To Work or Not to Work, That Is the Question: The Psychological Impact of the First COVID-19 Lockdown on the Elderly, Healthcare Workers, and Virtual Workers

The spread of COVID-19 created a state of emergency all over the world and played a big role in the decline of the mental health of citizens. The context of the workplace became an important variable in the impact of the lockdown on individuals. In this study, we deepened the categories of healthcare workers (HWs), virtual workers (VWs), and the elderly, along with their emotional approach to this emergency. A sample of 257 participants (ElderlyN = 62; HWsN = 104; VWsN = 91) completed: a semi-structured interview on their experience during lockdown via telephone; an online survey with a sociodemographic questionnaire; the Difficulties in Emotional Regulation Scale (DERS); and the Post-Traumatic Growth Inventory (PTGI). Linguistic measures of the Referential Process were utilized to code the interviews. An independent ANOVA explored the variability among groups. The results show more affective language in the Elderly (M = 0.0310, SD = 0.0070) and a growth in spirituality (M = 4.16, SD = 3.17). HWs displayed a higher PTGI (M = 56.84, SD = 20.29), while VWs displayed a lower PTGI (M = 50.02, SD = 21.05). Moreover, VWs presented higher scores in Impulse on the DERS (M = 11.67, SD = 5.05) and a more cognitive/abstract narration (Reflection IREF M = 0.0260, SD = 0.0071; Reorganization IWRRL M = 0.5419, SD = 0.0032; Referential Activity IWRAD M = 0.4978, SD = 0.0029). This study aims to take the work context into consideration to create focused interventions.

Narratives of Dreams and Waking Thoughts: Emotional Processing in Relation to the COVID-19 Pandemic

The Coronavirus-19 (COVID-19) pandemic posed a significant challenge to the physical, mental, and emotional well-being of each individual. It also brought the importance of daily emotional management for survival to the forefront of every human being. Our study aims to explore whether emotional processes perform different functions during waking thoughts and night dreams during the first lockdown in Italy. Utilizing Multiple Code Theory (MCT), our goal is to verify whether waking thoughts facilitate a functional disconnection in order to manage the trauma caused by COVID-19. Two online forms were distributed to random participants in the general population, presenting a total of 49 reports of night dreams (23 males; mean age 33.45 ds. 10.12; word mean 238.54 ds. 146.8) and 48 reports of waking thoughts (25 males; mean age 34.54 ds. 12.8; word mean M. 91 words ds. 23). The Referential Process linguistic measures and Affect Salience Index were utilized. It was found that Affect Salience is present in both dreams and in waking thoughts; however, Referential Activity was higher in dreams and Reflection and Affect words were higher in waking thoughts. Two different processes of emotional elaboration emerged. The results highlight the use of greater symbolization processes during dreams and a higher emotional distance in waking thoughts. These results confirm that during the nocturnal processes, there is greater contact with the processing of trauma, while during the diurnal processes, defensive strategies were activated to cope with and manage life via a moment of the defensive disruption of daily activities.

Contemporary Art and Event-Based Social Theory

In light of the sociological insight that it is left to the art system what counts as art, new artistic forms inevitably alter the prevailing concept of art. The article examines how artistic morphogenesis occurs in a twofold manner in the case of contemporary art: as self-referential process through new form combinatorics or asynchronous artistic operations whose artworks elude the gaze, and as other-referential relation. One of the main features of contemporary art lies in its strong reference to the present, based on a conception of operative time. Time is not understood as a sequence of past, present, future, but rather as the linking of respective presences. Contemporary art shares this understanding of time with event-based social theories. This is analysed as other-referential act of synchronization within the art system with its societal environment. Empirical evidence is provided by select works of art and by self-descriptions of the art system.

The Semantic-Discursive Status of comme je l’ai dit ‘as I said’

The current paper examines the function of a specific construction comme je l’ai dit and its role in a particular type of oral discourse. The phrase occurs with high frequency in an established discursive genre, namely, debates in the European Parliament (EP). It is presented as a parenthetic construction, including elements with an anaphoric function, and endowed with a specific discursive aim. In order to better understand the raison d’être of this syntactically autonomous form in the specialized corpus, a mixed semantic-discursive approach is adopted. The aim of the study is to highlight the main properties of the construction bearing a particular functionality and to specify its status in discourse from the perspective of the active interlocutor.Given its rather simple morphological paradigm, its rather stereotypical enlargements, and its easy mobility, comme je l’ai dit reveals certain specificities of the referential process. The reference of the anadeictic type causes a sort of “duplication” of the object of discourse and also its reconfiguration. The return to the already said, with the aim of re-modeling it, is in fact accompanied by a re-saying, a repetition of the locutor’s own speech.The interrupting, the going back, the reworking and advancing, involved in the use of the analysed construction, seem to have several implications. The presence of comme je l’ai dit is justified by the speaker’s intention to construct relevant discourse that takes into account intralocutive and interlocutive dialogism. The interruption followed by a relaunch is a signal that redirects the attention of the interlocutor, while the repetition, which is a reminder of the already said, preserves the continuity of the discourse.The two processes set up by comme je l’ai dit, anaphoric reference and repetition, have the function of ensuring the coherence and the continuity of ongoing discourse through the tradeoff between saying, repeating and discursive memory. The importance of adjustments between speaker and interlocutor is the basis of the chosen discursive strategy. The functional perspective brings out the interpersonal aspect of the referential procedure.

