All in Your Mind

We began this inquiry of culture yesterday with the question of whether or not society today has put their racial and cultural differences aside and made a great leap forward in terms of cultural awareness and understanding.  We’ve already seen that while our chosen field is very self-aware when it comes to issues of culture, we still have much to learn and much to do.

I suggested previously that society may be supressing or sublimating the issues inherent in cultural difference.  I based that idea on my own personal encounters with others of different races, religions, and cultures than my own.  My wife and I come from very different cultural reference groups.  I come from a lower-middle class Caucasian American family, and am myself Caucasian.  My wife comes from a lower-middle class Chinese family, and is herself Asian, or more specifically, Han Chinese.  Studies have seperated culture into two main types: individualistic cultures, and collectivist cultures.  Individualistic cultures tend to represent the “Western” perspective, while Collectivistic cultures tend to make up the “Eastern” perspective.  So for me and my family, we could literally say that our pairing is “East meets West.” 

Let me give you an example that we’ve shared in our lives of the difference between our cultures.  My wife worked before at a King Buffet as a waitress.  While we were dating, I learned that the tip that I would leave on the table did not go directly to her.  All the tips that the waitresses received were collected into a “Tip Jar” and then divided evenly at the end of the month.  As someone from an individualistic culture, this was very shocking to me.  I was always raised to believe that tips were related to a waitress or waiter’s ability to serve you.  Leaving a substantial tip on the table was an indication of how well they did.  Their sharing of the tip though was a prime example of the value of a collectivist culture, a valuing of the group over the individual.  What is interesting though is that my wife had an opportunity to work as a waitress at a restaurant where they did things differently.  At this other Chinese restaurant, the tips were not shared, since the other waitresses were all natural born Americans.  During this time, my wife came to appreciate the fact that she could make more or less money based on how hard she worked!  Later she found it impossible to go back to the old way of sharing her earnings with other members of the group.  This isn’t to say that she had converted from collectivism to individualism.  In this particular case though, her cultural value system was refined and adjusted to handle the situation at hand.  Her reasoning behind not wanting to go back to the old system was that she would be able to make more money the “indivdualistic” way, and therefore be better able to support her family.  So in the end, the collectivistic idea of valuing the group reminded, even if which group that was had changed.

I’ll continue with Part 3 of the Exploration of Humanity next week.  Check back in then to learn how these ideas fit together, and why it is I consider this an exploration of humanity rather than an exploration of culture!

It’s far more common today to see people of different races and different cultures, but just how culturally in tune are we?  Many people would like to think that the time when a person was treated differently based on their race or ethnicity is long gone.  Have we truly moved forward, or are we as a society employing the classical defense mechanisms of suppression and sublimation? 

Since my very first years of undergraduate study, I’ve found the idea of cross-cultureal psychology very fascinating.  What intrigues me most is the tendency of reports to indicate that many of our counseling methods are less effective when used with those of other cultures, particularly those from the major collectivist cultures of Asia.  I’m reminded of the cultural awareness activity that many mental health organizations employ entitled “If the World Were a Village of 100 People.”  As it breaks it down there are “60 Asians, 14 Africans, 12 Europeans, 8 Latin Americans, 5 from the USA and Canada, and 1 from the South Pacific.”  ( see http://www.familycare.org/news/if_the_world.htm for the rest of the breakdowns). 

What does that say for our methods and techniques, if so many of them are tailored to western culture?  What would the world be like if this were the case for the entire field of medicine?  What if the physicians and surgeons of the world were only able to help that 12-17percent of the world that is Caucasian?  Many people who have suffered a mental illness would tell you that a difficulty in the mind can be just as painful, if not more so, than a difficulty with the body.  Psychiatrists and Psychotherapists have helped a great many people, but still yet, there is litterally a world full of people out there in need of help.  Even though it may seem at times all the “thinks” have been “thunk” when it comes to ideas for helping better society, there’s still a lot of ground to cover and a vast ocean to cross before we get there.

This idea that our discipline still has much to develop when it comes to cultural differences is just the beginning of our exploration of humanity.  Look for Part 2 of this exploration of culture on Friday, when I’ll start to discuss the aforementioned idea that we may or may not be as culturally aware as we think we are.  Feel free to comment here on the page, or e-mail a personal story of your own that you would like me to share with others on the blog!

