The Psychologist January 2018

the

the psychologist

psychologist january 2018

january 2018

Rethinking addiction Nick Heather

www.thepsychologist.org.uk

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the

the psychologist

psychologist january 2018

january 2018

Rethinking addiction Nick Heather

contact The British Psychological Society 48 Princess Road East Leicester LE1 7DR 0116 254 9568 mail@bps.org.uk www.bps.org.uk the psychologist and research digest www.thepsychologist.org.uk www.bps.org.uk/digest www.jobsinpsychology.co.uk psychologist@bps.org.uk Twitter: @psychmag Download our iOS/Android apps advertising Reach 50,000+ psychologists at very reasonable rates.

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www.thepsychologist.org.uk

The Psychologist is the magazine of The British Psychological Society It provides a forum for communication, discussion and controversy among all members of the Society, and aims to fulfil the main object of the Royal Charter, ‘to promote the advancement and diffusion of a knowledge of psychology pure and applied’

The Psychologist needs you!

We rely on your submissions throughout the publication, and in return we help you to get your message across to a large and diverse audience.

For details of all the available options, plus our policies and what to do if you feel these have not been followed, see www.thepsychologist.org.uk/contribute The main message, though, is simply to engage with us.

Contact the editor Dr Jon Sutton on jon.sutton@bps.org.uk, tweet us on @psychmag or call / write to us at the Society’s Leicester office.

Managing Editor Jon Sutton Assistant Editor Peter Dillon-Hooper Production Mike Thompson Journalist Ella Rhodes Editorial Assistant Debbie Gordon Research Digest Christian Jarrett (editor), Alex Fradera, Emma Young

Associate Editors Articles Michael Burnett, Paul Curran, Harriet Gross, Rebecca Knibb, Adrian Needs, Paul Redford, Sophie Scott, Mark Wetherell, Jill Wilkinson Conferences Alana James History of Psychology Alison Torn Interviews Gail Kinman Culture Kate Johnstone, Sally Marlow Books Emily Hutchinson, Rebecca Stack International panel Vaughan Bell, Uta Frith, Alex Haslam, Elizabeth Loftus, Asifa Majid The Psychologist and Digest Editorial Advisory Committee Catherine Loveday (Chair), Phil Banyard, Emma Beard, Harriet Gross, Kimberley Hill, Rowena Hill, Peter Olusoga, Richard Stephens, Miles Thomas

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the

psychologist

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january 2018

02 Letters Trauma and the EU; suicidality; and more

08 News

A new age

for our science?

18 Why emotional experiences get better with age Gloria Luong

24 Rethinking addiction Nick Heather

30 ‘Let’s confront the challenge of addiction together’ Caomhán McGlinchey with a personal take

36 Tackling sexual violence at universities

Graham Towl argues for action 42 ‘People need a period of stability…’

We meet Gail Kinman

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48 One on one Telmo Mourinho Baptista, President of EFPA

52 ‘Surely there’s room for more diverse approaches’ Saniya Rizvi 56 Jobs in psychology

58 Books Including extreme sport Q+A

66 Culture With Sathnam Sanghera on The Boy With the Topknot, and Nancy Doyle on Employable Me

74 Looking back Lucas Richert revisits Esalen 80 A to Z

From January to June 2018 the British Psychological Society is hosting the European Semester of Psychology.

It’s aimed at ‘creating a common space in which European psychologists can… foster the sharing and transmission of knowledge and expertise between members and, in turn, to stimulate the ongoing development of a truly European identity among psychologists across Europe’. For more information see bps.org. uk/eusemester But what is ‘a truly European identity among psychologists across Europe’? And how can ‘European Psychology’, and, for that matter, UK Psychology, truly thrive after Brexit? We hope to develop this conversation during the semester. In the words of Telmo Mourinho Baptista, President of the European Federation of Psychologists’ Associations, who we meet on p.48, ‘keep talking. If we do, we will, in the end, find ways to solve our old and new problems.’

Keep talking to us too!

We’re 30 this month and would love your feedback.

Dr Jon Sutton Managing Editor @psychmag

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A new age for psychology?

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Lief Nelson, University of California, Berkeley

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sychological science may just be in the midst of a renaissance. After waves of revelations about the apparent inaccuracy of research, questionable statistical practices and the lack of successful replications of psychology studies, are there signs that the tide has turned?

In 2011 a number of events led psychology into a period of scrutiny, resulting in many of the changes we have seen in recent years. In that year social psychologist Diederik Stapel was suspended from Tilburg University for fabricating data. Papers were also published illustrating how p-hacking, or picking out significant results and data without having a hypothesis of effects beforehand, can lead to spurious false positives – for example how listening to music can statistically be shown to reduce one’s age!

The authors of that music paper, Leif Nelson (University of California, Berkeley), Joseph Simmons and Uri Simonsohn (University of Pennsylvania), in a new pre-print article (reported by Christian Jarrett on our Research Digest blog: see tinyurl.com/yborq528), have turned their attention to psychology’s changing face.

They suggest that thanks to the increased prevalence of data-sharing, open-access publication, pre-registered studies, publishing negative findings and attempted replications, psychological science is experiencing a renaissance.

Nelson told us about some of the most encouraging changes in the field since 2011. While he said the most observable change had been an increase in sample sizes, with samples in the hundreds of thousands becoming relatively common, the most beneficial change had been a move towards transparent reporting: ‘By no means has that change been complete (many journals are still quite lax in requesting such reporting), but I have already seen a change in expectation for the completeness with which an author should report scientific details. Going forward, I think that pre-registration will have huge positive consequences for the field. Adoption of pre-registration has been somewhat slower, but in just the last few years it has gone from a non-existent novelty to a frequent and reasonable presence in many journals. My guess is that in 10 years most published research in psychology will be pre-registered.’

Pre-registration is a model of publishing where a research question, methods and suggested analyses are pre-registered with a journal prior to data collection in an aim to shift the focus in publishing from a bias towards positive results to one where methodology and research questions are more important factors. Around 80 journals now accept registered reports in some form, thanks largely to advocacy of the cause by Professor Chris Chambers (Cardiff University) – in 2012 that number was one, with Cortex (Chambers being on the editorial board) being the first to accept them.

Nelson and his colleagues believe that p-hacking explains how psychologists have so often used underpowered studies with small numbers of participants yet have still uncovered positive results. He told us that he had himself been guilty but that his work today, compared with 10 years ago, was entirely different: ‘I would look at my data in many different ways and convince myself that the analysis that looked the best was probably the correct analysis. Honestly, I am sure that I would fall into the exact same traps today – I am no less biased and self-serving than I was 10 years ago – but there is less allowance for it. I pre-register studies. I replicate findings.

I know that all of my data and materials will be posted. All of those features keep my self-serving biases in check.’

Although debatable, p-hacking may explain why so few key findings in psychology are reproducible. Professor Brian Nosek, co-founder of the Centre for Open Science, and his colleagues brought widespread attention to this in their attempt to replicate 100 psychology studies in which only 36 per cent found a significant result. Nosek (University of Virginia), who also helped to launch the Open Science Framework, an online platform for the online sharing of methods and data, told us that while change was afoot much needed to be done: ‘Journals and researchers that are leading the renaissance have demonstrated that interventions such as pre-registration, badges for open practices, and registered reports can be implemented efficiently.’

Researchers are actively working to assess the effects of these interventions on the accessibility of data and reproducibility of research. Nosek added: ‘What we need now is to scale the adoption of the new practices across the psychology community and to continuously evaluate their impact. But it can’t only be the leading voices that are willing to act.’ A full cultural shift towards openness and reproducibility requires action by all society leaders, journal editors and researchers to adopt practices that will accelerate progress in psychology, Nosek said.

‘The most exciting aspects of the renaissance is that we are turning our scientific skills to investigating and improving our own research culture and practices. The psychology of science will first improve our field, but will eventually improve all of science.’

The renaissance in psychology has also led to open, public scrutiny of some academic work on blogs and Twitter. Several researchers turned their attention recently to the findings of food psychologist Brian Wansink and detailed their concerns over many of his findings and methods online. Amy Cuddy’s work on power posing has also come under detailed and public scrutiny.

Some have called this ‘methodological terrorism’ or bullying, while others argue open debate and scrutiny are an essential part of academia.

Professor Daryl O’Connor (University of Leeds), Chair of the British Psychological Society’s Research Board,

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, UK rg.uk

Improving wellbeing and productivity in the workpl the psychologist january 2018 news said it was an exciting time for psychology, with the field leading the way in the last decade. ‘Researchers have begun to embrace open science, pre-registration and large-scale replication efforts, and recognise the risks of p-hacking and other questionable research practices.’ But he added: ‘It is important that we continue to work collaboratively and to keep the tone of the debate collegiate, non-judgemental and supportive.

As a result, our renaissance will propel psychological researchers forward by improving scientific practice and trigger new ways of working that will ultimately improve the robustness of our evidence base.’

One example of large-scale collaboration is the recently-founded Psychological Science Accelerator, which is bringing together a worldwide network of labs to work on replications and other hypotheses. Founded

by Christopher Chartier (Ashland University, Ohio), who initially hoped to create a CERN for psychology, the Accelerator already has 180 member labs in 40 countries. Anyone can submit research proposals to the accelerator, which are reviewed and selected by a large subset of network members. The group has recently selected its first study to work on: Ben Jones and Lisa DeBruine (University of Glasgow) proposed to test whether Oosterhof and Todorov’s (2008) valencedominance model of social perception generalises across world regions.

Chartier said he wanted to set up the network to improve the reliability and generalisability of psychological evidence: ‘We have frequently seen small studies coming out of independent labs that are later difficult to reproduce in larger collaboratively collected samples. I’m hoping the Accelerator can 9 781854 337542 speed up the process of confi rmation in psychological science by quickly gathering huge global data sets on our important research questions. Our hope is to INF287/10.17 consistently select exciting projects from all areas of psychology that the network can then collect data for.

We are a standing lab network, instead of recruiting labs anew for each data collection project, we can quickly match labs with appropriate projects. We’re also geographically dispersed, so data collection will occur all around the world, not just in traditional strongholds of North America and Europe.’

When asked what we should turn our attention to in the future in terms of methodological overhauls and changes in practice, Nelson said: ‘At every turn we have been surprised by what we have come to recognise as critical. When we originally talked about transparent reporting we thought that pre-registration was ponderous and unreasonable, so we ignored it. Three years later we came to see it as useful to the point of being all but essential. If you ask me today what will be most important in the future, I would not trust myself to have a correct answer.

Perhaps we are simply not good at knowing what will come next? Instead, we try to advocate for those tools which we know to be useful now while continuously thinking about other changes that might be useful in the future.’ er

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Report released on workplace wellbeing Employers and the government have been urged to consider neurodiversity among employees, supporting people into work, and creating psychologically healthy workplaces. The British Psychological Society’s new report Psychology at Work: Improving Wellbeing and Productivity in the Workplace was launched at the Houses of Parliament at the second meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Psychology.

Co-authored by Dr Ashley Weinberg and Nancy Doyle, the report makes three broad recommendations; • There should be a suspension and subsequent review of the use of sanctions in the benefits system and their effects on mental health and wellbeing. It also suggests a review of the work capability assessment process.

• The government should incentivise employers to introduce evidence-based interventions that promote psychologically healthy workplaces.

• Employers should take the needs of neurodiverse people into account in the workplace. Around 10 per cent of people are neurodiverse, a term that describes a range of conditions, including difficulties with attention, memory and impulse control as well as longer-term conditions like attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, dyslexia and Tourette’s syndrome.

October 2017

Scottish National Party MP for East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow Dr Lisa Cameron, who is also Chair of the APPG, said the report raised an extremely important issue that had implications for many. Weinberg, Senior

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Lecturer at the University of Salford, suggested that Parliament should act as an exemplar for the kind of workplace we all deserve. Although it had been a rocky road, he added, awareness was the first step. Work, he said, was a positive experience for many, but four key things can make work even more positive. Control at work, social support, job security and resources – or not being expected to do more with less – were all vital.

Weinberg said that with numbers of teachers and nurses on the decline the psychological impact of unhealthy workplaces was being brought into the heart of government.

A focus on literacy, numeracy, concentration and eye contact for success in education and the workplace, Doyle said, can alienate neurodiverse individuals. She said society had created a disability in this way, as neurodiverse people, while they struggle with some

aspects of work, thrive in other areas. Employers owe it to those who work for them to make reasonable adjustments for those people, she added. Schemes such as Access to Work can be really helpful for those with disabilities and neurodiversity, but very few know they exist.

During a Q&A session, Cameron suggested interested people could meet with their local MPs to discuss having the recommendations from the report raised in Parliament. While it is an uncomfortable thought for those in the public sector, Weinberg said, people should focus on the selling points of the report – that wellbeing is linked to productivity and performance, and employers should therefore aim to maintain or improve wellbeing.

The report can be downloaded free from tinyurl.com/y8v375kt

High-flying award

Professor Robert Bor (above) gives a psychological perspective on the unique working environment of airline pilots

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‘I never thought I would find myself being honoured alongside Major Tim Peake,’ says British Psychological Society Fellow Professor Robert Bor. But, together with Britain’s most famous astronaut, he was due to receive Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Aeronautical Society at a ceremony on 5 December.

The award is made to recognise the most outstanding contributions to the aerospace profession. Bor’s citation refers to the ‘outstanding and lasting contributions that he has made in the field of aviation clinical psychology’ and says he is ‘recognised as one of the world’s preeminent authorities on pilot mental health assessment, pilot selection and pilot peer-support initiatives’.

Professor and lead consultant clinical psychologist at the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust and visiting professor at City, University of London, Bor is the convener of the British Psychological Society’s unique CPD course in aviation psychology.

He also holds a pilot’s licence, so he was a natural choice to chair the task group set up by the British Psychological Society’s Professional Practice Board in the aftermath of the Germanwings disaster – ‘a watershed in aviation’, he Bor says – to produce a position paper on aviation psychology and pilot mental health and wellbeing.

That paper, to be published in December, gives a psychological perspective on the unique working environment of airline pilots and discusses factors that may increase their risk of developing mental health conditions. Among its recommendations are the establishment of a post-qualification course in aviation and aerospace by the BPS and higher education institutions by 2020. The same date, says the report, should see airlines ensure that all pilots have access to specialist psychological support and, where needed, assessment. It also calls for a review of what is known about pilot wellbeing to identify gaps and best practice.

Bor emphasises that psychologists working in aviation,

who may come from a variety of specialisms, must be sensitive to pilots’ concerns: ‘Rather than look for “black swan” events like Germanwings we should focus on supporting pilots’ wellbeing and mental health so they can get help without jeopardising their careers.’

Psychologists have a key role in fostering the wellbeing of all air personnel in safety-critical roles, not just pilots. With air travel becoming ever more popular, the need for these personnel is growing. The paper quotes estimates that the worldwide aviation industry will need to recruit more than two million new personnel, including 617,000 pilots, by 2013.

