Wnat are you reading/researching?

Odysseus

I don't know if anyone would be interested in this, but its an idea stolen from the literature forum, where they have a "what are you reading" thread. As we are all interested in the same topic, but approach it from different viewpoints I thought a similar thread might facilitate learning from different perspectives. So in the spirit of things I'll go first. I am currently working my way through two books.

1. The Subject of Addiction by Rik Loose. Rik works in Dublin and I'm quite familar with his work. The book is a Lacanian theory of addiction and also gives a a good overview the various comments Freud made on addiction, it also provides an interesting overview of Freud's work on Cocaine.

2. The Seminar of Jacques Lacan. Book I Freud's Papers on Technique. Lacan gave a seminar on a different topic each year throughout his career. Here he discusses not only the papers entitled "on technique" contained within vol. 12 of the Standard Edition, but explores other articles on technique. So I will be working my way through these papers yet again!!

So what do people think, is it worth giving it a shot, and exploring other areas in your own CPD?

Valmont

Odysseus wrote: »

Freud's work on Cocaine.

Is that what he called it?:D

I'm between courses at the moment so I'm spending more time looking at colleges than actually researching anything although I have ordered a copy of Paul Kline's Intelligence: The Psychometric View and I finished reading Robert Cialdini's book on influence and persuasion a while ago, I've forgotten the exact name.

Odysseus

Valmont wrote: »

Is that what he called it?:D

I'm between courses at the moment so I'm spending more time looking at colleges than actually researching anything although I have ordered a copy of Paul Kline's Intelligence: The Psychometric View and I finished reading Robert Cialdini's book on influence and persuasion a while ago, I've forgotten the exact name.

The whole cocaine episode is very interesting, his papers on cocaine where not included in the Standard Edition, which is a pity. The are available in a book Ed by Robert Byck. Its out of print and difficult to get a copy of; I was lucky and spotted in on a online auction nearly 10 years ago and pick it up for the princely sum of $1.50.

Thb honest I try to read around as many things as I can, but these are some of the most interesting things I have read on coke. As a analyst I have read alot around it, and it was about 10 years after the whole coke thing that he moved on from neurology. I know you where just having a laught, but there is so much crap out there about his theories being the result of cocaine induced delusions.

Freud started to see coke for what it was when he tried to treat a close friend who was morphine dependent with coke. Byck's book reproduces the the papers that stated this coke was looking like a cure for morphinism. However, his firend being an addict increased the doses and changed from IM use to IV use. This had a profound effect on Freud.

So on your book I know little of psychometics, they where trying to get us to use them in work at one stage, and some of my colleague's use them around Alcohol and Drug use disorders, is you book based on sloely on testing for intelligence?

yoohoo

I'm also between courses at the moment but am currently reading a couple of books on sport psychology by Aidan Moran and went to a lecture he was giving on concentration in sport the other day was quite interesting. I've also ordered the man who mistook his wife for a hat by Oliver Sacks it's a book of case study types of neuropsychological disorders can't wait to give it a good read.

hotspur

The Subject of Addiction is one of my favourite books in the addiction field, although it took me two or three reads to fully appreciate the last third or so of it even with him lecturing me at the time on it.

What I'm currently reading of relevance here are Cognitive Therapy: an Introduction by Sanders & Wills and Person Centred Counselling in Action by Mearns & Thorne.

Odysseus

hotspur wrote: »

The Subject of Addiction is one of my favourite books in the addiction field, although it took me two or three reads to fully appreciate the last third or so of it even with him lecturing me at the time on it.

What I'm currently reading of relevance here are Cognitive Therapy: an Introduction by Sanders & Wills and Person Centred Counselling in Action by Mearns & Thorne.

Yeah I have been reading his stuff since 97, as he published alot of the book in the guise of various papers in the Letter[as you probably already know]. Still struggle alot with it, but I get something out of it each time. It a pity some of the French research he cites isn't translated.

Valmont

Odysseus wrote: »

I know you where just having a laught, but there is so much crap out there about his theories being the result of cocaine induced delusions.

I had read somewhere that he was addicted to snorting cocaine? I am open to the fact that that may be wrong.

