Self-Discrepancy and Regulatory Focus

Self-discrepancy theory and regulatory focus theory are two related motivational theories. Self-discrepancy theory describes the associations between self and affect, positing that the relations among different sets of self-concepts influence a person’s emotional experience. A discrepancy between a person’s ideal self-guide (e.g., hopes and aspirations) and his or her actual self-concept produces dejection-related emotions (e.g., sadness), whereas a discrepancy between a person’s ought self-guide (e.g., duties and obligations) and his or her actual self-concept produces agitation-related emotions (e.g., anxiety). The intensity of these emotional experiences depends upon the magnitude and accessibility of the associated discrepancy. Regulatory focus theory builds on self-discrepancy theory, positing that distinct self-regulatory systems are reflected in the two types of self-guides proposed in self-discrepancy theory. The promotion system is motivated by ideal end-states, by pursuing hopes and aspirations; as a result, it is primarily concerned with the presence or absence of positive outcomes—with gains and non-gains. Given this focus on gains and non-gains, the promotion system is motivated by fundamental needs for nurturance and growth. In contrast, the prevention system is motivated by ought end-states, by fulfilling duties and obligations; as a result, it is primarily concerned with the presence or absence of negative outcomes—with losses and non-losses. Given this focus on losses and non-losses, the prevention system is motivated by fundamental needs for safety and security. The promotion and prevention systems predict a range of important variables relating to cognition, performance, and decision-making.

Cognitive Development in Chimpanzees

Cognitive development in chimpanzees has been illuminated through fieldwork and laboratory studies. Their life history reveals the importance of the mother–infant relationship. Females give birth at 5-year intervals on average, and the infants cling to their mothers in the first 3 months. Each chimpanzee community has its own unique cultural traditions, for example in tool use. How tools are used is passed across generations through social learning, in a process called education by master-apprenticeship. Laboratory studies in the early 21st century examined chimpanzees’ learning abilities even at the fetal stage. Chimpanzee and human cognition appear similar in both physical and social domains, and they follow the same developmental stages. However, there is a fundamental difference in the levels of complexity of hierarchical structure. Chimpanzees do not show the recursive and infinite levels that characterize human cognition. Chimpanzees are good at memorizing things at a glance but less skilled at representing things through imagination. The cognitive trade-off between working memory and language may explain the essential difference in cognitive development in the two species.

Semantic Cognition: Semantic Memory and Semantic Control

Semantic processing is a defining feature of human cognition, central not only to language, but also to object recognition, the generation of appropriate actions, and the capacity to use knowledge in reasoning, planning, and problem-solving. Semantic memory refers to our repository of conceptual or factual knowledge about the world. This semantic knowledge base is typically viewed as including “general knowledge” as well as schematic representations of objects and events distilled from multiple experiences and retrieved independently from their original spatial or temporal context. Semantic cognition refers to our ability to flexibly use this knowledge to produce appropriate thoughts and behaviors. Semantic cognition includes at least two interactive components: a long-term store of semantic knowledge and semantic control processes, each supported by a different network. Conceptual representations are organized according to the semantic relationships between items, with different theories proposing different key organizational principles, including sensory versus functional features, domain-specific theory, embodied distributed concepts, and hub-and-spoke theory, in which distributed features are integrated within a heteromodal hub in the anterior temporal lobes. The activity within the network for semantic representation must often be controlled to ensure that the system generates representations and inferences that are suited to the immediate task or context. Semantic control is thought to include both controlled retrieval processes, in which knowledge relevant to the goal or context is accessed in a top-down manner when automatic retrieval is insufficient for the task, and post-retrieval selection to resolve competition between simultaneously active representations. Control of semantic retrieval is supported by a strongly left-lateralized brain network, which partially overlaps with the bilateral network that supports domain-general control, but extends beyond these sites to include regions not typically associated with executive control, including anterior inferior frontal gyrus and posterior middle temporal gyrus. The interaction of semantic control processes with conceptual representations allows meaningful thoughts and behavior to emerge, even when the context requires non-dominant features of the concept to be brought to the fore.

