bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Progressive Muscle Relaxation
Authors: Bracke Paul E.
Published: January 2010

Progressive muscle relaxation (PMR) is a fundamental form of stress management that was developed in the early 1920s by Edmund Jackson, an American physician, as a technique to help his patients reduce muscle tension. Jacobson's research demonstrated the connection between excessive muscle tension and a variety of physical and psychological disorders. Specifically, Jacobson's research revealed that muscle tension is always accompanied by a shortening of muscle fibers and that reducing muscle tension reduced central nervous system activity and promoted a relaxed state. That is, because muscle tension is associated with various types of psychological tension (e.g., anxiety), Jacobson hypothesized that anxiety could be reduced by learning to reduce muscle tension.
Projective Identification
Authors: Williams Paul , Seligman Steven
Published: January 2010

The term
projective identification
is the best known of Melanie Klein's (1946) concepts. Klein's view was that it refers to an unconscious belief (fantasy) that a part of the self or inner world, usually unwanted, may be disposed of by relocating it into the mental representation of another object. This is usually regarded as a primitive form of the mental mechanism of projection
,
but it is different in that it may involve actual behavior by people toward an object in a way that will allow them to confirm their omnipotent suppositions. This projectively identifying mechanism can be used for a variety of psychological purposes, including denial (disposing of undesirable elements) or controlling in fantasy the object. Or it may be a form of communication, as in the expression of disavowed anger or other unmetabolized affects.
Propensity Scores
Authors: Shadish William R. , Galindo Rodolfo
Published: January 2010

A propensity score is the conditional probability of a unit being assigned to a condition, given a set of observed covariates. These scores can be used to equate groups on those covariates by using matching, blocking, weighting, or analysis of covariance. In theory, propensity score adjustments should reduce the bias that often accompanies nonrandom assignment, and the adjusted treatment effects should be closer to the effects that would have occurred had participants been randomly assigned to conditions.
Propaganda
Authors: DiFonzo Nicholas
Published: January 2010

Propaganda is goal‐oriented communication that employs (to one degree or another) deceptive tactics. The term derives from the Latin word
propagare,
meaning to spread plants to new locations. To spread propaganda originally meant to disseminate information in order to promote a cause, idea, or action (Rogers, 2007). In modern times, propaganda has taken on pejorative connotations: dishonest communication, factoids, rumors, misinformation, dirt, lies, distortions, deceit, manipulation, psychological warfare, and brainwashing (Jowett & O'Donnell, 1986).
Psi Chi
Authors: Wang Alvin
Published: January 2010

Psi Chi is the National Honor Society in Psychology, founded in 1929 for the purposes of encouraging, stimulating, and maintaining excellence in scholarship and advancing the science of psychology. Membership is open to graduate and undergraduate men and women who are making the study of psychology one of their major interests and who meet the minimum qualifications. Psi Chi is a member of the Association of College Honor Societies and is an affiliate of the American Psychological Association (APA) and the Association for Psychological Science (APS). Psi Chi's sister honor society is Psi Beta, the national honor society in psychology for community and junior colleges.
Psychoanalytic Theories
Authors: Fonagy Peter
Published: January 2010

Psychoanalytic theory is a continually evolving body of knowledge, but the so‐called genetic or developmental point of view, which regards current functioning as a consequence of developmentally prior phases, has always been central. The notion that mental disorders could be best understood as residues of childhood experiences and primitive modes of mental functioning was key to Freud's thinking (Freud, 1905/1961), and a developmental approach to psychopathology has been the traditional framework of psychoanalysis. Each theory described here focuses on particular aspects of development or specific developmental phases and delineates a model of normal personality development based on clinical experience.
Psychodrama
Authors: Baim Clark
Published: January 2010

Psychodrama is a method of group and individual psychotherapy in which people are helped to explore their psychosocial issues by using sensitively guided enactment and a wide range of action‐based techniques. During a psychodrama session, the person in focus recreates significant events, relationships, or internal processes in order to explore their impact, integrate new responses, and gain insight, healing, and growth.
Psychodynamic Psychotherapy
Authors: Gold Jerry
Published: January 2010

The term “Psychodynamic Psychotherapy” is a generic label that is applied to a large group of psychotherapies that are derived theoretically and technically from clinical psychoanalysis. The term usually is understood as being synonymous with the terms “Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy” or “Psychoanalytically Oriented Psychotherapy.” These psychotherapies share certain commonalities with regard to their approaches to understanding psychopathology, their psychological change strategies, and interventions that mark them as descendants of traditional or classical psychoanalysis, but they also differ from classical psychoanalysis and from each other in numerous ways, both theoretically and clinically.
Psycholinguistics
Authors: Meteyard Lotte
Published: January 2010