The psychology community today mourned the passing of a giant in the field.  Albert B., affectionately known throughout the psychology community as “Little Albert” passed away yesterday at the age of 89.  The Los Angeles county coroner’s office has listed his cause of death as myocardial infarction.

Reporters spoke with Dr. Hammill at St. Sebastian’s Hospital in Los Angeles, California about Little Albert’s last days.  “He had been coming to see me the last few weeks for chest pains.”  Dr. Hammill explained.  “Albert had become a recluse and had only recently, due to his ailing condition, found the courage to get out to see a doctor.  We originally thought his chest pains were due to his anxiety, but Albert refused to see a psychologist or any other mental health professional.” 

A friend of Little Albert’s had went to check on him just this morning.  “I usually drop by to see how he’s doing and take him a few things since he never gets out.” his friend explained.  His friend went on to tell how he had found Little Albert lying there on the kitchen floor with an aspirin bottle by his side, cotton ball still in place. 

“It was only after his death,” Dr. Hammill explained, “that we learned who Albert really was.  Had I known who he was and his history when he first came to see me, I would have been more careful.”  When asked about what caused Little Albert’s death, Dr. Hammill had a firm response.  “It doesn’t take Sherlock Holmes, or Dr. Watson for that matter, to see what happened here.  He opened the bottle of aspirin, saw the cotton ball, and had a heart attack.  He was literally scared to death.  It’s baffling really.  This is the first time we’ve ever had anything like this happen.  This is the first time I can think of where prescribing aspirin actually served to exacerbate the patient’s condition.” 

The psychology community had long wondered what had became of their beloved teacher of behaviorism.  In the brief time he was with us, he answered so many questions and yet left us with so many more.  Little Alberts soon grow into Big Alberts, and Big Alberts into Old Alberts and before we know it they’re gone.  You taught us much about our lives and our behavior, Albert.  We pray that wherever you go now, it’s a better place than this.  A place devoid of white rats, fuzzy bunnies, cotton balls, and old men that get their kicks from scaring babies.  We’ll miss you.

And as the saying goes, “If you bought that, I’d love to sell you a bridge in New York.” 

This was, if you haven’t guessed by now, an April Fool’s joke.  This in no way reflects the real life Little Albert and is purely a work of fiction.  To the best of my knowledge, no one knows what became of Little Albert after the experiments were over.  It’s quite possible that he overcame his fears later in life and became a well-adjusted individual.  It’s also possible that he was incarcerated for shooting an obnoxiously loud man in white fur coat. 

If you’d like to read a bit more about Little Albert, there are two resources to check out.  First is where I got the picture from,   http://www.phschool.com/science/science_news/articles/fear_not.html.  This article talks about steps that are being taken to help uncondition those fear responses that Little Albert developed (a step that Watson himself had planned to do had Little Albert not been removed before the completion of the study).  Also, there is a very interesting paper prepared by Ben Harris from Vasser College entitled, “Whatever happened to Little Albert?” that can be found here: http://www.sussex.ac.uk/psychology/documents/harris_-1979.pdf  The paper debunks some of the myths that have began to develop over the years about Watson’s study and the effects it had on Little Albert.

Below is an exerpt from NAMI’s (National Alliance on Mental Illness) newsletter – I wrote a piece for them last year describing clinical research, advancement of treatment for mental illness, and the neuroscience clinical research center at Indiana. Perhaps it will be of interest to students or other faculty or clinicians, in terms of what kind of research goes on, how to evaluate treatments, or what comprises a psychiatry research center. First, below is Poe if he had access to Prozac:

Neuroscience Clinical Research Center : Hoping to Better Understand Mental Illness Through Research

The Neuroscience Clinical Research Center (NCRC) at Indiana University School of Medicine is a research facility based primarily at Larue D. Carter Memorial Hospital and dedicated to studying symptoms and factors in severe mental illnesses such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Directed by Dr. Anantha Shekhar of Indiana University School of Medicine’s Department of Psychiatry, the NCRC strives to better understand severe mental illnesses and develop new treatments for these illnesses. The NCRC is comprised of a staff of RN research coordinators, a clinical psychologist, psychiatrists and psychiatry residents, clinical psychology interns, a fulltime psychometrician, and research technicians, who are all dedicated to excellence in the treatment of persons with severe mental illness. The NCRC facilities include neurobiology laboratories, as well as several interview/assessment rooms and staff offices. Such a diverse research and treatment team and state of the art research facilities allow close and frequent monitoring of individuals participating in studies, which is essential for safe and effective clinical research. By basing such studies in a hospital setting, participants being put on medication or being discontinued from other medications can always have hospital support staff and medical professionals nearby in the rare cases of serious side effects or adverse reactions.

