How does the sense of basic fairness--or selflessness versus selfishness--arise? How is it exhibited behaviorally? How is it maintained? Few topics hold more contemporary significance or have proved more elusive to specification in precise scientific terms. Current research perspectives on altruism, narcissism, and comity by distinguished behavioral scientists from around the world were brought together in a special issue of Current Psychology (Summer 1998) and are offered here in a useful compendium.

Chapters and contributors include: "Equity, Justice, and Altruism" by Graham F. Wagstaff; "Reactions to the Fate of One's Brainchild After Its Disclosure" by Sidney Rosen and Shannon Wheatman; "Need Norm, Demographic Influence, Social Role, and Justice Judgment" by Helen E. Linkey and Sheldon Alexander; "Adaptive and Maladaptive Narcissism" by Robert W. Hill and Greg Yousey; "Perceptions of Self-Oriented and Other-Oriented Help-Providers" by Mark A. Barnett, Guy D. Vitaglione, Jeffrey S. Bartel, Birgit S. Valdez, Lee Ann Steadman, and Kimberly K. G. Harper; and "Pathological Narcissism and Serial Homicide" by Louis B. Schlesinger. Altruism, Narcissism, Comity will benefit students, researchers, and practitioners in the psychological sciences, sociology, political science, philosophy, law, and other disciplines concerned with the nature of selflessness, heroism, justice, and their variants.

This volume contains 23 articles, grouped under six themes: values and national identity; immigration and acculturation; personality and social behaviour across cultures; organizational and work psychology; educational and developmental psychology; and conceptual and methodological ideas.

This book has a practical purpose. It seeks to help the reader to understand himself and his problems, that he may increase his successes, his fruit, and his satisfactions. The discussion centers about the conditions that shape personality, but the attempt of the book is not to rehearse the findings and theories of science but to provide the means by which the reader can come to a better understanding of himself.

Neither human nature nor personality can be independent of culture. Human beings share certain social norms or rules within their cultural groups. Over 2000 years ago, Aristotle held that man is by nature a social animal. Similarly, Xun Kuang (298-238 B.C.), a Chinese philosopher, pointed out that humans in social groups can not function without shared guidance or rules.
This book is designed to provide readers with a perspective on how people are different from, and similar to, each other --both within and across cultures. One of its goals is to offer a practical guide for people preparing to interact with those whose cultural background is different from their own.

This title was first published in 2000: This text contributes to the development of communicative theory by advancing a theory of the self-sufficient to support intersubjectivity and meet the conditions required for communicative rationality and communicative reason. The conclusion supports theories advanced by Habermas, Apel and Wittgenstein, evaluated against the background of later works from Immanuel Kant. The origins of communicative theory in the writings of Kant and Charles Sanders Peirce are sketched, followed by an outline of the development of the theory by Apel and Habermas. In this discussion a central issues is identified as the failure of communicative theory to produce an adequate theory of the self as the subject of communicative transactions. It is argued that both Mead and Habermas fail to fully establish intersubjectivity as they retain elements of a Cartesian introspective subjectivity. An alternative approach, developed by Charles Taylor, is then discussed. Finally, it is argued that freedom and imagination, understood in the context of Kant and the late Wittgenstein are the key elements to a self capable of supporting the intersubjectivity required by communicative theory.

Since its formulation by George Kelly in the mid-1950s Personal Construct Psychology has been distinguished by its links with general philosophy and by the philosophical richness of its fundamental postulates. Personal Construct Psychology recognizes that any attempt to understand why we behave as we do must begin with an understanding of how we create meaning. After a brief general introduction Bill Warren traces the philosophical history of Personal Construct Psychology through the broad and complex tradition of phenomenology and thinkers such as Spinoza, Hegel and Heidegger. He also gives credit to the influence of general creative and dramatic literature across a variety of cultures. Specific issues addressed in depth include the position of Personal Construct Psychology with regard to philosophy of science, cognitive science, clinical psychology, concepts of mental illness and the implications for social and political philosophy. The text should provide counsellors, therapists and students of Personal Construct Psychology with a broader appreciation of its historical and philosophical context and its importance to contemporary psychology.