Most would agree that modern psycholinguistics began after Noam Chomsky's review ofVerbal Behaviorby B. F. Skinner (1959), which rejected the book's behaviorist explanation of language development and use. Acquisition could not be explained by simple input–output relations, Chomsky wrote, because the input was not consistent or comprehensive enough (the “poverty of the stimulus” argument). The only way to explain language was to understand and explain the internal, cognitive representations that mediate input and output. Psycholinguistics brings psychologist cognitive scientists and linguists together in the study of the cognitive processes that underpin the acquisition, representation, production, perception, and comprehension of language. This article focuses on behavioral research and identifies comprehensive texts on psycholinguistics in the references. The relevance to psycholinguistics of bilingualism (see Kroll & De Groot, 2005), neuropsychology (see Caplan, 1996), and neuroscience (Hartley, 2001; Gaskell, 2007) are not included in this presentation.
Psychological Assessment
Authors: Weiner Irving B.
Published: January 2010

Psychological assessment consists of a variety of procedures for evaluating characteristics of people. Psychological assessment has sometimes been equated with psychological testing, but the assessment process goes beyond merely giving tests. Psychological assessors integrate information obtained not only from test protocols, but also from interviews, behavioral observations, collateral reports, and historical documents. This article describes these sources of information and the applications of assessment information in clinical, educational, health care, forensic, and industrial/organizational settings.
Psychological Autopsy
Authors: White Thomas W.
Published: January 2010

Approximately five decades ago, the termpsychological autopsyfirst appeared in the mental health literature. The methodology is most often associated with cases of completed suicide and involves constructing a psychological profile of the deceased during the time immediately prior to death. By conducting interviews with significant individuals, reviewing records, and investigating events that appear to bear directly on the deceased's emotional state, investigators seek to determine the motivation or circumstances that may have contributed to the death. Initially, it was utilized as a clinical tool to assist coroners and medical examiners in determining the cause of death in equivocal cases (Clark & Horton‐Deutsch, 1992), but the technique has evolved over the years to become a recognized research, clinical, and forensic tool. Yet despite this general acceptance, the methodology still has many critics and a number of legitimate shortcomings that severely limit its utility in some settings (Pouliot & De Leo, 2006) while offering promise in others (Aufderheide, 2000).
Psychological Mindedness
Authors: Beitel Mark
Published: January 2010

Psychological mindedness (PM) is the ability to process information with reference to a psychological system. Hatcher and Hatcher (1997) explain that different psychological systems may lead to different conceptualizations of PM. Fundamentally, however, PM requires identifying some data as psychological (rather than biological, religious, economic, etc.) and finding psychological meaning in the data. Therefore, the psychologically minded person is capable of making psychological rather than purely biological, religious, economic, or any other nonpsychological attributions for behavior. For example, a psychologically minded person might explain an aggressive outburst by saying, “I did it because I was angry,” rather than “The devil made me do it” or “I have a chemical imbalance.”
Psychological Science
Authors: Boneau C. Alan
Published: January 2010

Psychological science connotes the application of scientific methods and rationales to the study of psychological issues to produce a utilizable body of knowledge called, appropriately, psychological science. To make the story complete, the brief discussion here characterizes psychological content, explicates relevant scientific method and practice, details some historical developments and insights that made this conflation of psychology and science possible, and mentions in passing the relationship of psychological science to the vast arena of scientific endeavor.
Psychology and Philosophy
Authors: O'Donohue William
Published: January 2010

Concerns that are now typically part of contemporary psychology—What is the nature of the mind? What causes human happiness? How do humans come to believe or know?—were, until the end of the nineteenth century, the concerns only of philosophers. In the latter part of the nineteenth century, investigators such as Wilhelm Wundt took an experimental approach to these questions, or at least certain aspects of these questions, and contemporary scientific psychology was born. Although empirical and experimental methods allow psychologists to address questions commonly outside the scope of philosophy (e.g., What is the incidence of depression?), philosophical concerns continue to influence these empirical pursuits. One clear example of such influence is the general agreement among psychologists that research takes place within a context of philosophical assumptions: What is science? What counts as evidence? What inferences are legitimate to make given the data? What are morally permissible research or clinical methodologies? Relatedly, analytic philosophers often engage in conceptual explication, and psychologists are often still puzzled by their concepts, for example, What is intelligence? What is clinical depression? Ludwig Wittgenstein (1953), in his
Philosophical Investigations,
famously wrote the following:

The confusion and barrenness of psychology is not to be explained by calling it a “young science”; its state is not comparable with that of physics, for instance, in its beginnings. (Rather with that of certain branches of mathematics. Set theory.) For in psychology there are experimental methods and conceptual confusion…. The existence of the experimental method makes us think we have the means of solving the problems which trouble us; though problem and method pass one another by.
Psychology and the Law
Authors: Roesch Ronald , Zapf Patricia A.
Published: January 2010