It is our belief that the advancement of care comes through the advancement of science, and it is our goal to provide cutting-edge treatments available through ongoing clinical trials of new medications and therapies that evaluate safety, tolerability and efficacy. Improving and advancing treatment of severe mental illness has a major impact on the quality of life of persons with mental illness, as well as on family and friends of such individuals. In collaborating with mental health advocacy organizations, such as NAMI, the NCRC hopes to enhance understanding of the process of clinical research and why it is essential for developing the best treatments for mental illness. Our research specializes in treating persons with mental illness by not only utilizing clinical trials, but also with conventional medication treatments as well. Since mental illnesses such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia affect the lives of so many persons with these illnesses as well as their family and friends, many areas of functioning are impacted including mood, memory, thinking, concentration, perception, work and school performance, social interactions, and interpersonal relationships. Therefore, clinical trials research is necessary to evaluate new approaches and interventions with mental illness that that may be effective in treating a variety of these areas of difficulty. For example, two of our newer studies are evaluating medications that are thought to be effective in reducing some of the cognitive and neurological difficulties in persons with schizophrenia, such as information processing speed, attention, alertness, memory, visual learning, reasoning, and problem solving. Such difficulties are important areas for which to develop treatments, as cognitive impairments have been shown to be even more closely related to problems in everyday functioning, like unemployment and social withdrawal, than positive symptoms such as delusions and hallucinations.

Many people might wonder what clinical research means, generally speaking. A clinical trial is a research study that is designed to test new medications or procedures to assess whether they work the way they are supposed to and are safe, whether we can learn new uses for existing medications or procedures, and to more closely examine the effects of medications over longer periods of time such as a year or more. Nearly all medications that are available on the market today have gone through clinical research trials, and because of these trials many life-saving treatments are available for hundreds of diseases such as cancer and HIV. The Federal Drug Administration (FDA) is the branch of government that oversees the development of new drugs, and helps to enforce the rules and regulations that clinical trials research must follow in order to develop new and safe drugs. The researchers and the individuals who participate in such research help to further the development of such treatments and cures. In psychiatry, recent developments such as atypical antipsychotic medications, which have greatly reduced side effects compared to previous medications, have helped to improve the overall quality of life for persons with mental illness.

How, then, are such medications evaluated for their ability to improve functioning, treat symptoms, and improve quality of life in mental illness? Outcome measures in psychiatry clinical trials are selected based on previous evidence showing that they are able to validly, reliably, and meaningfully assess the levels of current symptoms related to a mental illness as well as measure change in such symptoms. In other words, we need to be able to measure not just the number of current symptoms and how severe the symptoms are, but also how such symptoms change with treatment and how improvement in symptoms translates to improved functioning in the real world. The medications being evaluated for improving cognitive deficits, for example, are assessed using several measures of cognition that have been evaluated in prior research as being appropriate for use in measuring cognitive change in schizophrenia. Such clinical trials also aim to include measures that have real-world measures of functioning and quality of life, such as social skills, work performance, and basic skills in daily living activities. Other psychiatry research studies might measure symptoms of depression and alleviation of such symptoms in response to treatment; hence, outcome would be measured by tests which have been shown to accurately assess and be sensitive to change in the occurrence of depressive symptoms. Individuals who participate in such studies in the NCRC are screened to assess whether they qualify for a particular study, get paid for each study visit, and area closely monitored for any physical, emotional, or psychological responses to the treatment. They typically complete many questionnaires about mood, personality, perceptions, and cognitions across several weeks of testing, and those who choose to participate in studies include both hospital inpatients as well as outpatients from the surrounding community.

Much like the trees outside, the blog has seen plenty of new growth in the past week.  We’re seeing regular posts by a couple of our favorite teachers, Professor Hammersley and Dr. Keefe, and there are more new faces on the way!  We have two students from the department, one from the undergraduate program and one from the graduate program, that will be added as authors to the blog in the coming days.  They both have some fantastic ideas to discuss, and I can’t wait for you all to hear them!