Bor says this ubiquity of air travel is posing new problems for those in the industry: ‘People who have become seasoned flyers may not listen to the safety announcement before take-off, reasoning that they already know it all. Equally, the fact that they feel more at home when flying means they are more likely to bend the rules. I increasingly hear reports of passengers ignoring instructions to leave their baggage when the plane has to be evacuated in an emergency.’

As well as being dangerous in themselves, such passenger attitudes can erode the effectiveness of the aircrew, with implications for their wellbeing. jonathan calder

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the psychologist january 2018 news

Changing behaviours Two new behaviour change briefings have offered insights from psychology on childhood nutrition and the use of electronic cigarettes. The documents, written by members of the British Psychological Society’s Behaviour Change Advisory Group, aim to raise awareness of areas where psychology can achieve behaviour change and inform interventions.

Professor Jane Ogden wrote the Changing Behaviour: Childhood Nutrition report and recommended an increase in tax on high-fat and highsugar foods to improve children’s diets. The report also suggests enforcing manufacturers to lower fat, sugar and salt contents, or better label food with high amounts of these.

Ogden (University of Surrey) said the briefing was published at a time when the UK has seen a dramatic rise in childhood obesity: ‘There are many psychological and physical consequences of being obese as a child, including teasing, low selfesteem and asthma. In addition, regardless of weight, many children’s diets are poor and high in fat, sugar and salt. Something therefore needs to be done. Children’s diets reflect both individual factors – beliefs, behaviours, emotions – and social factors such as availability and tax.

This briefing is an attempt to show how those in power need to take action to deal with these factors as a means to improve child health.’

The report also suggests that healthy eating should be included in parenting programmes and within the personal, social, health and economic education curriculum in schools. ‘Parents face lots of problems when trying to help their children eat well in terms of the child’s own reactions to foods, the parent’s own history and relationship with food, the impact of both the child’s and the parent’s peers, the wider social world in terms of the media, supermarkets, and food industry and the even broader world of policy and the pricing of healthy and unhealthy food and the regulations around portion sizes and food labelling.’

The second report, Changing Behaviour: Electronic Cigarettes, recommends that e-cigarettes should be actively promoted as a method for stopping smoking.

Its authors also recommend improving education about the relative harms of smoking, nicotine, and e-cigarettes and offering e-cigarettes as part of NHS Stop Smoking Services.

Dr Lynne Dawkins, Associate Professor (London South Bank University) and co-author of the report, said that while we don’t know the long-term effects of using these devices, or ‘vaping’, studies that have measured toxicants and carcinogens in the vapour under normal usage conditions support the Royal College of Physicians’

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conclusion that the harms of vaping are unlikely to exceed 5 per cent of those associated with smoking tobacco.

‘Whilst the use of e-cigarettes remains controversial, over the past few years, a number of professional bodies (Public Health England, Royal College of Physicians, Cancer Research UK) have recognised the positive contribution that they can have on smokers attempting to stop. The BPS now also endorse the use of e-cigarettes for smoking cessation, which may help to reassure smokers of their reduced harm status and that they can be useful for some smokers trying to quit. The intervention functions and policy recommendations made in the briefing should also help to ensure that correct evidence-based information about e-cigarettes is disseminated and that e-cigarettes are allowed to evolve and improve in order to increase capabilities, opportunities and motivations to use among smokers.’

Dawkins also used the COM-B behavioural change framework to assess why e-cigarettes are less satisfactory to some who are attempting to quit smoking.

‘There are clear examples of how we can improve capability, opportunity and motivation for smokers to quit using e-cigarettes and important policy recommendations can be drawn from this.’

The report also recommends using policy interventions and fiscal measures to raise the cost of smoking and reduce the cost of e-cigarettes, continuing to increase taxes, smoke-free regulation and purchasing barriers for cigarettes, but also to regulate the reducedrisk product less heavily. It also suggests avoiding both taxation on e-cigarettes and legislation for ‘vape-free’ environments, as well as promoting the unrestricted advertising of factual information about them. er You can read our article by Dr Lynne Dawkins in The Psychologist on why it’s so hard to quit smoking, and listen to our audio interview at tinyurl.com/y7zpr79a To read our ‘One-on-one’ interview with Jane Ogden see tinyurl.com/y96r7jle News online: Find more news at www.thepsychologist.org.uk/reports, including two perspectives on the annual festival of the British Psychological Society’s Community Psychology Section, from Dr Helen Molden and Iain MacLeod.

For much more of the latest peer-reviewed research, digested, see www.bps.org.uk/digest Do you have a potential news story? Email us on psychologist@bps.org.uk or tweet @psychmag.

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Helpful or harmful?

Research digest

About a quarter of us experience ‘mirror pain’. Brain scans of such people found that some of them show patterns of neural activity that suggest they struggle to distinguish other people’s experience from their own. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience Our beliefs about the amount of exercise we get may be just as important to our health as how active we really are. Researchers compared surveys on people’s exercise beliefs with relevant death records 21 years later.

Even after controlling for actual exercise undertaken and other obvious health measures, like obesity and smoking status, people who believed they exercised less than their peers were more likely to have died.

Health Psychology A new analysis of 379 midlevel managers has found that although IQ was correlated with receiving better ratings from peers and subordinates, this pattern reversed beyond an IQ of about 120, perhaps because super-smart leaders find it difficult to inspire and empathise with their staff. Journal of Applied Psychology

By Dr Christian Jarrett. Covered, along with more studies, by him, Dr Alex Fradera and Emma Young at www.bps.org.uk/digest 12

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A combination of three metaanalyses covering the effects of training in chess, music or working memory abilities, all involving children, has found that once you remove the weaker studies, there is little to no evidence of what’s known as ‘far transfer’. In other words, learning in one domain is not beneficial to unrelated faculties. Current Directions in Psychological Science

The very same therapist behaviours were sometimes identified as helpful and at other times as a hindrance

Although psychotherapy is effective for many people, it doesn’t help everyone. In fact, in some cases it can do more harm than good. And while clinical researchers publish many studies into the outcomes of different therapeutic approaches, such as CBT or psychoanalytic psychotherapy, we actually know relatively little about the specific therapist behaviours that clients find beneficial or unwelcome.

A new study in the Journal of Clinical Psychology, although it involves only a small sample, has broken new ground by asking clients to provide detailed feedback on a second-by-second basis of their experience of a recent therapy session, and to explain their perspective on what took place.

Intriguingly, the very same therapist behaviours were sometimes identified as helpful and at other times as a hindrance.

‘It is important to recognise that all therapists are going to make mistakes,’ write Joshua Swift at Idaho State University, and his colleagues. ‘Perhaps the success of the session does not depend on whether errors are made but on the frequency of mistakes and how quickly therapists are able to repair them.’

Swift and his colleagues recruited 16 individuals, most of them women, attending therapy sessions at a training centre for clinical psychologists. The clients each saw one of 10 therapists at the clinic (eight were women), who between them either endorsed CBT, person-centred therapy or integrative therapy. The researchers asked the clients to watch a recording of their most recent therapy session and equipped them with a dial-rating device, which they could rotate clockwise or counter-clockwise to indicate how helpful or hindering they found each stage of the session (the researchers call this a ‘microprocess approach’).

There was a lot of variability through a session, which the researchers said shows the limitation of client feedback approaches that

involve filling out questionnaires at the end of each session. Using the dial ratings, the researchers identified the three most helpful and three most hindering therapy segments for each client and then asked them to explain what was happening in those moments.

The most helpful moments were when the therapist: gave specific treatment techniques, such as a concrete strategy the client could use in everyday life; made connections for the client, such as identifying events that affected their depression symptoms; and helped the client process their emotions. Other helpful moments involved fundamental therapist skills, such as listening and expressing empathy, offering support or praise, and discussing the process of therapy, including what the client wants from it. The clients said they found these moments helpful because they learned a new skill, felt heard or understood, gained insight and/or were better able to process their emotions.

In terms of hindering therapist behaviours, these often seemed the same, superficially at least, as the helpful behaviours, including instances when the therapist listened, attempted to express empathy, or attempted to structure the session. The difference seemed to be in the execution or timing of these behaviours. The clients said they found these moments unhelpful when they were off-topic (for instance, their therapist listened to them ‘rambling’ on about irrelevant details without intervening); when they felt like they were being judged; or they felt it was too soon for them to confront a particular issue.

The fact that the same therapist behaviours can be seen as helpful or harmful in different contexts shows, the researchers said, ‘the delicate balance that therapists must obtain while conducting therapy.’

Dr Christian Jarrett for the Research Digest www.bps.org.uk/digest Read the article: tinyurl.com/ ybl9bl6o

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the psychologist january 2018 news

Moderate alcohol consumption improves foreign-language skills Alcohol is not exactly known for its brain-boosting properties. In fact, it impairs all kinds of cognitive functioning, including working memory and the ability to ignore distractions. So it really should make it harder for someone to speak in a foreign language.

However, as Fritz Renner of Maastricht University in the Netherlands and colleagues point out in a new paper in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, ‘contrary to what would be expected based on theory, it is a widely held belief among bilingual speakers that alcohol consumption improves foreign-language fluency, as is evident in anecdotal evidence from numerous discussions in social and popular media’. And in welcome news for holiday drinkers (not to mention language students) everywhere, it turns out that, at least at moderate levels, this belief seems to be right.

To test the effect of alcohol on foreign-language skills, Renner and his fellow researchers recruited 50 German students in their second year of an undergraduate degree in psychology at Maastricht University in the Netherlands. Maastricht is close to the German border and the university attracts many German students, all of whom must pass a Dutch language exam before they can attend.

To begin, the students drank either 250ml of chilled water or 250ml of bitter lemon and enough vodka to generate a moderate blood alcohol concentration of about 0.04 per cent (the precise amount of vodka varied, according to gender and body weight). About 15 minutes after finishing the drink – by which time alcohol would have been absorbed into the bloodstream – the students were instructed to argue either for or against animal testing in Dutch, for two minutes. Two Getty Images

native Dutch speakers, who didn’t know which students had drunk what, rated the students’ language performance in terms of overall quality, understandability, vocabulary, pronunciation, word selection and fluency. Finally, the students completed an arithmetic task.

Renner and his colleagues predicted that while alcohol might increase the students’ perceptions of how well they’d spoken in Dutch, they would in fact perform worse, based on the judges’ ratings, than the students who’d drunk water.

But this isn’t what they found.

The vodka drinkers didn’t rate their own language performance any higher than the water-drinkers did.

Neither did they do any worse on the arithmetic task. But they did receive better scores for their Dutch language skills, both overall and specifically for pronunciation.

Why might this be? Some people feel nervous when speaking in a foreign language. It may be that the anxiety-reducing effects of a relatively small amount of alcohol improved their performance, but this needs further investigation.

‘The findings of this study need replication in future studies, testing participants learning languages other than Dutch and varying the amount of alcohol that is consumed to further explore the effects of acute alcohol consumption on foreign language proficiency,’ Renner and his fellow researchers concluded.

At least, it shouldn’t be too tricky to find students willing to volunteer.

As the researchers noted in their paper, however, the amount of alcohol will be important in determining effects. The level in this study equated to a drink or two. As anyone who’s ever drunk more than that knows, at higher levels, slurring sets in.

Emma Young for the Research Digest www.bps.org.uk/digest Read the article: tinyurl.com/ y8yz9sgn

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Behind the scenes of psychology Jon Sutton reports from the British Psychological Society’s Psychology4Students 2017 event, held in Nottingham

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As it should be, this day was about inspiring the next generation of psychologists with stories, personal journeys to the heart of psychology, glimpses behind the scenes. And in the opening ‘not really a talk, more a demonstration of things I think are interesting’, from Phil Banyard on his Nottingham Trent University home turf, it was about (re)capturing a sense of wonder.

Banyard began with a promise that psychology deals with big questions. Who am I? Why do I think, feel and behave like this? And, in his own case, ‘Where’s my exit?

– physically, mentally, emotionally, I need to know where my exit is.’ Thankfully, Banyard is not exiting psychology just yet: in fact, he says that as he’s got older his sense of wonder has come back. If he’s not wondering about nonstick frying pans (search our website), he’s wondering about the gargoyles on medieval buildings in Europe.

Where did the idea come from? Did people back then think they had seen them? A brilliant demonstration of ‘flashed face distortion’ suggests what lurks in the shadows of our visual systems can make ‘modern-day gargoyles’ out of even the most attractive faces. Another demonstration showed how manipulating photos of our faces to mirror one side at a time can create composites with a very different feel. ‘Just play with psychology,’ Banyard concluded: ‘you can have a bit of fun with it.’

Stephen Gibson (York St John University) was up next, a fine example of how a footnote can become the whole story. For him, it was in Thomas Blass’s biography of Stanley Milgram, The Man Who Shocked the World.

Across all his experiments, Blass had written, Milgram had a tape-recorder running. His widow Alexandra had donated the tapes to the library at Yale. ‘If they’re gathering dust,’ Gibson thought, ‘maybe I could dust them off.’ It turned out that the tapes revealed a much more complex side to a well-known story. Milgram’s published work gives the impression that his ‘obedience’ studies were very standardised, through the use of six prods.

Yet the tapes revealed staged consultation, additional deception, and language showing that this was no simple case of ‘following orders’. This is ‘the 50-year mistake’, Gibson says: Milgram’s studies do not show people obeying, they show people disobeying, arguing their way out of the experiment. ‘We need a revised definition of obedience,’ Gibson concluded, ‘one that doesn’t include that direct command. It’s more about submission to the requirements of an authority.’ Resisting the lure of authority himself, Gibson advised the audience to always question it, to ‘go behind the scenes’ of science.

After lunch, Alison Torn (Leeds Trinity University) turned to ‘Bricolage: My career as a quilt maker’ – a ‘patchwork career’ of different elements. An aspiring musician as a child, Torn said she ‘never wanted to be a psychologist, lecturer, researcher, manager, administrator’. Plagued by impostor syndrome, she still reminds herself ‘I do stuff. Not stuff that’s going to

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launch me onto the world stage, but still important stuff that is going to change lives.’ Her life ‘patches’ included not being afraid to take risks – she had trained as a schoolteacher, but ‘hated it, right from the word go’; to ‘fake it till you become it’, which she happily admits doing when applying for her Head of Department role; don’t be afraid to say yes (but not too often! Stay focused on your goals); have the courage to be imperfect; and, most of all, be kind to yourself.’ ‘I’m a social constructionist,’ Torn concluded. ‘As human beings we are works in progress.

Your career will not be the linear trajectory you think it might be – it’s yours to write.’