The field of psychology and law first began to develop within the last century and is currently experiencing a period of growth and expansion. The interaction between the disciplines of psychology and law has greatly increased over the past few decades in three overlapping areas: forensic psychology, legal psychology, and psychological jurisprudence. In forensic psychology, psychologists act as experts, practitioners, researchers, and/or consultants with respect to legally relevant clinical areas (such as competency to stand trial, insanity, or civil commitment to psychiatric hospitals). Legal psychology uses applied and empirical research methods to study a range of issues of importance to the legal system (e.g., eyewitness accuracy, police selection, procedural justice, jury decision making, and legal assumptions about human behavior relevant to the rights of defendants, victims, children, and mental patients). Finally, psychological jurisprudence is that area of the field in which the main focus involves efforts to develop a philosophy of law and justice based on psychological values.
Psychology of Men
Authors: Cochran Sam V.
Published: January 2010

The study of sex and gender differences in psychology has a long and distinguished history. However, a field of psychology explicitly devoted to the study of the psychology of men is a relatively recent development. Beginning as a response to the feminist critique of traditional gender roles that gained prominence in the late 1960s, the psychology of men is now an established specialization within developmental, clinical, and counseling psychology. The American Psychological Association has established a division, the Society for the Psychological Study of Men and Masculinity, devoted to this psychology of men. In addition, a number of national organizations, such as the National Organization of Men against Sexism, have sections and interest groups devoted to issues pertaining to the psychology of men.
Psychoneuroendocrinology
Authors: Campeau Serge
Published: January 2010

Psychoneuroendocrinology is the study of endocrine functions ultimately controlled by the brain. In turn, many brain processes underlying mood and cognition are influenced by the hormonal products of the various endocrine organs. The main endocrine functions of the body organize development and growth, reproduction, homeostasis (temperature, fluids, minerals, and energy balance), and immunity. Although endocrine dysfunctions are often produced by direct organic disorders, many endocrine disorders have been traced to abnormal brain processes. Thus, the discipline of psychoneuroendocrinology focuses on an exploration of the relationships between mind, brain, and endocrine systems. The following account briefly describes the major constituents of the neuroendocrine system and focuses on how the brain, moods, and cognition regulate, and are regulated by, hormones.
Psychonomic Society
Authors: Carlson Laura A.
Published: January 2010

The objective of the Psychonomic Society (
http://www.psychonomic.org
) is to promote the communication of scientific research in psychology and allied sciences. It achieves this goal through two main mechanisms: (1) an annual meeting devoted to the presentation of scientific papers and (2) the publication of scholarly journals in a variety of domains relating to cognition.
Psychopathic Personality
Authors: Patrick Christopher J. , Vaidyanathan Uma
Published: January 2010

Because of its important social impact, psychopathic personality (psychopathy) is one of the most studied personality disorders. Psychopathy is characterized by distinctive emotional (shallow affect, lack of remorse or shame, callousness), interpersonal (charm, grandiosity, deceitfulness, manipulativeness), and behavioral features (impulsivity, irresponsibility, norm‐violating acts). Antisocial personality disorder (APD) comprises a related, but distinguishable syndrome. The diagnostic criteria for APD include extensive coverage of behavioral deviancy in childhood and adulthood but limited coverage of affective and interpersonal features.
Psychophysiology
Authors: Stern Robert M.
Published: January 2010

Psychophysiology, the study of the interaction of psychological and physiological variables, is relatively new as a separate discipline. The formal development of psychophysiology began in the 1950s, when a group composed mainly of psychologists met informally under the leadership of R. C. Davis. In 1960 this group organized the Society for Psychophysiological Research, with Chester Darrow as the first president. Research communications among this group were initiated in 1955, when Al Ax began a newsletter dealing with research and instrumentation in psychophysiology. In 1964 this newsletter developed into the journal
Psychophysiology,
with Ax as the editor, and became the official publication of the Society for Psychophysiological Research. However, the subject matter of psychophysiology—the interaction of mind and body—has been studied for centuries by people trained as philosophers, physicists, physicians, physiologists, and, most recently, psychologists.
Psychostimulant Treatment for Children
Authors: Rapport Mark D. , Raiker Joseph S.
Published: January 2010

Psychostimulants are the most widely used and efficacious treatments currently available for children with Attention‐Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Recent estimates by the Center for Disease Control indicate that 2.5 of the 4.4 million children with ADHD residing in the United States between 4 and 17 years old are prescribed medication, and in most cases, are given one of the available psychostimulants. Table 1 lists available psychostimulant formulae according to their release format (extended, intermediate, immediate), and the typical dosing schedule, onset of effect, and peak/duration of behavioral effects for each formula.
Psychotherapy Integration
Authors: Boswell James F. , Goldfried Marvin R.
Published: January 2010