We’re also working to change the theme to make it a little more vibrant and user friendly.  Our plan is to make the different posts easier to see at a glance, add some pictures, a little color, and more information about Union College, its programs, and the fine women and men that work there.  The deliberation on the new theme is still under way, so if you have any thoughts on the matter feel free to post them in the comments section or send me an e-mail. 

Lot’s of great stuff going on here, so keeping checking back regularly!

–Jonathan Hammersley

Some of my responsibilities as the chair of Union College’s human subjects IRB (Institutional Review Board) include balancing risk and reward of research for everone involved. We typically meet 3 to 4 times per semester, or about once a month, to review any research projects on campus using human participants and evaluate the risks and rewards that the research project might pose for the participant, for the researcher, for the college, and for the field of science in general. Preparing for an upcoming meeting, I suppose my mind was primed to be thinking about risk and reward.

If you think about it, much of the practice of clinical psychology involves the evaluation of risk, or working with clients to balance risk and reward. In the realm of assessment, clinicians are constantly being asked to evaluate if someone is at risk for developing a psychiatric disorder, if someone’s behavior poses an imminent risk to oneself or others, or even whether a child is more at risk if custody is granted to one parent over the other parent. In treatment and interventions with clients, a common task might be to speak with a depressed client to decide if suicidal ideation poses an immediate threat, if the client has a plan and means for suicide, or if there is a real intention to do so. Another common goal might be to decide with clients which behavior or difficulty poses the greatest risk to one’s well-being, and thus work to treat that issue first before tackling other problems. For example, if current difficulties include issues getting along with a romantic partner, wanting to quit smoking, and self-injurious wrist-cutting behavior, then obviously the therapist must do a quick risk evaluation and decide that the cutting poses the most immediate threat and thus that should be the starting point. On the flip side, therapeutic interventions might involve helping clients weigh the rewards of a situation such as accepting a new job, dating and entering a relationship with a new partner, deciding strict a diet to impose on oneself, beginning an exercise regimen, or deciding whether drinking can be done in moderation or should be ceased altogether.

Another major feature of clinical psychology is evaluating the risk to oneself as a clinician. That may include deciding that with an aggressive client, it would be wise to schedule a session for early afternoon when there are plenty of other staff around to help intervene if things take a turn for the worse. It may involve simply arranging one’s office so that the client is never located between the therapist and the door, in case there is a need for an immediate escape. Or it may involve deciding which cases to take on in terms of the types of problems that one is competent to treat or that would be less likely to lead to a lawsuit or disagreement later on. Custody evaluations, for example, are a major source of malpractice liability because by their very definition, you are ensuring that 50% of the clients involved will disagree with and even completely resent you. And certain disorders, such as complex post-traumatic stress disorder, are risky and the clinician must have adequate training, expertise, and malpractice insurance to feel comfortable in dealing with them. Finally, a clinician must be very careful in how he or she doles out advice or expert opinions. There have been recent cases of a psychologist being sued simply for making informal clinical-related recommendations to a neighbor, just over the course of normal conversation standing in one’s driveway. This could be something as simple as a simple recommendation of how to best intervene with a child who is having difficulty at school with a teacher or another student. In a personal example, when I was completing my clinical internship at Indiana School of Medicine, my own internship director had a malpractice suit filed against her, basically because an estranged parent had a problem with how she was helping a child deal with that parent. The case was frivolous and had little to no chance of actually succeeding, but it was still a major source of stress, worry, and time-consumption. In an area involving custody or parental training, there is greater risk inherent in the work and is taken into consideration when choosing malpractice insurance plans. However, it does not allow for any greater control over who can actually file a lawsuit against you, and does not offer much relief or alleviate much anguish once that lawsuit is filed. So budding clinicians, always keep in mind the risk versus reward appraisal that is so central to our line of work within psychology.

– by Kristy Keefe and Jonathan Hammersley

Many students ask what it takes to obtain a clinical doctorate degree. Especially around this time of year and toward the end of an undergraduate education, students are wondering “What next?” Sometimes, the question of “How will I pay for it?” can be as important as “What can I do to get in?”