Paul Kline's book really gets to the core of the theories behind intelligence testing and how useful it has been. I believe it goes some length to debunking the popular misconceptions the public have about the whole field, which is my primary interest.

p.pete

I've been putting a PhD application together, so had been trying to get my head around the cognitive architecture SOAR, and applying it to models of reflective learning. Lots of stuff in this area has been done by FR Ritter including "Using reflective learning to master opponent strategy in a competitive environment". This outlines a basic reflective learning module, applied to a baseball metaphor.

Odysseus

Valmont wrote: »

I had read somewhere that he was addicted to snorting cocaine? I am open to the fact that that may be wrong.

Paul Kline's book really gets to the core of the theories behind intelligence testing and how useful it has been. I believe it goes some length to debunking the popular misconceptions the public have about the whole field, which is my primary interest.

Book sounds interesting.

In my opinion and a result of the years of research I put into it, its sh!te, yes he took it, lot of authors where recommending it at the time as a cure for morphine addiction, especially in the states following the civil war. He took tiny amounts and the carried out experiment on his concentration,motor power and the likes; witout checking up doses ranged from 0.05-0.10g. In treating addiction he recommended subscutaneous injections, AFAIR without checking sources he sent some to his wife to be, suggesting making a tea out of it as an exlir, he do this with lots of his friends.

In the self -experiments I can't remember if it was ingested through an infusion or a subscutaneopus injection, I think it was the tea but I would have to check. In the same way people later thought diamorphine aka heroin was a sure cure for opiate addiction, they really did not know what they where dealing with.

I don't know if its online but try finding his last paper on it Craving and Fear for Cocaine 1887. That's 13 years before The Interpretation of Dreams. The othe four if you can get them are good reading:

Uber Coca 1884
Contribution To The Knowledge Of The Effect Of Cocaine. 1885
Addenda To Uber Coca
On The General Effect Of Cocaine. 1885

Odysseus

p.pete wrote: »

I've been putting a PhD application together, so had been trying to get my head around the cognitive architecture SOAR, and applying it to models of reflective learning. Lots of stuff in this area has been done by FR Ritter including "Using reflective learning to master opponent strategy in a competitive environment". This outlines a basic reflective learning module, applied to a baseball metaphor.

There is alot there I know little of could you briefly explain "cognitive architecture SOAR" if it doesn't require going into load of detail to explain one point. Cheers

Valmont

Odysseus wrote: »

There is alot there I know little of could you briefly explain "cognitive architecture SOAR" if it doesn't require going into load of detail to explain one point. Cheers

+1

*swoosh*

Odysseus

Valmont wrote: »

+1

*swoosh*

Went right over my head too, however, hopefully this thread will give us insight into the other areas people are working on.


PS: Hope I didn't waffle on about the coke thing too much.

p.pete

Coke'll do that to a man...
I'm still at a low level of knowledge myself, but'll have a go. Cognitive architectures relates to cognitive modelling. Cognitive modelling being the exercise of trying to mirror cognitive processes computationally. You'd usually take just one (as it's an area that still needs to develop a lot, keeping things simple) or two (ideally there should be lots interacting, some day) cognitive processes e.g. reflective learning (the process of improving/learning by seeing what you've done previously and adjusting), and try to recreate that on a cognitive architecture.

The cognitive architectures such as Soar, or ACT-R have already been developed, and are continuously being upgraded with increased functionality. The ultimate aim would be for it to act exactly as a brain would I guess. Soar is at version 9 already but still nowhere near a fraction of the way toward that kind of functionality. The architectures are built up on designs of computer architecture, which I guess is diodes, transistors and electricity, combining into chips and components, combining into systems, into the computer - sort of how the brain is built from neurons upwards. Reminds me of some Steven Pinker stuff I read once that properly put me to sleep!

So trying to develop cognitive modules, such as for reflective learning, can develop seperately from the development of the overall architecture (the brain). I've proposed using a task such as the Wisconsin Card Sorting Task (WCST) to start off with, just to show how people's strategies change once they realise the rule has changed and they're getting things wrong. So this would be done with human participants first to get response data, reaction times and % correct e.t.c. The task then is to design something that will produce comparable responses for the same inputs. This learning module would be designed with the Soar language, so that it sits on top of the Soar architecture. The WCST can be developed with something like Java, and then XML can be used for communication between the task and the module.

p.pete

Great thread idea btw Odysseus!