Finally, Tom Muskett (Leeds Beckett University) recounted ‘a personal journey into the heart of critical psychology’. ‘It’s not just my job, it’s my whole life,’ he admitted. In common with other speakers, he advised ‘a step back from how psychology is typically done’, or at the very least an awareness of how we may be creating ‘a particular kind of psychology’. Muskett’s background is in speech and language therapy, which sparked an interest around using critical approaches to rethink diagnoses such as autism. ‘I wanted some boxes and arrows to make sense of something about autism’: in particular, its stereotyped or repetitive speech and idiosyncratic language. Does the ‘seemingly automatic retrieval of odd words in the fluent speech of many verbal autistic individuals’ reflect a ‘disorganised’ conceptual system?

When Muskett started looking at videos of hundreds of hours of interactions, he ‘started noticing things’.

There was lots of evidence of children using language unusually, but no evidence of that having interactional consequences. ‘What’s the problem here?’ asked Muskett.

Is it with the child, or with the adult who doesn’t ask what it all means? ‘Boom! – we’ve gone critical!’ This move away from individualism and universalism, and from a deficit-focus, has been a cornerstone of new approaches to physical and intellectual disability. Muskett showed how it can also lead to changes in the student experience: with inclusive, community-based approaches to teaching.

Phil Banyard on his Nottingham Trent University home turf, talked about (re)capturing a sense of wonder

04/12/2017 12:43

Call for Nominations President 2019-20

The President is the visible figurehead of the Society and Chair of the Board of Trustees.

We are seeking nominations of Members of the Society to stand for election to the role of President in the Presidential year 2019-20.

The successful candidate will be President-Elect in 2018-19 and VicePresident in 2020-21.

Descriptions of the role and responsibilities, together with requirements and time commitments, are available on request.

Procedure A nomination pack, which includes further information regarding the role and a standard nomination form, is available from Zoë Mudie (zoe.mudie@bps.org.uk).

The Board of Trustees has the

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responsibility to ensure that there is at least one candidate for this position. In line with previous practice, a Search Committee has been set up to facilitate this process.

Those wishing to propose candidates are invited to contact the Honorary General Secretary, Dr Carole Allan (e-mail: carole.allan@bps.org.uk) for guidance.

Nominations must reach the Chief Executive’s Office at the Society’s Leicester office by 5pm on Friday 2 February 2018. Nominations will only be valid if the standard nomination form, including signatures, is fully completed.

If more than one candidate is nominated, the election will be decided by a ballot of the Membership and the result announced at the 2018 Annual General Meeting.

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Why emotional experiences get better with age Gloria Luong goes in pursuit of happiness

Chances are, if you have switched on the television lately, you may have noticed that adults over the age of 60 are often depicted as depressed, lonely, ‘grumpy old men’. Yet switch the channel and you are also bound to find images of older adults as sweet, loving grandparents, akin to the ‘golden girls’. So is later adulthood a time of hopelessness and despair, or the prime of life?

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t’s no secret that older age is associated with widespread decline and undesirable changes.

A full head of hair thins out and randomly distributes to strange places on one’s body (like in the ears!). Skin droops and wrinkles, eyesight becomes less acute, and hearing requires extra effort. In addition to the prominent changes in physical appearance, health issues become more common and memory gets fuzzier.

Prominent theories of ageing in the 1980s therefore suggested that emotional experiences would follow a similar pathway toward dysfunction. They were wrong. In a 2011 study by Laura Carstensen and colleagues, participants carried beepers around with them during their everyday routines for one week.

The beepers would go off at random times throughout the day as part of an experience sampling study, and participants reported their emotions at those moments.

This procedure was repeated five and 10 years later on the same participants. It turns out that across adulthood, negative emotions (like anger) wane, and positive emotions (like contentment) become more prominent. In very late life (in the eighties and beyond), this pattern reverses slightly, but never to the same low levels observed in younger adulthood (in the twenties and thirties). Much to the surprise of many gerontologists, these findings have been replicated in both cross-sectional and longitudinal studies all over the world. Why might this be the case?

Fewer stressors in later adulthood Our social ecology also shows pronounced changes in later life. Work demands are eliminated after retirement. Daily activities become routine and predictable. There is more time for leisure pursuits like gardening, travelling and volunteering. And older adults structure their physical and social environments in ways that reduce the occurrence of unnecessary stressors. My colleagues and I have analysed some daily diary data of women who recently relocated and

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the psychologist january 2018 emotions and ageing Getty Images

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found that not only do the oldest women in the study report the lowest number of daily stressors (such as getting stuck in traffic, getting into arguments with others), but that this partially accounts for lower levels of negative emotions with age. It appears that avoiding Emotional goals change stressors in the first place is a good Not only are older adults more place to start when it comes to Gloria Luong likely to work on goals that make cultivating happiness. is at Colorado State University them happy than are younger Moreover, as we age, our time Gloria.Luong@colostate.edu adults, they are also more realistic horizons shrink – we perceive with their goals and what it that we have increasingly limited means to be happy. For example, time left on a 2013 study by Susanne Scheibe and colleagues Earth. According to Carstensen’s asked participants between 18 and 93 years of age Key sources socioemotional selectivity theory, to report on positive emotions (e.g. excitement, these shifts in our future time calm) that they would ideally like to feel. Using a perspective lead to a reprioritisation Carstensen, L.L., Bulent, T., Scheibe, similar experience sampling strategy as described of the goals that are most important S., Ram, N. et al. (2011). Emotional above, participants reported how they actually felt to us. We learn not to sweat the experience improves with age: Evidence at random times throughout the day for seven days. small stuff and to spend our based on over 10 years of experience sampling. Psychology and Aging, 26, The researchers found that older adults valued precious remaining time on the 21–33. ideally experiencing low-activating emotions things that matter most to us: Charles, S.T., Luong, G., Almeida, D.M. (calm, relaxing) over highly-activating emotions we hug our grandchildren a little et al. (2010). Fewer ups and downs: Daily (excitement, pride), whereas younger adults valued tighter, let arguments pass, and stressors mediate age differences in both types of positive emotions equally. Given that work on checking things off the negative affect. Journals of Gerontology: older adults more often experience low-activating bucket list. So, getting older means Psychological Sciences, 65B, 279–286.

Fingerman, K.L., Miller, L. & Charles, positive emotions than high-activating ones, their we work toward goals that bring us S. (2008). Saving the best for last: How emotional goals (i.e. what they ideally wanted happiness and contentment. adults treat social partners of different to feel) closely matched with what they actually For younger people, conversely, ages. Psychology and Aging, 23, 399–409. experienced in daily life. For younger adults, they time may seem more openLuong, G. & Charles, S.T. (2014). had a larger mismatch between their ideal and actual ended, which can lead to a greater Age differences in affective and positive emotions in daily life. investment into long-term goals, cardiovascular responses to a negative social interaction: The role of goals, In other words, younger adults set goals that like working on a college degree appraisals, and emotion regulation. are more difficult to achieve and subsequently, are and moving up the career ladder.

Developmental Psychology, 50, less likely to reach their emotional goals. Other Often, however, achieving such 1919–1930. studies, such as those by Michaela Riediger and long-term goals requires some Luong, G., Charles, S.T. & Fingerman, her colleagues, corroborate these findings: younger personal sacrifices (e.g. struggles K. (2011). Better with age: Social adults are more likely to say they want to maximise to balance work–life issues) and relationships across adulthood. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 28, their positive emotions, whereas older adults are exposing oneself to more stressful 9–23. more realistic in their goal-setting and say they experiences. College, for example, Luong, G., Wrzus, C., Wagner, G.G. & simply want to maintain (as opposed to increase) involves taking heavy course loads, Riediger, M. (2016). When bad moods their levels of happiness. These findings suggest that completing numerous exams and may not be so bad: Valuing negative older adults are happy with being happy enough, assignments, and navigating new affect is associated with weakened which, ironically, might actually make them happier. social and academic experiences for affect-health links. Emotion, 16, 387–401.

The same study by Riediger and colleagues also several years. Many young adults Riediger, M., Schmiedek, F., Wagner, found that teenagers and younger adults were more take on these challenges for the G.G. & Lindenberger, U. (2009). Seeking likely at any given moment throughout the day to chance to hold a coveted graduate pleasure and seeking pain: Differences say they wanted to increase their negative emotions. degree, but you would probably be in prohedonic and contra-hedonic This finding is consistent with stereotypes of the hard-pressed to find many 90or motivation from adolescence to old age. angsty, brooding teen wrestling with her emotions.

100-year-olds who would be willing Psychological Science, 20, 1529–1535.

Scheibe, S., English, T., Tsai, J.L. & So, while older adults were content with being just to sacrifice the next four years of Carstensen, L.L. (2013). Striving to feel ‘happy enough’, they were unwilling to experience their lives to achieve the same goal. good: Ideal affect, actual affect, and much, if any, negative emotion. their correspondence across adulthood.

These results help us understand how emotional Psychology and Aging, 28, 160–171. goals (what we want to feel) can shape what we actually feel. In a recent study I conducted with Full list available in online/app version.

Michaela Riediger and colleagues, we found that negative emotions are not always bad for our health

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the psychologist january 2018 emotions and ageing

Life experiences make us better at regulating our emotions Relationships, however, are a two-way street, and it is not just social partners who de-escalate conflicts with older adults; older adults are also rather adept at avoiding conflicts with loved ones. Older adults tend to have known their partners longer and have more intimate knowledge about what makes their friends and family tick. In essence, they know how to keep the peace, which is critical for maintaining high levels of wellbeing.

Even in the best relationships, however, conflicts and disagreements arise. In many of these situations, older adults use emotion regulation and coping strategies aimed at promoting harmony in the relationship and neutralising feelings of anger and resentment. In a recent study I conducted with Susan Charles, we found that this effect even extends to strangers. Younger (18–30 years old) Social partners are more compassionate with and older adults (60+ years old) discussed hypothetical older adults dilemmas with a stranger that they believed was another Think about the last time you had a big family research participant in the study. In fact, this person was gathering. Now imagine that your grandmother makes a confederate (i.e. a member of our research team who an inappropriate political or racial comment. Would you confront her about it? What if your teenage cousin was planted in the study). The age-group and gendermatched confederate was scripted to made the same statements? Would act in an unfriendly and disagreeable you act differently? Although “…the quality, and not manner toward the participant. During older adults proactively shape the social interaction, we monitored their own personal networks to necessarily the quantity, the pulse rate and blood pressure of maximise their remaining time of partners makes the partners. Participants also reported with loved ones, their social social relationships, their negative and positive emotions partners also provide older adults before, immediately after, and 20–30 with preferential treatment that and therefore emotional minutes after the task. We found that contributes to older adults’ experiences, more relative to the younger adults, older greater emotional satisfaction. rewarding with age” adults showed smaller increases in An elegant series of studies by their negative affect, pulse rate, and Karen Fingerman and colleagues blood pressure during the negative has shown that social partners social interaction. These effects were explained, in part, are less likely to confront older adults, even when the by the fact that older adults appraised the confederate older adults may be at fault. Younger adults, on the and task in a more positive light. This was rather other hand, do not get the same benefit of the doubt. surprising, given that coders blind to the hypotheses rated Older adults are also more likely to be forgiven for the negativity of the younger and older confederates’ social transgressions compared with their younger behaviours toward the participants in similar ways (which counterparts. is exactly what they were trained to do). Thus, emotion This finding may explain why, in part, older adults are more satisfied with their social networks and report regulation strategies of positively reframing argument situations appear to be used more effectively by older more warm and enjoyable interactions with their adults, which ultimately contributes to less affective and friends and family members, compared with younger physiological reactivity. individuals. Older adults generally have smaller social Of course, there are exceptions to the rule. Some networks, but they tend to be more tightknit. That is, the quality, and not necessarily the quantity, of partners adults are ‘grumpier’ than others, especially those who are facing progressive physical or cognitive decline (e.g. makes social relationships, and therefore emotional dementia, Parkinson’s disease), chronic stressors (e.g. experiences, more rewarding with age. In short, older health conditions, caregiving responsibilities), or loss of adults are more likely to have close social partners social belonging – risk factors that become more prevalent who shape the social interactions in ways that are less caustic and hostile and more warm and understanding. with age. On average, however, emotional experiences become more positive and less negative with age as a result of changes in one’s environment, including how social partners interact with older adults, as well as in the behaviours and cognitive emotion regulation strategies that become more prominent and effective with greater life experience. In summary, we may look forward to some of the best years of our lives as we age. and wellbeing. It is true that by and large, experiencing excessive negative emotions can be distressing and can lead to poorer long-term physical and mental health.

Yet, individuals who had a greater appreciation for negative emotions and recognised that they sometimes have value were less likely to have health problems when they experienced negative emotions. In other words, how we make meaning from our emotional experiences can shape what kinds of consequences those emotions will have for our health. Perhaps for older adults, negative emotions are so potent that they do not have many redeeming qualities, and are therefore avoided at all costs. More studies are needed to disentangle how these processes change with age.

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Rethinking addiction Nick Heather challenges the brain disease model This might come as a surprise to those who regard it as settled that addiction is ‘a chronic relapsing brain disease’, but this is not the unanimous view of scientists, academics and professionals interested in addiction. There is a dissatisfaction with the ‘official’ portrayal of addiction and a desire for a more realistic, genuinely scientific account of this ubiquitous human problem.

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wo polarised views of addiction, and the seemingly endless dispute between them, go way back. The ‘moral’ view, emerging from pre-industrial times, is that what we would now call addictive behaviour represents a free choice, similar to all the other apparently autonomous choices people make every day and are fully responsible for. Although most clearly associated with a pre-scientific mode of thinking, the moral view of addiction also finds expression in the work of scientists, an influential example being the The Myth of Addiction by my friend John B. Davies (who died while this article was in press – see obituary at tinyurl.com/yb92fqy7). At the opposite extreme is the disease view, beginning in the early 19th century and culminating in its latest manifestation, the brain disease model of addiction. This conceptualises addictive behaviour as completely involuntary and against the will of the person: addicts do not ‘use’ because they choose to, but because they are compelled to. This characterisation of addiction is now so common among scientists and professionals that to challenge it seems heretical. But, as we shall see, there is a mountain of evidence against the view that addictive behaviour is compulsive in any straightforward sense.

A recent collection of essays I edited with Gabriel Segal (Heather & Segal, 2017) explores the ‘middle ground’ between completely free choice and no choice. The overall message is the need for a third stage, superseding the moral and disease stages, in our understanding of addiction. An interdisciplinary mix of contributors from philosophy, neuroscience, psychology, psychiatry and the law hold out the promise Nick Oliver/www.smilecreative.co.uk

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the psychologist january 2018 addiction

that these ostensibly different perspectives might one day converge on a unifying model of addiction.

However, the contribution of philosophers is central to the task of rethinking. As Daniel Dennett wrote in Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, ‘ there is no such thing as philosophy-free science; there is only science whose philosophical baggage is taken on board without examination’ (p.21).

