendlin published a comprehensive book on Focusing-oriented psychotherapy. The Focusing-oriented psychotherapist attributes a central importance to the client's capacity to be aware of their "felt sense" and the meaning behind their words or images. The client is encouraged to sense into feelings and meanings which are not yet formed. Other elements of Focusing are also incorporated into the therapy practice so that Focusing remains the basis of the process—allowing for inner resonance and verification of ideas and feelings, and allowing new and fresh insights to come from within the client. Several adaptations of Gendlin's original six-step Focusing process have been developed. The most popular and prevalent of these is the process Ann Weiser Cornell teaches, called Inner Relationship Focusing. Other developments in Focusing include focusing alone using a journal or a sketchbook. Drawing and painting can be used with Focusing processes with children. Focusing also happens in other domains besides therapy. Attention to the felt sense naturally takes place in all manner of processes where something new is being formed: for example in creative process, learning, thinking, and decision making. See also Emotion-focused therapy Internal Family Systems Model Intuition (mind) Method of levels Nonviolent Communication References Further reading External links International Focusing Institute Focusing-Oriented Psychotherapy British Focusing Association Psychotherapy

Anomalistic psychology

In psychology, anomalistic psychology is the study of human behaviour and experience connected with what is often called the paranormal, with few assumptions made about the validity of the reported phenomena. Early history According to anomalistic psychology, paranormal phenomena have naturalistic explanations resulting from psychological and physical factors which have given the false impression of paranormal activity to some people. There were many early publications that gave rational explanations for alleged paranormal experiences. The physician John Ferriar wrote An Essay Towards a Theory of Apparitions in 1813 in which he argued that sightings of ghosts were the result of optical illusions. Later, the French physician Alexandre Jacques François Brière de Boismont published On Hallucinations: Or, the Rational History of Apparitions, Dreams, Ecstasy, Magnetism, and Somnambulism in 1845 in which he claimed sightings of ghosts were the result of hallucinations. William Benjamin Carpenter, in his book Mesmerism, Spiritualism, Etc: Historically and Scientifically Considered (1877), wrote that Spiritualist practices could be explained by fraud, delusion, hypnotism and suggestion. The British psychiatrist Henry Maudsley, in Natural Causes and Supernatural Seemings (1886), wrote that so-called supernatural experiences could be explained in terms of disorders of the mind and were simply "malobservations and misinterpretations of nature". In the 1890s, the German psychologist Max Dessoir and psychiatrist Albert Moll formed the "critical occultism" position. This viewpoint interpreted psychical phenomena naturalistically. All apparent cases were attributed to fraud, suggestion, unconscious cues or psychological factors. Moll wrote that practices such as Christian Science, Spiritualism and occultism were the result of fraud and hypnotic suggestion. Moll argued that suggestion explained the cures of Christian Science, as well as the apparently supernatural rapport between magnetisers and their somnambulists. He wrote that fraud and hypnotism could explain mediumistic phenomena. Lionel Weatherly (a psychiatrist) and John Nevil Maskelyne (a magician) wrote The Supernatural? (1891) which offered rational explanations for apparitions, paranormal and religious experiences and Spiritualism. Karl Jaspers, in his book General Psychopathology (1913), stated that all paranormal phenomena are manifestations of psychiatric symptoms. The German Zeitschrift für Kritischen Okkultismus (Journal for Critical Occultism) operated from 1926 to 1928. Psychologist Richard Baerwald was the editor, and the journal published articles by Dessoir, Moll and others. It contained "some of the most important skeptical investigations of claims of the paranormal". Other early scientists who studied anomalistic psychology include Millais Culpin, Joseph Jastrow, Charles Arthur Mercier and Ivor Lloyd Tuckett. Modern research The phrase "Anomalistic Psychology" was a term first suggested by the psychologists Leonard Zusne and Warren Jones in their book Anomalistic Psychology: A Study of Magical Thinking (1989) which systematically addresses phenomena of human consciousness and behaviors that may appear to violate the laws of nature when they actually do not. The Canadian psychologist Graham Reed published a major work on the subject The Psychology of Anomalous Experience (1972). Various psychological publications have explained in detail how reported paranormal phenomena such as mediumship, precognition, out-of-body experiences and psychics can be explained by psychological factors without recourse to the supernatural. Researchers involved with anomalistic psychology try to provide plausible non-paranormal accounts, supported by empirical evidence, of how psychological and physical factors might combine to give the impression of paranormal activity when there had been none. Apart from deception or self-deception such explanations might involve cognitive biases, anomalous psychological states, dissociative states, hallucinations, personality factors, developmental issues and the nature of memory. The psychologist David Marks wrote that paranormal phenomena can be explained by magical thinking, mental imagery, subjective validation, coincidence, hidden causes, and fraud. Robert Baker wrote that many paranormal phenomena can be explained via psychological effects such as hallucinations, sleep paralysis and hidden memories, a phenomenon in which experiences that originally make little conscious impression are filed away in the brain to be suddenly remembered later in an altered form. In his 1980 edition of ESP: A Scientific Evaluation, C. E. M. Hansel noted that "after 100 years of research, not a single individual has been found who can demonstrate ESP to the satisfaction of independent investigators. For this reason alone it is unlikely that ESP exists". Massimo Polidoro, a professor of Anomalistic Psychology at the University of Milano Bicocca, Italy, taught the course "Scientific Method, Pseudoscience and Anomalistic Psychology". Another notable researcher is the British psychologist Chris French who set up the Anomalistic Psychology Research Unit (APRU) in the Department of Psychology at Goldsmiths, University of London. Hauntings A psychological study (Klemperer, 1992) of ghosts wrote that visions of ghosts may arise from hypnagogic hallucinations ("waking dreams" which are experienced in the transitional states to and from sleep). In an experiment (Lange and Houran, 1997) 22 subjects visited five areas of a performance theatre and were asked to take note of the environment. Half of the subjects were informed that the locations they were in were haunted, whilst the other half were told that the building was simply under renovation. The subjects' perceptions in both groups were recorded to an experiential questionnaire which contained 10 subscales related to psychological and physiological perceptions. The results showed more intense perceptual experiences on nine of the ten subscales from the group that was told the building was haunted, which has indicated that demand characteristics alone can stimulate paranormal experiences. A study (Lange and Houran, 1998) suggested that poltergeist experiences are delusions "resulting from the affective and cognitive dynamics of percipients' interpretation of ambiguous stimuli". Two experiments into alleged hauntings (Wiseman et al. 2003) discovered that the data supported the "notion that people consistently report unusual experiences in ‘haunted’ areas because of environmental factors, which may differ across locations." Some of these factors included "the variance of local magnetic fields, size of location and lighting level stimuli of which witnesses may not be consciously aware". Mediumship Research and empirical evidence from psychology for over a hundred years has revealed that where there is not fraud, mediumship and Spiritualistic practices can be explained by psychological factors. Trance mediumship, which is claimed by the Spiritualists to be caused by discarnate spirits speaking through the medium, has been proven in some cases to be the emergence of alternate personalities from the medium's subconscious mind. The medium may obtain information about their clients, called sitters, by secretly eavesdropping on sitter's conversations or searching telephone directories, the internet and newspapers before the sittings. Mediums are known for employing a technique called cold reading which involves obtaining information from the sitter's behavior, clothing, posture, and jewellery. In a series of fake seance experiments (Wiseman et al. 2003), an actor suggested to paranormal believers and disbelievers that a table was levitating when, in fact, it remained stationary. After the seance, approximately one third of the participants incorrectly reported that the table had moved. The results showed a greater percentage of believers reporting that the table had moved. In another experiment the believers had also reported that a handbell had moved when it had remained stationary and expressed their belief that the fake seances contained genuine paranormal phenomena. The experiments strongly supported the notion that in the seance room, believers are more suggestible than disbelievers to suggestions that are consistent with their belief in paranormal phenomena. An experiment (O'Keeffe and Wiseman, 2005) involving 5 mediums found no evidence to support the notion that the mediums under controlled conditions were able to demonstrate paranormal or mediumistic ability. Paranormal healing A study in the British Medical Journal (Rose, 1954) investigated spiritual healing, therapeutic touch and faith healing. In a hundred cases that were investigated no single case revealed that the healer's intervention alone resulted in any improvement or cure of a measurable organic disability. A trial was carried out by a group of scientists (Beutler, 1988) to see whether three treatment groups, paranormal laying on of hands, paranormal healing at a distance and no paranormal healing to test if they might reduce blood pressure. The data did not reveal any paranormal effects as no significant differences between the three treatment groups were found. The results concluded that the fall in blood pressure in all three of the groups was caused by the psychosocial approach and the placebo effect of the trial itself. One form of paranormal healing known as psychic surgery has been discovered to be the result of sleight of hand tricks. Psychic surgeons pretend to reach into the patient's body but the skin is never punctured, there are no scars and the blood is released from packets hidden in the surgeon's hands. Psychokinesis Cognitive biases have been found in some cases of psychokinesis. A meta-analysis by Bösch, et al (2006) of 380 studies found that "statistical significance of the overall database provides no directive as to whether the phenomenon is genuine or not" and came to the conclusion that "publication bias appears to be the easiest and most encompassing explanation for the primary findings of the meta-analysis." According to Richard Wiseman there are a number of ways for faking psychokinetic metal bending (PKMB) these include switching straight objects for pre-bent duplicates, the concealed application of force, and secretly inducing metallic fractures. Research has also suggested that (PKMB) effects can be created by verbal suggestion. On this subject (Harris, 1985) wrote: In an experimental study (Wiseman and Greening, 2005) two groups of participants were shown a videotape in which a fake psychic placed a bent key on a table. Participants in the first group heard the fake psychic suggest that the key was continuing to bend when it had remained stationary, whilst those in the second group did not. The results revealed that participants from the first group reported significantly more movement of the key than the second group. The findings were replicated in another study. The experiments had demonstrated that "testimony for PKMB after effects can be created by verbal suggestion, and therefore the testimony from individuals who have observed allegedly genuine demonstrations of such effects should not be seen as strong evidence in support of the paranormal". Remote viewing Research has suggested that in cases the participants of remote viewing experiments are influenced by subjective validation, a process through which correspondences are perceived between stimuli that are in fact associated purely randomly. Sensory cues have also occurred in remote viewing experiments. Telepathy Research has discovered that in some cases telepathy can be explained by a covariation bias. In an experiment (Schienle et al. 1996) 22 believers and 20 skeptics were asked to judge the covariation between transmitted symbols and the corresponding feedback given by a receiver. According to the results the believers overestimated the number of successful transmissions whilst the skeptics made accurate hit judgments. The results from another telepathy experiment involving 48 undergraduate college students (Rudski, 2002) were explained by hindsight and confirmation biases. Relationship with parapsychology Anomalistic psychology is sometimes described as a sub-field of parapsychology, however, anomalistic psychology rejects the paranormal claims of parapsychology. According to Chris French: Anomalistic psychology has been reported to be on the rise. It is now offered as an option on many psychology degree programmes and is also an option on the A2 psychology syllabus in the UK. See also Australian Sheep-Goat Scale Psychology of paranormal belief References Further reading Gustav Jahoda. (1974). The Psychology of Superstition. Jason Aronson, Inc. Publisher. David Marks. (2000). The Psychology of the Psychic. Prometheus Books. Andrew Neher. (2011). Paranormal and Transcendental Experience: A Psychological Examination. Dover Publications. John Schumaker. (1990). Wings of Illusion: The Origin, Nature and Future of Paranormal Belief. Prometheus Books. Etzel Cardeña, Steven Jay Lynn, Stanley Krippner. (2000). Varieties of Anomalous Experience. American Psychological Association. External links What is Anomalistic Psychology? Prof Chris French explains anomalistic psychology on Pulse Project Expert Explanations. Scientific method Scientific skepticism

Personal life

Personal life is the course or state of an individual's life, especially when viewed as the sum of personal choices contributing to one's personal identity. Apart from hunter-gatherers, most pre-modern peoples' time was limited by the need to meet necessities such as food and shelter through subsistence farming; leisure time was scarce. People identified with their social role in their community and engaged in activities based on necessity rather than on personal choice. Privacy in such communities was rare. The modern conception of "personal life" is an offshoot of modern Western society. Modern people tend to distinguish their work activities from their personal life and may seek work–life balance. It is a person's choices and preferences outside of work that define personal life, including one's choice of hobbies, cultural interests, manner of dress, mate, friends, and so on. In particular, what activities one engages in during leisure-time defines a person's personal life. Religious authorities, moralists, managers and personal-development gurus have seized on the concept of an individual life as a fulcrum for potential control and manipulation. People in Western countries, such as the United States and Canada, tend to value privacy. Privacy includes both information privacy and decisional privacy; people expect to be left alone with respect to intimate details of their life and they expect to be free from undue control by others. History In the past, before modern technology largely alleviated issues of economic scarcity in industrialised countries, most people spent a large portion of their time attempting to provide their basic survival needs, including water, food, and protection from the weather. Humans needed survival skills for the sake of both themselves and their community; food needed to be harvested and shelters needed to be maintained. There was little privacy in a community, and people identified one another according to their social role. Jobs were assigned out of necessity rather than personal choice. Furthermore, individuals in many ancient cultures primarily viewed their self-existence under the aspect of a larger social whole, often one with mythological underpinnings which placed the individual in relation to the cosmos. People in such cultures found their identity not through their individual choices—indeed, they may not have been able to conceive a choice which was purely individual. Such individuals, if asked to describe themselves, would speak of the collective of which they were part: the tribe, the Church, the nation. Even in the 21st century, survival issues dominate in many countries and societies. For example, the continents of Africa and Asia are still largely mired in poverty and third-world conditions, without technology, secure shelter, or reliable food sources. In such places, the concepts of a "personal life", "self-actualization", "personal fulfillment", or "privacy" are often unaffordable luxuries. The English philosopher John Locke (1632–1704) figures among the pioneers in discussing the concept of individual rights. In the 17th century he promoted the natural rights of the individual to life, liberty, and property, and included the pursuit of happiness as one of the individual's goals. Sociology The notion of a personal life, as currently understood in the west is in part an artefact of modern Western society. People in the United States of America, especially, place a high value on privacy. Since the colonial period, commentators have noted Americans' individualism and their pursuit of self-definition. Indeed, the United States Declaration of Independence and the Constitution explicitly raise the pursuit of happiness and the expectation of privacy to the level of rights. George Lakoff sees the metaphor of life as "a journey" as a noteworthy structuring idea in "our culture". Compare the traditional Chinese concept of tao. In modern times, many people have come to think of their personal lives as separate from their work. This 9 to 5 paradigm regards work and recreation as distinct; one is either on the job or not, and the transition is abrupt. Employees have certain hours they are bound to work, and work during recreational time is rare. This may reflect the continuing specialisation of jobs and the demand for increased efficiency, both at work and at home. The common phrase "Work hard, play hard" illustrates this mindset. There is a growing trend, however, towards living more holistically and minimising such rigid distinctions between work and play, in order to achieve an "appropriate" work–life balance. The concept of personal life also tends to be associated with the way individuals dress, the food they eat, their schooling and further education as well as their hobbies, leisure activities, and cultural interests. Increasingly, in the developed world, a person's daily life is also influenced by leisure-time use of consumer electronics such as televisions, computers and the Internet, mobile phones and digital cameras. Other factors affecting personal life include individuals' health, personal relationships, pets as well as home and personal possessions. Leisure activities The way in which individuals make use of their spare time also plays an important role in defining their personal lives. In general, leisure activities can be categorised as either passive, in cases when no real effort is required, or active, when substantial physical or mental energy is needed. Passive activities include watching television, listening to music, watching sports activities or going to the cinema. The individual simply relaxes without any special effort. Active activities may be more or less intensive ranging from walking, through jogging and cycling to sports such as tennis or football. Playing chess or undertaking creative writing might also be considered as demanding as these require a fair amount of mental effort. Based on 2007 data, a US survey on use of leisure time found that the daily use of leisure time by individuals over 15 averaged 4.9 hours. Of this, more than half (2.6 hours) went on watching TV while only 19 minutes involved active participation in sports and exercise. Privacy Privacy has been understood as entailing two different concepts; namely informational privacy and decisional privacy. The former concerns the right to be left alone in respect of the most intimate details of one's personal life and is a more accepted doctrine than the latter which concerns freedom from undue regulation and control. See also References Further reading Philosophy of life

Trauma model of mental disorders

The trauma model of mental disorders, or trauma model of psychopathology, emphasises the effects of physical, sexual and psychological trauma as key causal factors in the development of psychiatric disorders, including depression and anxiety as well as psychosis, whether the trauma is experienced in childhood or adulthood. It conceptualises people as having understandable reactions to traumatic events rather than suffering from mental illness. Trauma models emphasise that traumatic experiences are more common and more significant in terms of aetiology than has often been thought in people diagnosed with mental disorders. Such models have their roots in some psychoanalytic approaches, notably Sigmund Freud's early ideas on childhood sexual abuse and hysteria, Pierre Janet's work on dissociation, and John Bowlby's attachment theory. There is significant research supporting the linkage between early experiences of chronic maltreatment and severe neglect and later psychological problems. In the 1960s trauma models became associated with humanist and anti-psychiatry approaches, particularly in regard to understanding schizophrenia and the role of the family. Personality disorders have also been a focus, particularly borderline personality disorder, with the role of dissociation and 'freezing responses' (more extreme reactions than fight-flight when someone is terrified and traumatised) thought to have a significant role in the aetiology of psychological disturbance. Extreme versions of trauma models have implicated the fetal environment and the trauma of being born, but these are not well-supported in the academic literature and have been associated with recovered memory controversies. People are traumatised by a wide range of people, not just family members. For example, male victims of sexual abuse report being abused in institutional settings (boarding schools, care homes, sports clubs). Trauma models thus highlight stressful and traumatic factors in early attachment relations and in the development of mature interpersonal relationships. They are often presented as a counterpoint to psychiatric orthodoxy and inform criticisms of mental health research and practice in that it has become too focused on genetics, neurochemistry and medication. History From the 1940s to the 1970s prominent mental health professionals proposed trauma models as a means of understanding schizophrenia, including Harry Stack Sullivan, Frieda Fromm-Reichmann, Theodore Lidz, Gregory Bateson, Silvano Arieti and R.D. Laing. Based on their clinical work they theorised that schizophrenia appears to be induced by children's experiences in profoundly disturbed families and reflect victims' attempts to cope with such families and live in societies that are inherently damaging to people's psychological well-being. In the 1950s Sullivan's theory that schizophrenia is related to interpersonal relationships was widely accepted in the United States. Silvano Arieti's book Interpretation of Schizophrenia won the American National Book Award in the field of science in 1975. The book advances a psychological model for understanding all the regressive types of the disorder. Some of the psychogenic models proposed by these early researchers, such as the "schizophrenogenic mother", came under sustained criticism, from feminists who saw them as 'mother-blaming' and from a psychiatric profession that increasingly moved towards biological determinism. From the 1960s pharmacological treatments became the increasing focus of psychiatry, and by the 1980s the theory that the family dynamics could be implicated in the aetiology of schizophrenia became viewed as unacceptable by many mental health professionals in America and Europe. Before his death in 2001, at 90, Theodore Lidz, one of the main proponents of the "schizophrenogenic" parents theory, expressed regret that current research in biological psychiatry was "barking up the wrong tree". Like Lidz, Laing maintained until his death that the cause of both schizoid personality disorder and schizophrenia was influenced by family relationships. Some more recent research has provided support for this; for instance, child abuse has been shown to have a causal role in depression, PTSD, eating disorders, substance abuse and dissociative disorders, and research reveals that the more severe the abuse the higher the probability that psychiatric symptoms will develop in adult life. Judith Herman's book Trauma and Recovery has heavily influenced therapeutic approaches. Recovery entails three phases which are best worked through sequentially: First 'establishing safety'; secondly 'a process of remembrance and mourning for what was lost'; thirdly 'reconnecting with community and more broadly, society'. Critiques Critics of the model, such as August Piper, argue that the logic that childhood trauma causes insanity has a serious flaw: If the claim was true, the abuse of millions of children over the years should have caused higher prevalence rates of mental disorders than the literature reveals. However, this critique disregards the possibility of underdiagnosis and the fact that not every instance of abuse causes lasting trauma. Other critics, particularly proponents of behaviour family therapy, have seen trauma models as parent blaming, and have emphasised the fact that families are usually the main, and often only, source of support for people diagnosed with severe mental illness. Lucy Johnstone has pointed out that some critics advocate family interventions for adult psychiatric patients whilst at the same time maintaining that childhood experiences are not causal as regards mental illness – as if family members can only have a helpful or damaging impact on their adult children. In response to Piper's assertion, it has been noted that Arieti stated in Interpretation of Schizophrenia that a trauma is more significant when committed by people to whom young human beings are emotionally bonded, and abuse is often interwoven with other forms of neglect and confusing behaviours from care-givers: Recent approaches A 2005 meta-analysis of schizophrenia revealed that the prevalence of physical and sexual abuse in the histories of people diagnosed with psychotic disorders is very high and has been understudied. This literature review revealed prevalence rates of childhood sexual abuse in studies of people diagnosed with schizophrenia ranging from 45% to 65%. An analysis of the American National Comorbidity Study revealed that people who have endured three kinds of abuse (e.g., sexual, physical, bullying) are at an 18-fold higher risk of psychosis, whereas those experiencing five types are 193 times more likely to become psychotic. A 2012 review article supported the hypothesis that current or recent trauma may affect an individual's assessment of the more distant past, changing the experience of the past and resulting in dissociative states. Several reviews of risk factors for common mental disorders have emphasised trauma. Such research has rejuvenated interest in this field, both from clinicians, researchers and service user organisations such as the Hearing Voices Movement. Psychiatrist Colin Ross calls his model the "trauma model of mental disorders" and emphasises that, unlike biological models, this addresses the literature on comorbidity of trauma with mental disorders. Ross describes the theoretical basis of his trauma model: "The problem faced by many patients is that they did not grow up in a reasonably healthy, normal family. They grew up in an inconsistent, abusive and traumatic family. The very people to whom the child had to attach for survival were also abuse perpetrators and hurt him or her badly.... The basic conflict, the deepest pain, and the deepest source of symptoms, is the fact that mom and dad's behavior hurts, did not fit together, and did not make sense." In terms of psychoses, most researchers and clinicians believe that genetics remains a causative risk factor but "genes alone do not cause the illness". Modern views of genetics see genes more like dimmer switches, with environmental factors switching the genes on; the more severe the environmental stress, the more effect genes have. In the field of criminology, Lonnie Athens developed a theory of how a process of brutalization by parents or peers that usually occurs in childhood results in violent crimes in adulthood. Richard Rhodes's Why They Kill describes Athens's observations about domestic and societal violence in the criminals' backgrounds. Both Athens and Rhodes reject the genetic inheritance theories. Criminologists Jonathan Pincus and Dorothy Otnow Lewis believe that although it is the interaction of childhood abuse and neurological disturbances that explains murder, virtually all of the 150 murderers they studied over a 25-year period had suffered severe abuse as children. Pincus believes that the only feasible remedy for crime would be the prevention of child abuse. See also References External links Alice-Miller.com – According to Miller, the "forbidden issue" is the parental role in mental disorders Special edition of JCPCP on complex reactions to severe trauma LaingSociety.org – The Society for Laingian Studies, R.D. Laing (1927–1989) MosherSoteria.com – Loren Mosher, MD, (1933–2004) Prof J.J. Freyd's Betrayal Trauma Theory Home Page at the University of Oregon Psychohistory.com – The Institute for Psychohistory Rossinst.com  – Home page of the Ross Institute for Psychological Trauma sfhelp.org  – Home page of the "Break the Cycle! (of inherited psychological wounds + unawareness)" Web site Aftermath of war Anti-psychiatry Attachment theory Child abuse Mental disorders Psychiatric models

Biocybernetics

Biocybernetics is the application of cybernetics to biological science disciplines such as neurology and multicellular systems. Biocybernetics plays a major role in systems biology, seeking to integrate different levels of information to understand how biological systems function. The field of cybernetics itself has origins in biological disciplines such as neurophysiology. Biocybernetics is an abstract science and is a fundamental part of theoretical biology, based upon the principles of systemics. Biocybernetics is a psychological study that aims to understand how the human body functions as a biological system and performs complex mental functions like thought processing, motion, and maintaining homeostasis.(PsychologyDictionary.org)Within this field, many distinct qualities allow for different distinctions  within the cybernetic groups such as humans and insects such as beehives and ants. Humans work together but they also have individual thoughts that allow them to act on their own, while worker bees follow the commands of the queen bee.  (Seeley, 1989). Although humans often work together, they can also separate from the group and think for themselves.(Gackenbach, J. 2007) A unique example of this within the human sector of biocybernetics would be in society during the colonization period, when Great Britain established their colonies in North America and Australia. Many of the traits and qualities of the mother country were inherited by the colonies, as well as niche qualities that were unique to them based on their areas like language and personality—similar vines and grasses, where the parent plant produces offshoots, spreading from the core.  Once the shoots grow their roots and get separated from the mother plant, they will survive independently and be considered their plant. Society is more closely related to plants than to animals since, like plants, there is no distinct separation between parent and offspring. The branching of society is more similar to plant reproduction than to animal reproduction. Humans are a k- selected species that typically have fewer offspring that they nurture for longer periods than r -selected species. It could be argued that when Britain created colonies in regions like North America and Australia, these colonies, once they became independent, should be seen as offspring of British society. Like all children, the colonies inherited many characteristics, such as language, customs and technologies, from their parents, but still developed their own personality. This form of reproduction is most similar to the type of vegetative reproduction used by many plants, such as vines and grasses, where the parent plant produces offshoots, spreading ever further from the core. When such a shoot, once it has produced its own roots, gets separated from the mother plant, it will survive independently and define a new plant. Thus, the growth of society is more like that of plants than like that of the higher animals that we are most familiar with, there is not a clear distinction between a parent and its offspring. Superorganisms are also capable of the so-called "distributed intelligence," a system composed of individual agents with limited intelligence and information. These can pool resources to complete goals beyond the individuals' reach on their own. Similar to the concept of "Game theory." (Durlauf, S.N., Blume, L.E. 2010) In this concept, individuals and organisms make choices based on the behaviors of the other player to deem the most profitable outcome for them as an individual rather than a group. Terminology Biocybernetics is a conjoined word from bio (Greek: βίο / life) and cybernetics (Greek: κυβερνητική / controlling-governing). Although the extended form of the word is biological cybernetics, the field is most commonly referred to as biocybernetics in scientific papers. Early proponents Early proponents of biocybernetics include Ross Ashby, Hans Drischel, and Norbert Wiener among others. Popular papers published by each scientist are listed below. Ross Ashby, "Introduction to Cybernetics", 1956 Hans Drischel, "Einführung in die Biokybernetik." 1972 Norbert Wiener, "Cybernetics or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine", 1948 Similar fields Papers and research that delve into topics involving biocybernetics may be found under a multitude of similar names, including molecular cybernetics, neurocybernetics, and cellular cybernetics. Such fields involve disciplines that specify certain aspects of the study of the living organism (for example, neurocybernetics focuses on the study neurological models in organisms). Categories Biocybernetics – the study of an entire living organism Neurocybernetics – cybernetics dealing with neurological models. (Psycho-Cybernetics was the title of a self-help book, and is not a scientific discipline) Molecular cybernetics – cybernetics dealing with molecular systems (e.g. molecular biology cybernetics) Cellular cybernetics – cybernetics dealing with cellular systems (e.g. information technology/cell phones or biological cells) Evolutionary cybernetics – study of the evolution of informational systems (See also evolutionary programming, evolutionary algorithm) See also Bioinformatics Biosemiotics Computational biology Computational biomodeling Medical cybernetics List of biomedical cybernetics software References External links Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics Journal "Biological Cybernetics" Scientific portal on biological cybernetics UCLA Biocybernetics Laboratory Cybernetics Branches of biology

Dual inheritance theory

Dual inheritance theory (DIT), also known as gene–culture coevolution or biocultural evolution, was developed in the 1960s through early 1980s to explain how human behavior is a product of two different and interacting evolutionary processes: genetic evolution and cultural evolution. Genes and culture continually interact in a feedback loop: changes in genes can lead to changes in culture which can then influence genetic selection, and vice versa. One of the theory's central claims is that culture evolves partly through a Darwinian selection process, which dual inheritance theorists often describe by analogy to genetic evolution. 'Culture', in this context, is defined as 'socially learned behavior', and 'social learning' is defined as copying behaviors observed in others or acquiring behaviors through being taught by others. Most of the modelling done in the field relies on the first dynamic (copying), though it can be extended to teaching. Social learning, at its simplest, involves blind copying of behaviors from a model (someone observed behaving), though it is also understood to have many potential biases, including success bias (copying from those who are perceived to be better off), status bias (copying from those with higher status), homophily (copying from those most like ourselves), conformist bias (disproportionately picking up behaviors that more people are performing), etc. Understanding social learning is a system of pattern replication, and understanding that there are different rates of survival for different socially learned cultural variants, this sets up, by definition, an evolutionary structure: cultural evolution. Because genetic evolution is relatively well understood, most of DIT examines cultural evolution and the interactions between cultural evolution and genetic evolution. Theoretical basis DIT holds that genetic and cultural evolution interacted in the evolution of Homo sapiens. DIT recognizes that the natural selection of genotypes is an important component of the evolution of human behavior and that cultural traits can be constrained by genetic imperatives. However, DIT also recognizes that genetic evolution has endowed the human species with a parallel evolutionary process of cultural evolution. DIT makes three main claims: Culture capacities are adaptations The human capacity to store and transmit culture arose from genetically evolved psychological mechanisms. This implies that at some point during the evolution of the human species a type of social learning leading to cumulative cultural evolution was evolutionarily advantageous. Culture evolves Social learning processes give rise to cultural evolution. Cultural traits are transmitted differently from genetic traits and, therefore, result in different population-level effects on behavioral variation. Genes and culture co-evolve Cultural traits alter the social and physical environments under which genetic selection operates. For example, the cultural adoptions of agriculture and dairying have, in humans, caused genetic selection for the traits to digest starch and lactose, respectively. As another example, it is likely that once culture became adaptive, genetic selection caused a refinement of the cognitive architecture that stores and transmits cultural information. This refinement may have further influenced the way culture is stored and the biases that govern its transmission. DIT also predicts that, under certain situations, cultural evolution may select for traits that are genetically maladaptive. An example of this is the demographic transition, which describes the fall of birth rates within industrialized societies. Dual inheritance theorists hypothesize that the demographic transition may be a result of a prestige bias, where individuals that forgo reproduction to gain more influence in industrial societies are more likely to be chosen as cultural models. View of culture People have defined the word "culture" to describe a large set of different phenomena. A definition that sums up what is meant by "culture" in DIT is: This view of culture emphasizes population thinking by focusing on the process by which culture is generated and maintained. It also views culture as a dynamic property of individuals, as opposed to a view of culture as a superorganic entity to which individuals must conform. This view's main advantage is that it connects individual-level processes to population-level outcomes. Genetic influence on cultural evolution Genes affect cultural evolution via psychological predispositions on cultural learning. Genes encode much of the information needed to form the human brain. Genes constrain the brain's structure and, hence, the ability of the brain to acquire and store culture. Genes may also endow individuals with certain types of transmission bias (described below). Cultural influences on genetic evolution Culture can profoundly influence gene frequencies in a population. Lactase persistence One of the best known examples is the prevalence of the genotype for adult lactose absorption in human populations, such as Northern Europeans and some African societies, with a long history of raising cattle for milk. Until around 7,500 years ago, lactase production stopped shortly after weaning, and in societies which did not develop dairying, such as East Asians and Amerindians, this is still true today. In areas with lactase persistence, it is believed that by domesticating animals, a source of milk became available while an adult and thus strong selection for lactase persistence could occur; in a Scandinavian population, the estimated selection coefficient was 0.09-0.19. This implies that the cultural practice of raising cattle first for meat and later for milk led to selection for genetic traits for lactose digestion. Recently, analysis of natural selection on the human genome suggests that civilization has accelerated genetic change in humans over the past 10,000 years. Food processing Culture has driven changes to the human digestive systems making many digestive organs, such as teeth or stomach, smaller than expected for primates of a similar size, and has been attributed to one of the reasons why humans have such large brains compared to other great apes. This is due to food processing. Early examples of food processing include pounding, marinating and most notably cooking. Pounding meat breaks down the muscle fibres, hence taking away some of the job from the mouth, teeth and jaw. Marinating emulates the action of the stomach with high acid levels. Cooking partially breaks down food making it more easily digestible. Food enters the body effectively partly digested, and as such food processing reduces the work that the digestive system has to do. This means that there is selection for smaller digestive organs as the tissue is energetically expensive, those with smaller digestive organs can process their food but at a lower energetic cost than those with larger organs. Cooking is notable because the energy available from food increases when cooked and this also means less time is spent looking for food. Humans living on cooked diets spend only a fraction of their day chewing compared to other extant primates living on raw diets. American girls and boys spent on average 7 to 8 percent of their day chewing respectively (1.68 to 1.92 hours per day), compared to chimpanzees, who spend more than 6 hours a day chewing. This frees up time which can be used for hunting. A raw diet means hunting is constrained since time spent hunting is time not spent eating and chewing plant material, but cooking reduces the time required to get the day's energy requirements, allowing for more subsistence activities. Digestibility of cooked carbohydrates is approximately on average 30% higher than digestibility of non-cooked carbohydrates. This increased energy intake, more free time and savings made on tissue used in the digestive system allowed for the selection of genes for larger brain size. Despite its benefits, brain tissue requires a large amount of calories, hence a main constraint in selection for larger brains is calorie intake. A greater calorie intake can support greater quantities of brain tissue. This is argued to explain why human brains can be much larger than other apes, since humans are the only ape to engage in food processing. The cooking of food has influenced genes to the extent that, research suggests, humans cannot live without cooking. A study on 513 individuals consuming long-term raw diets found that as the percentage of their diet which was made up of raw food and/or the length they had been on a diet of raw food increased, their BMI decreased. This is despite access to many non-thermal processing, like grinding, pounding or heating to 48 °C. (118 °F). With approximately 86 billion neurons in the human brain and 60–70 kg body mass, an exclusively raw diet close to that of what extant primates have would be not viable as, when modelled, it is argued that it would require an infeasible level of more than nine hours of feeding every day. However, this is contested, with alternative modelling showing enough calories could be obtained within 5–6 hours per day. Some scientists and anthropologists point to evidence that brain size in the Homo lineage started to increase well before the advent of cooking due to increased consumption of meat and that basic food processing (slicing) accounts for the size reduction in organs related to chewing. Cornélio et al. argues that improving cooperative abilities and a varying of diet to more meat and seeds improved foraging and hunting efficiency. It is this that allowed for the brain expansion, independent of cooking which they argue came much later, a consequence from the complex cognition that developed. Yet this is still an example of a cultural shift in diet and the resulting genetic evolution. Further criticism comes from the controversy of the archaeological evidence available. Some claim there is a lack of evidence of fire control when brain sizes first started expanding. Wrangham argues that anatomical evidence around the time of the origin of Homo erectus (1.8 million years ago), indicates that the control of fire and hence cooking occurred. At this time, the largest reductions in tooth size in the entirety of human evolution occurred, indicating that softer foods became prevalent in the diet. Also at this time was a narrowing of the pelvis indicating a smaller gut and also there is evidence that there was a loss of the ability to climb which Wrangham argues indicates the control of fire, since sleeping on the ground needs fire to ward off predators. The proposed increases in brain size from food processing will have led to a greater mental capacity for further cultural innovation in food processing which will have increased digestive efficiency further providing more energy for further gains in brain size. This positive feedback loop is argued to have led to the rapid brain size increases seen in the Homo lineage. Mechanisms of cultural evolution In DIT, the evolution and maintenance of cultures is described by five major mechanisms: natural selection of cultural variants, random variation, cultural drift, guided variation and transmission bias. Natural selection Differences between cultural phenomena result in differential rates of their spread; similarly, cultural differences among individuals can lead to differential survival and reproduction rates of individuals. The patterns of this selective process depend on transmission biases and can result in behavior that is more adaptive to a given environment. Random variation Random variation arises from errors in the learning, display or recall of cultural information, and is roughly analogous to the process of mutation in genetic evolution. Cultural drift Cultural drift is a process roughly analogous to genetic drift in evolutionary biology. In cultural drift, the frequency of cultural traits in a population may be subject to random fluctuations due to chance variations in which traits are observed and transmitted (sometimes called "sampling error"). These fluctuations might cause cultural variants to disappear from a population. This effect should be especially strong in small populations. A model by Hahn and Bentley shows that cultural drift gives a reasonably good approximation to changes in the popularity of American baby names. Drift processes have also been suggested to explain changes in archaeological pottery and technology patent applications. Changes in the songs of song birds are also thought to arise from drift processes, where distinct dialects in different groups occur due to errors in songbird singing and acquisition by successive generations. Cultural drift is also observed in an early computer model of cultural evolution. Guided variation Cultural traits may be gained in a population through the process of individual learning. Once an individual learns a novel trait, it can be transmitted to other members of the population. The process of guided variation depends on an adaptive standard that determines what cultural variants are learned. Biased transmission Understanding the different ways that culture traits can be transmitted between individuals has been an important part of DIT research since the 1970s. Transmission biases occur when some cultural variants are favored over others during the process of cultural transmission. Boyd and Richerson (1985) defined and analytically modeled a number of possible transmission biases. The list of biases has been refined over the years, especially by Henrich and McElreath. Content bias Content biases result from situations where some aspect of a cultural variant's content makes them more likely to be adopted. Content biases can result from genetic preferences, preferences determined by existing cultural traits, or a combination of the two. For example, food preferences can result from genetic preferences for sugary or fatty foods and socially-learned eating practices and taboos. Content biases are sometimes called "direct biases." Context bias Context biases result from individuals using clues about the social structure of their population to determine what cultural variants to adopt. This determination is made without reference to the content of the variant. There are two major categories of context biases: model-based biases, and frequency-dependent biases. Model-based biases Model-based biases result when an individual is biased to choose a particular "cultural model" to imitate. There are four major categories of model-based biases: prestige bias, skill bias, success bias, and similarity bias. A "prestige bias" results when individuals are more likely to imitate cultural models that are seen as having more prestige. A measure of prestige could be the amount of deference shown to a potential cultural model by other individuals. A "skill bias" results when individuals can directly observe different cultural models performing a learned skill and are more likely to imitate cultural models that perform better at the specific skill. A "success bias" results from individuals preferentially imitating cultural models that they determine are most generally successful (as opposed to successful at a specific skill as in the skill bias.) A "similarity bias" results when individuals are more likely to imitate cultural models that are perceived as being similar to the individual based on specific traits. Frequency-dependent biases Frequency-dependent biases result when an individual is biased to choose particular cultural variants based on their perceived frequency in the population. The most explored frequency-dependent bias is the "conformity bias." Conformity biases result when individuals attempt to copy the mean or the mode cultural variant in the population. Another possible frequency dependent bias is the "rarity bias." The rarity bias results when individuals preferentially choose cultural variants that are less common in the population. The rarity bias is also sometimes called a "nonconformist" or "anti-conformist" bias. Social learning and cumulative cultural evolution In DIT, the evolution of culture is dependent on the evolution of social learning. Analytic models show that social learning becomes evolutionarily beneficial when the environment changes with enough frequency that genetic inheritance can not track the changes, but not fast enough that individual learning is more efficient. For environments that have very little variability, social learning is not needed since genes can adapt fast enough to the changes that occur, and innate behaviour is able to deal with the constant environment. In fast changing environments cultural learning would not be useful because what the previous generation knew is now outdated and will provide no benefit in the changed environment, and hence individual learning is more beneficial. It is only in the moderately changing environment where cultural learning becomes useful since each generation shares a mostly similar environment but genes have insufficient time to change to changes in the environment. While other species have social learning, and thus some level of culture, only humans, some birds and chimpanzees are known to have cumulative culture. Boyd and Richerson argue that the evolution of cumulative culture depends on observational learning and is uncommon in other species because it is ineffective when it is rare in a population. They propose that the environmental changes occurring in the Pleistocene may have provided the right environmental conditions. Michael Tomasello argues that cumulative cultural evolution results from a ratchet effect that began when humans developed the cognitive architecture to understand others as mental agents. Furthermore, Tomasello proposed in the 80s that there are some disparities between the observational learning mechanisms found in humans and great apes - which go some way to explain the observable difference between great ape traditions and human types of culture (see Emulation (observational learning)). Cultural group selection Although group selection is commonly thought to be nonexistent or unimportant in genetic evolution, DIT predicts that, due to the nature of cultural inheritance, it may be an important force in cultural evolution. Group selection occurs in cultural evolution because conformist biases make it difficult for novel cultural traits to spread through a population (see above section on transmission biases). Conformist bias also helps maintain variation between groups. These two properties, rare in genetic transmission, are necessary for group selection to operate. Based on an earlier model by Cavalli-Sforza and Feldman, Boyd and Richerson show that conformist biases are almost inevitable when traits spread through social learning, implying that group selection is common in cultural evolution. Analysis of small groups in New Guinea imply that cultural group selection might be a good explanation for slowly changing aspects of social structure, but not for rapidly changing fads. The ability of cultural evolution to maintain intergroup diversity is what allows for the study of cultural phylogenetics. Historical development In 1876, Friedrich Engels wrote a manuscript titled The Part Played by Labour in the Transition from Ape to Man, accredited as a founding document of DIT; “The approach to gene-culture coevolution first developed by Engels and developed later on by anthropologists…” is described by Stephen Jay Gould as “…the best nineteenth-century case for gene-culture coevolution.” The idea that human cultures undergo a similar evolutionary process as genetic evolution also goes back to Darwin. In the 1960s, Donald T. Campbell published some of the first theoretical work that adapted principles of evolutionary theory to the evolution of cultures. In 1976, two developments in cultural evolutionary theory set the stage for DIT. In that year Richard Dawkins's The Selfish Gene introduced ideas of cultural evolution to a popular audience. Although one of the best-selling science books of all time, because of its lack of mathematical rigor, it had little effect on the development of DIT. Also in 1976, geneticists Marcus Feldman and Luigi Luca Cavalli-Sforza published the first dynamic models of gene–culture coevolution. These models were to form the basis for subsequent work on DIT, heralded by the publication of three seminal books in the 1980s. The first was Charles Lumsden and E.O. Wilson's Genes, Mind and Culture. This book outlined a series of mathematical models of how genetic evolution might favor the selection of cultural traits and how cultural traits might, in turn, affect the speed of genetic evolution. While it was the first book published describing how genes and culture might coevolve, it had relatively little effect on the further development of DIT. Some critics felt that their models depended too heavily on genetic mechanisms at the expense of cultural mechanisms. Controversy surrounding Wilson's sociobiological theories may also have decreased the lasting effect of this book. The second 1981 book was Cavalli-Sforza and Feldman's Cultural Transmission and Evolution: A Quantitative Approach. Borrowing heavily from population genetics and epidemiology, this book built a mathematical theory concerning the spread of cultural traits. It describes the evolutionary implications of vertical transmission, passing cultural traits from parents to offspring; oblique transmission, passing cultural traits from any member of an older generation to a younger generation; and horizontal transmission, passing traits between members of the same population. The next significant DIT publication was Robert Boyd and Peter Richerson's 1985 Culture and the Evolutionary Process. This book presents the now-standard mathematical models of the evolution of social learning under different environmental conditions, the population effects of social learning, various forces of selection on cultural learning rules, different forms of biased transmission and their population-level effects, and conflicts between cultural and genetic evolution. The book's conclusion also outlined areas for future research that are still relevant today. Current and future research In their 1985 book, Boyd and Richerson outlined an agenda for future DIT research. This agenda, outlined below, called for the development of both theoretical models and empirical research. DIT has since built a rich tradition of theoretical models over the past two decades. However, there has not been a comparable level of empirical work. In a 2006 interview Harvard biologist E. O. Wilson expressed disappointment at the little attention afforded to DIT: Kevin Laland and Gillian Ruth Brown attribute this lack of attention to DIT's heavy reliance on formal modeling. Economist Herbert Gintis disagrees with this critique, citing empirical work as well as more recent work using techniques from behavioral economics. These behavioral economic techniques have been adapted to test predictions of cultural evolutionary models in laboratory settings as well as studying differences in cooperation in fifteen small-scale societies in the field. Since one of the goals of DIT is to explain the distribution of human cultural traits, ethnographic and ethnologic techniques may also be useful for testing hypothesis stemming from DIT. Although findings from traditional ethnologic studies have been used to buttress DIT arguments, thus far there have been little ethnographic fieldwork designed to explicitly test these hypotheses. Herb Gintis has named DIT one of the two major conceptual theories with potential for unifying the behavioral sciences, including economics, biology, anthropology, sociology, psychology and political science. Because it addresses both the genetic and cultural components of human inheritance, Gintis sees DIT models as providing the best explanations for the ultimate cause of human behavior and the best paradigm for integrating those disciplines with evolutionary theory. In a review of competing evolutionary perspectives on human behavior, Laland and Brown see DIT as the best candidate for uniting the other evolutionary perspectives under one theoretical umbrella. Relation to other fields Sociology and cultural anthropology Two major topics of study in both sociology and cultural anthropology are human cultures and cultural variation. However, Dual Inheritance theorists charge that both disciplines too often treat culture as a static superorganic entity that dictates human behavior. Cultures are defined by a suite of common traits shared by a large group of people. DIT theorists argue that this doesn't sufficiently explain variation in cultural traits at the individual level. By contrast, DIT models human culture at the individual level and views culture as the result of a dynamic evolutionary process at the population level. Human sociobiology and evolutionary psychology Evolutionary psychologists study the evolved architecture of the human mind. They see it as composed of many different programs that process information, each with assumptions and procedures that were specialized by natural selection to solve a different adaptive problem faced by our hunter-gatherer ancestors (e.g., choosing mates, hunting, avoiding predators, cooperating, using aggression). These evolved programs contain content-rich assumptions about how the world and other people work. When ideas are passed from mind to mind, they are changed by these evolved inference systems (much like messages get changed in a game of telephone). But the changes are not usually random. Evolved programs add and subtract information, reshaping the ideas in ways that make them more "intuitive", more memorable, and more attention-grabbing. In other words, "memes" (ideas) are not precisely like genes. Genes are normally copied faithfully as they are replicated, but ideas normally are not. It's not just that ideas mutate every once in a while, like genes do. Ideas are transformed every time they are passed from mind to mind, because the sender's message is being interpreted by evolved inference systems in the receiver. It is useful for some applications to note, however, that there are ways to pass ideas which are more resilient and involve substantially less mutation, such as by mass distribution of printed media. There is no necessary contradiction between evolutionary psychology and DIT, but evolutionary psychologists argue that the psychology implicit in many DIT models is too simple; evolved programs have a rich inferential structure not captured by the idea of a "content bias". They also argue that some of the phenomena DIT models attribute to cultural evolution are cases of "evoked culture"—situations in which different evolved programs are activated in different places, in response to cues in the environment. Sociobiologists try to understand how maximizing genetic fitness, in either the modern era or past environments, can explain human behavior. When faced with a trait that seems maladaptive, some sociobiologists try to determine how the trait actually increases genetic fitness (maybe through kin selection or by speculating about early evolutionary environments). Dual inheritance theorists, in contrast, will consider a variety of genetic and cultural processes in addition to natural selection on genes. Human behavioral ecology Human behavioral ecology (HBE) and DIT have a similar relationship to what ecology and evolutionary biology have in the biological sciences. HBE is more concerned about ecological process and DIT more focused on historical process. One difference is that human behavioral ecologists often assume that culture is a system that produces the most adaptive outcome in a given environment. This implies that similar behavioral traditions should be found in similar environments. However, this is not always the case. A study of African cultures showed that cultural history was a better predictor of cultural traits than local ecological conditions. Memetics Memetics, which comes from the meme idea described in Dawkins's The Selfish Gene, is similar to DIT in that it treats culture as an evolutionary process that is distinct from genetic transmission. However, there are some philosophical differences between memetics and DIT. One difference is that memetics' focus is on the selection potential of discrete replicators (memes), where DIT allows for transmission of both non-replicators and non-discrete cultural variants. DIT does not assume that replicators are necessary for cumulative adaptive evolution. DIT also more strongly emphasizes the role of genetic inheritance in shaping the capacity for cultural evolution. But perhaps the biggest difference is a difference in academic lineage. Memetics as a label is more influential in popular culture than in academia. Critics of memetics argue that it is lacking in empirical support or is conceptually ill-founded, and question whether there is hope for the memetic research program succeeding. Proponents point out that many cultural traits are discrete, and that many existing models of cultural inheritance assume discrete cultural units, and hence involve memes. Criticisms Psychologist Liane Gabora has criticised DIT. She argues that traits that are not transmitted by way of a self-assembly code (as in genetic evolution) is misleading, because this second use does not capture the algorithmic structure that makes an inheritance system require a particular kind of mathematical framework. Other criticisms of the effort to frame culture in tandem with evolution have been leveled by Richard Lewontin, Niles Eldredge, and Stuart Kauffman. See also References Further reading Books Lumsden, C. J. and E. O. Wilson. 1981. Genes, Mind, and Culture: The Coevolutionary Process. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press. Cavalli-Sforza, L. L. and M. Feldman. 1981. Cultural Transmission and Evolution: A Quantitative Approach. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press. Durham, W. H. 1991. Coevolution: Genes, Culture and Human Diversity. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press. Shennan, S. J. 2002. Genes, Memes and Human History: Darwinian Archaeology and Cultural Evolution. London: Thames and Hudson. Boyd, R. and P. J. Richerson. 2005. The Origin and Evolution of Cultures. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Laland, K.H. 2017. Darwin's Unfinished Symphony: How Culture Made the Human Mind. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Reviews Smith, E. A. 1999. Three styles in the evolutionary analysis of human behavior. In L. Cronk, N. Chagnon, and W. Irons, (Eds.) Adaptation and Human Behavior: An Anthropological Perspective New York: Aldine de Gruyter. Bentley, R.A., C. Lipo, H.D.G. Maschner and B. Marler 2007. Darwinian Archaeologies. In R.A. Bentley, H.D.G. Maschner & C. Chippendale (Eds.) Handbook of Archaeological Theories. Lanham (MD): AltaMira Press. Journal articles External links Current DIT researchers Rob Boyd, Department of Anthropology, UCLA Marcus Feldman , Department of Biological Sciences, Stanford Joe Henrich, Departments of Psychology and Economics, University of British Columbia Richard McElreath, Anthropology Department, UC Davis Peter J. Richerson, Department of Environmental Science and Policy, UC Davis Related researchers Liane Gabora , Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia Russell Gray Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany Herb Gintis , Emeritus Professor of Economics, University of Massachusetts & Santa Fe Institute Kevin Laland , School of Biology, University of St. Andrews Ruth Mace, Department of Anthropology, University College London Alex Mesoudi Human Biological and Cultural Evolution Group, University of Exeter, UK Michael Tomasello, Department of Developmental and Comparative Psychology, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology Peter Turchin Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Connecticut Mark Collard, Department of Archaeology, Simon Fraser University, and Department of Archaeology, University of Aberdeen Anthropology Behavioural genetics Cultural anthropology Human evolution Population genetics Sociobiology