Auditory Attention

The modern world is noisy. Streets are cacophonies of traffic noise; homes and workplaces are replete with bleeping timers, announcements, and alarms. Everywhere there is the sound of human speech—from the casual chatter of strangers and the unwanted intrusion from electronic devices through to the conversations with friends and loved ones one may actually wish to hear. Unlike vision, it is not possible simply to “close our ears” and shut out the auditory world and nor, in many cases, is it desirable. On the one hand, soft background music or environmental sounds, such as birdsong or the noise of waves against the beach, is often comfortingly pleasurable or reassuring. On the other, alarms are usually auditory for a reason. Nevertheless, people somehow have to identify, from among the babble that surrounds them, the sounds and speech of interest and importance and to follow the thread of a chosen speaker in a crowded auditory environment. Additionally, irrelevant or unwanted chatter or other background noise should not hinder concentration on matters of greater interest or importance—students should ideally be able to study effectively despite noisy classrooms or university halls while still being open to the possibility of important interruptions from elsewhere. The scientific study of auditory attention has been driven by such practical problems: how people somehow manage to select the most interesting or most relevant speaker from the competing auditory demands made by the speech of others or isolate the music of the band from the chatter of the nightclub. In parallel, the causes of auditory distraction—and how to try to avoid it where necessary—have also been subject to scrutiny. A complete theory of auditory attention must account for the mechanisms by which selective attention is achieved, the causes of auditory distraction, and the reasons why individuals might differ in their ability in both cases.

Communication in Organizations

Communication serves a constitutive force in making organizations what they are. While communication can be viewed as merely occurring “within” the organization, communication itself is essential to the creation and maintenance of organizations. Modern research in organizational communication explores this constitutive force of communication as well as the ways downward, upward, and lateral communication patterns determine positive and negative outcomes for both organizations and their members. Supportive, adaptive, and ethical downward communication from organizational leadership enhances members’ productivity and satisfaction while reducing turnover. In addition, candid upward communication from members to management is crucial for detecting and correcting troubles while they remain small and resolvable. Lateral communication through which members make sense of organizational events is key to understanding members’ perceptions, decisions, and behaviors. Finally, new information communication technologies both enable distributed work but also create new and troubling issues for modern work life.

Major Theories in Social Psychology

A synopsis of major theories of social psychology is provided with reference to three major domains of social-psychological inquiry: attitudes and attitude change, motivation regulation, and group behavior. Despite the heterogeneity of research topics, there is considerable overlap in the basic theoretical principles across all three domains. Typical theories that constitute the common ground of social psychology rely on rules of good Gestalt consistency, on psychodynamic principles, but also on behaviorist learning models and on semantic-representation and information-transition models borrowed from cognitive science. Prototypical examples that illustrate the structure and the spirit of theories in social psychology are dissonance theory, construal-level, regulatory focus, and social identity theory. A more elaborate taxonomy of pertinent theories is provided in the first table in this article.

Humanitarian Work and Organizational Psychology

Humanitarian simply means putting people first. Humanitarian work and organizational psychology puts people first in at least two major ways. One is by enabling humanitarian workers and organizations (like aid charities, for instance) to become more effective in what they do. The other is by aiming to help make working conditions, regardless of sector or type of work, humanitarian. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the International Labor Organization (ILO) associated the world of work with a range of inhumane and unsustainable working conditions. A ‘new normal’ for working conditions was insecure, precarious work, working poverty, and income inequality. Viewed through this lens, the COVID-19 virus became a disruptor, with the potential to either set back or dramatically advance the preexisting 2016–2030 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs had been focusing, and subsequently refocused minds even more, on “eradicating poverty in all its forms,” everywhere. A focal point within humanitarian work and organizational psychology is that any eradication of poverty, post COVID-19, must include not simply a return to 2019-style economic slavery-like conditions but unfettered access to sustainable livelihood. Humanitarian work and organizational psychology arguably contributes toward advancing the SDGs, and putting people first, in at least four main ways. Using the metaphor of a house, first its foundations are ethical (serving empowerment rather than power), historical (in humanitarian work and human services like employee assistance programs), conceptual (replacing the idea of “job” with sustainable livelihood), and political (advancing new diplomacies for bending political will to humanitarian evidence and ethics). Second, its levels are systemic, spanning individual (e.g., selecting for humanitarian values), organizational (e.g., helping food banks during the COVID-19 pandemic, providing startup training for business entrepreneurs in low-income neighborhoods), and societal (advocating for humanitarian interventions like wage subsidies and other forms of social protection). Third, its spaces traverse poverty lines; minimum, living, and maximum wages; formal and informal sectors; and transitions and transformations among unemployment, underemployment, and decent work. Fourth, its vistas include promoting livelihood security for all by balancing automation with social protection like universal basic income (UBI), and organizational social responsibility (protecting the biosphere). In these ways we may also sustain our own livelihoods, as humanitarian work and organizational psychologists.