Odysseus

Its alot to process, but thanks for the introduction to it P.Pete; its completely outside of my field.

Valmont

Considering I did my final year project in a cognitve area (reasoning), I find that very interesting. I'll have to crack open the cognitive book and have a look.

hotspur

I read The Emperor's New Drugs: Exploding the Antidepressant Myth by Irving Kirsch this week. Kirsch is a psychologist, psychotherapist, and one of the leading experts in placebo. I've read his stuff in the past on hypnosis.

It is a fantastic book and anyone with even a passing interest in the debates we've had around here recently on anti-depressants should read it.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Emperors-New-Drugs-Exploding-Antidepressant/dp/1847920837/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1259537258&sr=8-1

Anouilh

http://www.infibeam.com/Books/info/Harriet-B-Braiker/Who-s-Pulling-Your-Strings-How-to/0071446729.html

I'm re-reading this book after 20 years.
It was very useful for dealing with workplace tensions.


http://books.google.ie/books?id=wGbZ2ynQOokC&pg=PA5&lpg=PT1&dq=who%27s+pulling+your+strings+psychology+book&client=firefox-a

Anouilh

I'm often puzzled by the lack of cross-referencing between various Fora on Boards.ie.

This thread on the Photography Forum has some interesting ideas and reading links.

http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055694237

Psychology is increasingly linking to the visual arts, as evidenced by the number of classes available in museums and art colleges.

Google Books has many finely thought out links as well, for example:

http://books.google.ie/books?id=zHYzeCh91mwC&pg=PA69&dq=psychology+photography&client=firefox-a

Torakx

interesting stuff from everyone.its nice to see other peoples research topics.
i like the S.O.A.R idea that is very interesting and i guess only a matter of time before that happened.

i recently joined the local library! part of my foray into the world i have been doing my best to shut out lol

got myself 4 books not all psychology but interesting none the less

Patrick Heron - The Nephilim and the pyramid of the apocalypse
(this ones about the nephilim in noahs day and later on too possibly today ^^ and also the egyptians and there technology and various knowledge of the ancients)pretty good book only 2 days and im half way through hehe

Carl Jung - Answer to Job
while reading the essential Carl Jung i found an interesting section more heading to philosophy regarding God and job. in this afaik the author applies i think analytical psychology to God when he reacts to Satans provocation in the book of Job.

Joseph O'Connor & John Seymour - Introducing NLP
Basic introduction to Neuro Linguistic Programming.a topic i found extremely interesting and cant wait to read it.have you ever watched obama speak or seen Derren Brown on TV? thats NPL in action.

Andrew Bradbury - Develop your NLP skills
think this is mainly bussiness orientated.but when dealing with money and potential bussiness contacts and sales this should prove helpful.
a great book for getting along with work colleagues i would guess.

cant wait to see what else everyone is reading

Valmont

Torakx wrote: »

Joseph O'Connor & John Seymour - Introducing NLP
Andrew Bradbury - Develop your NLP skills

I'm surprised NLP is still lumped in with proper psychology. Shame really! But I digress, that is for another thread.

Odysseus

I'm still work my way the Lacan seminar, but that will be a year long process because it will involve reading various works of Freud that are referenced.

However, I have just started to re-read Making Us Crazy by Herb Kutchins and Stuart Kirk. Its a critque of the DSM, its interesting in that it gives a historical viewpoint From DSM I to IV tracking the development and demise of various disorders with that time frame.

hotspur

Odysseus wrote: »

However, I have just started to re-read Making Us Crazy by Herb Kutchins and Stuart Kirk. Its a critque of the DSM, its interesting in that it gives a historical viewpoint From DSM I to IV tracking the development and demise of various disorders with that time frame.

Just bought it there. You're a bad man Odysseus, I bought 7 books online at the weekend already. Over the past week or 2 I have reread:
Control theory by William Glasser
Choice theory by William Glasser
Counselling with choice theory by William Glasser
Reality therapy for the 21st century by Robert Wubbolding.