Aka

Aka, AKA or a.k.a. may refer to: Language "Also Known As", used to introduce a sobriquet, or alternative name Languages Aka language (Sudan) Aka language, in the Central African Republic Hruso language, in India, also referred to as Aka a prefix in the names of Great Andamanese languages Akan language (ISO 639-2 and ISO 639-3 codes) People Aka (name), a list of people with the surname or given name Aka people, in the Central African Republic and Congo Aka (tribe), of Kameng, Arunachal Pradesh, India AKA (rapper), stage name of South African Kiernan Forbes (1988–2023) Places Japan Aka, Fukuoka, a village Mount Aka (Daisetsuzan), Daisetsuzan National Park, Hokkaidō Mount Aka (Yatsugatake), Yatsugatake Mountains, Honshū Aka Island, Okinawa Prefecture Aka River, Yamagata Prefecture Elsewhere Aka, Hungary, a village Aka Hills, Arunachal Pradesh, India Aka, Iran, a village in Khuzestan Province Arts and entertainment Film and television AKA (2023 film), a French-language film AKA (2002 film), a drama film "A.K.A." (Jericho episode), a 2007 episode of the TV series Jericho a.k.a. Cartoon, a Canadian animation company Aka Pella (Histeria!), a character from the cartoon Histeria! Channel AKA, former name of the UK music television channel Now 70s Music The A.K.A.s, an American rock band A.K.A. (album), a 2014 album by Jennifer Lopez "AKA", a video by True Widow Sports Aka (Burmese), martial arts movements Aka (sailing), part of a multi-hull boat Aka Arena, a football stadium in Hønefoss, Norway American Kickboxing Academy American Kitefliers Association Australian Karting Association Science and technology Alcoholic ketoacidosis, a medical condition A retired US Navy hull classification symbol: Attack cargo ship (AKA) Authentication and Key Agreement, a security protocol used in 3G networks Transportation Ankang Fuqiang Airport (IATA code: AKA), China Atka Airport (FAA location identifier: AKA), Alaska Aka Station, a railway station in Aka, Fukuoka Prefecture, Japan AKA (car), a defunct automobile manufacture from Czechoslovak Other uses Manpower Directorate of the Israeli Defence Forces Alpha Kappa Alpha, an African-American sorority Aga Khan Academies, a network non-denominational day and residential schools See also Akas (disambiguation) Akka (disambiguation) Akha (disambiguation) Language and nationality disambiguation pages

Brainspotting

Brainspotting is a psychotherapy technique that attempts to help people process psychological trauma or other problems via eye movements, bilateral stimulation, and client therapist attunement. Like EMDR, practitioners of this technique use a pointer to direct a client’s eye gaze. Brainspotting has been listed as one of the Trauma Power Therapies, and recommended by trauma experts Bessel Van der Kolk, M.D., Robert Scaer, M.D., Peter Levine, M.D., Gabore Mate, and Steven Porges, among others. History Brainspotting was developed by David Grand, Ph.D., in 2003 after working with 9/11 survivors and other patients. David Grand was previously trained in psychoanalysis in the 1980s and EMDR in 1993. He combined EMDR, psychoanalysis, and somatic experiencing into a modality he titled "Natural Flow EMDR", which became the precursor for brainspotting. The neuroscientist Robert C. Scaer, M.D., P.C., and his conceptualization of psychological trauma, contributed to the development of Brainspotting. Brainspotting is a modification of eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy, a copiously studied, and evidence-based trauma intervention that resolves traumatic memory, with its associated strong emotion and unwanted behavior, with eye movements that mimic the eye movements that occur during REM sleep. David Grand, Ph.D., the founder of brainspotting, an expert EMDR therapist, noticed that while clients discussed their trauma, or while the client was moving their eyes during EMDR sessions, the eyes tended to stick and react when fixed in specific spots.  While EMDR therapy instructs the client to sweep their eyes back and forth over the field of vision, Brainspotting moves the eyes to spots identified as specifically associated with the targeted emotion, behavior, or traumatic event. Focused on this spot, using bilateral stimulation, and the focused and compassionate attunement of the therapist, the distressing experience is integrated and resolved. Technique Brainspotting is based on the premise that “Where you look affects how you feel”. Unlike EMDR therapy, which allows the eyes to move back and forth to resolve a clinical issue, the brainspotting clinician will facilitate the client to be focused on a specific external location. Brainspotting is based on the theory that influencing the visual field will influence neurological and psychological processes. Brainspotting sessions involve focusing on a presenting problem, rating feelings of distress, focusing on bodily sensations, following guided eye gazes, and practicing focused mindfulness. There are several variations of brainspotting that may include bilateral stimulation via audio recordings called “BioLateral”, wearing goggles that block vision in one eye, or allowing clients to guide therapists on how to direct their gaze. Effects and efficacy Grand claims that it can also be used to treat anxiety, depression, chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, and ADHD. "Both EMDR and Brainspotting are empirically driven and validated, with 75% of recent experimental groups showing significant decreases in their PTSD scores after only three sessions using a hybridized model of the two (Van der Kolk, 2015; D’Antoni et al., 2022). Findings from recent meta-analyses support seven of 10 participants suffering from PTSD found brain-based interventions to be more effective and faster acting than trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy in conjunction with cyclical antidepressants (Bernardy & Friedman, 2015; Shrader & Ross, 2021)" Several studies support brainspotting as effective treatment for PTSD Subjects report experiencing lower levels of PTSD and depression symptoms after brainspotting sessions compared to before the session, and changes in function. Another study compared the effects of a single 40-min session of EMDR, Brainspotting (BSP), Body Scan Meditation (BSM), and placebo reading condition in the processing of distressing memories reported by adult participants (psychologists and medical doctors studying Systemic Psychotherapy). The authors of the study wrote "As far as the specific experimental design employed in the current study is concerned, EMDR and BSP thus appeared to be comparable in terms of efficacy in reducing healthy participants’ subjective disturbance connected with distressing memories." See also Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing Treatments for PTSD List of topics characterized as pseudoscience References Mind–body interventions Post-traumatic stress disorder Counseling Psychotherapy by type Pseudoscience

Dual degree

A dual degree (also known as a double degree or joint degree) refers to an educational program where a student works towards two different academic or professional degrees in parallel, either at the same institution or at different institutions. Dual-degree programs are usually designed to offer students an opportunity to gain diverse academic experiences and qualifications in a reduced time frame compared to pursuing the degrees separately. Dual degrees can be offered at the undergraduate or postgraduate level across various disciplines, such as business, law, engineering, and the arts. The structure of dual degree programs varies significantly, with some requiring a unified curriculum and others allowing more flexibility in course selection. Upon completion, graduates receive two academic degrees, which may enhance career prospects, broaden expertise, and offer a more global perspective in their field of study. See also Academic major Double majors in the United States Interdisciplinarity References Academic degrees

Energy (psychological)

Energy is a concept in some psychological theories or models of a postulated unconscious mental functioning on a level between biology and consciousness. Philosophical accounts The idea harks back to Aristotle's conception of actus et potentia. In the philosophical context, the term "energy" may have the literal meaning of "activity" or "operation". Henry More, in his 1642 Psychodia platonica; or a platonicall song of the soul, defined an "energy of the soul" as including "every phantasm of the soul". In 1944 Julian Sorell Huxley characterised "mental energy" as "the driving forces of the psyche, emotional as well as intellectual [...]." Psychoanalytic accounts In 1874, the concept of "psychodynamics" was proposed with the publication of Lectures on Physiology by German physiologist Ernst Wilhelm von Brücke who, in coordination with physicist Hermann von Helmholtz, one of the formulators of the first law of thermodynamics (conservation of energy), supposed that all living organisms are energy-systems also governed by this principle. During this year, at the University of Vienna, Brücke served as supervisor for first-year medical student Sigmund Freud who adopted this new "dynamic" physiology. In his Lectures on Physiology, Brücke set forth the then-radical view that the living organism is a dynamic system to which the laws of chemistry and physics apply. In The Ego and the Id, Freud argued that the id was the source of the personality's desires, and therefore of the psychic energy that powered the mind. Freud defined libido as the instinct energy or force. Freud later added the death drive (also contained in the id) as a second source of mental energy. The origins of Freud's basic model, based on the fundamentals of chemistry and physics, according to John Bowlby, stems from Brücke, Meynert, Breuer, Helmholtz, and Herbart. In 1928, Carl Jung published a seminal essay entitled "On Psychic Energy" which dealt with energy Jung claimed was first discovered by Russian philosopher Nikolaus Grot. Later, the theory of psychodynamics and the concept of "psychic energy" was developed further by those such as Alfred Adler and Melanie Klein. A pupil of Freud named Wilhelm Reich proponed a theory construed out of the root of Freud's libido, of psychic energy he came to term orgone energy. This was very controversial and Reich was soon rejected and expelled from the Vienna Psychoanalytical Association. Psychological energy and force are the basis of an attempt to formulate a scientific theory according to which psychological phenomena would be subject to precise laws akin to how physical objects are subject to Newton's laws. This concept of psychological energy is separate and distinct from (or even opposed to) the mystical eastern concept of spiritual energy. The Myers–Briggs Type Indicator divides people into 16 categories based on whether certain activities leave them feeling energized or drained of energy. Neuroscientific accounts Mental energy has been repeatedly compared to, or connected with, the physical quantity energy. Studies of the 1990s to 2000s (and earlier) have found that mental effort can be measured in terms of increased metabolism in the brain. The modern neuroscientific view is that brain metabolism, measured by functional magnetic resonance imaging or positron emission tomography, is a physical correlate of mental activity. Criticism The concept of psychic energy has been criticized because it lacks empirical evidence and there is not a neurological or neuropsychological correlate, unlike with the neural correlates of consciousness. Shevrin argues that energy may be a systems concept. He theorizes that the strength of an emotion can remain the same, while an emotion changes. He argues that this intensity, can be understood separately from emotion and that this intensity might be considered energy. However, a significant volume of empirical research on energy psychology has emerged over several decades, much of it published in peer-reviewed medical and psychology journals. It includes a large body of randomized controlled trials; extensive noteworthy uncontrolled trials in which subjects served as their own controls, with measurements taken over time to assess client progress; as well as small pilot studies and collections of case histories that are suggestive of future research directions. Thus, as of the date of this citation, there have been over 200 review articles, research studies, and meta-analyses published in professional peer-reviewed journals. This includes over 70 randomized controlled trials, 50 clinical outcomes studies, 5 meta-analyses, 4 systematic reviews of various energy psychology modalities, and 9 comparative reviews of energy psychology with other therapies such as EMDR and cognitive behavioral therapy. All but one of the experimental studies have documented the effectiveness of energy psychology modalities. Also, the studies document the efficacy of energy psychology methods for the treatment of physical pain, anxiety, depression, cravings, trauma, PTSD, and peak athletic performance. Concerning meta-analyses, four revealed a large effect size and one a moderate effect size. The Gilomen & Lee (2015) meta-analysis indicated a moderate effect size of tapping on psychological distress (utilizing Hedge's g as compared to the standard Cohen's h), although they opined that the results could be due to factors common to other therapeutic approaches, and not necessarily due to tapping. Nelms & Castel (2016) found a large effect size on tapping for depression, Clond's (2017) revealed a large effect size for treating anxiety, and Sebastian & Nelms (2017) also indicated a large effect size for PTSD. Regarding the question of acupoint tapping as an active therapeutic ingredient, the meta-analysis by Church, Stapleton, Kip & Gallo (2020) revealed a large effect size in this regard, supporting tapping as an active therapeutic ingredient. See also Cathexis Cognitive load Death drive Energy (esotericism) Energy psychology Humorism Id, ego and superego Libido Mind Motivation Psyche (psychology) Spoon theory Theory of mind References Further reading Laplanche, J.|Jean Laplanche and Pontalis, J.B. (1974). The Language of Psycho-Analysis. Trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1974. Furman, M., and Gallo, F. (2000). The Neurophysics of Human Behavior: Explorations at the Interface of Brain, Mind, Behavior, and Information. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press. Gallo, F. (2005). Energy Psychology: Explorations at the Interface of Energy, Cognition, Behavior, and Health. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press. Gallo, F. (2007). Energy Tapping for Trauma. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger. Gallo, F., and Vincenzi, V. (2008). Energy Tapping. Oakland, CA: New Harbinger. Clond, M. (2016). Emotional freedom techniques for anxiety: A systematic review with meta-analysis. The Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease. 204(5), 388-395. Gilomen, S. A. & Lee, C. W. (2015). The efficacy of acupoint stimulation in the treatment of psychological distress: A meta-analysis. Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, 48, 140-148. Johnson, C., Shala, M., Sejdijaj, X., Odell, R., Dabishevci, K. (2001). Thought field therapy: Soothing the bad moments of Kosovo. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 57(10), 1237-1240. Nelms, J. & Castel, D. (2016). A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized and nonrandomized trials of emotional freedom techniques (EFT) for the treatment of depression. Explore: The Journal of Science and Healing, 12(6), 416-26. Sebastian, B., & Nelms, J. (2017). The effectiveness of emotional freedom techniques in the treatment of posttraumatic stress disorder: A meta-analysis. Explore: The Journal of Science and Healing, 13(1), 16-25. External links Psychic Energy & Psychoanalytic Theory Motivation Psychological concepts

VALS

VALS (Values and Lifestyle Survey) is a proprietary research methodology used for psychographic market segmentation. Market segmentation is designed to guide companies in tailoring their products and services in order to appeal to the people most likely to purchase them. History and description VALS was developed in 1978 by social scientist and consumer futurist Arnold Mitchell and his colleagues at SRI International. It was immediately embraced by advertising agencies and is currently offered as a product of SRI's consulting services division. VALS draws heavily on the work of Harvard sociologist David Riesman and psychologist Abraham Maslow. Mitchell used statistics to identify attitudinal and demographic questions that helped categorize adult American consumers into one of nine lifestyle types: survivors (4%), sustainers (7%), belongers (35%), emulators (9%), achievers (22%), I-am-me (5%), experiential (7%), societally conscious (9%), and integrated (2%). The questions were weighted using data developed from a sample of 1,635 Americans and their significant others, who responded to an SRI International survey in 1980. The main dimensions of the VALS framework are resources (the vertical dimension) and primary motivation (the horizontal dimension). The vertical dimension segments people based on the degree to which they are innovative and have resources such as income, education, self-confidence, intelligence, leadership skills, and energy. The horizontal dimension represents primary motivations and includes three distinct types: Consumers driven by knowledge and principles are motivated primarily by ideals. These consumers include groups called Thinkers and Believers. Consumers driven by demonstrating success to their peers are motivated primarily by achievement. These consumers include groups referred to as Achievers and Strivers. Consumers driven by a desire for social or physical activity, variety, and risk taking are motivated primarily by self-expression. These consumers include the groups known as Experiencers and Makers. At the top of the rectangle are the Innovators, who have such high resources that they could have any of the three primary motivations. At the bottom of the rectangle are the Survivors, who live complacently and within their means without a strong primary motivation of the types listed above. The VALS Framework gives more details about each of the groups. VALS Researchers faced some problems with the VALS method, and in response, SRI developed the VALS2 programme in 1978; additionally, SRI significantly revised it in 1989. VALS2 places less emphasis on activities and interests and more on a psychological base to tap relatively enduring attitudes and values. The VALS2 program has two dimensions. The first dimension, Self-orientation, determines the type of goals and behaviours that individuals will pursue, and refers to patterns of attitudes and activities which help individuals reinforce, sustain, or modify their social self-image. This is a fundamental human need. The second dimension, Resources, reflects the ability of individuals to pursue their dominant self-orientation and includes full-range of physical, psychological, demographic, and material means such as self-confidence, interpersonal skills, inventiveness, intelligence, eagerness to buy, money, position, education, etc. According to VALS 2, a consumer purchases certain products and services because the individual is a specific type of person. The purchase is believed to reflect a consumer's lifestyle, which is a function of self–orientation and resources. In 1991, the name VALS2 was switched back to VALS, because of brand equity. Criticisms Psychographic segmentation has been criticized by well-known public opinion analyst and social scientist Daniel Yankelovich, who says psychographics are "very weak" at predicting people's purchases, making it a "very poor" tool for corporate decision-makers. The VALS Framework has also been criticized as too culturally specific for international use. Segments The following types correspond to VALS segments of US adults based on two concepts for understanding consumers: primary motivation and resources. Innovators. These consumers are on the leading edge of change, have the highest incomes, and such high self-esteem and abundant resources that they can indulge in any or all self-orientations. They are located above the rectangle. Image is important to them as an expression of taste, independence, and character. Their consumer choices are directed toward the "finer things in life." Thinkers. These consumers are the high-resource group of those who are motivated by ideals. They are mature, responsible, well-educated professionals. Their leisure activities center on their homes, but they are well informed about what goes on in the world and are open to new ideas and social change. They have high incomes but are practical consumers and rational decision makers. Believers. These consumers are the low-resource group of those who are motivated by ideals. They are conservative and predictable consumers who favor local products and established brands. Their lives are centered on family, community, and the nation. They have modest incomes. Achievers. These consumers are the high-resource group of those who are motivated by achievement. They are successful work-oriented people who get their satisfaction from their jobs and families. They are politically conservative and respect authority and the status quo. They favor established products and services that show off their success to their peers. Strivers. These consumers are the low-resource group of those who are motivated by achievements. They have values very similar to achievers but have fewer economic, social, and psychological resources. Style is extremely important to them as they strive to emulate people they admire. Experiencers. These consumers are the high-resource group of those who are motivated by self-expression. They are the youngest of all the segments, with a median age of 25. They have a lot of energy, which they pour into physical exercise and social activities. They are avid consumers, spending heavily on clothing, fast-foods, music, and other youthful favorites, with particular emphasis on new products and services. Makers. These consumers are the low-resource group of those who are motivated by self-expression. They are practical people who value self-sufficiency. They are focused on the familiar - family, work, and physical recreation - and have little interest in the broader world. As consumers, they appreciate practical and functional products. Survivors. These consumers have the lowest incomes. They have too few resources to be included in any consumer self-orientation and are thus located below the rectangle. They are the oldest of all the segments, with a median age of 61. Within their limited means, they tend to be brand-loyal consumers. See also Advertising Data mining Demographics Fear, uncertainty, and doubt Marketing Psychographics References Further reading External links Strategic Business Insights Official website (was formerly SRI Consulting Business Intelligence) Market research Market segmentation

Sociotropy

Sociotropy is a personality trait characterized by excessive investment in interpersonal relationships and usually studied in the field of social psychology. People with sociotropy tend to have a strong need for social acceptance, which causes them to be overly nurturant towards people who they do not have close relationships with. Sociotropy can be seen as the opposite of autonomy, because those with sociotropy are concerned with interpersonal relationships, whereas those with autonomy are more concerned with independence and do not care so much for others. Sociotropy has been correlated with feminine sex-role orientation in many research experiments. Sociotropy is notable in that it interacts with interpersonal stress or traumatic experience to influence subsequent depression. Sociotropy-Autonomy Scale The Sociotropy-Autonomy Scale (SAS) was introduced by Aaron T. Beck as a means of assessing two cognitive-personality constructs hypothesized as risk factors in depression. The scale focuses on the two personality traits of Sociotropy (social dependency) and Autonomy (satisfying independency). The development of the SAS was gathered through patient self-reports and patient records collected from therapists. Using psychometrics, from the sample of 378 psychiatric patients questions were placed into a two-factor structure where the final pool of items was 60-109. From there each 30 items generated three factors for sociotropy: Concern About Disapproval, Attachment/Concern About Separation, and Pleasing Others; and three for autonomy: Individualistic or Autonomous Achievement, Mobility/Freedom from Control of Others, and Preference for Solitude. The SAS has 60 items rated on a 5-point scale (ranging from 0 to 4). Scores are then totaled separately on each dimension. The scale has been modified since its development. The current SAS decomposes Sociotropy into two factors (neediness and connectedness). Neediness is associated with the symptoms of depression—and connectedness is a sensitivity towards others, and associated with valuing relationships. Since the development of the SAS, many other measures of personality constructs have been developed to assess other personality traits with some overlapping with the SAS, but examining for different traits. Self-control Sociotropic individuals react differently when faced with situations that involve self-control. Sociotropic individuals consume more food, or try to match a peer's eating habits when they believe doing so makes the peer more comfortable. This is often hypothesized as being a result of the individual attempting to achieve social approval and avoid social rejection. The social pressure and dependence can cause a loss of self-control in an individual, especially if they are unaware of their desire for social acceptance. Depression Much research on Sociotropy focuses on links between personality and the risk for depression. People who are very dependent are classified as sociotropic individuals, and are more prone to depression as they seek to sustain their low self-esteem by establishing secure interpersonal relationships. Sociotropic individuals are heavily invested into their relationships with other people and have higher desires for acceptance, support, understanding, and guidance—which is problematic when relationships fail. People who are sociotropic and going through failed relationships are likely to become depressed due to intensified feelings of abandonment and loss. Researchers have a hard time figuring out exactly how much personality affects risk for depression, as it is hard to isolate traits for research, though they conclude that a person can either be sociotropic or independent, but not both. Research Sociotropy has been linked to other personality traits such as introversion and lack of assertion. Lack of assertion has been hypothesized to be due to the need to please others to build interpersonal relationships. Individuals who are sociotropic avoid confrontation to prevent abandonment. Along the lines of lack of assertion there has also been research studying the connection between sociotropy and shyness. The characteristic interpersonal dependence and fear of social rejection are also attributes of shyness. Research shows that many items from the SAS relate to dimensions of dependence and preoccupations for receiving approval of others, which is problematic in interpersonal relationships for people who are shy. Individuals who are shy and sociotropic have internal conflicts to want to avoid others as well as having strong motives to approach people. The results from such research concludes that sociotropy predicts other symptoms of discomfort in assertive situations and in conversations. Research on the subject also seems to connect a link between higher levels of anxiety and sociotropy. Putting excessive amounts of energy into dependent relationships increases anxiety. The behavioral disposition that causes an individual to depend on others for personal satisfaction can also have an effect on their anxiety levels. The research concluded that anxiety and sociotropy are positively correlated in many situations such as social evaluation, physical danger, and ambiguous situations. Sociotropy and anxiety are present in these situations because they are social by definition, and therefore associated with emphasis on social relationships that are characteristic of sociotropic individuals. External links The Sociotropy-Autonomy Scale (SAS) National Library of Medicine entry WILEY Interscience Sociotropy-autonomy and interpersonal problems References Personality

Vegetotherapy

Vegetotherapy is a form of Reichian psychotherapy that involves the physical manifestations of emotions. Development The fundamental text of vegetotherapy is Wilhelm Reich's Psychischer Kontakt und vegetative Strömung (1935), later included in the expanded edition of Reich's Character Analysis (1933 and 1949). The practice grew out of Reich's extension of psychoanalysis to cover what he called "character analysis", which involved alleviating a person's body armor and the character defenses that maintain an individual in a state of neurosis. Reich argued that "the feeling of unity of all body sensations ... increases with each new dissolution of an armor ring," leading ultimately to a merger with the autonomic functions of the body. He considered that "orgone physics reduces the emotional functions of humans even much further, to the forms of movement of molluscs and protozoa". After his claim to have thus discovered "orgone" or life energy, vegetotherapy was accordingly adapted and succeeded by "psychiatric orgone therapy". Subsequently, neo-Reichian therapists have adopted the body work of vegetotherapy in various forms into their therapeutic practices. Practice The practice of vegetotherapy involves the analyst enabling the patient to physically simulate the bodily effects of strong emotions. In this technique, the patient is asked to remove his or her outer clothing, lie down on a sheet-covered bed in the doctor's office, and breathe deeply and rhythmically. An additional technique is to palpate or tickle areas of muscular tension, also known as "body armour". This activity and stimulation eventually causes the patient to experience the simulated emotions, thus theoretically releasing emotions pent up inside both the body and the psyche (compare with primal therapy). Screaming and vomiting may occur as the catharsis of emotive expression breaks down the cathexis of stored emotions. While experiencing a simulated emotional state, the patient may reflect on past experiences that may be the source of his or her unresolved emotions. These emotions are described as "stored emotions," and in Reichian analysis are seen as manifesting in the body. Vegetotherapy relies on a theory of stored emotions, or affects, where emotions build tensions in the structure of the body. This tension can be seen in shallow or restricted breathing, posture, facial expression, muscular stress (particularly in the circular muscles), and low libido. Good sexual function and unrestricted, natural breathing are seen as evidence of recovery. Examples of vegetotherapy, as well as interviews with analysts and patients who have undergone vegetotherapy, can be seen in the film Room for Happiness, directed by Dick Young and approved by the American College of Orgonomy. Criticism Psychoanalyst Otto Fenichel has criticized Reich's relaxation techniques. Although he accepts the fact that there are positive effects of vegetotherapy, he sees two potential problems. First, the possibility of psychological splitting that prevents changes in the body from affecting the mind and second, the need for subsequent working through to integrate the abreacted material into the psyche. See also Alternative medicine Body psychotherapy Gerda Boyesen Neo-Reichian massage Primal scream therapy References Bibliography Reich, Wilhelm: Psychic Contact and Vegetative Current. (Chap. xiv of Character Analysis, 1949 ff) Orig. in Reich's Zeitschrift für Politische Psychologie und Sexualökonomie External links Vegetotherapy page from A Skeptical Scrutiny of the Works and Theories of Wilhelm Reich Orgonomy Body psychotherapy

Thomas theorem

The Thomas theorem is a theory of sociology which was formulated in 1928 by William Isaac Thomas and Dorothy Swaine Thomas: In other words, the interpretation of a situation causes the action. This interpretation is not objective. Actions are affected by subjective perceptions of situations. Whether there even is an objectively correct interpretation is not important for the purposes of helping guide individuals' behavior. The Thomas theorem is not a theorem in the mathematical sense. Definition of the situation In 1923, W. I. Thomas stated more precisely that any definition of a situation would influence the present. In addition, after a series of definitions in which an individual is involved, such a definition would also "gradually [influence] a whole life-policy and the personality of the individual himself". Consequently, Thomas stressed societal problems such as intimacy, family, or education as fundamental to the role of the situation when detecting a social world "in which subjective impressions can be projected on to life and thereby become real to projectors". The definition of the situation is a fundamental concept in symbolic interactionism. It involves a proposal upon the characteristics of a social situation (e.g. norms, values, authority, participants' roles), and seeks agreement from others in a way that can facilitate social cohesion and social action. Conflicts often involve disagreements over definitions of the situation in question. This definition may thus become an area contested between different stakeholders (or by an ego's sense of self-identity). A definition of the situation is related to the idea of "framing" a situation. The construction, presentation, and maintenance of frames of interaction (i.e., social context and expectations), and identities (self-identities or group identities), are fundamental aspects of micro-level social interaction. See also Impression management Linguistic relativity Placebo Pluralistic ignorance Self-fulfilling prophecy Sociology of knowledge Tinkerbell effect References Further reading Sociological theories Cognitive biases

English for specific purposes

English for specific purposes (ESP) is a subset of English as a second or foreign language. It usually refers to teaching the English language to university students or people already in employment, with reference to the particular vocabulary and skills they need. As with any language taught for specific purposes, a given course of ESP will focus on more occupation or profession, such as Technical English, Scientific English, English for medical professionals, English for waiters, English for tourism, etc. Despite the seemingly limited focus, a course of ESP can have a wide-ranging impact, as is the case with Environmental English. English for academic purposes, taught to students before or during their degrees, is one sort of ESP, as is Business English. Aviation English is taught to pilots, air traffic controllers and civil aviation cadets to enable clear radio communications. Definition Absolute characteristics ESP is defined to meet psychological needs of the learners and how they will respond to temptations (Maslow's hierarchy of needs). ESP makes use of underlying methodology and activities of the discipline it serves. ESP is centered on the language appropriate to these activities in terms of grammar, lexis, register, study skills, discourse and genre. Variable characteristics Strevens' (1988) ESP may be, but is not necessarily: Restricted as to the language skills to be learned (e.g. reading only); Not taught according to any pre-ordained methodology (pp. 1–2) Dudley-Evans & St John (1998) ESP may be related to or designed for specific disciplines;(Dabong, 2019) ESP may use, in specific teaching situations, a different methodology from that of general English; ESP is likely to be designed for adult learners, either at a tertiary level institution or in a professional work situation. It could, however, be for learners at secondary school level; ESP is generally designed for intermediate or advanced students; Most ESP courses assume some basic knowledge of the language system, but it can be used with beginners (pp. 4–5) Teaching ESP is taught in many universities of the world. Many professional associations of teachers of English (e.g., TESOL and IATEFL) have ESP sections. Much attention is devoted to ESP course design. ESP teaching has much in common with English as a foreign or second language and English for academic purposes (EAP). Quickly developing Business English can be considered as part of a larger concept of English for specific purposes. ESP is different from standard English teaching in the fact that the one doing the teaching not only has to be proficient in standard English, but they also must be knowledgeable in a technical field. When doctors of foreign countries learn English, they need to learn the names of their tools, naming conventions, and methodologies of their profession before one can ethically perform surgery. ESP courses for medicine would be relevant for any medical profession, just as how learning electrical engineering would be beneficial to a foreign engineer. Some ESP scholars recommend a "two layer" ESP course: the first covering all generic knowledge in the specific field of study, and then a second layer that would focus on the specifics of the specialization of the individual. See also Test of English for Aviation EAP – English for academic purposes English for Specific Purposes World (online journal) Functional English References Notes Hutchinson, T. & A. Francisco. 1987. English for Specific Purposes: A learning-centered approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Eric.ed.gov, Dudley-Evans, Tony. An Overview of ESP in the 1990s. In: The Japan Conference on English for Specific Purposes Proceedings (Aizuwakamatsu City, Fukushima, Japan, November 8, 1997) Amazon.co.uk, Dudley-Evans, Tony (1998). Developments in English for Specific Purposes: A multi-disciplinary approach. Cambridge University Press. Ideas and Options in English for Specific Purposes 2006 Developmentalpsychologyarena.com, Helen Basturkmen. Ideas and Options in English for Specific Purposes. Published by: Routledge, 2005 Eric.ed.gov, The Apitong 3rd floor on English for Specific Purposes Proceedings (Aizuwakamatsu City, Fukushima, November 8, 1997) Orr, Thomas, Ed. External links Organizations Tesol.org, TESOL's ESP Interest Section and the ESP discussion list Espsig.iatefl.org, IATEFL ESP Special Interest Group UNAV.es, IATEFL ESP SIG Website IESPTA - International ESP Teachers' Association (it is the only association for ESP Teachers) Articles Esp-world.info, Hewings, M. 2002. A history of ESP through 'English for Specific Purposes'. Iteslj.org, Kristen Gatehouse. Key Issues in English for Specific Purposes (ESP) Curriculum Development. The Internet TESL Journal. Antlab.sci.waseda.ac.jp, Laurence Anthony. English for Specific Purposes: What does it mean? Why is it different? Journals Asian ESP Journal Elsevier.com, English for Specific Purposes An International Research Journal Journal of Teaching English for Specific and Academic Purposes Magazines ESP Professional -It is the only magazine for ESP Teachers worldwide. Official Site English Learning Official Site English-language education

'I' and the 'me'

The I' and the 'me are terms central to the social philosophy of George Herbert Mead, one of the key influences on the development of the branch of sociology called symbolic interactionism. The terms refer to the psychology of the individual, where in Mead's understanding, the "me" is the socialized aspect of the person, and the "I" is the active aspect of the person. One might usefully 'compare Mead's "I" and "me", respectively, with Sartre's "choice" and "the situation". But Mead himself matched up the "me" with Freud's "censor", and the "I" with his "ego"; and this is psychologically apt. Characteristics The "Me" is what is learned in interaction with others and (more generally) with the environment: other people's attitudes, once internalized in the self, constitute the Me. This includes both knowledge about that environment (including society), but also about who the person is: their sense of self. "What the individual is for himself is not something that he invented. It is what his significant others have come to ...treat him as being." This is because people learn to see who they are (man or woman, old or young, etc.) by observing the responses of others to themselves or their actions. If others respond to a person as (for instance) a woman, the person develops a sense of herself indeed as a woman. At the same time, 'the "Me" disciplines the "I" by holding it back from breaking the law of the community'. It is thus very close to the way in a man Freud's 'ego-censor, the conscience...arose from the critical influence of his parents (conveyed to him by the medium of the voice), to whom were added, as time went on, those who trained and taught him and the innumerable and indefinable host of all the other people in his environment—his fellow-men—and public opinion'. It is 'the attitude of the other in one's own organism, as controlling the thing that he is going to do'. By contrast, 'the "I" is the response of the individual to the attitude of the community'. The "I" acts creatively, though within the context of the me. Mead notes that "It is only after we have acted that we know what we have done...what we have said." People, he argues, are not automatons; Mead states that "the "I" reacts to the self which arises through the taking of the attitudes of others." They do not blindly follow rules. They construct a response on the basis of what they have learned, the "me". Mead highlighted accordingly those values that attach particularly to the "I" rather than to the me, "...which cannot be calculated and which involve a reconstruction of the society, and so of the 'me' which belongs to that society." Taken together, the "I" and the "me" form the person or the self in Mead's social philosophy. According to Mead, there would be no possibility of personality without both the "I" and the "Me". Fusion Mead explored what he called 'the fusion of the "I" and the "me" in the attitudes of religion, patriotism, and team work', noting what he called the "peculiar sense of exaltation" that belongs to them. He also considered that 'the idea of the fusion of the "I" and the "me" gives a very adequate explanation of this exaltation...in the aesthetic experience'. In everyday life, however, 'a complete fusion of the "I" and the "me" may not be a good thing...it is a dynamic sort of balance between the "I" and the "me" that is required'. Conventionality When there is a predominance of the "me" in the personality, 'we speak of a person as a conventional individual; his ideas are exactly the same as those of his neighbours; he is hardly more than a "me" under the circumstances'—"...the shallow, brittle, conformist kind of personality..." that is "all persona, with its excessive concern for what people think." The alternative—and in many ways Mead's ideal—was the person who has a definite personality, who replies to the organized attitude in a way that makes a significant difference. With such a person, the I is the most important phase of the experience. Dissociation Mead recognised that it is normal for an individual to have 'all sorts of selves answering to all sorts of different social reactions', but also that it was possible for 'a tendency to break up the personality' to appear: 'Two separate "me's" and "I's", two different selves, result...the phenomenon of dissociation of personality'. Literary examples Walt Whitman 'marks off the impulsive "I", the natural, existential aspect of the self, from critical sanction. It is the cultured self, the "me", in Mead's terms, that needs re-mediation'. See also References Social philosophy Conceptions of self Identity (social science)

Social media and identity

Social media can have both positive and negative impacts on a user's identity. Psychology and Communication scholars study the relationship between social media and identity in order to understand individual behavior, psychological impact, and social patterns. Communication within political or social groups online can result in practice application of those identities or adoption of them as a whole. Young people, defined as emerging adults in or entering college, especially shape their identities through social media. Young adults At the stage where a young adult becomes an emerging adult, individuals are especially influenced by social media. Psychologists study methods of self-presentation to determine how a user's patterns and media participation affects their own identity. Young adults, through media literacies, can also find their identity as a part of a social group, such as feminists. These studies are connected to building frameworks for educators on teaching media literacies. Due to their fluency in media literacy, young people often contribute to these larger social identities through their networks, and unique style of communication when sharing information. Young Individuals have been found to be affected by what they take in on Social Media. Psychologists believe that at a time when young adults are coming into adolescence, they are more likely to be influenced by what they see on sites like Instagram or Twitter. More so directed towards the times of Identity Formation, as these individuals are impressionable and still creating their identity. With the advance of social media, most young adults will widely share, with varying degrees of accuracy, honesty, and openness, information that in the past would have been private or reserved for select individuals. Key questions include whether they accurately portray their identities online and whether the use of social media might impact young adults’ identity development. Media Imagery, in particular, is said to be a major influence on the minds of young men and women. Studies have shown that it is even more relevant when it comes to the issue of body image. Social Media, in part, has been created to host a safe haven for those who do not claim a solid identity in the material world, giving them a chance for exploration of other identities in the virtual concept. Psychologists and Scholars have noted that while past identities are not easy to escape from; the Internet is more permanent. Social media is an essential part of the social lives of young adults. They rely on it to maintain relationships, create new relationships, and stay up to date with the world around them. Adolescents find social media to be extremely helpful when changing environments, like moving off to university for example. Social media provides students, especially first year students, the opportunity to create the identity they want the world to see. However, it has been seen that these students create online personas that may not reflect their true selves bringing up the issues of impression management. Social media provides young adults with the opportunity to present themselves as something other than their authentic self. Media literacy The definition of media literacy has evolved over time to encompass a range of experiences that can occur in social media or other digital spaces. The definition of media literacy is also broad and wide ranging in its context. Currently, media literacy includes being able to understand, apply, and share digital images and messages. Educators teach media literacy skills because of the vulnerable relationship that young adults can have with social media. Some examples of media literacy practices, particularly on Twitter, include using hashtags, live tweeting, and sharing information. Overall, the goal of media literacy within social media is to keep young adults aware of potentially violent, graphic, or dangerous content that they may come across on the internet, and how to handle it with responsibility and safety in mind. In order to be considered media-literate, a person must be able to take in media from online and social platforms and have the correct competencies and context to be able to organize the information. In order to be considered media-literate, the digital information must be given to the user in a way that it can be put into the correct perspective and analyzed, deducted and synthesized. Teenagers and young adults can be vulnerable to specific content online outside of their age-range. Media literacy campaigns and education research shows that targeting those who fall into this age category would be the best way to understand and target their needs as young online users. There are multiple individual studies investigating social media identity relating to media literacy online, however there is a need for much more conclusive information that analyzes multiple studies at a time. Social media literacy is still considered an under-researched topic. Many scholars in media literacy research emphasize the impact of training young adults to consume media in a safe way is the major solution for furthering internet education in children and young adults. The more information the young adults are given on media literacy, the better prepared they are to enter the digital world confidently. One scientific model that has been proposed, known as The Social Media Literacy (SMILE) model. This framework hypothesizes that at the core of this model is helping young adults truly know the meaning and display the actions of media literacy online. SMILE is also meant to inspire more research on the subject of media literacy as it relates to social media effects and young adult leaning abilities. The model was applied through the lens of a social media positivity bias among adolescents and puts forth five different assumptions about social media and media literacy; Social media literacy as a moderator (what is seen on social media) Social media literacy as a predictor (what is seen for specific individuals on social media) Media literacy within social media is a reciprocal process The development of social media literacy depends on a conditional process of variables affecting other variables Media literacy within social media is a differential learning process, and who teaches it is highly affective of the outcome This model also stresses that human beings learn media literacy (and social media literacy) naturally as they go through life. Research suggests that having young adults taught media literacy from an educator may make them less interested (and therefore less careful) of threats on social media. Self Presentation People create images of themselves to present to the public, a process called self presentation. Depending on the demographic, presenting oneself as authentic can result in identity clarity. Methods of self presentation can also be influenced by geography. The framework for this relationship between a user's location and their social media presentation is called the spatial self. Users depict their spatial self in order to include their physical space as a part of their self presentation to an audience. In a 2018 research paper, it shares that patients of plastic surgeons have gone in and asked for specific snapchat "filter" features. This led to a theory of Snapchat Dysmorphia. Since the introduction to snapchat in 2011, more and more people each year are going into doctor offices and asking for smoother skin, bigger eyes, and fuller lips. It is creating a disconnect from who they are and who they want to be. Social comparison theory is the idea that people are likely to compare themselves to people who are similar to them. Influencers have impacted this idea, we often watch people on the internet that we feel we can relate too. Within this theory there is 2 subcategories; Upward and downward comparison. Upward comparison is the idea that someone compares themselves to someone they feel is better than they are. Downward is the opposite, they compare themselves to someone they feel is worse off. Cultivation theory is the more often people are going to be exposed to images of society's ideal body, the less they are going to realize the images are unrealistic Self Schema Theory is the idea women use three points to determine how they view themself Socially ideal: ideal ways women are represented in media Objective body: how we view our own self Internalized ideal body: Internalizing media and how much they want to achieve it Pescott (2020) study found that the use of Snapchat filters in preteens has a great impact on how they present themselves online. Boys found filters to be more fun and used for entertainment, whereas girls used filters more as a beauty enhancer. This becomes dangerous for preteens who are not aware of when a filter is being used when consuming content from friends, influencers, or celebrities. The same study found that the use of filters can have a large impact on preteens’ identity formation as they begin to compare themselves with others. Influences on Body Image In comparison to traditional forms of media, where individuals could only act as consumers of media, social media networking sites provide a more engaging opportunity where users can produce their own content, as well as interact with other users and content creators. As these sites have become increasingly popular, researchers have turned their focus to the discussion of the various impacts social media has on users. One of the main focuses researchers have studied is the effects on body image. This is especially seen in adolescents and young adults who engage in social media. It has been suggested that in the early adolescent years, when perceptions about self and identity are being formed, individuals may be influenced by the media to feel certain ways about their bodies based on the ideal body types expressed and perpetuated in the media, which may increase body surveillance behaviors and, consequently, experiencing feelings of body shame. Salomon & Brown (2019), measured self-objectification behaviors on social media, body surveillance behaviors, feelings of body shame, and levels of self-monitoring to examine whether or not young adolescents engaging in higher amounts of self-objectification behaviors on social media also experienced higher levels of body shame. Self-objectification behaviors result from internalizing objectification from others, and may, for example, take the form of taking frequent photos of oneself and valuing how others view their appearance. Body surveillance behaviors indicate a preoccupation with how the appearance of one’s body will be perceived by others and can be measured by behaviors such as constant evaluation and monitoring of one’s body. Body shame refers to a negative emotional experience resulting from feeling as if one failed to meet society’s body ideals. Self-monitoring refers to how much individuals do or do not change their behavior in response to feedback and cues received from peers. In the study, it was found that individuals who reported engaging in self-objectified social media use exhibited more body surveillance behaviors, which led to increased experience in feelings of body shame. Some studies have demonstrated that body image is not influenced by how much time is spent on social media, but is influenced by the way an individual engages with the site. For instance, Meier and Gray (2014), measured Facebook usage among young women and found that those who more frequently viewed posts of images and videos were more likely to experience negative thoughts about their own body image and internalize the thin ideal. However, it is seen that Facebook did not influence body image itself. More interacting on Facebook, in regards to posting, commenting and viewing, causes women, specifically high school females to have greater weight dissatisfaction, drive for thinness, thin-ideal internalization and self objectification. Having more of an opportunity to compare yourself to other people on social media can cause people to feel like they should look that way. Facebook posts more than 10 million photos an hour, so having many examples of an idealistic body-type tempts viewers to compare their bodies to their own. In response to self-portraits on social media, friends and followers can indicate affirmation and acceptance, and creators can receive validation, through feedback such as likes and comments. According to the findings of Bukowski, Dixon, and Weeks (2019), the more value that an individual placed on the feedback received on a self-portrait that they’ve shared, the more they experience body dissatisfaction and a desire to become thinner, but only if they also engage in body-surveillance. Studies have shown that users can also experience feelings of body dissatisfaction when consuming rather than creating content. In a study conducted by Fardouly, et al. (2015), the implications of Facebook usage on young women’s mood, level of body dissatisfaction, and desires to change aspects of their body or facial features were examined. The results of the study indicated that in addition to Facebook usage being associated with a more negative mood, it was associated with an increasing desire to change facial related features in women who were more likely to make comparisons between elements of their and others appearance. Platform Affordances The different platform affordances of social media sites can both enable and constrain the options users have for presenting themselves. Initially coined by Gibson (1966), Affordances, broadly, can be defined as “describing what material artifacts such as media technologies allow people to do”. This can therefore be applied to how users of social media construct identity, through the ways in which social media sites provide users with opportunities for self-presentation. For example, Instagram requires users to create a profile when they register an account. In this, they require a username, profile photo, biography and more recently, the option to present the users chosen pronoun. However, none of these identifiable aspects need to be factual, and unlike Facebook, which requires users to register with their legal name, Instagram users can use pseudonyms or made-up usernames and profile pictures. This gives them the ability to construct whichever identity they choose to present. Media Reactions Within Companies Frank J Lexa and David Fessell managed to test and review a hypothetical question given to a group of MD’s from various universities. The question asks if a key radiologist posted a media post that involved a racial epithet and a younger colleague brought this to your attention, what would you do? Response replies varied, but almost all had one common theme/connection that connected to points made by Darren L Linvell in discussing the dangers of social media. Linvell made a point to bring up how digital civility is key in producing healthy online dynamics and connections. The respondents within Frank J Lexas and David Fessells test, answered by saying how immediate communication would take place to set the basics of the situation down. This focuses on creating civility through proper communication. Another connection seen is that in case of media controversies, training and policy making methods would take place such as sensitivity training. Other policies would take place depending on what specific policies a certain workplace may have. So, within work settings, it is seen to be important to first make sure an establishment has already implemented policy making methods for various cases, and also create an employee board that is able to demonstrate and carry out digital civility. Increased Policymaking The creation of social media has brought along with it various ways for people all around the world to communicate. This media has created a system for all kinds of peoples to connect, create new and improved identities, improve relationships, share information, and be able to reach out into a world of new opportunities. This same media has also given way for young adolescents to access their way into a world of mental health issues, negative self image, racial hostility, cyberbullying, sexual harassment, stalking, and even suicide. As social media continues to fall into the hands of younger children, it is necessary to implement policy making strategies in order to decrease the rate of harm towards adolescents who are more susceptible and fall victim to the dangers that are presented with social media use so it is necessary to implement. 13 year old girls are given access to view methods on how to consume under 300 calories a day through Tik Tok, but youth within the U.S. has been having access to these various kinds of platforms for some while now. Adolescents consuming unhealthy media leads to mental health issues revolving around depression, eating disorders, and sometimes even leading to suicide. Due to this, a research program by the name The Strategic Training Initiative for the Prevention of Eating Disorders (STRIPED) has begun to study the dangerous and harmful effects of social media platforms and how we are able to regulate social media's presentation of harmful content. It has been found that $11 billion revenue has been made from users ages 0-17 through advertisement methods which is why companies continue to display harmful content to youth. Policymaking may be a way to regulate social media platforms, but certain legal obstacles make it difficult to provide regulation. First, The First Amendment protects the rights of social media platforms since social media is just a computer code, individuals attempting to regulate media speech, are at risk of violating this law. As for Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (CDA), online services are provided with protection and are not responsible for the speech produced by the 3rd party individuals who are using the platform. Due to this, new laws created for social media safety have to be careful not to overrun and violate the currently standing laws such as the First Amendment. So, it is important to require companies to have algorithm risk audits which are approaches that review media processing systems through testing media outputs or documentations in order to protect the wellbeing of the youth and diminish the risk of danger.   Darren L Linvell discusses the “dark side” of social media which is the dangers that are brought along to students within and beyond a college campus. Social media use within students in the college age range use social media as a way to be able to display themselves. Some students choose to display their authentic selves, while others choose to create a different persona to present to surrounding peers. But, social media does come with its dangers such as cyberbullying, racial hostility, aggression, stalking, et. When students present whichever persona they display publicly online, they are at risk of falling victim to cyberbullying. Cyberbullying produces a larger number of bystanders than physical bullying as it is seen as less serious and that the victim brought on the situation to themselves. But, both cyberbullying and physical bullying have the same unfortunate outcomes such as mental health impacts and even suicide. The importance of the idea of teaching social media literacy to students to increase levels of safety within social media through education. Students may not always care to engage in this method, so it is more recommended to focus on the process and communication that occurs in order to give the result of certain information when engaging with information given. Another main focus is also the concept of digital civility as it requires creating healthy relationships through building mutual understanding with each other by learning to communicate properly. Rather than focusing on teaching students all aspects of social media literacy/safety, the light focuses on human communication skills because students are more likely to be engaged and educated more from this method to develop higher social media literacy. Since it is difficult to implement legal policymaking actions against media dangers, the APA has released recommendations which discuss various methods that families may try to improve social media safety. Recommendations vary from stating that adolescents should be educated in social media literacy which is done through the SMILE method. But looking back at points made by Darren L Linvell, this method may make students less interested in being educated on it which results in unsafe media consumption behavior. Other recommendations discuss that setting limitations may decrease intake of harmful content which leads to adolescents engaging in eating disorder behavior, negative self image, and violence. Another goal of limitation is to aid adolescents in keeping up a healthy sleep schedule and physical activity engagement. But, recommendations may not work for every family, which is why some releases as well as clinicians state that rules should be made based on an individual's intellectual stage/knowledge. This connects to the importance of keeping up a healthy family dynamic, which is why parents should aim to understand their children's weaknesses and strengths within knowledge on social media use. Parents need to understand their children and have trust in them that they will use social media safely. Families can discuss together what limitations may be implemented within media use and that way adolescents will not feel unmotivated to use media in a harmful way as they are able to have a say within media rules and not feel limited by external influences (adults, policies, etc.) This connects to another advisory stated by the APA which discusses that parents should collaborate with teens in order to get them on board to use social media more safely. It is important for adults to support teens' personal interests rather than keeping them limited from it as that may lead to harmful/dangerous behavior that is not in the teens best interest. Overall, it is seen that unsafe and sometimes even safe media use, can bring upon negative outcomes such as dangers and various threats that young adolescents have to deal with. Various law making policies are attempting to be made, but current laws create an obstruction in that path which make it difficult to create laws to fight media dangers. Due to this, families and adolescents have to take matters into their own hands to protect themselves from media harm. Fortunately, various sources such as the APA give helpful and effective recommendations to help protect themselves. It is important to address privacy and awareness matters when dealing with media use. Social media is a platform that gives access to endless opportunities and possibilities, but in order to keep this progression up, it is necessary to create effective legal policies as well as understand basic media literacy and digital civility. References Social media Social impact Identity (social science)