No matter how you look at it or measure it, it is VERY expensive to become a clinical psychologist. I (Jonathan) have been enrolled in a clinical psychology Ph.D. program for approximately 9 years, which is somewhat atypical but not -that- far outside the norm. One nice feature of many Ph.D. programs is that there is often funding available to pay for the cost of tuition, as well as a small stipend to cover a few small living expenses such as rent and groceries. My program guaranteed 3 years of tuition as well as a graduate assistantship stipend, which was appreciated but did not come close to covering all rent, food, entertainment, and other costs of living. On top of that, it was strictly prohibited for graduate students in my doctoral program to obtain ANY outside employment. Once, a fellow student was able to get a part-time job as a waitress in order to help pay for her expenses, and this was considered fairly risky and scandalous behavior.

In many Ph.D. clinical psychology programs, neither the cost of tuition nor assistantship funding is guaranteed, meaning that students are often competing amongst themselves in order to try to obtain the funding. This, in my informal consultations with colleagues from other programs, can lead to resentment if not outright hostility toward fellow students, which is unfortunate because in my experience some of the very fondest memories of graduate school were the relationships and social interactions with my fellow grad students. In my program, it was fairly common practice to take between 2 to 3 years to complete a research-based master’s thesis, at which point students were eligible to take preliminary exams in order to become a doctoral candidate. At that point, another 2 to 3 years was common in order to complete a dissertation while preparing to apply to and go on a clinical internship. All of this is to explain the fact that in my program, the average time to be enrolled in on-campus coursework tended to be about 5 years, pre-internship. My Ph.D. program ranked about a “3.5” on a scale of 1 to 5, with “1” being very little emphasis on research and “5” being very heavily research-focused. In schools with even heavier emphasis on research, common time before going on internship probably tended to be closer to 6 or 8 years. I have also noticed that in contrast to medical school, many psychology graduate programs seem to have a “weed out” model, in which only those students with the fortitude to survive this long, strenuous, frustrating process are rewarded with a degree in the end.

I (Kristy), on the other hand, was enrolled in a clinical psychology Psy.D. for 4 years, with 3 of the years involving on-campus pre-doctoral coursework. Completing doctoral coursework within 4 total years is somewhat less than the norm for PsyD. Programs, with the average time in total for a Psy.D. degree being about 5 to 6 years. The unfortunate thing about my program at U Indy, and most PsyD programs in general, is that absolutely no funding was provided outside of menial stipend amounts for temporary graduate assistantships. The majority of PsyD students, then, take out full student loans to cover all tuition plus all living expenses. Another feature of PsyD programs is that these schools tend to be located in and near larger urban areas, making the cost of rent and living much higher than in major universities located in more rural regions. Much like in Jonathan’s program, we were VERY strongly discouraged and all but prohibited from obtaining any outside employment in order to earn extra income. On a similar research scale in comparison to Jonathan’s program, my school ranked at about a “2” in research emphasis, in which our dissertation but not Master’s thesis were required to involve a research study. I chose to use a single-subject design study for my Master’s thesis, and an empirical, research-based study for my dissertation, making me more trained in research principles and well-versed in empirical research compared to most PsyD degrees and even some Ph.D’s. Although my program did not necessarily emphasize research, it did heavily emphasize clinical skill development, requiring heavy practicum training and often involving commuting around Indianapolis and other nearby cities. This practicum training entailed, on average, about 25 hours per week of full-time clinical work for 3 straight years (52 weeks a year) prior to going on internship.

The point of describing our lengthy training procedures: it was unavoidable to rack up large student loan amounts in order to complete doctoral-level clinical training, without previously being independently wealthy. In fact, in the spirit of full disclosure, it cost us as a couple more than $200K in combined student loans, even with some small stipends as well as Ph.D tuition waivers. According to a recent survey by APA (2007), the AVERAGE debt for a clinical psychology doctoral graduate is $150K, with a range of 0-$10K all the way up to to $250K per degree.