Towards a ‘sticky’ definition Any task of rethinking must begin with a fundamental definition. For some time now, laypeople and academics alike have extended the use of the term beyond substance addictions to a wide range of repetitive activities, to the point where it often seems to mean little more than ‘something people spend a lot of time doing’. There are indeed good grounds for seeing some forms of repetitive and harmful non-substance behaviours, like problem gambling, as ‘behavioural addictions’ – but we need a criterion for distinguishing those behaviours usefully thought of as addictions from those that are not. We need a litmus test.

My proposed test is: ‘A person is addicted to a specified behaviour if they have demonstrated repeated and continuing failures to refrain from or radically reduce the behaviour despite prior resolutions to do so.’ The resolutions in question can be more precisely defined by adopting Richard Holton’s phrase, ‘contraryinclination-defeating intentions’. That is, the resolution is made ‘in the attempt to overcome contrary desires that one believes one will have when the time comes to act’ (Holton, 2009, p.77).

The definition covers what nearly all clinicians in the field would regard as the main difficulty in treating addiction – that an initial change in behaviour is relatively easy to achieve, but the major problem lies in maintaining that change over time. In other words, the hallmark of addiction is its relapsing nature. It might be objected that research shows the majority of individuals meeting formal criteria for addiction, such as those in diagnostic systems like DSM or ICD, succeed in resolving their problem without treatment.

This is true, but research also shows that these natural recoveries are typically marked by persistent relapse.

For example, research by Ron Borland and colleagues reported in Addiction in 2012 found that about 40 per cent of smokers in four English-speaking countries

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reported making at least one quit attempt each year. Their data suggest that, by the age of 40, the average smoker may have made as many as 25 failed quit attempts. It is a valid part of the folk wisdom on addiction that, while many eventually succeed, addictive behaviours are very difficult habits to break. As Mark Twain said, ‘Giving up smoking is the easiest thing in the world. I know because I’ve done it thousands of times.’

This doesn’t mean that I regard other accepted features of addiction – craving, preoccupation with the object of desire, failure to carry out major role obligations, acquired tolerance and physiological withdrawal, and other ‘symptoms’ found in DSM or ICD categorisations – as unimportant or uninteresting.

I only claim that the leading question that should capture our theoretical attention is why addiction is so ‘sticky’, why addicts find it so hard to change their behaviour.

Is addictive behaviour compulsive?

The crux of the disease view, that addictive behaviour is carried out against the will of the addicted individual, leads to the conclusion that addicts should not be blamed or punished for the transgression of legal and social norms associated with their addictive behaviour. Instead, they must receive compassion and treatment. This message is, of course, the basis of longstanding communications to the general public and policy-makers and, despite the origins of the disease theory of addiction at least 200 years ago, is still promoted as a mark of up-to-date, enlightened opinion: addiction really is a disease and sufferers from it can’t help behaving the way they do.

But is it true that addictive behaviour is compulsive? Is there evidence that bears on this question? There certainly is (and the interested reader is referred to Heather, 2017a, for more).

A series of laboratory experiments in the 1960s and 70s showed conclusively that the drinking of even the most chronic and severe alcohol addicts found in institutional settings was operant behaviour that was largely determined by its consequences. Rather than being qualitatively different and compelled, alcohol addicts’ drinking behaviour is subject to the same general laws that govern normal, goal-directed, voluntary behaviour of any sort.

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More recently, a demonstration of the power of alternative reinforcers to modify cocaine use in experienced cocaine smokers recruited from the community was carried out by Carl Hart and his colleagues (outlined in his book High Price). What is remarkable about these findings is that, among individuals who in the mainstream media and in many conventional scientific and professional circles would be regarded as hopelessly addicted to crack cocaine, a relatively small amount of money could be effective in persuading them to reject the choice of cocaine.

Indeed, as shown by a large number of randomised controlled trials, the most efficacious method of treatment for addictive behaviours is contingency management (CM). This evidence further supports the conclusion that addictive behaviour is not impervious to its consequences. Studies of CM programmes with physicians, airline pilots and other professional groups have reported truly remarkable results, but similarly high rates of recovery have been obtained among much less privileged groups (see DuPont and Humphreys’ editorial in a 2011 edition of Substance Abuse).

The idea of compulsion also implies that addictive behaviour is inflexible, stereotyped and unreflective but, in her qualitative study of drug users (mostly heroin) in Scotland, Joanne Neale found a very different picture. Rather than helpless victims of forces over Key sources which they had little or no control, Neale’s respondents were typically self-respecting and self-determining Hall, W., Carter, A. & Forlini, C. (2015). individuals ‘who actively confronted Brain disease model of addiction: and purposefully responded Misplaced priorities? Lancet Psychiatry, to external constraints and life 2, 867.

Heather, N. (2017a). Is the concept of opportunities’. compulsion useful in the explanation or If addiction entails compulsive description of addictive behaviour and behaviour, it is reasonable to expect experience? Addictive Behavior Reports, that addicts would take a long 6. doi:10.1016/j.abrep.2017.05.002 time to recover, if they ever did.

Heather, N. (2017b). Q: Is addiction a In a 2009 book Gene Heyman and brain disease or a moral failing? A: Neither. Neuroethics, 10(1), 115–124. colleagues examined data from four Available at tinyurl.com/lbn7qzl large-scale, longitudinal surveys Heather, N. & Segal, G. (2017). Addiction of the general population in the and choice: Rethinking the relationship.

USA carried out at various times Oxford: Oxford University Press. since 1980. Among all respondents Heyman, G.M. (2009). Addiction: A who had ever met DSM criteria disorder of choice. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. for substance dependence in their Kalant, H. (2010). What neurobiology lifetime, between 76 per cent and cannot tell us about addiction. Addiction, 83 per cent were in remission (i.e.

105, 780–789. showed no evidence of dependence Levy, N. (Ed.) (2013). Addiction and selfin the past year). For the great control: Perspectives from philosophy, majority of respondents, remission psychology and neuroscience. Oxford: Oxford University Press. was achieved without benefit of Wiens, T.K. & Walker, L.J. (2015). The treatment. It is surely incompatible chronic disease concept of addiction: with the notion of a compulsive, Helpful or harmful? Addiction Research chronic disease that over three & Theory, 23, 309–321. quarters of those who had ever Wiers, R.W. & Stacy, A.W. (Eds.) (2006).

Handbook of implicit cognition and addiction. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

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suffered from it no longer did so, and despite never having received treatment.

One of the most sensational pieces of evidence bearing on the nature of addiction comes from a follow-up of veterans of the Vietnam War. Towards the end of the war, the US government became alarmed about reports that a large proportion of American servicemen in Vietnam were addicted to heroin or other drugs. A team of researchers led by Lee N. Robins was commissioned to interview a large sample of men in Vietnam to determine the extent and characteristics of their drug use, and then to follow them up on their return to the US after discharge in 1971. Against all expectations, the great majority had simply ‘given up’ addiction. In the first year after return, only 5 per cent of those who had been addicted in Vietnam were addicted in the US; and despite reports of withdrawal symptoms, 88 per cent had not resumed regular use of opiates at a three-year follow-up. This did not occur because drugs were unavailable after return home; interviewees reported that they knew how to obtain heroin and some had occasionally, but not regularly, used.

Now, there may be senses in which it is valid to describe the phenomenology of addiction as if compulsive, but the evidence flatly contradicts any notion of compulsion in the strong sense of automatic behaviour elicited involuntarily by drug-related cues independently of the person’s motivational status at the time it occurs. Compulsion may have some traction in a weaker sense of the addict’s experience of feeling unable to resist powerful temptations to use, but this is not a sufficient condition for relapse to occur, as shown simply by the fact that addicts do occasionally successfully resist. It is true that some addicts don’t change their behaviour before irreversible damage has been done, but to say that this shows they are compelled to continue using and can’t change is a fine example of circular reasoning.

Unfortunately, rather than try to accommodate the evidence above, neurobiological theories of addiction, based on the assumption that addiction is compulsive due to a chronic brain disease, simply ignore it.

This is the main reason for accusing such theories of being unscientific. Despite the obvious trappings of science – colourful pictures of the brain based on expensive neuroimaging techniques, intricate diagrams illustrating complex neurological circuits held to be involved in compulsive behaviour, innumerable experimental manipulations of the brains of rodents – there seems to be no interest in linking hypothesised brain mechanisms with the large body of observations of the behaviour of human addicts in the real world.

Towards a dual-systems theory Equally unfortunately, the evidence in question has misled some, as we have seen, to dismiss the concept of addiction itself and to regard it as a myth. Although addictive behaviour is not ‘against the will’ in any

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the psychologist january 2018 addiction

of their interaction – one dealing simple sense, it is still a disorder with implicit, automatic and mainly of some kind and there is still ‘Most of my non-conscious processes and the something in the addict’s supremely research other with explicit, controlled irrational behaviour that requires a career and mainly conscious processes. special explanation. has been In addiction, the balance between One possibility is that focused on the two systems has become addiction is a disorder of temporal improving the disturbed. Automatic processes, inconsistency, a view articulated by effectiveness like cue-elicited urges, attentional Neil Levy. Though addicts respond of treatment and brief bias, automatic approach to incentives and are free to choose interventions for alcohol tendencies, implicit memory to engage in behaviour or not at problems, and I was fortunate associations and cognitions any one time, their autonomy is enough to receive the 2017 promote the maintenance of impaired when their pattern of Jellinek Memorial Award for addictive behaviour, while poor choices is considered over time. this work. However, I have goal-directed planning, limited Someone makes a strong resolution always had an interest in the self-control capacity and distorted to refrain from behaving in a theory of addiction and how the judgements and evaluations certain way but fails to carry out way it is understood in society undermine attempts to resist it. that resolution; when that happens affects how it is manifested The ‘final common pathway’ of repeatedly and distressingly, we can and responded to. After my overt behaviour has become biased describe this pattern of behaviour retirement from the NHS in in favour of automatic processes. as addiction. If we identify the 2003, I was able to devote more In sum, a dual systems theory addict’s resolution with their will, time to reading and thinking of addiction is an attempt to on the ground that this reflects about this fascinating area.’ understand what Ron Borland, in ‘that set of considerations which his 2014 book Understanding Hard (the addict) – in a cool and to Maintain Behaviour Change, non-deceptive moment – articulates Nick Heather calls ‘the constraints on and the as definitive of the good’ (see Gary is Emeritus Professor of Alcohol potential of volitional attempts to Watson’s Free Will, 2003, p.105), and Other Drug Studies in the change behaviour patterns that it is in this sense that addictive Department of Psychology at are under the moment-to-moment behaviour is against the will. In Northumbria University control of non-volitional processes’. other words, in respect of their nick.heather@northumbria.

The crucial point, however, is addictive behaviour, addicts cannot ac.uk summarised in a 2015 editorial in effectively extend their will over Addictive Behaviors by Marcantonio time. In Levy’s words, in a 2006 Spada and colleagues thus: ‘…the exercise of volition Canadian Journal of Philosophy article: ‘It is because is not lost to the automaticity and irresistibility of addiction undermines extended agency, so that addicts addictive responses, but rather…can be employed to are not able to integrate their lives and pursue a single decide whether to comply and satisfy, or to deny and conception of the good, that it impairs autonomy’ abstain’.

(2006, p.427) This is consistent with another view of addiction that sees it primarily as a disorder of self-regulation.

Brains aren’t addicted, people are As we have seen, the crucial task in the study of No sensible observer would discount the contribution addiction is to account for the breakdown of a that neuroscience has made, and will continue to resolution at the point at which the addict succumbs make, to the understanding of addiction. But there to temptation. What are the key determinants of this are severe and inherent limitations to what breakdown? Conversely, how do we ever succeed in neuroscience alone can tell us about the disorder. persisting with our resolutions in the face of strong No theory consisting of descriptions of the activity of contrary inclinations? These are ancient questions but neurotransmitters, synapses and neural pathways can the suggestion here is that they must continue to be ever amount to an adequate account of addiction. To given prominence in scientific inquiry into addiction. believe otherwise is to subscribe to what Dennett has Seeing addiction as a disorder of choice or of selfcalled ‘greedy reductionism’, the kind that believes regulation can be subsumed under the more general more basic levels of explanation, such as the neuronal, proposal that addiction can be explained within can make redundant higher levels couched for example the framework of a dual-systems theory of human in psychological and social terms. behaviour and experience, a proposal that is by no This is the most general reason for believing means new (see, for example, references in Chapter 25 that regarding addiction as a disease of the brain, like of Heather & Segal, 2017). Though there are different Parkinsonism, epilepsy or Alzheimer’s disease, is a versions of dual-systems theory, they all provide an fundamental mistake. Distinguished neuroscientists account of how behaviour can be the result of one of themselves share this view. Harold Kalant (2010) two different systems for information processing and

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Nick Oliver www.smilecreative.co.uk

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A 2014 editorial in Nature prompted 94 academics and researchers to protest against its ‘one-dimensional’ view of addiction (tinyurl.com/ hjj5ywq). Derek Heim and I then set up a Google group, the Addiction Theory Network, to coordinate criticism of the brain disease model and to develop alternative ways of understanding addiction. See tinyurl.com/ hn7f3qs and apply to join the network.

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has shown that the postulation of neural mechanisms given causal roles in the portrayal of addiction as a brain disease caused by chronic exposure to drugs has not been experimentally or clinically supported.

Recently, in his 2015 book The Biology of Desire, Marc Lewis has argued that the brain changes all the time and that the changes brought about by chronic drug ingestion are similar in kind to learning any new habit or way of behaving. Lewis presents a developmental-learning model of addiction in which recovery, rather than representing a return to some previous level of stability or homeostasis, marks a stage of growth beyond addiction.

A defence of the brain disease model of addiction (BDMA) was provided in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2016 by Nora Volkow, the current Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse in the USA, and her colleagues. However, critics of the BDMA fall roughly into two camps: those who maintain that addiction is not just a brain disease, implying that if the psychological, social and cultural influences on addiction were fully recognised, the notion of brain disease would be acceptable; and those who argue that addiction is not best regarded as a brain disease of any kind. I am in the latter camp. Addictive behaviour is volitional at the time it is carried out; addicts are agents who make choices. This doesn’t sound like a ‘disease’: whatever disagreement there may be about the meaning of the word, a disease is surely something that happens to us, not something we do. It may be useful to describe automatic processes involved in addiction at the lower system level as representing a disease – the drug withdrawal syndrome, for example, is obviously a disease – but it does not follow that the interplay between volitional and non-volitional processes that constitute the addict’s predicament is usefully described as a disease.

What are the consequences of all this?

The dispute about whether or not addiction is a disease should eventually be resolved by examining the consequences of holding one view or the other.

I have tried to show that one consequence of the disease view is that it limits the chances for an adequate understanding of addiction. There are more practical consequences too.

