Why are people often so unpredictable? Why do they do things which can often cause great personal harm even whey they know this to be the case? This volume seeks to address these and many other enduring questions through a detailed discussion of the chaotic nature of human existence. It explores three general areas, the first of which is neurobiology and genetics. The evolution of the mind is examined from a Darwinian perspective, drawing attention to the way chance and uncertainty in development are structured by natural selection. Key findings from current biological and medical research are reviewed, the interrelationship between genetics and experience is explored, and Gerald Edelman's theory of the evolution of the mind through natural selection is discussed. The second theme, cognition and collective action, is considered in the light of evidence indicating that the way we think is also subject to natural selection. Furthermore, it is argued that there is a meaningful distinction between reason (adaptive rationality) and formal rationality. Finally, recent research into chaos theory, order and complexity is reviewed.

This volume offers a realistic discussion of the complexity of the treatment of traumatic and dissociative experiences in eating disorders. The authors investigate critical issues concerning contraindications and the pitfalls of treatment while reflecting on the longterm outcomes of treatment.

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This book challenges the assumptions of the event-dominated DSM model of posttraumatic stress disorder. Bowmam examines a series of questions directed at the current mental health model, reviewing the empirical literature. She finds that the dose-response assumptions are not supported; the severity of events is not reliable associated with PTSD, but is more reliably associated with important pre-event risk factors. She reviews evidence showing the greater role of individual differences including trait negative affectivity, belief systems, and other risk factors, in comparison with event characteristics, in predicting the disorder. The implications for treatment are significant, as treatment protocols reflect the DSM assertion that event exposure is the cause of the disorder, implying it should be the focus of treatment. Bowman also suggests that an event focus in diagnosis anad treatment risks increases the disorder because it does not provide sufficient attention to important pre-exisiting risk factors.

Originally published in 1986, this book was an effort to integrate thinking and research concerning the role of emotion and cognition in altruistic behaviour. Prior to publication there was a vast body of research and theorizing concerning the development and maintenance of prosocial (including altruistic) behaviour. This book focusses primarily on a specific set of intrapsychic factors involved in prosocial responding, especially emotions and cognitions believed to play a major role in altruistic behaviour. In the final chapters these intrapsychic factors are also discussed in relation to a variety of other relevant factors including socialization and situational influences on altruism.

First published in 1976, this volume was completely new with original contributions and traces the advances in theory and research on anxiety and emotion of the previous decade. The authors examine the origins of fear, anxiety, and other emotions and consider self-report and psychophysiological approaches to the measurement of anxiety. Also considered are the effects of anxiety on the behaviour of normal and abnormal subjects, and the volume concludes with behavioural approaches to assessment and treatment of anxiety in clinical settings.

Originally published in 1985, this title was a retrospective appreciation of the late Richard L. Solomon. His pre- and postdoctoral students from past years presented the 22 papers which are published in this volume. The book reflects the breadth of Solomon's impact through his teaching and research. The first part contains a chapter that provides a bit of history in a retrospective appreciation of the several foci of Solomon's research career. This chapter sets the stage for those that follow and reduces their diversity by providing a degree of historical understanding. The second part on the role of properties of fear contains chapters that address various issues associated with the role of conditioned fear. The third part contains papers that address cognitive, information-processing issues in the context of Pavlovian conditioning of appetitive and aversive events, reasoning and timing. The fourth part continues the exploration of the phenomenon of learned helplessness first discovered in Solomon's laboratory. The fifth part addresses various issues associated with the Solomon and Corbit opponent-process theory of motivation and affect. The final part, on applications to human and cultural issues, contains chapters on such diverse subjects as cross-cultural analyses of aggressive behavior in children, the analysis of resistance to change in industrial organizations, the concept of liberty in formulating research issues in developmental psychology, and the status of free will in modern American psychology.

This text contains an up-to-date survey of theory, research and practice in environmental psychology, drawing on international literature. It adopts the perspective that physical and social factors are inextricably linked in their influence on human behaviour and experience and that the world in which we live is changed and often damaged by human action.; Throughout the text, the issues which are important in contemporary psychology, such as levels of explanation, methodological diversity and the relationship between psychology and other disciplines, are brought to the fore. The text covers established areas of environmental concern and also brings together research on rarely covered topics, such as the effects of smell, colour and light, and the way in which physical environments influence social identity.