Anxiety sensitivity (AS) is the fear of anxiety sensations which arises from beliefs that these sensations have harmful somatic, social, or psychological consequences. Over the past decade, AS has attracted a great deal of attention from researchers and clinicians with more than 100 peer-reviewed journal articles published. In addition, AS has been the subject of numerous symposia, papers, and posters at professional conventions.
Why this growing interest?
Theory and research suggest that AS plays an important role in the etiology and maintenance of many forms of psychopathology, including anxiety disorders, depression, chronic pain, and substance abuse.
Bringing together experts from a variety of different areas, this volume offers the first comprehensive state-of-the-art review of AS--its conceptual foundations, assessment, causes, consequences, and treatment--and points new directions for future work. It will prove to be an invaluable resource for clinicians, researchers, students, and trainees in all mental health professions.

This text presents a wide-ranging discussion of the body image by looking at the individual's immediate apprehension toward his or her body and bodily capabilities. In a philosophical treatment of the role played by the body image in our everyday experience, Gail Weiss returns to the seminal contributions of the phenomenologist Merleau-Ponty and the psychoanalyst Paul Schilder, which reveal the complex physiological, social and physical structure of the body image.

In his acclaimed book A Theory of Personality Development, Luciano L'Abate introduced a revolutionary theory of personality development and functioning that departed radically from traditional theories. In place of hypothetical traits existing in an empirical vacuum, Dr. L'Abate offered an image of observable interpersonal competencies functioning within the basic contexts of home, work, leisure, and the marketplace. Central to his theory was a developmental model that posited the family as the primordial setting in which propensities are formed and behavior patterns set. By defining personality in terms of the growth and interplay of interpersonal competencies, the L'Abate theory provided an epistemologically and empirically sound basis for understanding personality function and dysfunction as corollaries and extensions of one another.

In The Self in the Family, Luciano L'Abate and Margaret Baggett again break new ground by expanding the L'Abate theory of personality development to encompass criminal and psychopathological behavior. Drawing upon mounting empirical evidence that the family paradigm is the major determinant of personality socialization throughout the life span, the authors develop a selfhood model with demonstrable links between the three domains of personality function, criminality, and psychopathology. With the help of the model, they show how it is now possible to arrive at a personality-based interpretation of most deviant behaviors, including criminality, psychopathology, addictions, and even psychosomatic illnesses, and they describe various preventive and psychotherapeutic applications for this expanded theory of family-based personality development.

The authors further elaborate on the theories developed in Dr. L'Abate's previous books by introducing the core concepts of hurt--the basic feeling underlying much of personality functioning and dysfunctioning--and a continuum of likeness--the fundamental determinant of interpersonal choices and behavior in friendships, parent-child relations, and marital relations.

Offering an empirically rigorous, developmentally based, unified field theory of personality function, criminality, and psychopathology, The Self in the Family is essential reading for developmental and clinical psychologists, family therapists, personality theorists, and criminality and psychopathology researchers.

CHILD-CENTERED FAMILY THERAPY

Lucille L. Andreozzi

This book is the first complete introduction to the Child-Centered Structural Dynamic Therapy Model--a revolutionary, short-term treatment model which helps integrate child and family system development into a comprehensive framework for self-guided, family-initiated change. This guide, with its numerous case illustrations, works to build knowledge from within the family by engaging family members in structured activities that help them translate family system principles into practical, everyday reality. Child-Centered Family Therapy is an important resource for couples and family therapists, child psychologists, counselors, and social workers.

1996 (0-471-14858-X) 374 pp.

TREATING THE CHANGING FAMILY

Handling Normative and Unusual Events

Edited by Michele Harway

This inimitable book offers a broad-ranging, carefully integrated review of contemporary trends in family therapy, research, and practice. It reexamines the family and the many challenges to its function and provides practical advice for therapists who treat troubled families. It explores the impact that non-normative events such as violence and abuse, addiction, long-term and chronic illness, divorce, adoption, trauma, and many others can have on family function and provides proven intervention strategies and techniques for treating these families. With the special attention given to the structure, dynamics, and unique problems of families that do not fit the traditional mold, such as binuclear, single-parent, and gay and lesbian families, Treating the Changing Family is a valuable resource for all mental health professionals and families.