Although a substantial number of psychotherapists identify themselves as eclectic or integrative (Norcross & Goldfried, 2005), the acceptance of psychotherapy integration was a process that evolved over several decades. A seed for psychotherapy integration was first planted by French in his address of the 1932 meeting of the American Psychiatric Association (later published as French, 1933), in which he drew parallels between psychoanalysis and Pavlovian conditioning. Subsequently, the potential for psychotherapy integration received attention from only a handful of authors between 1932 and 1960 (e.g., Dollard & Miller; Rosenzweig), and did not emerge as a theme until the 1960s and 1970s, beginning with Frank's (1961)
Persuasion and Healing
.
Psychotherapy Research
Authors: Castonguay Louis G. , Norberg Samuel S. , Schut Alexander J. , Constantino Michael J.
Published: January 2010

Psychotherapy research is primarily concerned with the evaluation of the impact and process of psychological interventions for clinical disorders (e.g., depression, anxiety), problems of living (e.g., marital discord), and medical conditions (e.g., chronic pain). It is also concerned with characteristics of the client and therapist as they relate to treatment process and outcome. Most psychotherapy research has focused on individual treatment. However, numerous investigations have also been conducted on couples, family, and group therapy.
Psychotherapy Training
Authors: Hess Allen K.
Published: January 2010

The story of psychotherapy training reaches back to antiquity. Perhaps a devoted student accompanied the medicine man, shaman, or priest and helped alleviate mental anguish. This student apprenticed or modeled the rituals, prescriptions, and incantations while providing sympathetic care to the afflicted. In more contemporary times, the art and science of psychotherapy and its training or supervision dates back to the late nineteenth century. Bernheim, Charcot, and Janet demonstrated hysteria and hypnotic phenomena to their eager students, one of whom was Freud. Freud formally systematized many of the ideas of the time into a unified theory including developmental states, unconscious phenomena, the continuity of abnormal and normal people, and the combination of scientific and humane treatment for the mental disorders. He conferred with his senior colleague, Breuer, and eventually formed his Wednesday evening groups whereby psychoanalytic theory, clinical cases, and the scientific methodology of psychoanalysis were reviewed, debated, and revised.
Psychotherapy, Effective Elements of
Authors: Horvath Adam O.
Published: January 2010

In the last three decades a strong and empirically supported consensus has emerged that psychotherapy is effective. Therefore one might expect that the question “Which elements in psychotherapy therapy are responsible for its effectiveness?” would have straightforward answers supported by reasonable consensus in the profession. This, however, is not the case.
Psychotherapy, Effectiveness of
Authors: Lambert Michael J.
Published: January 2010

The effectiveness of psychotherapy has been the subject of study since the 1930s. The activities that characterize psychotherapy practice have evolved over time and today consist of hundreds of established procedures based on psychological theories aimed at reducing the symptoms of psychopathology. In this brief summary, some of the most notable findings are reviewed and their implications highlighted.
Psychotherapy, Philosophy of
Authors: Messer Stanley B. , Woolfolk Robert L.
Published: January 2010

Psychotherapy is often considered to be an applied science consisting of a compendium of techniques or approaches validated by empirical research. Alternately, it is viewed as an art form requiring a creative, intuitive, and individualistic approach to clients and their problems. Psychotherapy, however, can also be regarded as a philosophically influenced practice whose underpinnings transcend its scientific, human engineering, or artistic dimensions.
Psychotic Disorders
Authors: Cohen Lisa J.
Published: January 2010

Psychosis refers to a breakdown in the ability to recognize external reality. Symptoms of psychosis include hallucinations, delusions, and disorganization of thought or behavior. Hallucinations entail the perception of something that is not present, and they can occur in auditory, visual, tactile, olfactory, and gustatory modes. Delusions are characterized by a fixed, false belief, and they vary across a spectrum from plausible to bizarre. Thought disorder can range in severity from subtle disorganization to total incoherence.
Puberty
Authors: Susman Elizabeth J. , Negriff Sonya , Dorn Lorah D.
Published: January 2010

Puberty is the period of development when sexual, reproductive maturity is reached. The span of puberty covers the approximate ages of 9–15 in girls and 10–16 in boys. Why is this predictable, biological event surrounded by so much psychological turmoil for some adolescents? The significance of puberty as a psychological event for adolescents is that it entails major neuroendocrine and structural brain changes as well as a period of growth that is exceeded in rapidity only during infancy. These neuroendocrine and structural brain changes putatively alter cognition, emotions, and potentially social roles, yet all of these changes are essential for the healthy development of adolescents. Changes in the behavior of adolescents, in turn, affect the functioning of the family as adolescents and families develop within a close system of dynamic and coordinated relationships. Furthermore, pubertal‐age adolescents and their families experience these major changes within a culture that continues to harbor the impression that puberty is synonymous with adolescence, a period negatively characterized as one in which there is risky sexuality, delinquency, and psychopathology. This section will discuss the neuroendocrine processes responsible for the onset and progression of puberty, the measurement of puberty, and the problem behaviors associated with off‐time pubertal development.
Q‐Methodology
Authors: Bambery Michael , Porcerelli John
Published: January 2010