A claim frequently heard from supporters of the BDMA is that its promotion is the only way the public can be persuaded to withhold blame and punishment from addicts, the only way to combat the stigma they suffer. It follows that a rejection of the BDMA is equivalent to promoting the idea that addiction signifies a moral failing on the addict’s part. This is an entirely spurious claim (see Heather, 2017b).

It is obviously possible to develop a scientific account

of addiction which is neither a disease nor a moral model but which the public could understand. There is good evidence that public acceptance of the disease concept is largely lip-service and that the claim the BDMA removes stigma among public or professionals is untrue. That someone’s aberrant behaviour is caused by a disease of the brain is surely one of the most stigmatising things one can believe. There may be difficulties in communicating a morally neutral, non-brain disease account of addiction to the public but, if we are to make progress in understanding and responding to the disorder, there is no alternative.

On the other hand, there are clear disadvantages to promoting the BDMA. The main practical advance anticipated by its supporters is the development of new pharmacological substances and other medical procedures to correct the putative brain malfunction responsible for the disease. There is no question that pharmacotherapy has a role to play in addiction treatment, mainly by making possible a period of stability in which problems in relationships, accommodation, livelihood etc., may be addressed.

But this essential period of stability leaves the more lasting problem of the self-regulation of behaviour largely untouched; any long-lasting solution to this problem can only be achieved by learning ways to strengthen control over addictive behaviour, whether by cognitive-behavioural therapy, mindfulness training, membership of a mutual aid group, or any other relevant method. By contrast, the argument to the public and to governments put by BDMA advocates that the development of new medications for the brain disease of addiction is the only way forward is likely to result, not in any miracle cure, but to an increase in the over-medicalisation of personal and social problems many of us fear. As Wayne Hall and colleagues (2015) have argued, it is also likely to result in a continued neglect of what is the best way forward – the application of public health policies aimed at reducing harmful drug use in the general population, and ways of increasing access to cheap and effective treatments that already exist.

Another important disadvantage of the BDMA is that it may reduce addicts’ chances of recovery by telling them that they are powerless to change without special help. This is based on the assumption that people’s belief in their capacity to change is the single greatest factor in bringing that change about, and this is, of course, an underlying principle of modern cognitive-behavioural therapy, repeatedly shown to be the most empirically well-supported modality of treatment for behavioural disorders. It seems likely that the language of irreversible brain disease and of compulsion is a strong disincentive to self-change and to the success of treatment aimed at helping people change. We therefore need a radical transformation in communications to the public about addiction, one in which they are persuaded to believe that breaking free from addiction is possible and told what we know about how this can be successfully accomplished.

04/12/2017 12:49

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the psychologist january 2018 addiction

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04/12/2017 12:55

Gail Kinman ‘People need a period of stability, otherwise they may actively resist beneficial change’ From compassion fatigue and burnout to resilience – Gail Kinman takes Lance Workman through her work as an occupational health psychologist

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You’re currently Professor of Occupational Health Psychology at the University of Bedfordshire. Did you set out to become an academic psychologist?

I didn’t do my degree until I was 34. I had been working as an administrator in various organisations and had always wanted to be a social worker. I eventually went to my local university to enrol and found out that the social work course was full, but the admissions tutor asked me if I had thought about doing psychology. I thought, ‘That sounds interesting, why not?’

So I didn’t set out to be a psychologist at all. In the end, I got a first and then went on to get a PhD from the University of Hertfordshire. During my undergraduate degree, I became interested in the work-related wellbeing of academics. Both my first

and second husbands were academics and so were most of our friends. This meant I had some insight into the heavy demands and role pressures they experience and the deep involvement they typically have in their work. For my undergraduate dissertation research, I was lucky enough to be sponsored by the (then) National Association for Teachers in Higher Education to do a national survey of wellbeing in the sector. I won a British Psychological Society prize for my dissertation research, which involved presenting it at the Division of Occupational Psychology [DOP] conference. This was very scary, but I found the conference very friendly and thoroughly enjoyed the experience. Then I got asked to do more and more research in that area and ended up looking at mental health and work–life balance in academics for my PhD.

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the psychologist january 2018 interview

by the HSE, it is eroding due to a growing culture of managerialism and disempowerment in higher education. This is a problem because academics expect a great deal of autonomy over their work – job control can offset the negative impact of demands on wellbeing, so it has serious implications.

The number of roles academics are expected to fulfil has also increased dramatically. It is no longer Later, I started to broaden the focus of the just about research and teaching, academics need to occupational groups I was working with – but I have always been interested in jobs which were in some way ‘sell’ their services externally as well as demonstrate the impact and reach of their work. There are also vocational and emotionally demanding. more pressures regarding pastoral care – students are Why did you choose occupational health psychology? experiencing more mental health problems and need reassurance and guidance, which can be emotionally It wasn’t called occupational health psychology when demanding. At the same time academics are required to I started out – the type of research I did came under keep up to date with their own fast-moving disciplines. the heading of ‘workplace stress’. Occupational health We have also found that support has changed over psychology broadened out the field considerably. It time. Perceptions of support from managers has concerns the application of psychology to improving decreased but support from colleagues has remained the quality of work life and to protecting and stable – which is a considerable source of satisfaction promoting the safety, health and wellbeing of workers. and wellbeing.

I am on the Executive Committee of the European One of the most powerful findings in our most Academy of Occupational Health Psychology. This was recent study, conducted with Siobhan Wray of York established in 1997 to support research, education and professional practice across Europe. We have started to St John University, is the high level of ‘change fatigue’.

This is a general sense of work closely with the DOP as we apathy or passive resignation have common interests and goals. towards organisational change.

“Peer support is of great It is a growing problem, not only in Many psychologists have key importance – for many, academia but also in other public figures that influenced the direction they took academically. relationships with peers is sector work, particularly within the NHS. Change fatigue can be highly Is this true for you? the most positive part of stressful and reduce job satisfaction I have been very lucky to meet a the job” and motivation, stifle creativity lot of people who are my heroes, and organisational citizenship and I have even interviewed some behaviours, and encourage of them in my role as Associate absenteeism and turnover. People need a period Editor for Interviews for this magazine. Tom Cox is a of stability, otherwise they may actively resist pioneer in occupational health psychology – he wrote beneficial change. the first book on stress I ever bought. Richard Lazarus We have also found that work–life conflict has and Susan Folkman are internationally recognised for increased dramatically. Academics are spending more their contributions to the field of stress and coping. and more hours working, taking time and energy away Susan is now doing some ground-breaking work on from their personal life. We have found a particularly caregiving, end-of-life care and bereavement in people high level of strain-based conflict, where people with HIV/AIDS. Christina Maslach is a major hero – I recently interviewed her for this magazine about how worry about work even when they aren’t actually doing it. This can threaten their health, their personal she developed the burnout construct, her struggles to relationships and, over time, their job performance. get it recognised by the academic community, and her In terms of mental health, over half of our participants recent intervention work. She is a real inspiration. scored at ‘caseness’ levels where some intervention is recommended. A similar pattern has been found in Over the years, you have published several surveys national studies of Australian academics, suggesting that have revealed high levels of work-related stress that wellbeing in the sector is a general problem. in academia.

My first national survey in the sector was conducted It seems to me that these problems could be in 1996, and I have done three further waves of data resolved with better management interventions. Line collection. We have used the work-related wellbeing managers didn’t come out very well in your surveys framework developed by the UK Health and Safety – is that something particular to academia, or do you Executive (HSE) to track sector-level changes over think we all complain about our line managers? time across a large sample of academics. We found Poor management is clearly an issue, but line managers that demands are increasing steadily over time. often get little training and support. In academia, Interestingly, even though academics perceive more people are often promoted to a management role control than the minimum standards recommended

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04/12/2017 12:57

because they excel at research and/or teaching. Then, when they are promoted, they have to stop doing the things they are good at and start doing things that they haven’t really been trained to do. There is a great deal of bureaucracy to wade through. Academics are also notoriously difficult to manage – somebody once said it is like herding cats, as they try to be as independent as possible. So there are problems on both sides, which can encourage conflict… management styles in academia probably need some re-thinking.

On a more positive note, you are also interested in resilience. I’ve noticed that resilience has been a pretty big topic since psychologists looked at the aftermath of 9/11. What can people do to improve levels of resilience?

Resilience is an important resource as it helps us overcome stress and adversity. My research with social workers, nurses, the clergy and prison officers has shown that it is crucial for people who do emotionally demanding jobs. People in such jobs need to be caring and compassionate, but they also have to manage their emotions effectively to avoid becoming over-involved with service users or overwhelmed by their needs.

Our early work aimed to identify the psychosocial factors that underpinned resilience in social workers.

We found that emotional intelligence, reflective ability and coping flexibility, as well as social support, were

key features of resilient people. A lack of resilience is a risk factor for the wellbeing of employees and the people they look after.

Based on this research, we developed a series of interventions for organisations and individuals to support resilience. A ‘tool-box’ type of approach seems most effective, as people are introduced to different strategies that they can choose from depending on the situation or their personal preference. Mindfulness, for example, can be very useful in building the capacity for resilience and protecting wellbeing, but we have found that it may be more attractive to people who have more highly developed reflective abilities.

Peer coaching is another good way to build resilience.

It’s a kind of formalised support system that is goalorientated and solution-focused. Emotional disclosure, where people write about their feelings, can also be very effective. These strategies have some value in building resilience and protecting health at the individual level, but organisations have a duty of care to protect the wellbeing of their staff. Even the most resilient social worker or nurse would struggle to survive in working conditions that are pathogenic.

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the psychologist january 2018 interview

Another area you have examined is compassion and empathy in nurses and social workers. Is it true that displaying high levels of empathy to patients can lead to compassion fatigue? And, if so, don’t we have a bit of a conundrum in that we want nurses who are compassionate and empathic – but this might make them ill?

Yes, absolutely. Compassionate ‘person-centred’ care has wide-ranging benefits for service users. Staff who are more compassionate and empathic also tend to find their work more satisfying – this ‘compassion satisfaction’ can protect against burnout. Nonetheless, there is growing evidence that compassion fatigue, characterised by emotional exhaustion, cynicism and feelings of disillusionment, are commonplace, and it is a key risk factor for employee health and retention as well as job performance. We have found that self-compassion, where people are as caring and understanding towards themselves as they are to others, helps build resilience and protects against compassion fatigue. It is vital to build a culture of compassion, but policy makers should appreciate the risk factors and provide workers with the skills and organisational support required to manage the emotional demands of the work effectively.

Nonetheless, we found the extent of mental health problems in the sector worrying – nearly three quarters of our participants scored at levels where intervention is recommended. Incidentally, recent research conducted by a colleague found that 92 per cent of officers in a single prison in England were experiencing anxiety and depression. Officers had problems winding down from the work, and sleeping problems and relationship breakdown were common. Interventions are clearly needed, but we found the provision of support to be very poor. Where it was available, uptake was low as staff were reluctant to disclose that they were not coping well and were concerned about You mentioned prison officers confidentiality. I am really proud earlier – tell me about your work of this research, because officers with them and the problems they clearly felt that nobody cared about “Staff who are more face. the problems they face. They were compassionate and A few years ago, I was approached really pleased that their working empathic also tend to by the Prison Officers Association. conditions had been brought into They were aware of the work I the public eye and invited me to find their work more had done with academics and their annual conference. We were satisfying” commissioned me to do a national invited to present the findings study of wellbeing in the prison of our research at the House of sector. Many feel that the prison Commons, and it has subsequently service is in crisis – the job in itself is physically and been taken to a select committee. So hopefully this mentally challenging, but the increasing demands, might lead to some changes. reducing resources and the fast pace of change have increased the risk of stress-related illness, absenteeism Let’s hope it does! So far you’ve been involved in and retention problems. Although I had previously work on empathy, wellbeing, compassion fatigue and worked with various occupational groups, I really had work–life balance, what’s next? no idea about what being a prison officer was like. We I’d love to do more research on interventions, as well as quickly realised that the job is often very dangerous identify ways to increase the uptake of support in work and emotionally demanding – officers are frequently in jobs where disclosing a ‘failure to cope’ can be highly exposed to harassment and violence and they have to stigmatised. Sadly, many people working in health and be very vigilant. Peer support is of great importance – social care seem to feel this way. By 2022 there will for many, relationships with peers is the most positive be an almost 50 per cent rise in the number of people part of the job. Many officers find the work rewarding needing some level of care. The increase in the pension and genuinely care about rehabilitating prisoners. age means that people will need to work for longer.

Although the work can be very satisfying, people are burning out. We must get a lot better at supporting people who work in these jobs. A multi-level approach is needed where individual resilience is supported by resilient organisations that, in turn, are underpinned by effective public policies. Changing policies and organisational practices is much more challenging than working at the individual level, but this is vital if things are to improve.

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04/12/2017 12:57

‘See the great picture, and don’t get lost in the daily tasks’ Telmo Mourinho Baptista, President of the European Federation of Psychologists’ Associations

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One important role for the European Semester, which is hosted by the UK from January to June 2018 The European Semester serves as a great opportunity to get together psychologists from all over Europe, and to understand the ways that psychology in a country develops and how the organisation that represents psychologists deals with the different challenges. It is a significant learning opportunity that reinforces the network of knowledge that EFPA wants to be.

a film in the British Council in Lisbon. The film was Knots, about the anti-psychiatry movement, based on the work of R.D. Laing. The person presenting the film was from a new faculty in Lisbon, the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences. I discovered that day that I could study psychology at the state university. The public studies of psychology were not allowed before the revolution of 1974 in Portugal. The next day I went to change my preferences, and in October of that year, I started.

One challenge Brexit brings for European psychology Brexit should allow us to think and to explain how the forces of divisiveness can sometimes win over the need for cohesion, how people perceive these solutions as the best for them, even when historical events could lead us to think otherwise. This understanding should be made with the most respect for the choices of the people.

It does not help to be dismissive or patronising. I think that we need to understand this very profoundly and derive consequences for politics and the choices that are now being presented to the different countries.

I can agree with reasons from both sides, but the final decision to leave the EU saddened me. The UK is a critical part of the EU. However, I am glad to have signed a joint statement initiated by the British Psychological Society the day after the referendum, stating ‘The result of the referendum on the UK’s future relationship with the European Union will not drive us apart as psychologists.’

One book you think all psychologists should read Principles of Psychology by William James, for its enormous contribution, and for the pleasure of reading about psychology in a writing style that seems to be lost for science. I know it is old stuff, but I like to go back to the beginning of the history (and stories) of psychology.

One person who inspired you My philosophy teacher in high school, Alberto Ferreira, was a model teacher and human being. He taught me the value of open discussions, intellectual pursuit, and the mutual respect as a basis for a relationship with students.

Also, he gave me an excellent background in philosophy and showed me how this area can be helpful for science, politics and other subjects.

One cultural recommendation Tchaikovsky Symphony No 6, ‘Pathétique’ conducted by a Russian conductor (Mravinsky, Gergiev or Kirill Petrenko).