For those not as familiar with clinical psychology, on top of coursework, research, and practicum experiences, doctoral internship training requires a full-time, year-long, supervised clinical experience to get the final doctoral degree. This is well before licensure as a psychologist can occur, which is a separate experience. This process is an extraordinarily competitive process, where 1 in 4 students are not matched to an internship upon application. When you think about it, at this point in training, everyone is in competition with the very “best of the best,” who have made it thus far through all doctoral training. If one is not matched the first year, the student must wait an entire year to reapply, which only adds to the expense of the clinical degree. If one actually does get matched, that person is required to attend the internship to which he or she was matched, and at this point it typically requires a move to another state, if not across the entire country. Predoctoral internships at least pay a salary, but the bad news is that the average intern’s salary is $19K per year, which is hardly sufficient if one is matched to an internship program in a major city such as Chicago, San Francisco, NYC, or even Indianapolis. This means – you probably guessed it – even MORE student loans to be taken out in order to simply live and pay rent.

Once the internship process is complete, and you have completed a dissertation along the way, you may graduate and begin thinking about licensure as a psychologist. Depending upon the state, at this point one is often forced to take a low-paying, 1 or 2-year postdoctoral position in order to complete the hours required for a psychology license, and to specialize in a particular field. A $20 to $25K salary at this point can frequently be expected, and a good chunk of this is eaten up by the fees to apply for licensure, to buy study materials, and to take various licensing tests such as the EPPP, ranging from $2 to $3K just to study and take the tests.

None of this is meant to discourage anyone from applying to, trying to get into, and attending graduate school for clinical psychology training. Rather, take it from 2 individuals who have gone through the entire process – it is MUCH better to know beforehand the total cost involved and what you are getting into exactly, in order to plan accordingly. It can most definitely be done, but as they say, knowing is much of the battle. But it is also very important to realize that a great number of sacrifices along the way are necessary, which is why clinical psychologists are often in demand. The lengthy, demanding, and specialized training is also why psychologists fiercely protect their territory and qualifications. In Indiana, for example, it was a crime punishable by the state’s attorney to practice or advertise as a psychologist without a license. As a result of the intensive training required, clinical psychology is therefore among the most expensive of professional training, comparable to law school and medicine. It would be nice if, since the same amount of intensive, specialized training approximately equals that of a physician, the pay was more equivalent. Some of the most frequently asked questions by psychology students is, “How can I get a doctorate degree in clinical psychology?” and “how much money do psychologists make?” When it comes time for repayment of student loans, there is often a great struggle between altruism (providing free or inexpensive services) and earning enough income to support one’s family. Of course, clinical practice can have many other intrinsic rewards, such as helping others, autonomous functioning, and working for oneself, but none of this is possible without supporting oneself financially.

It’s also a very pertinent topic during these times of economic turmoil in our country. The topic of how to give back to one’s community, and move back to where one grew up after graduate training, even came up during the minority day student panel when discussing the problem of “abandoning” one’s community after obtaining higher education. Unfortunately, it’s often not so much a choice, as having to go where the jobs are and where you will make enough to repay student loans, because Uncle Sam does NOT like to take no for an answer.

It is well-established that your emotions can affect your thinking. If you wake up in an irritable mood, or are under high stress from work or school, you are more likely to interpret ambiguous situations in a more negative manner. For example, while driving in an irritable or a stressful mood, you are probably likely to interpret someone pulling out in front of you as “I can’t believe that jerk cut me off.” If it were a pleasant, relaxing day you might be more likely to think “Oh, that person just must not have seen me.” It is also well-established that the reverse is also true – that is, your THINKING can have a profound effect on your emotions. One long-established treatment for major depression has been Beck’s cognitive therapy, which aims to change negative thought patterns, help clients recognize their “automatic” negative thoughts, and find more rational approaches to thinking about oneself, the world, and one’s future. Albert Ellis used a similar treatment approach, called rational-emotive behavior therapy, in order to help clients recognize when they are using irrational, maladaptive, and even self-destructive thinking and then try to change such thoughts. For that matter, it is also one of my beliefs that no matter which therapeutic orientation one is coming from, one of the ultimate, overarching goals of psychotherapy is always to change aspects of your clients’ thinking. One of my favorite terms coined by Ellis is the notion of “shoulding on yourself,” which simply means placing unrealistic expectations on oneself and setting oneself up for disappointment by telling oneself what one should and should not be doing, thinking, or feeling: i.e., “I should not get so upset,” “I really should get better grades,” “I really should spend more time exercising,” etc.