Q‐methodology embraces, and is particularly suited for, the study of human subjectivity. Commonly (though incompletely) known as the Q‐sorting technique, Q‐methodology encompasses a unique set of psychometric and operational principles that, when combined with specialized statistical applications of correlational and factor‐analytical techniques, provides psychological researchers with an organized and rigorously quantitative means for examining subjective impressions (McKeown & Thomas, 1988). It allows complex naturalistic data to be reliably rated and examined. From the standpoint of Q‐methodology, the subjectivity inherent in many areas of psychology is not problematic; it is merely regarded as points of view on any matter to be researched. In fact, it is only subjective judgments that are at issue in Q‐methodology, and although they are typically improvable, they can nevertheless be reliably and intersubjectively observed, and they can be shown to have structure and form. Q‐methodology is employed to test whether subjective phenomena are intersubjectively observable and co‐occur; this is done by assessing their relationships through rigorous quantitative means (Jones, 2000).
Quality of Life
Authors: Evans David R.
Published: January 2010

Quality of life has become a popular concept that is used by politicians, marketing executives, media and sports personalities, and members of the public. There is an extensive scientific literature of books, theoretical articles, and empirical studies on the subject by health practitioners, psychologists, sociologists, economists, geographers, social historians, and philosophers. Scholars in ancient China and Greece were interested in quality of life several millennia ago, and renewed interest occurred in times of enlightenment in the centuries that followed. In more recent history, quality of life emerged as a political entity in the United States in the mid‐1950s and in Europe in the 1960s. In presidential commissions and in their speeches, U.S. presidents such as Eisenhower, Johnson, and Nixon popularized the term. The focus on quality of life in the last half century has increased, as there has been a general recognition that the health of countries must be judged by something more than gross economic factors and that the health of individuals is something beyond the absence of illness.
Quasi‐Experimental Design
Authors: Shadish William R. , Galindo Rodolfo
Published: January 2010

Like all experiments, quasi‐experiments manipulate treatments to determine their effects. Quasi‐experiments differ from randomized experiments in that units are not randomly assigned to conditions. Instead, units are assigned to conditions using such nonrandomized ways as permitting units to choose conditions or assigning them based on presumed need or merit. Lacking random assignment, quasi‐experiments may not yield unbiased estimates, threatening the validity of inferences about treatment effects.
Questionnaires
Authors: Geisinger Kurt F.
Published: January 2010

Questionnaires are inventories used by researchers to gather various kinds of information from responding individuals. Questionnaires are typically self‐administered, so‐called self‐report devices. As such, they are similar to interviews conducted face‐to‐face or over the telephone. In fact, some or all of the individuals who do not choose to complete a survey are often contacted and interviewed by a researcher so that their opinions and information may be included in the study data. Among the advantages of questionnaires are their relatively low cost as a means of gathering data, a general freedom from bias on the part of an interviewer, the large number of individuals who can be asked to respond, the sense of anonymity that respondents may feel, the temporal flexibility afforded the respondent, the possibility of directly linking research questions and survey results, and the ease of data coding and analysis for interpretation of the results (Judd, Smith, & Kidder, 1991).
Racial Differences
Authors: Griffin Tiffany M. , Jackson James S.
Published: January 2010

DuBois (1989) stated that the “problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line.” Contemporary research reveals that the color line still poses major problems in the twenty‐first century (Jackson, 2000). Racial differences have been observed in many domains, including housing, employment, education, social and economic standing and wealth, occupational opportunities, criminal convictions and incarceration, and physical and mental health statuses. Thus, although interpersonal racial discrimination, or behavioral manifestations of racial bias, has become subtler (Mays, Cochran, & Barnes, 2007), racial differences are still extremely pervasive and are projected to remain for years to come (Jackson, 2000). This article discusses the concept of race and research findings related to mechanisms by which race may produce disparities between social groups, and it ends with a brief discussion of important theoretical and empirical considerations that researchers and consumers of psychological literature should take into account when thinking about race and race differences.
Randomized Control Trials
Authors: Shadish William R. , Galindo Rodolfo
Published: January 2010

Randomized control trials (RCTs) are experiments that randomly assign participants to two or more groups to assess the effects of treatment (Shadish, Cook, & Campbell, 2002). Random assignment, when properly implemented and analyzed, yields effect estimates that are both unbiased and consistent. They are unbiased in that the expectation of the effect equals the effect in the population; thus, while any single trial might not yield exactly the right answer, the average over many similar RCTs will approach the right answer. They are consistent in that the effect in any given randomized experiment will approach the population effect as the sample size of the experiment increases. Therefore, large sample sizes in any single trial make it more likely that the results will be accurate.
Rape
Authors: McDonald Kate L. , Koss Mary P.
Published: January 2010