Consulting psychology

Consulting psychology is a specialty area of psychology that addresses such areas as assessment and interventions at the individual, group, and organizational levels. The Handbook of Organizational Consulting Psychology provides an overview of specific areas of study and application within the field. The major journal in the field is Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research. Consulting psychologists typically work in business or non-profit organizations, in consulting firms or in private practice. Consulting psychologists are typically professionally licensed as psychologists. Defining consulting psychology The American Psychological Association defines the fields as: "Consulting psychology shall be defined as the function of applying and extending the specialized knowledge of a psychologist through the process of consultation to problems involving human behavior in various areas. A consulting psychologist shall be defined as a psychologist who provides specialized technical assistance to individuals or organizations in regard to the psychological aspects of their work. Such assistance is advisory in nature and the consultant has no direct responsibility for its acceptance. Consulting psychologists may have as clients individuals, institutions, agencies, corporations or other kinds of organization." Consultation should help individuals and organizations "become more efficient and effective." Models of consultation Generic The generic model encompasses all kinds of consulting, starting with Entry, moving through Diagnosis and Implementation and ending with an explicit Disengagement. Client-centered This approach focuses on an individual client (recipient of service) and helps service providers better help that client. The consultant functions assesses the client, makes a diagnosis and recommends changes to the consultee, typically a teacher, physician or other care providers. Consultee-centered This relationship focuses on the consultee rather than a particular client, helping build new skills via training and/or supervision. The consultant typically does not meet clients directly. Consultees seek consultation to increase knowledge, skills, confidence, and/or objectivity. Consultee-centered administrative consultation In some cases, the focus is on administrative rather than professional staff. Such relationships are typically longer term. Behavioral consultation model/behavioral-operant In this model, the consultant is an authority figure who assumes primary responsibility for the relationship. The focus is on problem-solving more than skills development or a particular client. Organization consultation This model employs systems theory to improve productivity or to streamline the relationship between an organization and its environment. Statistical consultation A model that focuses on having statistical consultants to research empirical evidence and sophisticated analysis through consulting test and certified projects. Litigation and risk management A model used by behavioral scientists who works in jury thought and decision making processes. They are usually reserved to help attorneys and insurance companies to evaluate the risks of lawsuits and/or the application of settlement. Roles Consulting psychology encompasses diverse roles including individual assessment, individual and group process consultation, organizational development, education/training, employee selection/appraisal, research and evaluation test construction, executive/manager coaching, change management, expert technical support Professional education The American Psychological Association publishes professional training guidelines for consulting psychologists. Master's programs are available under varying program names (e.g., business psychology). Some psychologists come to the field from areas such as clinical psychology, counseling psychology, or industrial and organizational psychology. Consultation in community psychology It is often critical to build community relationships to understand the context and enable the collection of appropriate data to supporting the consulting relationship. Strong relationships can increase trust between consultants and clients, leading to more effective interventions. Urie Bronfenbrenner's model of ecological systems theory is a framework for navigating the challenges of consulting in community psychology. Cultural sensitivity Consulting psychology can involve providers in communities unlike their own. Success requires sensitivity to cultural variation, including recognition of the consultant's own cultural bias and/or ethnocentrism. This is further complicated by potential differences between the background of the consultee and client. In this context, "culture" involves client's/consultee's religious, cultural and family background and value system. Cultural differences can involve communication styles, attitudes towards conflict, approaches to completing tasks, decision-making and attitudes towards disclosure. Notable consulting psychologists Consulting psychologists who have helped to develop the field include Clayton Alderfer, Chris Argyris, Elliott Jaques, Harry Levinson, and Edgar Schein. More recent authors include Arthur Freedman, Dale Fuqua, Richard Kilburg, Rodney L. Lowman, Jody Newman, Ann O'Roark, David Peterson, Sharon Robinson-Kurpius, Peter Sorensen, and Len Sperry. Society of Consulting Psychology The field's professional association is the Society of Consulting Psychology, Division 13 of the American Psychological Association (APA). The Society for Industrial and Organizational Psychology, Division 14 of the APA, is another professional association of which many consulting psychologists are members. The American Board of Professional Psychology certifies participants. Ethical issues Consultants face different ethical questions than clinicians: What degree of responsibility does the consultant take for a consultee's behavior and client outcomes? To what extent and over what period is the consultee dependent on the consultant? How is the consultant's responsibility for resolving conflicts with and among other participants? What are acceptable motivations for the consultant to offer consulting services? How are financial arrangements handled? What is the proper oversight for consulting relationships? What are the consultant's responsibilities for maintaining confidentiality? Consulting relationships differ from traditional counseling and psychotherapeutic relationships in fundamental ways that require consideration in evaluating ethical questions. As of 2012, formal ethical guidelines specific to the discipline are not available. Existing codes of ethics for the helping professions provide limited guidance for consultation practice. Ethical issues are inevitably complicated by the fact that consulting relationships involve three parties: the consultant, the consultee, and the consultee's client system. Confidentiality depends on the consultant and on the cooperative efforts of perhaps many organizational members. Variable levels of participation means attention to providing only appropriate access to information. Managing information access and confidentiality require negotiation. Clients' right to informed consent must be maintained in the presence of a consulting relationship. This right is complicated by the corresponding rights of consultees, including the right not to accept consultation. Power is typically distributed unequally among participants in the consultation process. Power differentials may be real or perceived. Those with greater power must take responsibility for its use and impact. Consultants with preexisting personal or professional relationships with participants in the consultation must take care that such relationships do not compromise the process. See also Coaching psychology References External links APA Division 13 Consulting Psychology Journal Applied psychology

Typology (urban planning and architecture)

Typology is the study and classification of object types. In urban planning and architecture, typology refers to the task of identifying and grouping buildings and urban spaces according to the similarity of their essential characteristics. Common examples of essential characteristics include intensity of development (from rural to suburban to urban) and building use (church, hospital, school, apartment, house, etc.) Non-essential characteristics are those which, if modified, would not change the building type. Color, for example, would rarely be considered an essential characteristic of building type. Material, however, may or may not be considered essential depending on how integral the material is to the structure (engineering) and construction (assembly) of the building. Building types may be further divided into subtypes. For example, among religious structures there are churches and mosques, etc.; among churches there are cathedrals and chapels, etc.; among cathedrals there are gothic and romanesque, etc. In architecture and urban planning discourse, typology is sometimes distinguished from morphology, which is the study and classification of buildings according to their shape or form (gk. morph). When this dichotomy is employed between typology and morphology, the term typology tends to refer to the more limited aspects of buildings or urban sites specifically related to their use. In other words: typology is used-based classification; morphology is form-based classification. This distinction is particularly relevant in urban planning and design, where some have begun to question the standard model of single-use zoning codes in favor of form-based zoning codes that regulate development not by use (commercial, residential, industrial, etc) but instead by the shape, size, and placement of buildings on their lots. See also Pattern language Architectural theory Urban studies and planning terminology

Problematization

Problematization is a process of stripping away common or conventional understandings of a subject matter in order to gain new insights. This method can be applied to a term, writing, opinion, ideology, identity, or person. Practitioners consider the concrete or existential elements of these subjects. Analyzed as challenges (problems), practitioners may seek to transform the situations under study. It is a method of defamiliarization of common sense. Problematization is a critical thinking and pedagogical dialogue or process and may be considered demythicisation. Rather than taking the common knowledge (myth) of a situation for granted, problematization poses that knowledge as a problem, allowing new viewpoints, consciousness, reflection, hope, and action to emerge. What may make problematization different from other forms of criticism is its target, the context and details, rather than the pro or con of an argument. More importantly, this criticism does not take place within the original context or argument, but draws back from it, re-evaluates it, leading to action which changes the situation. Rather than accepting the situation, one emerges from it, abandoning a focalised viewpoint. To problematize a statement, for example, one asks simple questions: Who is making this statement? For whom is it intended? Why is this statement being made here, now? Whom does this statement benefit? Whom does it harm? Problematization (Foucault) For Michel Foucault, problematization serves as the overarching concept of his work in "History of Madness". He treats it both as an object of inquiry and a specific form of critical analysis. As an object of inquiry, problematization is described as a process of objects becoming problems by being “characterized, analyzed, and treated” as such. As a form of analysis, problematization seeks to answer the questions of “how and why certain things (behavior; phenomena, processes) became a problem”. Foucault does not distinguish clearly problematization as an object of inquiry from problematization as a way of inquiry. Problematization as a specific form of critical analysis is a form of “re-problematization”. History of Thought Problematization is the core of his “history of thought” which stands in sharp contrast to "history of ideas" ("the analysis of attitudes and types of action") as well as "history of mentalities" ("the analysis of systems of representation"). The history of thought refers to an inquiry of what it is, in a given society and epoch, “what allows one to take a step back from his way of acting or reacting, to present it to oneself as an object of thought and question it as to its meaning, its conditions and its goals”. Therefore, thought is described as a form of self-detachment from one's own action that allows “to present it to oneself as an object of thought [and] to question it as to its meaning, its conditions, and its goals". Thought is the reflection of one's own action “as a problem”. According to Foucault, the notions of thought and problematization are closely linked: to problematize is to engage in “work of thought”. Crucially, then, Foucault implies that our way of reflecting upon ourselves as individuals, as political bodies, as scientific disciplines or other, has a history and, consequently, imposes specific (rather than universal or a priori) structures upon thought. Responses To Problems A central element in the problematization analysis are responses to problems. The analysis of a specific problematization is “the history of an answer (…) to a certain situation”. However, Foucault stresses that "most of the time different responses [...] are proposed". His analytical interest focuses on finding at the root of those diverse and possibly contrasting answers, the conditions of possibility of their simultaneous appearance, i.e. “the general form of problematization”. This sets Foucauldian problematization apart from many other approaches in that it invites researchers to view opposing scientific theories or political views, and indeed contradictory enunciations in general as responses to the same problematization rather than as the manifestations of mutually excluding discourses. It is this level of problematizations and discourses that Foucault refers to when establishing that Foucault's “history of thought” seeks to answer the question of "how [...] a particular body of knowledge [is] able to be constituted?". Engaging in Problematization Engaging in problematization entails questioning beliefs held to be true by society. Ultimately, this intellectual practice is “to participate in the formation of a political will”. It also carves out elements that “pose problems for politics”. At the same time, it also requires self-reflection on behalf of the intellectual, since problematization is to investigate into the ontological question of the present and to determine a distinguishing “element of the present". This element is decisive for the “process that concerns thought, knowledge, and philosophy” in which the intellectual is part of as “element and actor". By questioning the present, or “contemporaneity”, “as an event”, the analyst constitutes the event's “meaning, value, philosophical particularity” but relies at the same time on it, for he/she “find[s] both [his/her] own raison d’être and the grounds for what [he/she] says” in the event itself. Actor-Network Theory The term also had a different meaning when used in association with actor–network theory (ANT), and especially the "sociology of translation" to describe the initial phase of a translation process and the creation of a network. According to Michel Callon, problematization involves two elements: Interdefinition of actors in the network Definition of the problem/topic/action program, referred to as an obligatory passage point (OPP) Criticism In Literary Criticism, An Autopsy Mark Bauerlein writes: The act of problematizing has obvious rhetorical uses. It sounds rigorous and powerful as a weapon in the fight against lax and dishonest inquiry. Also, for trained critics, problematizing x is one of the easiest interpretative gestures to make. In the most basic instance, all one has to do is add quotation marks to x, to say "Walden is a 'classic'" instead of "Walden is a classic." The scarequotes cause a hesitation over the term and imply a set of other problematizing questions: what is a "classic"? what does it presuppose? in what contexts is it used? what does it do? what educational and political purposes does it serve? Instead of being a familiar predicate in scholarship, one readers casually assimilate without much notice, "classic" now stands out from the flow of discourse. The questions hover around its use and, until they are resolved, the use of "classic" is impaired. Usually, such questions yield ready answers, but their readiness does not cut into the apparent savviness of the critics asking them. This is another advantage of the term "problematize": it is a simple procedure, but it sounds like an incisive investigative pursuit. References External links Postmodern theory

Guided imagery

Guided imagery (also known as guided affective imagery, or katathym-imaginative psychotherapy) is a mind-body intervention by which a trained practitioner or teacher helps a participant or patient to evoke and generate mental images that simulate or recreate the sensory perception of sights, sounds, tastes, smells, movements, and images associated with touch, such as texture, temperature, and pressure, as well as imaginative or mental content that the participant or patient experiences as defying conventional sensory categories, and that may precipitate strong emotions or feelings in the absence of the stimuli to which correlating sensory receptors are receptive. The practitioner or teacher may facilitate this process in person to an individual or a group or you may do it with a virtual group. Alternatively, the participant or patient may follow guidance provided by a sound recording, video, or audiovisual media comprising spoken instruction that may be accompanied by music or sound. Mental imagery in everyday life There are two fundamental ways by which mental imagery is generated: voluntary and involuntary. The involuntary and spontaneous generation of mental images is integral to ordinary sensory perception, and cognition, and occurs without volitional intent. Meanwhile, many different aspects of everyday problem solving, scientific reasoning, and creative activity involve the volitional and deliberate generation of mental images. Involuntary The generation of involuntary mental imagery is created directly from present sensory stimulation and perceptual information, such as when someone sees an object, creates mental images of it, and maintains this imagery as they look away or close their eyes; or when someone hears a noise and maintains an auditory image of it, after the sound ceases or is no longer perceptible. Voluntary Voluntary mental imagery may resemble previous sensory perception and experience, recalled from memory; or the images may be entirely novel and the product of fantasy. Technique The term guided imagery denotes the technique used in the second (voluntary) instance, by which images are recalled from long-term or short-term memory, or created from fantasy, or a combination of both, in response to guidance, instruction, or supervision. Guided imagery is, therefore, the assisted simulation or re-creation of perceptual experience across sensory modalities. Clinical investigation and scientific research Mental imagery can result from both voluntary and involuntary processes, and it comprises simulation or recreation of perceptual experience across all sensory modalities, including olfactory imagery, gustatory imagery, haptic imagery, and motor imagery. Nonetheless, visual and auditory mental images are reported as being the most frequently experienced by people ordinarily as well as in controlled experiments, with visual imagery remaining the most extensively researched and documented in scientific literature. In experimental and cognitive psychology, researchers have concentrated primarily on voluntary and deliberately generated imagery, which the participant or patient creates, inspects, and transforms, such as by evoking imagery of an intimidating social event, and transforming the images into those indicative of a pleasant and self-affirming experience. In psychopathology, clinicians have typically focused on involuntary imagery which "comes to mind" unbidden, such as in a depressed person's experience of intrusive unwelcome negative images indicative of sadness, hopelessness, and morbidity; or images that recapitulate previous distressing events that characterize posttraumatic stress disorder. In clinical practice and psychopathology, involuntary mental images are considered intrusive when they occur unwanted and unbidden, "hijacking attention" to some extent. The maintenance of, or "holding in mind" imagery, whether voluntary or involuntary, places considerable demands upon cognitive attentional resources, including working memory, redirecting them away from a specific cognitive task or general-purpose concentration and toward the imagery. In clinical practice, this process can be positively exploited therapeutically by training the participant or patient to focus attention on a significantly demanding task, which successfully competes for and directs attention away from the unbidden intrusive imagery, decreasing its intensity, vividness, and duration, and consequently alleviating distress or pain. Mental imagery and ill health Mental imagery, especially visual and auditory imagery, can exacerbate and aggravate a number of mental and physical conditions. This is because, according to the principles of psychophysiology and psychoneuroimmunology, the way an individual perceives his or her mental and physical condition in turn affects biological processes, including susceptibility to illness, infection, or disease; and that perception is derived significantly from mental imagery. That is to say that in some cases, the severity of an individual's mental and physical disability, disorder, or illness is partially determined by his or her images, including their content, vividness or intensity, clarity, and frequency with which they are experienced as intrusive and unbidden. An individual can aggravate the symptoms and intensify the pain or distress precipitated by many conditions through generating, often involuntarily, mental imagery that emphasizes its severity. For example, mental imagery has been shown to play a key role in contributing to, exacerbating, or intensifying the experience and symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), compulsive cravings, eating disorders such as anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa, spastic hemiplegia, incapacitation following a stroke or cerebrovascular accident, restricted cognitive function and motor control due to multiple sclerosis, social anxiety or phobia, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, and depression. Example conditions aggravated by mental imagery The aforementioned challenges and difficulties are some of those for which there is evidence to show that an individual can aggravate the symptoms and intensify the pain or distress precipitated by the condition through generating mental imagery that emphasizes its severity. The following elaborates the way in which such mental imagery contributes to or aggravates four specific conditions: Posttraumatic stress disorder Social anxiety Depression Bipolar disorder Posttraumatic stress disorder Posttraumatic stress disorder often proceeds from experiencing or witnessing a traumatic event involving death, serious injury, or significant threat to others or oneself; and disturbing intrusive images, often described by the patient as 'flashbacks', are a common symptom of this condition across demographics of age, gender, and the nature of the precipitating traumatic event. This unbidden mental imagery is often highly vivid, and provokes memories of the original trauma, accompanied by heightened emotions or feelings and the subjective experience of danger and threat to safety in the present "here and now". Social anxiety Individuals with social anxiety have a higher than normal tendency to fear situations that involve public attention, such as speaking to an audience or being interviewed, meeting people with whom they are unfamiliar, and attending events of an unpredictable nature. As with posttraumatic stress disorder, vivid mental imagery is a common experience for those with social anxiety, and often comprises images that revive and replay a previously experienced stressful, intimidating or harrowing event that precipitated negative feelings, such as embarrassment, shame, or awkwardness. Thereby, mental imagery contributes to the maintenance and persistence of social anxiety, as it does with posttraumatic stress disorder. In particular, the mental imagery commonly described by those suffering from social anxiety often comprises what cognitive psychologists describe as an "observer perspective". This consists of an image of themselves, as though from an observing person's perspective, in which those suffering from social anxiety perceive themselves negatively, as if from that observing person's point of view. Such imagery is also common among those suffering from other types of anxiety, who often have depleted ability to generate neutral, positive, or pleasant imagery. Depression The capacity to evoke pleasant and positively affirming imagery, either voluntarily or involuntarily, may be a critical requisite for precipitating and sustaining positive moods or feelings and optimism; and this ability is often impaired in those suffering from depression. Depression consists of emotional distress and cognitive impairment that may include feelings of hopelessness, pervasive sadness, pessimism, lack of motivation, social withdrawal, difficulty in concentrating on mental or physical tasks, and disrupted sleep. Whilst depression is frequently associated with negative rumination of verbal thought patterns manifested as unspoken inner speech, ninety percent of depressed patients reporting distressing intrusive mental imagery that often simulates and recollect previous negative experiences, and which the depressed person often interprets in a way that intensifies feelings of despair and hopelessness. In addition, people suffering from depression have difficulty in evoking prospective imagery indicative of a positive future. The prospective mental imagery experienced by depressed persons when at their most despairing commonly includes vivid and graphic images related to suicide, which some psychologists and psychiatrists refer to as "flash-forwards". Bipolar disorder Bipolar disorder is characterized by manic episodes interspersed with periods of depression; 90% of patients experience comorbid anxiety disorder at some stage; and there is a significant prevalence of suicide amongst sufferers. Prospective mental imagery indicative of hyperactivity or mania and hopelessness contributes to the manic and depressive episodes respectively in bipolar disorder. Principles The therapeutic use of guided imagery, as part of a multimodal treatment plan incorporating other suitable methods, such as guided meditation, receptive music therapy, and relaxation techniques, as well as physical medicine and rehabilitation, and psychotherapy, aims to educate the patient in altering their mental imagery, replacing images that compound pain, recollect and reconstruct distressing events, intensify feelings of hopelessness, or reaffirm debilitation, with those that emphasize physical comfort, functional capacity, mental equanimity, and optimism. Whether the guided imagery is provided in person by a facilitator, or delivered via media, the verbal instruction consists of words, often pre-scripted, intended to direct the participant's attention to imagined visual, auditory, tactile, gustatory or olfactory sensations that precipitate a positive psychologic and physiologic response that incorporates increased mental and physical relaxation and decreased mental and physical stress. Guided imagery is one of the means by which therapists, teachers, or practitioners seek to achieve this outcome, and involves encouraging patients or participants to imagine alternative perspectives, thoughts, and behaviors, mentally rehearsing strategies that they may subsequently actualize, thereby developing increased coping skills and ability. Stages According to the computational theory of imagery, which is derived from experimental psychology, guided imagery comprises four phases: Image generation Image maintenance Image inspection Image transformation Image generation Image generation involves generating mental imagery, either directly from sensory data and perceptual experience, or from memory, or from fantasy. Image maintenance Image maintenance involves the volitional sustaining or maintaining of imagery, without which, a mental image is subject to rapid decay with an average duration of only 250 ms. This is because volitionally created mental images usually fade rapidly once generated in order to avoid disrupting or confusing the process of ordinary sensory perception. The natural brief duration of mental imagery means that the active maintenance stage of guided imagery, which is necessary for the subsequent stages of inspection and transformation, requires cognitive concentration of attention by the participant. This concentrative attentional ability can be improved with the practice of mental exercises, including those derived from guided meditation and supervised meditative praxis. Even with such practice, some people can struggle to maintain a mental image "clearly in mind" for more than a few seconds; not only for imagery created through fantasy but also for mental images generated from both long-term memory and short-term memory. In addition, while the majority of the research literature has tended to focus on the maintenance of visual mental images, imagery in other sensory modalities also necessitates a volitional maintenance process in order for further inspection or transformation to be possible. The requisite for practice in sustaining attentional control, such that attention remains focused on maintaining generated imagery, is one of the reasons that guided meditation, which supports such concentration, is often integrated into the provision of guided imagery as part of the intervention. Guided meditation assists participants in extending the duration for which generated mental images are maintained, providing time to inspect the imagery, and proceed to the final transformation stage of guided imagery. Image inspection Once generated and maintained, a mental image can be inspected to provide the basis for interpretation, and transformation. For visual imagery, inspection often involves a scanning process, by which the participant directs attention across and around an image, simulating shifts in perceptual perspective. Inspection processes can be applied both to imagery created spontaneously, and to imagery generated in response to scripted or impromptu verbal descriptions provided by the facilitator. Image transformation Finally, with the assistance of verbal instruction from the guided imagery practitioner or teacher, the participant transforms, modifies, or alters the content of generated mental imagery, in such a way as to substitute images that provoke negative feelings, are indicative of suffering, or that reaffirm disability or debilitation for those that elicit positive emotion, and are suggestive of resourcefulness, ability to cope, and an increased degree of mental and physical capacity. This process shares principles with those that inform the clinical psychology techniques of "imagery restructuring" or "imagery re-scripting" as used in cognitive behavioral therapy. While the majority of research findings on image transformation relate to visual mental imagery, there is evidence to support transformations in other sensory modalities such as auditory imagery. and haptic imagery. Outcome of image generation, maintenance, inspection, and transformation Through this technique, a patient is assisted in reducing the tendency to evoke images indicative of the distressing, painful, or debilitative nature of a condition, and learns instead to evoke mental imagery of their identity, body, and circumstances that emphasizes the capacity for autonomy and self-determination, positive proactive activity, and the ability to cope, whilst managing their condition. As a result, symptoms become less incapacitating, pain is to some degree decreased, while coping skills increase. Requisite for absorption In order for the foregoing process to take place effectively, such that all four stages of guided imagery are completed with therapeutic beneficial effect, the patient or participant must be capable of or susceptible to absorption, which is an "openness to absorbing and self-altering experiences". This is a further reason why guided meditation or some form of meditative praxis, relaxation techniques, and meditation music or receptive music therapy are often combined with or form an integral part of the operational and practical use of the guided imagery intervention. For, all those techniques can increase the participant's or patient's capacity for or susceptibility to absorption, thereby increasing the potential efficacy of guided imagery. As a mind-body intervention The United States National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH), which is among twenty-seven organizations that make up the National Institutes of Health (NIH), classifies guided imagery and guided meditation, as mind–body interventions, one of five domains of medical and health care systems, practices, and products that are not presently considered part of conventional medicine. The NCCIH defines mind-body interventions as those practices that "employ a variety of techniques designed to facilitate the mind's capacity to affect bodily function and symptoms", and include guided imagery, guided meditation and forms of meditative praxis, hypnosis and hypnotherapy, prayer, as well as art therapy, music therapy, and dance therapy. All mind–body interventions, including the aforementioned, focus on the interaction between the brain, body, and behavior and are practiced with intention to use the mind to alter physical function and promote overall health and wellbeing. There are documented benefits of mind-body interventions derived from scientific research firstly into their use in contributing to the treatment a range of conditions including headaches, coronary artery disease and chronic pain; secondly in ameliorating the symptoms of chemotherapy-induced nausea, vomiting, and localised physical pain in patients with cancer; thirdly in increasing the perceived capacity to cope with significant problems and challenges; and fourthly in improving the reported overall quality-of-life. In addition, there is evidence supporting the brain and central nervous system's influence on the immune system and the capacity for mind-body interventions to enhance immune function outcomes, including defense against and recovery from infection and disease. Guided imagery has also demonstrated efficacy in reducing postoperative discomfort as well as chronic pain related to cancer, arthritis, and physical injury. Furthermore, the non-clinical uses for which the efficacy of guided imagery has been shown include managing the stress of public performance among musicians, enhancing athletic and competitive sports ability, and training medical students in surgical skills. The evidence that it is effective for non-musculoskeletal pain is encouraging but not definitive. Evidence and explanation Evidence and explanations for the effectiveness and limitations of creative visualization come from two discreet sources: cognitive psychology and psychoneuroimmunology. Cognitive psychology Guided imagery is employed as an adjunctive technique to psychological therapies in the treatment of many conditions, including those identified in the previous sections. It plays a significant role in the application of cognitive approaches to psychotherapy, including cognitive behavioral therapy, rational emotive behavior therapy, schema therapy, and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. These therapies derive from or draw substantially upon a model of mental functioning initially established by Aaron T. Beck, a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who posited that the subjective way in which people perceive themselves and interpret experiences influences their emotional, behavioral, and physiological reactions to circumstances. He additionally discovered that by assisting patients in correcting their misperceptions and misinterpretations, and aiding them in modifying unhelpful and self-deprecating ways of thinking about themselves and their predicament, his patients had more productive reactions to events, and developed a more positive self-concept, self-image, or perception of themselves. This use of guided imagery is based on the following premise. Everyone participates in both the voluntary and involuntary spontaneous generation of visual, auditory and other mental images, which is a necessary part of the way in which a person solves problems, recollects the past, predicts and plans the future, and formulates their self-perception, self-image, or the way they 'view' and perceive themselves. However, this self-image can be altered and self-regulated with the aid of mind-body interventions including guided imagery, by which an individual changes the way he or she visualizes, imagines, and perceives themselves generally, and their physical condition, body image, and mental state specifically. Psychoneuroimmunology The term "psychoneuroimmunology" was coined by American psychologist Robert Ader in 1981 to describe the study of interactions between psychological, neurological, and immune systems. Three years later, Jean Achterberg published a book called Imagery in Healing that sought to relate and correlate contemporaneous evidence from the then emerging scientific study of the way mental processes influence physical and physiological function, with particular emphasis on mental imagery, to the folklore she extrapolated from a set of diverse ancient and geographically indigenous practices previously described as 'shamanism' by the historian of religion and professor at the University of Chicago, Mircea Eliade; and a number of anthropologists and ethnologists. The fundamental hypothesis of psychoneuroimmunology is concisely that the way people think and how they feel directly influences the electrochemistry of the brain and central nervous system, which in turn has a significant influence on the immune system and its capacity to defend the body against disease, infection, and ill health. Meanwhile, the immune system affects brain chemistry and its electrical activity, which in turn has a considerable impact on the way we think and feel. Because of this interplay, a person's negative thoughts, feelings, and perceptions, such as pessimistic predictions about the future, regretful ruminations upon the past, low self-esteem, and depleted belief in self-determination and a capacity to cope can undermine the efficiency of the immune system, increasing vulnerability to ill health. Simultaneously, the biochemical indicators of ill health monitored by the immune system feeds back to the brain via the nervous system, which exacerbates thoughts and feelings of a negative nature. That is to say, we feel and think of ourselves as unwell, which contributes to physical conditions of ill health, which in turn cause us to feel and think of ourselves as unwell. However, the interplay between cognitive and emotional, neurological, and immunological processes also provides for the possibility of positively influencing the body and enhancing physical health by changing the way we think and feel. For example, people who are able to deconstruct the cognitive distortions that precipitate perpetual pessimism and hopelessness and further develop the capacity to perceive themselves as having a significant degree of self-determination and capacity to cope are more likely to avoid and recover from ill health more quickly than those who remain engaged in negative thoughts and feelings. This simplification of a complex interaction of interrelated systems and the capacity of the mind to influence the body does not account for the significant influence that other factors have on mental and physical well-being, including exercise, diet, and social interaction. Nonetheless, in helping people to make such changes to their habitual thought processes and pervasive feelings, mind-body interventions, including creative visualization, when provided as part of a multimodal and interdisciplinary treatment program of other methods, such as cognitive behavioral therapy, have been shown to contribute significantly to treatment of and recovery from a range of conditions. In addition, there is evidence supporting the brain and central nervous system's influence on the immune system and the capacity for mind-body interventions to enhance immune function outcomes, including defense against and recovery from infection and disease. See also Creative visualization Guided meditation Mental image Psychoneuroimmunology Tulpa References Hypnosis Mind–body interventions Psychotherapy by type Imagination Alternative medicine

Confusion

In medicine, confusion is the quality or state of being bewildered or unclear. The term "acute mental confusion" is often used interchangeably with delirium in the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems and the Medical Subject Headings publications to describe the pathology. These refer to the loss of orientation, or the ability to place oneself correctly in the world by time, location and personal identity. Mental confusion is sometimes accompanied by disordered consciousness (the loss of linear thinking) and memory loss (the inability to correctly recall previous events or learn new material). Etymology The word confusion derives from the Latin word, confundo, which means "confuse, mix, blend, pour together, disorder, embroil." Causes Confusion may result from drug side effects or from a relatively sudden brain dysfunction. Acute confusion is often called delirium (or "acute confusional state"), although delirium often includes a much broader array of disorders than simple confusion. These disorders include the inability to focus attention; various impairments in awareness, and temporal or spatial dis-orientation. Mental confusion can result from chronic organic brain pathologies, such as dementia, as well. Other Acute stress reaction Alcoholism Anemia Anticholinergic toxicity Anxiety Brain damage Brain tumor Concussion Dehydration Encephalopathy Epileptic seizure Depression Fatigue Fever Brain injury Heat stroke Hypoglycemia Hypothermia Hypothyroidism Jet lag Kidney failure Kidney infection (pyelonephritis) Lactic acidosis Lassa fever Lewy body dementia Listeria Lyme disease Meningitis Postpartum depression & Postpartum psychosis Psychotic Disorder Reye's syndrome Rocky Mountain spotted fever (RMSF) Schizophrenia Sick building syndrome Sleep apnea Stroke Yellow fever STDs & STIs Streptococcal Infections Toxicity Toxic shock syndrome Transient ischemic attack (TIA, Mini-Stroke) Vitamin B12 deficiency Acute Porphyria West Nile virus Differential diagnosis The most common causes of drug induced acute confusion are dopaminergic drugs (used for the treatment of Parkinson's disease), diuretics, tricyclic, tetracyclic antidepressants and benzodiazepines or alcohol. The elderly, and especially those with pre-existing dementia, are most at risk for drug induced acute confusional states. New research is finding a link between vitamin D deficiency and cognitive impairment (which includes "foggy brain"). See also Cognitive distortion References External links National Library of Medicine - National Institutes of Health Cognitive dissonance Emotions Neurology Symptoms and signs of mental disorders Failure Mental states Cognitive neuroscience Error Anxiety de:Verworrenheit

Value (marketing)

Value in marketing, also known as customer-perceived value, is the difference between a prospective customer's evaluation of the benefits and costs of one product when compared with others. Value may also be expressed as a straightforward relationship between perceived benefits and perceived costs: Value = . The basic underlying concept of value in marketing is human needs. The basic human needs may include food, shelter, belonging, love, and self expression. Both culture and individual personality shape human needs in what is known as wants. When wants are backed by buying power, they become demands. With a consumers' wants and resources (financial ability), they demand products and services with benefits that add up to the most value and satisfaction. The four types of value include: functional value, monetary value, social value, and psychological value. The sources of value are not equally important to all consumers. How important a value is, depends on the consumer and the purchase. Values should always be defined through the "eyes" of the consumer: Functional value: This type of value is what an offer does, it's the solution an offer provides to the customer. Monetary value: This is where the function of the price paid is relative to an offerings perceived worth. This value invites a trade-off between other values and monetary costs. Social value: The extent to which owning a product or engaging in a service allows the consumer to connect with others. Psychological value: The extent to which a product allows consumers to express themselves or feel better. For a firm to deliver value to its customers, they must consider what is known as the "total market offering." This includes the reputation of the organization, staff representation, product benefits, and technological characteristics as compared to competitors' market offerings and prices. Value can thus be defined as the relationship of a firm's market offerings to those of its competitors. Value in marketing can be defined by both qualitative and quantitative measures. On the qualitative side, value is the perceived gain composed of individual's emotional, mental and physical condition plus various social, economic, cultural and environmental factors. On the quantitative side, value is the actual gain measured in terms of financial numbers, percentages, and dollars. For an organization to deliver value, it has to improve its value : cost ratio. When an organization delivers high value at high price, the perceived value may be low. When it delivers high value at low price, the perceived value may be high. The key to deliver high perceived value is attaching value to each of the individuals or organizations—making them believe that what you are offering is beyond expectation—helping them to solve a problem, offering a solution, giving results, and making them happy. Value changes based on time, place and people in relation to changing environmental factors. It is a creative energy exchange between people and organizations in our marketplace. Very often managers conduct customer value analysis to reveal the company's strengths and weaknesses compared to other competitors. The steps include: Identifying the major attributes and benefits that customers value for choosing a product and vendor. Assessment of the quantitative importance of the different attributes and benefits. Assessment of the company's and competitors' performance on each attribute and benefits. Examining how customer in the particular segment rated company against major competitor on each attribute. Monitoring customer perceived value over time. References Peter Doyle: Value-Based Marketing: Marketing Strategies for Corporate Growth and Shareholder Value. Wiley, 2000. Raquel Sánchez-Fernández and M. Ángeles Iniesta-Bonillo, "The concept of perceived value: a systematic review of the research," Marketing Theory 7 (2007), 427-451 Turel, O., Serenko, A. and Bontis, N. (2007). "User acceptance of wireless short messaging services: Deconstructing perceived value." Information & Management 44(1): 63-73. Philip Kotler, Kevin Lane Keller, Abraham Koshy, Mithileshwar Jha: "Marketing Management: A south Asian Perspective", Pearson, 13th Edition (2009) 117-121. Product management

Information processing theory

Information processing theory is the approach to the study of cognitive development evolved out of the American experimental tradition in psychology. Developmental psychologists who adopt the information processing perspective account for mental development in terms of maturational changes in basic components of a child's mind. The theory is based on the idea that humans process the information they receive, rather than merely responding to stimuli. This perspective uses an analogy to consider how the mind works like a computer. In this way, the mind functions like a biological computer responsible for analyzing information from the environment. According to the standard information-processing model for mental development, the mind's machinery includes attention mechanisms for bringing information in, working memory for actively manipulating information, and long-term memory for passively holding information so that it can be used in the future. This theory addresses how as children grow, their brains likewise mature, leading to advances in their ability to process and respond to the information they received through their senses. The theory emphasizes a continuous pattern of development, in contrast with cognitive-developmental theorists such as Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development that thought development occurs in stages at a time. Humans as information processing systems The information processing theory simplified is comparing the human brain to a computer or basic processor. It is theorized that the brain works in a set sequence, as does a computer. The sequence goes as follows, "receives input, processes the information, and delivers an output". This theory suggests that we as humans will process information in a similar way. Like a computer receives input the mind will receive information through the senses. If the information is focused on, it will move to the short-term memory. While in the short-term memory or working memory, the mind is able to use the information to address its surroundings. The information is then encoded to the long-term memory, where the information is then stored. The information can be retrieved when necessary using the central executive. The central executive can be understood as the conscious mind. The central executive can pull information from the long-term memory back to the working memory for its use. As a computer processes information, this is how it is thought our minds are processing information. The output that a computer would deliver can be likened to the mind's output of information through behavior or action. Components Though information processing can be compared to a computer, there is much more that needs to be explained. Information processing has several components. The major components are information stores, cognitive processes, and executive cognition. Information stores are the different places that information can be stored in the mind. Information is stored briefly in the sensory memory. This information is stored just long enough for us to move the information to the short-term memory. George Armitage Miller discovered the short-term memory can only hold 7 (plus or minus two) things at once. The information here is also stored for only 15–20 seconds. The information stored in the short-term memory can be committed to the long-term memory store. There is no limit to the information stored in the long-term memory. The information stored here can stay for many years. Long-term memory can be divided between semantic, episodic, and procedural memories. Semantic memory is made up of facts or information learned or obtained throughout life. Episodic memory concerns personal experiences or real events that have happened in a person's life. Lastly, procedural memory is made up of procedures or processes learned such as riding a bike. Each of these are subcategories of long-term memory. Cognitive processes are the way humans transfer information among the different memory stores. Some prominent processes used in transferring information are coding, retrieval, and perception. Coding is the process of transferring information from the short to long-term memory by relating the information of the long-term memory to the item in the short-term memory. This can be done through memorization techniques. Retrieval is used to bring information from the long-term memory back to the short-term memory. This can be achieved through many different recall techniques. Perception is the use of the information processed to interpret the environment. Another useful technique advised by George Miller is recoding. Recoding is the process of regrouping or organizing the information the mind is working with. A successful method of recoding is chunking. Chunking is used to group together pieces of information. Each unit of information is considered a chunk, this could be one or several words. This is commonly used when trying to memorize a phone number. Executive cognition is the idea that someone is aware of the way they process information. They know their strengths and weaknesses. This concept is similar to metacognition. The conscious mind has control over the processes of the information processing theory. Emergence Information processing as a model for human thinking and learning is part of the resurgence of cognitive perspectives of learning. The cognitive perspective asserts that complex mental states affect human learning and behavior that such mental states can be scientifically investigated. Computers, which process information, include internal states that affect processing. Computers, therefore, provided a model for possible human mental states that provided researchers with clues and direction for understanding human thinking and learning as information processing. Overall, information-processing models helped reestablish mental processes—processes that cannot be directly observed—as a legitimate area of scientific research. Major theorists George Armitage Miller was one of the founders of the field of psychology known as cognition. He played a large role when it came to the information processing theory. He researched the capacity of the working memory, discovering that people can only hold up to 7 plus or minus 2 items. He also created the term chunking when explaining how to make the most of our short-term memory. Two other theorists associated with the cognitive information processing theory are Richard C. Atkinson and Richard Shiffrin. In 1968 these two proposed a multi-stage theory of memory. They explained that from the time information is received by the processing system, it goes through different stages to be fully stored. They broke this down to sensory memory, short-term memory, and long-term memory (Atkinson). Later in 1974 Alan Baddeley and Graham Hitch would contribute more to the information processing theory through their own discoveries. They deepened the understanding of memory through the central executive, phonological loop, and visuospatial sketch pad. Baddeley later updated his model with the episodic buffer. Atkinson and Shiffrin model The Atkinson–Shiffrin memory model was proposed in 1968 by Richard C. Atkinson and Richard Shiffrin. This model illustrates their theory of the human memory. These two theorists used this model to show that the human memory can be broken in to three sub-sections: Sensory Memory, short-term memory and long-term memory. Sensory memory The sensory memory is responsible for holding onto information that the mind receives through the senses such as auditory and visual information. For example, if someone were to hear a bird chirp, they know that it is a bird because that information is held in the brief sensory memory. Short-term memory Short-term memory lasts for about 30 seconds. Short-term memory retains information that is needed for only a short period of time such as remembering a phone number that needs to be dialed. Long-term memory The long-term memory has an unlimited amount of space. In the long-term memory, there can be memory stored in there from the beginning of our life time. The long-term memory is tapped into when there is a need to recall an event that happened in an individual's previous experiences. Baddeley and Hitch model of working memory Baddeley and Hitch introduced the model of working memory in 1974. Through their research, they contributed more to help understand how the mind may process information. They added three elements that explain further cognitive processes. These elements are the central executive, phonological loop, and the visuo-spatial working memory. Later Alan Baddeley added a fourth element to the working memory model called the episodic buffer. Together these ideas support the information processing theory and possibly explain how the mind processes information. Central executive Phonological loop Working in connection with the central executive is the phonological loop. The phonological loop is used to hold auditory information. There are two sub components of the phonological loop; the phonological store and the articulatory rehearsal process. The phonological store holds auditory information for a short period. The articulatory rehearsal process keeps the information in the store for a longer period of time through rehearsal. Visuospatial sketch pad The visuospatial sketch pad is the other portion of the central executive. This is used to hold visual and spatial information. The visuospatial sketch pad is used to help the conscious imagine objects as well as maneuver through the physical environment. Episodic buffer Baddeley later added a fourth aspect to the model called the episodic buffer. It is proposed that the episodic buffer is able to hold information thereby increasing the amount stored. Due to the ability to hold information the episodic buffer is said to also transfer information between perception, short-term memory and long-term memory. The episodic buffer is a relatively new idea and is still being researched. Other cognitive processes Cognitive processes include perception, recognition, imagining, remembering, thinking, judging, reasoning, problem solving, conceptualizing, and planning. These cognitive processes can emerge from human language, thought, imagery, and symbols. In addition to these specific cognitive processes, many cognitive psychologists study language-acquisition, altered states of mind and consciousness, visual perception, auditory perception, short-term memory, long-term memory, storage, retrieval, perceptions of thought and much more. Cognitive processes emerge through senses, thoughts, and experiences. The first step is aroused by paying attention, it allows processing of the information given. Cognitive processing cannot occur without learning, they work hand in hand to fully grasp the information. Nature versus nurture Nature versus nurture refers to the theory about how people are influenced. The nature mentality is around the idea that we are influenced by our genetics. This involves all of our physical characteristics and our personality. On the other hand, nurture revolves around the idea that we are influenced by the environment and our experiences. Some believe that we are the way we are due to how we were raised, in what type of environment we were raised in and our early childhood experiences. This theory views humans as actively inputting, retrieving, processing, and storing information. Context, social content, and social influences on processing are simply viewed as information. Nature provides the hardware of cognitive processing and Information Processing theory explains cognitive functioning based on that hardware. Individuals innately vary in some cognitive abilities, such a memory span, but human cognitive systems function similarly based on a set of memory stores that store information and control processes determine how information is processed. The “Nurture” component provides information input (stimuli) that is processed resulting in behavior and learning. Changes in the contents of the long-term memory store (knowledge) are learning. Prior knowledge affects future processing and thus affects future behavior and learning. Quantitative versus qualitative Information processing theory combines elements of both quantitative and qualitative development. Qualitative development occurs through the emergence of new strategies for information storage and retrieval, developing representational abilities (such as the utilization of language to represent concepts), or obtaining problem-solving rules (Miller, 2011). Increases in the knowledge base or the ability to remember more items in working memory are examples of quantitative changes, as well as increases in the strength of connected cognitive associations (Miller, 2011). The qualitative and quantitative components often interact together to develop new and more efficient strategies within the processing system. Current areas of research Information processing theory is currently being used in the study of computer or artificial intelligence. This theory has also been applied to systems beyond the individual, including families and business organizations. For example, Ariel (1987) applied information processing theory to family systems, with sensing, attending, and encoding of stimuli occurring either within individuals or within the family system itself. Unlike traditional systems theory, where the family system tends to maintain stasis and resists incoming stimuli which would violate the system's rules, the information processing family develops individual and mutual schemes which influence what and how information is attended to and processed. Dysfunctions can occur both at the individual level as well as within the family system itself, creating more targets for therapeutic change. Rogers, P. R. et al. (1999) utilized information processing theory to describe business organizational behavior, as well as to present a model describing how effective and ineffective business strategies are developed. In their study, components of organizations that "sense" market information are identified as well as how organizations attend to this information; which gatekeepers determine what information is relevant/important for the organization, how this is organized into the existing culture (organizational schemas), and whether or not the organization has effective or ineffective processes for their long-term strategy. Cognitive psychologists Kahnemen and Grabe noted that learners has some control over this process. Selective attention is the ability of humans to select and process certain information while simultaneously ignoring others. This is influenced by many things including: What the information being processed means to the individual The complexity of the stimuli (based partially on background knowledge) Ability to control attention (varies based on age, hyperactivity, etc.) Some research has shown that individuals with a high working memory are better able to filter out irrelevant information. In particular, one study on focusing on dichotic listening, followed participants were played two audio tracks, one in each ear, and were asked to pay attention only to one. It was shown that there was a significant positive relationship between working memory capacity and ability of the participant to filter out the information from the other audio track. Implications for teaching Some examples of classroom implications of the information processing theory include: References Further reading Cognitive psychology

Adolescent health

Adolescent health, or youth health, is the range of approaches to preventing, detecting or treating young people's health and well-being. The term adolescent and young people are often used interchangeably, as are the terms Adolescent Health and Youth Health. Young people's health is often complex and requires a comprehensive, biopsychosocial approach. Adolescent health risks Because adolescence represents a life stage of increasing psychosocial independence, but one of limited legal and social rights (for those who have not reached the legal age of adulthood where they reside), adolescent health exists at the intersection of many forces often outside of the control of individual young people. Some young people might have a history of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), or may be actively living in or experiencing the situations described as ACEs. The Adverse Childhood Experiences Study suggests that ACEs are common, and are predictive of adverse physical health outcomes (ischemic heart disease, cancer, chronic lung disease) in adults. Social, cultural and environmental factors are all important areas of focus in adolescent health. Young people have specific health problems and developmental needs that differ from those of children or adults: The causes of ill-health in adolescents are mostly psychosocial rather than biological. Young people often engage in health risk behaviours that reflect the processes of adolescent development: experimentation and exploration, including using drugs and alcohol, sexual behaviour, and other risk taking that affect their physical and mental health. Adolescent health also encompasses children's and young people's sexual and reproductive health (SRH). The World Health Organization describes the leading health-related problems in the age group 10 – 19 years to include: Road traffic accidents Drowning Violence Alcohol and drugs Tobacco Mental health Communicable disease (such as HIV, Tuberculosis) Early pregnancy and childbirth Environmental health Overweight Nutrition Physical activity Young people often lack awareness of the risks of harm associated with certain behaviours, or may overestimate the risks of some behaviours while underestimating the risks of others. They may be in the process of developing protective skills and behaviors, or may lack knowledge about how and where to seek help for their health concerns. By intervening at this early life stage, many chronic conditions later in life can be prevented. In addition to intervention on young people's knowledge around the risks of health-related behaviors, it is crucial to acknowledge that adolescents under the legal age of majority are often occupying an idiosyncratic legal, economic, and social state, where their rights to access confidential medical services, or to consent to preventative medical care is highly dependent on the laws and practices of where they reside. For example, in the US,  the legal rights of minors to consent to screening and treatment for sexually transmitted infections (STIs) varies on a state by state level, and the right to confidential access to these services varies as well. In a majority of US states, a minor may legally consent to testing and treatment starting at age 12 or 14, but 18 US states allow a physician to inform a minor's parents that their child has requested or has received STI screening or treatment if the physician deems it in the patient's best interests. At the same time, adolescents as an age group do not have the same economic power as adults, and may be unable to pay for or transport themselves to medical screening or treatment, whether for physical or behavioral health issues. An emphasis on individual risk behaviors may obfuscate the role of institutional barriers to performing protective health behaviors. Key principles Evidence-based practices include harm reduction and health promotion to intervene early in the life course and illness trajectory. Adoption of unhealthy behaviors are evident particularly during life stages involving transition such as the commencement of university where physical inactivity, sedentary activity and poor dietary habits prevail. Youth health is founded on collaborative approaches that address social justice. Youth development approaches include youth empowerment and youth participation. Their aim is to promote youth rights, youth voice and youth engagement. Access to health-care services Studies about young people's access to healthcare have identified major barriers including concerns about confidentiality, practitioners attitudes and communication style, environment, availability of services, cost and the developmental characteristics of young people. Marginalised young people can have greater difficulty accessing health services and need support to navigate the health system. The World Health Organization 'Global standards for quality health-care services for adolescents' include: Adolescents' health literacy Community support Appropriate package of services Providers' competencies Facility characteristics Equity and non-discrimination Standard Data and quality improvement Adolescents' participation Key health services for young people Youth Health includes adolescent medicine as a speciality, along with other primary and tertiary care services. Health services for young people include mental health services, child protection, drug and alcohol services, sexual health services. General Practitioners work alongside multidisciplinary health practitioners including psychology, social Work and Youth health nursing and school health services. Youth work and youth development services support and engage young people. Web based supports, such as Reach Out!, provide early intervention. Youth health services ('one-stop-shops' for young people) are specialist services providing multi-disciplinary, primary health care to young people. Focusing on engaging disadvantaged young people, they deliver flexible and unique services to young people in relaxed and comfortable youth-friendly environments. Youth health services work in partnership with other government and non-government services. Youth health services provide a range of entry-points and non-threatening services (such as creative arts, basic services such as showers and laundries, a drop in service, sports and recreational facilities), which encourage young people to connect with the service on their own terms. They also provide informal links to other support services and sectors including education, housing, financial support and legal services, offering support to young people who are dealing with complex issues. Youth health services understand the need to respond immediately to young people's requests for support and assistance and they share a common operating philosophy, which values social justice, equity, and a holistic view of young people's health and well-being. Capacity building organisations support the Youth Health sector by providing access to information and resources, conducting research and providing training. Effects of discrimination Social-emotional distress In a comprehensive review of research literature including 126 different studies that analyzed the relationship between perceived discrimination and social-emotional distress with effect sizes from small to moderate, perceived discrimination was shown to correlate with many social-emotional distresses for adolescents (Benner et al., 2018). Additionally, the study found that the more an adolescent perceived they were a victim of discrimination, the more likely it is that they will also report experiences with depression, anxiety, loneliness, and stress. Risky health behaviors Adolescents who report more discrimination also tend to report engaging in more risky health behaviors such as delinquency, anger, and other externalizing behaviors Other risky health behaviors include substance abuse and risky sexual behaviors like unprotected sex and sex with multiple partners. The data was taken from 71 different studies that analyze the relationship between perceived discrimination and risky health behaviors with effect sizes from small to moderate. The relationship between risky health behaviors in adolescents and discrimination can be partially explained by a greater tendency for school administrators to discipline minority students more often and more severely than other students (Mallett, 2016). This increase in discipline can lead to further delinquent and externalizing behaviors as they spend less time in the classroom environment. Academics Perceived discrimination has also been linked to lower academic performance in adolescents. Students who feel they face discrimination are more likely to have lower grade point averages (GPA), more absences, less engagement in class, and lower academic motivation. The data was taken from 73 different studies that analyze the relationship between perceived discrimination and academic outcomes in all areas with small effect sizes. The increased frequency of discipline also takes class time away from students which could contribute to their lowered academic outcomes. With less time in the classroom they do not receive the same amount of instruction that students in the classroom receive. Research The American teen study Reliable research in adolescent sexual behavior has been subject to political interventions in the past, particularly with funding availability, and the formal peer review process. Reasons for political interventions pertaining to research in adolescent sexual behavior is rooted in conservative ideologies from political figures and activist organizations. These groups tend not to support funding for abstinence education rather than programming that might inadvertently support teenage sexual behavior. These political interventions result in less of an understanding of long-term adolescent risk-taking sexual behavior and thus disease prevention. The American Teen Study, which began in May 1991, was a peer-reviewed study on adolescent sexual risk-taking behavior whose funding from the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development was shut down by former secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), Louis Sullivan. This cancellation led to further amendments created to halt the National Institutes of Health from funding research in adult and adolescent sexual behavior studies because conservative political figures such as, Gary Bauer, believed there was enough literature on this subject. However, the data meant to be collected from the American Teen Study was critical for accurately understanding the dynamics of how adolescents may come into contact with sexually transmitted infections, such as HIV, and how to further prevent adolescents from being infected. The need for data The American Teen Study acknowledged that there is insufficient data required for assessing rates of sexually transmitted infections among adolescents, which creates a barrier for trying to prevent infection rates and treatment of infections. HIV seroprevalence surveys, evaluating archived data on AIDS infections in the past, and adolescent risk-taking behaviors are the various types of data needed for accurately assessing the HIV infection trends among adolescents. Seroprevalence surveys give an idea about the rates of HIV infections among various groups of people, however, using this data solely is not always externally valid as it is not completely feasible to produce accurate rates of HIV among all of the groups being measured. Evaluating archived data of AIDS infections in the past is useful for obtaining an idea of how current HIV trends may be, but this data is not separated by age, which does not allow researchers to distinguish whether decreasing rates are applicable to adolescents. However, by integrating both of these methods, and further incorporating data on adolescent sexual behavior, the information would be more effective with determining HIV rates among various groups of adolescents. In addition, for future studies, researchers must incorporate comprehensive sample sizes, perform various research design types, understand the social norms that may influence risk-taking behaviors, and also be consistent with replicating research studies as risk-taking trends among adolescents may change. Overall, this data is needed in order to understand and effectively prevent infections of sexual transmitted infections, however, political figures policing peer-reviewed research studies gets in the way of obtaining this information. Peer review process Political interventions on peer-reviewed research may affect the integrity of the sciences, and political figures rescinding funding for certain studies they do not accept also affects the well-being of all individuals. It is recommended for specialist peer reviewers to have the freedom in being able to allocate funding for certain research studies, while also allowing a justified veto of funding decisions to be made by the HHS secretary if studies are later deemed as unethical. This reform is mindful that specialist peer reviewers will not be driven by personal bias, but instead by assuring that research funded is ethical, just, and neutral to the objective of the study, such as the American Teen Study. Organizations International Alliance for Child and Adolescent Mental Health and Schools International Association for Adolescent Health International Childhood and Youth Research Network (ICYRNet) World Health Organization - Adolescent Health Australian Association for Adolescent Health Canadian Association for Adolescent Health New Zealand Aotearoa Adolescent Health and Development The York Centre for Children, Youth, and Families SpunOut.ie Irish National Youth Website The Royal College of Psychiatrists, UK Youth Advolution for Health (Singapore) See also Adolescent and young adult oncology Adolescent Medicine Lancet Commission on Adolescent Health and Wellbeing Youth Risk Behavior Survey Advocates for Youth Freechild Project References Adolescent medicine