The above examples illustrate the integrative, cyclical nature of emotion and cognition: not only do emotions have a major impact on one’s thinking, but one’s thoughts can also play an important role in emotion, and even the development or maintenance of psychiatric disorders such as depression.
This is why I advocate for an integrative, reciprocal approach to clinical research and require my research methods students to keep in mind how social, psychological, and biological factors can all interact in order to produce an outcome. By only considering one factor in how a disorder such as depression might develop (i.e., an emotionally abusive mother), one might miss the rich, meaningful description of that disorder in how a childhood experience interacts with other thoughts, social factors, and biological processes. As a clinician trained in therapy, assessment, and clinical research, I also believe that psychologists may fail to consider the importance of research on emotional processing or cognitive psychology when making clinical decisions, or on the flip side, researchers may fail to note how important clinical skills can be in interacting with human subjects in order to conduct research studies. Again: integration, reciprocity, and the cyclical nature of all things human should be an important notion to keep in mind for any psychological endeavor.

Anyway, back on point, as I was recently asked to give a presentation for the spring Psi Chi induction, I began to think about other ways in which emotion and emotional processing may interact and become integrated. One interesting way is with chronic pain. As my physiological psychology students *should* know (don’t tell Ellis), pain perception depends upon a few important factors, such as number of pain receptors and sensitivity of those pain receptors, as well as — wait for it — emotional reactions to the pain itself. Not surprisingly, when talking about emotional response to pain, limbic system areas are involved and become activated by pain reception. This notion may have some important implications for the treatment of chronic pain, which is a major feature of a number of disorders such as fibromyalgia or in situations such as following back or neck injuries. It might also beg a rather fascinating question: Can controlling the emotional response to pain reduce the perception, and overall impact, of chronic pain? My initial hypothesis is that it can. For this reason, I helped start a research project and submit a research grant while at Indiana University School of Medicine to look at the impact of antidepressants and cognitive therapy on chronic pain. Unfortunately, I left IU before the project was able to get off the ground, but in a region such as Eastern Kentucky, which is plagued by abuse of and addiction to prescription painkillers, the notion that pain might be able to be controlled by antidepressants and cognitive therapy could have some far-reaching implications.

Some other areas in which I think emotion and cognition intersect, and where emotion has a seldom-noticed impact on daily life, include fairy tales & mythology, nicotine addiction, curiosity and learning, motivation, advertising, stereotypes &; prejudice, medical malpractice, and even deja vu! I will be discussing many of these areas at the psi chi induction, so I don’t want to give too many spoilers here in this space. But please come check out the Psi Chi induction and hear me speak about some of these ideas on Friday night, April 17 in the student center conference rooms.

Ah, the dreaded mid-terms!  I trust you all fared well and survived with passing grades and new found vigor to see yourselves through to the end of the semester.  If you didn’t do as well as you hoped, now’s the perfect time to place your nose to ther proverbial grindstone and bring it up!  If you’re struggling in class there are a multitude of options at your disposal.  Seek out a classmate, talk to your advisor, see someone in the counseling center, or post a cry for help in the comments section here!  Whatever you do though, don’t lose hope. 

As a quick message to all the procrastinators out there, now is also the time to get started on those term papers!  Don’t know where to start?  Setting up your tital page, your formatting and  your references is a great place to start.  You may even start on your abstract or introduction, just to give yourself some direction.  Who knows?  You may enjoy it so much you forego all else until it’s finished!  Despite the popular belief amongst the masses, I’m fairly certain that finishing your paper early will not bring about the cataclysmic doom of mankind.  In the event it does though, you can proudly say “I told you so!” and I will sullenly hang my head in shame. 

Before I go, here’s a little humor to help you relax.  The following was found at the University of Pennsylvania Department of Psychology website, and you’re sure to find plenty more bits of Psychology humor on their site at http://www.psych.upenn.edu/humor.html#ring.  Enjoy!

The following list of phrases and their definitions might help you understand the mysterious language of science (including psychology) and medicine. These special phrases are also applicable to anyone reading a PhD dissertation or academic paper.

“IT HAS LONG BEEN KNOWN”… I didn’t look up the original reference.

“A DEFINITE TREND IS EVIDENT”… These data are practically meaningless.