It is one of my favourite pieces of music. I am a music lover, and most activities in my life have a music track.

One moment that changed the course of your career We were in 1978, two weeks before entering medical school (my choice of studies as I wanted to be a psychiatrist or a surgeon), and I went to the projection of

One thing that you would change about psychology I would like to have curricula that are more diverse regarding subjects outside psychology and more concerned about allowing people to have different practical experiences. Also, I would like to have more activism on behalf of psychology’s contribution to society.

One nugget of advice for aspiring psychologists Contribute to the wellbeing of the world. See the great picture, and don’t get lost in the daily tasks. We are making the world a better place.

One alternative career path you may have chosen Music, philosophy, medicine, and diplomacy, just to name a few. They will have to wait until my next lives.

One thing that makes me laugh I laugh easily and I try to see the comic side of life. Rare is the day when I don’t laugh about the small things of

04/12/2017 12:59

the psychologist january 2018 one on one

life. And I am a big fan of the British humour, my favourite series of all being Monty Python.

One of my greatest achievements The creation of the Order of Portuguese Psychologists (the national representative body of psychologists). It took seven years, and an enormous effort of many people, but one day in 2008 the law that created OPP became a reality.

Then we had to organise all the 20,000 psychologists in Portugal. I’m very proud of what we achieved.

One treasured possession I know they are not my possessions, but my friends are most important to me, and I am fortunate to have many from all over the world. They are my treasure, for sure.

And now with all the different communication apps I am closer to them. I am also a bit of a geek for tech stuff.

One hero from psychology past or present Jean Piaget.

One problem that psychology should deal with Psychological knowledge and practice should be more applied to the mediation of peace processes. We need to address with empathy and respect the needs of the conflicting partners. Without addressing the suffering, the hurt continues and becomes a barrier to finding peaceful solutions. We already have outstanding examples of this kind of work, but politicians need to know we can help.

psy 0118 p48_49 one.indd 49

One thing that organised psychology could do better The sharing of success stories of influencing policy with the knowledge derived from psychology. We don’t need to reinvent the wheel, and we should share more the successes that we have had so that we can have more influence in general. This is an ongoing project for me.

One great thing that psychology has achieved Psychology has established itself as a sound science with methods and approaches that can give us knowledge and insight on human behaviour, but also derive many possible applications to better the human condition in many areas. We shouldn’t be modest in our objectives.

Telmo Mourinho Baptista, right, pictured at the EFPA General Assembly in Amsterdam, with Society member Tony Wainwright

One hope for the future of psychology That psychology gains a significant role in contributing to the wellbeing of humankind. Our influence is still minimal if we consider what we have to offer in so many fields.

For that to happen, psychologists should be activists and be trained to have a public presence. It is essential to have a firm scientific ground for a field, and I think that psychology has achieved this. However, our citizens could benefit so much more from our knowledge if we can disseminate more what we can do and our successes.

One final thought I am optimistic about the future. I usually say, ‘Keep talking’. If we do, we will, in the end, find ways to solve our old and new problems.

04/12/2017 12:59

Seeing is believing

‘Ceci n’est pas une Ames room?’

(Image by Brian Rogers) The Oxford Compendium of Visual Illusions Arthur Shapiro & Dejan Todorovic (Eds.) Oxford University Press; Hb £162.50

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A

t the very start of this impressive book, Nicholas Wade’s opening chapter takes readers on a whirlwind tour of the early history of optical illusions. Wade notes that written accounts of optical oddities date back to antiquity, with Ptolemy (ad 100–170) providing an early classification of illusions into those concerned with colour, position, shape, size and movement. Fast-forward almost two thousand years, and the same type of organisational framework forms the backbone of this current compendium. The book is divided into 11 parts (including colour, faces, grouping, motion, and so on), with each part containing a series of essays reflecting different aspects of the general theme. All of the 115 essays are richly illustrated (including, of course, many, many illusions), and the glossy format of the book easily accommodates the colour images needed to bring many of the illusions alive. In addition, the authors have helpfully provided a companion website, and this allows readers to experience those illusions requiring video-based stimuli.

The range of illusions covered is breathtaking, and one would be hard-pressed to find a more complete picture of the current research into visual illusions. At one moment readers find themselves learning about individual differences and the perception of illusions, whilst a few pages later they discover the nuts and bolts of the Ames Window. The essays have been written by leading academics, and the writing feels both accessible and authoritative.

The brevity of the essays means that the book would act as a wonderful

introduction to the study of optical illusions. However, the depth and range of the writings means that even the most experienced of researchers will find something new and surprising here. All of the essays are well referenced, and so provide a useful gateway into additional work.

This book will not just inform and delight psychologists, but will also fascinate anyone interested in perception, including artists and designers.

In terms of potential criticisms, it might have been nice if some of the authors had focused more on the discovery of some of the illusions, in part, because such stories often provide a fascinating glimpse into the serendipitous nature of science (such as when a member of Richard Gregory’s laboratory rediscovered the Münsterberg illusion in the tiled wall of a Bristol café).

Also, it might have been good to have some of the essays reflect more on what has yet to be discovered within their specific domain (thus providing a useful resource for those wishing to conduct future research), and perhaps on the way in which some of the illusions have been used to tackle problems outside of the laboratory.

However, these are very minor gripes. Overall, this is a remarkable achievement. It presents an astonishing account of a vast amount of work, and deserves a place on the shelf of anyone interested in the current state of research into optical illusions. Like most illusions, this book has to be seen to be believed.

Reviewed by Professor Richard Wiseman, University of Hertfordshire Look out for our feature in next month’s issue: ‘The age of illusion’, in which Nicholas Wade discusses the emergence of visual illusions in the 19th century and their impact on the development of psychology.

04/12/2017 13:04

the psychologist january 2018 books

Some very interesting questions meditation rooted in Buddhist philosophy, it is possible I have always been interested in secular Buddhism to detach from the oleaginous rails of our desires and and evolutionary psychology and first heard the name simultaneously sit with noetic conflicts that we may Robert Wright after taking his Princeton Coursera on ordinarily seek to escape and at least periodically wrangle Buddhism and Modern Psychology in 2016. Anyone who our emotion life into a collaborative space rather than has taken this course or read Robert’s books will attest be blindly driven by naturally selected needs that are to his deceptively amiable style of reorganising expert heretofore obscured from our view. knowledge into witty but suitably challenging teaching While light on citations and relying heavily on and writing.

Wright’s own theories, this book does provoke some very In the The Moral Animal, published in 1994, Wright interesting questions on the subject of outlined how human desires were Buddhism and psychology, particularly selected for by evolution and noted that regarding the correlation Wright sees the result is that we are not necessarily Why Buddhism Is True: between the Buddhist teaching of notdesigned to see the world clearly or The Science and Philosophy of self and the modular model of the mind to be satisfied. But if we concede the Meditation and Enlightenment most recently expounded by Douglas human brain’s design has been selected Robert Wright T. Kenrick and Vladas Griskevicius to court unease, impatience, jealousy Simon & Schuster; Hb £20.00 in their book The Rational Animal. It and depression, then what are we as is at the very least an affable aid to individuals to do about it? those interested in meditation, evolutionary psychology, In Why Buddhism Is True, Wright makes the case for Buddhism and mindfulness-based cognitive therapy. mindfulness meditation rooted in Buddhist philosophy Its conclusion, brought to mind the infamous words of as a practical way to dispel the delusions that lead to the US statistician W. Edwards Deming: ‘In God we trust. suffering we feel, fastened to the hedonistic treadmill.

Everyone else, bring data.’

Where CBT interrogates the logic behind intrusive thoughts, Wright argues that Buddhist meditation seeks Reviewed by Niall James Holohan, to disembody thought in order to rebel against the musician, writer and psychology undergraduate at the agenda set for us by natural selection. We may not be in University of East London a position to defy our biological engineering but through

Human Neuroanatomy (2nd edn) James R. Augustine Wiley; Hb £104.00

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Keeping up to date Having completed my PhD in neuroanatomy, I am always excited to see a new anatomy book. As is the nature and rapid advances in our understanding of neuroanatomy, it is the unfortunate truth that anatomy textbooks can quickly become outdated and can easily overlook current developments in the field. It is clear from the outset that Augustine has paid attention to the current research and has tried his best to keep the content of this detailed summary of human neuroanatomy relevant.

It is commonplace nowadays for books to come with a companion website, and Human Neuroanatomy has an excellent one. The website provides an excellent tool for enthusiastic readers, or those

looking for additional information on a specific subject to gain a bit more from the book without making the book content too complex or intimidating for those requiring more of an introduction. This flexible approach makes Human Neuroanatomy suitable for a wide audience, from expert neuroscientists to undergraduate psychologists.

The book itself has an extensive contents list, which could be overwhelming at first glance.

Augustine however has done a good job of breaking down the content into easily digestible sections that flow on from one another in an easy-to-

follow way, making the large amount of information less intimidating.

Augustine begins with a basic, but detailed, introduction to the human nervous system and its components. Although the book is aimed at advanced students, researchers and clinicians, this introductory section makes it accessible to a beginner such as an undergraduate or a non-specialist.

This theme of accessibility continues throughout the chapters, with simple and easy-to-follow explanations followed by more complex in-depth sections.

Human Neuroanatomy offers an excellent source of information for those at any stage of their career, in neuroscience or psychology, or for someone with a general interest in brain science.

Reviewed by Dr Stacey A. Bedwell, Lecturer in Psychology, Birmingham City University

04/12/2017 13:04

‘Adventure is an important part of being human’ Jon Sutton hears from Eric Brymer, who has co-authored (with Robert Schweitzer) Phenomenology and the Extreme Sport Experience (Routledge).

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Why extreme sport?

Many years ago, when I first got interested in exploring extreme sports, I was studying for a master’s degree in sport and exercise psychology as well as working in the adventure industry. I was reading research that explained participation in terms of risk-taking personalities searching for thrills and excitement, while working with people who spent a great deal of time being careful.

My experience with people did not match the research I was reading.

I think one of the major issues at the time was that the models used to study extreme sport either came from traditional sports or the clinical field. So either extreme sports were seen as competitive sports or deviant activities. Hence the idea that extreme athletes are either trying to ‘conquer the elements’ or had something not quite right with them. I didn’t get round to undertaking the study at this time, which actually worked out well, but the idea had formed, and after my master’s I looked for a PhD opportunity. When I did begin a formal research project on the experience I was interested in exploring the most extreme sports, for example, BASE jumping, big wave surfing, waterfall kayaking and solo rope-free climbing.

To begin with, potential participants were quite wary of being approached because they are so often represented negatively as thrill seekers and adrenaline junkies.

However, when people realised that I really was after their

story, participants were highly articulate, with profound insights – not only to the extreme sport experience as something that stands alone, but as something that is an integral part of being human.

What’s different about your approach and this book?

In the very early days I was going down the same route, of holding predetermined notions of risk and thrills, adopting a theory (such as sensation seeking) that satisfied this notion, and testing participants.

The approach I eventually took, phenomenology, starts with the notion of not knowing anything about the experience that you wish to investigate (and there are processes that researchers need to follow to help with this) and then encourages the researcher to explore. For example, by asking those who do know what it is about.

In most areas of study this approach (when followed properly) highlights differences between the traditional theory-driven approach and the lived experience.

The book introduces the reader to phenomenology and the practice of phenomenology and then works through the traditional approach to understanding extreme sports before presenting the phenomenological description.

Have you taken explanations based on hermeneutic phenomenology back to the participants, in those terms, and if so how were they received?

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the psychologist january 2018 books As part of the research process the final description was sent to participants to ask for feedback. In the end this is not essential because the researcher’s insights can add depth to an experience, but the process can add to the findings. All participants were happy with the interpretations and many reported that the descriptions had revealed aspects of the experience that they could not quite express. Beyond this I have had people contact me who were not part of the project just to let me know that the thesis puts words to an experience that they struggled to articulate. In fact, the film based on my research came from that very reason.

In the extreme, can we find themes that unite psychology?

For the moment it is early days but research is now exploring gender differences, personality, neurological activity, decision making, and using ecological approaches, cognitive approaches, positive psychology approaches and social psychological approaches.

Extreme sports are really for anyone who wishes to give them a go. You do not need a special personality or be from a particular gender but you do need to develop a sound understanding of self, the activity and the environment. The benefits are profound and change the way participants experience themselves, others and the environment.

Have psychologists researched how extreme sports participation affects those around the participant?

Nothing formal has been done here, but of course those close to participants are worried. I think we need to realise though that while a mistake can be disastrous, participants take great care to minimise the chance of that happening. Participants know what the downside is, but they do not have a death wish – in fact I would argue that it is the opposite, it’s a ‘life-wish.’

A desire to live life to its fullest. They are highly trained and thoughtful athletes. For example, a BASE jumper noted how he read all the death reports in order to work out what not to do. Of course things can still go wrong and when it does the margins are small. But then a couch potato is guaranteed to knock 10 years off their life.

Adventure is an important part of being human, it teaches us about what we are capable of, lets us find out how capable we really are, opens up doors to discovering our own inner capabilities and facilitates growth. Of course we do not all need to take adventure to the extreme. However, most athletes that do choose extreme sports are adamant that they work well within their comfort zone just in case they need to tap into something a bit more because of an unforeseen challenge. This is perhaps another way that extreme sport athletes are different from traditional sport athletes. They never give it all, in the sport metaphor way. Having said all that, yes of course it is a worry for family members. Some of course have no choice in being connected to extreme athletes, others do have choice and

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perhaps that makes a difference. However, I remember talking to one partner who suggested that if their partner was not doing what they loved to do, then they would not be who they were.

All those you spoke to were clear that words were inadequate tools for exploring core elements of their experience. Yet were there times when what they said brought you up short, made you think ‘that’s a really key psychological insight’?

I think there were lots of occasions where this happened and for different reasons. The realisation that aspects of the activity are beyond words was one of those occasions.

This was not something I was really expecting and came out not necessarily because people said it was beyond words. On many occasion it was because when people tried to describe the experience they relied on metaphor or even mixed metaphors to get close. For example, a BASE jumper tried to summarise it as: ‘It’s more of a self-discovery activity, it’s more of a spiritual esoteric… umm... it’s another form of expression that’s so outside any normal type of activity yet you can get results from it that are so outside anything you’d expect from any normal activity.’ Another extreme athlete tried to put the experiences into words through evoking similar experiences: ‘It’s just better than sex, better than any shit like that it’s just very very hard to describe, like I say only the guys that have done it would be able to put it into words… if they can.’

Another really interesting perspective was comparing extreme sports to everyday experiences: ‘I often dream that I’m able to take somebody else’s being and put it inside my body just to let them look out through my eyes because it’s such an amazing situation to be in. There’s no way they could possibly understand the feelings, to feel what I’m feeling and to see what I’m seeing at that point partly because you never get to see those things. It’s not logical for me, it feels like being in another world. I think it’s an overused quote from me really but to go back into the real world you have to step through this door and arrive back at the bottom and the only way back to that real world where everyone else is sitting waiting is to drop over the fall.’