According to the Centers for Disease Control, rape is the nonconsensual completed or attempted penetration, however slight, of the vulva or anus by the penis, hand, finger, or other object. Rape occurs if a person cannot give consent (e.g. because of age, disability, or being under the influence of drugs or alcohol) or cannot refuse (e.g. because of the use of weapons, physical violence, or coercion; Basile & Saltzman, 2002). Laws defining rape vary by state, but in contrast to older definitions, rape is no longer limited to female victims or vaginal penetration alone, and spouses are no longer excluded as possible perpetrators. Social scientists describe many forms of rape, including child rape, rape by acquaintances and dates, punitive rape, forced prostitution, rape in war, and genocidal rape. In general, the rape of women is 10 times more common than the rape of men, and perpetrators are almost always males regardless of the sex of the victim (United States Department of Justice, 2006).
Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy
Authors: Enfield Roger E.
Published: January 2010

Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) is a theory of personality and a system of psychological treatment developed in the 1950s by Albert Ellis, an American clinical psychologist. It emphasizes the role of unrealistic expectations and irrational beliefs in human misery. Emotional upsets, Ellis asserted, largely follow from cognitions, not from events. The REBT “A‐B‐C theory” of personality holds that should an unfortunate event, such as a family quarrel, be followed by extreme anxiety or some other undesirable emotional consequence, inquiry will disclose that consequences (C) were caused not by the activating event (A) but rather by some irrational belief or beliefs (B) about the nature or meaning of the quarrel, such as “I am an awful person” or “They are awful and should be punished” or “Without their approval, I cannot go on.”
Raven's Progressive Matrices
Authors: Robertson Gary J.
Published: January 2010

Developed by British psychologist J. C. Raven and first published in 1938, the progressive matrices (PM) tests measure the ability to deduce relationships within geometric patterns or among figural elements contained in a matrix. Items employ either a complete pattern from which a piece has been removed, or figural elements placed in discrete rows and columns, with one element missing. The missing element must be selected from six or eight answer choices presented. These tests reportedly assess the ability to impose meaning on confusion, to formulate nonverbal constructs to explain complex relationships, and to minimize the influences of verbal communication and past experience (J. Raven, J. C. Raven, & Court, 1998, p. 1).
Reality Therapy
Authors: Wubbolding Robert E.
Published: January 2010

William Glasser developed reality therapy in a mental hospital and a correctional institution in California in the 1950s and 1960s. Although reality therapy is rooted in the work of Alfred Adler, who described human beings as social creatures and behavior as purposeful, many mental health professionals saw Glasser's ideas as controversial. Believing that human beings choose their behavior and are at least in partial control of it, he held his patients responsible for their actions and treated them as such. When approaching his supervisor, G. L. Harrington, and explaining how he perceived patient behavior, he was greeted with the encouraging response, “Join the club.” From that point on, Glasser and Harrington enjoyed a mutually cordial and professional relationship that resulted in the 1965 publication of Glasser's book
Reality Therapy.
Recovered Memories
Authors: McNally Richard J.
Published: January 2010

Few controversies in the history of psychology have been as polarized as the one concerning recovered memories of childhood sexual abuse (CSA; McNally, 2003). No one doubts that many people report recalling having been sexually abused as children after not having thought about their abuse for many years. The controversy concerns what to make of these reports.
Reflective Listening
Authors: Iberg James R.
Published: January 2010

Reflective listening refers to a way of responding to another person to communicate empathy. Empathy is widely believed to be an important element of psychotherapeutic interaction. Carl Rogers believed empathy was one of the necessary conditions for psychotherapy. The importance of empathy and empathic listening has been written about in many approaches to psychotherapy, including client‐centered, self psychology, psychoanalysis, Gestalt, existential, focusing‐oriented, process‐experiential, pre‐therapy, child therapy, marital and couple therapy, disaster‐recovery therapy, and clinical supervision.
Reframing
Authors: Newman Cory F. , Fox Marci G.
Published: January 2010

The cognitive technique known as reframing is perhaps most closely associated with the broader category of technique called rational responding, in which clients learn to spot the automatic thoughts that are causing their undue emotional distress and then use a series of questions to prompt themselves into generating more hopeful, constructive ways to look at themselves and their problems. Rational responding can be an extensive process in which the client uses automatic thought records (cf. Beck, 1995) to document a series of troublesome thoughts across a number of problematic life situations, perhaps leading to the identification of negative themes or schemas (Young, Klosko, & Weishaar, 2003) in the client's habitual ways of thinking. By contrast, reframing is more discrete, often pertaining to one automatic thought or a circumscribed area of concern. In addition, whereas rational responding is performed largely by the client (e.g., as part of their homework assignments), reframing is often done by the therapist, in session, as a way to model the process of rational responding as well as to demonstrate empathy.
Rehabilitation Psychology
Authors: Scherer Marcia J.
Published: January 2010