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It is argued in this book that there are three major approaches to anxiety. First, there is anxiety as an emotional state. Second, there is trait anxiety as a dimension of personality. Third, there is anxiety as a set of anxiety disorders. What is attempted is to produce a unified theory of anxiety which integrates all these major approaches. According to this unified theory, there are four sources of information which influence the level of experienced anxiety: (1) experimental stimulation; (2) internal physiological activity; (3) internal cognitions, (e.g., worries); and (4) one's own behaviour. The unified theory is essentially based on a cognitive approach. More specifically, it is assumed that individual differences in experienced anxiety between those high and low in trait anxiety depend largely on cognitive biases. It is also assumed that the various anxiety disorders depend on cognitive biases, and that the main anxiety disorders differ in terms of the source of information most affected by such biases (e.g., social phobics have biased interpretation of their own behaviour). In sum, this book presents a general theory of anxiety from the cognitive perspective. It is intended that this theory will influence theory and research on emotion, personality, and the anxiety disorders.

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The opening of the former Soviet Union to the West has provided an opportunity to describe Russian human factors/ergonomics and to compare American theories and methods with it. Although this book is principally dedicated to describing the theory of activity as it applies to issues of design and training, it is also offered to a general audience of psychologists and interested lay readers. This theory studies the goal-directed behavior of man and attempts to integrate the cognitive, motivational, and behavioral aspects of activity into a holistic system. Such fundamental notions as goal, action, and self-regulation are described and analyzed from totally different theoretical points of view.
This is the first comprehensive, systematic description of the theory of activity in the English language. Existing attempts to translate the theory of activity into English suffer from certain limitations. Among them, the theory of activity -- considered one of the more important accomplishments of Soviet psychological science -- has an extensive history dating back to the work of Vygotsky and his students. Subsequent development of the theory by other well-known Soviet psychologists and psychophysiologists took place within different schools with some significant differences. In the former Soviet Union, psychological theory could not be advanced unconnected to Marxist-Leninist ideology. Accordingly, theoretical formulations were subject to their own version of "political correctness." Books published in this field were addressed only to other scientists with backgrounds in the field. Moreover, the translation of the technical terms in Russian psychology frequently resist translation in the absence of the context of the debates in which they were being used. Thus, simple translation of books in this field as they were written in a specialized and politicized environment for Russian audiences is really not a particularly sensible or worthwhile undertaking.
This book is addressed in the first instance to Western psychologists. It compares, among other things, analyses of work from the former Soviet Union with the work from the West. Applications of activity theory to design and learning were paramount in the Soviet Union. Using their own theoretical perspective, the authors provide a comparative analysis of the various schools working in activity theory. They hope that this book may facilitate the exchange of ideas between Russian psychological scientists and Western psychologists working in ergonomics, human factors, industrial/organizational psychology, education, learning, and related areas where the theory of activity may find general application.
This book's authors attempt to provide a contribution not only to science but also to history. Western researchers have strongly influenced Russian work, but because of negative political pressure in the former USSR, the flow of concepts was one-sided. Russian ergonomists received so much from American and Western sources that it is now important to give something back. Despite the considerable similarity between Russian and American theories and methods, the special "spin" the former put on their work may stimulate new thinking on the part of their American colleagues.

This text explores family of origin treatment, which looks at patterns and rules in a family which affect interactions within that family. These patterns are then unconsciously utilized throughout a person's life in work and family settings. Examining and understanding these family rules allows an emphasis on cultural diversity. The family is often the basis for ethnic, cultural and religious norms. Examining these norms can help the individuals and their families deal with norms and variations from these norms, when confronting issues such as marriage and intimacy, sexual orientation and religious belief.

This book showcases papers presented at the annual Advertising and Consumer Psychology Conference. The contributors -- active scholars with both practitioner and academic backgrounds -- share an interest in the general area of psychographics, values, and lifestyle in advertising.
The interdisciplinary and international mix of authors bring a diverse perspective to this volume, which is divided into four nonorthogonal sections. The first section deals with theoretical and conceptual issues in advertising research, while the second section presents chapters devoted to improving methodology. The final two sections illustrate how value, lifestyle, and psychographic research have been used to understand differences among people. The first of these final two sections emphasizes differences among people at different times (commonly called trend research), and the second emphasizes differences among people across national boundaries.
Collectively, these chapters illustrate how practical state-of-the-art research in values, lifestyles, and psychographics can be. Thoughtful consideration of values, lifestyles, and psychographics as they are manifested in quality research can improve advertising and marketing practice, and can help the business community deliver products and services that are more in line with consumers' needs.