1995 (0-471-07905-7) 374 pp.

Also in the Series:

HANDBOOK OF RELATIONAL DIAGNOSIS AND DYSFUNCTIONAL FAMILY PATTERNS

Florence W. Kaslow, Editor

1996 (0-471-08078-0) 592 pp.

The formation of identity in adolescence is the most central concept in psychological and sociological studies of young people. Most theories to date assume that adolesence share the same conditions under which their identities are formed. Personality Development in Adolescence is a collection of work by leading researchers that considers different contexts affecting personality and identity development. Three main contexts are considered: cultural, family and life-span development.
Of central importance to developmental psychologists, this collection will also be valuable to social workers, teachers, nurses and all those whose work involves young people

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This book has a practical purpose. It seeks to help the reader to understand himself and his problems, that he may increase his successes, his fruit, and his satisfactions. The discussion centers about the conditions that shape personality, but the attempt of the book is not to rehearse the findings and theories of science but to provide the means by which the reader can come to a better understanding of himself.

Our lives are preoccupied with bodily maintenance. We spend many of our waking hours eating, exercising, washing, grooming and dressing in order to maintain our sense of self. What happens after major physical impairment? How do we relate to a damaged body?
Wendy Seymour interviews men and women who have suffered profound bodily paralysis, and explores how they deal with their appearance, relationships, sexuality, incontinence and sport. She finds that even major impairment hasn't annihilated these people's experience of an embodied self. She shows that the process of self-reconstruction is interwoven with social expectations and argues that the experience of disability highlights the continuous work involved in embodiment for everyone.
Remaking the Body is a major contribution to the field of the sociology of the body and essential reading for rehabilitation professionals and students.

Jane Loevinger's innovative research methodology, psychometric rigor, and theoretical scope have attracted the attention of numerous scholars and researchers. Empirical investigations employing Loevinger's Washington University Sentence Completion Test of ego development (WUSCT) have appeared with increasing frequency and total more than 300 studies. Following the publication of the first comprehensive revision of the scoring manual for the WUSCT, this volume reflects on the strengths and limitations of Loevinger's developmental model.
It is divided into sections that correspond with four broad questions that can be raised about Loevinger's developmental model:
* What is its scope and intellectual tradition?
* What evidence is there for construct validity?
* What is its relationship to other social-developmental models?
* What is its clinical relevance to Loevinger's model of ego development?
This four-part grouping provides a framework for effectively organizing the present material, and frequently, the questions raised in one section are addressed in other sections as well. In the concluding chapter, Loevinger addresses some of the ideas that are proposed by the various authors. She also presents the origin of the ego development concept by recounting its history.

Women who are dominant are more likely to have sons. Demographic studies show that more male children are born after wars, yet most people believe that their baby's sex is a matter of chance - determined by the father's sperm. Valerie Grant presents evidence that the mother's personality - which is related to female testosterone levels - can actually influence which type of sperm fertilises the egg.
Using data from human and animal studies Valerie Grant discusses the implications for human evolution, developmental psychology and reproductive biology. Her claims are controversial and the implications of her findings far reaching. Whether mothers have sons or daughters may not be a matter of chance. It may depend on which sex infant the mother is more suited to raise.

Related link: www.sexratio.com
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The Dark Triad of Personality: Narcissism, Machiavellianism, and Psychopathy in Everyday Life summarizes the latest research on how these personality traits (psychopathology, narcissism, Machiavellianism) are defined and displayed, while also exploring the impact they have on individuals and society, the relationship between clinical conditions and personality traits, and their adaptivity. The book introduces the Dark Triad through the lens of existing clinical and personality literature, discussing shared and unique cognitive and empathetic profiles associated with each trait. Antisocial, antagonistic, and criminal behaviors associated with the Dark Triad are also covered, as is the way these individuals compete socially and in the workplace.