At the weekend I bought:
Cognitive Therapy and the Emotional Disorders - Beck
Anxiety Disorders and Phobias: A Cognitive Perspective - Beck et al.
Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy - Burns
Cognitive Hypnotherapy: An Integrated Approach to the Treatment of Emotional Disorders - Alladin
The Clinical Use of Hypnosis in Cognitive Behavior Therapy: A Practitioners Casebook - Chapman
Cognitive Hypnotherapy - Dowd
Handbook of Clinical Hypnosis - Lynn et al.

Odysseus

hotspur wrote: »

Just bought it there. You're a bad man Odysseus.

Lets know what you think of it. |Their is an intersting chapter on the deletion on homosexuality as a pathological abd also one on the inclusion on PTSD. Also I know its an area your interested in yourself so if you have any recommendations around trhat area give me a shout; if you don't mind.


I want to get reading around the area again, as you know I'm looking at doing some study next year. Everyone I go to is telling to stop looking for a warm up course and just do my PhD. As my MA was prettty much on psychodiagnostics I might as well look at doing some thing around that area.

hotspur

Odysseus wrote: »

Lets know what you think of it. |Their is an intersting chapter on the deletion on homosexuality as a pathological abd also one on the inclusion on PTSD.

Will do. I think many people, Lacanians such as Rik Loose included, who view the DSM and such psychiatric nosologies in such a negative light are often committing the genetic fallacy.

Besides the original descriptive function of Kraepelin inspired biological diagnostic systems of psychiatric diagnosis I think as an emergent social feature they also function prescriptively. The totality of its function is not limited to that for which it was originally intended.

Illness is socially constructed and there exists culturally recognised and accepted ways of manifesting psychological illness or suffering.

I view the DSM and the promulgating of its diagnoses as functioning, in part, to shape and validate the culturally accepted ways of being ill. It has a legitimising function every bit as much, if not more, than the stigmatising function that anti-psychiatrists attack it for.

It also opens up a shared language and acknowledgment upon which mental health workers and suffering clients can initially say something concrete and the clinician can quickly acknowledge (as the representative of society) that they hear, understand, and accept the meaningfulness of the client's suffering.

Then the real work can proceed beyond the initial communication, and acceptance, of socially recognised suffering.

Consequently not only do I not have a problem with the social and political nature of the DSM but, given my view of it expressed above, I think it is functioning in accordance with its most important role when it is being affected by such factors.

The question that has always been on my mind in respect of the cultural shaping of expressions of suffering and illness in our modern consumerist information heavy world is this: Is it feasible or desirable to fully accept and embrace the fact that academics, researchers, clinicians, and the media construct and shape psychological illness and to move towards actively promoting (advertising?) more benign forms of illness?

Now I obviously don't subscribe to the idea that all manifestations of psychopathology are merely chosen communications which are socially constructed. I fully recognise that many are symptoms of personal attempts to resolve difficulties in being.

I vaguely remember Lacan having a lot of interesting things to say about the symptom in relation to a Borromean knot, but its quite hazy. My view was informed mainly from studying culture and illness from around the world in health psychology, and a good dollop of epistemology and philosophy of language I suppose.

It hit me one week when there was both a TV programme on BBC and a 2 page spread in a newspaper on Munchausen by proxy syndrome, which is a particularly pernicious expression of illness. I was annoyed by the media exposure because I had come to believe that society shapes what manifestations and expressions of mental illness it recognises and accepts.

I didn't think that such a pernicious form of expressing suffering and need for help ought to be advertised to consumers of illness. When I decided that it lead me to an uncomfortable position which was out of touch with any thinking I have ever read.

I am confident that the media paying a lot of attention to any psychological illness results in increased expressions of it, so ought we not to use that knowledge to shape expressions of illness in society which are as benign as possible? The expressions of suffering are complicating factors in the amelioration of the underlying problems. Why shouldn't we socially shape these expressions so that they will contribute less problematically to the therapeutic endeavour?

I sat down and decided what would be the features of such an artificially constructed and relatively benign expression of psychological suffering, you know what I ended up coming up with? Chronic fatigue syndrome.