Social conditioning

Social conditioning is the sociological process of training individuals in a society to respond in a manner generally approved by the society in general and peer groups within society. The concept is stronger than that of socialization, which is the process of inheriting norms, customs and ideologies. Manifestations of social conditioning are vast, but they are generally categorized as social patterns and social structures including nationalism, education, employment, entertainment, popular culture, religion, spirituality and family life. The social structure in which an individual finds him or herself influences and can determine their social actions and responses. Social conditioning represents the environment and personal experience in the nature and nurture debate. Society in general and peer groups within society set the norms which shape the behavior of actors within the social system. Though society shapes individuals; however, it was the individual who made society to begin with and society in turn shaped and influenced us. Emile Durkheim who really played an important role in the theory of social facts, explained and talked how what was once a mere idea which in this case Durkheim is talking about society has turned out to be a thing which basically controls and dictates us. Socialization Social conditioning is directly related to the particular culture that one is involved in. In You May Ask Yourself, Dalton Conley, a professor of sociology at New York University, states that "culture affects us. It's transmitted to us through different processes, with socialization—our internalization of society's values, beliefs and norms—being the main one." The particular manner or influence that one is exposed to is associated by the herd that he or she is involved in. Social conditioning bases its principals on the natural need for an animal to be a part of a pack. Herd Instinct Sigmund Freud, known as the father of psychoanalysis, recorded his observations of group dynamics in Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego. In his work, he refers to Wilfred Trotter as the group conditions its members, Freud states "opposition to the herd is as good as separation from it, and is therefore anxiously avoided". Such fear causes the individual members and even leaders of a particular group to go along with the decisions a group based in accordance to its culture. On a micro scale, the individual is conditioned to partake in the social norms of the said group even if they contradict his or her personal moral code. The consequences of such protest (may) result in isolation. Such, in accordance to Freud, is one of the greatest punishments than can be instilled on an individual. This would result in the inability of an individual to practice his or her "instinctual impulses". These instincts, in accordance to Freud, are the motives behind actions that the individual may take. The father of psychoanalysis further states that, "we thus have an impression of a state in which an individual's private emotional impulses and intellectual acts are too weak to come to anything by themselves and are entirely dependent for this on being reinforced by being repeated in a similar way in the other members of the group". Out of fear of isolation and to secure the practice of instinctual impulses, there may be little protest from individual members as the group continues to conditions. Propaganda Edward Bernays, Freud's nephew and the father of propaganda and public relations, used many of his uncle's theories in order to create new methods in marketing. In Propaganda, he published that "If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind, it is now possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without them knowing it". He used the herd theory in order to create public relations, thus conditioning the public to need particular goods from certain manufacturers. In the same publication he stated, "A single factory, potentially capable of supplying a whole continent with its particular product, cannot afford to wait until the public asks for its product; it must maintain constant touch, through advertising and propaganda, with the vast public in order to assure itself the continuous demand which alone will make its costly plant profitable." His theories and applications in social conditioning continue throughout his work. Bernays and the elite Bernays continued the application of his work as he associates the method in which a minority elite use social conditioning to assert their dominance and will power. In You May Ask Yourself, Dalton Conley describes this ideal with hegemony. He states that the term "refers to a historical process in which a dominant group exercises 'moral and intellectual leadership' throughout society by winning the voluntary 'consent' of popular masses." Bernays believed that this was a functionalist approach. Stating "vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society ...In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons...who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses." Such influence is made possible by persistent repetition. Wilbert E. Moore, a formal Princeton University Sociology professor, in Social Change, states that "the persistence of patterns gives order and constancy to recurrent events. In terms of behavior, many elements of persistence are more nearly cyclical, the near repetition of sequences of action over various time periods." He continues to state that "role structures (and this norms) grow out of the need for predictability". While he does state that there are several reasons for group formation (spontaneous, deliberate and coercive) the group usually winds up 'repeating sequences' and then, in accordance to Freud and Bernays, contribute to the socialization of possibly new members. Classical conditioning – Ivan Pavlov and behaviorism Such repetition contributes to basic social conditioning. Ivan Pavlov demonstrated this theory with his infamous conditioned stimuli experiment. In Pavlov's dog experiment, the research proved that repeated exposure to a particular stimuli results in a specific behavior being repeated. In accordance to Mark Bouton of the University of Vermont, the strength of such 'repetition' and influence can be seen in operant conditioning. Where, depending on reinforcement and punishment of a particular behavior, a response is conditioned. Methods of social conditioning – media In accordance to Ashley Lutz, an editor of Business Insider, 90% of the media, in 2011, was owned by merely six companies. Such limits the exposure to information, at least the perspective on information. The limited exposure to the perspectives of information results in increase of particular social conditioning. Through repetition of a particular perspective of an ideal, the view is reinforced into the audience and results in a formed social norm. This contributes to the formation of a reflection of the culture in media. Conley states that "culture is a projection of social structures and relationships into the public sphere, a screen onto which the film of the underlying reality or social structure of our society is shown". Such cycling repetition creates a method of socialization and a manner in which society further molds its current members or new ones into the culture. Labeling theory Social control and stigmatization (SCS) Conley states that "individuals subconsciously notice how others see or label them, and their reactions to these labels over time form the basis of their self-identity. It is only through the social process of labeling that we create deviance by assigning shared meanings to acts." Social conditioning is formed by the creation of 'good' and 'bad' behaviors - persistent reinforcement and the use of operant conditioning influences individuals/groups to develop particular behaviors and/or ideals. In "A Differential Association—Reinforcement Theory of Criminal Behavior", from Criminological Theory Readings and Retrospectives, social norms and deviance in a particular group is described as follows: "We often infer what the norms of a group are by observing reaction to behavior, i.e., the sanctions applied to, or reinforcement and punishment of, such behavior. We may also learn what a group's norms are through verbal and written statements. The individual group member also learns what is and is not acceptable behavior on the basis of verbal statements made by others, as well as through sanctions (i.e. the reinforcing or aversive stimuli) applied by others in response to his behavior and that of other norms violators." A particular group conditions its members into certain behaviors. In Juvenile Delinquency and Urban Areas, the authors note that even illegal behaviors may be seen as positive and promoted within a particular group because different social organizations have a varying amount of influence over particular members – in particular, as children age, their friends play a greater amount of influence than the family. Burgess and Akers further reinforce this point: "In terms of our analysis, the primary group would be seen to be the major source of an individual's social reinforcements. The bulk of behavioral training which the child receives occurs at a time when the trainers, usually the parents, possess a very powerful system of reinforcement. In fact, we might characterize a primary group as a generalized reinforce (one associated with many reinforces, conditioned as well as unconditioned). And, as we suggest above, as the child grows older, groups other than the family may come to control a majority of an individual's reinforces, e.g. the adolescent peer group. Such theories are further backed up by Mead's theory of Social Development and are reinforced by stigmatization." Mead's theory of social development In accordance to Margaret Mead, one's identity is shaped by outside forces. While the self exists on its own at birth, the first interactions influence the development of one's identity. With the introductions of more and more groups, starting with the significant other (ex. family) and reference groups (ex. friends) an individual develops his or her perception of self. As Conley states, individuals "...develop a sense of other, that is, someone or something outside of oneself". Finally, individuals interact with the generalized other, "which represents an internalized sense of the total expectations of others in a variety of settings—regardless of whether we're encountered those people or places before". Stigma "A stigma is a negative social label that not only changes others' behaviour towards a person but, also alters that person's self-concept and social identity." Once placed into such a category, an individual finds it nearly impossible to move out of that particular grouping. Such becomes his or her master status, overshadowing any other statuses. Such conditions the individual to continuously partake in the activities ascribed to the master status, good or bad. See also Brave New World Operant conditioning Peer pressure Social theory Political correctness References Sociological terminology

Setting (narrative)

A setting (or backdrop) is the time and geographic location within a narrative, either non-fiction or fiction. It is a literary element. The setting initiates the main backdrop and mood for a story. The setting can be referred to as story world or milieu to include a context (especially society) beyond the immediate surroundings of the story. Elements of setting may include culture, historical period, geography, and hour. Along with the plot, character, theme, and style, setting is considered one of the fundamental components of fiction. Role Setting may refer to the social milieu in which the events of a novel occur. The elements of the story setting include the passage of time, which may be static in some stories or dynamic in others with, for example, changing seasons. A setting can take three basic forms. One is the natural world, or in an outside place. In this setting, the natural landscapes of the world play an important part in a narrative, along with living creatures and different times of weather conditions and seasons. The second form exists as the cultural and historical background in which the narrative resides. Past events that have impacted the cultural background of characters or locations are significant in this way. The third form of a setting is a public or private place that has been created/maintained and/or resided in by people. Examples of this include a house, a park, a street, a school, etc. Types Setting may take various forms: Alternate history Campaign setting Constructed world (Worldbuilding) Dream world Dystopia Fantasy world Fictional city Fictional country Fictional crossover Fictional location Fictional universe Future history Imaginary world Mythical place Parallel universe Planets in science fiction Simulated reality Utopia Virtual reality See also British regional literature Index of fictional places Landscape List of fictional universes Setting List of narrative techniques Worldbuilding Notes References Creative works Narratology

Explanatory style

Explanatory style is a psychological attribute that indicates how people explain to themselves why they experience a particular event, either positive or negative. Aspects Personal This aspect covers the degree to which a person attributes the cause of an event to internal or external sources. An optimist might attribute a bad experience to a stroke of bad luck whereas a pessimist might unreasonably assume it is their fault or punishment. A person might also attribute the responsibility of their actions to external forces in a maladaptive, unhealthy way (e.g. "I had no choice but to get violent.") Permanent This aspect covers characteristics considered stable versus unstable (across time). An optimist would tend to define his or her failures as unstable ("I just didn't study enough for this particular test") whereas a pessimist might think, for example, "I'm never good at tests". Pervasive This distinction covers global versus local and/or specific and the extent of the effect. A pessimist might, for example, think that "Everywhere there is misery" and an optimist think that, "I have had dealings mostly with honest people". Personality People who generally tend to blame themselves for negative events, believe that such events will continue indefinitely, and let such events affect many aspects of their lives display what is called a pessimistic explanatory style. Conversely, people who generally tend to blame outside forces for negative events, believe that such events will end soon, and do not let such events affect too many aspects of their lives display what is called an optimistic explanatory style. Some research has suggested a pessimistic explanatory style may be correlated with depression and physical illness. The concept of explanatory style encompasses a wide range of possible responses to both positive and negative occurrences, rather than a black-white difference between optimism and pessimism. Also, an individual does not necessarily show a uniform explanatory style in all aspects of life, but may exhibit varying responses to different types of events. Literature on attributional style Attributional style emerged from research on depression, with Abramson, Seligman and Teasdale (1978) arguing that a characteristic way of attributing negative outcomesto internal, stable and global causeswould be associated with depression in response to negative events happened to them. As a diathesis–stress model of depression, the model does not predict associations of attributional style with depression in the absence of objective negative events (stressors). A meta-analysis of 104 empirical studies of the theory indicates that the predictions are supported. Data have, however, been ambiguous, and some researchers believe that the theory is well-supported, some believe that it has not had impressive empirical support and some believe that, at least in the early days of the theory, the theory was never adequately tested. One factor accounting for ambiguity in research into the model is whether researchers have assessed attributions for hypothetical events or for real events. Those studies that have looked at attributions for hypothetical events have been more supportive of the model, possibly because these studies are more likely to have controlled for event severity. The "learned helplessness" model formed the theoretical basis of the original Abramson, Seligman, and Teasdale statement on attributional style. More recently, Abramson, Metalsky and Alloy proposed a modified "hopelessness theory". This distinguished hopeless depression and more circumscribed pessimism. It emphasizes the dimensions of stability and globality rather than internality, and suggests that stable and global attributions (rather than internal cause attributions) are associated with hopelessness depression. Hopelessness theory also highlights perceived importance and consequences of a negative outcome in addition to causal attributions as factors in clinical depression. Developmentally, it has been suggested that attributional style originates in experiences of trust or lack of trust in events Along with evidence from twin studies for some heredity basis to attributional style., Eisner argues that repeated exposure to controllable events may foster an optimistic explanatory style, whereas repeated exposure to uncontrollable events may foster a negative attributional style. Trust in interpersonal relationships is argued to build an optimistic explanatory style. Measurement Attributional style is typically assessed using questionnaires such as the Attributional Style Questionnaire or ASQ, which assesses attributions for six negative and six positive hypothetical events, the Expanded Attributional Style Questionnaire or EASQ, which assesses attributions for eighteen hypothetical negative events, and various scales that assess attributions for real events, such as the Real Events Attributional Style Questionnaire or the Attributions Questionnaire. Although these scales provide empirical methodology for study of attributional style, and considerable empirical data support the Abramson–Seligman–Teasdale model of depression, there has been dispute about whether this concept really exists. Cutrona, Russell and Jones, for example, found evidence for considerable cross-situational variation and temporal change of attributional style in women suffering from post-partum depression. Xenikou notes, however, that Cutrona, Russell and Jones found more evidence for the cross-situational consistency of stability and globalism than of internalization. More data in support of long-term stability of attributional style has come from a diary study by Burns and Seligman. Using a technique called Content Analysis of Verbatim Explanation (CAVE), these authors found stable patterns of attributional style over a long time period. Attributional style may be domain-specific. Using the Attributional Style Assessment Test, Anderson and colleagues found some evidence for domain-specificity of style, for instance work-related attributions vs interpersonal attributions. Modelling of the items of the ASQ suggests that the positive and negative event information (e.g. getting a promotion, losing a job) and the causal nature of attributions – whether events are seen as global or local in scope, or as temporally stable or unstable, for instance – assess distinct factors. A global focus tends to emerge, for instance, independent of the valence of an event. Such effects are found more broadly in cognition, where they are referred to as Global versus local precedence. Optimistic and Pessimistic attributions emerged as independent of each other, supporting models in which these styles have distinct genetic and environmental origins. Relationship to other constructs Attributional style is, at least superficially, similar to locus of control. However, the locus of control is concerned with expectancies about the future while attribution style is concerned with attributions for the past. Whereas locus of control cuts across both positive and negative outcomes, authors in the attributional style field have distinguished between a Pessimistic Explanatory Style, in which failures are attributed to internal, stable, and global factors and successes to external, unstable, and specific causes, and an Optimistic Explanatory Style, in which successes are attributed to internal, stable, and global factors and failures to external, unstable, and specific causes. See also References Further reading External links Examples of explanatory style Learned optimism with videos demonstrating the 3 types of explanatory styles Note on explanatory style and its relationship to athletics Discussion of explanatory style and physical health Personality

SOCRATES (pain assessment)

SOCRATES is a mnemonic acronym used by emergency medical services, physicians, nurses, and other health professionals to evaluate the nature of pain that a patient is experiencing. Uses SOCRATES is used to gain an insight into the patient's condition, and to allow the health care provider to develop a plan for dealing with it. It can be useful for differentiating between nociceptive pain and neuropathic pain. Adverse effects SOCRATES only focuses on the physical effects of pain, and ignores the social and emotional effects of pain. Procedure History SOCRATES is often poorly used by health care providers. Although pain assessments usually cover many or most of the aspects, they rarely included all 8 aspects. See also History of presenting complaint Medical history OPQRST References Medical mnemonics Pain management Mnemonic acronyms

Thematic learning

Thematic teaching (also known as thematic instruction) is the selecting and highlighting of a theme through an instructional unit or module, course, or multiple courses. It is often interdisciplinary, highlighting the relationship of knowledge across academic disciplines and everyday life. Themes can be topics or take the form of overarching questions. Thematic learning is closely related to interdisciplinary or integrated instruction, topic-, project- or phenomenon-based learning.  Thematic teaching is commonly associated with elementary classrooms and middle schools using a team-based approach, but this pedagogy is equally relevant in secondary schools and with adult learners. A common application is that of second or foreign language teaching, where the approach is more commonly known as theme-based instruction. Thematic instruction assumes students learn best when they can associate new information holistically with across the entire curriculum and with their own lives, experiences, and communities. Steps Under the thematic learning instruction, organization of curriculum can be based on a macro or micro theme, depending upon the topic to be covered. Choosing a theme: Themes about the particular topic should be of interest to students and relevant to the curriculum. In some approaches, students choose the thematic topic. Themes should also be topics of interest to the teacher(s) because successful thematic instructions often requires additional research and preparation. Interdisciplinary themes related to multiple academic disciplines such as science, social studies, math, language/writing, and other courses or subjects can be reinforced in lessons throughout the school day. Themes relevant to students' interests encourage active participation. For example, students may express interest in current popular music. This interest can be developed into thematic instructional units and lessons that span across time and cultures, how cultures interact and impact one another, music as a social or political commentary in social studies or history classes. Themes allowing past to present connections and highlight persistent issued faced by society such as war, poverty, pollution, disease, or natural disasters are especially effective. Doing the research: Effective interdisciplinary thematic instruction requires extensive knowledge and research by the teacher. Without a broad knowledge base on which to design relevant activities and lessons, thematic lessons can become randomly selected activities loosely related to a topic that fail to demand higher level thinking from students. Design an essential question(s) relevant to the theme. Essential questions are open-ended, intellectually engaging questions that demand higher-order thinking. Essential questions focus a thematic inquiry, helping the teacher chose the most important facts and concepts relative to the theme and focus planning efforts. Essential questions require students to learn the key facts and concepts related to the theme as well as analyze and evaluate the importance and relevance of that information. Good essential questions cannot be answered with a simple yes/no or true/false; students must discuss, defend, and debate issues related to the theme. Designing thematic instruction around essential questions requires that students learn both content and develop critical analysis skills. Designing instructional units and activities that guide students in answering the essential question. Teachers must choose teaching and learning strategies, activities, classroom materials, and experiences related to the wider theme and guide students in answering the essential question. Strategies can be individual or cooperative; stress various skills such as reading, writing, or presenting. Curriculum For thematic learning to be successful among learners, the following should be considered: Thematic learning consists of a curriculum that is unified and dwells on an identified theme or topic, ideally guided by essential questions. The sources are not limited to textbooks. For example, in the social studies or history classroom, primary source texts and images encourage the development of critical reading skills. For themes related to current events, analysis of modern media hones media literacy skills. Various teaching and learning methods can be used. Projects, cooperative learning, active participation, experiential learning are often highlighted. Thinking and problem solving skills, observation, critical reasoning, analysis and drawing conclusions are key skills in thematic learning. Advantages Students learn better when experiencing knowledge in a larger context. They begin to see relationships and connections across time, place, and disciplines. Learning about wider themes and related concepts and facts more closely resembles how life is experienced outside of school and the classroom. Themes can be chosen that are current and student-centered, incorporating the needs, interests and perspectives of the students. Carefully selecting topics and information related to a theme helps teachers narrow the overwhelming amount of information of any discipline. Thematic instructions aligns with current popular pedagogies and standards including place-based education, project-based education, and cooperative learning. When thematic instruction takes place along with cooperative learning, the advantages include the following: Thematic cooperative learning activities encourage authentic communication. The learner shares one's ideas with others in the group. Interaction encourages the values of respect and cooperation, thus building effective peer learning groups. The teacher becomes the facilitator, reduces the role of dispenser of learning. See also Interdisciplinary teaching References Education theory Pedagogy Learning methods

Psychological dependence

Psychological dependence is a cognitive disorder and a form of dependence that is characterized by emotional–motivational withdrawal symptoms upon cessation of prolonged drug use or certain repetitive behaviors. Consistent and frequent exposure to particular substances or behaviors is responsible for inducing psychological dependence, requiring ongoing engagement to prevent the onset of an unpleasant withdrawal syndrome driven by negative reinforcement. Neuronal counter-adaptation is believed to contribute to the generation of withdrawal symptoms through changes in neurotransmitter activity or altered receptor expression. Environmental enrichment and physical activity have been shown to attenuate withdrawal symptoms. Symptoms Psychological withdrawal symptoms include: Anhedonia Anxiety Changes in appetite Craving for responsible stimulus Dysphoria Exhaustion Insomnia / Hypersomnia Irritability Panic attack Stress Development Psychological dependence develops through consistent and frequent exposure to a stimulus. After sufficient exposure to a stimulus capable of inducing psychological dependence (e.g., drug use), an adaptive state develops that results in the onset of withdrawal symptoms that negatively affect psychological function upon cessation of exposure. Psychostimulants (e.g., amphetamine) are a class of drugs that only induce psychological withdrawal symptoms in dependent users, as opposed somatic withdrawal symptoms associated with physical dependence. Whilst psychological dependence is commonly associated with prolonged drug use, a behavioral dependence-withdrawal syndrome can also manifest through certain behaviors. For instance, exercise dependence can develop in amateur and professional athletes whereby cognitive withdrawal symptoms (e.g., anxiety and irritability) arise during periods of abstinence, with symptom severity often correlating with the duration of abstinence. Other behaviors that can produce observable psychological withdrawal symptoms (i.e., cause psychological dependence) include shopping, sex and self-stimulation using pornography, and eating food with high sugar or fat content, among others. The process responsible for the induction of psychological dependence is a negative feedback mechanism that involves neuronal-counter adaptation, leading to tolerance to the desirable effects of certain drugs or stimuli and a subsequent withdrawal syndrome upon abrupt cessation of exposure. While psychological dependence and addiction are distinct disease states mediated by opposite modes of reinforcement, they arise through partially overlapping biological processes. In the nucleus accumbens, both conditions involve overlapping signaling cascades that diverge at the CREB transcription factor. Upregulation of CREB expression in the nucleus accumbens plays a major role in mediating psychological dependence by inhibiting reward-related motivational salience, which mediates the onset of emotional-motivational withdrawal symptoms. Evidence indicates that the unpleasant nature of these withdrawal symptoms intensifies the desire to resume the associated drug or behavior. Biomolecular mechanisms Two factors have been identified as playing pivotal roles in psychological dependence: the neuropeptide "corticotropin-releasing factor" (CRF) and the gene transcription factor "cAMP response element binding protein" (CREB). The nucleus accumbens (NAcc) is one brain structure that has been implicated in the psychological component of drug dependence. In the NAcc, CREB is activated by cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP) immediately after a high and triggers changes in gene expression that affect proteins such as dynorphin; dynorphin peptides reduce dopamine release into the NAcc by temporarily inhibiting the reward pathway. A sustained activation of CREB thus forces a larger dose to be taken to reach the same effect. In addition, it leaves the user feeling generally depressed and dissatisfied, and unable to find pleasure in previously enjoyable activities, often leading to a return to the drug for another dose. In addition to CREB, it is hypothesized that stress mechanisms play a role in dependence. Koob and Kreek have hypothesized that during drug use, activates the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis (HPA axis) and other stress systems in the extended amygdala. This activation influences the dysregulated emotional state associated with psychological dependence. They found that as drug use escalates, so does the presence of CRF in human cerebrospinal fluid. In rat models, the separate use of CRF inhibitors and CRF receptor antagonists both decreased self-administration of the drug of study. Other studies in this review showed dysregulation of other neuropeptides that affect the HPA axis, including enkephalin which is an endogenous opioid peptide that regulates pain. It also appears that μ-opioid receptors, which enkephalin acts upon, is influential in the reward system and can regulate the expression of stress hormones. Increased expression of AMPA receptors in nucleus accumbens MSNs is a potential mechanism of aversion produced by drug withdrawal. Methods for reducing dependence A study examined how rats experienced morphine withdrawal in different surroundings. The rats were either placed in a standard environment (SE) or in an enriched environment (EE). The study concluded that EE reduced depression and anxiety withdrawal symptoms. Another study tested whether swimming exercises affected the intensity of perceivable psychological symptoms in rodents during morphine withdrawal. It concluded that the anxious and depressive states of the withdrawal were reduced in rats from the exercise group. Distinction between psychological and physical dependence The defining contrast between psychological dependence and physical dependence syndromes lies in the nature of the withdrawal symptoms experienced from removal of a particular stimulus following the development of tolerance. Psychological dependence is characterized by symptoms that are cognitive in nature and may include anxiety, dysphoria, exhaustion, hyperphagia, or irritability, among other symptoms. Conversely, physical dependence involves entirely somatic symptoms, such as diarrhea, myalgia, nausea, sweating, tremors, and other symptoms that are readily observable. Substance dependence is a general term that can refer to either psychological or physical dependence, or both, depending on the specific substance involved. See also Notes References Substance dependence Psychopathological syndromes

Content analysis

Content analysis is the study of documents and communication artifacts, which might be texts of various formats, pictures, audio or video. Social scientists use content analysis to examine patterns in communication in a replicable and systematic manner. One of the key advantages of using content analysis to analyse social phenomena is their non-invasive nature, in contrast to simulating social experiences or collecting survey answers. Practices and philosophies of content analysis vary between academic disciplines. They all involve systematic reading or observation of texts or artifacts which are assigned labels (sometimes called codes) to indicate the presence of interesting, meaningful pieces of content. By systematically labeling the content of a set of texts, researchers can analyse patterns of content quantitatively using statistical methods, or use qualitative methods to analyse meanings of content within texts. Computers are increasingly used in content analysis to automate the labeling (or coding) of documents. Simple computational techniques can provide descriptive data such as word frequencies and document lengths. Machine learning classifiers can greatly increase the number of texts that can be labeled, but the scientific utility of doing so is a matter of debate. Further, numerous computer-aided text analysis (CATA) computer programs are available that analyze text for predetermined linguistic, semantic, and psychological characteristics. Goals Content analysis is best understood as a broad family of techniques. Effective researchers choose techniques that best help them answer their substantive questions. That said, according to Klaus Krippendorff, six questions must be addressed in every content analysis: Which data are analyzed? How are the data defined? From what population are data drawn? What is the relevant context? What are the boundaries of the analysis? What is to be measured? The simplest and most objective form of content analysis considers unambiguous characteristics of the text such as word frequencies, the page area taken by a newspaper column, or the duration of a radio or television program. Analysis of simple word frequencies is limited because the meaning of a word depends on surrounding text. Key Word In Context (KWIC) routines address this by placing words in their textual context. This helps resolve ambiguities such as those introduced by synonyms and homonyms. A further step in analysis is the distinction between dictionary-based (quantitative) approaches and qualitative approaches. Dictionary-based approaches set up a list of categories derived from the frequency list of words and control the distribution of words and their respective categories over the texts. While methods in quantitative content analysis in this way transform observations of found categories into quantitative statistical data, the qualitative content analysis focuses more on the intentionality and its implications. There are strong parallels between qualitative content analysis and thematic analysis. Qualitative and quantitative content analysis Quantitative content analysis highlights frequency counts and statistical analysis of these coded frequencies. Additionally, quantitative content analysis begins with a framed hypothesis with coding decided on before the analysis begins. These coding categories are strictly relevant to the researcher's hypothesis. Quantitative analysis also takes a deductive approach. Examples of content-analytical variables and constructs can be found, for example, in the open-access database DOCA. This database compiles, systematizes, and evaluates relevant content-analytical variables of communication and political science research areas and topics. Siegfried Kracauer provides a critique of quantitative analysis, asserting that it oversimplifies complex communications in order to be more reliable. On the other hand, qualitative analysis deals with the intricacies of latent interpretations, whereas quantitative has a focus on manifest meanings. He also acknowledges an "overlap" of qualitative and quantitative content analysis. Patterns are looked at more closely in qualitative analysis, and based on the latent meanings that the researcher may find, the course of the research could be changed. It is inductive and begins with open research questions, as opposed to a hypothesis. Codebooks The data collection instrument used in content analysis is the codebook or coding scheme. In qualitative content analysis the codebook is constructed and improved during coding, while in quantitative content analysis the codebook needs to be developed and pretested for reliability and validity before coding. The codebook includes detailed instructions for human coders plus clear definitions of the respective concepts or variables to be coded plus the assigned values. According to current standards of good scientific practice, each content analysis study should provide their codebook in the appendix or as supplementary material so that reproducibility of the study is ensured. On the Open Science Framework (OSF) server of the Center for Open Science a lot of codebooks of content analysis studies are freely available via search for "codebook". Furthermore, the Database of Variables for Content Analysis (DOCA) provides an open access archive of pretested variables and established codebooks for content analyses. Measures from the archive can be adopted in future studies to ensure the use of high-quality and comparable instruments. DOCA covers, among others, measures for the content analysis of fictional media and entertainment (e.g., measures for sexualization in video games), of user-generated media content (e.g., measures for online hate speech), and of news media and journalism (e.g., measures for stock photo use in press reporting on child sexual abuse, and measures of personalization in election campaign coverage). Computational tools With the rise of common computing facilities like PCs, computer-based methods of analysis are growing in popularity. Answers to open ended questions, newspaper articles, political party manifestos, medical records or systematic observations in experiments can all be subject to systematic analysis of textual data. By having contents of communication available in form of machine readable texts, the input is analyzed for frequencies and coded into categories for building up inferences. Computer-assisted analysis can help with large, electronic data sets by cutting out time and eliminating the need for multiple human coders to establish inter-coder reliability. However, human coders can still be employed for content analysis, as they are often more able to pick out nuanced and latent meanings in text. A study found that human coders were able to evaluate a broader range and make inferences based on latent meanings. Reliability and Validity Robert Weber notes: "To make valid inferences from the text, it is important that the classification procedure be reliable in the sense of being consistent: Different people should code the same text in the same way". The validity, inter-coder reliability and intra-coder reliability are subject to intense methodological research efforts over long years. Neuendorf suggests that when human coders are used in content analysis at least two independent coders should be used. Reliability of human coding is often measured using a statistical measure of inter-coder reliability or "the amount of agreement or correspondence among two or more coders". Lacy and Riffe identify the measurement of inter-coder reliability as a strength of quantitative content analysis, arguing that, if content analysts do not measure inter-coder reliability, their data are no more reliable than the subjective impressions of a single reader. According to today's reporting standards, quantitative content analyses should be published with complete codebooks and for all variables or measures in the codebook the appropriate inter-coder or inter-rater reliability coefficients should be reported based on empirical pre-tests. Furthermore, the validity of all variables or measures in the codebook must be ensured. This can be achieved through the use of established measures that have proven their validity in earlier studies. Also, the content validity of the measures can be checked by experts from the field who scrutinize and then approve or correct coding instructions, definitions and examples in the codebook. Kinds of text There are five types of texts in content analysis: written text, such as books and papers oral text, such as speech and theatrical performance iconic text, such as drawings, paintings, and icons audio-visual text, such as TV programs, movies, and videos hypertexts, which are texts found on the Internet History Content analysis is research using the categorization and classification of speech, written text, interviews, images, or other forms of communication. In its beginnings, using the first newspapers at the end of the 19th century, analysis was done manually by measuring the number of columns given a subject. The approach can also be traced back to a university student studying patterns in Shakespeare's literature in 1893. Over the years, content analysis has been applied to a variety of scopes. Hermeneutics and philology have long used content analysis to interpret sacred and profane texts and, in many cases, to attribute texts' authorship and authenticity. In recent times, particularly with the advent of mass communication, content analysis has known an increasing use to deeply analyze and understand media content and media logic. The political scientist Harold Lasswell formulated the core questions of content analysis in its early-mid 20th-century mainstream version: "Who says what, to whom, why, to what extent and with what effect?". The strong emphasis for a quantitative approach started up by Lasswell was finally carried out by another "father" of content analysis, Bernard Berelson, who proposed a definition of content analysis which, from this point of view, is emblematic: "a research technique for the objective, systematic and quantitative description of the manifest content of communication". Quantitative content analysis has enjoyed a renewed popularity in recent years thanks to technological advances and fruitful application in of mass communication and personal communication research. Content analysis of textual big data produced by new media, particularly social media and mobile devices has become popular. These approaches take a simplified view of language that ignores the complexity of semiosis, the process by which meaning is formed out of language. Quantitative content analysts have been criticized for limiting the scope of content analysis to simple counting, and for applying the measurement methodologies of the natural sciences without reflecting critically on their appropriateness to social science. Conversely, qualitative content analysts have been criticized for being insufficiently systematic and too impressionistic. Krippendorff argues that quantitative and qualitative approaches to content analysis tend to overlap, and that there can be no generalisable conclusion as to which approach is superior. Content analysis can also be described as studying traces, which are documents from past times, and artifacts, which are non-linguistic documents. Texts are understood to be produced by communication processes in a broad sense of that phrase—often gaining mean through abduction. Latent and manifest content Manifest content is readily understandable at its face value. Its meaning is direct. Latent content is not as overt, and requires interpretation to uncover the meaning or implication. Uses Holsti groups fifteen uses of content analysis into three basic categories: make inferences about the antecedents of a communication describe and make inferences about characteristics of a communication make inferences about the effects of a communication. He also places these uses into the context of the basic communication paradigm. The following table shows fifteen uses of content analysis in terms of their general purpose, element of the communication paradigm to which they apply, and the general question they are intended to answer. As a counterpoint, there are limits to the scope of use for the procedures that characterize content analysis. In particular, if access to the goal of analysis can be obtained by direct means without material interference, then direct measurement techniques yield better data. Thus, while content analysis attempts to quantifiably describe communications whose features are primarily categorical——limited usually to a nominal or ordinal scale——via selected conceptual units (the unitization) which are assigned values (the categorization) for enumeration while monitoring intercoder reliability, if instead the target quantity manifestly is already directly measurable——typically on an interval or ratio scale——especially a continuous physical quantity, then such targets usually are not listed among those needing the "subjective" selections and formulations of content analysis. For example (from mixed research and clinical application), as medical images communicate diagnostic features to physicians, neuroimaging's stroke (infarct) volume scale called ASPECTS is unitized as 10 qualitatively delineated (unequal) brain regions in the middle cerebral artery territory, which it categorizes as being at least partly versus not at all infarcted in order to enumerate the latter, with published series often assessing intercoder reliability by Cohen's kappa. The foregoing italicized operations impose the uncredited form of content analysis onto an estimation of infarct extent, which instead is easily enough and more accurately measured as a volume directly on the images. ("Accuracy ... is the highest form of reliability.") The concomitant clinical assessment, however, by the National Institutes of Health Stroke Scale (NIHSS) or the modified Rankin Scale (mRS), retains the necessary form of content analysis. Recognizing potential limits of content analysis across the contents of language and images alike, Klaus Krippendorff affirms that "comprehen[sion] ... may ... not conform at all to the process of classification and/or counting by which most content analyses proceed," suggesting that content analysis might materially distort a message. The development of the initial coding scheme The process of the initial coding scheme or approach to coding is contingent on the particular content analysis approach selected. Through a directed content analysis, the scholars draft a preliminary coding scheme from pre-existing theory or assumptions. While with the conventional content analysis approach, the initial coding scheme developed from the data. The conventional process of coding With either approach above, immersing oneself into the data to obtain an overall picture is recommendable for researchers to conduct. Furthermore, identifying a consistent and clear unit of coding is vital, and researchers' choices range from a single word to several paragraphs, from texts to iconic symbols. Last, constructing the relationships between codes by sorting out them within specific categories or themes. See also Donald Wayne Foster Hermeneutics Text mining The Polish Peasant in Europe and America Transition words Video content analysis Grounded theory References Further reading Quantitative research Qualitative research Hermeneutics

Genomics of personality traits

Personality traits are patterns of thoughts, feelings and behaviors that reflect the tendency to respond in certain ways under certain circumstances. Personality is influenced by genetic and environmental factors and associated with mental health. Beside the environment factor, genetic variants can be detected for personality traits. These traits are polygenic. Significant genetic variants are present for most of the behavioral traits. There is a consistency in detection of genetic variants and genomic association for traits derived from pedigree. Personality trait research has been conducted both for humans and non-human animals like dogs. Trait theory For humans, the Big Five personality traits, also known as the five-factor model (FFM) or the OCEAN model, is the prevailing model for personality traits. When factor analysis (a statistical technique) is applied to personality survey data, some words or questionnaire items used to describe aspects of personality are often applied to the same person. For example, someone described as conscientious is more likely to be described as "always prepared" rather than "messy". This theory uses descriptors of common language and therefore suggests five broad dimensions commonly used to describe the human personality and psyche. The five factors are: Openness to experience (inventive/curious vs. consistent/cautious) Conscientiousness (efficient/organized vs. easy-going/careless) Extraversion (outgoing/energetic vs. solitary/reserved) Agreeableness (friendly/compassionate vs. challenging/detached) Neuroticism (sensitive/nervous vs. secure/confident). Methods The methods mostly used in genomics of personality traits' studies are two: analytic methods and non-analytic ones (such as questionnaires). Analytic Analytical techniques that can be used to measure genomics of personality include: GWAS, genome wide association study is a method used to define markers (these markers are single nucleotide polymorphism, SNPs) across the genomes in order to better understand the contribution of genetics to personality traits. Since SNPs occur in the DNA between genes, GWAS technique aims to find those genes that are associated with certain personality traits, for example neuroticism was reported to be associated with intronic variant in MAGI1 and openness with variants near RASA1. Recently, UK Biobank achieved several SNPs that are associated with neuroticism. The first GWAS studies on all five human personality factors (i.e. neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience, conscientiousness and agreeableness) used a sample of 3972 individuals from an isolated population on Sardinia, Italy, and found 362 129 SNPs. DNA genotyping, which can be performed through different kits, for example: The CanineHD BeadChip containing 173,662 validated SNPs derived from the Dog Genome Sequencing Project. This chip has 99.99% of reproducibility, it is a PCR-free protocol, it provides a uniform genome-wide coverage by the 70 markers placed on the platform, it has a high-throughput (up to 12 samples in parallel) and it can be applied to the interrogation of genetic variation in any domestic dog breed. The full set of SNPs that it contains can be analysed with the purpose of explaining the proportion of the phenotypic traits' variances and to show the "genomic heritabilities" of the traits (considering the total of the autosomal and X-linked estimates). For example, the study that used this approach revealed a significant genetic variance present for most of the behavioural traits examined. The Infinium OmniExpress-24 BeadChip array containing 710,000 SNPs. The data obtained from the DNA genotyping can be filtered by many software, such the Genome Studio one, which is able to analyze SNP data across 5 million markers and probes and that can detect sample outliers. Moreover, the data can be then subjected to stringent quality controls, such that of PLINK v1.9. RNA sequencing can provide a more precise elucidation of common genetic influences on gene expression in the developing brain and the molecular differences that could confer susceptibility to neuropsychiatric disorders. With this technique combined to the GWAS, it was possible, to provide the first eQTL dataset derived exclusively from the human fetal brain. One example of protocol used to do it is the following: total RNA was treated with DNase and purified. Integrity of RNA was assessed and then RNA-Seq libraries were prepared using 1 μg of purified total RNA, depleting ribosomal RNA and modifying the RNA fragmentation times for lower RIN samples (<7). Also library size was assessed and then libraries were quantified. At the end, libraries were sequenced, generating at least 50 million read pairs (100 million reads) per sample. Whole-Genome Bisulfite Sequencing (WGBS) to examine DNA methylation in cellular subpopulations isolated from human brain tissue. This analysis is important, because DNA methylation differences between neuronal and non-neuronal populations have been widely reported and many neuropsychiatric diseases preferentially affect neuronal subpopulations present in particular brain regions. An example of WGBS protocol is the following: samples were fragmented and then they were bisulfite converted after size selection. Amplification was performed after the bisulfite conversion using Kapa Hifi Uracil + polymerase at the following cycling conditions: 98 °C 45 s/8 cycles: 98 °C 15 s, 65 °C 30 s, 72 °C 30 s/72 °C 1 min. Final libraries were run for quality control purposes. Then, libraries were quantified by qPCR. Libraries were also sequenced using a 125 bp paired-end single indexed run. Karyotyping is performed to determine fetal sex. Sex is a parameter considered as a covariate in some studies of characterization of personality traits. Candidate gene approach focus on genes whose function suggests an association with a trait. Originally, it was assumed that few key genes were responsible for the observed heritable variance of personality features. Even though the complexity behind the polygenicity of personality traits was demonstrated, candidate gene studies are still performed today. The small number of genes selected for this type of studies are included in neurotransmission patterns, like the ones involving dopamine and serotonin. The most studied candidate genes and polymorphism related to personality, with the most informative meta-analyses, are DRD4 and 5HTT. DRD4 encodes for the D4 dopamine receptor, while 5HTT encodes for a serotonin transporter responsible for the reuptake of this neurotransmitter. According to some publications, SNPs in DRD4 are associated with extraversion and novelty seeking. Also variations in 5HTT are associated with neuroticism and harm avoidance. Family and twins studies: The studies of genomics of personality traits involves families and specifically twins, because they have a high heritability of the traits. The families and twins studies have showed that personality traits are moderately heritable, and can predict various lifetime outcomes, including psychopathology. The identical twins have a heritability of 40%, suggesting that the additive genetic effects are responsible for the variance of personality traits for a moderate portion. Family and adoption studies have yielded of approximately 30%. The sex is not involved in heritability of personality traits, on the other end environmental differences can increase or decrease the importance of genetic factors. Twins data shows that genetic influences contribute to personality stability and are relatively constant with age whereas environmental influence on personality increases with age. In addition, twin and family studies show strong genetic correlations across diverse cognitive domains, suggesting pleiotropy, and across levels of ability, substantiating the view of general intelligence as an etiological continuum. The families have members affected by psychiatric disorder, because these diseases can be considered as extremes of normal tendencies and personal traits. It is intended to foster a biological analysis of behavior in order to study neurological disorder and find a correlation with human personality, meaning that heritable variation in personality traits would share a common genetic basis with psychiatric diseases. The geneticists define the phenotype of the patients following the Human Phenotype Ontology (HPO) which provides a standardized vocabulary of phenotypic abnormalities encountered in human disease. The study of complex trait in genetics presents a gap defined as "missing heritability", so a single genetic variations cannot account for much of the heritability of diseases, behaviors, and other phenotypes. For example, a person susceptibility to disease may depend more on the combined effect of all the genes in the background than on the disease genes in the foreground, or the role of genes may have been severely overestimated. Non analytic Non-analytic methods mainly use approach is that of questionnaire, here discuss: Questionnaires: As previously mentioned, questionnaires were often used as another tool to analyze the association of a behaviour to genetic variances. In some studies, questionnaires were indirectly given at the owners of the animals involved in the experiment and in other studies they were directly given to the patients involved. These questionnaires were: C-BARQ, which stands for Canine Behavioural Assessment and Research Questionnaire. It is a survey-based approach used in a large number of studies on dog behaviour, where the dog owner's answers to validated questionnaires to assess the personality traits of the dog. C-BARQ was developed at the University of Pennsylvania and its reliability, validity and standardized test scores support its use as a tool in behavioural researches. The C-BARQ survey contains 101 questions regarding the dog's behavioural response to various situations, with answers marked on a five-step scale. Depending on the results obtained from the compilation of the survey the dogs are divided into 11-14 behavioural traits' groups. Demographic questionnaires about general information of the dogs, such as sex, neuter status, housing, coat colour, health status, exercise per day and "Role" (based on the activities of the dog). The data obtained from questionnaires can be analysed by the Mixed Linear Model (REML) approach, that provides a consistent and accurate estimation of non-normally-distributed traits. This approach can be implemented using software as ASReml. Self-report questionnaires, which investigate several aspects of participants' life. Some examples are the following: The Eysenck Personality Questionnaire (EPQ), defines 3 traits of personality: psychoticism (characterized by aggressiveness and interpersonal hostility), extraversion (manifested in outgoing, energetic behaviour) and neuroticism (typified by emotional stability). The Tridimensional Personality Questionnaire (TPQ) defines 3 traits of personality that are based on the biochemical bases of temperament: novelty seeking, harm avoidance and reward dependence. The Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI) defines 4 personality: persistence (or perseverance despite fatigue or frustration), self-directedness (the ability to modify behaviour in order to achieve personal goals), cooperativeness (the tendency to exhibit agreeable relations with others) and self-transcendence (associated with experiencing spiritual aspects of the self). The Five Factor model (NEO-PI) is based on biological mechanisms shaping 5 higher-order traits (the big five): neuroticism (proneness to experience negative affect), extraversion (motivation to engage with others), openness to experience (inventive or curious behaviour), agreeableness (friendliness and compassion toward others) and conscientiousness (attentive and organized behaviour). This questionnaire is the most commonly used for genetic studies and it has also derivative types, such as the NEO-PI-R and NEO-FFI. UK Biobank self-report questionnaire has several questions related to loneliness and social isolation and it permit to identify cases and controls and then also to compare genetic differences. Some examples of questions are: 'Do you often feel lonely?', to which individuals answered 'yes' (recorded as cases) or 'no' (controls); other questions are based on the quality of social interactions as: 'How often are you able to confide in someone close to you?' (cases were defined as those who answered 'Never or almost never', controls were defined as those who answered 'Almost daily'). Correlation with psychiatric disorders Scientists demonstrated that most of personality traits cluster together and they also cluster with most neuropsychiatric disorders and are therefore related. In research, scientists used linkage disequilibrium regression score to investigate the correlation between personality traits and psychiatric disorder. According to LDSC, there is a positive correlation between major depression disorder and neuroticism and a small correlation between schizophrenia and neuroticism; these correlation have also been confirmed in twins studies. Also, neuroticism and openness show strong genetic correlation. Besides, scientists found that there is a positive correlation between first principal component and all psychiatric disorders, but first principal component showed negative correlation with conscientiousness and agreeableness. Personality features are highly linked with mental, social and physical outcome. For example, scientists realized that schizophrenia and bipolar disorders cluster with openness. Moreover, they demonstrated that ADHD shows the highest correlation with personality trait especially extraversion. Recently, the negative correlation between neuroticism and loneliness was identified as well as a strong correlation between anxiety and neuroticism. Plus, narcissism, psychopathy and Machiavellianism have association with low agreeableness. In general, neuroticism and other personality traits show negative correlation, while openness, extraversion, agreeableness and conscientiousness shows positive correlation. Example for the genes that they find to be correlative are: Within 8p23.1, MTMR9 has intronic variant which has association with extraversion and also with neuroticism shows inverse association. Another one is 12q23.3, WSCD2 which is found for extraversion, by using GWAS, it had been shown that this locus has association with bipolar disorder. In addition, L3MBTL2 is associated with both schizophrenia and neuroticism. Another gene is DRD4 which has association with both ADHD and novelty seeking behavior. Examples Genetic basis of Dog Personality Traits: in different genomes of dogs, several SNPs are found close to genes with known neurological or behavioral functions. The TH (tyrosin hydroxylase) gene, whose product is LDOPA, the precursor of the neurotransmitter dopamine, is located 1 Mb from the SNP on CFA18 associated with agitated behaviour. Mutation in this gene cause hyperactivity disorder. The TH gene has been associated with activity, impassivity, and inattention in two dog breeds. The SNP associated with NoiseFear is located 0.27 Mb from CADPS2 on CFA20. CADPS2 is a member of a gene family encoding calcium-binding proteins that regulate the exocytosis of neuropeptide encompassing (dense-core) vesicles from neurons and neuron endocrine cells. The gene and its variants have been associated with autism in humans and noise phobia reported for dogs with this SNPs. Similar SNPs in dogs and in humans are correlated with the same gene which has different outcomes in terms of personality traits. Intelligence is one of the traits that are affected by genetics. Inherited DNA differences are responsible for substantial individual differences in intelligence test scores the 10% variance in intelligence scores explained by the SNP heritability. From twins studies it is possible to consider neuroticism as a heritable trait, as shown in a meta-analysis of data from over 29 000 twin pairs, in which they found this correlation in 16 twin pairs, independently from the sex of individuals. Limitations GWAS studies require very large sample size in order to be able to identify the polymorphisms which are responsible for the variance observed, since personality traits are influenced by many genes, each one explaining only a small amount of variations (1 – 2%). Whole genome bisulfite sequence method has some limitations, because it is an exclusively qualitative method, so, it is possible to analyze the methylation status of only a limited number of CpG dinucleotides. Candidate gene association studies led to inconsistent and inconclusive results due to the fact that the effect of the loci under study was considered to be much larger than it really was, wrong assumptions were made regarding the importance of genes related to key neurotransmitter systems, regulatory and noncoding regions were not taken into consideration. Family and twins studies may result in the confounding of pedigree genetic effects with shared family environmental effects. Moreover, shared environment effects could obscure dominance variation causing dizygotic twins to appear more alike than monozygotic twins. See also Big Five personality traits References External links Human Phenotype Ontology Genomics