Rehabilitation is an integrated program of interventions that empower individuals with disabilities and chronic health conditions to achieve “personally fulfilling, socially meaningful, and functionally effective interaction” in their daily contexts (Riggar & Maki, 2004, p. 1). Rehabilitation psychology is a specialty area within psychology that focuses on the study and application of psychological knowledge and skills on behalf of individuals with disabilities and chronic health conditions in order to maximize health and welfare, independence and choice, functional abilities, and social role participation across the life span (e.g., Hagglund & Heinemann, 2006; Martz & Livneh, 2007). Rehabilitation psychologists are uniquely trained and specialized to engage in a broad range of activities that include clinical practice, consultation, program development, service provision, research, teaching and education, training, administration, development of public policy, and advocacy related to persons with disability and chronic health conditions (e.g., Banks & Kaschak, 2003; Farmer, Donders, & Warschausky, 2006; Frank, Rosenthal, & Caplan, in press; Hanson & Kerkhoff, 2004).
Religion and Mental Health
Authors: Pearce Michelle J. , Koenig Harold G.
Published: January 2010

Religion is an organized system of beliefs, practices, and rituals designed to facilitate closeness to the sacred or transcendent—whether that be God, a higher power, ultimate truth, or ultimate reality—and to foster an understanding of one's relationship and responsibility to others in living together in a community. Religion includes not only attendance at religious services and involvement in religious community activities involving scripture study or prayer, but also private personal religious practices such as prayer, meditation, study of scriptures, reading inspirational literature, and private worship. Religion also includes personal religiousness, degree of religious commitment, and religious motivation, which is the extent to which religious beliefs are the object of the person's ultimate concern in life. National surveys have consistently revealed that many Americans have religious beliefs and engage in religious practices. For example, 64% of Americans report praying at least once a day, 44% report attending religious services in the last 7 days, and 84% report that religion is somewhat or very important to them (Gallup, 2005).
Religion and Psychology
Authors: Houts Arthur C.
Published: January 2010

The relationship between religion and psychology has often been contentious, with religious rejection of secular psychology on the one hand, and psychological rejection of religious experience on the other hand. Religion and psychology have often been in competition over their shared interest in providing an understanding of what it means to be human. As a matter of presupposition, both psychology and religion require some prior philosophical anthropology, and it is at this most basic level that the tensions between the two arise. In the West, the clash between religion and psychology reflects the contradictory Western conceptual traditions of Judeo‐Christian subjective engagement versus Greek objective detachment.
Rey Complex Figure Test
Authors: Poreh Amir
Published: January 2010

The use of complex figures (CF) for evaluating cognitive performance was first described by Arnold Gesell (1925). Since that time, numerous CFs have been proposed, all of which rely on a depiction of the Union Jack as its main component. The most famous of these figures is the Rey‐Osterrieth Complex Figure (ROCF). This complex figure was developed by Andre Rey at the University of Geneva in the laboratory of Jean Piaget and was later presented by Rey (1941) as part of an article describing his comprehensive neuropsychological test battery. The popularity of the ROCF in the United States is credited to Edith Taylor (1959). In recent years, due to the fact that the ROCF has been removed from public domain, a number of alternate figures have been developed. One of the most widely used alternate figures is the Modified Taylor Complex Figure.
Rigidity
Authors: Gorman Bernard S.
Published: January 2010

Especially within the fields of developmental psychology, clinical psychology, and learning theory, psychology has consistently sought mechanisms that explain behavior change. But what about behavior that resists change, even when the situation calls for new adaptations? Perhaps the construct of rigidity might prove to be useful. In 1959, Sheila Chown wrote a classic review article, “Rigidity—A Flexible Concept.” At that time, she struggled with a working definition of the term. In more recent times, a very fruitful definition was offered by Schultz and Searleman (2002), who stated: “
Rigidity
can be defined as the tendency to develop and perseverate in the use of mental or behavioral sets” (p. 170).
Risk Management
Authors: Doverspike William F.
Published: January 2010

Risk management refers to the basic premise that ethical problems can be prevented and legal liability can be reduced through the use of some commonsense ethical principles. These principles include understanding relevant ethical and legal standards, practicing within one's area of competence, supervising only what one knows, obtaining adequate informed consent, being aware of the risks inherent in child custody evaluations, maintaining clear boundaries with clients, using projective retrospective thinking, consulting with a colleague, documenting decisions in writing, maintaining open communication, and aspiring to excellence (Doverspike, 2008). Good risk management involves putting these principles into practice.
Risk‐Taking Behavior
Authors: Broaddus Michelle , Bryan Angela
Published: January 2010