One of the most profound insights of the dynamic systems perspective is that new structures resulting from the developmental process do not need to be planned in advance, nor is it necessary to have these structures represented in genetic or neurological templates prior to their emergence. Rather, new structures can emerge as components of the individual and the environment self-organize; that is, as they mutually constrain each other's actions, new patterns and structures may arise. This theoretical possibility brings into developmental theory the important concept of indeterminism--the possibility that developmental outcomes may not be predictable in any simple linear causal way from their antecedents.
This is the first book to take a critical and serious look at the role of indeterminism in psychological and behavioral development.
* What is the source of this indeterminism?
* What is its role in developmental change?
* Is it merely the result of incomplete observational data or error in measurement?
It reviews the concepts of indeterminism and determinism in their historical, philosophical, and theoretical perspectives--particularly in relation to dynamic systems thinking--and applies these general ideas to systems of nonverbal communication. Stressing the indeterminacy inherent to symbols and meaning making in social systems, several chapters address the issue of indeterminism from metaphorical, modeling, and narrative perspectives. Others discuss those indeterministic processes within the individual related to emotional, social, and cognitive development.

Why do some young adults substantially change their patterns of smoking, drinking, or illicit drug use after graduating from high school? In this book, the authors show that leaving high school and leaving home create new freedoms that are linked to increases in the use of cigarettes, alcohol, marijuana, and cocaine. They also show that marriage, pregnancy, and parenthood create new responsibilities that are linked to decreases in drug use.
The research is based on more than 33,000 young people followed from high school through young adulthood by the nationwide Monitoring the Future project. Every two years, participants reported on their drug use, as well as their schooling, employment, military service, living arrangements, marriages, pregnancies, parenthood, and even their divorces.
The unique qualities of this research--large nationally representative samples, follow-ups extending up to 14 years beyond high school, and multiple approaches to analysis and data presentation--allowed the examination of several important influences simultaneously, while retaining much of the rich detail encountered in the real world. On the whole, the results are encouraging, suggesting that the potentials for change and improvement during the transition to adulthood are as important as the detrimental effects of problem behavior in adolescence. This research is a "must" read for anyone concerned with how new freedoms and responsibilities impact adolescents, young adults, and the use of licit and illicit drugs.

The result of extensive scholarship and consultation with leading scholars, this text introduces students to twenty-four theorists and compares and contrasts their theories on how we develop as individuals. Emphasizing the theories that build upon the developmental tradition established by Rousseau, this text also covers theories in the environmental/learning tradition.

Everyday conversations including gossip, boasting, flirting, teasing, and informative discussions are highly creative, "improvised" interactions. Children's play is also an important, often improvisational activity. One of the most improvisational games among 3- to 5-year-old children is "social pretend play"--also called fantasy play, sociodramatic play, or role play. Children's imaginations have free reign during pretend play. Conversations in these play episodes are far more improvisational than the average adult conversation. Because pretend play occurs in a dramatized, fantasy world, it is less constrained by social and physical reality.
This book adds to our understanding of preschoolers' pretend play by examining it in the context of a theory of improvisational performance genres. This theory, derived from in-depth analyses of the implicit and explicit rules of theatrical improvisation, proves to generalize to pretend play as well. The two genres share several characteristics:
* There is no script; they are created in the moment.
* There are loose outlines of structure which guide the performance.
* They are collective; no one person decides what will happen.
Because group improvisational genres are collective and unscripted, improvisational creativity is a collective social process.
The pretend play literature states that this improvisational behavior is most prevalent during the same years that many other social and cognitive skills are developing. Children between the ages of 3 and 5 begin to develop representations of their own and others' mental states as well as learn to represent and construct narratives. Freudian psychologists and other personality theorists have identified these years as critical in the development of the personality. The author believes that if we can demonstrate that children's improvisational abilities develop during these years--and that their fantasy improvisations become more complex and creative--it might suggest that these social skills are linked to the child's developing ability to improvise with other creative performers.