Chitta (Buddhism)

Citta (Pali and Sanskrit: , pronounced chitta) is one of three overlapping terms used in the Nikaya to refer to the mind, the others being manas and viññāṇa. Each is sometimes used in the generic and non-technical sense of "mind" in general, and the three are sometimes used in sequence to refer to one's mental processes as a whole. However, their primary uses are distinct. Usage The Pali–English Dictionary translates citta as heart or heart-mind, emphasizing it as more the passionate side of the mind, as opposed to manas as the intellect that grasps mental objects (dhamma). Citta is the object of meditation in the third part of Satipatthana, also called Four Foundations of Mindfulness. Citta primarily represents one's mindset, or state of mind. It is the term used to refer to the quality of mental processes as a whole. Citta is neither an entity nor a process; this likely accounts for its not being classified as a skandha, nor mentioned in the paticcasamuppada formula. In Indian Psychology, chitta is the seat and organ of thought. The complex causal nexus of volitions (or intentions) that one experiences continuously conditions one's thoughts, speech, and actions. At any given time, one's state of mind reflects that complex; thus, the causal origin of actions, speech, and thoughts is sometimes associated with the state of mind in a manner of speaking. This does not mean that it is that causal nexus; it is better understood as an abstract reflection. One's mindset can be out of tune with one's desires or aspirations. In that it reflects the volitions, the citta is said to go off with its own will if not properly controlled. It may lead a person astray or, if properly controlled, directed and integrated, ennobling one. One may "make citta turn according to" his wishes most effectively by developing skill in meditative concentration, which brings mental calm and clarity. An individual undergoes many different states of mind; M.II.27 asks: "Which citta? for citta is manifold, various, and diverse." Generally speaking, a person will operate with a collection of changing mindsets, and some will occur regularly. While these mindsets determine the personality, they do not control themselves but fluctuate and alternate. There is thus the need for the meditative integration of personality to provide a greater, more wholesome consistency. Regarding volitions, there is a similarity between viññāna and chitta; they are both associated with the qualitative condition of a human being. Viññāna provides awareness and continuity by which one knows one's moral condition, and citta is an abstraction representing that condition. Citta is closely related to volitions; this connection is also etymological, as chitta comes from the same verbal root in Pali as the active terms meaning "to will". Citta also reflects one's cognitive condition/progress. Citta as a mindset can become "contracted" (i.e. unworkable), "distracted", "grown great", "composed", or the opposite of such qualities (M.I.59). It can be dominated by a certain emotion, to be "terrified", "astonished", or "tranquil." It can be "taken hold of" by pleasant or unpleasant impressions (M.I.423). A host of negative emotionally charged states can pertain to it, or it may be free of such states, so it is vital to develop or purify it: "For a long time this chitta has been defiled by attachment, hatred, and delusion. By defilement of chitta, beings are defiled; by purity of chitta, beings are purified" (S.III.152). Attaining a purified citta corresponds to attaining liberating insight. This indicates that a liberated state of mind reflects no ignorance or defilements. As these represent bondage, their absence is described in terms of freedom. See also Chit (consciousness) Luminous mind Mental factors (Buddhism) Vijñāna Yogachara References Further reading External links Thich Nhat Tu, Nature Of chitta, Mano And Viññāṅa Buddhist philosophical concepts

Genophobia

Genophobia or coitophobia is the physical or psychological fear of sexual relations or sexual intercourse. The term erotophobia can also be used when describing genophobia. It comes from the name of the Greek god of erotic love, Eros. Genophobia can induce panic and fear in individuals, much like panic attacks. People who suffer from the phobia can be intensely affected by attempted sexual contact or just the thought of it. The extreme fear can lead to trouble in romantic relationships. Those afflicted by genophobia may stay away from getting involved in relationships to avoid the possibility of intimacy. This can lead to feelings of loneliness. Genophobic people may also feel lonely because they may feel embarrassed or ashamed of their personal fears. Etymology The word genophobia comes from the Greek nouns , meaning "offspring", and , meaning "fear". The word coitophobia is formed from the term coitus, referring to the act of copulation in which a male reproductive organ penetrates a female reproductive tract. Signs and symptoms Symptoms of genophobia can be feeling of panic, terror, and dread. Other symptoms are increased speed of heartbeat, shortness of breath, trembling/shaking, anxiety, sweating, crying, and avoidance of others. Causes There can be many different reasons for why people develop genophobia. Some of the main causes are former incidents of sexual assaults or abuse. These incidents violate the victim's trust and take away their sense of right to self-determination. Another possible cause of genophobia is the feeling of intense shame or medical reasons. Others may have the fear without any diagnosable reason. Rape Rape is the nonconsensual and unlawful act of sexual intercourse forced by one person onto another. This can include penetration, but does not have to. Victims of rape can be of any gender. "Rape is the most extreme possible invasion of a person's physical and emotional privacy." It is considered to be such a heinous crime because victims are attacked in a very personal manner and because physical force or deception can be utilized. Rape can be physically painful, but it can be more emotionally unbearable. Rape is often described as less of an invasion of the body and more of an invasion of "self". Victims often have intense emotional reactions, usually in a predictable order. This is known as rape trauma syndrome. Rape victims can experience added stress after the assault because of the way hospital staff, police personnel, friends, family, and significant others react to the situation. They can often feel lowered self-esteem and even a sense of helplessness. They long for a sense of safety and control over their lives. Rape victims can develop a fear of sex for physical and psychological reasons. During sexual assault, victims experience physical trauma such as soreness, bruising, pain, genital irritation, genital infection, severe tearing of vaginal walls, and rectal bleeding. They may also grapple with fear of the potential reoccurrence of assault. This possibility for rape can put stress on relationships as well. Some victims can become distrusting and suspicious of others. Rape victims can become fearful of sexual intercourse because of physical pain and mental anguish. Molestation Child molestation, or child sexual abuse, is a form of sexual assault in which a child, an adult or older adolescent abuses a younger child for sexual satisfaction. (A child can molest another child; this is defined as child-on-child sexual abuse). This can include talking to a child about having sex, showing pornography to a child, making a child participate in the production of pornography, exposing genitals to a child, fondling of a child's genitals, or forcing a child to engage in any form of sexual intercourse. Force is not often used in child molestation. Children usually cooperate because they are not fully aware of the significance of what is happening. They also may feel intimidated by the adult or older adolescent. Victims of child molestation often experience their feelings about the incidents later in life when they can fully understand the importance. They often feel that their privacy has been invaded when they were too young to consent. They can feel like they were taken advantage of and betrayed by those that they trusted. Victims of child molestation can experience long-term psychological traumas. This pushes them to distrust others. The lack of reliance on others can lead to an overall fear of sexual intercourse. Insecurities Some people may become afflicted with genophobia because of body image issues. Some men and women can become obsessively self-conscious of their bodies. This may be regarding their entire physique or it may be focused on one specific issue. Women may become insecure if they dislike the appearance of their labia majora or labia minora. Men may become genophobic if they suffer from erectile dysfunction. Others who grapple with gender dysphoria can also develop a fear of sex. Other fears Some sufferers of genophobia may develop the fear as a result of preexisting fears. Some people may have nosophobia: the fear of contracting a disease or virus. They may also have gymnophobia: the fear of nudity. Others may have extreme fear of being touched. These issues, along with stress disorders, can manifest themselves as the innate fear of sex. Treatments There is no universal cure for genophobia. Some ways of coping with or treating anxiety issues is to see a psychiatrist, psychologist, or licensed counselor for therapy. Some people experiencing pain during sex may visit their doctor or gynecologist. Medicine may also be prescribed to treat the anxiety brought on by the phobia. The independent film Good Dick centers on the theme of genophobia and how it affects a young woman and her relationships with people. It also, indirectly, deals with the theme of incest. The movie was written and directed by Marianna Palka and was released in 2008. See also Asexuality Corrective rape References Phobias Non-sexuality

Brain training

Brain training (also called cognitive training) is a program of regular activities purported to maintain or improve one's cognitive abilities. The phrase “cognitive ability” usually refers to components of fluid intelligence such as executive function and working memory. Cognitive training reflects a hypothesis that cognitive abilities can be maintained or improved by exercising the brain, analogous to the way physical fitness is improved by exercising the body. Cognitive training activities can take place in numerous modalities such as cardiovascular fitness training, playing online games or completing cognitive tasks in alignment with a training regimen, playing video games that require visuospatial reasoning, and engaging in novel activities such as dance, art, and music. Numerous studies have indicated that aspects of brain structure remain "plastic" throughout life. Brain plasticity reflects the ability for the brain to change and grow in response to the environment. There is ample debate within the scientific community on the efficacy of brain training programs and controversy on the ethics of promoting brain training software to potentially vulnerable subjects. Studies and interventions Cognitive training has been studied by scientists for the past 100 years. Cognitive training includes interventions targeted at improving cognitive abilities such as problem-solving, reasoning, attention, executive functions, and working memory. These kinds of abilities are targeted because they are correlated with individual differences such as academic achievement and life outcomes and it is thought that training general cognitive functions will lead to transfer of improvement across a variety of domains. Cognitive reserve is the capacity of a person to meet the various cognitive demands of life and is evident in an ability to assimilate information, comprehend relationships, and develop reasonable conclusions and plans. Cognitive training includes interventions targeted at improving cognitive abilities. One hypothesis to support cognitive training is that certain activities, done regularly, might help maintain or improve cognitive reserve. Cognitive training studies often target clinical groups such as people with neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer's and children with ADHD that experience general cognitive deficits. More broadly, it is thought that cognitive training may especially benefit older adults as there is a general decline in fluid intelligence with age as there are decreases in speed of processing, working memory, longterm memory, and reasoning skills. Some researchers argue that the lower performance of older adults on cognitive tasks may not always reflect actual ability as older adults may show performance decrements due to strategy choice, such as avoiding using memory retrieval in memory tasks. Conceptual basis Cognitive training is grounded in the idea that the brain is plastic. Brain plasticity refers to the ability for the brain to change and develop based on life experiences. Evidence for neuroplasticity includes studies on musical expertise and London taxicab drivers that have demonstrated that expertise leads to increased volume in specific brain areas. A  2008 study that trained older adults in juggling showed an increase in gray matter volume as a result of the training. A study attempting to train the updating component of executive function in young and older adults showed that cognitive training could lead to improvements in task performance across both of the groups, however, general transfer of ability to new tasks was only shown in young adults and not older adults. It has been hypothesized that transfer effects are dependent on an overlap in neural activation during the trained and transfer tasks. Cognitive training has been shown to lead to neural changes such as increased blood flow to the prefrontal cortex in attention training and decreased bilateral compensatory recruitment in older adults. Mental exercises Mind games for self-improvement fall into two main categories. There are mental exercises and puzzles to maintain or improve the actual working of the brain. Mental exercises can be done through simple socializing. Social interaction engages in many facets of cognitive thinking and can facilitate cognitive functioning. Cartwright and Zander noted that if an alien was visiting Earth for the first time, they would be surprised by the amount of social contact humans make. Caring for one another and growing up in a group setting (family) shows a certain degree of interdependence that shows deep phylogenetic roots. However, this social contact is declining in the United States. Face-to-face interaction is getting more and more sparse. Family and friend visits, including dinners, are not as common. The amount of social contact a person receives can greatly affect their mental health. A preference for being with others has a high correlation with well-being and with mental long-term and short-term effects on performance. There are many things involved in a simple interaction between two people: paying attention, maintaining in memory the conversation, adjusting to a different perspective than your own, assessing situational constraints, and self-monitoring appropriate behavior. It is true that some of these are automatic processes, but attention, working memory, and cognitive control are definitely executive functions. Doing all these things in a simple social interaction helps train the working memory in influencing social inference. Social cognitive neuroscience also supports social interaction as a mental exercise. The prefrontal cortex function involves the ability to understand a person's beliefs and desires. The ability to control one's own beliefs and desires is served by the parietal and prefrontal regions of the brain, which is the same region emphasizing cognitive control. The other category of mental exercises falls into the world of puzzles. Neurocognitive disorders such as dementia and impairment in cognitive functioning have risen as a healthcare concern, especially among the older generation. Solving jigsaw puzzles is an effective way to develop visuospatial functioning and keeping the mind sharp. Anyone can do it, as it is low-cost and can be intrinsically motivating. The important part about jigsaw puzzles is that it is challenging, especially compared to other activities, such as watching television. Engagement in such an intellectual activity predicts a lower risk in developing a cognition disorder later on in life. There is also the category of the self-empowering mind game, as in psychodrama, or mental and fantasy workshops – elements which might be seen as an ultimate outgrowth of yoga as a set of mental (and physical) disciplines. The ability to imagine and walk oneself through various scenarios is a mental exercise in itself. Self-reflection in this way taps into many different cognitive capabilities, including questioning rigid viewpoints, elaborating on experience, and knowing oneself through their relational context. Commercial programs By 2016, companies offering products and services for cognitive training were marketing them as improving educational outcomes for children, and for adults as improving memory, processing speed, and problem-solving, and even as preventing dementia or Alzheimers. They often have supported their marketing with discussion about the educational or professional background of their founders, some discuss neuroscience that supports their approach—especially concepts of neuroplasticity and transfer of learning, and some cite evidence from clinical trials. The key claim made by these companies is that the specific training that they offer generalizes to other fields—academic or professional performance generally or everyday life. CogniFit was founded in 1999, Cogmed in 2001, Posit Science in 2002, and Brain Age was first released in 2005, all capitalizing on the growing interest within the public in neuroscience, along with heightened worries by parents about ADHD and other learning disabilities in their children, and concern about their own cognitive health as they aged. The launch of Brain Age in 2005 marked a change in the field, as prior to this products or services were marketed to fairly narrow populations (for example, students with learning problems), but Brain Age was marketed to everyone, with a significant media budget. In 2005, consumers in the US spent $2 million on cognitive training products; in 2007 they spent about $80 million. By 2012, "brain training" was a $1 billion industry. In 2013 the market was $1.3 billion, and software products made up about 55% of those sales. By that time neuroscientists and others had a growing concern about the general trend toward what they called "neurofication", "neurohype", "neuromania", and neuromyths. Regulation and lawsuits Starting in January 2015, the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sued companies selling "brain training" programs or other products marketed as improving cognitive function, including WordSmart Corporation, the company that makes Lumosity, and Brain Research Labs (which sold dietary supplements) for deceptive advertising; later that year the FTC also sued LearningRx. The FTC found that Lumosity's marketing "preyed on consumers' fears about age-related cognitive decline, suggesting their games could stave off memory loss, dementia, and even Alzheimer's disease", without providing any scientific evidence to back its claims. The company was ordered not to make any claims that its products can "[improve] performance in school, at work, or in athletics" or "[delay or protect] against age-related decline in memory or other cognitive function, including mild cognitive impairment, dementia, or Alzheimer's disease", or "[reduce] cognitive impairment caused by health conditions, including Turner syndrome, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), traumatic brain injury (TBI), stroke, or side effects of chemotherapy", without "competent and reliable scientific evidence", and agreed to pay a $50 million settlement (reduced to $2 million). In its lawsuit against LearningRx, the FTC said LearningRx had been "deceptively claim[ing] their programs were clinically proven to permanently improve serious health conditions like ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder), autism, dementia, Alzheimer's disease, strokes, and concussions". In 2016, LearningRx settled with the FTC by agreeing not to make the disputed assertions unless they had "competent and reliable scientific evidence" which was defined as randomized controlled trials done by competent scientists." For the judgment's monetary component, LearningRx agreed to pay $200,000 of a $4 million settlement. Effectiveness Studies that try to train specific cognitive abilities often only show task-specific improvements, and participants are unable to generalize their strategies to new tasks or problems. In 2016, there was some evidence that some of these programs improved performance on tasks in which users were trained, less evidence that improvements in performance generalize to related tasks, and almost no evidence that "brain training" generalizes to everyday cognitive performance. In addition, most clinical studies were flawed. But in 2017, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine found moderate strength evidence for cognitive training as an intervention to prevent cognitive decline and dementia, and in 2018, the American Academy of Neurology guidelines for treatment of mild cognitive impairment included cognitive training. To address growing public concerns with regard to aggressive online marketing of brain games to older population, a group of scientists published a letter in 2008 warning the general public that there is a lack of research showing effectiveness of brain games in older adults. In 2010, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found that there was insufficient evidence to recommend any method of preventing age-related memory deficits or Alzheimer's. In 2014 another group of scientists published a similar warning. Later that year, another group of scientists made a counter statement, organized and maintained by the Chief Scientific Officer of Posit. They compiled a list of published studies on efficacy of cognitive training across populations and disciplines. In 2014, one group of over 70 scientists stated that brain games cannot be scientifically proven as being cognitively advantageous, whether that be in preventing cognitive decline or improving cognitive functioning. Another group argued the opposite, with over 130 scientists saying that there is valid evidence in the benefits of brain training. The question is how these two groups reached different conclusions in reading the same literature. Different standards on both sides can answer that question. In a more specific manner, there is indeed a great deal of evidence that brain training does indeed improve performance on trained tasks, but less evidence in closely related tasks. There is even less evidence on distantly related tasks. In 2017, a committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine released a report about the evidence on interventions for preventing cognitive decline and dementia. In 2017, a group of Australian scientists undertook a systematic review of what studies have been published of commercially available brain training programs in an attempt to give consumers and doctors credible information on which brain training programs are actually scientifically proved to work. After reviewing close to 8,000 studies about brain training programs marketed to healthy older adults, most programs had no peer reviewed published evidence of their efficacy. Of the seven brain training programs that did, only two of those had multiple studies, including at least one study of high quality: BrainHQ and CogniFit. In 2019, a group of researchers showed that claims of enhancement following brain training and other training programs have been exaggerated, based on a number of meta-analyses. Other factors, e.g., genetics, seem to play a bigger role. Cognitive training for Parkinson's disease A 2020 Cochrane review found no certain evidence that cognitive training is beneficial for people with Parkinson's disease dementia (PDD) or Parkinson's disease-related mild cognitive impairment (PD-MCI), however the authors also note that their conclusion was based on a small number of studies with few participants, limitations of study design and execution, and imprecise results, and that there is still an overall need for more robust studies involving cognitive training as it pertains to PDD and PD-MCI. See also Apensar, a "brain trainer" mobile game Brain training programs Cognitive intervention Environmental enrichment Neurocognition Neuroplasticity Sudoku Logic puzzle References Further reading Applied psychology Cognitive neuroscience Neuropsychology

Self psychology

Self psychology, a modern psychoanalytic theory and its clinical applications, was conceived by Heinz Kohut in Chicago in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, and is still developing as a contemporary form of psychoanalytic treatment. In self psychology, the effort is made to understand individuals from within their subjective experience via vicarious introspection, basing interpretations on the understanding of the self as the central agency of the human psyche. Essential to understanding self psychology are the concepts of empathy, selfobject, mirroring, idealising, alter ego/twinship and the tripolar self. Though self psychology also recognizes certain drives, conflicts, and complexes present in Freudian psychodynamic theory, these are understood within a different framework. Self psychology was seen as a major break from traditional psychoanalysis and is considered the beginnings of the relational approach to psychoanalysis. Origins Kohut came to psychoanalysis by way of neurology and psychiatry in the 1940s, but then 'embraced analysis with the fervor of a convert ... [and as] "Mr Psychoanalysis" ' took on an idealizing image of Freud and his theories. Subsequently, "in a burst of creativity that began in the mid-1960s ... Kohut found his voice and explored narcissism in new ways that led to what he ended up calling a 'psychology of the self'". Major concepts Self Kohut explained, in 1977, that in all he wrote on the psychology of the self, he purposely did not define the self. He explained his reasoning this way: "The self...is, like all reality...not knowable in its essence...We can describe the various cohesive forms in which the self appears, can demonstrate the several constituents that make up the self ... and explain their genesis and functions. We can do all that but we will still not know the essence of the self as differentiated from its manifestations. Empathy Kohut maintained that parents' failures to empathize with their children and the responses of their children to these failures were 'at the root of almost all psychopathology'. For Kohut, the loss of the other and the other's self-object ("selfobject") function (see below) leaves the individual apathetic, lethargic, empty of the feeling of life, and without vitality – in short, depressed. The infant moving from grandiose to cohesive self and beyond must go through the slow process of disillusionment with phantasies of omnipotence, mediated by the parents: 'This process of gradual and titrated disenchantment requires that the infant's caretakers be empathetically attuned to the infant's needs'. Correspondingly, to help a patient deal in therapy with earlier failures in the disenchantment process, Kohut the therapist 'highlights empathy as the tool par excellence, which allows the creation of a relationship between patient and analyst that can offer some hope of mitigating early self pathology'. In comparison to earlier psychoanalytic approaches, the use of empathy, which Kohut called "vicarious introspection", allows the therapist to reach conclusions sooner (with less dialogue and interpretation), and to create a stronger bond with the patient, making the patient feel more fundamentally understood. For Kohut, the implicit bond of empathy itself has a curative effect, but he also warned that 'the psychoanalyst ... must also be able to relinquish the empathic attitude' to maintain intellectual integrity, and that 'empathy, especially when it is surrounded by an attitude of wanting to cure directly ... may rest on the therapist's unresolved omnipotence fantasies'.) The conceptual introduction of empathy was not intended to be a "discovery." Empathic moments in psychology existed long before Kohut. Instead, Kohut posited that empathy in psychology should be acknowledged as a powerful therapeutic tool, extending beyond "hunches" and vague "assumptions," and enabling empathy to be described, taught, and used more actively. Selfobjects Self Objects are external objects when young. Over time the child learns to regulate her internal world through internalized self objects - think Bowen's differentiation, the person no longer needs the external object to regulate their inner world. We mature to Winnicott's object use. To be dependent on an external object in adulthood is explored in the world of codependency and the formation of fascism. The internal self objects and the healthy use of external objects function as part of the "self machinery". They are persons, objects or activities that "complete" the self, and which are necessary for normal functioning. 'Kohut describes early interactions between the infant and his caretakers as involving the infant's "self" and the infant's "selfobjects"'. Observing the patient's selfobject connections is a fundamental part of self psychology. For instance, a person's particular habits, choice of education and work, taste in life partners, may fulfill a selfobject-function for that particular individual. Selfobjects are addressed throughout Kohut's theory, and include everything from the transference phenomenon in therapy, relatives, and items (for instance Linus van Pelt's security blanket): they 'thus cover the phenomena which were described by Winnicott as transitional objects. Among 'the great variety of selfobject relations that support the cohesion, vigor, and harmony of the adult self ... [are] cultural selfobjects (the writers, artists, and political leaders of the group – the nation, for example – to which a person feels he belongs)'. If psychopathology is explained as an "incomplete" or "defect" self, then the self-objects might be described as a self-prescribed "cure". As described by Kohut, the selfobject-function (i.e. what the selfobject does for the self) is taken for granted and seems to take place in a "blindzone". The function thus usually does not become "visible" until the relation with the selfobject is somehow broken. When a relationship is established with a new selfobject, the relationship connection can "lock in place" quite powerfully, and the pull of the connection may affect both self and selfobject. Powerful transference, for instance, is an example of this phenomenon. Optimal frustration When a selfobject is needed, but not accessible, this will create a potential problem for the self, referred to as a "frustration" – as with 'the traumatic frustration of the phase appropriate wish or need for parental acceptance ... intense narcissistic frustration'. The contrast is what Kohut called "optimal frustration"; and he considered that, 'as holds true for the analogous later milieu of the child, the most important aspect of the earliest mother-infant relationship is the principle of optimal frustration. Tolerable disappointments ... lead to the establishment of internal structures which provide the basis for self-soothing.' In a parallel way, Kohut considered that the 'skilful analyst will ... conduct the analysis according to the principle of optimal frustration'. Suboptimal frustrations, and maladaptations following them, may be compared to Freud's trauma concept, or to problem solution in the oedipal phase. However, the scope of optimal (or other) frustration describes shaping every "nook and cranny" of the self, rather than a few dramatic conflicts. Idealizing Kohut saw idealizing as a central aspect of early narcissism. 'The therapeutic activation of the omnipotent object (the idealized parent image) ... referred to as the idealizing transference, is the revival during psychoanalysis' of the very early need to establish a mutual selfobject connection with an object of idealization. In terms of 'the Kleinian school ... the idealizing transference may cover some of the territory of so-called projective identification'. For the young child, ' idealized selfobjects "provide the experience of merger with the calm, power, wisdom, and goodness of idealized persons"'. Alter ego/twinship needs Alter ego/twinship needs refer to the desire in early development to feel alikeness to other human beings. Freud had early noted that 'The idea of the "double" ... sprung from the soil of unbounded self-love, from the primary narcissism which holds sway in the mind of the child.' Lacan highlighted 'the mirror stage ... of a normal transitivism. The child who strikes another says that he has been struck; the child who sees another fall, cries.' In 1960, 'Arlow observed, "The existence of another individual who is a reflection of the self brings the experience of twinship in line with the psychology of the double, of the mirror image and of the double".' Kohut pointed out that 'fantasies, referring to a relationship with such an alter ego or twin (or conscious wishes for such a relationship) are frequently encountered in the analysis of narcissistic personalities', and termed their transference activation 'the alter-ego transference or the twinship'. As development continues, so a greater degree of difference from others can be accepted. The tripolar self The tripolar self is not associated with bipolar disorder, but is the sum of the three "poles" of the body: "grandiose-exhibitionistic needs" "the need for an omnipotent idealized figure" "alter-ego needs" Kohut argued that 'reactivation of the grandiose self in analysis occurs in three forms: these relate to specific stages of development ... (1) The archaic merger through the extension of the grandiose self; (2) a less archaic form which will be called alter-ego transference or twinship; and (3) a still less archaic form ... mirror transference. Alternately, self psychologists 'divide the selfobject transference into three groups: (1) those in which the damaged pole of ambitions attempts to elicit the confirming-approving response of the selfobject (mirror transference); (2) those in which the damaged pole of ideals searches for a selfobject that will accept its idealisation (idealising transference); and those in which the damaged intermediate area of talents and skills seeks ... alter ego transference.' The tripolar self forms as a result of the needs of an individual binding with the interactions of other significant persons within the life of that individual. Cultural implications An interesting application of self psychology has been in the interpretation of the friendship of Freud and Jung, its breakdown, and its aftermath. It has been suggested that at the height of the relationship 'Freud was in narcissistic transference, that he saw in Jung an idealised version of himself', and that conversely in Jung there was a double mix of 'idealization of Freud and grandiosity in the self'. During Jung's midlife crisis, after his break with Freud, arguably 'the focus of the critical years had to be a struggle with narcissism: the loss of an idealized other, grandiosity in the sphere of the self, and resulting periods of narcissistic rage'. Only as he worked through to 'a new sense of himself as a person separate from Freud' could Jung emerge as an independent theorist in his own right. On the assumption that 'the western self is embedded in a culture of narcissism ... implicated in the shift towards postmodernity', opportunities for making such applications will probably not decrease in the foreseeable future. Criticism Kohut, who was 'the center of a fervid cult in Chicago', aroused at times almost equally fervent criticism and opposition, emanating from at least three other directions: drive theory, Lacanian psychoanalysis, and object relations theory. From the perspective of drive theory, Kohut appears 'as an important contributor to analytic technique and as a misguided theoretician ... introduces assumptions that simply clutter up basic theory. The more postulates you make, the less their explanatory power becomes.' Offering no technical advances on standard analytic methods in 'his breathtakingly unreadable The Analysis of the Self, Kohut simply seems to blame parental deficit for all childhood difficulties, disregarding the inherent conflicts of the drives: 'Where the orthodox Freudian sees sex everywhere, the Kohutian sees unempathic mothers everywhere – even in sex.' To the Lacanian, Kohut's exclusive 'concern with the imaginary', to the exclusion of the Symbolic meant that 'not only the patient's narcissism is in question here, but also the analyst's narcissism.' The danger in 'the concept of the sympathetic or empathic analyst who is led astray towards an ideal of devotion and samaritan helping ... [ignoring] its sadistic underpinnings' seemed only too clear. From an object relations perspective, Kohut 'allows no place for internal determinants. The predicate is that a person's psychopathology is due to unattuned selfobjects, so all the bad is out there and we have a theory with a paranoid basis.' At the same time, 'any attempt at "being the better parent" has the effect of deflecting, even seducing, a patient from using the analyst or therapist in a negative transference ... the empathic analyst, or "better" parent'. With the passage of time, and the eclipse of grand narrative, it may now be possible to see the several strands of psychoanalytic theory less as fierce rivals and more 'as complementary partners. Drive psychology, ego psychology, object relations psychology and self psychology each have important insights to offer twenty-first-century clinicians.' See also Metacognition True self and false self: Kohut References Psychotherapy Psychoanalytic schools Self Object relations theory

Hypostatic model of personality

The hypostatic model of personality is a view asserting that humans present themselves in many different aspects or hypostases, depending on the internal and external realities they relate to, including different approaches to the study of personality. It is both a dimensional model and an aspect theory, in the sense of the concept of multiplicity. The model falls into the category of complex, biopsychosocial approaches to personality. The term hypostasis can cover a wide range of personality-related entities usually known as type, stage, trait, system, approach. The history of the concept can be traced back to Peirce's hypostatic abstraction, or personification of traits. Different authors have described various dimensions of the self (or selves), personality dimensions and subpersonalities. Contemporary studies link different aspects of personality to specific biological, social, and environmental factors. The work on subpersonalities was integrated into a hypostatic model. The model describes personality aspects and dimensions, as well as intra- and interpersonal relations. Not the person whole and alone, nor the relationship, but the relation between parts of person(s) is held as a central element that promotes both personal and social organization and disorganization. Personality is viewed as both an agency and a construction, along with its development and psychopathology, as the model is accompanied by specific methods of assessment and therapy, addressing each of the personality dimensions. The hypostatic relations of the human mind also imply the existence of a hypostatic model of consciousness, representing the contents of consciousness as an identity of various aspects, different only with respect to each other, but tending to coincide in a certain aspect of their consideration. Overview The hypostatic model of personality is a way of viewing the many sides of a person's character. The model states that a person can behave and appear to others in many ways, depending on how that person is, but also on how that person is viewed by the others (scientists included). It also states that people are not one-sided, but are a little bit of everything. For example, today someone can be mean, and tomorrow they can be good. How people are and present themselves at one moment or another also depends on their biological state, and the situation or environment (the people and things around them). For example, sometimes the most cowardly person may become the greatest hero, if they are called to save someone's life. In order to be improved, all these "sides" of a person have first to be scientifically assessed. Historical background Origins and terminology The concept of hypostasis as the shared existence of spiritual and corporal entities has been used in a number of religious and intellectual settings. The word hypostasis means underlying state or underlying substance, and is the fundamental reality that supports all else. The Neoplatonic philosopher Plotinus writes about three hypostases: Soul, Intellect (nous) and the One. The Christian view of the Trinity is often described as a view of one God existing in three distinct hypostases. In the Kabbalah, the ten sephirot are the hypostases of God, capable of being known, as opposed to his absolute essence, which is inaccessible to knowledge. Charles Sanders Peirce introduced the concept of hypostatic abstraction, which is a formal operation that takes an element of information, such as might be expressed in a proposition of the form "X is Y", and conceives its information to consist in the relation between a subject and another subject, such as expressed in a proposition of the form "X has Y-ness". Hypostatic ethics has been described as the study of values in themselves, with all their relations, as agents and/or influencers of cognition and behavior. In linguistics, Leonard Bloomfield introduced the concept of hypostasis to describe the personification of an object or state in sentences as I'm tired of your buts and ifs. Aaron Rosanoff's theory of personality distinguishes seven dimensions (normal, hysteroid, manic, depressive, autistic, paranoid, and epileptoid), which can be epistatic or hypostatic dimensions, the manifestation of the latter being concealed or inhibited by the former. Variants and evolution: selves and dimensions In the philosophy of mind, double-aspect theory is the view that the mental and the physical are two aspects of the same substance. In his Principles of Psychology, William James describes four aspects of the self: material self (the body and the person's closest possessions and relatives, including the family); social self (the being-for-others); spiritual self (the person's inner and subjective being, her psychic faculties and dispositions, taken concretely); the "pure" ego (the bare principle of personal unity). Cognitive psychologist Ulric Neisser later described five "selves": ecological self, as directly perceived with respect to the immediate physical environment; interpersonal self, also directly perceived, established by specific emotional communication; extended self, based on memory and anticipation; private self (our private conscious experiences); conceptual self, a system of socially-based assumptions and theories about human nature in general and ourselves in particular. Carl Rogers distinguishes between the real self (the person as she is), and the ideal self (the person as the world told her she ought to be). Incongruence between these selves leads to feelings of anxiety. Facet theory asserts that social-behavioral concepts are multivariate, and therefore they could be better described in terms of their "facets" and dimensions rather than as undifferentiated wholes; this can also be done using multidimensional scaling. Hans Eysenck's three factor model of personality contains the independent dimensions of extraversion, neuroticism, and psychoticism; these different dimensions are caused by the properties of the brain, which themselves are the result of genetic factors. The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory uses ten clinical scales measuring dimensions whose development and correlations in an individual determine her pathological tendencies. The Big Five model describes five personality dimensions that affect the whole behavior, with each dimension having several facets. The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders used an axial (dimensional) and categorical system of diagnosis. DSM-IV takes into account five dimensions: mental state, global personality, physical condition, environment, and global functioning of the person. Towards a contemporary integration Differentiation between various mental states and behavior patterns on the basis of their relation with brain and social environment became commonplace in contemporary psychology and sociology. On the biopsychological side, functional MRI studies have shown that different behavioral and mental activities involve specific patterns of brain activation, corresponding to psychological states. C. Robert Cloninger defines three independent dimensions of personality, which are related to heritable variation in patterns of response to specific types of environmental stimuli; variation in each dimension is strongly correlated with activity in a specific central monoaminergic pathway: novelty seeking, with frequent exploratory activity and intense excitement in response to novel stimuli, and with low basal dopaminergic activity; harm avoidance, with intense responses to aversive stimuli and a tendency to learn to avoid punishment, novelty, and non-reward passively, and with high serotonergic activity; reward dependence, with intense responses to reward and succorance and a tendency to learn to maintain rewarded behavior, and with low basal noradrenergic activity. These neurobiological dimensions interact to give rise to integrated patterns of differential responses to punishment, reward, and novelty. On the social-environmental side, role theory defines the role as a set of connected behaviors, rights and obligations as conceptualized by actors in a social situation. Thus, roles can be: cultural roles: roles given by culture (e.g. priest); social differentiation: e.g. teacher, taxi driver; situation-specific roles: e.g. eyewitness; bio-sociological roles: e.g. as human in a natural system; gender roles: as a man, woman, mother, father, etc. Intersectionality is a methodology of studying "the relationships among multiple dimensions and modalities of social relationships and subject formations". Roberto Assagioli uses the term "subpersonalities" for the social roles the person plays in different groups, roles that are mere "characters" played by the person, being different from her central inner Self. As a core idea of his transactional analysis, Eric Berne asserts that there are at least three "persons" in each of us, calling them our "ego states": the Child (the emotional in us), the Adult (the rational in us), and the Parent (the authoritarian in us). As functioning as a “society of mind”, the self is populated by a multiplicity of “self-positions” that have the possibility to entertain dialogical relationships with each other. Internal Family Systems Model combines systems thinking with the view that mind is made up of relatively discrete subpersonalities each with its own viewpoint and qualities. Description At a metatheoretical level, the hypostatic model argues that persons have several kinds of aspects, including, but not limited to: Adaptive aspects, pertaining to the internal organization of the person and the way she adapts to environment, including through actions and relations; Constitutive aspects – the ways in which personality is constituted within its relations with the organism and the external world; Temporal aspects, which represent the totality of forms that the person takes along the time line, short or long – including actions, states of consciousness, and developmental stages; Referential aspects, which are the ways the person is perceived by herself or by the others (including personality scientists and theorists); Integrative aspects – various combinations of the previous, which can be (or have been) the object of numerous research projects in psychology and related fields. Organization of personality Many schools of psychotherapy see subpersonalities as relatively enduring psychological structures or entities that influence how a person feels, perceives, behaves, and sees him- or herself. According to the hypostatic model, human personality consists of four components or hypostases, which are patterns of behavior related to specific systems in the brain, and are conceptualized by virtually every culture as being characteristic and/or essential to humans: the basic cognitive component – "Homo sapiens" (the intelligent person), which is in connection with sensory areas of the cerebral cortex; the verbal subsystem – "Homo Loquens" (the speaking, communicating, and [self-]controlling person), which is connected with the activities of association areas; the emotional and motivational subsystem – "Homo Potens" (the powerful and energetic person), which is correlated with the activity of the limbic system; the pragmatic (motor) component – "Homo faber" (the productive and industrious person), which is linked to motor cortex activity. One of these aspects can dominate the person, and lead to the development of – and adherence to – various philosophical views and schools: Cognitive-intuitive aspect focuses on concrete, immediate data, which are not subject of any kind of selection – it originated philosophical empiricism; Cognitive-intellectual aspect is only guided by reason; it leads to rationalism; Verbal aspect is dominated by all that is meaningful – it leads to philosophical nominalism; Emotional-hedonistic aspect views action as strictly limited to providing pleasure – it corresponds to philosophical hedonism; Emotional-idealistic aspect is dominated by superior motives of contributing to the world in accepted ways – it leads to stoicism; Pragmatic aspect values only things that facilitate practical action – it generates pragmatism. Human behavior is generated through the interaction and coupling of these human aspects, creating personality dimensions. The six behavioral, mental, and personality dimensions are: cognitive behavior, generated by cognitive and verbal aspects; practical behavior, produced by verbal and motor components; affective behavior, conducted by cognitive and motivational components; expressive behavior, "co-worked" by motivational and motor components; personality regulation, provided by verbal and motivational aspects, which form the regulative axis of personality; general perceptual–motor adaptation, performed by the cognitive component together with the motor component, which form the adaptive axis of personality. These dimensions correspond to the following types of mental operations: cognitive operations – production and verbalization of images and thoughts; practical operations, pertaining to executive functions; affective operations – affective evaluation of the world and self; expressive operations (emotional expression); regulative operations – verbalization of needs, motives and feelings, and self-control; perceptual–motor adaptive operations (e.g., eye–hand coordination). In every specific task of daily life, one of the first four dimensions (cognitive, practical, affective, or expressive) is dominant, being at the center of the experience, whereas the other three are subordinated to it. Regulative and adaptive dimensions are constantly acting as a background throughout the behavioral process. The six personality dimensions are described as follows: Consciousness is the level of mental (cognitive) development; Strength is the overall capacity of the person to change or influence her surroundings, which is distinct from the vital or mental energy that she expresses; Values are what is most important or valuable to a person, and they imply evaluating what is good vs. what is bad; Energy is a subjective measure of the strength or intensity of personality (the vital or mental energy that it expresses through behavior); Direction refers to the person's attitudes, motives, and intentions that regulate her behavior; Depth refers to the levels of complexity of behavior, ranging from simple reactions to complex adaptive patterns. This is a composite view in which the six dimensions combine in complex ways to form "the web and woof of human personality". Within this view, the concrete, developing person may be represented as a point or a small three-dimensional object. Her trajectory for growth is to expand from that point in multiple dimensions to become a sphere, developing her four specific dimensions of knowledge, capacity, power, and enjoyment. Personality as an agency and as a construction In addition to this "doing" dimension of personality, there is also a "being made" dimension, including the constitutive axes – each one formed of a mental content (which can be cognitive, verbal, motivational, or pragmatic, depending on the personality aspect), a mental and behavioral activity related to it (which can be cognitive, practical, affective, expressive, regulative, or adaptive), and their brain and environmental correlates, respectively. Each constitutive axis consists of two couples: one formed by a brain factor and the corresponding behavior, shaping a mental (memory) content and structuring a "trait" or recurrent behavior, and the other one formed by that mental content and its environmental correlate, generating the specific behavior (functioning). For example, assertive behavior is determined by environmental factors and assertiveness, whereas assertiveness itself is the product of both brain predisposition and assertive behavior. An obsessive-compulsive individual maintains his obsessions (content) if often left alone with his predisposing brain and ritualistic behaviors. A shy person (trait) displays less shy behavior when in a familiar environment. This model provides a picture of the emergent relations between personality structuring, mental functioning (behavior), environment, and biology. Cognitive and affective "paths": brain imaging data Research using functional magnetic resonance imaging of the brain suggests that cognitive and affective-expressive forms of communication and self-reflection have distinct neural bases. Clinical findings have long suggested that verbalizations are often very incoherent when the individual is trying to put into words something deeply emotional. Identification of words naming emotions (happy, neutral, sad) was found to be faster than identification of corresponding facial expressions. Recognition of face expressions was more difficult to suppress in favor of the recognition of words than vice versa, the two conditions presenting different patterns of brain activation. These experimental results suggest that reading and recognition of face expressions are stimulus-dependent and perhaps hierarchical behaviors, hence recruiting distinct regions of the medial prefrontal cortex. Research indicates that the representations of faces and objects in ventral temporal cortex are widely distributed and overlapping, face stimuli eliciting response patterns distinct from those elicited by object stimuli. The phenomena that have been characterized clinically as “unconscious communication” may be defined systematically as emotional communication, which occurs both within and outside of awareness. Research suggested that the fundamental mechanism at the basis of the experiential understanding of others’ actions is the activation of the mirror neuron system. A similar mechanism, but involving the activation of viscero-motor centers, underlies the experiential understanding of the emotions of others. Activation of mirror neurons in a task relying on empathic abilities without explicit task-related motor components supports the view that mirror neurons are not only involved in motor cognition but also in emotional interpersonal cognition. Evidence suggests that there are at least two large-scale neural networks: frontoparietal mirror-neuron areas related to perceptual-motor interactions with others, and cortical midline structures that engage in processing information about the self and others in cognitive and evaluative terms. Relations According to the model, intrapersonal relations can be: direct (adjusted) relations (cognitive decision followed by practical action: "I decided that's better for me to leave my boyfriend, and I told him that", or affective decision followed by expressive action: "I love my girlfriend, so I'm always gentle with her"); crossed (unadjusted) relations (cognitive decision followed by expressive action: "Today I decided that it's better for me to break up with my girlfriend, and I'll behave so that she will leave me", or affective decision followed by practical action: "We love each other; that's why we are moving in together"). Interpersonal relations can also be: direct (cognitive reaction to another person's practical action: "My girlfriend wants to make up with me, and I agree, because that's better for both of us", or affective reaction to the other's expressive action: "She loves me, I can feel it in her eyes"); crossed (affective reaction to other's practical action: "My partner wants to buy me a house, and therefore I assume he/she loves me", or cognitive reaction to an expressive action of another person: "He is giving me a bitter look, and I'm wondering what is wrong?"). The locus of a relational disorder "is on the relationship rather than on any one individual in the relationship." The self The self is the self-reflective dimension of mental life, which has long been considered as the central element and support of any experience, as the notion of "subject of experience" suggests. There is only one "me", but she is not always center stage. Sometimes people are so focused on a task that they forget themselves altogether. The self is in fact at the center of the experience only during self-evaluation. In cognitive, affective, practical, and expressive tasks, consistency of specific operations involved in accomplishing the tasks was found to be significantly higher than consistency of the results of self-assessment involved in the same tasks. Standard ways to tackle the self by considering self-evaluation do not target the self in its specificity. Instead, what is specific to the self is the subjective perspective, which is not intrinsically self-evaluative but rather relates any represented object to the representing subject. Unconscious phenomena As adaptive and regulative axes of personality provide integration of consciousness and personality, certain unconscious phenomena may result from the incomplete integration of one of these axes. For example, in subliminal perception, the adaptive, perceptual-motor axis is not properly integrated with other mental operations, and in dissociative disorders, the regulative axis is the one affected. If one of the axes does not function properly, both consciousness and performance in specific tasks are impaired. Intelligence and personality Intelligence and personality are often seen as fundamentally different, a fact which ignores both the performance aspect of personality, and intelligence-related traits. Thus, cognitive and emotional instruments are artificially separated from their energetic and value contents. The concept of dimensional capacity is therefore proposed as a binder of behavioral performance and content. Biological and social adaptation The hypostatic model suggests that human behavior is usually the result of the random interference of two separate behavior systems: the "animal" system (biological adaptation) and the "human" system (social adaptation), both having the same biological underpinnings and partially sharing the same behavioral repertoire with different effects, not directly related. For example, while homosexual behavior does not have biological (reproductive) effect, it has social adaptive value in cultures that permit it or, as in ancient Greece, require it. Also, heterosexual behavior can have reproductive effect, but has no social adaptive value in monks or nuns. Cosmetic surgery has no biological value, but can be highly valued by society, while taking sleeping medication may have a biologically adaptive effect, but may not be socially adaptive in ascetic cultures. People can eat because they are hungry (biological adaptation), or because they like good food or want to enjoy the company of others (social adaptation). They can have sex to fulfill their sexual and reproductive needs (biological adaptation), or to fulfill their love, have children to bear their name, or simply have a good time together (social adaptation). People can use the same instinctual or learned behavior to different adaptive purposes, biological or social. In critical situations, biological and social fields of adaptation converge, forming an integrated, bio-social adaptation system: confronted with new and spreading disease and risk factors, modern medicine made people live longer, healthier, more productive lives, and that, in turn, set the ground for further progress of civilization. Nobel laureate Ralph M. Steinman prolonged his life with the help of his own scientific discoveries, and this allowed him to continue research in cancer immunotherapy. Preliminary experiments needing extensive verification have suggested that in well-rested subjects, engaging in "biological" behavior (eating, sex) does not lead to lowering of mental energy levels, as measured with a self-assessment scale, and engaging in "psychosocial" behavior (cognitive tasks) does not lead to lowering of physical energy levels (measured with a similar scale). However, in subjects with exhaustion both results were positive (feeding-related and sexual activities lowered both physical and mental energy levels, and engaging in cognitive tasks did the same). These results have been interpreted as an indication that biological and social systems of adaptation are energetically independent in "normal" conditions, and become energetically integrated (create a common pool of energy) in exhausting, "heavy duty" situations. Decision making and free will Subjects who had the possibility to choose freely between performing different cognitive, practical, affective, and expressive tasks reported that they chose each task because they either a) felt the need to do it, b) considered this was the task they could perform most efficiently in given circumstances, or c) for both previous reasons. Not one of the three reasons above was statistically prevalent. This research suggested that human freedom can be scientifically interpreted in terms of an internal selection of environmental stimuli and internal variables, a selection which has a randomly variable, cognitive or affective locus. People with transient mental disorders, as well as people without disorders acted according to a probabilistic model, whereas those with chronic disorders showed a more deterministic pattern of behavior. Personality development Development pertains to long term change versus stability of personality. According to the hypostatic view, the actual development of a person is the result of the opposition between stimulating and inhibiting factors of development, factors that are biological and environmental in nature. If stimulating factors are dominant, then developmental progress results (new acquisitions are made); if inhibiting factors are dominant, then the result is developmental regression (acquisitions are lost). If the two kind of factors are of relatively equal force, development is stagnant. Development can be accelerated, decelerated, or of uniform speed, depending on the dynamics of the relation between stimulating and inhibiting factors. Childhood and adolescence Some of the characteristics of personality development during childhood and adolescence are summarized in the table below. Adulthood During adulthood, the person is usually capable of creation and self-determination, and development can follow paths such as these: Evolutive–constructive–self-determined, which is characteristic to the free person who changes herself and the world she lives in according to her own projects; Stagnant–constructive–self-determined – the person who sacrifices her own evolution in order to invest her entire creative freedom in transforming the world (the "selfless creators"); Evolutive–reactive–self-determined – the person who uses her freedom mainly to determine her own evolution (personal achievement); Evolutive–reactive–determined – the person affected by compelling biological factors or environmental events, positive or negative, that restrain her freedom (e.g. disease, war, winning the big pot); Stagnant–reactive–determined is the submissive, responsive, and complying person who lives in a non-stimulating environment (a "dull" existence). Psychopathology The unusual, the unnatural, and the counter-cultural in the area of mental life have been – in all ages – "subject of astonishment and reflection for individual reason, object of exclusion and confinement for social action", being met with "reserve or even repulsion by the public and with interest and even fascination by thinkers". In all cultures, aspects of internal disorganization and adaptive inefficiency of the person have generally been considered abnormal, whether they were referenced as "demonic possession", "madness", "mental illness", or "deviance" by different societies and theories. People displaying an efficient disorganization of personality and behavior do their job in spite of the fact that they are not well organized, and are generally described as "strange" by others, while those presenting an inefficient organization are not successful in what they do, although their behavior is consistent; they have a high rate of failure, caused by a low level of acquisitions and/or functioning. Efficient adaptive patterns are those in which specific adaptive behavior is displayed only in situations that require it ("activating situations"), whereas inefficient adaptive patterns are those in which adaptive behavior is inappropriate in the given situation. Inefficient adaptive patterns can be hyperadaptive, when adaptive operations are active in both activating and non-activating situations (as in mania), or hypoadaptive, when adaptive operations remain inactive in both types of situations (as in depression). People tend to neglect stimuli with low cognitive or affective significance to them, as well as forget excessively intense emotions and information that is too difficult for them to understand. Experiments performed on individuals which were given cognitive and affective (evaluative) tasks much above their current levels of cognitive and emotional competence led to difficulties in remembering the difficult tasks, associated with lowering of performance in previously mastered tasks. Improving performance in simple, repetitive tasks in anxious patients improves memory of failed tasks as anxiety symptoms decrease. Broader applications The model of personality components and axes was extended to familial-organizational and societal levels.<ref name=crich>Crichton, A. "Personality Manipulation and Change Throughout Life" . The Philosopher's Zone.</ref> The model was also applied to the study of the historical evolution of human civilization in the process of globalization, as well as in the analysis of literary characters seen as novel creations "in humans' image" and part of the "neoverse" – the universe created by the author of a literary work. Methods Methodological parameters The hypostatic model uses several qualitative parameters for the assessment of personality investigation and intervention; these parameters can be applied to any scientific endeavor. Parameters of investigation assessment Experimental productivity is the difference between the system of hypotheses and the system of experimental data resulting from the research; it measures the efficiency and precision of scientific prediction – a greater difference means a lower predictability of the experiment. Experimental progress is the difference between the hypothetical structure of the research and the structure of its conclusions ("theses"); it represents the contribution to knowledge of that particular research project. A greater difference between hypotheses and conclusions means more new ideas suggested by the experimental outcome, thus a greater progress. Parameters of intervention assessment Intervention amplitude is the difference between the current state of the person and her state projected as the outcome of the intervention – the "ambition" of the intervention; Intervention efficacy is the ratio of goal structure to outcome structure of the intervention; Interventional effect (transformation or change) is the difference between the person before and after intervention – it indicates the degree of modification of personality induced by the mental health professional or educator. Nearest-neighbor comparison Nearest-neighbor comparison of two persons in a sample involves comparing a person A with the person B who has the closest match to A on one or more given criteria. It is also called the method of hypostatic definition, because of "defining" a person through her genus (in this case the nearest neighbor) by outlining her differentia. By comparing two very similar persons and trying to detect the differences between them, the researcher obtains a deeper knowledge of both persons. The steps of the technique are: finding the nearest neighbor B of the person A; comparing the two persons (A and B) and finding as many differences as possible based on the methods used in data gathering; rebuilding a richer picture of each person (A and B), based on the differences that have been identified. For example, person B is almost as aggressive as person A (nearest neighbor). Through comparison it is found that while A is most aggressive at home, B is most aggressive at work (difference). Comprehensive data about concrete aspects of human personality gathered from many individuals all over the world can be digitized and stored in a "hypostatic library" with practically limitless growing potential, given the current developments in computing technology; data in this library could be used as reference in further research and practice. Setting the goals for personality change In this kind of humanistic "psychological engineering", setting the goals for personality change is completely non-normative and non-judgemental. There is nothing wrong that must be remedied, no disease to cure, but an end state to be reached, like in the following goal formulations by the subjects and/or their families: "I want to be in a certain way, planned by me"; "I want to be like I was before"; "I want to be like other people"; "I want to be the way that others want me to be"; "I want to be different from how I am today". Summary of methods The model uses the following methods of assessment and intervention: biological and ecological assessment through methods of dynamic analysis of development, investigating the complex interplay of stimulating and inhibiting factors of development and their effects on developmental speed (acceleration or deceleration), with prognostic implications; cognitive and affective techniques (method of prints of consciousness, based on self-coverage and self-report; human liberty test, using free-choice activities in order to study probability in an individual's behavior); practical techniques (method of operational chains, a form of mental chronometry that ensured the identification of mental operations and allows the assessment of their speed and functionality); regulative techniques (task boosting techniques); perceptual-motor adaptation techniques (test of adaptive reactivity; method of adaptive therapy, based on non-specific perceptual-motor learning); psychopharmacological techniques, using drugs that act specifically on different constitutive axes of personality (cognitive, practical, affective, expressive); psycho-molecular method, influencing the activity of specific neurotransmitter systems through specific psychological tasks; the method is part of psycho-molecular medicine, which integrates details of molecular structure into upper, psychosocial levels of the human organism. relational techniques, which aim to "set the things straight" by assessing relations and replacing crossed (indirect) relations with direct (straight) relations. Psycho-molecular therapy The psycho-molecular method uses specific tasks in order to influence specific neurotransmitter systems. Through the control of the environment which is selectively enriched or deprived, some of the subject's brain areas can be stimulated or inhibited systematically, leading to changes in the seric levels of the metabolites of certain neurotransmitters, associated with clinical improvement in burnout individuals. Behavioral approaches have a critical impact on molecular patterns of autoregulation, leading to the assumption of a bio-psycho-socio-molecular model of autoregulation, including stress and pain. Thus, molecules and behavior may be seen as two sides of the same problem in pain and stress relief. Psycho-molecular techniques can be stimulating or inhibiting. Stimulating techniques involve the presence of environmental materials that allow a single type of activity (cognitive, practical, affective, or expressive). For example, the subject sits in a room where he has nothing else to do except read. Inhibiting techniques selectively exclude from the subject's environment materials that allow one specific type of activity, leaving all the other types available (for example, the subject can look at paintings, watch sports on TV, prepare his food, but has no books or other learning material in his room). Stimulating techniques are: Practical technique, that involves living at a farm where the sole activity is food foraging and preparation; Expressive technique, that involves relational experiences in a room where the subject lives together with another person; Cognitive technique, that puts the subject in a room where books and other learning material are the only object of activity; Affective technique, that involves placing the subject in a room where there are only art works and audio and video hardware for listening music and watching movies. Inhibiting techniques are: Cognitive technique, that excludes from the environment textbooks and other objects of cognitive behavior; Affective technique, that excludes sources of affective and aesthetic evaluation; Practical technique, that excludes home appliances, cleaning activities, preparing food, and setting the table; Expressive technique, that places the subject in a room with all facilities, but where interactions with other persons are reduced at a minimum. The control of the effects of these techniques is made through clinical scales and biochemical tests monitoring serum levels of metabolites of several stimulating and inhibiting neurotransmitters: dopamine (homovanillic acid), norepinephrine (3-methoxy-4-hydroxyphenylglycol), and serotonin (5-hydroxyindoleacetic acid). Although less spectacular than with psychopharmacological methods, the effect of psycho-molecular therapy is more complex and natural, and needs to be associated with psychopharmacological and psychotherapeutic treatments. Relational therapy Relational (or direct relations) therapy (RT) is a method of psychotherapy aimed at changing the relations between the four dimensions of doing – thinking, acting, feeling, and expressing, both within the person and in her relationships.Ostaciuc, Vasile (2002). "Codrin Stefan Tapu: Psihologie operatorie" (book review), Journal of Psychology. Romanian Academy, 1-2, 148-149 Goals The main goal of RT is improving client's communication and relationships through: 1. Replacing crossed intrapersonal relations with direct intrapersonal relations; instead of expressing what she thinks or acting out what she feels, the client should act the way she thinks and express what she feels. Characterological self-blame (through attributing affective and personal, relatively nonmodifiable sources to own actions) has been proved to be more depressogenic than behavioral self-blame (through attributing cognitive and impersonal, controllable sources to actions). For example, female victims of rape who said to themselves 'It was me, it was something I've done that provoked this' were more depressed than those who said 'The fact that I was walking through that part of the town caused the attack'. 2. Replacing crossed interpersonal relations with direct interpersonal relations; instead of feeling about others' acts or thinking about what others express, the client should think about others' acts and feel what others express. Many problems originate in acting to please or hurt others, and in being pleased or hurt by others' actions. Indications The indications of RT consist of all kinds of relational problems that may arise in dating, family and work relationships, casual social encounters, as well as anxiety, depression, and other mental problems. In the case of problems in stable relationships, both partners should be assessed and participate in sessions, if needed. Client-therapist relationship During therapy sessions, client and therapist promote direct relations between each other. For this they are required: to let their feelings for each other be expressed through their body language; to avoid verbalizing what they feel about each other; to freely and boldly verbalize what they think about one another; not to let their body language be the mean of communication of thoughts they do not dare utter; to try to feel each other's emotions as they are expressed through their body language; not to be emotionally moved by each other's actions, as in taking things personally; to reflect about the actions of each other; not to try to discover some meaning in each other's body language. Relational therapy is in accord with other psychotherapeutic approaches in understanding the nature of human relationships and the therapeutic mechanisms: many forms of psychotherapy, such as psychoanalysis, person-centered therapy, and cognitive therapy, aim ultimately to create direct relations between thoughts and actions, and between feelings and expressions, so as the client's thoughts really get in touch with her feelings, and her expressions really support her actions. Initial assessment The initial assessment in RT has two main objectives: to establish what is the main problem that led the client to therapy; to identify crossed relations within the person, and between her and others. Therapy sessions and techniques A typical session of RT involves the following steps: 1. The client presents her crossed relations, as they occurred since the last session; 2. The therapist asks the client how she thinks the correct relation should sound like, and tells her that, if she could not say; 3. The therapist, along with the client, tries to identify crossed intrapersonal relations in people with whom the client interacts; 4. The therapist asks the client about what she thinks she could do to counteract those crossed relations, in order to improve communication relationships with those people, and makes suggestions to her, if she has no ideas. Outcome assessment A final assessment through interview and questionnaire is made, to see: 1. If there are residual crossed relations in the client's life; 2. If she is able to prevent new crossed relations to occur; 3. If she is able to counteract crossed relations in others with whom she interacts, in order to maintain good communication relationships with those people; 4. To what extent the initial problems for which she addressed the therapist have been solved. Treating typical problems Interpersonal problems: relationship management Problem definition: I decided that's better for me to leave my boyfriend, and I tried to show him that (expressing thoughts through behavior). Problem solution: I decided that's better for me to leave my boyfriend, and I told him that (actively and explicitly communicating thoughts). Problem definition: My girlfriend wants to make up with me, and I'm thrilled about that, because that means that she loves me (feeling about the other's intended actions). Problem solution: My girlfriend wants to make up with me, and I think that's better for both of us (thinking about the other's intended actions). Problem definition: I love my girlfriend, and I always make her gifts (acting out feelings). Problem solution: I love my girlfriend, and I'm always gentle with her (expressing feelings). Problem definition: I can see in her eyes that she thinks I'm smart (thinking about other's expressions as indicating supposed thoughts). Problem solution: I can see in her eyes that she likes me (feeling other's expressions). An intrapersonal problem: fear of going to college First, client and therapist identify crossed intrapersonal relations, through the following scenario: I plan to go to college [thought], but I can't do it [expression]. Thoughts not acted out give rise to pathological expressions (symptoms), because only feelings – and not thoughts – can be really expressed nonverbally. This is a crossed relation between thought and expression; I feel anxious and afraid [feeling], and I try to do something about that [action]. This is a crossed relation between feeling and action – the client tries to change his feelings through voluntary action but, as expected, he is unable to. The first step of therapy consists of creating direct relations between feelings and expressions, and between thoughts and actions: I feel insecure [feeling], and that's why I can't go to college [expression]. The client interprets his inability to go to college as an emotional expression of his insecurity. This is a direct relation between feeling and expression; I plan to go to college [thought], and I try to do something about that [action], because I cannot simply command myself not to be afraid anymore (by means of rational decision). This is a direct relation between thought and action. In the second step of therapy, the natural result of establishing direct relations is that the problem ceases to exist: I plan to go to college [thought], and I try to take concrete steps in that direction [action]; I don't feel so anxious and afraid [the unwanted feeling is gone], and I feel I can go to college [the unwanted emotional expression is gone]. When I'm afraid about it [accepted feeling], I express my fears [accepted emotional expression]. Group interventions Relational therapy can be applied in families, organizations, and classrooms to change crossed relations and thus increase performance and satisfaction in work and learning. For example, confronted with a poor homework of a student, a teacher may think that by doing the homework that way, the student wants to defy him. If that is true, the problem is with the student – she tends to express her feelings indirectly, through her actions (feeling-action crossed intrapersonal relation). If that is not true, and the student was just lazy or incompetent, the problem is with the teacher – he tends to take personally and process emotionally the acts of others (action-feeling crossed interpersonal relation). Whatever the source of the problem, relations counselor uses both individual and couple interventions, based on drawing a relational matrix of the group, which shows crossed relations. If, for some reason, one of the partners could not be changed, the other may be taught to compensate his crossed (distorted) relation through another crossed relation, the result being an accurate communication at both rational and emotional levels. For example, if one of the partners is busy and does not have time to spend with the other, but does not dare to tell her that, and instead expresses that through his body language, the other learns to interpret this body language not as emotional indifference (what it seems to be), but as a sign of busyness (what it actually is), and thus she will not be hurt anymore. Evaluation Karl Jaspers criticized the hypostatic method as used in the study of personality, arguing that: Some presentations of the hypostatic model have been criticized for containing too many neologisms that make it difficult to understand, and for being "doomed to be incomplete". The model was praised for being "original" and "provocative", and for inaugurating the field of "concrete-systemic" or "hypostatic" psychology. It alludes to understanding the effects of illicit substances and disease, as well as the underlying change in personality which likely ensues in relation. It shows that personality is believed to be static and relatively in-changeable, whereas ideology is more dynamic than personality. The model was cited as one of the reference sources on the subjects of self, character, and personality. See also Cognitive-affective personality system Constructivist epistemology Contextualism Personality systematics Perspectivism Postmodernism Relationalism Second-order cybernetics Social neuroscience Systems psychology Notes References Berne, Eric (1979). Transactional Analysis. Ballantine Books. . Carter, Rita (2008). Multiplicity: The New Science of Personality, Identity, and the Self. Little Brown and Company. . Fall, Kevin A., Miner Holden, Janice, Marquis, Andre (2004). Theoretical Models of Counseling and Psychotherapy. Brunner-Routledge. . James, William (2001). Psychology: The Briefer Course. Dover. . Minsky, Marvin (1985). The society of mind. Simon & Schuster. . Rodriguez, Tessie J. (2009). Understanding Human Behavior. Rex Bookstore Inc. . Rowan, John (1990). Subpersonalities: The People Inside Us. Routledge . Schwartz, Richard C. (1997). Internal Family Systems Therapy. Guilford Press. . Starkey, William J. (2011). Cupid's Code: The Psychology of Relationships, Seduction, Marriage & Love. Morning Star Resources. . Tapu, Codrin Stefan (2001). Hypostatic Personality: Psychopathology of Doing and Being Made. Premier. . Tapu, Codrin Stefan (2011). Guide to Relational Therapy''. CAdPsy. . External links Dialogical self theory Hypostatic relationality Relational being Relational therapy Subpersonalities The singular self Personality theories Psychological models