Taking risks is an important and, indeed, valuable part of the human experience; from playing the stock market to traveling to unexplored lands to skydiving, people routinely engage in risk taking. But what are the psychological phenomena behind risk‐taking behavior? And how can we make sense of self‐destructive risk taking that potentially endangers people's lives? This article presents a brief introduction to the psychological study of risk‐taking behavior. First, emerging research in brain structures, neurotransmitters, and genetics is described to capture the biological bases and substrates of risk‐taking behavior. Next, we review basic research in the domain of judgment and decision making (JDM) to explore the connection between the human brain's perception of risk and an individual's resulting risk‐taking behavior. We also cover the complex role of affect and emotion on these judgments. Finally, we discuss risk perception from within the broader framework of models of health behavior, with a specific focus on interventions to increase health behavior. For the purposes of this presentation, we adopt a definition of risk taking as a lack of ability to inhibit an automatic or prepotent response or to self‐regulate one's behavior, resulting in limited delay of gratification and risky decision making.
R
ogers,
C
arl
R
ansom (1902–1987)
Authors: Lundin Ralph W.
Published: January 2010

As Carl Ransom Rogers pointed out, both hard work and a commitment to Protestant Christianity were equally stressed in his youth. Certainly, both are implicit in his theories. He received the B.A. degree from the University of Wisconsin and then attended the Union Theological Seminary in New York City for two years. He decided to switch to psychology, and he received the PhD from Teacher's College of Columbia University in 1931. He began his career at the Institute for Child Guidance there and later accepted a position in the child study department of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children in Rochester, New York, where he soon became the director. In 1939 he accepted a post at the Rochester Guidance Center, and he also lectured at the University of Rochester. The following year he moved to Ohio State University, where he began to develop a new system of psychotherapy known first as nondirective, then client‐centered, and more recently, person‐centered therapy. It began to gain attention with the publication of his first book,
Counseling and Psychotherapy
. Some considered it to be an affront to Freudian psychoanalysis, because interpretations were not given. In 1945, he went to the University of Chicago, serving as executive of their counseling center and a professor, where he remained until 1957. After Chicago, he returned to his alma mater, Wisconsin, as professor during 1957–1963. In the following decade he published
Client‐Centered Therapy
and probably his most popular book,
On Becoming a Person
. In 1963, he moved to LaJolla, California, where he established the Center for the Study of the Person, and he remained there until his death in 1987.
Romantic Competence
Authors: Davila Joanne
Published: January 2010

Broadly speaking, romantic competence refers to the extent to which one functions adaptively in the romantic domain of life. This construct is associated with the broader concept of social competence; depending on how narrowly romantic competence is defined, it may have overlapping features with general social competence (e.g., adaptive conflict negotiation) or distinct features that pertain more specifically to romantic relationships (e.g., adaptive management of sexual attractions and experiences).
R
orschach,
H
ermann (1884–1922)
Authors: Peyser Charles S.
Published: January 2010

Hermann Rorschach received his medical degree from Zurich in 1912 with a dissertation concerning hallucinations that was supervised by Bleuler. Except for a year on the staff of a sanitorium near Moscow, his career was spent mainly in posts at Swiss mental hospitals, but with some time in Russia. Heavily influenced by Freud, he was a promoter of psychoanalysis among Swiss psychiatrists.
Sadism
Authors: Beauregard Eric , Proulx Jean
Published: January 2010

The origin of the term
sadism
is found in the literary works of French writer Marquis de Sade (1740–1814), but it was introduced into the medical field by Krafft‐Ebing. The
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders
(
DSM‐IV‐TR;
American Psychiatric Association, 2000) offers a definition of sadism that coincides largely with that offered by Krafft‐Ebing (1886/1965) over a century ago and requires “psychological or physical suffering (including humiliation) of the victim to cause sexual excitement in the sadist” (p. 574). This definition of sexual sadism indicates that the origins of sexual pleasure and sexual excitement are found in fantasies or acts in which physical or psychological torture causes a victim to suffer. However, some authors have also specified the inclusion of the association of feelings of power and control with sexual pleasure and gratification (Yates, Hucker, & Kingston, 2008).
Sadness
Authors: Power Michael J.
Published: January 2010

Until recently, the study of emotion (or the “passions,” as they were originally called) was primarily left to novelists, poets, and philosophers, who have provided some of the most poignant analyses of emotions such as sadness, whether from the Bible:

“They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.” (Psalms)
Sample Size Planning
Authors: Kelley Ken
Published: January 2010

Sample size planning is the systematic approach to selecting the number of participants to include in a research study so that some specified goal or set of goals can be satisfied with the minimum sample size. Sample size planning addresses the question, “What size sample should be used in this study?” However, an answer to an appropriate sample size question must be based on the particular goal(s) articulated by the researcher. Because of the variety of research questions that can be asked and the multiple inferences made in many studies, planning an appropriate sample size is not often straightforward. The appropriate sample size depends at least on the research questions of interest, the statistical model used, the assumptions specified in the sample size planning procedure, and the goal(s) of the study.