There is a tremendous concern and interest in the number of chemical dependents with co-existing compulsive behaviors. However, no one has developed a theory that can explain the high prevalence of compulsive behaviors in chemical dependents, and more importantly, describe the treatment and recovery implications. The literature and professionals are divided with the counselors/clinicians on one side and the researchers on the other. The authors try to bridge this obvious gap by writing a book that can bring recent genetic/biochemical research to the counselor/clinician in a way that will help them diagnose and treat their patients.
This book is the result of the authors' long interest in and study of chemical dependency and compulsive behaviors. It begins with the observation that chemical dependents experience a much higher prevalence of compulsive behaviors than the general population. Although many have written about the two subjects--generally the relationship of a single compulsive behavior to chemical dependency--none have developed a theory with supporting research that ties the type of chemical dependency to specific compulsive behaviors. The authors describe recent research that connects chemical dependency and compulsive behaviors to the underlying genetic/biochemical mechanisms, and provide detailed examinations of the clinical implications of the model as well as case histories.

Seen in modern perspective, the concept of national character poses fundamental problems for social science theory and research: To what extent do conditions of life in a particular society give rise to certain patterns in the personalities of its members? What are the consequences?

Alex Inkeles surveys various definitions of national character, tracing developments through the twentieth century. His approach is to examine the regularity of specific personality patterns among individuals in a society. He argues that modal personality may be extremely important in determining which new cultural elements are accepted and which institutional forms persist in a society. Reviewing previous studies, Inkeles canvasses the attitudes and psychological states of different nations in an effort to discover a set of values in the United States. He concludes that, despite recent advances in the field, there is much to be done before we can have a clear picture of the degree of differentiation in the personality structure of modern nations.

Until now, there were few formal definitions and discussions on national character and the limits of this field of study. This book will be of great interest to psychologists, sociologists, philosophers, and political theorists.

Contents:
Part I: Basic Concepts of Theory and Practice of Temperament. Our Initial Concept of Temperament. Our Initial Hypothesis. Our First Research Effort: From Failure to Success. We Launched the New York Longitudinal Study. Analysis of Data and the Definition and Rating of Temperament Definition and Rating of Temperament and Categories. The Clinical Interview for Temperament. The Concept of Goodness and Fit. Parent Guidance. Part II: New Applications to the Theory and Practice of Temperament. The Rapid Expansion of Temperament Theory and Practice Since 1970. Parent and Child Education About Temperament. Prevention and Early Intervention in Temperament Programs. The Kaiser Permanente Temperament Program. A New Mental Health Profession: The Temperament Counselor. Temperament and School Functioning. Temperament and Pediatric Practice. Temperament and Nursing. Temperament and Psychotherapy of Children. Temperament and Psychotherapy of Adolescents. Temperament and Psychotherapy of Adults. Temperament and the Handicapped Child. Temperament and Culture. Temperament in Consistency and Change. A Look to the Future.

The field of behavioural economics can tell us a great deal about cognitive bias and unconscious decision-making, challenging the orthodox economic model whereby consumers make rational and informed choices. But it is in the arena of health that it perhaps offers individuals and governments the most value. In this important new book, the most pernicious health issues we face today are examined through a behavioral economic lens. It provides an essential and timely overview of how this growing field of study can reframe and offer solutions to some of the biggest health issues of our age. The book opens with an overview of the core theoretical concepts, after which each chapter assesses how behavioral economic research and practice can inform public policy across a range of health issues. Including chapters on tobacco, alcohol and drug use, physical activity, dietary intake, cancer screening and sexual health, the book integrates the key insights from the field to both developed and developing nations. Also asking important ethical questions around paternalism and informed choice, this book will be essential reading for students and researchers across psychology, economics and business and management, as well as public health professionals wishing for a concise overview of the role behavioral economics can potentially play in allowing people to live healthier lives.

