Philip Rosenbaum

The un-making of a method: From rating scales to the study of psychological processes

Rating scales are standard instruments in psychology. They force the research participant to provide a numerical estimate of an assumed “degree” of some characteristic along a linear scale. We prove that such numerical estimates are artifacts based on unknown psychological processes that are used in the making of a rating. Psychology’s current use of rating scales entails reliance upon unexplored and abbreviated introspection. It superimposes upon the rater the use of real numbers for the subjective construction of the ratings. The axiomatic superimposition of the notion of “degree” of subjective estimates by the rating task overlooks the qualitative (structural) relation between the implied opposites. We propose the reconstruction of the rating tasks into a method that accesses the process of meaning construction by the rater. When the rater faces a rating task, a field of meanings is constructed in terms of dialogical oppositions. These oppositions can be observed to lead to the moment of subjective synthesis (the rating outcome). Examples are given of the tracing of the process of subjective synthesis from an empirical study using NEO PI items. We claim that reconstruction of the rating task in terms of the study of microgenesis of rating processes allows psychology access to the reality of the workings of the human mind.

The Following Editorial Has Not Been Empirically Verified

As the flow of submissions starts to enter our new online platform, one of our early observations is the number of studies that focus on Evidence Based Treatments (EBTs). Clearly, the impact of the EBT movement has influenced college counselors, administrators, and academicians that study college student mental health. While we appreciate the virtues of establishing and utilizing EBTs (e.g., clearer specificity of treatments, consumer confidence), it leads us to wonder how the EBT movement shapes and ultimately impacts the ongoing discussion about college student mental health. Specifically, we’d like to discuss three less talked about aspects about EBTs:

How self-harmers use the body as an interpretive canvass

This commentary to Arcoverde, Amazonas, and de Lima builds off their advice to psychologists to attend to the varied and multiple meanings of self-harming conduct. Its focus is on how in the absence of the ability to symbolically communicate, self-harmers use their bodies to communicate the need to make meaning of their experiences (emotional, interpersonal, and cognitive). The physical usage of the body challenges the therapeutic field, providing at once avenues for novel meaning making, but also the potential to undermine these processes. Some thoughts are offered about the role of the therapist in this context.

Reframing the Conversation on College Student Mental Health

The expression “mental health” has become ubiquitous when discussing college students’ lived experiences. While effective, this expression has not, problematically, been deconstructed. In this article, we explore what “mental health” means. Through doing so we identify three unintended effects embedded within its usage: (a) symptoms should be relieved and not understood as meaningful; (b) health refers to objective functioning alone; and (c) expert authority should be emphasized at the cost of local communities. Accordingly, we argue for the importance of resisting the unreflective usage of this term and creating spaces to reframe the conversations, which engages complexity, subjective meaning, and ambiguity.

What Does the EPPP Step 2 Mean for College Counseling

Sometime around January of 2019, recently graduated psychologists (PhDs and PsyDs), in some states (yet to be determined) are going to have to leap an additional hurdle on their path toward licensure. The Association of State and Provincial Psychology Boards (ASPBB) has approved development of the Step 2 Examination for Professional Practice in Psychology (EPPP Step 2). Unlike the regular EPPP (renamed EPPP Step 1), which assesses the broad knowledge base required to be a clinical psychologist, the EPPP Step 2 avows to assess “competency-based skills” of beginning clinicians. While this may not seem to be a big deal, especially to those who are not psychologists, the successful implementation of the EPPP Step 2 has potentially far-reaching consequences not only for psychology, but for all professionally based college counseling practices. Simply stated, if implemented, the EPPP Step 2 represents another step towards increased bureaucratization, increased cost, and artificial standardization of the counseling field. Let’s take these ideas in turn.

The role of projective identification in constructing the “Other”: Why do Westerners want to “liberate” Muslim women?

This commentary offers a cultural psychological understanding of the traditionally psychoanalytic notion of projective identification to explore the ironic way that majority and minority cultures can influence each other. In the target paper (Wagner, Sen, Permanadeli, & Howarth, 2012), the Western gaze operates ironically by constructing minority Muslim women as needing liberation. This leads to their resistance, through increased religious observance, which requires giving up their individual freedom. Understood as a circular and monological process of projective-identification designed to protect off-limit areas of meaning making, dialogue requires each culture to take ownership of these areas.

Resilience and Thinking Perpendicularly: A Meditation or Morning Jog

ABSTRACT In this article, we explore the topic of resilience. We consider some of the ways that resilience relates to managing stress levels, with the intention of developing a capacity to “keep going.” However, we find that this model does not match our clinical experience and propose instead that resilience is about the ability to think perpendicularly. We define this as the developmental capacity to take perspective and alter one’s coordinates to think and feel about things in new lights. We locate this achievement in a developmental model originating with Object Relations, and relate it to achieving the “depressive position,” which recognizes the substantial gray areas in life. Finally, we use Plato’s allegory of the Cave to underscore our thinking.

Returning to Modernity

A BOTH A PRACTICING PSYCHOANALYST as well as an academically trained philosopher, Jon Mills offers a unique perspective on the current state of contemporary psychoanalysis. In Conundrums: A Critique of Contemporary Psychoanalysis, Millss analysis takes two distinct forms. In his opening chapters, Mills directly challenges many of the implicit philosophical underpinnings of Relational psychoanalysis. Subsequent chapters principally deal with the political and personal issues he has experienced when presenting these critiques in professional settings. These two styles of analysis are very different and necessitate a caveat before moving forward. Because I lack personal experience and direct knowledge of the delicate incidents he describes, especially in chapters 4-6, I choose to not engage with them. Instead, my goals in this review are to faithfully present the complex critiques of Relational psychoanalysis and then offer my thoughts on them in the discussion section.