Reflective practice

Reflective practice is the ability to reflect on one's actions so as to take a critical stance or attitude towards one's own practice and that of one's peers, engaging in a process of continuous adaptation and learning. According to one definition it involves "paying critical attention to the practical values and theories which inform everyday actions, by examining practice reflectively and reflexively. This leads to developmental insight". A key rationale for reflective practice is that experience alone does not necessarily lead to learning; deliberate reflection on experience is essential. Reflective practice can be an important tool in practice-based professional learning settings where people learn from their own professional experiences, rather than from formal learning or knowledge transfer. It may be the most important source of personal professional development and improvement. It is also an important way to bring together theory and practice; through reflection a person is able to see and label forms of thought and theory within the context of his or her work. A person who reflects throughout his or her practice is not just looking back on past actions and events, but is taking a conscious look at emotions, experiences, actions, and responses, and using that information to add to his or her existing knowledge base and reach a higher level of understanding. Bibliography Anderson, R., Anderson, B., and Anderson, J. (2019). ‘Nutritional management of chronic pancreatitis,’ Journal of chronic gastroenterology and Hepatology, 31(5), pp. 529-534. Alanezi, F Z. (2021) ‘Nurses attitude towards patient advocacy in a single Tertiary Care Hospital’, Nursing Open, 9(6), pp. 2602-2607. Bennett, O (1999) ‘Advocacy in nursing’, Nursing Standard, 14(11), pp 40-41 Buka, P. (2020) Essential law and ethics in nursing: Patients, rights and decision making. 3rd Ed. London: Routledge, Taylor and amp Francis Group Chaloner, C.(2007) ‘ An introduction to ethics in nursing’ Nursing Standard, 21(32), pp. 42-46 (no date) NHS choices. NHS. Available at: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/social-care-and-support-guide/making-decisions-for-someone-else/mental-capacity-act/ (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  (no date) NHS choices. NHS. Available at: https://www.healthcareers.nhs.uk/career-planning/career-planning/developing-your-health-career/developing-your-health-career/continuing-professional-development-cpd/continuing#:~:text=Personal%20and%20professional%20development%20helps,you%20practice%20safely%20and%20legally. (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  At a glance 31: Enabling risk, ensuring safety: Self-directed support and personal budgets (no date) Social Care Institute for Excellence. Available at: https://www.scie.org.uk/publications/ataglance/ataglance31.asp (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Better Care through collaboration (no date) Better care through collaboration - Care Quality Commission. Available at: https://www.cqc.org.uk/publications/major-reports/better-care-through-collaboration (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Care and support planning (no date) Mind. Available at: https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/legal-rights/health-and-social-care-rights/care-and-support-planning/ (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Certificate/Diploma in Health and Social Care - Oxford, Cambridge and ... (no date). Available at: https://ocr.org.uk/Images/139856-individual-needs-in-health-and-social-care.pdf (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Department of Health and Social Care (2014) Consultation to improve regulation of Health and Social Care Providers, GOV.UK. GOV.UK. Available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/consultation-to-improve-regulation-of-health-and-social-care-providers (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Equality act 2010 - overview for social care (no date) Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE). Available at: https://www.scie.org.uk/key-social-care-legislation/equality-act (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Lee, E. (2021) Encouraging active participation, CPD Online College. Available at: https://cpdonline.co.uk/knowledge-base/care/encouraging-active-participation/ (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Making informed decisions (no date) Middlesex-London Health Unit. Available at: https://www.healthunit.com/making-informed-decisions (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Nicole Celestine, P.D. (2023) Abraham Maslow, his theory & contribution to psychology, PositivePsychology.com. Available at: https://positivepsychology.com/abraham-maslow/ (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Person-centred care made simple what everyone ... - health foundation (no date). Available at: https://www.health.org.uk/sites/default/files/PersonCentredCareMadeSimple.pdf (Accessed: January 8, 2023). Cole, C., Wellard, S. and Bernard, R., and Whitetaker, A., (2020). ‘Effective communication in healthcare,’ British Journal of Nursing, 29(14), pp. 815-820. Morrison, F., and Newman, D., (2012). ‘The importance of communication in healthcare’, British Journal of Nursing, 21(15), pp. 932-935. Mummery, J. (2014) ‘Problematising autonomy and advocacy in nursing’, Nursing Ethics, 21(5), pp. 576-582 O’Connor, M., and Palfreyman, S., (2005). ‘The role of family members in patient care: Helping or Hindering?’ Journal of Advanced Nursing, 52(4), pp. 432-440. Research evidence on reading for pleasure - gov.uk (no date). Available at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/284286/reading_for_pleasure.pdf (Accessed: January 8, 2023).  Winterbourne View – time for change - NHS england (no date). Available at: https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/transforming-commissioning-services.pdf (Accessed: January 8, 2023). History and background Donald Schön's 1983 book The Reflective Practitioner introduced concepts such as reflection-on-action and reflection-in-action which explain how professionals meet the challenges of their work with a kind of improvisation that is improved through practice. However, the concepts underlying reflective practice are much older. Earlier in the 20th century, John Dewey was among the first to write about reflective practice with his exploration of experience, interaction and reflection. Soon thereafter, other researchers such as Kurt Lewin and Jean Piaget were developing relevant theories of human learning and development. Some scholars have claimed to find precursors of reflective practice in ancient texts such as Buddhist teachings and the Meditations of Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius. Central to the development of reflective theory was interest in the integration of theory and practice, the cyclic pattern of experience and the conscious application of lessons learned from experience. Since the 1970s, there has been a growing literature and focus around experiential learning and the development and application of reflective practice. As adult education professor David Boud and his colleagues explained: "Reflection is an important human activity in which people recapture their experience, think about it, mull it over and evaluate it. It is this working with experience that is important in learning." When a person is experiencing something, he or she may be implicitly learning; however, it can be difficult to put emotions, events, and thoughts into a coherent sequence of events. When a person rethinks or retells events, it is possible to categorize events, emotions, ideas, etc., and to compare the intended purpose of a past action with the results of the action. Stepping back from the action permits critical reflection on a sequence of events. The emergence in more recent years of blogging has been seen as another form of reflection on experience in a technological age. Models Many models of reflective practice have been created to guide reasoning about action. However, they are not without their criticisms, and need to be understood within the context within which they were written. Borton 1970 Terry Borton's 1970 book Reach, Touch, and Teach popularized a simple learning cycle inspired by Gestalt therapy composed of three questions which ask the practitioner: What, So what, and Now what? Through this analysis, a description of a situation is given which then leads into the scrutiny of the situation and the construction of knowledge that has been learnt through the experience. Subsequently, practitioners reflect on ways in which they can personally improve and the consequences of their response to the experience. Borton's model was later adapted by practitioners outside the field of education, such as the field of nursing and the helping professions. Kolb and Fry 1975 Learning theorist David A. Kolb was highly influenced by the earlier research conducted by John Dewey and Jean Piaget. Kolb's reflective model, which also draws from the works of Kurt Lewin, highlights the concept of experiential learning and is centered on the transformation of information into knowledge. This takes place after a situation has occurred, and entails a practitioner reflecting on the experience, gaining a general understanding of the concepts encountered during the experience, and then testing these general understandings in a new situation. In this way, the knowledge that is formed from a situation is continuously applied and reapplied, building on a practitioner's prior experiences and knowledge. Argyris and Schön 1978 Management researchers Chris Argyris and Donald Schön introduced the "theory of action", which emerged out of their previous research on relationship between people and organizations. This theory defines learning as detection and correction of error. It included the distinction between single-loop learning and double-loop learning in 1978. Single-loop learning is when a practitioner or organisation, even after an error has occurred and a correction is made, continues to rely on current strategies, techniques or policies when a situation again comes to light. Double-loop learning involves the modification of objectives, strategies or policies so that when a similar situation arises a new framing system is employed. Schön claimed to derive the notions of "reflection-on-action, reflection-in-action, responding to problematic situations, problem framing, problem solving, and the priority of practical knowledge over abstract theory" from the writings of John Dewey, although education professor Harvey Shapiro has argued that Dewey's writings offer "more expansive, more integrated notions of professional growth" than do Schön's. Schön advocated two types of reflective practice. Firstly, reflection-on-action, which involves reflecting on an experience that you have already had, or an action that you have already taken, and considering what could have been done differently, as well as looking at the positives from that interaction. The other type of reflection Schön notes is reflection-in-action, or reflecting on your actions as you are doing them, and considering issues like best practice throughout the process. For Schön, professional growth really begins when a person starts to view things with a critical lens, by doubting his or her actions. Doubt brings about a way of thinking that questions and frames situations as "problems". Through careful planning and systematic elimination of other possible problems, doubt is settled, and people are able to affirm their knowledge of the situation. Then people are able to think about possible situations and their outcomes, and deliberate about whether they carried out the right actions. Gibbs 1988 Learning researcher Graham Gibbs discussed the use of structured debriefing to facilitate the reflection involved in Kolb's experiential learning cycle. Gibbs presents the stages of a full structured debriefing as follows: (Initial experience) Description "What happened? Don't make judgements yet or try to draw conclusions; simply describe." Feelings "What were your reactions and feelings? Again don't move on to analysing these yet." Evaluation "What was good or bad about the experience? Make value judgements." Analysis "What sense can you make of the situation? Bring in ideas from outside the experience to help you." "What was really going on?" "Were different people's experiences similar or different in important ways?" Conclusions (general) "What can be concluded, in a general sense, from these experiences and the analyses you have undertaken?" Conclusions (specific) "What can be concluded about your own specific, unique, personal situation or way of working?" Personal action plans "What are you going to do differently in this type of situation next time?" "What steps are you going to take on the basis of what you have learnt?" Gibbs' suggestions are often cited as "Gibbs' reflective cycle" or "Gibbs' model of reflection", and simplified into the following six distinct stages to assist in structuring reflection on learning experiences: Description Feelings Evaluation Analysis Conclusions Action plan Johns 1995 Professor of nursing Christopher Johns designed a structured mode of reflection that provides a practitioner with a guide to gain greater understanding of his or her practice. It is designed to be carried out through the act of sharing with a colleague or mentor, which enables the experience to become learnt knowledge at a faster rate than reflection alone. Johns highlights the importance of experienced knowledge and the ability of a practitioner to access, understand and put into practice information that has been acquired through empirical means. Reflection occurs through "looking in" on one's thoughts and emotions and "looking out" at the situation experienced. Johns draws on the work of Barbara Carper to expand on the notion of "looking out" at a situation. Five patterns of knowing are incorporated into the guided reflection: the aesthetic, personal, ethical, empirical and reflexive aspects of the situation. Johns' model is comprehensive and allows for reflection that touches on many important elements. Brookfield 1998 Adult education scholar Stephen Brookfield proposed that critically reflective practitioners constantly research their assumptions by seeing practice through four complementary lenses: the lens of their autobiography as learners of reflective practice, the lens of other learners' eyes, the lens of colleagues' experiences, and the lens of theoretical, philosophical and research literature. Reviewing practice through these lenses makes us more aware of the power dynamics that infuse all practice settings. It also helps us detect hegemonic assumptions—assumptions that we think are in our own best interests, but actually work against us in the long run. Brookfield argued that these four lenses will reflect back to us starkly different pictures of who we are and what we do. Lens 1: Our autobiography as a learner. Our autobiography is an important source of insight into practice. As we talk to each other about critical events in our practice, we start to realize that individual crises are usually collectively experienced dilemmas. Analyzing our autobiographies allows us to draw insight and meanings for practice on a deep visceral emotional level. Lens 2: Our learners' eyes. Seeing ourselves through learners' eyes, we may discover that learners are interpreting our actions in the way that we mean them. But often we are surprised by the diversity of meanings people read into our words and actions. A cardinal principle of seeing ourselves through learners' eyes is that of ensuring the anonymity of their critical opinions. We have to make learners feel safe. Seeing our practice through learners' eyes helps us teach more responsively. Lens 3: Our colleagues' experiences. Our colleagues serve as critical mirrors reflecting back to us images of our actions. Talking to colleagues about problems and gaining their perspective increases our chance of finding some information that can help our situation. Lens 4: Theoretical literature. Theory can help us "name" our practice by illuminating the general elements of what we think are idiosyncratic experiences. Nguyen Nhat Quang's iceberg of reflection 2022 Reflection is not linear, uniform, and homogeneous. Nguyen Nhat Quang (2022) adopts Fleck (2012)'s classification of reflective practices into an iceberg of reflection. That is, reflection consists of different layers representing four stages. Descriptive reflection is the tip of the iceberg as it manifests as narratives of reality without any multilateral accounts and analyses to bring forward a change in individual perspective. Dialogic reflection, just below water surface, represents the interdependence and correlations of experiences through iterative self- questioning cycles seeking reasons for an action. After identifying these reasons, this process can provide the reflectors with alternative interpretations. Following repeated cycles of dialogic reflection, transformative reflection allows the reflective practitioners to revisit issues with alternative solutions that may create more transformative and welcomed outcomes compared to those in the past. Critical reflection, the deepest level of reflection, goes beyond the reflection-on-action process by looking at what, why, and how an incident or series of incidents happened through an ecological well-rounded lens inclusive of social, historical, political, and cultural factors. It is important to note that not all reflective practices are able to reach all four layers as the depth of reflection is subjective to reflectors' cognitive, metacognitive ability as well as their sociocultural background. Gibbs' cycle review Galli-New (GGN) 2022 The GGN reflective practice model is based on a revision of the original Gibbs'cycle model. Differently from the previous one, a step has been inserted in the cycle, dedicated to emotions, their perception, and their contextualization. The GGN model, through the clear differentiation between feelings and emotions, gives value to self-awareness and critical thinking of personal perception. Monitoring emotions as well as feelings aims to be a tool for observing and developing mental well-being, stress management, growth of emotional intelligence, critical thinking, as well as professional and personal development. Application Reflective practice has been described as an unstructured or semi-structured approach directing learning, and a self-regulated process commonly used in health and teaching professions, though applicable to all professions. Reflective practice is a learning process taught to professionals from a variety of disciplines, with the aim of enhancing abilities to communicate and making informed and balanced decisions. Professional associations such as the American Association of Nurse Practitioners are recognizing the importance of reflective practice and require practitioners to prepare reflective portfolios as a requirement to be licensed, and for yearly quality assurance purposes. Education The concept of reflective practice has found wide application in the field of education, for learners, teachers and those who teach teachers (teacher educators). Tsangaridou & O'Sullivan (1997) define reflection in education as "the act of thinking about, analyzing, assessing, or altering educational meanings, intentions, beliefs, decisions, actions, or products by focusing on the process of achieving them … The primary purpose of this action is to structure, adjust, generate, refine, restructure, or alter knowledge and actions that inform practice. Microreflection gives meaning to or informs day-to-day practice, and macroreflection gives meaning to or informs practice over time". Reflection is the key to successful learning for teachers and for learners. Students Students can benefit from engaging in reflective practice as it can foster the critical thinking and decision making necessary for continuous learning and improvement. When students are engaged in reflection, they are thinking about how their work meets established criteria; they analyze the effectiveness of their efforts, and plan for improvement. Rolheiser and et al. (2000) assert that "Reflection is linked to elements that are fundamental to meaningful learning and cognitive development: the development of metacognition – the capacity for students to improve their ability to think about their thinking; the ability to self-evaluate - the capacity for students to judge the quality of their work based on evidence and explicit criteria for the purpose of doing better work; the development of critical thinking, problem-solving, and decision-making; and the enhancement of teacher understanding of the learner." (p 31-32) When teachers teach metacognitive skills, it promotes student self-monitoring and self-regulation that can lead to intellectual growth, increase academic achievement, and support transfer of skills so that students are able to use any strategy at any time and for any purpose. Guiding students in the habits of reflection requires teachers to approach their role as that of "facilitator of meaning-making" – they organize instruction and classroom practice so that students are the producers, not just the consumers, of knowledge. Rolheiser and colleagues (2000) state that "When students develop their capacity to understand their own thinking processes, they are better equipped to employ the necessary cognitive skills to complete a task or achieve a goal. Students who have acquired metacognitive skills are better able to compensate for both low ability and insufficient information." (p. 34) The Ontario Ministry of Education (2007) describes many ways in which educators can help students acquire the skills required for effective reflection and self-assessment, including: modelling and/or intentionally teaching critical thinking skills necessary for reflection and self-assessment practices; addressing students' perceptions of self-assessment; engaging in discussion and dialogue about why self-assessment is important; allowing time to learn self-assessment and reflection skills; providing many opportunities to practice different aspects of the self-assessment and reflection process; and ensuring that parents/guardians understand that self-assessment is only one of a variety of assessment strategies that is utilized for student learning. Teachers The concept of reflective practice is now widely employed in the field of teacher education and teacher professional development and many programs of initial teacher education claim to espouse it. Education professor Hope Hartman has described reflective practice in education as teacher metacognition, indicating there is broad consensus that teaching effectively requires a reflective approach. Attard & Armour explain that "teachers who are reflective systematically collect evidence from their practice, allowing them to rethink and potentially open themselves to new interpretations". Teaching and learning are complex processes, and there is not one right approach. Reflecting on different approaches to teaching, and reshaping the understanding of past and current experiences, can lead to improvement in teaching practices. Schön's reflection-in-action can help teachers explicitly incorporate into their decision-making the professional knowledge that they gain from their experience in the classroom. As professor of education Barbara Larrivee argues, reflective practice moves teachers from their knowledge base of distinct skills to a stage in their careers where they are able to modify their skills to suit specific contexts and situations, and eventually to invent new strategies. In implementing a process of reflective practice teachers will be able to move themselves, and their schools, beyond existing theories in practice. Larrivee concludes that teachers should "resist establishing a classroom culture of control and become a reflective practitioner, continuously engaging in a critical reflection, consequently remaining fluid in the dynamic environment of the classroom". It is important to note that, "the reflective process should eventually help the teacher to change, adapt and modify his/her teaching to the particular context. This does not happen in stages, but is a continuum of reflection, leading to change ... and further reflection". Without reflection, teachers are not able to look objectively at their actions or take into account the emotions, experience, or consequences of actions to improve their practice. It is argued that, through the process of reflection, teachers are held accountable to the standards of practice for teaching, such as those in Ontario: commitment to students and student learning, professional knowledge, professional practice, leadership in learning communities, and ongoing professional learning. Overall, through reflective practice, teachers look back on their practice and reflect on how they have supported students by treating them "equitably and with respect and are sensitive to factors that influence individual student learning". Teacher educators For students to acquire necessary skills in reflection, their teachers need to be able to teach and model reflective practice (see above); similarly, teachers themselves need to have been taught reflective practice during their initial teacher education, and to continue to develop their reflective skills throughout their career. However, Mary Ryan has noted that students are often asked to "reflect" without being taught how to do so, or without being taught that different types of reflection are possible; they may not even receive a clear definition or rationale for reflective practice. Many new teachers do not know how to transfer the reflection strategies they learned in college to their classroom teaching. Some writers have advocated that reflective practice needs to be taught explicitly to student teachers because it is not an intuitive act; it is not enough for teacher educators to provide student teachers with "opportunities" to reflect: they must explicitly "teach reflection and types of reflection" and "need explicitly to facilitate the process of reflection and make transparent the metacognitive process it entails". Larrivee noted that (student) teachers require "carefully constructed guidance" and "multifaceted and strategically constructed interventions" if they are to reflect effectively on their practice. Rod Lane and colleagues listed strategies by which teacher educators can promote a habit of reflective practice in pre-service teacher education, such as discussions of a teaching situation, reflective interviews or essays about one's teaching experiences, action research, or journaling or blogging. Neville Hatton and David Smith, in a brief literature review, concluded that teacher education programs do use a wide range of strategies with the aim of encouraging students teachers to reflect (e.g. action research, case studies, video-recording or supervised practicum experiences), but that "there is little research evidence to show that this [aim] is actually being achieved". The implication of all this is that teacher educators must also be highly skilled in reflective practice. Andrea Gelfuso and Danielle Dennis, in a report on a formative experiment with student teachers, suggested that teaching how to reflect requires teacher educators to possess and deploy specific competences. However, Janet Dyment and Timothy O'Connell, in a small-scale study of experienced teacher educators, noted that the teacher educators they studied had received no training in using reflection themselves, and that they in turn did not give such training to their students; all parties were expected to know how to reflect. Many writers advocate for teacher educators themselves to act as models of reflective practice. This implies that the way that teacher educators teach their students needs to be congruent with the approaches they expect their students to adopt with pupils; teacher educators should not only model the way to teach, but should also explain why they have chosen a particular approach whilst doing so, by reference to theory; this implies that teacher educators need to be aware of their own tacit theories of teaching and able to connect them overtly to public theory. However, some teacher educators do not always "teach as they preach"; they base their teaching decisions on "common sense" more than on public theory and struggle with modelling reflective practice. Tom Russell, in a reflective article looking back on 35 years as teacher educator, concurred that teacher educators rarely model reflective practice, fail to link reflection clearly and directly to professional learning, and rarely explain what they mean by reflection, with the result that student teachers may complete their initial teacher education with "a muddled and negative view of what reflection is and how it might contribute to their professional learning". For Russell, these problems result from the fact that teacher educators have not sufficiently explored how theories of reflective practice relate to their own teaching, and so have not made the necessary "paradigmatic changes" which they expect their students to make. Challenges Reflective practice "is a term that carries diverse meaning" and about which there is not complete consensus. Professor Tim Fletcher of Brock University argues forward-thinking is a professional habit, but we must reflect on the past to inform how it translates into the present and future. Always thinking about 'what's next' rather than 'what just happened' can constrain an educator's reflective process. The concept of reflection is difficult as beginning teachers are stuck between "the conflicting values of schools and universities" and "the contradictory values at work within schools and within university faculties and with the increasing influence of factors external to school and universities such as policy makers". Conflicting opinions make it difficult to direct the reflection process, as it is hard to establish what values you are trying to align with. It is important to acknowledge reflective practice "follows a twisting path that involves false starts and detours". Meaning once you reflect on an issue it cannot be set aside as many assume. Newman refers to Gilroy's assertion that "the 'knowledge' produced by reflection can only be recognized by further reflection, which in turn requires reflection to recognize it as knowledge". In turn, reflective practice cannot hold one meaning, it is contextual based on the practitioner. It is argued that the term 'reflection' shouldn't be used as there are associations to it being "more of a hindrance than a help". It is suggested the term is referred to 'critical practice' or 'practical philosophy' to "suggest an approach which practitioners can adopt in the different social context in which they find themselves". Meanwhile, Oluwatoyin discusses some disadvantages and barriers to reflective practice as, feeling stress by reflecting on negative issues and frustration from not being able to solve those identified issues, and time constraints. With reflection often taking place independently, educators lack the motivation and assistance in tackling these difficult problems. It is suggested that teachers communicate with one another, or have an indicated individual to talk to, this way there is external informed feedback. Overall, before engaging in reflective practice it is important to be aware of the challenges. Health professionals Reflective practice is viewed as an important strategy for health professionals who embrace lifelong learning. Due to the ever-changing context of healthcare and the continual growth of medical knowledge, there is a high level of demand on healthcare professionals' expertise. Due to this complex and continually changing environment, healthcare professionals could benefit from a program of reflective practice. Adrienne Price explained that there are several reasons why a healthcare practitioner would engage in reflective practice: to further understand one's motives, perceptions, attitudes, values, and feelings associated with client care; to provide a fresh outlook to practice situations and to challenge existing thoughts, feelings, and actions; and to explore how the practice situation may be approached differently. In the field of nursing there is concern that actions may run the risk of habitualisation, thus dehumanizing patients and their needs. In using reflective practice, nurses are able to plan their actions and consciously monitor the action to ensure it is beneficial to their patient. The act of reflection is seen as a way of promoting the development of autonomous, qualified and self-directed professionals, as well as a way of developing more effective healthcare teams. Engaging in reflective practice is associated with improved quality of care, stimulating personal and professional growth and closing the gap between theory and practice. Medical practitioners can combine reflective practice with checklists (when appropriate) to reduce diagnostic error. Reflective practice can also help improve cultural sensitivity of healthcare workers. Equality diversity and inclusion reflective practice groups have been shown to be beneficial for improving mental health professionals reflexivity and awareness of equality diversity and inclusion related issues within both direct clinical work with patients, families and systems, as well as professional supervision. Activities to promote reflection are now being incorporated into undergraduate, postgraduate and continuing medical education across a variety of health professions. Professor of medical education Karen Mann and her colleagues found through a 2009 literature review that in practicing professionals the process of reflection appears to include a number of different aspects, and practicing professionals vary in their tendency and ability to reflect. They noted that the evidence to support curricular interventions and innovations promoting reflective practice remains largely theoretical. Samantha Davies identified benefits as well as limitations to reflective practice: Benefits to reflective practice include: Increased learning from an experience or situation Promotion of deep learning Identification of personal and professional strengths and areas for improvement Identification of educational needs Acquisition of new knowledge and skills Further understanding of own beliefs, attitudes and values Encouragement of self-motivation and self-directed learning Could act as a source of feedback Possible improvements of personal and clinical confidence Limitations to reflective practice include: Not all practitioners may understand the reflective process May feel uncomfortable challenging and evaluating own practice Could be time-consuming May have confusion as to which situations/experiences to reflect upon May not be adequate to resolve clinical problems Environmental management and sustainability The use of reflective practice in environmental management, combined with system monitoring, is often called adaptive management. There is some criticism that traditional environmental management, which simply focuses on the problem at hand, fails to integrate into the decision making the wider systems within which an environment is situated. While research and science must inform the process of environmental management, it is up to the practitioner to integrate those results within these wider systems. In order to deal with this and to reaffirm the utility of environmental management, Bryant and Wilson propose that a "more reflective approach is required that seeks to rethink the basic premises of environmental management as a process". This style of approach has been found to be successful in sustainable development projects where participants appreciated and enjoyed the educational aspect of utilizing reflective practice throughout. However, the authors noted the challenges with melding the "circularity" of reflective practice theory with the "doing" of sustainability. Leadership positions Reflective practice provides a development opportunity for those in leadership positions. Managing a team of people requires a delicate balance between people skills and technical expertise, and success in this type of role does not come easily. Reflective practice provides leaders with an opportunity to critically review what has been successful in the past and where improvement can be made. Reflective learning organizations have invested in coaching programs for their emerging and established leaders. Leaders frequently engage in self-limiting behaviours because of their over-reliance on their preferred ways of reacting and responding. Coaching can help support the establishment of new behaviours, as it encourages reflection, critical thinking and transformative learning. Adults have acquired a body of experience throughout their life, as well as habits of mind that define their world. Coaching programs support the process of questioning and potentially rebuilding these pre-determined habits of mind. The goal is for leaders to maximize their professional potential, and in order to do this, there must be a process of critical reflection on current assumptions. Other professions Reflective practice can help any individual to develop personally, and is useful for professions other than those discussed above. It allows professionals to continually update their skills and knowledge and consider new ways to interact with their colleagues. David Somerville and June Keeling suggested eight simple ways that professionals can practice more reflectively: Seek feedback: Ask "Can you give me some feedback on what I did?" Ask yourself "What have I learnt today?" and ask others "What have you learnt today?" Value personal strengths: Identify positive accomplishments and areas for growth View experiences objectively: Imagine the situation is on stage and you are in the audience Empathize: Say out loud what you imagine the other person is experiencing Keep a journal: Record your thoughts, feelings and future plans; look for emerging patterns Plan for the future: Plan changes in behavior based on the patterns you identified Create your own future: Combine the virtues of the dreamer, the realist, and the critic Human activity and work in general Reflective practices can also be applied to areas of human activity, in particular work, and include considering the impacts of one's (or a workforce's) actions. Relevant considerations could include ethical values, environmental impacts and efficiency and could be determinants of one's choice of activity or work during lifetime. Reflective capacities could be strengthened by education and possibly other means. See also Moral intelligence Video-based reflection Notes References External links Personal development Education theory Vocational education Learning theory (education) Learning methods Experiential learning Nursing education

Academic department

An academic department is a division of a university or school faculty devoted to a particular academic discipline. In the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth countries, universities tend to use the term faculty; faculties are typically further divided into schools or departments, but not always. Disciplines The organization of faculties into departments is not standardized, but most U.S. universities will at least have departments of History, Physics, English (language and literature), Psychology, and so on. Sometimes divisions are coarser: a liberal arts college which de-emphasizes the sciences may have a single Science department; an engineering university may have one department for Language and Literature (in all languages). Sometimes divisions may be finer: for example, Harvard University has separate departments of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Molecular and Cellular Biology, and Chemistry and Chemical Biology. Some disciplines are found in different departments at different institutions: biochemistry may be in biology, in chemistry or in its own department; computer science may be in mathematics, applied mathematics, electrical engineering, or its own department (the usual case nowadays). Typically, "Departments reflect disciplines with the disciplines representing coherent areas of research and scholarship." Departments in professional schools, or more so, professional schools at the postgraduate level will be specialized like the school itself, so a medical school will probably have departments of Anatomy, Pathology, Dermatology, and so on. Structure Chairs and faculty "Departments serve as administrative structures." Departments are generally chaired by a member of the department, who may be elected by the faculty of the department, appointed by the dean of the faculty, or assigned by simple rotation among the tenured faculty. The duties, importance, and power of the department chair vary widely among institutions and even among departments within an institution. Responsibilities and themes of a department leader or head may include: Recruitment and retention Ensuring good internal relations and coordination between staff Research Educational reform Trust and collaboration Curricula "Programs [in Departments or outwith] reflect how disciplines (or combinations of disciplines) form curriculum to teach their disciplines or combinations/intersections of disciplines." Courses belong to programs and are generally given within a department, and often named for the department, e.g. Physics 230: Quantum mechanics. Undergraduate students Undergraduate academic majors or degree programs are generally administered by departments, although there may also be interdisciplinary committees for subjects which touch more than one department. Per Umbrach and Porter (2002), several aspects of academic departments can affect the performance of students within them. Higher proportions of female undergrads, as well as deeper focuses on research (as measured by grant money per full-time employee) tend to increase student satisfaction with their majors. The two variables also tend to increase students' perception of how much their skills developed overall. (Decomposing this into intellectual and personal development, more patterns appear. Intellectually, only grant money appears to substantially increase skill development. Personally, gender diversity and student contact with faculty are also positive factors; average SAT score, however, can be a negative factor.) Graduate students Graduate students in academic (as opposed to professional) programs are much more closely tied to their departments than undergraduates, and the department, rather than the university, is almost completely responsible for their selection (cf. college admissions) and course of study. Alternatives Some institutions without conventional academic departments include the University of Wisconsin at Green Bay, the University of California, Santa Cruz, and the Evergreen State College. See also Academic major Chair (Polish academic department) List of academic disciplines References Department