After many "out-of-print" years, this volume has been reissued in response to an increasing demand for copies. This reflects that the fundamental questions that motivated this book thirty years ago are still being asked. But more important, the answers -- or at least their outlines -- now seem to be in sight. In 1968, this book stood as an expression of a paradigm crisis in its critique of the state of personality psychology. The last three decades have been filled with controversy and debate about the dilemmas raised here, and then with renewal and fresh discoveries. It therefore seems especially timely to revisit the pages which posed the challenges. Mischel outlined the need to encompass the situation in the study of personality, but with a focus on the acquired meaning of stimuli and on the situation as perceived, viewing the individual as a cognitive-affective being who construes, interprets, and transforms the stimulus in a dynamic reciprocal interaction with the social world. He focused on the idiographic analysis of personality that had originally motivated the field, and the complexity, discriminative facility, and uniqueness of the individual, and sought to connect the expressions of personality to the individual's behavior -- that is, to what people do and not just what they say. Even the intrinsically contextualized "if...then..." expressions of the personality system -- its essential behavioral signatures -- were foreshadowed in this book that fired the opening salvo in a search for "a truly dynamic personality psychology."

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) is the number one killer of men and women in industrialized countries. In older age groups, CVD is also the most important cause for hospitalization, and, in many countries, it is the basis of early retirement from work. Thus, CVD is associated with enormous costs for care and loss of productivity, as well as for disabilities, pensions, etc. All this has motivated clinicians and scientists to develop and implement new methodologies and technologies to better care for patients who are hospitalized for heart disease.
Efforts to improve care in the acute phases of coronary heart disease (CHD) have been successful. During the last decade, the immediate mortality risk of a patient admitted to coronary care for a suspected myocardial infarction or other acute coronary syndrome has decreased to less than 10%. Despite these achievements, CVD continues to represent a major threat to the health of middle-aged and elderly men and women.
This volume addresses myriad aspects of CHD prevention, including biobehavioral and psychosocial factors, behavioral epidemiology, behavioral intervention models, and policy. The first section of the text provides an introduction to CVD prevention and behavioral medicine. The second section introduces two theoretically different approaches to preventive action, high-risk and population-based strategies. The third section describes and discusses the important questions of how behavioral sciences can be conceptually integrated into traditional, medically based, preventive efforts. The fourth section presents both population and high-risk behavioral intervention approaches.
In summary, this volume examines the social environment and its potentials for preventive actions, reviews the psychosocial and biobehavioral mechanisms involved in these effects, and describes concrete and practical implementations of behavioral medicine knowledge as they have been applied to CHD prevention.

In one grand effort, this is an anatomy of power, a history of the ways in which it has been defined, and a study of its forms (force, manipulation, authority, and persuasion), its bases (individual and collective resources, political mobilization), and its uses. The issues that Dennis Wrong addresses range from the philosophical and ethical to the psychological and political. Much of the work is punctuated with careful examples from history. While the author illuminates his discussion with references to Weber, Marx, Freud, Plato, Dostoevsky, Orwell, Hobbes, Arendt, and Machiavelli, he keeps his arguments grounded in contemporary practical issues, such as class conflicts, multi-party politics, and parent-child relationships.

In his new introduction, prepared for the 1995 edition of Power, the author reconsiders the concept of power, now locating it in the broader traditions of the social sciences rather than as a series of actions and actors within the sociological tradition. As a result. Wrong emphasizes such major distinctions as "power over" and "power to," and various conflations of power as commonly used. The new opening provides the reader with a deeper appreciation of the non-reductionist character of the book as a whole.

Breastfeeding is a biocultural phenomenon: not only is it a biological process, but it is also a culturally determined behavior. As such, it has important implications for understanding the past, present, and future condition of our species. In general, scholars have emphasized either the biological or the cultural aspects of breastfeeding, but not both. As biological anthropologists the editors of this volume feel that an evolutionary approach combining both aspects is essential. One of the goals of their book is to incorporate data from diverse fields to present a more holistic view of breastfeeding, through the inclusion of research from a number of different disciplines, including biological and social/cultural anthropology, nutrition, and medicine. The resulting book, presenting the complexity of the issues surrounding very basic decisions about infant nutrition, will fill a void in the existing literature on breastfeeding.

This text explores the relationship between the planned or built environment and the occurrence of mental ill-health. It begins by providing a broad overview of what is known about the causes of psychopathic behaviour. It then goes on to discuss the issues that arise when attempting to identify: the impact of the environment as a source of stress; the effects that the environment can have on the quality of relationships between people; and the relationship between symbolic aspects of the environment, the planning process and mental health. The book uses analysis and case studies drawn from the UK and US and contains example illustrations of the built environment.