Creativity: Research, Development, and Practice, Third Edition, summarizes research on the development, expression, and enhancement of creativity. It draws from the full range of disciplines studying creativity, including psychology, business, education, economics, philosophy, neuroscience, and more. This volume includes exploration of research on the nature/nurture debate, what influences creativity, how creativity is related to personality, how social context may affect creativity, mental health, and its relation to creativity, gender differences, and how creativity is related to and differs from, invention, innovation, imagination, and adaptability. The third edition has been thoroughly updated, with a new chapter on psychometrics and substantial updates on the biology and neuroscience of creativity, politics, and creative cognition. It includes quotations, graphics, boxed controversial issues, and biographical examples from unambiguously creative individuals.

How do we move from an understanding of the administration, scoring, and interpretation of responses on various personality assessment instruments to the ability to put our understanding into words and communicate it effectively to referral agents and to patients themselves? And how do we transmit that ability to students?
"Teaching and Learning Personality Assessment" strives to fill a gap in the literature and in many training programs. The editors have assembled a group of renowned clinicians, noted not only for their own acumen in personality assessment but also for their teaching talent, who present in detail time-tested techniques for teaching assessment. Readers have the opportunity to "sit beside" these seasoned mentors and learn their special skills. Numerous examples illustrate the key concepts.
For every instructor of personality assessment who has ever pondered ways to organize a course or to convey difficult material, and for every student who has worried about how to translate theory into practice, in the context of a course or on his or her own, this book will offer enlightenment and provide uniquely practical assistance. It will be important reading for psychologists and trainees at every level of experience. Its clear style, vivid anecdotes, frank discussion of disagreements in the field, and innovative ideas make it an excellent text for both introductory and advanced courses.

Our lives are preoccupied with bodily maintenance. We spend many of our waking hours eating, exercising, washing, grooming and dressing in order to maintain our sense of self. What happens after major physical impairment? How do we relate to a damaged body? Wendy Seymour interviews men and women who have suffered profound bodily paralysis, and explores how they deal with their appearance, relationships, sexuality, incontinence and sport. She finds that even major impairment hasn't annihilated these people's experience of an embodied self. She shows that the process of self-reconstruction is interwoven with social expectations and argues that the experience of disability highlights the continuous work involved in embodiment for everyone.;The book contributes to the field of the sociology of the body. It is intended for rehabilitation professionals and students.

This book describes the evolution of the Washington University Sentence Completion Test (SCT), a major measure of ego development, from an intuitive rating scale to an empirically derived reliable and valid personality test. The authors recount the complete history of the SCT, which begins with the Family Problems Scale, an objective test of mothers' attitudes. Work with that test led to a concept of ego development, testable by the SCT, which was elaborated and refined in further work.
The book discusses uses of the SCT in other languages and other cultures, offers suggestions for giving the SCT in translation, and presents computer programs for handling SCT responses. Data on reliability and validity of the SCT are brought up to date. These include evidence of the equivalence of the male and female forms of the current version, Form 81, and the equivalence of the two halves of Form 81, each usable as a short form. Rules for obtaining total protocol ratings for 18-item as well as 36-item forms are given. Frequently used forms of the SCT, including a new form for adolescents and children over eight years old, are presented.

Shame and shame reactions are two of the most delicate and difficult issues of psychotherapy and are among the most likely to defy our usual dynamic, systemic, and behavioral theories. In this groundbreaking new collection, The Voice of Shame, thirteen distinguished authors show how use of the Gestalt model of self and relationship can clarify the dynamics of shame and lead us to fresh approaches and methods in this challenging terrain. This model shows how shame issues become pivotal in therapeutic and other relationships and how healing shame is the key to transformational change. The contributors show how new perspectives on shame gained in no particular area transfer and generalize to other areas and settings. In so doing, they transform our fundamental understanding of psychotherapy itself. Grounded in the most recent research on the dynamics and experience of shame, this book is a practical guide for all psychotherapists, psychologists, clinicians, and others interested in self, psychotherapy, and relationship. This book contains powerful new insights for the therapist on a full-range of topics from intimacy in couples to fathering to politics to child development to gender issues to negative therapeutic reactions. Filled with anecdotes and case examples as well as practical strategies, The Voice of Shame will transform your ideas about the role of shame in relationships - and about the potential of the Gestalt model to clarify and contextualize other approaches.