“WHILE IT HAS NOT BEEN POSSIBLE TO PROVIDE DEFINITE ANSWERS TO THE QUESTIONS”… An unsuccessful experiment, but I still hope to get it published.

“THREE OF THE SAMPLES WERE CHOSEN FOR DETAILED STUDY”… The other results didn’t make any sense.

“TYPICAL RESULTS ARE SHOWN”… This is the prettiest graph.

“THESE RESULTS WILL BE IN A SUBSEQUENT REPORT”… I might get around to this sometime, if pushed/funded.

“IN MY EXPERIENCE”… Once

“IN CASE AFTER CASE”… Twice

“IN A SERIES OF CASES”… Thrice

“IT IS BELIEVED THAT”… I think.

“IT IS GENERALLY BELIEVED THAT”… A couple of others think so, too.

“IT MIGHT BE ARGUED THAT” … I have such a good answer for this objection that I now raise it. [Thanks to Brendan Keefe.]

“CORRECT WITHIN AN ORDER OF MAGNITUDE”… Wrong.

“ACCORD1NG TO STATISTICAL ANALYSIS”… Rumour has it.

“A STATISTICALLY-ORIENTED PROJECTION OF THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THESE FINDINGS”… A wild guess.

“A CAREFUL ANALYSIS OF OBTAINABLE DATA”… Three pages of notes were obliterated when I knocked over a glass of beer.

“IT IS CLEAR THAT MUCH ADDITIONAL WORK WILL BE REQUIRED BEFORE A COMPLETE UNDERSTANDING OF THIS PHENOMENON OCCURS”… I don’t understand it

“AFTER ADDITIONAL STUDY BY MY COLLEAGUES”… They don’t understand it either.

“THANKS ARE DUE TO JOE BLOGGS FOR ASSISTANCE WITH THE EXPERIMENT AND TO CINDY ADAMS FOR VALUABLE DISCUSSIONS”… Mr. Bloggs did the work and Ms. Adams explained to me what it meant.

“A HIGHLY SIGNIFICANT AREA FOR EXPLORATORY STUDY”… A totally useless topic selected by my committee.

“IN AN IMPORTANT PAPER BY SMITH AND JONES, …” This obscure paper by Smith and Jones agrees supports my theory.

“IT IS HOPED THAT THIS WILL STIMULATE FURTHER WORK IN THIS FIELD” … This paper isn’t very good, but neither are any others on this miserable subject. [Thanks to Brendan Keefe.]

“IT IS HOPED THAT THIS STUDY WILL STIMULATE FURTHER 1NVESTIGATION IN THIS FIELD”… I quit.

So many things changing, so many things staying the same.  One thing that’s changed since Obama has entered office is the way that the war in Iraq is being handled.  Browsing MSN today, I happened across this article:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29410258?GT1=43001#storyContinued

I wasn’t aware of the ban in 1991 on photographing our fallen soldiers as they returned home.  I found the image of the flag covered coffins and the men tending to them to be deeply moving.  As I looked through those images, and read through the article, I couldn’t help but feel that allowing the decision for our deceased’s homecoming to be photographed being left up to their families was a very good thing.  

Another thing that’s come from Obama’s presidency, and a thing I think we could label as a good thing, is the ban on torture.  Following is another article from MSN, Obama’s declaration that the U.S. will no longer torture prisoners of war:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28574408/ . 

I believe that the APA would be in agreeance with Obama when he said, “We must adhere to our values as diligently as we protect our safety with no exceptions.”  If you’re unfamiliar with their stance on torture, you can find it here:

 http://www.apa.org/monitor/2008/04/torture.html

It’s not uncommon for a new president to be met with some opposition, but being ever the optomist, I prefer to keep in consideration the good things that have come from the situation.  This is in no way an intention to sway your political beliefs, or an attempt to give you a glimpse into my own thoughts on politics.  This isn’t about whether you’re a republican or a democrat, a liberal or a conservative.  This is about putting all that aside for a moment and focusing on some of the positives that are happening in our world today.  Perhaps it’s just the particular environment I find myself in day to day, but it seems that environment is focused on all the negative aspects of our country and our economy.  In light of that, I felt that it was important to mention a few of the positives I’ve found.  Looking at the pictures of all those men, symbols of freedom lying under our symbol of freedom, I forgot all about the cost of the stimulus bill and was reminded of the cost of war.