Toward a better approach to goodness: Comments on Van der Helm and Leeuwenberg (1996).

Some regularities are more salient to the visual system than others. P. A. Van der Helm and E. L. J. Leeuwenberg (see record 1996-01780-002) have proposed a new approach that quantifies the goodness of a pattern's regularity as the number of holographic identities constituting the regularity, relative to the total amount of information needed to describe the pattern. This holographic approach to goodness was compared with previous approaches and was presented in relation to metatheoretical issues. These 3 aspects are discussed further here. First, the theory is shown to contain implausible assumptions and unfortunate gaps with respect to the required processing. Second, Van der Helm and Leeuwenberg's critique on preceding theories is refuted. Third, some metatheoretical issues need to be qualified or at least clarified. Together, these concerns suggest that a better approach to goodness might result from a synthesis of the most useful aspects of diverse theories of goodness. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Process, not representation: Reply to Radavansky (1999).

The size of fan effects is determined by processes at retrieval, not by whether or not information is represented as situations. Evidence contradicts G. A. Radvansky's (see record 1999-05245-005) claim that time to retrieve information from a situation does not depend on the number of elements in the situation. Moreover, Radvansky's principles for ascribing situational models to experiments appear to be post hoc ways of redescribing the data. On the other hand, the evidence does support the Adaptive Control of Thought—Rational (ACT-R) assumption that participants can adjust their attentional weightings and so produce differential fan effects. Moreover, the ACT-R theory of the fan effect is consistent with many other findings. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Not a piano key: Reply to Orange (1999).

What I called "minor quibbles" with a book I found appealing appear to reflect some major issues. The authors may have intended the book for readers in the tradition of European phenomenology, but I reviewed the book for psychoanalytic psychologists who are members of an American Psychological Association, not for a journal of philosophy or of psychoanalysis alone. I don't fault the authors for not writing a literature review or a work of scholarly criticism. Prospective readers will wonder, however, if they are saying something different from other writers they are already familiar with—if they are "introducing" any new ideas or if their ideas differ from others' ideas (I had just reviewed Benjamin's book, for example). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Graded effects in hierarchical figure-ground organization: Reply to Peterson (1999).

An important issue in vision research concerns the order of visual processing. S. P. Vecera and R. C. O'Reilly (1998) presented an interactive, hierarchical model that placed figure-ground segregation prior to object recognition. M. A. Peterson (1999) critiqued this model, arguing that because it used ambiguous stimulus displays, figure-ground processing did not precede object processing. In the current article, the authors respond to Peterson's (1999) interpretation of ambiguity in the model and her interpretation of what it means for figure-ground processing to come before object recognition. The authors argue that complete stimulus ambiguity is not critical to the model and that figure-ground precedes object recognition architecturally in the model. The arguments are supported with additional simulation results and an experiment, demonstrating that top-down inputs can influence figure-ground organization in displays that contain stimulus cues. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The phoenix of bipolarity: Reply to Watson and Tellegen (1999).

In their commentary on our review (J. A. Russell & J. M. Carroll, 1999; see record 1998-03256-001), D. Watson and A. Tellegen (1999; see record 1999-03909-006) agreed that when various factors, including activation, are taken into account, the structure of self-reported affect includes a bipolar dimension contrasting pleasant with unpleasant feelings. Agreement on this the central conclusion of our review may surprise readers familiar with the widespread claim that pleasant and unpleasant affect are not bipolar opposites but are largely independent of one another. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

"Working intersubjectively: Contextualism in psychoanalytic practice": Reply to Curtis (1999).

Comments on R. C. Curtis's (see record 2003-01834-002) review of Working Intersubjectively: Contextualism in Psychoanalytic Practice (1997) by Donna M. Orange, George E. Atwood, and Robert D. Stolorow. Orange discusses the purposes and functions of scholarly citation and Curtis's misunderstanding of the authors' critique of technical rationality. Orange notes that their contextualism is not equivalent to the dialectical acceptance of opposites with which Curtis confuses it. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Resolution now! Reply to Riccio, Richardson, and Ebner (1999).

The authors' original article reviewing the status of the context-forgetting paradox (Bouton, Nelson, & Rosas; see record 1999-10106-001) made 2 general points: an empirical one (previous reviews had overstated the impact of published findings) and a conceptual one (the paradox can be resolved by assuming that a superordinate temporal context can control retrieval of physical context cues). In their comment, Riccio, Richardson, and Ebner (see record 1999-10106-002) have (a) offered only a partial criticism of the former point and (b) ignored the latter one. It is therefore not possible to accept their claim that the contextual cues paradox is still unresolved. This argument is presented and amplified. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reply to Robert Perloff's (1999) comments on "Becoming a consultant: The real stories" (Leonard, 1999).

In response to R. Perloff's comments (see record 1999-11964-005) regarding "Becoming a Consultant: The Real Stories," the author highlights the Catch-22 dilemma facing younger or new consulting psychologists. Both the need for and the progress with training and experience in consultation are addressed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Response to Young-Bruehl (1999).