This book constitutes a collection of articles that were written for, and recently published as, special sections in three consecutive issues of the Journal of Personality Assessment.
Part I provides lucid commentaries on the current status of and future issues regarding the Rorschach and MMPI-2 and other instruments, including the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory -- Adolescent (MMPI-A), the Interpersonal Adjective Scales (IAS-R), the Inventory of Interpersonal Problems -- Circumplex version (IIP-C), the revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R), and the third edition of the Millon Clinical Multiaxial Inventory (MCMI-III). The authors not only participated in the dvelopment of the instruments, but continue to lead the research effort in their application in both clinical and research settings.
Part II addresses several issues that have been recurring themes, and often topics of debate, in the research and professional literature. The contributors discuss the impact of the five-factor model on personality assessment, the issue of deception in personality assessment, and various critical issues in the measurement of mood states. Other articles focus on the integration of the MMPI-2 and Rorschach and the process that clinicians should follow when applying scientific knowledge to clinical practice.
Part III is primarily devoted to overviews of several statistical methods that are employed infrequently in personality assessment research, but have great potential in contributing to the understanding of the complex data sets often encountered in the measurement and study of personality. These articles serve as both an introduction and a brief tutorial forpersonality researchers who are unfamiliar with the subject matter. They are valuable references that will form the basis for evaluating the appropriate use of these methods in published research in their areas of interest.

That which does not kill us makes us stronger. (Nietzsche) The phenomenon of positive personal change following devastating events has been recognized since ancient times, but given little attention by contemporary psychologists and psychiatrists, who have tended to focus on the negative consequences of stress. In recent years, evidence from diverse fields has converged to suggest the reality and pervasive importance of the processes the editors sum up as posttraumatic growth. This volume offers the first comprehensive overview of these processes. The authors address a variety of traumas--among them bereavement, physical disability, terminal illness, combat, rape, and natural disasters--following which experiences of growth have been reported. How can sufferers from posttraumatic stress disorder best be helped? What does "resilience" in the face of high risk mean? Which personality characteristics facilitate growth? To what extent is personality change possible in adulthood? How can concepts like happiness and self-actualization be operationalized? What role do changing belief systems, schemas, or "assumptive worlds" play in positive adaptation? Is "stress innoculation" possible? How do spiritual beliefs become central for many people struck by trauma, and how are posttraumatic growth and recovery from substance abuse or the crises of serious physical illnesses linked? Such questions have concerned not only the recently defined and expanding group of "traumatologists," but also therapists of all sorts, personality and social psychologists, developmental and cognitive researchers, specialists in health psychology and behavioral medicine, and those who study religion and mental health. Overcoming the challenges of life's worst experiences can catalyze new opportunities for individual and social development. Learning about persons who discover or create the perception of positive change in their lives may shed light on the problems of those who continue to suffer. Posttraumatic Growth will stimulate dialogue among personality and social psychologists and clinicians, and influence the theoretical foundations and clinical agendas of investigators and practitioners alike.

All human relationships are containers of emotional life, but what are the structures underlying them? Nathan Schwartz-Salant looks at all kinds of relationships through an analyst's eye. By analogy with the ancient system of alchemy he shows how states of mind that can undermine our relationships - in marriage, in creative work, in the workplace - can become transformative when brought to consciousness. It is only by learning how to access the interactive field of our relationships that we can enter this transformative process and explore its mysterious potential for self-realization.

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This work examines the way in which personality and identity of the pupil is shaped by his or her experiences in school. The text considers the way in which teachers in secondary schools are working, and to some extent living, with adolescent pupils for the majority of time in their weekday waking lives. The book examines: to what extent teachers provide both positive and negative role models for pupils to follow; the factors restricting the ability of teachers to teach effectively; and conversely, what factors work to their advantage.; The text provides an overview of the debates and research into areas of: teaching children about controversial subjects such as sex and drugs; gender differences; identities; peer groups; relations with adults; and beliefs and values.

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