I suppose the most interesting aspect in general was that rather than describing the experience as exciting, loud, thrilling – as would be expected from the traditional perspective – and also evoked when watching YouTube videos with heavy rock music – the experience was spoken about as relaxing, free, quiet, calm and mindful.

The complete opposite.

What’s next?

I am still involved in research in this area and gradually attempting to reveal the experience… we hope to know enough about the experience to perhaps use aspects as psychological interventions. We have already started this with investigations into sports such as parkour, skiing, parachuting, snowboarding as a mental health interventions. Adventure generally seems to be a very powerful facilitator of profound change.

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2018 30 years of The Psychologist…

the

the psychologist

psychologist january 2018

january 2018

Rethinking addiction Nick Heather

www.thepsychologist.org.uk

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Thank you to everyone who has contributed over the years.

Our development continues – keep an eye on www.bps.org.uk/thepsychologist (@psychmag on Twitter) and www.bps.org.uk/digest (@researchdigest on Twitter) for all the latest

‌and 15 years of our Research Digest

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‘I did something difficult and courageous’ Sathnam Sanghera’s first book, The Boy with the Topknot, is a touching, humorous and emotional rites-of-passage memoir about a second-generation Indian growing up in Britain, and the mental health secrets he discovers in his family. It was adapted for television and aired on BBC Two in November 2017, receiving high critical acclaim. We spoke to him about the book and its TV adaptation.

What were you looking to achieve by telling your story?

The whole thing was an extravagant quarter-life crisis.

I can’t actually remember what order things happened, but I think I began the whole thing as a way of explaining to my family why I wasn’t going to marry a Sikh girl, as they desperately wanted me to – having spent my twenties lying to them, and to myself. But then, when I began to find out troubling things about my family’s history, it became something else entirely. I’m amazed I thought it was a good idea, and even more amazed it mostly worked out.

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Has the TV version given you a different perspective on your own life?

Yes. Seeing Sacha Dhawan’s sensitive performance gave me something unexpected – a feeling of compassion

towards my younger self. It’s very easy, with a book you don’t reread, to assume the worst. But seeing him agonise made me realise that, for all the embarrassing things I have been, I did something difficult and courageous in writing the book. I took more than a year out of my career and life to have painful conversations with my family and to tell their story. Besides, if you are not embarrassed by the person you were 10 years ago, then you are probably not trying to live life deeply enough.

When you look back on your childhood, do you see it as you did then, or through a prism of things you know now?

For example, ‘It’s 1979, I’m three years old, and like all breakfast times during my youth it begins with Mum combing my hair, a ritual for which I have to sit down on

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the psychologist january 2018 culture the second-hand, floral-patterned settee, and lean forward, like I’m presenting myself for execution…’

Is that how you saw it back then?

It’s strange how writing about your childhood changes the way you remember it. I don’t actually have a great memory and had to reconstruct it journalistically – asking lots of people who were there to fill in the gaps, and examining photographs in detail. Now I remember it how I wrote it, and doubtless the film version has reshaped my memories again. It’s actually quite a thrill to discover something I didn’t write about now.... and to have it for myself.

Do you think stigma around mental health in the Punjabi Sikh community led to worse outcomes for your father and sister? Is the experience of mental illness different in tightly bound communities?

The level of ignorance about severe mental health in Indian communities is profound. But the story is also complicated. Several studies have demonstrated that people who have schizophrenia in developing countries such as India, and people from such cultural backgrounds, have a better chance of improvement than those who live in, or are from, the industrialised world. Various hypotheses have been put forward. One is that there are more opportunities for employment in the Third World, and a meaningful social role helps.

Another possible explanation is that rates of damaging emotional involvement with an unwell relative, are rarer in Indian than European communities.

Does the lack of scientific and academic consensus around schizophrenia frustrate you? What would you like to see more/less of from psychology and psychologists?

It is important not to over-stress the problems that Indian communities have with schizophrenia, given that even in the West, at various points through history, mental illness has been blamed on the devil, masturbation, character weakness, and for much of the 20th century many blamed bad mothering – so-called ‘schizophregenic’ mothers were thought to have so corrupted their child’s development that when their offspring entered the real world, they went mad. The lack of clarity is frustrating, but it also means there is hope of finding a clear cause one day, and perhaps a cure. I’d like simply to see lots more research.

Do you feel you’ve successfully bridged the gap between the world you were born into and the world you’re in now?

Yes. The real thrill about the film was that my family were present at the screenings… an entire new generation, my nephews and nieces, have read the book and appreciate what we went through and how amazing my parents are.

Find out more about Sathnam Sanghera at www.sathnam.com

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Man and woman intertwine If I told you that Carl Jung created Aquaman or that The Incredible Like Liam Neeson’s Kinsey (2004), Hulk was invented by Ivan Pavlov, here was one psychologist whose you’d correctly suspect that I was theories and sex life became deeply lying to you. Nevertheless, Wonder intertwined… quite literally in this Woman, the most popular female superhero of all time – featured in two case as Marston’s fondness for ropes and sado-masochistic role-play major blockbusters this year alone became more and more apparent. It – was the brainchild of controversial is fascinating how much it dominated psychologist Dr William Moulton – if that’s the mot juste – the early Marston. This film about him is never Wonder Woman comic strips. less than compelling.

The film somehow avoids making While his research on systolic it seem salacious, however. By blood pressure and deception, which concentrating heavily on Elizabeth led to the polygraph lie-detector and Olive, one strident, one shy, test, was dealt its final blow when and played superbly by Rebecca occupational psychologist Clive Hall and Bella Heathcote, the two Fletcher and his crack British emerge as characters Psychological Society more interesting and review team discredited film maybe more important the instrument to Professor Marston than Luke Evans’s the point where now and the Marston. In fact, there is only Jeremy Kyle will Wonder Women a deliberately feminist still use it, his DISC Angela Robinson tone to the proceedings, model of emotion has (Director) a touch ironic given how – perhaps inexplicably much Marston made of – proved more durable. the differences between Marston felt people men and women. were a combination of Like Hitchcock (2012), Dominance, Inducement, which emphasised how Submission and important his wife Alma Compliance. After his was to the Master of death, this formed Suspense’s films, so it the basis of a 1958 is here with Marston’s personality questionnaire theories and indeed still widely used in Wonder Woman herself, occupational selection at least as much an and available in various empowered female icon guises from various as a fetishistic male publishers. Most of them fantasy. Marston put have changed the names it this way: ‘Frankly, of a couple of the scales Wonder Woman is psychological (and not necessarily the same ones) propaganda for the new type of because it all sounds so kinky. woman who should, I believe, rule And indeed it is. the world.’

Marston’s private life created This is a mature, accurate scandal (the film begins in 1928 (as much as any biopic can be) when prohibition was in full swing and immensely entertaining film. and, while Cole Porter might have Marston, like Freud, was to some penned ‘Anything Goes’ in 1934, it extent a product of the era in which was clear that, at the time, very little he lived, though in many ways was went – in the American bedroom at considerably more ahead of his time. least). He had a complex three-way relationship with his wife Elizabeth and research student Olive Byrne, the Read more of the origin story of three of them often sleeping together, Wonder Woman on our website.

Reviewed by George Sik, a consultant which lost him his job as a lecturer psychologist at eras ltd and got him kicked off campus.

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Courtesy Alexander Gray Associates, New York/© Coco Fusco/Artists Rights Society (ARS) New York. Coco Fusco, Operation Atropos, 2006 Film still

© Ai Weiwei Studio; Courtesy Lisson Gallery

exhibition Age of Terror: Art since 9/11 Imperial War Museum

Ai Weiwei, Surveillance Camera with Plinth, 2015, Marble

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Deeply murky waters The Imperial War Museum has always been one of London’s more dramatic museums. Massive battleship guns guard the entrance, aptly setting the scene for a ferocious arsenal of planes, tanks and assorted other weapons waiting inside. The major conflicts of the 20th century are covered extraordinarily well within the museum, but it has traditionally struggled in terms of how to represent the lesser clashes. Northern Ireland’s Troubles, for example, was for a very long time reduced to a single cabinet in an obscure corner.

The Museum though has made conscious efforts to recognise the importance of the ‘Wars on Terror’ in recent years. A few years ago, as part of a major refurbishment, a highly prominent place was handed (and is still given) to the wreckage of a car crushed in a suicide bombing in Baghdad. The Museum’s current major exhibition, Age of Terror: Art Since 9/11, represents an even bigger commitment to reflect the importance of terrorism in the modern era. Currently taking up almost the entire third floor, this exhibition houses 50 works that explore and represent major themes of terrorism and the state’s response to it.

The headline pieces in the exhibition include Ai Weiwei’s marble bust of a CCTV camera, and Iván Navarro’s much more impactful The Twin Towers, which uses mirrors and lights to create an optical illusion of two empty spaces disappearing into the floor to represent the fallen towers. Cognitive psychology can certainly appreciate the techniques used by Navarro, but overall the display of most distinct relevance to the psychology,

More online: At www.thepsychologist.org.uk/reviews, we hear from Dr Chrissy Jayarajah, a Consultant Perinatal Psychiatrist with Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust, about her involvement in a storyline for the popular BBC soap EastEnders.

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in my opinion, is Coco Fusco’s Operation Atropos (see above). As a profession, the American Psychological Association drifted into deeply murky waters as it became clear that key APA officials colluded with the United States Department of Defense to maintain loose ethical guidelines that effectively helped facilitate the psychological torture of detainees. This film documents the use of these same psychological torture techniques against a group of volunteers. The torture is carried out by former military personnel and mimics the tactics used on suspected terrorists in a variety of settings over the past 16 years. There are strong echoes of the Stanford prison experiment throughout and the impact on the volunteer ‘detainees’ at times certainly seems real. Operation Atropos might not have made it past many university ethics committees, but I can’t help but feel a wide viewing among psychologists would be valuable. See it if you can.

Subtly compelling is Francis Alÿs’ deceptively simple ‘Sometimes doing is undoing, sometimes undoing is doing’. Projected on a large screen is a video of a British solider in Afghanistan filmed assembling and disassembling his weapon. On an adjacent screen, a Taliban fighter does the same with his weapon. No words are spoken and both men, separately, go about their tasks with a calm focus. As a piece of artwork it subtly but pervasively challenges the idea that the enemy is an ‘other’ and underlines instead only shared humanity.

Age of Terror is a sombre, critical and thoughtprovoking exhibition. Entirely as it should be. I commend it to you.

Age of Terror: Art since 9/11 runs until 28 May 2018.

For more information go to tinyurl.com/y7bz5jt6.

Reviewed by Professor Andrew Silke, Cranfield University, whose next book, The Routledge Handbook on Terrorism and Counterterrorism, is published in March.

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the psychologist january 2018 culture

film Marjorie Prime Michael Almereyda (Writer and Director)

Understated and rewarding At some unspecified time in the future Marjorie (Lois Smith) is an 80-year-old widow living with dementia. Her daughter Tess (Gena Davis) and John, her son-in-law (Tim Robbins), arrange for a holographic representation of her husband, Walter, to be present in their house. The version of Walter Prime (Jon Hamm) that Marjorie chooses is of Walter when he was a much younger man. The intention is that Walter Prime will comfort Marjorie, in much the same way that simulated presence therapy or the video or audio recordings from an attachment figure are currently used in dementia care.

In order for the computerised Walter Prime to learn more about the real Walter, so he/it must be told stories – by Marjorie and by John, as Tess refuses to see the re-animated version of her father. In this way, through these confused, sometimes contradictory memories, we slowly learn about the historical Walter. We also learn about Walter’s relationship with Marjorie and about the secrets in their life – and how the suppression of emotion and memories ripples through time and across generations.

While the context for the story is Marjorie’s dementia, this is a film that is more about the remembering of the autobiographical past than it is about

Marjorie’s struggle to recall the recent past. Its focus is on memory and relationships rather than the day-today business of living alongside Alzheimer’s disease: it is about the repression of trauma rather than the stress of caregiving. The hologram of Walter is not, from the point of view of dementia care, especially relevant – it is, in essence, a plot device around which the lives of the remaining members of the family can evolve.

Marjorie Prime is a quiet film with understated performances that allow the underlying despair of this family to be gradually revealed. Its power comes from the slow, measured pace at which the characters and the sadness of their lives are revealed. The small cast are excellent: Jon Hamm’s Walter Prime is enquiring but unemotional and complements the equally unemotional, but puzzled and forgetful, Marjorie and the uncertain Tess. It is sparse and concentrated, but also a rewarding experience.

Although not the traditional science fiction film, Marjorie Prime nevertheless raises thought-provoking questions about the nature of identity and the selfprotective nature of forgetfulness.

Reviewed by Richard Cheston, Professor of Dementia Research, University of the West of England

The thwarted genius within

Nancy Doyle on her involvement with BBC Two’s Employable Me When I received the call from Optomen productions in 2014 to discuss an idea, I thought my fairy godmother was looking after me! My whole career, from aged 18 when I was a support worker for teenagers with learning disabilities, has been about creating positivity around disability. I set up Social Enterprise Genius Within CIC in 2011 to address the lack of understanding, poor practice and lack of evidence-based solutions for workplace inclusion. Here was a team who wanted to find out more, and could do what I had been unable to do – change the narrative on a national scale.

Despite my nervousness that the cutting room would bias the programme towards patronising sympathy or judgemental views on motivation, the first BBC Two series held the balance beautifully. We saw the genuine struggles created by trying to fit in to a neurotypical, able-ist world, and the thwarted genius within. We also saw how individuals were able to flourish in the right circumstances with the right

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attitude and basic adjustments.

Series two was a joy to make.

We filmed much more of the journey.

How does a person go from feeling hopeless and frustrated to competent and confident? It’s not just about positive assessment, but also about coaching, working with peers to feel less isolated, and practising new skills. This year’s contributors put their remarkably brave faces straight to the camera and told it like it is. They shared their heartache, their passion, their hopes and dreams.

We owe them such massive appreciation for inviting us to see their vulnerability such that we might learn to respect them and be inspired, rather than feeling sorry for them or suggesting that they are failing because they aren’t trying hard enough.

In terms of psychology, I am relying on social cognitive learning theory.

We know that through a bit of knowledge transfer, role-modelling in peer groups and vicarious learning we can create the conditions for mastery experiences.

This is why the group workshops are more powerful than 1:1. They also address the issues in social identity – unemployment is isolating, disability is isolating, by bringing people together we give them a chance to develop a new social ‘ingroup’ where they can feel welcome and empowered. So many of these ideas are reflected in our recent British Psychological Society report, Psychology at Work: Improving Wellbeing and Productivity in the Workplace.