Burnout in Organizations

A starting point in examining job burnout is determining its definition. The burnout syndrome of exhaustion, cynicism, and inefficacy is at times distilled into a synonym for exhaustion, leading to some confusion in the research literature. Another critical issue is burnout as a clinical issue requiring treatment for individuals or burnout as a management problem requiring changes in the organization of work and workplaces. Considering burnout as a problem in the relationship of people with workplaces opens additional possibilities for action. Intervention research evaluating systems for alleviating or preventing burnout continue to be rare in the research literature. Furthermore, these studies are largely focused on building individual capacity to endure or thrive in workplaces rather than changing conditions that aggravate exhaustion, cynicism, or inefficacy.

Neural Plasticity in Amblyopia

Early in life, the brain has a substantial capacity for change, often referred to as neuroplasticity. Disrupted visual input to the brain during an early “critical” or “sensitive period” of heightened neuroplasticity induces structural and functional changes within neural systems and causes amblyopia, a sensory disorder associated with abnormal development of the brain areas involved in perception. Amblyopia impairs a broad range of visual, multisensory, and motor functions, and recovery from amblyopia requires a substantial change in visual information processing within the brain. Therefore, not only is amblyopia caused by an interaction between visual experience and heightened neuroplasticity, recovery from amblyopia also requires significant neuroplastic change within the brain. A number of evidence-based treatments are available for young children with amblyopia whose brains are still rapidly developing and have a correspondingly high level of neuroplasticity. However, adults with amblyopia are often left untreated because of the idea that the adult brain no longer has sufficient neuroplasticity to relearn how to process visual information. In the early 21st century, it became clear that this idea was not correct. A number of interventions that can enhance neuroplasticity in the mature visual cortex have been identified using animal models of amblyopia and are now being translated into human studies. Other promising techniques for enhancing visual cortex neuroplasticity have emerged from studies of adult humans with amblyopia. Examples of interventions that may improve vision in adult amblyopia include refractive correction, patching of the amblyopic eye (reverse patching), monocular and binocular perceptual learning, noninvasive brain stimulation, systemic drugs, and exercise. The next important stage of research within this field will be to conduct fully controlled randomized clinical trials to assess which, if any, of these interventions can be translated into a mainstream treatment for amblyopia in adulthood.

Central European Psychiatry: World War I and the Interwar Period

During World War I, soldiers from all warring countries suffered from mental disorders caused by the strains and shocks of modern warfare. Military psychiatrists in Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire were initially overwhelmed by the unexpected numbers of psychiatric patients, and they soon engaged in fierce debates about the etiology and therapy of “war neuroses.” After early therapeutic approaches relying on rest and occupational therapy had failed to yield the necessary results, psychiatry faced increasing pressure by the state and the military. After 1916, the etiological debate coalesced around the diagnosis of “war hysteria,” and psychiatric treatment of war neurotics became dominated by so-called active therapies, which promised to return patients to the frontline or the war industry as quickly and efficiently as possible. War psychiatry became characterized by an unprecedented rationalization of medical treatment, which subordinated the goals of medicine to the needs of the military and the wartime economy. Brutal treatment methods and struggles over pensions led to conflicts between patients and doctors that continued after the war ended.