Putting into Words the COVID-19 Lockdown Experience: Psychological Symptoms and the Referential Process

The coronavirus pandemic is a unique collective event which has affected the physical and psychological health of all individuals. Restrictions imposed by governments to counteract this situation have represented risk factors for developing psychopathological symptoms. This study aims to explore the relationship between psychological symptoms and the referential process (RP). Forty-eight healthy participants (25 males, mean age = 39.3; SD = 16.6) completed a demographic questionnaire and the Symptom Checklist-90-Revised (SCL-90-R) through an online platform and wrote about their experience 3 weeks after the imposition of the lockdown. Different linguistic measures of the RP were applied to the narratives. The logical functions expressed through written narratives (The Italian Reflection Dictionary score, IREF) showed significant positive correlations with the SCL-90-R General Score Index (GSI) and different SCL-90-R subscales (depression, anxiety, obsessive-compulsiveness, interpersonal sensitivity, hostility, and paranoid ideation). On the contrary, the reorganization and reflection function related to emotional events (The Italian Weighted Reflection and Reorganization List score, IWRRL) showed significant negative correlations with the SCL-90-R’s GSI and different subscales (obsessive-compulsiveness, depression, anxiety). The results highlight the relationship between psychological symptoms and complex defense mechanisms based on the intellectualization of negative emotions and a positive strategy of reorganization based on emotional elaboration. These results suggest the importance of supporting collective elaborations of citizens in the context of the pandemic.

Dreaming in quarantine: linguistic analysis of referential process of dreams during COVID-19 pandemic lockdown

The spread of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) became a collective trauma adversely affecting physical and psychological health. The impact of this trauma made itself manifest in a myriad of ways, including through dreams. This study aimed to explore the Referential Process (RP, Bucci, 2021) of dreams reported during quarantine. Dream samples were collected through a social blog. Linguistic analysis and clinical evaluation were conducted to explore the group’s collective elaboration of a shared traumatic experience. Sixty-eight people (22 males; mean age 26.16 ds. 7.68) contributed to a social-blog, writing their dreams. 91 dreams were collected and transcribed using transcription rules for the Discourse Attributes Analysis Program (DAAP). Linguistic measures of RP were applied and a statistical cluster analysis was performed. In addition, each dream was evaluated by trained judges on three specific qualities of the RP (Arousal, Symbolizing, and Reflection/Reorganizing). Clinical judges in a double-blinded method reached reliable scoring (Arousal α.874 ICC 0.701; Symbolizing α.783 ICC 0.671; Reflection/reorganization α.884 ICC 0.758). Cluster Analysis yielded three dream clusters. 26 dreams fell under a cluster defined as a symbolizing process (Cluster A); 16 into a cluster defined as arousal of emotional activation (Cluster B); and 49 dreams fell into a cluster defined as Reflection/Reorganizing elaboration (Cluster C). Each cluster showed specific linguistic features. The dreams collected through a blog showed a Referential Process that is similar to that found in psychotherapy process. Results suggests that writing dreams can play different functions in processing and integrating social traumatic experience.

Decoding Tableaux Vivants: the Metareferential Potential of Painterly References in Cinema

The article focuses on the intermedial relationship between cinema and painting, viewed as a self-referential process, and tries to determine various ways in which this type of signifying process can be used to “encode” various messages (within the work itself), or become an integral part of this (meta)communicative operation. Starting from a broad definition of intermedial references and continuing with a brief recontextualized detour through Gérard Genette’s taxonomy of transtextual instances, the author narrows down a specific technique that exemplifies this type of “codifying” procedure, namely the tableau vivant. In accordance with Werner Wolf’s proposed terminology, he attempts to determine the metareferential potential of this extra-compositional self-referential technique. The case studies focus on films by Peter Greenaway and Lars von Trier.

Analytic Process and Linguistic Style: Exploring Analysts’ Treatment Notes in the Light of Linguistic Measures of the Referential Process

This paper presents a comparison between a clinical evaluation and a computerized linguistic analysis of the treatment notes of the first two years of an analysis conducted four sessions a week with the patient lying on a couch. Clinical notes had been written as part of the analyst’s standard practice after every session, some years prior to the planning of this study. The notes describe the analytic interchange and the analyst’s internal thoughts. The linguistic analysis focuses on two analytically relevant linguistic variables: Referential Activity (RA), a measure of the degree of connection between emotional processing and language, and Reflection, the use of words referring to thoughts. The examination of the linguistic measures point to overlooked parts of sessions which may be clinically significant. In particular, the examination of the clinical material during the nodal points of the first summer break, where significant changes in the linguistic measures were seen, provided clinical understanding of the analytic work that was not explicitly noted at the time of treatment. This method has the potential to be utilized in ongoing treatments and to improve the supervisory process.

Stimulus Features of the Object Relations Technique Affecting the Linguistic Qualities of Individuals’ Narratives

Previous studies on projective techniques have investigated the effects of variation in stimulus features on individuals’ response behavior. In particular, the influence of chromatic colors and form definition on the images elicited by the stimuli has been tested. Most studies have focused on the Rorschach and TAT and have examined effects in terms of variables such as reality testing and reactions to perceptual details. This is the first study to examine the effects of variation in visual stimuli as represented in features of the Object Relations Technique (ORT) cards on linguistic indicators of connection to emotional experience using measures of the referential process. The ORT was administered to 207 Italian non-clinical participants to explore effects of color, form and content variation on language style. The sample was stratified by age, gender, marital status and education to be representative of the Italian population. The stories told in response to the card images were rated using computerized linguistic measures, including the Weighted Referential Activity Dictionary—Italian version (IWRAD) which indicates the degree to which language is connected to nonverbal experience, and the Weighted Reflection/Reorganization List—Italian version (IWRRL) which detects a linguistic style of personal re-elaboration of emotional experience. The results provide support for the color-affect and form-reality testing hypotheses. Cards with better form definition, including color definition, and with fewer silhouettes of people elicited responses that were higher in IWRAD and lower in IWRRL, and also higher in the degree to which the two measures varied together. Implications of the results for use of ORT in clinical assessment and intervention are discussed.