Social cue

Social cues are verbal or non-verbal signals expressed through the face, body, voice, motion (and more) and guide conversations as well as other social interactions by influencing our impressions of and responses to others. These percepts are important communicative tools as they convey important social and contextual information and therefore facilitate social understanding. A few examples of social cues include: eye gaze facial expression vocal tone body language Social cues are part of social cognition and serve several purposes in navigating the social world. Due to our social nature, humans rely heavily on the ability to understand other peoples' mental states and make predictions about their behaviour. Especially in the view of evolution, this ability is critical in helping to determine potential threats and advantageous opportunities; and in helping to form and maintain relationships in order to fulfill safety and basic physiological needs. These cues allow us to predict other people's meanings and intentions in order to be able to respond in an efficient and adaptive manner, as well as to anticipate how others might respond to one's own choices. For instance, people were found to behave more prosocially in economic games when being watched which indicates potential reputational risk (see also watching eye effect). The ability to perceive social signals and integrate them into judgements about others' intentional mental states (e.g. beliefs, desires, emotions, knowledge) is often referred to as theory of mind or mentalization, and is evident from about 18 months of age. Processing and decoding social cues is an important part of everyday human interaction (e.g. turn-taking in conversation), and therefore a critical skill for communication and social understanding. Taking into account other people's internal states such as thoughts or emotions is a critical part of forming and maintaining relationships. The social monitoring system attunes individuals to external information regarding social approval and disapproval by increasing interpersonal sensitivity, the "attention to and accuracy in decoding interpersonal social cues" relevant to gaining inclusion. Being able to accurately detect both positive and negative cues allows one to behave adaptively and avoid future rejection, which therefore produces greater social inclusion. High need for social inclusion due to situational events (e.g. rejection) activates higher social monitoring; and individuals that generally experience greater belonging needs are associated with greater interpersonal sensitivity. However, this mechanism should not be confused with rejection sensitivity—a bias that decodes ambiguous social cues as signs of rejection. Under-developed awareness of social cues can make interaction in social situations challenging. There are various mental disorders (e.g. schizophrenia) that impair this ability, and therefore make effective communication as well as forming relationships with others difficult for the affected person. Additionally, research shows that older adults have difficulties in extracting and decoding social cues from the environment, especially those about human agency and intentionality. Children rely more on social cues than adults as children use them in order to comprehend and learn about their surroundings. Mechanisms Recent work done in the field studying social cues has found that perception of social cues is best defined as the combination of multiple cues and processing streams, also referred to as cue integration. Stimuli are processed through experience sharing and mentalizing and the likelihood of the other person's internal state is inferred by the Bayesian logic. Experience sharing is a person's tendency to take on another person's facial expressions, posture and internal state and is often related to the area of empathy. A stimulus that is perceptually salient can cause a person to automatically use a bottom-up approach or cognitive top-down intentions or goals. This causes one to move in a controlled and calculated manner. A peripheral cue is used to measure spatial cuing, which does not give away information about a target's location. Naturally, only the most relevant contextual cues are processed and this occurs extremely fast (around 100–200 milliseconds). This type of fast, automating processing is often referred to as intuition and allows us to integrate complex multi-dimensional cues and generate suitable behaviour in real time. Cognitive learning models illustrate how people connect cues with certain outcomes or responses. Learning can strengthen associations between predictive cues and outcomes and weaken the link between nondescriptive cues and outcomes. Two aspects of the EXIT model learning phenomena have been focused on by Collins et al. The first is blocking which happens when a new cue is introduced with a cue that already has meaning. The second is highlighting which happens when an individual pays close attention to a cue that will change the meaning of a cue that they already know. When a new cue is added along with a previous one it is said that individuals only focus on the new cue to gain a better understanding as to what is going on. Brain regions involved in processing Benjamin Straube, Antonia Green, Andreas Jansen, Anjan Chatterjee, and Tilo Kircher found that social cues influence the neural processing of speech-gesture utterances. Past studies have focused on mentalizing as being a part of perception of social cues and it is believed that this process relies on the neural system, which consists of: paracingulate cortex temporal poles superior temporal sulcus. When people focus on things in a social context, the medial prefrontal cortex and precuneus areas of the brain are activated; however, when people focus on a non-social context there is no activation of these areas. Straube et al. hypothesized that the areas of the brain involved in mental processes were mainly responsible for social cue processing. It is believed that when iconic gestures are involved, the left temporal and occipital regions would be activated and when emblematic gestures were involved the temporal poles would be activated. When it came to abstract speech and gestures, the left frontal gyrus would be activated according to Straube et al. After conducting an experiment on how body position, speech and gestures affected activation in different areas of the brain Straube et al. came to the following conclusions: When a person is facing someone head on the occipital, inferior frontal, medial frontal, right anterior temporal and left hemispheric parietal cortex were activated. When participants watched an actor who was delivering a speech talking about another person an extended network of bilateral temporal and frontal regions were activated. When participants watched an actor who talked about objects and made iconic gestures the occipito-temporal and parietal brain areas were activated. The conclusion that Straube et al. reached was that speech-gesture information is effected by context-dependent social cues. The amygdala, fusiform gyrus, insula, and superior and middle temporal regions have been identified as areas in the brain that play a role in visual emotional cues. It was found that there was greater activation in the bilateral anterior superior temporal gyrus and bilateral fusiform gyrus when it came to emotional stimuli. The amygdala has been connected with the automatic evaluation of threat, facial valence information, and trustworthiness of faces. When it comes to visual cues, individuals follow the gaze of others to find out what they are looking at. It has been found that this response is evolutionarily adaptive due to the fact that it can alert others to happenings in the environment. Almost 50% of the time, peripheral cues have a hard time finding the location of a target.[clarification needed] Studies have shown that directed gaze impacts attentional orienting in a seemingly automatic manner. Part of the brain that is involved when another person averts their gaze is also a part of attentional orienting. Past researchers have found that arrow cues are linked to the fronto-parietal areas, whereas arrow and gaze cues were linked to occipito-temporal areas. Therefore, gaze cues may indeed rely on automatic processes more than arrow cues. The importance of eye gaze has increased in importance throughout the evolutionary time period. Higher level visual regions, such as the fusiform gyrus, extrastriate cortex and superior temporal sulcus (STS) are the areas of the brain which studies have found to link to perceptual processing of social/biological stimuli. Behavioral studies have found that the right hemisphere is highly connected with the processing of left visual field advantage for face and gaze stimuli. Researchers believe the right STS is also involved in using gaze to understand the intentions of others. While looking at social and nonsocial cues, it has been found that a high level of activity has been found in the bilateral extrastriate cortices in regards to gaze cues versus peripheral cues. There was a study done on two people with split-brain, in order to study each hemisphere to see what their involvement is in gaze cuing. Results suggest that gaze cues show a strong effect with the facial recognition hemisphere of the brain, compared to nonsocial cues. The results of Greene and Zaidel's study suggest that in relation to visual fields, information is processed independently and that the right hemisphere shows greater orienting. Pertaining to emotional expression the superior temporal cortex has been shown to be active during studies focusing on facial perception. However, when it comes to face identity the inferior temporal and fusiform cortex is active. During facial processing the amygdala and fusiform gyrus show a strong functional connection. Face identification can be impaired if there is damage to the orbitofrontal cortex (OFC). The amygdala is active during facial expressions and it improves long-term memory for long term emotional stimuli. It has also been found that there are face response neurons in the amygdala. The connection between the amygdala, OFC, and other medial temporal lobe structures  suggest that they play an important role in working memory for social cues. Systems which are critical in perceptually identifying and processing emotion and identity need to cooperate in order to maintain maintenance of social cues. In order to monitor changing facial expressions of individuals, the hippocampus and orbitofrontal cortex may be a crucial part in guiding critical real-world social behavior in social gatherings. The hippocampus may well be a part of using social cues to understand numerous appearances of the same person over short delay periods. The orbitofrontal cortex being important in the processing of social cues leads researchers to believe that it works with the hippocampus to create, maintain, and retrieve corresponding representations of the same individual seen with multiple facial expressions in working memory. After coming across the same person multiple times with different social cues, the right lateral orbitofrontal cortex and hippocampus are more strongly employed and display a stronger functional connection when disambiguating each encounter with that individual. During an fMRI scan the lateral orbitofrontal cortex, hippocampus, fusiform gyrus bilaterally showed activation after meeting the same person again and having previously seen two different social cues. This would suggest that both of these brain areas help retrieve correct information about a person's last encounter with the person. The ability to separate the different encounters with different people seen with different social cues leads researchers to believe that it permits for suitable social interactions. Ross, LoPresti and Schon offer that the orbitofrontal cortex and hippocampus are a part of both working memory and long-term memory, which permits flexibility in encoding separate representations of an individual in the varying social contexts in which we encounter them. Oxytocin has been named "the social hormone". Research done on rats provide strong evidence that social contact enhances oxytocin levels in the brain which then sets the stage for social bonds. In recent years it has been found that inhaling oxytocin through the nasal passage increases trust toward strangers and increases a person's ability to perceive social cues. Activation of face-induced amygdala was found to be increased by oxytocin in women. There have been findings that oxytocin increases occurrence of attention shifts to the eye region of a face which suggests that it alters the readiness of the brain to socially meaningful stimuli. Dopamine neurons from the ventral tegmental area[clarification needed] code the salience of social as well as nonsocial stimuli. Bartz et al. found that the effects of oxytocin are person-dependent, meaning that every individual will be affected differently by oxytocin, especially those who have trouble in social situations. Research done by Groppe et al. supports that motivational salience of social cues is enhanced by oxytocin. Oxytocin has been found to influence responses to cues that are socially relevant. Examples Nonverbal cues Roles of nonverbal cues Nonverbal communication is any sort of communication based on facial expressions, body language, and any vocal communication that does not use words. Nonverbal cues consist of anything you do with your face, body or nonlinguistic voice that you others can and may respond to. The main role of nonverbal cues is communication. These types of cues can help us connect with others and communicate emotions, moods, instructions, and many other things based on facial cues, motion cues and body language. Understanding and using nonverbal cues can also help people not only in day to day life but in situations such as interviews, leadership roles, service roles, educational roles and more. Facial cues Facial expressions are signals that we make by moving our facial muscles on our face. Facial expressions generally signify an emotional state, and each emotional state or state of mind has a specific facial expression, many of which are universally used around the world. Without seeing someone's facial expression, one would not be able to see if the other person is crying, happy, angry, etc. Furthermore, facial expressions enable us to further comprehend what is going on during situations that are very difficult or confusing. Facial cues do not only refer to explicit expressions but also include facial appearance. There is a wealth of information that people gather simply from a person's face in the blink of an eye, such as gender, emotion, physical attractiveness, competence, threat level and trustworthiness. One of the most highly developed skills that humans have is facial perception. The face is one of the greatest representations of a person. A person's face allows others to gain information about that person, which is helpful when it comes to social interaction. The fusiform face area of the human brain plays a large role in face perception and recognition; however, it does not provide useful information for processing emotion recognition, emotional tone, shared attention, impulsive activation of person knowledge and trait implications based on facial appearance. The fallacy of making inferences about people's personality traits from their facial appearance is referred to as overgeneralization effect. For instance, baby face overgeneralization produces the biased perception that people whose facial features resemble those of children have childlike traits (e.g. weakness, honesty, need to be protected), and an attractive face leads to judgements that the attractive person possesses positive personality traits such as social competency, intelligence, and health. It is mainly facial features which resemble low fitness (anomalous face overgeneralization), age (baby face overgeneralization), emotion (emotion face overgeneralization) or a particular identity (familiar face overgeneralization) that affect impression formation; even a trace of these qualities can lead to such a response. These effects are prevalent in spite of a general awareness that those impressions most likely do not represent a person's true character. An important tool for communication in social interactions are the eyes. Gaze cues are the most informative social stimulus as they are able to convey basic emotions (e.g. sadness, fear) and reveal a lot about a person's social attention. Infants that are already 12 months old respond to the gaze of adults, which indicates that the eyes are an important way to communicate, even before spoken language is developed. Eye gaze direction conveys a person's social attention; and eye contact can guide and capture attention as well as act as a signal of attraction. People must detect and orient to people's eyes in order to utilize and follow gaze cues. People may use gaze following because they want to avoid social interactions. Past experiments have found that a person is more likely to look at a speaker's face when the speaker uses direct eye contact during real-time communication (e.g., conversing via live video) versus taped recordings. Individuals use gaze following and seeking to provide information for gaze cuing when information is not provided in a verbal manner. However, people do not seek gaze cues when they are not provided or when spoken instructions contain all of the relevant information. Motion cues Body language and body posture are other social cues that we use to interpret how someone else is feeling. Other than facial expressions, body language and posture are the main non-verbal social cues that we use. For instance, body language can be used to establish personal space, which is the amount of space needed for oneself in order to be comfortable. Taking a step back can therefore be a social cue indicating a violation of personal space. People pay attention to motion cues even with other visual cues (e.g. facial expression) present. Already brief displays of body motion can influence social judgements or inferences regarding a person's personality, mating behaviour, and attractiveness. For example, a high amplitude of motion might indicate extraversion and vertical movements might form an impression of aggression. Gestures are specific motions that one makes with the hands in order to further communicate a message. Certain gestures such as pointing gestures, can help direct people's focus to what is going on around them that is important. Not only does using gestures help the speaker to better process what they are saying, but it also helps the listener to better comprehend what the speaker is saying. Use of social cues during early childhood From a young age people are taught to use the social cues of others to gain insight about the world around them. There is also evidence that reliance on social cues is a naturally occurring tendency. Research has found that from birth, babies prefer infant directed speech over adult directed speech. At as young as 6 months old, babies prefer someone that has previously talked to them and who speaks their native language, over someone who speaks a foreign language. According to Guellai and Steri, at 9 weeks old, babies fixate more on an adult's eye region when the adult is talking to them, than when the adult is silent and looking at them. Guellai and Steri concluded that at birth, babies are able to read two forms of social cues: eye gaze and voice. When children use and interpret different signs and symbols to communicate with an adult, they use social cues such as eye gaze and engaging facial expressions to understand the adult's intentions. Leekam, Soloman and Teoh hypothesized that children would pay more attention to a task if the adult had an engaging facial expression. They tested their hypothesis on 2 and 3 year olds using three signs: a pointer finger, a replica and an arrow. Their first experiment supported their hypothesis. An important social cue that helps children comprehend the function and meaning of a sign or symbol is an engaging facial expression. During the difficult tasks of the study involving unfamiliar symbols, children looked more for social cues. They also found that young children understood the purpose behind the symbol or sign better in the presence of an engaging face. However, when no face was visible, performance on the tasks significantly declined, especially for tasks involving unfamiliar symbols and signs. Leekam et al. state that it is possible that children understood the significance of the pointing sign due to their familiarity with it; children as young as 12 months old begin to comprehend and use pointing as a gesture. The researchers concluded that it is easier for children as young as 7 months old to identify an action carried out by a bare hand than to understand the intent behind an action of a gloved hand. According to studies conducted on social referencing, infants use the emotional cues of others to guide their behavior. In a visual cliff study conducted by Vaish and Striano, infants were left on the shallow end of a plexiglass cliff with their mothers on the other end. The mothers used either facial and vocal cues, facial cues only, or vocal cues only to beckon their child forward. The study showed that infants crossed over faster in response to vocal-only cues than facial-only cues. The authors suggest the reason infants do this is because they are accustomed to vocal-only cues from their parents. In past studies, it has been found that infants use social cues to help them learn new words, especially when there are multiple objects present. Most studies have used two or more objects simultaneously to test if infants could learn if they paid attention to the cues presented. At 14 months old, infants followed an adult's gaze to an object, indicating that they believe that the eyes are important for looking. Head turning and gaze are other gazes that infants view as referential cues. At around 18 months old, social cues become beneficial to infants, though they are not always useful. Young infants rely on attentional cues while older infants rely more on social cues to help them learn things. However, it was found that 12-month-old infants could not use cues such as eye gaze, touching, and handling to learn labels. Research shows that 15-month-old infants are sensitive to gaze direction directed by adults and are able to correctly use these cues to help with referent novel words. Young children receive social cues from adults and determine how they should behave based upon these cues. Smith and LaFreniere mention recursive awareness of intentionality (RAI), which is the understanding of how the cues one provides will influence the beliefs and actions of those receiving them. RAI is absent in children under the age of 5, but develops during middle childhood. They tested to see if children of ages 4, 6, and 8 were able to read the intentions of their partner in a game through both nonverbal hints and facial expressions. They found that 8-year-olds were better able to read their partner's cues and based their decisions off of those cues. In school In the classroom, there is a development of cues between the teacher and student. Classrooms develop their own ways of talking and communicating information. Once a set of verbal and nonverbal behaviors takes place in a classroom on a consistent basis, it becomes a norm or set of rules within the classroom. The following cues are nonverbal indications that give way to certain norms in the classroom: pitch stress inflection Teachers and students develop ways of understanding the way the other party thinks, believes, acts and perceives things. A teacher can use the gaze of their eyes and the position of their body to indicate where the student's attention should be held. Sometimes when students are stuck in a previous discussion or cannot determine an appropriate response to the current topic, it could mean that they did not correctly perceive the cues that the teacher was displaying. Both students and teachers must read the classroom cues to gather what is going on, if and how they are supposed to be doing something, and the reasoning underlying actions. Impairments in psychological disorders Accurately interpreting social cues is a vital part of normal social function. However, individuals with certain psychological disorders, including autism, schizophrenia, social anxiety disorder and ADHD, tend to have difficulties in interpreting and using these cues. Autism spectrum disorder Autistic individuals often have trouble reading social cues correctly. Misreading social cues can lead to a person acting out, which can then result in negative interactions and social disapproval. Therefore, social cues are believed to be an important aspect of inclusion and comfort in personal, interpersonal and social environments. The DSM-V states that autism spectrum disorder is a neurodevelopmental disorder involving persistent deficits in social communication as well as repetitive and restricted behaviors. These deficits must be clinically impairing and present since childhood. Persistent deficits in social communication and social interaction across multiple contexts, as manifested by the following, currently or by history (must have all three): deficits in social-emotional reciprocity, ranging, for example, from abnormal social approach and failure of normal back-and-forth conversation; to reduced sharing of interests, emotions, or affect; to failure to initiate or respond to social interactions. deficits in nonverbal communicative behaviors used for social interaction, ranging, for example, from poorly integrated verbal and nonverbal communication; to abnormalities in eye contact and body language or deficits in understanding and use of gestures; to a total lack of facial expressions and nonverbal communication. deficits in developing, maintaining, and understanding relationships, ranging, for example, from difficulties adjusting behavior to suit various social contexts; to difficulties in sharing imaginative play or in making friends; to absence of interest in peers. Restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior, interests, or activities, as manifested by at least two of the following, currently or by history (must have at least two out of four): stereotyped or repetitive motor movements, use of objects, or speech (e.g., simple motor stereotypes, lining up toys or flipping objects, echolalia, idiosyncratic phrases). insistence on sameness, inflexible adherence to routines, or ritualized patterns of verbal or nonverbal behavior (e.g., extreme distress at small changes, difficulties with transitions, rigid thinking patterns, greeting rituals, need to take same route or eat same food every day). highly restricted, fixated interests that are abnormal in intensity or focus (e.g., strong attachment to or preoccupation with unusual objects, excessively circumscribed or perseverative interests). hyper- or hyporeactivity to sensory input or unusual interest in sensory aspects of the environment (e.g. apparent indifference to pain/temperature, adverse response to specific sounds or textures, excessive smelling or touching of objects, visual fascination with lights or movement). The main social cue impairments of those on the autism spectrum include interpreting facial expressions, understanding body language, and deciphering gaze direction. All three of these cues are classified under the nonverbal communication category. However, research has found that autistic children and adults have no difficulty in identifying human bodily movements or body language that is used in everyday and normal activities. The aspect that autistic people have trouble with is more so the ability that is needed to verbally describe the emotions that are connected with these types of bodily movements. Children who are not autistic learn to relate the body movements that they see with the emotions and mental states of others when they have face to face interactions with other children. Having face to face interactions with other people helps children increase their knowledge of what these body movements represent. After seeing these representations being used multiple times, children are then able to make inferences about the representations and the people making them. Thus, the children will be able to make assumptions about a person that they interact with in the future, since they already understand what body movements or body language represents. Schizophrenia According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), schizophrenia is a psychological disorder, which has to include two out of the five symptoms listed below: delusions hallucinations disorganized speech grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior negative symptoms: affective flattening, alogia, or avolition Schizophrenic people find it hard to pick up on social cues. More specifically, people with schizophrenia are found to have deficits in emotional facial recognition, social knowledge, empathy, and non-verbal cues, and emotional processing. Most of these aspects are part of a category called social cognition. However, most tasks that are related to social cognition involve emotional processing, empathy, and social norms knowledge. When dealing with facial expression recognition, recent research has found that people with this disorder are unable to recognize facial expressions that exhibit negative emotions, including fear, sadness, anger, and disgust. As a result, schizophrenic people have trouble comprehending situations that involve different types of empathy, especially situations that require empathy for pain. In addition, research has found that those with schizophrenia are more likely to make additional false positives when aspects of the task are more abstract. A false positive is made whenever a participant mistakenly believes that they observed a specific social cue in the vignette shown to them. Therefore, the social cue that they believe they saw happening in the video was nonexistent. To see whether someone is able to correctly identify both types of cues, researchers use the Social Cue Recognition Test (SCRT). When the task is defined as being too abstract, this means that it contains abstract cues, which are cues that can be inferred from a social setting. This would consist of actions and situations that contain affect, goals, and rules. Thus, people with schizophrenia have trouble making inferences about social situations and settings that deal with abstract aspects. On the other hand, schizophrenic people are better at identifying features that use concrete cues, which are cues that can be observed directly. The reason for this is because concrete clues are more apparent while abstract cues are more ambiguous. Social anxiety Social anxiety disorder, also known as social phobia, is a disorder that the DSM identifies as someone who experiences some of the following: persistent fear of one or more social or performance related situations in which the person with the fear is exposed to people that are unfamiliar constantly fears being humiliated, embarrassed, and/or criticized by those unfamiliar people when exposed to the feared situation, the person exhibits anxiety that may take the form of a panic attack; in children this could be crying out or a tantrum avoids the feared situation at all costs the avoidance of the feared situation causes one to be in distress which causes a significant interference with the person's normal routine, relationships, and functioning in either school or work. People with social anxiety disorder are found to be overly concerned with the disapproval and approval of others around them. Due to this obsession with what others think of them, people with this disorder tend to interact with few or no people at all. As a result, they do not get an appropriate amount of social interaction, which contributes to their deficit in interpreting emotions and facial expressions. More specifically, people with social anxiety disorder tend to have a negative bias towards both facial expressions and emotions, which leads them to interpret such cues that are normal and/or happy as being negative. Previous research has found that because people with this disorder tend to have a negative bias towards social cues, they take longer to process and comprehend social cues that represent happiness. ADHD ADHD stands for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, which is a psychological disorder that most commonly exists in children and adults that also have learning disabilities. It has been found that children who have both ADHD and a learning disability also have trouble comprehending social cues, have poor social skills, have difficulty creating and/or maintaining friendships, and have trouble reacting to other people's thoughts and feelings. However, part of the reason that children with ADHD have deficits in the social realm is their lack of focus and self control, which obstructs their ability to properly interpret social cues. More specifically, people with ADHD tend to focus on too many cues, which disables them from interpreting which cues are more important. Because of this, certain social situations are especially hard for people with ADHD to interpret. One situation that would meet this criterion would be when someone is being deceptive towards them. The reason a deceptive situation would be harder for some with this disorder is because the social cues one gives off when being deceptive are very subtle. Since people with ADHD already have trouble interpreting social cues, subtle social cues would be even more difficult for them to comprehend and interpret. However, many studies have found that people with ADHD that take stimulants or prescribed medication for ADHD are better able to interpret which social cues are of the most importance. As a result, they are better at interacting and communicating with others, which then enables them to make and maintain better friendships or relationships. In Internet communication Communication on the Internet is very different from communication with others in person. McKenna and Bargh identified four main differences between face-to-face communication and communication that takes place on the internet. These four differences are: anonymity physical distance physical appearance time Anonymity is a major feature that internet communication can provide. When communicating through email, for example, neither person can see the other's face. This can be a very positive feature for those that are socially anxious or have a social anxiety disorder because it eliminates the possibility of being publicly humiliated or embarrassed, which is something that most people who are socially anxious are very worried about. As a result, people with social anxiety are more inclined to open up, allowing them to get closer to and form more relationships with others. On the other hand, being anonymous can cause deindividuation, which is when one is no longer an individual, but rather just seen as being part of a group. In other words, it is when one can feel like they are just one person among a thousand others, and because of this, they are not as noticeable. This has been found to cause some people to behave more impulsively and have less self-monitoring. This type of behavior and thinking can cause one to be more blunt and aggressive towards the people that they are communicating with. However, the blunt and aggressive responses can also be due to the fact that the person is not communicating with the other person face to face. However, others have suggested that whether or not the reduced availability of social cues results in negative behavior may depend upon the situation and the individual's goals. Unlike with face-to-face communication, physical distance and proximity are not barriers to communicating on the Internet. The Internet allows people from all over the world to come together and interact with each other. No matter what city or country one lives in, one is able to communicate or interact with anyone around the world who is also on the Internet. As a result, people are able to make friends and communicate with others that they normally would not have been able to due to physical distance. Furthermore, people are enabled to communicate and stay in contact with their family and friends that may live too far away to visit on a regular basis. As with physical distance, time is a feature that does not matter when one is communicating on the internet. For instance, people are able to communicate with others even if the person(s) they are communicating with is not online at the same moment. One way this is done is through the process of email. By communicating through email, one is able to send another person a message at any time. Using email also allows one to think about what they would like to say and edit one's response before sending it. Furthermore, when one receives an email, they do not have to respond right away; there is no time constraint on when one must respond. Along with proximity and time, physical appearance is another factor about the internet that is of no importance. People are unable to see the physical characteristics of the person or persons that they are interacting with on the internet. This sets the condition for the possibility for people to talk to others that they normally would not if they were seeing the person face-to-face. So, people can connect on a more meaningful level and create closer relationships, physical attraction notwithstanding. This is also considered to be a very positive aspect about the internet. A positive feature of the internet is that it hosts millions of different chat rooms and blogs that allow people to communicate with others who share the same interests and values. Not only does this enable people to find others who are similar to them, but it also allows people to find emotional support. However, the ability for people to connect with like-minded others online also has negative implications. One negative feature is that it allows people to come together and talk about subjects such as murder; and another is the organization of hate groups. The absence of certain social cues online can lead to more misunderstandings than if the communication was occurring face-to-face. For example, when reading an email, people are unable to hear the sender's voice or see the sender's facial expression; both voice and facial expressions are important social cues that allow one to understand how someone else is feeling, and without them, one can be more prone to misinterpret what someone is conveying in an email. References External links Learning difficulties and social skills Oral communication Interpersonal communication

Psychological statistics

Psychological statistics is application of formulas, theorems, numbers and laws to psychology. Statistical methods for psychology include development and application statistical theory and methods for modeling psychological data. These methods include psychometrics, factor analysis, experimental designs, and Bayesian statistics. The article also discusses journals in the same field. Psychometrics Psychometrics deals with measurement of psychological attributes. It involves developing and applying statistical models for mental measurements. The measurement theories are divided into two major areas: (1) Classical test theory; (2) Item Response Theory. Classical test theory The classical test theory or true score theory or reliability theory in statistics is a set of statistical procedures useful for development of psychological tests and scales. It is based on a fundamental equation, X = T + E where, X is total score, T is a true score and E is error of measurement. For each participant, it assumes that there exist a true score and it need to be obtained score (X) has to be as close to it as possible. The closeness of X has with T is expressed in terms of ratability of the obtained score. The reliability in terms of classical test procedure is correlation between true score and obtained score. The typical test construction procedures has following steps: (1) Determine the construct (2) Outline the behavioral domain of the construct (3) Write 3 to 5 times more items than desired test length (4) Get item content analyzed by experts and cull items (5) Obtain data on initial version of the test (6) Item analysis (Statistical Procedure) (7) Factor analysis (Statistical Procedure) (8) After the second cull, make final version (9) Use it for research Reliability The reliability is computed in specific ways. (A) Inter-Rater reliability: Inter-Rater reliability is estimate of agreement between independent raters. This is most useful for subjective responses. Cohen's Kappa, Krippendorff's Alpha, Intra-Class correlation coefficients, Correlation coefficients, Kendal's concordance coefficient, etc. are useful statistical tools. (B) Test-Retest Reliability: Test-Retest Procedure is estimation of temporal consistency of the test. A test is administered twice to the same sample with a time interval. Correlation between two sets of scores is used as an estimate of reliability. Testing conditions are assumed to be identical. (C) Internal Consistency Reliability: Internal consistency reliability estimates consistency of items with each other. Split-half reliability (Spearman- Brown Prophecy) and Cronbach Alpha are popular estimates of this reliability. (D) Parallel Form Reliability: It is an estimate of consistency between two different instruments of measurement. The inter-correlation between two parallel forms of a test or scale is used as an estimate of parallel form reliability. Validity Validity of a scale or test is ability of the instrument to measure what it purports to measure. Construct validity, Content Validity, and Criterion Validity are types of validity. Construct validity is estimated by convergent and discriminant validity and factor analysis. Convergent and discriminant validity are ascertained by correlation between similar of different constructs. Content Validity: Subject matter experts evaluate content validity. Criterion Validity is correlation between the test and a criterion variable (or variables) of the construct. Regression analysis, Multiple regression analysis, and Logistic regression are used as an estimate of criterion validity. Software applications: The R software has ‘psych’ package that is useful for classical test theory analysis. Modern test theory The modern test theory is based on latent trait model. Every item estimates the ability of the test taker. The ability parameter is called as theta (θ). The difficulty parameter is called b. the two important assumptions are local independence and unidimensionality. The Item Response Theory has three models. They are one parameter logistic model, two parameter logistic model and three parameter logistic model. In addition, Polychromous IRT Model are also useful. The R Software has ‘ltm’, packages useful for IRT analysis. Factor analysis Factor analysis is at the core of psychological statistics. It has two schools: (1) Exploratory Factor analysis (2) Confirmatory Factor analysis. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) The exploratory factor analysis begins without a theory or with a very tentative theory. It is a dimension reduction technique. It is useful in psychometrics, multivariate analysis of data and data analytics. Typically a k-dimensional correlation matrix or covariance matrix of variables is reduced to k X r factor pattern matrix where r < k. Principal Component analysis and common factor analysis are two ways of extracting data. Principal axis factoring, ML factor analysis, alpha factor analysis and image factor analysis is most useful ways of EFA. It employs various factor rotation methods which can be classified into orthogonal (resulting in uncorrelated factors) and oblique (resulting correlated factors). The ‘psych’ package in R is useful for EFA. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) is a factor analytic technique that begins with a theory and test the theory by carrying out factor analysis. The CFA is also called as latent structure analysis, which considers factor as latent variables causing actual observable variables. The basic equation of the CFA is X = Λξ + δ where, X is observed variables, Λ are structural coefficients, ξ are latent variables (factors) and δ are errors. The parameters are estimated using ML methods however; other methods of estimation are also available. The chi-square test is very sensitive and hence various fit measures are used. R package ‘sem’, ‘lavaan’ are useful for the same. Experimental design Experimental methods are very popular in psychology, going back more than 100 years. Experimental psychology is a sub-discipline of psychology . Statistical methods applied for designing and analyzing experimental psychological data include the t-test, ANOVA, ANCOVA, MANOVA, MANCOVA, binomial test, chi-square, etc. Multivariate behavioral research Multivariate behavioral research is becoming very popular in psychology. These methods include Multiple Regression and Prediction; Moderated and Mediated Regression Analysis; Logistics Regression; Canonical Correlations; Cluster analysis; Multi-level modeling; Survival-Failure analysis; Structural Equations Modeling; hierarchical linear modelling, etc. are very useful for psychological statistics. Journals for statistical applications for psychology There are many specialized journals that publish advances in statistical analysis for psychology: Psychometrika Educational and Psychological Measurement Assessment American Journal of Evaluation Applied Psychological Measurement Behavior Research Methods British Journal of Mathematical and Statistical Psychology Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics Journal of Mathematical Psychology Multivariate Behavioral Research Psychological Assessment Structural Equation Modeling Software packages for psychological research Various software packages are available for statistical methods for psychological research. They can be classified as commercial software (e.g., JMP and SPSS) and open-source (e.g., R). Among the open-source offerings, the R software is the most popular. There are many online references for R and specialized books on R for Psychologists are also being written. The "psych" package of R is very useful for psychologists. Among others, "lavaan", "sem", "ltm", "ggplot2" are some of the popular packages. PSPP and KNIME are other free packages. Commercial packages include JMP, SPSS and SAS. JMP and SPSS are commonly reported in books. See also Quantitative psychology Psychometrics Notes References Agresti, A. (1990). Categorical data analysis. Wiley: NJ. Bollen, KA. (1989). Structural Equations with Latent Variables. New York: John Wiley & Sons. Belhekar, V. M. (2016). Statistics for Psychology Using R, New Delhi: SAGE. Cohen, B.H. (2007) Explaining Psychological Statistics, 3rd Edition, Wiley. Cronbach LJ (1951). Coefficient alpha and the internal structure of tests. Psychometrika 16, 297–334. doi:10.1007/bf02310555 Hambleton, R. K., & Swaminathan H. (1985). Item Response theory: Principles and Applications. Boston: Kluwer. Harman, H. H. (1976). Modern Factor Analysis(3rd ed.). Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Hayes, A. F. (2013). Introduction to mediation, moderation, and conditional process analysis. The Guilford Press: NY. Howell, D. (2009) Statistical Methods for Psychology, International Edition, Wadsworth. Kline, T. J. B. (2005)Psychological Testing: A Practical Approach to Design and Evaluation. Sage Publications: Thousand Oaks. Loehlin, J. E. (1992). Latent Variable Models: An Introduction to Factor, Path, and Structural Analysis (2nd ed.). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Lord, F. M., and Novick, M. R. ( 1 968). Statistical theories of mental test scores. Reading, Mass. : Addison-Wesley, 1968. Menard, S. (2001). Applied logistic regression analysis. (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks. CA: Sage Publications. Nunnally, J. & Bernstein, I. (1994). Psychometric Theory. McGraw-Hill. Raykov, T. & Marcoulides, G.A. (2010) Introduction to Psychometric Theory. New York: Routledge. Tabachnick, B. G., & Fidell, L. S. (2007). Using Multivariate Statistics, 6th ed. Boston: Pearson. Wilcox, R. (2012). Modern Statistics for the Social and Behavioral Sciences: A Practical Introduction. FL: CRC Press. External links CRAN Webpage for R Page for R functions for psychological statistics Matthew Rockloff's tutorials on t-tests, correlation and ANOVA Psychometrics Psychology experiments Applied statistics

Social emotional development

Social emotional development represents a specific domain of child development. It is a gradual, integrative process through which children acquire the capacity to understand, experience, express, and manage emotions and to develop meaningful relationships with others. As such, social emotional development encompasses a large range of skills and constructs, including, but not limited to: self-awareness, joint attention, play, theory of mind (or understanding others' perspectives), self-esteem, emotion regulation, friendships, and identity development. Social emotional development sets a foundation for children to engage in other developmental tasks. For example, in order to complete a difficult school assignment, a child may need the ability to manage their sense of frustration and seek out help from a peer. To maintain a romantic relationship after a fight, a teen may need to be able to articulate their feelings and take the perspective of their partner to successfully resolve the conflict. However, it is also interrelated with and dependent on other developmental domains. For example, language delays or deficits have been associated with social-emotional disturbances. Many mental health disorders, including major depressive disorder, anxiety disorders, borderline personality disorder, substance use disorders, and eating disorders, can be conceptualized through the lens of social emotional development, most prominently emotion regulation. Many of the core symptoms of autism spectrum disorder reflect abnormalities in social emotional developmental areas, including joint attention and theory of mind. Early childhood (birth to 3 years old) Attachment Attachment refers to the strong bond that individuals develop with special people in their lives. Though we can have attachment relationships with significant others in adulthood, such as marital partners, most humans’ first and most influential attachment is with their primary caregiver(s) as infants. John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth first delineated and tested attachment theory as an evolutionarily informed process in which the emotional ties to a caregiver are adaptive for survival. Their research supported the presence of four stages of attachment formation: Undiscriminating social responsiveness (0–3 months) – Instinctual infant signals, such as crying, gazing, gasping, help facilitate caregiver interactions with infants. Infants do not consistently discriminate with whom they signal or how they respond.    Preferential social responsiveness (3–6 months) – Infants now clearly respond differently to primary caregiver(s) than strangers. Infants have learned that this caregiver will consistently respond to their signals. Emergence of secure-base behavior (6–24 months) – Young children use their attachment figure as a “secure base” from which to explore the world and a “safe haven” to return to for reassurance or comfort. When the attachment figure is not available, children may exhibit separation anxiety.    Partnership (24 months and older) – Children develop an internal working model about the availability and responsiveness of attachment figures that can impact their future behavior and relationships.    Early attachment is considered foundational to later social-emotional development, and is predictive of many outcomes, including internalizing problems, externalizing problems, social competence, self-esteem, cognitive development, and achievement. Mary Ainsworth's work using the Strange Situation method identified four types of attachment styles in young children: Secure attachment: Children in this category are willing to explore the room/toys independently when their caregiver is present. They may cry when separated, but seek out comfort and are easily soothed when their caregiver returns. This style is associated with sensitive, responsive care by the attachment figure. Anxious/Avoidant attachment: Children in this category tend to be less responsive to separation from their caregiver, do not differentiate as clearly between caregivers and strangers, and are avoidant of caregivers upon return. This style is associated with overstimulating care or by consistently detached care.    Anxious/Ambivalent attachment: Children in this category may seek out closeness with caregiver and appear unwilling to explore. They show distress upon separation and may appear both mad (e.g., hitting, struggling) and clingy when the caregiver returns. These children are often harder to soothe. This style is associated with inconsistent responsiveness or maternal interference with exploration. Disorganized attachment: Children in this category often do not show a predictable pattern of behavior, but may be non-responsive or demonstrate flat affect. This style is associated with unpredictable and/or frightening experiences with caregivers, and is more common in children who have experienced maltreatment. Emotional experiences Emotional expression Beginning at birth, newborns have the capacity to signal generalized distress in response to unpleasant stimuli and bodily states, such as pain, hunger, body temperature, and stimulation. They may smile, seemingly involuntarily, when satiated, in their sleep, or in response to pleasant touch. Infants begin using a “social smile,” or a smile in response to a positive social interaction, at approximately 2 to 3 months of age, and laughter begins at 3 to 4 months. Expressions of happiness become more intentional with age, with young children interrupting their actions to smile or express happiness to nearby adults at 8–10 months of age, and with markedly different kinds of smiles (e.g., grin, muted smile, mouth open smile) developing at 10 to 12 months of age. Between 18 and 24 months, children begin to acquire a sense of self. This gives rise to the onset of self-conscious emotions (e.g., shame, embarrassment, guilt, pride) around that same age, which are considered more complex in nature than basic emotions such as happiness, anger, fear, or disgust. This is because they require that children have recognition of external standards, and evaluative capacities to determine whether the self meets that standard. Emotion regulation Emotion regulation can be defined by two components. The first, “emotions as regulating,” refers to changes that are elicited by activated emotions (e.g., a child's sadness eliciting a change in parent response). The second component is labeled “emotions as regulated,” which refers to the process through which the activated emotion is itself changed by deliberate actions taken by the self (e.g., self-soothing, distraction) or others (e.g., comfort). Throughout infancy, children rely heavily on their caregivers for emotion regulation; this reliance is labeled co-regulation. Caregivers use strategies such as distraction and sensory input (e.g., rocking, stroking) to regulate infants’ emotions. Despite a reliance on caregivers to change the intensity, duration, and frequency of emotions, infants are capable of engaging in self-regulation strategies as young as 4 months. At this age, infants intentionally avert their gaze from overstimulating stimuli. By 12 months, infants use their mobility in walking and crawling to intentionally approach or withdraw from stimuli. Throughout toddlerhood, caregivers remain important for the emotional development and socialization of their children, through behaviors such as: labeling their child's emotions, prompting thought about emotion (e.g., “why is the turtle sad?”), continuing to provide alternative activities/distractions, suggesting coping strategies, and modeling coping strategies. Caregivers who use such strategies and respond sensitively to children's emotions tend to have children who are more effective at emotion regulation, are less fearful and fussy, more likely to express positive emotions, easier to soothe, more engaged in environmental exploration, and have enhanced social skills in the toddler and preschool years. Understanding others Social referencing Starting at about 8–10 months, infants begin to engage in social referencing, in which they refer to another, often an adult or caregiver, to inform their reaction to environmental stimuli. In the classic visual cliff experiments, 12-month-old babies who were separated from their mothers by a plexiglass floor that appeared to represent a dangerous “cliff” looked to their mothers for a cue. When mothers responded to their infants with facial expressions signaling encouragement and happiness, most infants crossed over the cliff. In contrast, if mothers displayed fear or anger, most infants did not cross. As infants age, their social referencing capacity becomes more developed. By 14 months, infants are able to use information gained from social referencing to inform decisions outside of the immediate moment. By 18 months, infants are able to socially reference interactions not directed at them. For example, if their caregiver responded with anger when their older brother went to take a cookie, the infant is able to harness that information and is less likely to take a cookie themselves. At this age, social referencing also begins to support children's understanding of others, as children learn what others like and dislike based on the information gained from social referencing (e.g., facial expression). As such, if an adult reacts by smiling when given a ball but with anger when given a doll, an 18-month-old will choose to give that adult a ball, rather than a doll, regardless of their own preferences. Empathy From an early age, newborns are reactive to others’ distress, as evidenced by behaviors such as crying in response to another infant's cry. As children continue to develop, they begin to display behaviors that indicate an understanding of and connection to others’ emotional states beyond the simple informational value those emotional states provide. Children at 18–30 months will respond to verbal and nonverbal cues, such as facial expressions or body posture, of discomfort or sadness with simple helping behaviors (e.g., giving an adult a blanket if they are shivering, rubbing their arms, and saying “brr”). Throughout this period (18–30 months), children become more adept and need fewer cues to engage in helping behavior. However, helping behavior at this age is already dependent on the cost of helping (e.g., they are less likely to give the adult their own blanket) and the recipient of the help (e.g., children are more likely to help and show concern for caregivers than strangers or peers). Social interactions Between 3 and 6 months old, infants begin engaging in simple back-and-forth exchanges, often with their caregivers. These exchanges do not consist of words, but of coos, gurgles, smiles or other facial expressions, and bodily movements (e.g., lifting arms, kicking legs). These back and forth exchanges mimic the turn-taking that occurs in conversations. Joint attention Joint attention refers to the ability of individuals to share a common point of reference or attention. In children, this common point of reference often is an object in the environment, such as a toy. The development of joint attention initially starts with the infants' ability to respond to joint attention bids (e.g., looking where their parent looks), and eventually develops with age to the ability to initiate joint attention by directing the attention of another to shared point of reference. This can be done through many means, including gaze, gesture (e.g., pointing, showing), or speech. As early as 3 to 4 months of age, infants show the beginning requisites of joint attention, by looking in the general direction as adults; however, they are not consistently able to find the shared point of reference. At 10 months, this accuracy improves, and infants are also more discerning in their response to joint attention. For example, at this age, a 10-month-old will not look in the same direction as an adult if that adult's eyes are closed, a mistake that younger children make. Initiation of joint attention begins at approximately 1 year old. This might look like a child pointing to an airplane, then looking at their mom, and back at the airplane, as if to say "do you see that?" or "look at that!" Joint attention is a critical social skill that drives development in other domains. Joint attention enables infants to identify objects that adults are labeling and promotes shared back-and-forth communication about them. Fifteen-month-old infants who were engaged in interactions with caregivers that include a joint attentional focus (e.g., a toy) demonstrated more frequent communicative utterances than when not in joint attention episodes. These episodes of joint engagement were predictive of later vocabulary and word learning, especially when the joint attention was focused on an object that the infant was initially attending to, such as when an infant picks up a ball, then the mother engages in a joint attention episode with the infant using the ball as the shared point of reference. At later ages, when initiating joint attention, the frequency that a child combines one word with a gesture (e.g., pointing to the plane and saying "plane") is associated with earlier onset of multi-word utterances, and more complex speech overall at 3.5 years old. Preschoolers (3–6 years old) Self-concept Self-concept refers to the set of attributes, abilities, attitudes, and values that one identifies as defining who he or she is. Although some initial milestones occur before this period that support self-concept, including basic self awareness (i.e., the ability to recognize themselves in a mirror) and self-labeling of their gender, this period involves several advances in this domain. By 42 months, children are able to describe their likes and dislikes, suggesting a developing awareness of what elicits positive and negative emotions in themselves. By 5 years old, children demonstrate agreement with their mothers' ratings of their behavior on basic behavioral indicators of personality. Gender identity During the preschool period, children are deepening their gender identity and integrating gender socialization information into their self-concept. Preschoolers learn gender stereotypes quickly and definitively, ranging from toy preferences, clothes, jobs, and behaviors. These stereotypes are initially held firmly, such that 3 to 4-year-olds will often state that violations are not possible and that they would not want to be friends with a child who violates their stereotypes. Children acquire gender stereotypic behaviors early in the preschool period through social learning, then organize these behaviors into beliefs about themselves, forming a basic gender identity. By the end of the preschool period, children acquire gender constancy, an understanding of the biological basis of sex and its consistency over time. Understanding others Younger preschool aged children demonstrate the basics of theory of mind, or the ability to take the perspective of others. However, this skill is constrained by children's limited understanding of how thoughts and beliefs, even when false, influence behavior. This is demonstrated in the following scenario: Danny puts his toy on the shelf, then leaves the room. His friend Sally comes in, plays with the toy, and puts it in the cabinet. When asked where Danny will look for his toy, a young preschool aged child will state that he will look in the cabinet, therefore not recognizing Danny's current false belief about the toy's location. Between 4 and 6 years, children's capacity to understand false beliefs, and subsequently their accuracy in perspective taking, becomes strengthened. Social interactions Play is often cited as a central building block to children's development, so much so that the United Nations Commission on Human Rights has declared it to be a human right of all children. The complexity and diversity of play increases immensely in the preschool years, most notably with the onset of cooperative play, where children work toward a common goal, and socio-dramatic play (a type of cooperative play), where children act out make believe scenes. Socio-dramatic play is rooted in the child's real-life experiences, falling into three categories: family scenes (e.g., "playing house" with assigned mommy and daddy roles), character scenes (e.g., being a superhero, or a princess), and functional scenes (e.g., playing doctor). Cooperative play and socio-dramatic play both bring about increased social interactions, as compared to solitary play and parallel play, where children play similarly next to each other without significant interaction (e.g., two children building their own towers). It is here where play becomes intertwined with social emotional development. The characteristics of socio-dramatic play allow children to practice cooperation, negotiation, and conflict resolution skills, as well as engage in role-playing that promotes perspective taking. As such, socio-dramatic play has been associated with all of these social emotional skills in children. Middle childhood (7–12 years old) Self-concept Between 8–11 years old, children begin to use self-evaluations and competencies to define their sense of self. This derives from the recently developed ability to make social comparisons. At 6 years old, these social comparisons may be to a specific individual; however, this becomes more complex in the coming years, allowing children to compare themselves and their performance to multiple individuals to arrive at a general conclusion. School aged children also show the ability to simultaneously hold differentiated self-evaluations across domains (e.g., having good physical appearance, but poor school performance). Gender identity In middle childhood, boys and girls form peer groups segregated by gender, which may act to perpetuate previously learned gender stereotypes. Deriving from the ability to make social comparisons, school aged children begin to integrate attributions about how gender typical they are into their gender identity. At this age, children's ability to make more global self-evaluations also allows them to recognize contentedness or dissonance with their gender assignment. Children's gender identity on these two dimensions is significantly correlated with their self-esteem, such that children with higher levels of typicality and contentedness report having higher self-esteem and worth. Emotional experiences Emotion vocabulary By 3 years old, children have acquired a basic vocabulary for labeling simple emotional experiences, using words such as "scared," "happy," and "mad." However, the emotional vocabulary of children grows much more rapidly during middle childhood, doubling every two years in this period before slowing down dramatically in adolescence. At the end of the preschool period, most children reliably comprehend the meaning of around 40 emotion words; by the time they are 11 years old, most children see a sevenfold increase to understanding almost 300 emotion words. Furthermore, a shift in the processing of positive and negative words in the course of development occurs: While young children (aged 5 and 6) have shown a better performance for positive words, this preference disappeared with increasing age (i.e., positivity bias in emotion term processing). Display rules Emotional display rules are culturally bound norms that dictate when, how, and with whom individuals can express emotions. Accordingly, the ability to enact display rules relies on children's capacity for emotional expression and emotion regulation. Socialization toward these display rules begins in infancy, and children show some capacity in the preschool period. However, children's use of display rules and understanding of their value become increasingly complex in elementary school. As children age from 1st to 7th grade, they are less likely to outwardly express anger or sadness. Children also report using display rules to control their emotional expressions more with teachers than with peers, and more than peers than with parents. There is some evidence to suggest that this emotional masking also increases with age throughout the school age period, at least with teachers. Display rules also inform how children choose to express emotions; as children move from the preschool period to middle childhood, they become more likely to use verbal communication to express negative emotions than nonverbal behaviors, such as crying or hitting. Finally, at around 9 years old, bolstered by increased perspective taking skills, display rules are recognized as important to maintaining social harmony and relationships rather than simply a means to avoid punishment. Emotion regulation Upon school entry, children's emotion regulation repertoire becomes increasingly diverse as previously relied upon methods (e.g., seeking support from parents, moving away/avoiding an emotionally activating stimuli) become less effective. In middle childhood, children implement more complex distraction techniques, cognitive appraisal strategies (e.g., choosing to focus on the positive), and problem solving methods. At 10 years old, children's emotion regulation involves a balance of problem-focused coping and emotion-focused coping strategies. Problem-focused coping represents a change driven strategy, focused on attempting to eliminate the source of stress through proactive action (e.g., if a child feels worried about a test, choosing to study to regulate that worry). In contrast, emotion-focused coping is acceptance based and can be more effective when the stressor can not be easily changed or removed (e.g., if a child is disappointed about their grade on the test, using strategies to reduce disappointment in the moment: "this will help me know what to study for the final"). And although diversification of emotion regulation strategy use occurs at this age, school aged children continue to strengthen their use of previous regulation strategies as well. Notably, school age children continue to seek out regulation support, but not just from their parents, but increasingly from teachers and peers in this period. Children also show a developmental progression in differentiation of whom to go to for emotional support given then specific situations. Thus on the whole, by the beginning of adolescence, children have become more skilled emotion regulators. Adolescence (13–18 years old) Self-concept Identity development As adolescents navigate an increasingly diverse social world, their self-concept shifts to create and accommodate an organized understanding of how situational factors may influence their behavior (e.g., how and why behavior is different with friends as compared to with parents). With this added complexity, a fundamental task of adolescence is considered forming a unified, coherent identity, inclusive of traits, values, and goals. Erik Erikson theorized that adolescence is characterized by a period of exploration and commitments. The combination of these two traits resulted in four identity statuses: Identity achievement: a status characterized by a past period of exploration, and subsequent commitment to values and goals Moratorium: a status characterized by continued active exploration, without commitment Foreclosure: a status characterized by strong commitment to a prescribed identity (e.g., by teachers, parents), without a previous period of self exploration Diffusion: a status characterized by both a lack of exploration and a lack of commitment Past research suggests that over the course of high school, the distribution of identity statuses changes, such that many adolescents begin high school in a Diffusion status, but many adolescents reach Identity Achievement status at the end of high school. This general pattern is echoed in specific studies of minority group ethnic identity development, where youth initially have an unexplored ethnic identity, then enter a moratorium phase, followed by ethnic identity achievement. In general, Identity Achievement and Moratorium statuses appear to be associated with positive psychological adjustment, including higher self-esteem, goal-oriented behavior, self-efficacy, and openness. Social interactions Friendships Adolescence is a time in which peer relationships become increasingly important and frequent. In this period, adolescents reliably spend approximately twice as much time with their peers than with their parents. At the same time, there is a developmental shift occurring in the quality and nature of friendships in this period. Adolescents' friendships are characterized by increased emotional support, intimacy, closeness, and loyalty. This is contrasted to friendships in early childhood, which is built upon time spent in joint activities, and middle childhood, which is defined by reciprocity and helping behavior. Close friendships in adolescence can act as a buffer against the negative impacts of stressors, provide a foundation for intimacy and conflict resolution necessary in romantic relationships, and promote empathy for others. Peer acceptance Peer acceptance is both related to children's prior social emotional development and predictive of later developments in this domain. Sociometric status identifies five classifications of peer acceptance in children based on two dimensions: social liking and social impact/visibility: popular, average, rejected, neglected, and controversial. These patterns of acceptance can become self-perpetuating throughout childhood and adolescence, as rejected children are excluded from peer interactions that promote relationship skills, such as perspective taking and conflict resolution. Peer groups During adolescence, children increasingly form peer groups, often with a common interest or values (e.g., "skaters," "jocks"), that are somewhat insular in nature (e.g., "cliques" or "crowds"). Theoretically, peer groups have been hypothesized to serve as an intermediary support source as adolescents exert independence from their family. This is supported by data that indicates that the importance of peer group membership to youth increases in early adolescence, followed by a decline in later adolescence. Peers and peer groups at this age become important socialization agents, contributing to adolescents' sense of identity, behavior, and values. Peer groups, whether intentionally or unintentionally, exert peer pressure and operant learning principles to shape behavior through reinforcement, resulting in members of peer groups become increasingly similar over time. Many adolescents report the effects of peer influence on many aspects of their behavior, including academic engagement, risk-taking, and family involvement; however, the direction of this influence varied dependent on the peer group the adolescent was affiliated with. Emotion Dynamics The literature suggests systematic changes in emotion dynamics throughout childhood and adolescence such as in the intensity of specific emotions they experience, and in the variability, instability, inertia, and differentiation of emotions, and whether and how emotions augment or blunt each other over time. From early to late adolescence positive and negative emotions tend to become more stable. Adolescent mental health problems have been associated with more variable and less intense positive emotions and more intense anxiety and heightened sadness variability. Assessment of social-emotional development The assessment of social emotional development in young children must include an assessment of both child-level factors, such as genetic disorders, physical limitations, or linguistic and cognitive developmental level, as well as contextual factors, such as family and cultural factors. Of particular importance for young children is the caregiving context, or the parent-child relationship. Early childhood Assessment The majority of measures designed to assess early childhood social emotional development are parent report questionnaires. Parent reports using such measures repeatedly indicate that the 7%-12% of children show early social-emotional problems or delays. Increasing evidence suggests that these problems remain moderately stable over periods of 1–2 years, suggesting clinical and societal benefits to early identification and intervention. Standardized assessments have been developed to identify social emotional concerns as young as 6 months old. Below is a list of some more widely used parent-report screening measures and comprehensive assessments: Ages and Stages Questionnaire: Social Emotional (ASQ-SE) Appropriate for children ages 6–60 months Screening measure: produces one score, with high scores indicating possible need for further evaluation Brief Infant and Toddler Social Emotional Assessment (BITSEA) Appropriate for children ages 12–36 months Screening measure: produces Problem and Competence scores, combined cut-off point determines concern Child Behavior Checklist ages 1.5-5 (CBCL) Appropriate for children ages 18 months – 60 months Comprehensive measure: produces specific DSM-oriented scale scores, as well as Internalizing, Externalizing, Total Problems standardized t-scores Later Childhood Assessment The Social Thinking Methodology is a developmental, language-based and thinking-based (metacognitive) methodology that uses visual frameworks, unique vocabulary, strategies, and activities to foster social competence for children ages 4 – 18 years old. The methodology has assessment and treatment components for both interventionists and social learners. The methodology includes components of other well-known and evidence based interventions such as Social Stories, Hidden Curriculum, 5-point scale, and others, etc. Social Thinking™ shares ideals with executive functioning, central coherence issues, and perspective-taking. The assessment itself is multi-faceted, pulling information from a variety of sources and contexts. A thorough assessment of social skills includes: (a) observing the student with his peers and in different environmental contexts; (b) the diagnostician relating with the student without facilitating the student's social success; (c) a battery of informal assessment tools; (d) administering carefully considered standardized measures; (e) interviewing teachers and parents with regard to the students social cognition and social behaviors. Social emotional learning & development in schools Social and emotional learning in schools involves 5 key abilities: self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making. These skills are seen as the foundation upon which people can build all other relational skills. These core skills allow people to regulate and process emotions, think critically, maintain positive relationships, collaborate, and communicate effectively. Social and emotional learning also has a clear connection with and is positively linked to academic success. It promotes active learning within a community setting, providing the emotional support many need to grow academically. Social and emotional learning recognizes that learning is a social activity and is most productive through collaboration. Many child theorists stress the importance of learning as a social process in theories of child development. Vygotsky's developmental framework highlights the importance of children as social learners needing connections to learn and grow. Social emotional development in Latin America In Mexico, efforts to promote social emotional development are challenged by the cultural stigma against mental health. Beginning in 2013, the Mexican government implemented programs of emotional pedagogy, like psicoeducacion, to raise self-knowledge and disseminate mental health information in many domains of public life in order to address this stigma. Mexico's secretary of health defines psychoeducacion as the teaching of expression, feelings, and behavior. In Oaxaca, government-initiated psychoeducacion projects are common in health clinics, public health communications, as well as in the projects of nonprofit organizations. Efforts have even been made to work with religious organizations to replace previous language for mental illness with more clinical terms. The psychoeducacion trainings by the Mexican government, some of them mandatory, are aimed at teaching children the vocabulary to be able to express themselves in order to recognize the need for early treatment. Although cultural barriers exists the identification and management of emotions are treated as teachable skills. In the global mental health sector, there is concern that Western psychology is crowding out traditional understandings and treatments of mental illness, leading to some backlash against mental health care - such as, for example, amongst indigenous groups in Mexico. To address this, some organizations advocate a close collaboration with indigenous communities. Western experts are studying how specific terminology used in indigenous communities corresponds with common mental health syndromes recognized by the American Psychiatric Association. By Western standards, the treatment and diagnosis of community "healers" is inconsistent and therefore devalued. Trained mental health experts express frustration, for example, towards those who wait until their symptoms are severe before seeking professional help. Notes References Child development Social change Emotion