The author felt the review of R. Wallerstein's (see record 1995-98727-000) The Talking Cures: The Psychoanalyses and the Psychotherapies was tendentious and misleading. It was felt that the tone was stridently ad hominem, and that the reviewer made wild speculations that were factually inaccurate and also missed and did not adequately represent the main thrust of the book. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Anger and approach: Reply to Watson (2009) and to Tomarken and Zald (2009).

C. S. Carver and E. Harmon-Jones (see record 2009-02580-003) reviewed evidence consistent with the idea that anger arises from a behavioral approach system. Commentary on that article by A. J. Tomarken and D. H. Zald (see record 2009-02580-005) raised questions about the many elements involved in acts of approach and limitations on what information can be provided by electroencephalograms. Commentary by D. Watson (see record 2009-02580-004) raised questions about the extensive psychometric evidence linking the negative affects. This article responds briefly to these issues. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reply to Shill (2004).

Shill's (see record 2004-11107-008) claim that the intersubjective perspective does not address conflict and defense is glaringly mistaken. In his article on signal anxiety, Shill (2004) declared that "the intersubjectivist approach does not address issues of conflict and defense at all" (p. 119). Astoundingly, he seems to have made this absurd pronouncement without being aware of any of the numerous articles and chapters my collaborators and I have written on the subject of psychological conflict and defense over the past three decades, one of which was published in this very journal (Stolorow & Brandchaft, 1987). Our aim has never been to defocus emotional conflict but rather to contextualize it-that is, to locate it within constitutive intersubjective systems. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reply to Alpert (1995).

Replies to J. L. Alpert's (see record 1995-44717-001) comment on Brenneis' (see record 1995-18442-001) article concerning the relation of dreams to early childhood trauma. Brenneis addresses Alpert's (1) dispute of the findings on the relation of dream content to traumatic experience; (2) argument that clinicians, in reconstructing trauma, work from a broader context than dreams; and (3) insistence that clinical findings discrepant from research findings not be summarily dismissed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A meta-analysis with nothing to hide: Reply to Hyman (2010).

In our article (Storm, Tressoldi, & Di Risio, 2010), we claimed that the ganzfeld experimental design has proved to be consistent and reliable. However, Hyman (2010) argues that the overall evidence for psi is, in fact, contradictory and elusive. We present a case for psi research that undermines Hyman's argument. First, we give examples from parapsychologists who do not outrightly dismiss psi, despite appearances, but actually support it. Second, we claim that Hyman does not tell the full story about the ganzfeld meta-analytic findings and thus presents a one-sided account. Third, we argue that our meta-analysis has followed standard procedures, that we have not broken any rules but have found a communications anomaly, often referred to as psi. Though we may be in agreement that the evidence is largely statistical, the evidence suggests that concealed targets are actually identified rather than guessed. We argue that further research is necessary. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reply to Pariser (2005).

The author responds to Michael Pariser's critique (see record 2005-01622-013) of her original article (see record 2003-99989-005) by distinguishing between reduction and reductionism, by refusing to see philosophy and neuroscience as competitors, by rejecting the call to adapt psychoanalysis to the demands of managed care, and by using the ideas of Wittgenstein to point out the problems of too-facile translation between the languages of neuroscience and of emotional-relational experience. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Response to Owen Renik (1999).

This article is an examination of points of agreement with O. Renik's (see record 1999-01070-002) view on psychoanalytic epistemology and a critique of his outlook on psychoanalytic method and results as they are laid out in his discussion of R. Schafer's article (see record 1999-01070-001). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Further tests of dual-process theory: A reply to Yonelinas (1999).

In a preceding article (M. Glanzer, K. Kim, A. Hilford, & J. K. Adams; see record 1999-00904-013), the authors reported the results of testing two predictions of dual-process theory concerning the shape of the receiver-operating characteristic (ROC). The theory predicts that item recognition ROCs in standard score form, z-ROCs, will, in general, be concave. It also predicts the degree of concavity that will be present. The two predictions were tested. The theory failed on both. They were tested again in this article: the first prediction with an extended set of data, the second with a new set of predicted concavity measures. The first test found again that contrary to the theory, z-ROCs were not, in general, concave. The second test found again that dual-process theory failed to predict the degree of concavity of specific z-ROCs. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reply to Charles Strozier (2003).

Attention to complexity of motivation and meaning would improve both Strozier's biography of Heinz Kohut and his treatment of reviewer Karen Maroda (Strozier, 2003). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Reply to Barbara Fajardo (2003).

Barbara Fajardo's negative response (see record 2003-02056-012) to the author's review (see record 2002-08457-006) of Arnold Goldberg's book Being of Two Minds (see record 1999-02973-000) includes the accusation that he has misread the book. Her proof for this apparently is based on her view of Goldberg's ideas derived from a participation in the group that produced this volume. In his response, the author maintains that his independent and critical reading cannot be dismissed as a misreading; rather, it is a reading that reveals fundamental differences in his approach to clinical work with the types of patients described in this text. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Attention/likelihood: Reply to Hintzman (1994).

D. L. Hintzman's (see record 1994-24278-001) criticism of K. Kim and M. Glanzer's (see record 1993-32210-001) theory on recognition memory consists of 2 points: An equation of attention/likelihood theory has been incorrectly written and the likelihood ratios of the theory can be replaced by another, preferable transformation. Both of these points are discussed and rebutted. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)