Employers are more and more open to the idea that disability is an untapped talent resource. We need to do our part as occupational psychologists and research reasonable adjustments so that employers know what to do. There needs to be a clear link between performance difficulties, reasonable adjustments and career success and progression. We need to stop research diagnosis and start researching intervention evaluations.

Employable Me 2 shows how dramatic the changes are for people who are given a chance.

04/12/2017 13:07

East meets West at the edge of the ocean Lucas Richert on the Esalen Institute, pioneer of the human potential movement

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n 1962, on an exquisite stretch of land bordering the Pacific Ocean in Big Sur, California, two Stanford graduates, Michael Murphy and Dick Price, established a small retreat and workshop centre called The Esalen Institute.

At the edge of the vast and unrelenting ocean, The Esalen Institute created a safe space where individuals could explore what Aldous Huxley called ‘human potentialities’ – and all that this included. Its founders, Michael Murphy and Dick Price, envisioned the integration and expansion of humanistic psychology alongside Eastern philosophies. Holistic approaches to wellness and personal Key sources transformation that involved the body, mind and spirit would thrive.

Caldwell, S.F. (1975, March). The Human The end of the 1960s and the Potential Movement: Forms of body/ 1970s, of course, also saw the rise movement/nonverbal experiencing. of transactional analysis (see my Paper presented at the 42nd Annual Conference of the California Association piece in the September 2017 issue) for Health, Physical Education, and and primal therapy, and it seemed Recreation, Los Angeles, CA. Retrieved an especially propitious moment for 1 November 2017 from http://files.eric. the emergence of Esalen. It attracted ed.gov/fulltext/ED110423.pdf all manner of thinkers, artists, Goldman, M.S. (2012). American soul psychologists and philosophers, rush: Esalen and the rise of spiritual privilege. New York: New York University including Erik Erikson, Ken Kesey, Press.

Buckminster Fuller, Aldous Huxley, Haldeman, P. (2015, 28 November). The John Lilly, Abraham Maslow, Linus return of Werner Erhard, father of selfPauling, Fritz Perl, Arnold Toynbee help. The New York Times. Retrieved and Alan Watts. Musicians showed 1 November 2017 from www.nytimes. up, such as Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, com/2015/11/29/fashion/the-return-ofwerner-erhard-father-of-self-help.html George Harrison, Joni Mitchell, and Kripal J.J. (2007). Esalen: America and the members of Crosby, Stills, Nash the religion of no religion. Chicago: & Young. Some called the institute University of Chicago Press. and its ideas radical, yet in his Kripal, J.J. & Shuck, G.W. (Eds.) (2005).

‘Critique on primal therapy’ Alfred On the edge of the future: Esalen and Yassky wrote that ‘all therapeutic the evolution of American culture.

Bloomington, IN: Indiana University approaches are anchored in Zeitgeist Press. and therefore reflect many aspects of Leonard, G.B. (1988). Walking on the the time and culture.’ edge of the world. Boston, MA: Houghton Liberated from any university, Mifflin. think tank, or religious organisation, Yassky, A.D. (1979). Critique on Esalen offered an extensive mix of primal therapy. American Journal of Psychotherapy, 33(1), 119–127. workshops by psy-sciences experts and a variety of other authors, scholars and shamans.

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The highly regarded psychologist Carl Rogers added to and reinforced Esalen’s human potential movement.

His theories of the self, predicated on humanism, existentialism and phenomenology, were highly influential. Fritz Perl, the German-born psychiatrist, taught Gestalt therapy to visitors, which underlined the value of enhanced awareness of sensation, perception, bodily feelings, emotion and behaviour in the present moment. He also resided at Esalen for over five years. Maslow, a world famous psychologist,

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the psychologist january 2018 looking back

proponent of self-actualisation and founder of the well-cited hierarchy of needs, provided lectures and guidance. Both Perls’s Gestalt therapy and Maslow’s humanistic psychology were two of the foremost trends in mental health in the 1960s and beyond, yet they did not dominate Esalen’s curriculum in any way.

Rather, Esalen promoted an approach that emphasised East-meeting-West, meditation, yoga, life coaching, encounter groups, and personal and spiritual development as a form of lifelong learning. Christian Evangelicalism intersected with Protestantism, Essence faiths and Gnosticism. Psychological and paranormal phenomena were accepted, while Tantric philosophies and yoga were highlighted. Traditional dichotomies of mental health and illness were rejected at Esalen, and a spotlight was placed on helping individuals create more vital and meaningful lives; indeed, dualism was rebuffed, whereas the concept of ‘holism’ was embraced. Besides encounter groups and a variety of non-traditional therapies (including the Gestalt therapy, psychodrama, transactional analysis, primal scream therapy, and Morita therapy), the human potential movement also included several disciplines

and practices involving self-healing, self-improvement and self-awareness, and Zen Buddhism, astrology, art, dance and various systems of body movement and manipulation. Drugs were also pervasive.

The Esalen Institute thus expanded into the leading venue for new (age) approaches committed to self-transformation. And the human potential movement was the title of this approach. According to Stratton Caldwell, something of a hippie intellectual himself, it focused ‘not upon meeting the social, political and economic wants and needs of the disadvantaged and dispossessed, but rather the psychological/sociological/spiritual hunger of many affluent and advantaged citizens…’.

The movement brought novel individual and group psychotherapies together, with an attention on improving relationships, rather than on healing old psychic wounds. Human potential psychology, according to its adherents, attracted Americans because it fundamentally redefined psychotherapy as a context for personal growth instead of recovery from mental illness, and it provided group experiences that were not as time- or money-consuming as traditional therapies.

Graham Nash and Joni Mitchell wait before performing at the Big Sur Folk Festival at the Esalen Institute on 14– 15 September 1969 in Big Sur, California (Photo

by Robert Altman/ Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images)

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At the same time, public service and support for liberal social reform constituted another area of interest at Esalen, and the Institute’s political Equal parts Zen Buddhism and Dale attitude bridged spiritual privilege Carnegie, Erhard created and sold and worldly activities beyond a programme called EST (short for the confines of Big Sur. True selfErhard Seminars Training) in hotel actualisation – authentic fulfilment ballrooms across the country, a of human potential – had to include sort-of cultish offshoot of Esalen. the pursuit of social justice and Lucas Richert is a Lecturer These combative training sessions peace. Actualised individuals were in History at the University of – aimed at business persons and compassionate toward those who Strathclyde. He is the author of government employees – had clients were less fortunate and were thus Conservatism, Consumer Choice, take responsibility for their lives obligated to support others to lead and the FDA During the Reagan and ‘get it’ by discovering there was, improved lives.

Era: A Prescription for Scandal actually, nothing at all to get.

In assessing the mental health (2014) and the upcoming Strange Celebrities who participated landscape of the 1970s, Alfred Medicines: Drugs, Science, and in EST included Diana Ross, Joe Yassky, the Executive Director of the Big Pharma in Culture (2018).

Namath, Yoko Ono and Jerry American Psychotherapy Seminar lucas.richert@strath.ac.uk Rubin. With over 100,000 clients, Center, based in Manhattan, Newsweek anointed Mr Erhard held that the tectonic plates of ‘a celebrity guru who retails enlightenment’. (Yoko mental health shifted. Americans were different.

Ono and John Lennon, who of course experimented The therapeutic geography had perceptibly altered. with many substances, also underwent Arthur Janov’s As he put it, Americans ‘are becoming alienated controversial primal therapy in 1970 after The Beatles and are hungering for a sense of meaning, identity, disbanded – and, along with 1970’s ‘primal concept happiness, and even salvation, we are wanting more album’ John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band, they helped from therapies and therapists. One way of putting it popularise the therapy. is that in many ways psychotherapy has taken over Numerous individuals believed human potential the function of religion. Therefore, the therapist and self-actualisation could be reached neither is supposed to take over the function and roles of quickly nor easily. For The New York Times magazine, shaman, guru, wiseman, minister, rabbi, or priest. the dapper, trenchcoat-wearing peddler of self-help We are expected to help with spiritual matters on was ‘the king of the brain snatchers’. The criticism the one hand and scientific on the other…’ intensified as EST continued to grow. It was labelled By 1971 Esalen was the model for more than 90 a cult that practised mind control (verbal abuse, sleep similar centres, known informally as ‘Little Esalens’. deprivation), as well as a smoke-and-mirrors grift They were large and small, rural and urban, with the that exploited its followers (heavy recruiting, endless majority located in California or in or near major ‘graduate seminars’). cities like Chicago, Boston and New York. (Much like The ideas and practices behind Esalen have since radical psychiatry grew after 1968.) Most survived for found the cultural mainstream. While the glitzier less than a decade. By the early 1970s there were an and unconventional features of the human potential estimated 150 to 200 growth centres modelled after movement have largely been relegated to fads of the Esalen throughout the United States. Most of these 1960s and 1970s, such as EST (Erhard Seminars centres highlighted, as Caldwell put it in the argot Training), it has endured in other forms. The American of the time: ‘humanness, wholeness, the integrated Society of Humanistic Psychologists remains active. totality of the person, providing experiences for Journals in the field include the Journal of Humanistic individuals valuing sensing/feeling varied ways Psychology, Journal of Creative Behavior, Journal of of knowing as means of personal/interpersonal/ Transpersonal Psychology, among others. transpersonal/organizational facilitation of growth/ Popular culture abounds with reference to Esalen change in awareness, consciousness, behaviour’. and its hybrid philosophy, from Mad Men to Madonna, Publicity for Esalen and these growth centres, in to references to New Age spirituality in politics Life, Newsweek, Ramparts, Look, and Time, contributed and films. In Jeffrey Kripal and Glenn Shuck’s 2005 to the Institute’s reputation as a catalyst for individual edited volume, Esalen was described as best ‘located psychological transformation, improved intimate and understood as a utopian experiment suspended relationships, and new social arrangements. Seventeen between the revelations and promises of religious books by authors directly associated with the Institute tradition and the democratic, scientific, and pluralist were published between 1969 and 1975, all as part of revolutions of modernity and now postmodernity’. the short-lived Esalen/Viking series.

As Robert Fuller noted, Esalen ‘helped put into While Esalen was the institutional pioneer of the circulation’ a metalanguage that ‘has contributed to human potential movement, if it had a single avatar, a new cultural and religious outlook’. a solo travelling salesman, it was Werner Erhard.

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the psychologist january 2018 looking back

what to seek out on

the

psychologist website this month

Exclusive content ‘It’s not an easy conversation to have with a kid who thinks they’re invincible’ Dr Carla Sofka, Professor of Social Work at Siena College, Loudonville, New York, on the role of digital and social media in supporting bereaved students.

Get involved!

Share your ‘lost finding’, thoughts on cities, the night, the ‘marvellous mundane’, and more

‘Immerse yourself in a psychological environment’ Hetashi Bawa on what volunteering, and serving as an Honorary Assistant Psychologist, has added to what she learnt at university.

The power of television We spoke to Dr Chrissy Jayarajah, a Consultant Perinatal Psychiatrist with Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust, about her involvement in a storyline for the popular BBC soap EastEnders.

From the archive 8 years ago – a special issue on social inclusion

Find all this and so much more via

http://thepsychologist.bps.org.uk

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AZ the

psychologist

Karla Novak

to

M ...is for Mundane

Suggested by Michael Apter, who is the progenitor of reversal theory @MichaelJApter ‘Psychology rarely seems to study widespread, everyday, seemingly banal phenomena. We put our subjects in organised situations with clear-cut goals and incentives, and seem to assume that people are permanently motivated to achieve things. Is it time for a psychology of doing nothing, messing around, the marvellous mundane? Aspects of mind and behaviour that, on closer inspection, reveal fundamentals about human nature? As a character in Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray says, “Unnecessary things are our only necessity”.’

According to James Pennebaker, ‘The smallest, most commonly used, most forgettable words serve as windows into our thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. The ways people use pronouns, articles, and other everyday words are linked to their personality, honesty, social skills, and intentions.’ Read our interview online.

80

In a 2016 study covered on our Research Digest, Emily Walton-Pattison and colleagues at Newcastle

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coming soon… the age of illusions; grief; dating; plus all our usual news, views, reviews, interviews, and much more...

University set out ‘a preliminary psychology of binge TV watching’.

Trevor Crawford (Lancaster University) studies in detail how people make tea, as a potential early marker of Alzheimer’s.

What’s the best way for a goalkeeper to save a penalty in football?

To do (relatively speaking) nothing. So why do they nearly always dive?

See tinyurl.com/yc7f4zrk Alexa Hepburn (Rutgers University) is interested in burping, as an example of children’s social infractions.

Does your work in psychology involve the mundane? The everyday, small and trivial that builds to the bigger picture?

Get in touch with the editor jon.sutton@bps.org.uk

A to Z Tweet your suggestions for any letter to @psychmag using the hashtag #PsychAtoZ or email the editor on jon.sutton@ bps.org.uk

contribute... reach 50,000 colleagues, with something to suit all. See www.thepsychologist.org.uk/ contribute or talk to the editor, Dr Jon Sutton, jon.sutton@bps.org.uk, +44 116 252 9573 comment... email the editor, the Leicester office, or tweet @psychmag to advertise... reach a large and professional audience at bargain rates: see details on inside front cover

Entries so far are collated at https:// thepsychologist. bps.org.uk/ psychology-z

Search for more on this topic and any other via www.bps.org.uk/thepsychologist and www.bps.org.uk/digest

04/12/2017 13:17

Find out more online at www.bps.org.uk

President Nicola Gale President Elect Professor Kate Bullen Honorary General Secretary Dr Carole Allan Honorary Treasurer Professor Ray Miller Chair, Membership and Standards Board Dr Mark Forshaw Chair, Education and Public Engagement Board Vacant Chair, Research Board Professor Daryl O’Connor Chair, Professional Practice Board Alison Clarke

society notices

society vacancies

Psychology in the Pub (South West of England Branch) Bath, 3i January 2018 See p.6 Division of Clinical Psychology Annual Conference Cardiff, 17–18 January 2018 See p.16 Division of Health Psychology Annual Conference Gateshead, 22 February 2018 See p.34 BPS conferences and events See p.46 CPD workshops 2017/18 See p.64 BPS Annual Conference Nottingham, 2–4 May 2018 See p.71 Division of Academics, Researchers & Teachers in Psychology Inaugural Conference Birmingham, 15 January 2018 See p.78

British Psychological Society President 2019–2020 See advert p.17 Contact Zoë Mudie zoe.mudie@bps.org.uk Closing date 2 February 2018

The Society has offices in Belfast, Cardiff, Glasgow and London, as well as the main office in Leicester.

All enquiries should be addressed to the Leicester office (see inside front cover for address).

The British Psychological Society was founded in 1901, and incorporated by Royal Charter in 1965. Its object is ‘to promote the advancement and diffusion of a knowledge of psychology pure and applied and especially to promote the efficiency and usefulness of Members of the Society by setting up a high standard of professional education and knowledge’.

Extract from The Charter

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