Vicarious traumatization

Vicarious trauma (VT) is a term invented by Irene Lisa McCann and Laurie Anne Pearlman that is used to describe how work with traumatized clients affects trauma therapists. The phenomenon had been known as secondary traumatic stress, a term coined by Charles Figley. In vicarious trauma, the therapist experiences a profound worldview change and is permanently altered by empathetic bonding with a client. This change is thought to have three requirements: empathic engagement and exposure to graphic, traumatizing material; exposure to human cruelty; and the reenactment of trauma in therapy. This can produce changes in a therapist's spirituality, worldview, and self-identity. Vicarious trauma is a subject of debate by theorists, with some saying that it is based on the concepts of countertransference and compassion fatigue. McCann and Pearlman say that there is probably a relationship to these constructs, but vicarious trauma is distinct. Understanding of the phenomenon is evolving. Signs and symptoms Symptoms of vicarious trauma align with those of primary trauma. As professionals attempt to connect with their clients emotionally, the symptoms of vicarious trauma can create emotional disturbances such as sadness, grief, irritability, and mood swings. Signs and symptoms of vicarious trauma parallel those of direct trauma, although they tend to be less intense. Workers with personal-trauma histories may be more vulnerable to VT, although research findings are mixed. Common signs and symptoms include social withdrawal, mood swings, aggression, increased sensitivity to violence, somatic symptoms, sleep difficulties, intrusive imagery, cynicism, sexual difficulties, difficulty managing boundaries with clients, and relationship difficulties which reflect problems with security, trust, esteem, intimacy, and control. Contributing factors Vicarious trauma, conceptually based in constructivism, arises from interaction between individuals and their situations. A helper's personal history (including prior traumatic experiences), coping strategies, support network, and other things interact with his or her situation (including work setting, nature of the work, and clientele served) and may trigger vicarious trauma. Individuals respond and adapt to, and cope with, VT differently. It has been suggested that traumatization occurs when one's view of the world, or a feeling of safety, is shattered by hearing about the experiences of a client. This exposure to trauma can interrupt a clinician's daily functioning, reducing their effectiveness. Anything that interferes with a helper's ability to fulfill his or her responsibility to assist traumatized clients can contribute to vicarious trauma. Many human-service workers report that administrative and bureaucratic factors that are an impediment to their effectiveness influence work satisfaction. Negative aspects of an organization such as reorganization, downsizing in the name of change management, and a lack of resources in the name of lean management contribute to burned-out workers. Vicarious trauma has also been attributed to the stigmatization of mental-health care by service providers. Stigma leads to an inability to engage in self-care; the service provider may reach burnout and become more likely to experience VT. Research has begun to indicate that vicarious trauma is more prominent in those with a prior history of trauma and adversity. A mental-health provider's defense style might pose a risk factor for vicarious traumatization; mental-health providers with self-sacrificing defense styles have been found to experience increased vicarious traumatization. Among EMS personnel, previous-veteran status increased the likelihood of experiencing vicarious trauma. Related concepts Although the term "vicarious trauma" has been used interchangeably with "compassion fatigue", "secondary traumatic stress disorder," "burnout," "countertransference" and "work-related stress," differences exist: Unlike compassion fatigue, VT is a theory-based construct. Observable symptoms can begin the process of discovering contributing factors and related signs, symptoms, and adaptations. VT specifies psychological domains that can be affected, rather than specific symptoms. This may more accurately guide preventive measures and interventions, and allow for the accurate development of interventions for multiple domains (such as changes in the balance between psychotherapy and other work-related tasks and changes in self-care practices). Countertransference is a psychotherapist's response to a particular client. VT refers to responses across clients and time. Unlike burnout, countertransference and work-related stress, VT is specific to trauma workers; a helper will experience trauma-specific difficulties, such as intrusive imagery, that are not part of burnout or countertransference. Burnout and vicarious traumatization overlap regarding emotional exhaustion. A worker may experience both VT and burnout, and each has its own remedies. VT and countertransference may also co-occur, intensifying each other. Unlike vicarious trauma, countertransference can provide psychotherapists with important information about their clients. Work-related stress is a generic term without a theoretical basis, specific signs and symptoms, contributing factors, or remedies. Burnout and vicarious trauma can co-exist. Countertransference responses may increase vicarious trauma. Vicarious post-traumatic growth is not a theory-based construct, but is based on self-reported signs. Body-centred countertransference Mechanism The posited mechanism for vicarious traumatization is empathy. Different forms of empathy may have different effects on helpers. Batson and his colleagues have conducted research that might aid trauma helpers in managing empathic connection constructively. Measurement VT has been measured in a variety of ways. Vicarious trauma is a multifaceted construct, requiring a multifaceted assessment. Aspects of VT that would need to be measured for a full assessment include self-capacities, ego resources, frame of reference (identity, world view, and spirituality), psychological needs, and trauma symptoms. They include: Psychological needs, using the Trauma and Attachment Belief Scale Self-capacities, using the Inner Experience Questionnaire or the Inventory of Altered Self-Capacities Trauma symptoms, using the PTSD Checklist, Impact of Events Scale, Impact of Events Scale-Revised, children's revised Impact of Events Scale (Arabic Version), Trauma Symptom Inventory, Detailed Assessment of Posttraumatic Stress, or the World Assumptions Scale Secondary Traumatic Stress Scale is a 17-item, five-point Likert scale that distinguishes between PTSD measures by framing the questions as stressors from exposure to clients. The Professional Quality of Life (ProQol) version five, with 30 questions on a five-point Likert scale, measures compassion fatigue and secondary trauma. Vicarious traumatization may be addressed with awareness, balance, and connection. One set of approaches is coping strategies, which include self-care, rest, escape, and play. A second set of approaches can be grouped as transforming strategies, which aim to help workers create community and find meaning through the work. Within each category, strategies may be applied in one's personal and professional lives. Organizations that provide trauma services can also play a role in mitigating vicarious trauma. Many simple things increase happiness, which lessens the impact of vicarious traumatization. People who are more socially connected tend to be happier. People who consciously practice gratitude are also shown happier. Creative endeavors that are detached from work also increase happiness. Self-care practices such as yoga, qigong, and sitting meditation have been found helpful. Harvard Business Review, in a case study of traumatization, noted the importance of an organizational culture which values social workers and counselors. Research indicates that clinicians exposed to vicarious trauma need targeted interventions such as respite, increasing self-efficacy, and appropriate professional support increase their resilience and act as a buffer against vicarious trauma. Prognosis Children have been found to experience vicarious trauma from trauma experienced by their caregivers and peers. Girls experience VT more than boys, and socioeconomic status and race have been found to predict vicarious trauma symptoms. Counselors and other mental-health professionals have been found to experience vicarious trauma when working with veterans and others who have experienced trauma. Factors that predict vicarious-trauma severity include professional trauma, level of peer supervision, population served by the clinician, defense mechanisms of the therapist, emotional coping strategies, and social-support availability. Foster parents have also been found to experience vicarious trauma related to the trauma of their children. Several studies have found that foster parents experience vicarious trauma, burnout and compassion fatigue, and report emotional disengagement (a common symptom of VT) as a coping strategy. See also Allostatic load Emotional labor Historical trauma W. H. R. Rivers Secondary traumatic stress Vicarious trauma after viewing media References Further reading External links University of Pennsylvania Positive Psychology Center Vicarious Trauma Among Therapists, University of Alberta Counseling Types of mental disorders

Proactivity

Proactivity or proactive behavior refers to self-initiated behavior that endeavours to solve a problem before it has occurred. Proactive behavior involves acting in advance of a future situation, rather than reacting. It refers to taking control of a situation and making early changes, rather than adjusting to a situation or waiting for something to happen. Reactivity, as a behaviour pattern, is a habitual mode of taking one's lead from the situation or a participant, rather than taking initiative to solve the problem on your own terms. In moderation, this can be an effective expression of social risk aversion. Taken to excess, reactivity is a form of disempowerment. History The use of the word proactive (or pro-active) was limited to the domain of experimental psychology in the 1930s, and used with a different meaning. Oxford English Dictionary (OED) credits Paul Whiteley and Gerald Blankfort, citing their 1933 paper discussing proactive inhibition as the "impairment or retardation of learning or of the remembering of what is learned by effects that remain active from conditions prior to the learning". In another related meaning, the 1946 book Man's Search for Meaning brought the word to the wider public domain. The author, Austrian existential neuropsychiatrist Dr. Viktor Frankl, used the word to describe a person who took responsibility for his or her life, rather than looking for causes in outside circumstances or other people. Frankl stressed the importance of courage, perseverance, individual responsibility and awareness of the existence of choices, regardless of the situation or context. Proactive behaviour Proactive behavior can be contrasted with other work-related behaviors, such as proficiency, i.e. the fulfillment of predictable requirements of one’s job, or adaptability, the successful coping with and support of change initiated by others in the organization. In regard to the latter, whereas adaptability is about responding to change, proactivity is about initiating constructive change. Proactivity is not restricted to extra role performance behaviors. Employees can be proactive in their prescribed role (e.g. by changing the way they perform a core task to be more efficient). Likewise, behaviors labeled as organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) can be carried out proactively or passively. For example, the altruistic OCB can be proactive in nature (e.g. offering help to co-workers before they ask for assistance). It aims at the identification and exploring of opportunities in taking action against the potential problems and threats. See also Journal of Applied Psychology Onboarding Personnel psychology Proactive communications References Bibliography Campbell, D. J. (2000). The proactive employee: Managing workplace initiative. Academy of Management Executive, 14(3), 52-66. Frese, M., Kring, W., Soose, A., & Zempel, J. (1996). Personal initiative at work: Differences between East and West Germany. Academy of Management Journal, 39(1), 37-63. Grant, A. M., & Ashford, S. J. 2008. The dynamics of proactivity at work. Research in Organizational Behavior, 28: 3-34. http://www.unc.edu/~agrant/publications.htm Griffin, M. A., Neal, A., & Parker, S. K. (2007). A new model of work role performance: Positive behavior in uncertain and interdependent contexts. Academy of Management Journal, 50(2), 327 - 347. Parker, S. K., & Collins, C. G. (2010). Taking stock: Integrating and differentiating multiple forms of proactive behavior. Journal of Management. 36, 633-662. https://web.archive.org/web/20110706123753/http://parker.zydec.net.au/publications/Parker%26collins_ProactivityDimensions_JOM_InPress.pdf Parker, S. K., Williams, H. M., & Turner, N. (2006). Modeling the antecedents of proactive behavior at work. Journal of Applied Psychology, 91(3), 636-652. https://web.archive.org/web/20110706123805/http://parker.zydec.net.au/publications/parker_et_al_modelingProactiveBehavior_JAP_2006.pdf External links Organizational theory

Infantilization

Infantilization is the prolonged treatment of one who is not a child, as though they are a child. Studies have shown that an individual, when infantilized, is overwhelmingly likely to feel disrespected. Such individuals may report a sense of transgression akin to dehumanization. Racism Infantilization is an important concept that was pivotal to maintaining slavery - children of enslaved women would also be enslaved because both belonged to the master. Africans were considered ‘child races’, resulting in subsequent infantilization. When black men respond negatively to “boy,” this is caused by infantilization. Infantilization plays a role in implicit bias, which is a modern effect caused by subjugation, primarily economically, by failing to honor the work and creativity of subjugated populations. Infantilization can be used by propaganda to remove factual contributions from subjugated communities. This is done by individuals who would rather believe something that fits within their belief system than truly hear information as it comes. Ableism Disabled individuals can be infantilized in their interactions with able-bodied people. That can occur alongside other paternalistic behaviours and denies individuals their autonomy. Infantilization is more commonly experienced by people with visible disabilities (e.g. people who have visual impairments). Another specific disability often infantilized is autism, which is viewed as a children’s disorder, with many autism organizations being run by neurotypical parents of autistic children and most charities dedicated to autism focused on children. The extreme focus on children essentially denies the existence of autistic adults within public consciousness, leading to many people unknowingly discriminating against autistic adults. Ageism Older adults Infantilization can happen to older adults which leads to denying them autonomy in their care, such as through being excessively controlled or being addressed with baby talk, as if they were a child incapable of understanding complex topics. This leads to a reduced quality of care. From a patient's perspective, this is seen as disrespectful and patronizing. Infantilization can also occur as an aspect of intimate partner violence, as some abusive partners substitute physical violence for psychological abuse to maintain their power. Youth When used in reference to teenagers or adolescents, the term typically suggests that teenagers and their potential are underestimated in modern society. It can also be used to describe adolescents being regarded as though they are younger than their actual age. Infantilization may also refer to a process when a child is being treated in a manner appropriate only for younger children. Robert Epstein is a notable critic of the treatment of youth and adolescents, suggesting that many public policymakers and neuroscientists utilize myths about the teenage brain in order to disenfranchise and ultimately infantilize them. Property law In property law, infantilization is defined as "the restriction of an individual’s or group’s autonomy based on the failure to recognize and respect their full capacity to reason." When infantilization is coupled with property takeover, the result is a dignity taking. There are several examples of dignity takings, including wage theft from undocumented workers in which the power imbalance allows employers to rob workers of their agency and avenues for redress; the dispossession of property from African Americans in the South Carolina sea islands by predatory tax buyers, who routinely infantilized their victims by overwhelming them with paperwork and timelines to accelerate foreclosures; and the unequal division of matrimonial property in southern Nigeria after divorce that assumes women are less capable of managing property and thus infantilizes them. Sexism Adult women are frequently referred to as girls, a term that is inherently infantilizing. Infantilization is such a common feature of sexism that it is one of five dimensions of sexual harassment in a Gender Experiences Questionnaire. Humanitarian aid can infantilize women who are displaced from their homes by depicting them simply as innocent victims, not as capable individuals with agency. Women refugees may also be depicted as helpless and unwanted. Fictional female characters have been depicted as "overtly girly" and criticized as contributing to the infantilization of women. See also Condescension Dumbing down Transgenerational trauma Family honor References Psychological attitude Ableism Ageism Misogyny

Cultural-historical activity theory

Cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) is a theoretical framework to conceptualize and analyse the relationship between cognition (what people think and feel) and activity (what people do). The theory was founded by L. S. Vygotsky and Aleksei N. Leontiev, who were part of the cultural-historical school of Russian psychology. The Soviet philosopher of psychology, S.L. Rubinshtein, developed his own variant of activity as a philosophical and psychological theory, independent from Vygotsky's work. (V. Lektorsky in Engeström, Miettinen & Punamäki 1999, p. 66;Brushlinskii, A. V. 2004) Political restrictions in Stalinist Russia had suppressed the cultural-historical psychology – also known as the Vygotsky School – in the mid-thirties. This meant that the core "activity" concept remained confined to the field of psychology. Vygotsky's insight into the dynamics of consciousness was that it is essentially subjective and shaped by the history of each individual's social and cultural experiences. Since the 1990s, CHAT has attracted a growing interest among academics worldwide. Elsewhere CHAT has been described as "a cross-disciplinary framework for studying how humans transform natural and social reality, including themselves, as an ongoing culturally and historically situated, materially and socially mediated process". CHAT explicitly incorporates the mediation of activities by society, which means that it can be used to link concerns normally independently examined by sociologists of education and (social) psychologists. (Roth, Radford & Lacroix 2012) Core ideas are: 1) humans act collectively, learn by doing, and communicate in and via actions; 2) humans make, employ, and adapt tools to learn and communicate; and 3) community is central to the process of making and interpreting meaning – and thus to all forms of learning, communicating, and acting. The term CHAT was coined by Michael Cole and popularized by to promote the unity of what, by the 1990s, had become a variety of currents harking back to Vygotsky's work. Prominent among those currents are Cultural-historical psychology, in use since the 1930s, and Activity theory in use since the 1960s. Historical overview Origins: revolutionary Russia CHAT traces its lineage to dialectical materialism, classical German philosophy, and the work of Lev Vygotsky, Aleksei N. Leontiev and Aleksandr Luria, known as "the founding troika" of the cultural-historical approach to Social Psychology. In particular Goethe's romantic science ideas which were later taken up by Hegel. The conceptual meaning of "activity" is rooted in the German word Tätigkeit. Hegel is considered the first philosopher to point out that the development of humans' knowledge is not spiritually given, but developed in history from living and working in natural environments. In a radical departure from the behaviorism and reflexology that dominated much of psychology in the early 1920s, they formulated, in the spirit of Karl Marx's Theses on Feuerbach, the concept of activity, i.e., "artifact-mediated and object-oriented action". By bringing together the notion of history and culture in the understanding of human activity, they were able to transcend the Cartesian dualism between subject and object, internal and external, between people and society, between individual inner consciousness and the outer world of society. At the beginning of and into the mid-20th century, psychology was dominated by schools of thought that ignored real-life processes in psychological functioning (e.g. Gestalt psychology, Behaviorism and Cognitivism (psychology)). Lev Vygotsky, who developed the foundation of cultural-historical psychology based on the concept of mediation, published six books on psychology topics during a working life which spanned only ten years. He died of tuberculosis in 1934 at the age of 37. A.N. Leont'ev worked with Lev Vygotsky and Alexandr Luria from 1924 to 1930, collaborating on the development of a Marxist psychology. Leontiev left Vygotsky's group in Moscow in 1931, to take up a position in Kharkov. There he was joined by local psychologists, including Pyotr Galperin and Pyotr Zinchenko. He continued to work with Vygotsky for some time but, eventually, there was a split, although they continued to communicate with one another on scientific matters. Leontiev returned to Moscow in 1934. Contrary to popular belief, Vygotsky's work was never banned in Stalinist Soviet Russia. In 1950 A.N. Leontiev became the Head of the Psychology Department at the Faculty of Philosophy of the Lomonosov Moscow State University (MGU). This department became an independent Faculty in 1966. He remained there until his death in 1979. Leontiev's formulation of activity theory, post 1962, had become the new "official" basis for Soviet psychology. In the two decades between a thaw in the suppression of scientific enquiry in Russia and the death of the Vygotsky's continuers, contact was made with the West. Developments in the West Michael Cole, a psychology post-graduate exchange student, arrived in Moscow in 1962 for a one-year stint of research under Alexandr Luria. He was one for the first Westerners to present Luria's and Vygotsky's ideas to an Anglo-Saxon public. This, and a steady flow of books translated from Russian ensured the gradual establishment of a Cultural Psychology base in the west. The earliest books translated into English were Lev Vygotsky's "Thought and Language" (1962), Luria's "Cognitive Development" (1976), Leontiev's Activity, Consciousness, and Personality (1978) and Wertsch's "The Concept of Activity in Soviet Psychology" (1981). Principal among the groups promoting CHAT-related research was Yjrö Engeström's Helsinki-based CRADLE. In 1982, Yrjö Engeström organized an Activity Conference to concentrate on teaching and learning issues. This was followed by the Aarhus (Dk) Conference in 1983 and the Utrecht (Nl) conference in 1984. In October 1986, West Berlin's College of Arts hosted the first ISCAR International Congress on Activity Theory. The second ISCRAT congress took place in 1990. In 1992, ISCRAT became a formal legal organization with its own by-laws in Amsterdam. Other ISCRAT conferences: Rome (1993), Moscow (1995), Aarhus (1998) and Amsterdam (2002), when ISCRAT and the Conference for Socio-Cultural Research merged into ISCAR. From here on, ISCAR organizes an international Congress every three years: Sevilla (Es) 2005; San Diego (USA) 2008; Rome (It) 2011; Sydney (Au) 2014; Quebec, Canada (2017). In recent years, the implications of activity theory in organizational development have been the focus of researchers at the Centre for Activity Theory and Developmental Work Research (CATDWR), now known as CRADLE, at the University of Helsinki, as well as Mike Cole at the Laboratory of Comparative Human Cognition (LCHC) at the University of California San Diego. Three generations of activity theory Diverse philosophical and psychological sources inform activity theory. In subsequent years, a simplified picture emerged, namely the idea that there are three principal 'stages' or 'generations' of activity theory, or "cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT). 'Generations' do not imply a 'better-worse' value judgment. Each generation illustrates a different aspect. Whilst the first generation built on Vygotsky's notion of mediated action from the individual's perspective, the second generation built on Leont'ev's notion of activity system, with emphasis on the collective. The third generation, which appeared in the mid-nineties, builds on the idea of multiple interacting activity systems focused on a partially shared object, with boundary-crossings between them. An activity system is a collective in which one or more human actors engage in activity to cyclically transform an object (a raw material or problem) to repeatedly achieve a desired result. First generation – Vygotsky The first generation emerges from Vygotsky's theory of cultural mediation, which was a response to behaviorism's explanation of consciousness, or the development of the human mind, by reducing the human "mind" to atomic components or structures associated with "stimulus – response" (S-R) processes. Vygotsky argued that the relationship between a human subject and an object is never direct but must be sought in society and culture because they evolve historically, rather than evolving in the human brain or individual mind unto itself. Vygotsky saw the past and present as fused within the individual, that the "present is seen in the light of history." His cultural-historical psychology attempted to account for the social origins of language and thinking. To Vygotsky, consciousness emerges from human activity mediated by artifacts (tools) and signs. These artifacts, which can be physical tools such as hammers, ovens, or computers; cultural artifacts, including language; or theoretical artifacts, like algebra or feminist theory, are created and/or transformed in the course of activity, which, in the first generation framework, happens at the individual level. Semiotic mediation is embodied in Vygotsky's triangular model which features the subject (S), object (O), and mediating artifact. Vygotsky's triangular representation of mediated action attempts to explain human consciousness development in a manner that did not rely on dualistic stimulus–response (S-R) associations. In mediated action the subject, object, and artifact stand in dialectical relationship whereby each affects the other and the activity as a whole. Vygotsky argued that the use of signs leads to a specific structure of human behavior, which allows the creation of new forms of culturally-based psychological processes – hence the importance of a cultural-historical context. Individuals could no longer be understood without their cultural environment, nor society without the agency of the individuals who use and produce these artifacts. The objects became cultural entities, and action that was oriented towards the objects became key to understanding the human psyche. In the Vygotskyan framework, the unit of analysis is the individual. First-generation activity theory has been used to understand individual behavior by examining the ways in which a person's objectivized actions are culturally mediated. Mediation is a key theoretical idea behind activity: People don't simply use tools and symbol systems; instead, everyday lived experiences are significantly mediated and intermediated by use of tools and symbols systems. Therefore, activity theory helps frame our understanding of such mediation. There is a strong focus on material and symbolic mediation, as well as internalization of external (social, societal, and cultural) forms of mediation. In Vygotskyan psychology, internalization is a theoretical concept that explains how individuals process what they learned through mediated action in the development of individual consciousness. Another important aspect of first generation CHAT is the concept of the zone of proximal development (ZPD) or "the distance between the actual developmental level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving under adult guidance or in collaboration with more capable peers". ZPD is the theoretical range of what a performer can do with competent peers and assistance, as compared with what can be accomplished on one's own. Second generation – Leontiev While Vygotsky formulated practical human activity as the general explanatory category in human psychology, he did not fully clarify its nature. A.N. Leontiev developed the second generation of activity theory, which is a collective model. In Engeström's depiction of second-generation activity, the unit of analysis includes collective motivated activity toward an object, making room for understanding how collective action by social groups mediates activity. Leontiev theorized that activity resulted from the confluence of a human subject, the object of their activity as "the target or content of a thought or action" and the tools (including symbol systems) that mediate the object(ive). He saw activity as tripartite in structure, being composed of unconscious operations on/with tools, conscious but finite actions which are goal-directed, and higher level activities which are object-oriented and driven by motives. Hence, second generation activity theory included community, rules, division of labor and the importance of analyzing their interactions with each other. Rules may be explicit or implicit. Division of labor refers to the explicit and implicit organization of the community involved in the activity. Engeström described Vygotskian psychology as emphasizing the way semiotic and cultural systems mediate human action, whereas Leontiev's second-generation CHAT focused on the mediational effects of the systemic organization of human activity. In conceptualizing activity as only existing in relation to rules, community and division of labor, Engeström expanded the unit of analysis for studying human behavior from individual activity to a collective activity system. While the unit of analysis, for Vygotsky, is "individual activity" and, for Leontiev, the "collective activity system", for Jean Lave and others working around situated cognition the unit of analysis is "practice", "community of practice", and "participation". Other scholars analyze "the relationships between the individual's psychological development and the development of social systems". The activity system includes the social, psychological, cultural and institutional perspectives in the analysis. In this conceptualization, context or activity systems are inherently related to what Engeström argues are the deep-seated material practices and socioeconomic structures of a given culture. These societal dimensions had not been taken sufficiently into account by Vygotsky's, earlier triadic model. In Leontiev's understanding, thought and cognition were understood as a part of social life – as a part of the means of production and systems of social relations on one hand, and the intentions of individuals in certain social conditions on the other. In the second generation diagram, activity is positioned in the middle, mediation at the top, adding rules, community and division of labor at the bottom. The minimum components of an activity system are: the subject; the object; outcome; mediating instruments/tools/artifacts; rules and signs; community and division of labor. In his example of the 'primeval collective hunt', Leontiev clarifies the difference between an individual action ("the beater frightening game") and a collective activity ("the hunt"). While individuals' actions (frightening game) are different from the overall goal of the activity (hunt), they share the same motive (obtaining food). Operations, on the other hand, are driven by the conditions and tools at hand, i.e. the objective circumstances under which the hunt is taking place. To understand the separate actions of the individuals, one needs to understand the broader motive behind the activity as a whole. This accounts for the three hierarchical levels of human functioning: object-related motives drive the collective activity (top); goals drive individual/group action(s) (middle); conditions and tools drive automated operations (lower level). Third generation – Engeström et al. After Vygotsky's foundational work on individuals' higher psychological functions and Leontiev's extension of these insights to collective activity systems, questions of diversity and dialogue between different traditions or perspectives became increasingly serious challenges. The work of Michael Cole and Yrjö Engeström in the 1970s and 1980s brought activity theory to a much wider audience of scholars in Scandinavia and North America. Once the lives and biographies of all the participants and the history of the wider community are taken into account, multiple activity systems needed to be considered, positing, according to Engeström, the need for a "third generation" to "develop conceptual tools to understand dialogue, multiple perspectives, and networks of interacting activity Systems". This larger canvas of active individuals (and researchers) embedded in organizational, political, and discursive practices constitutes a tangible advantage of second- and third-generation CHAT over its earlier Vygotskian ancestor, which focused on mediated action in relative isolation. Third-generation activity theory is the application of Activity Systems Analysis (ASA) in developmental research where investigators take a participatory and interventionist role in the participants' activities and change their experiences. Engeström's basic activity triangle (which adds rules/norms, intersubjective community relations, and division of labor, as well as multiple activity systems sharing an object) has become the principal third-generation model for analysing individuals and groups. Engeström summarizes the current state of CHAT with five principles: The activity system as primary unit of analysis: the basic third-generation model includes minimally two interacting activity systems. Multi-voicedness: an activity system is always a community of multiple points of views, traditions and interests. Historicity: activity systems take shape and get transformed over long stretches of time. Potentials and problems can only be understood against the background of their own histories. The central role of contradictions as sources of change and development. Activity systems' possibility for expansive transformation (cycles of qualitative transformation): when object and motive are reconceptualized a radically wider horizon opens up. Learning technologists have used third-generation CHAT as a guiding theoretical framework to understand how technologies are adopted, adapted, and configured through use in complex social situations. Engeström has acknowledged that the third-generation model was limited to analysing 'reasonably well-bounded' systems and that in view of new, often web-based participatory practices. a Fourth generation was needed. Informing research and practice Leontiev and social development From the 1960s onwards, starting in the global South, and independently from the mainstream European developmental line, Leontiev's core Objective Activity concept has been used in a Social Development context. In the Organization Workshop's Large Group Capacitation-method, objective/ized activity acts as the core causal principle which postulates that, in order to change the mind-set of (large groups of) individuals, we need to start with changes to their activity – and/or to the object that "suggests" their activity. In Leontievian vein, the Organization Workshop is about semiotically mediated activities through which (large groups of) participants learn how to manage themselves and the organizations they create to perform tasks that require complex division of labor. CHAT-inspired research and practice since the 1980s Over the last two decades, CHAT has offered a theoretical lens informing research and practice, in that it posits that learning takes place through collective activities that are purposefully conducted around a common object. Starting from the premise that learning is a social and cultural process that draws on historical achievements, its systems thinking-based perspectives allow insights into the real world. Change Laboratory (CL) Change Laboratory (CL) is a CHAT-based method for formative intervention in activity systems and for research on their developmental potential as well as processes of expansive learning, collaborative concept-formation, and transformation of practices, elaborated in the mid-nineties by the Finnish Developmental Work Research (DWR) group, which became CRADLE in 2008. The CL method relies on collaboration between practitioners of the activity being analyzed and transformed, and academic researchers or interventionists supporting and facilitating collective developmental processes. Engeström developed a theory of expansive learning, which "begins with individual subjects questioning accepted practices, and it gradually expands into a collective movement or institution. The theory enables a "longitudinal and rich analysis of inter-organizational learning by using observational as well as interventionist designs in studies of work and organization". From this, the foundation of an interventionist research approach at DWR was elaborated in the 1980s, and developed further in the 1990s as an intervention method now known as Change Laboratory. CL interventions are used both to study the conditions of change and to help those working in organizations to develop their work, drawing on participant observation, interviews, and the recording and videotaping of meetings and work practices. Initially, with the help of an external interventionist, the first stimulus that is beyond the actors' present capabilities, is produced in the Change Laboratory by collecting first-hand empirical data on problematic aspects of the activity. This data may comprise difficult client cases, descriptions of recurrent disturbances and ruptures in the process of producing the outcome. Steps in the CL process: Step 1 Questioning; Step 2 Analysis; Step 3 Modeling; Step 4 Examining; Step 5 Implementing; Step 6 Reflecting; Step 7 Consolidating. These seven action steps for increased understanding are described by Engeström as expansive learning, or phases of an outwardly expanding spiral, while multiple kinds of actions can take place at any time. The phases of the model simply allow for the identification and analysis of the dominant action type during a particular period of time. These learning actions are provoked by contradictions. Contradictions are not simply conflicts or problems, but are "historically accumulating structural tensions within and between activity systems". CL is used by a team or work unit or by collaborating partners across the organizational boundaries, initially with the help of an interventionist-researcher. The CL method has been used in agricultural contexts, educational and media settings, health care and learning support. Activity systems analysis (ASA) Activity systems analysis is a CHAT-based method that uses Activity Theory concepts such as mediated action, goal-directed activity and dialectical relationship between the individual and environment for understanding human activity in real-world situations with data collection, analysis, and presentation methods that address the complexities of human activity in natural settings aimed to advance both theory and practice. It is based on Vygotsky's concept of mediated action and captures human activity in a triangle model that includes the subject, tool, object, rule, community, and division of labor. Subjects are participants in an activity, motivated toward a purpose or attainment of the object. The object can be the goal of an activity, the subject's motives for participating in an activity, and the material products that subjects gain through an activity. Tools are socially shared cognitive and material resources that subjects can use to attain the object. Informal or formal rules regulate the subject's participation while engaging in an activity. The community is the group or organization to which subjects belong. The division of labor is the shared participation responsibilities in the activity determined by the community. Finally, the outcome is the consequences that the subject faces due to actions driven by the object. These outcomes can encourage or hinder the subject's participation in future activities. In Part 2 of her video "Using Activity Theory to understand human behaviour", shows how activity theory is applied to the problem of behavior change and HIV and AIDs (in South Africa). The video focuses on sexual activity as the activity of the system and illustrates how an activity system analysis, through a historical and current account of the activity, provides a way of understanding the lack of behavior change in response to HIV and AIDS. The book Activity Systems Analysis Methods describes seven ASA case studies which fall "into four distinct work clusters. These clusters include works that help (a) understand developmental work research (DWR), (b) describe real-world learning situations, (c) design human-computer interaction systems, and (d) plan solutions to complicated work-based problems". Other uses of ASA include summarizing organizational change; identifying guidelines for designing constructivist learning environments; identifying contradictions and tensions that shape developments in educational settings; demonstrating historical developments in organizational learning, and evaluating K–12 school and university partnership relations. Human–computer interaction (HCI) When human-computer interaction (HCI) first appeared as a separate field of study in the early 1980s, HCI adopted the information processing paradigm of computer science as the model for human cognition, predicated on prevalent cognitive psychology criteria, which did not account for individuals' interests, needs and frustrations involved, nor that the technology depends on the social and dynamic contexts in which it takes place. Adopting a CHAT theoretical perspective carries implications for understanding how people use interactive technologies: for example, a computer is typically an object of activity rather than a mediating artefact means that people interact with the world through computers, rather than with computer 'objects'. Since the 1980s, a number of diverse methodologies outlining techniques for human–computer interaction design have emerged. Most design methodologies stem from a model for how users, designers, and technical systems interact. Systemic-structural activity theory (SSAT) SSAT builds on the general theory of activity to provide an effective basis for both experimental and analytic methods of studying human performance, using developed units of analysis. SSAT approaches cognition both as a process and as a structured system of actions or other functional information-processing units, developing a taxonomy of human activity through the use of structurally organized units of analysis. The systemic-structural approach to activity design and analysis involves identifying the available means of work, tools and objects; their relationship with possible strategies of work activity; existing constraints on activity performance; social norms and rules; possible stages of object transformation; and changes in the structure of activity during skills acquisition.This method is demonstrated by applying it to the study of a human–computer interaction task. Future Evolving field of study CHAT offers a philosophical and cross-disciplinary perspective for analyzing human practices as development processes in which both individual and social levels are interlinked, as well as interactions and boundary-crossings between activity systems. Crossing boundaries involves "encountering difference, entering into unfamiliar territory, requiring cognitive retooling". More recently, the focus of studies of organizational learning has increasingly shifted away from learning within single organizations or organizational units, towards learning in multi‐organizational or inter‐organizational networks, as well as to the exploration of interactions in their social contexts, multiple contexts and cultures, and the dynamics and development of particular activities. This shift has generated such concepts as "networks of learning", "networked learning", coworking, and knotworking. Industry has seen growth in nonemployer firms (NEFs) due to changes in long-term employment trends and developments in mobile technology which have led to more work from remote locations, more distance collaboration, and more work organized around temporary projects. Developments such as these and new forms of social production or commons-based peer production like open source software development and cultural production in peer-to-peer (P2P) networks have become a key focus in Engeström's work. Social production processes are simultaneous, multi-directional and often reciprocal. The density and complexity of these processes blur distinctions between process and structure. The object of the activity is unstable, resists control and standardization, and requires rapid integration of expertise from various locations and traditions. "Fourth generation" The rapid rise of new forms of activities characterised by web-based social and participatory practices phenomena such as distributed workforce and the dominance of knowledge work, prompts a rethink of the third-generation model, bringing a need for a fourth generation activity system model. Fourth-Generation (4GAT) analysis should allow better examination of how activity networks interact, interpenetrate, and contradict each other. People "working alone together" may illuminate other examples of distributed, interorganizational, collaborative knowledge work. In fourth generation CHAT, the object(ive) will typically comprise multiple perspectives and contexts and be inherently transient; collaborations between actors are likely to be temporary, with multiple boundary crossings between interrelated activities. Fourth-generation activity theorists have specifically developed activity theory to better accommodate Castells's (and others') insights into how work organization has shifted in the network society. Hence, they will focus less on the workings of individual activity systems (often represented by triangles) and more on the interactions across activity systems functioning in networks. See also Activity theory Aleksei N. Leontiev Bonnie Nardi Community of practice Cultural-historical psychology Kharkov School of Psychology Knowledge sharing Large-group capacitation Legitimate peripheral participation Lev Vygotsky Organizational learning Organization workshop Social constructivism (learning theory) Vygotsky Circle Zone of proximal development References Publications ISSN 0304-615X – Chapter 25 in: Yogesh K. Dwivedi, Y.K. Lal, B., Williams, M., Schneberger, S.L., Wade, M., 2009, Handbook of Research on Contemporary Theoretical Models in Information Systems, IGI Global, 2009, External links Blunden, A. The Origins of CHAT. Blunden, A. Concepts of CHAT Action, Behaviour and Consciousness (ppts). Boardman, D. Activity Theory Interview with Professor Yrjö Engeström: part 1 Interview with Professor Yrjö Engeström: part 2 Introduction to Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) Nygård Leontiev works in English Robertson, I. An Introduction to Activity Theory Spinuzzi, Clay "All Edge: Understanding the New Workplace Networks" (Powerpoint Presentation) The Future of Activity Theory van der Riet Part I Introduction to Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) van der Riet Part II Using Activity to Understand Human Behaviour Vygotsky archive Yamagata "Activity Systems Analysis in Design Research". (Powerpoint Presentation) What is Activity Theory? Adult education Cognitive psychology Learning methods Social change Training

Psychoinformatics

Psychoinformatics is an emerging interdisciplinary field that uses principles from computer science for the acquisition, organization, and synthesis of data collected from psychology to reveal information about psychological traits such as personality and mood. The term may also be used in context of affective computing or character computing. Psychology has historically relied on experiments and questionnaires in order to collect data. These methods face several disadvantages, namely that experiments often consist of a small quantity of users (who must be incentivized to participate) and self-reported questionnaires and interviews are subject to bias and unreliable memory. Psychoinformatics solves these problems by storing Big Data related to psychology (such as communications on smartphones or social media websites) and then data mining for relevant psychological information. See also affective computing Bioinformatics Neuroinformatics Psychometrics Quantitative psychology References Subfields of computer science Interdisciplinary branches of psychology

Behavior change (individual)

A behavioral change can be a temporary or permanent effect that is considered a change in an individual's behavior when compared to previous behavior. It is sometimes considered a mental disorder, yet it is also a strategy used to improve such disorders. This change is generally characterized by changes in thinking, interpretations, emotions, or relationships. These changes can be either good or bad, depending on which behavior is being affected. Often, it takes much more work to change behavior for the better than it does to experience a negative change. Medications can cause this change as a side effect. The interaction between physiological processes and their effect on individual behavior is the basis of psychophysiology. Several theories exist as to why and how behavioral change can be affected, including behaviorism, Self-efficacy theory, and the stages of change model. Behavioral change can be very beneficial to an individual. Two such theories on the subject include behavior modification theory and cognitive behavioral theory. Both of these seek to help a patient engage in a positive behavioral change. Both legal and illegal drugs have been shown to alter behavior, both acutely and chronically. In both cases, following common sense harm reduction strategies can potentially reduce these side-effects. With mental illness, behavioral change is a menace, with drugs it is expected, and with the right techniques it can be a method to improve quality of life. In recent decades there has been an increased knowledge of common causes of these changes, such as mental illness and drug use, while several psychological fields regarding the study of inducing beneficial changes in individuals have been developed and applied, resulting in a variety of novel solutions. Clinical and psychological impacts While some behavioral changes can be beneficial, others can cause serious harm to the individual experiencing them. Sometimes, a change can be due to something as small as an environmental cue, whereas other cases may take a more multifaceted approach. In those cases, there are several treatment options available. Behavior modification is one method used to correct harmful behaviors. This method is centered around the concept of using rewards and punishments in order to condition the patient out of the behavior. Cognitive behavioral therapy can be used in the effort to change the behavior of an individual. This type of therapy focuses in on challenging and changing maladaptive behaviors by utilizing emotional self-regulation, while also developing beneficial coping mechanisms. Similarly, medication can cause changes in people’s behavior. In some instances, the reaction to a medication is an expected effect. For example, someone who is taking an opiate for pain should expect to feel sleepy and relaxed. In other instances, a behavior change may indicate that the dosage of medication is at a toxic level, or is an indication of hypersensitivity to the medication. For example, someone taking a stimulant medication should not experience depression. While this can be a very serious consequence, it is a concern that needs to be balanced with the effective dose of that medication. Geriatric patients are more susceptible to these effects. As a related note, various illicit drugs can also impact behavior change, without the benefit of having a medical professional to monitor the user. Drugs such as cannabis, opiates, stimulants, hallucinogens and barbiturates can have a very serious impact on one's behavior, with both acute and chronic usage leading to change. Non-medical causes While behavioral change is often associated with issues of medical importance, there are many non medical reasons that behavioral change may occur. One example is the noted change that happens in an individual as they go through the stages of grief. Despite a prolonged alteration in the way that one behaves, normalcy does usually return to an individual without any type of medical intervention. Another reason for such a change could be an altered schedule, or work-related stress. Such levels of stress may not qualify as medically necessary, and thus may be handled with preventative care. Such preventative care can include exercise, a good social support group, and a nutritious diet. While this type of behavioral change does not always require medical attention, individuals should seek professional help if they notice that these behavioral changes are especially maladaptive, or if they last longer than usual. References External links What Are The 5 Behaviors? Human behavior

Sanity

Sanity (from ) refers to the soundness, rationality, and health of the human mind, as opposed to insanity. A person is sane if they are rational. In modern society, the term has become exclusively synonymous with compos mentis (, having mastery of, and , mind), in contrast with non compos mentis, or insanity, meaning troubled conscience. A sane mind is nowadays considered healthy both from its analytical - once called rational - and emotional aspects. According to the writer G. K. Chesterton, sanity involves wholeness, whereas insanity implies narrowness and brokenness. Psychiatry and psychology Alfred Korzybski proposed a theory of sanity in his general semantics. He believed sanity was tied to the logical reasoning about and comprehension of what is going on in the world. He imposed this notion in a map-territory analogy: "A map is not the territory it represents, but, if correct, it has a 'similar structure' to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness." Given that science continually seeks to adjust its theories structurally to fit the facts, i.e., improves its maps to fit the territory, and thus advances more rapidly than any other field, he believed that the key to understanding sanity would be found in the study of the methods of science (and the study of structure as revealed by science). The adoption of a scientific outlook and attitude of continual adjustment by the individual toward their assumptions was the way, so he claimed. In other words, there were "factors of sanity to be found in the physico-mathematical methods of science." He also stressed that sanity requires the awareness that "whatever you say a thing is, it is not" because anything expressed through language is not the reality it refers to: language is like a map, and the map is not the territory. The territory, or reality, remains unnamable, unspeakable, and mysterious. Hence, the widespread assumption that we can grasp reality through language involves a degree of insanity. Psychiatrist Philip S. Graven suggested the term "un-sane" to describe a condition that is not exactly insane, but not quite sane either. In The Sane Society, published in 1955, psychologist Erich Fromm proposed that not just individuals, but entire societies "may be lacking in sanity." Fromm argued that one of the most deceptive features of social life involves "consensual validation": It is naively assumed that the fact that the majority of people share certain ideas or feelings proves the validity of these ideas and feelings. Nothing is further from the truth... Just as there is a folie à deux there is a folie à millions. The fact that millions of people share the same vices does not make these vices virtues, the fact that they share so many errors does not make the errors to be truths, and the fact that millions of people share the same form of mental pathology does not make these people sane. Law In criminal and mental health law, sanity is a legal term denoting that an individual is of sound mind and therefore can bear legal responsibility for their actions. The official legal term is compos mentis. It is generally defined in terms of the absence of insanity (non compos mentis). It is not a medical term, although the opinions of medical experts are often important in making a legal decision as to whether someone is sane or insane. It is also not the same concept as mental illness. One can be acting under profound mental illness and yet be sane, and one can also be ruled insane without an underlying mental illness. Legal definitions of sanity have been little explored by science and medicine, as the concentration has been on illness. It remains entirely impossible to prove sanity. Furthermore, as Korzybski has pointed out repeatedly, insanity to various degrees is widespread in the general population, which includes many people that are considered mentally fit in medical and legal terms. In this connection, Erich Fromm referred to the "pathology of normalcy," while David Cooper proposed that normality was opposed to both madness and sanity. For a last will and testament to be valid, the testator must have testamentary capacity. This is often expressed using the phrase "being of sound mind and memory". See also George Eman Vaillant Insanity defense Rationalism Sanism Self-actualisation References Mental health law General semantics

Stress-related disorders

Stress-related disorders constitute a category of mental disorders. They are maladaptive, biological and psychological responses to short- or long-term exposures to physical or emotional stressors. The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences categorizes Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) as stress-related disorders. However, the World Health Organization's ICD-11 excludes OCD but categorizes PTSD, Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD), adjustment disorder as stress-related disorders. Stress is a conscious or unconscious psychological feeling or physical condition resulting from physical or mental 'positive or negative pressure' that overwhelms adaptive capacities. It is a psychological process initiated by events that threaten, harm or challenge an organism or that exceed available coping resources and it is characterized by psychological responses that are directed towards adaptation. Stress is wear and tear on the body in response to stressful agents. Hans Selye called such agents: stressors, which are physical, physiological or sociocultural. Stress-related disorders differ from anxiety disorders, and do not constitute a normative concept. A person typically is stressed when positive or negative (e.g., threatening) experiences temporarily strain or overwhelm adaptive capacities. Stress is highly individualized and depends on variables such as the novelty, rate, intensity, duration, or personal interpretation of the input, and genetic or experiential factors. Both acute and chronic stress can intensify morbidity from anxiety disorders. One person's fun may be another person's stressor. For an example, panic attacks are more frequent when the predisposed person is exposed to stressors. Stress reduction strategies Stress-reduction strategies can be helpful to many stressed/anxious people. However, many anxious persons cannot concentrate enough to use such strategies effectively for acute relief. (Most stress-reduction techniques have their greatest utility as elements of a prevention plan that attempts to raise one's threshold to anxiety-provoking experiences.) The five R's of stress and anxiety reduction Five core concepts are used to reduce anxiety or stress. Recognition of the causes and sources of the threat or distress; education and consciousness raising. Relationships identified for support, help, reassurance Removal (from or of) the threat or stressor; managing the stimulus. Relaxation through techniques such as meditation, massage, breathing exercises, or imagery. Re-engagement through managed re-exposure and desensitization. Defenses Defense mechanisms are behavior patterns primarily concerned with protecting ego. Presumably the process is unconscious and the aim is to fool oneself. It is intra psychic processes serving to provide relief from emotional conflict and anxiety. Conscious efforts are frequently made for the same reasons, but true defense mechanisms are unconscious. Some of the common defense mechanisms are: compensation, conversion, denial, displacement, dissociation, idealization, identification, incorporation, introjection, projection, rationalization, reaction formation, regression, sublimation, substitution, symbolization and undoing. Summary The major function of these psychological defenses is to prevent the experiencing of painful emotions. There are several major problems with their use. Many of these defenses create new problems that are as bad, or worse, than the emotional problems they mask. Some may be just plain destructive. Example: rejection literally destroys the relationships we care most about. These defenses distort person's ability to perceive reality as it is. And this prevents them from dealing with their problems in a constructive way. These defenses do not get rid of the painful feelings. In fact, by masking them so that person doesn't feel them, they effectively store them up within themselves. Emotions are discharged through expression, so by denying themselves the chance to feel them, they also deny themselves the ability to get rid of them. These defenses do not just screen out painful emotions. They are, in fact, defenses against all emotion. So the more effective person's defenses become in protecting them from painful feelings, the less able they are to experience the joyful and happy feelings that make life worth living. These defenses are not perfect. As more and more hurt is stored away, a tension is developed. Person becomes increasingly anxious, nervous, and irritable. They become emotionally unpredictable. And when defenses weaken, from time to time, person may experience emotional explosions. These defenses prevent person from knowing what is wrong, but they do not prevent us from feeling bad. Stress as in clinical medicine Acute stress disorder Acute stress disorder occurs in individuals without any other apparent psychiatric disorder, in response to exceptional physical or psychological stress. While severe, such reactions usually subside within hours or days. The stress may be an overwhelming traumatic experience (e.g. accident, battle, physical assault, rape) or unusually sudden change in social circumstances of the individual, such as multiple bereavement. Individual vulnerability and coping capacity play a role in the occurrence and severity of acute stress reactions, as evidenced by the fact that not all people exposed to exceptional stress develop symptoms. However, an acute stress disorder falls under the class of an anxiety disorder. Symptoms Symptoms show considerable variation but usually include: An initial state of "DAZE" with some constriction of the field of consciousness and narrowing of attention, inability to comprehend stimuli, disorientation. Followed either by further withdrawal from the surrounding situation to the extent of a dissociative stupor or by agitating and over activity. Autonomic signs of "panic anxiety" The signs are: tachycardia (increased heart rate), sweating, hyperventilation (increased breathing). The symptoms usually appear within minutes of the impact of the stressful stimulus and disappear within 2–3 days. Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) This arises after response to a stressful event or situation of an exceptionally threatening nature and likely to cause pervasive distress (great pain, anxiety, sorrow, acute physical or mental suffering, affliction, trouble) in almost anyone. Causes The causes of PTSD are: natural or human disasters, war, serious accident, witness of violent death of others, violent attack, being the survivor of sexual abuse, rape, torture, terrorism or hostage taking. The predisposing factors are: personality traits and previous history of psychiatric illness. Typical symptoms Flashbacks are the repeated reliving of the trauma in the form of intrusive memories or dreams, intense distress at exposure to events that symbolize or resemble an aspect of the traumatic event, including anniversaries of the trauma, avoidance of activities and situations reminiscent of the trauma, emotional blunting or "numbness", a sense of detachment from other people, autonomic hyperarousal with hypervigilance, an enhanced startle reaction and insomnia, marked anxiety and depression and, occasionally, suicidal ideation. Treatment Psychiatric consultation: exploration of memories of the traumatic event, relief of associated symptoms and counseling. Prognosis The course is fluctuating but recovery can be expected in the majority of cases. Few people may show chronic course over many years and a transition to an enduring personality change In surgery Stress ulceration Stress ulceration is a single or multiple fundic mucosal ulcers that causes upper gastrointestinal bleeding, and develops during the severe physiologic stress of serious illness. It can also cause mucosal erosions and superficial hemorrhages in patients who are critically ill, or in those who are under extreme physiologic stress, causing blood loss that can require blood transfusion. Ordinary peptic ulcers are found commonly in the "gastric antrum and the duodenum" whereas stress ulcers are found commonly in "fundic mucosa and can be located anywhere within the stomach and proximal duodenum". See also Critical incident stress management Stress management Stress (biology) Gastritis References Further reading Selye H. Syndrome produced by diverse nocuous agents. Nature. 1936;138:32. Hales RE, Zatazick DF (1997) What is PTSD? American Journal of Psychiatry 154: 143-145 Royal College of Physicians/Royal College of Psychiatrist (1995) The Psychological Care of Medical Patients: Recognition of Need and Service Provision. London: RCPhys/RCPsych Psychological stress Stress-related disorders