I don't tend to express my desire that we ought to actively shape expressions of psychological illness because I suspect it sounds nuts. But the DSM is shaping it anyway for all manner of social and political reasons so why not for benign symptom reasons?

jokettle

I'm currently doing my PhD in neuroscience, and I'm completely overloaded with papers on methods and imaging and aaarrrgghh :eek: So I'm skulking around here hoping for some suggestions on light enjoyable reading, yet still relevant to psych! The most recent things I read that I really enjoyed were Sach's The Man Who Mistook His Wife For A Hat, and Musicophilia.All suggestions warmly welcomed.

Plus, if anyone has any questions about my research just ask, but I warn you, you might regret it

Valmont

I'm reading Leonard Mlodinow's "The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness rules our Lives"

So far he has talked about and referenced studies showing that humans are not very good at thinking probabilistically and how this affects our cognitions. I'm not sure where the book is going but it's hard to put down at the moment.

EDIT: jokettle, this book should be right up your alley.

hotspur

Valmont wrote: »

I'm reading Leonard Mlodinow's "The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness rules our Lives"

So far he has talked about and referenced studies showing that humans are not very good at thinking probabilistically and how this affects our cognitions. I'm not sure where the book is going but it's hard to put down at the moment.

EDIT: jokettle, this book should be right up your alley.

I highly recommend reading Fooled by Randomness by Hassim Taleb, it applies these lessons to the markets. And if you're interested in the area then of course read some Kahneman and Tversky such as Judgment under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases.

hotspur

Odysseus wrote: »

However, I have just started to re-read Making Us Crazy by Herb Kutchins and Stuart Kirk. Its a critque of the DSM, its interesting in that it gives a historical viewpoint From DSM I to IV tracking the development and demise of various disorders with that time frame.

Read this over Christmas and thought it was very poor to be honest. I knew from the first couple of pages that the authors were not serious academics from the mental health field - I think their first 3 references were from the New York Times. Indeed the authors are social work academics and as such I felt throughout that they didn't really understand the subject matter in important ways.

The chapters on BDP and racism were truly awful, the former being almost entirely about the ridiculous views of one psychiatrist Thomas Gutheil which had nothing whatsoever to do with the DSM. They really were struggling to find chapters for their book, and the ones they had were mind numbingly repetitive.

As an historical record of the developments of the DSM it is mildly interesting but written by 2 outsiders who aren't even mental health professionals or academics. Relying so heavily on newspaper reports is very telling.

Their points were that the DSM is affected by social, political, and economic factors and that it is not well based on a body of firm scientific research evidence. Does anybody with even a passing interest in it think otherwise?

This rather tedious and disparate detailing of the various social effects on the "science" of it is only in opposition to an avowed stance by the creators of the DSM. The antipositivist debate of science was something of an anachronism by the time they wrote it in 1997. It may have been relevant 20 years earlier when they got interested in the area, but just because they are still interested in the socially constructed aspects of the DSM doesn't mean that what they have to say is relevant anymore.

Anyone they will shock or surprise with this book is someone who knows nothing about the last 40 years of science and the philosophy and method of it. But it's one in the eye of any positivist scientist who hasn't read a science book since Wittgenstein died.

Odysseus

hotspur wrote: »

Read this over Christmas and thought it was very poor to be honest. I knew from the first couple of pages that the authors were not serious academics from the mental health field - I think their first 3 references were from the New York Times. Indeed the authors are social work academics and as such I felt throughout that they didn't really understand the subject matter in important ways.

The chapters on BDP and racism were truly awful, the former being almost entirely about the ridiculous views of one psychiatrist Thomas Gutheil which had nothing whatsoever to do with the DSM. They really were struggling to find chapters for their book, and the ones they had were mind numbingly repetitive.

As an historical record of the developments of the DSM it is mildly interesting but written by 2 outsiders who aren't even mental health professionals or academics. Relying so heavily on newspaper reports is very telling.

Their points were that the DSM is affected by social, political, and economic factors and that it is not well based on a body of firm scientific research evidence. Does anybody with even a passing interest in it think otherwise?

This rather tedious and disparate detailing of the various social effects on the "science" of it is only in opposition to an avowed stance by the creators of the DSM. The antipositivist debate of science was something of an anachronism by the time they wrote it in 1997. It may have been relevant 20 years earlier when they got interested in the area, but just because they are still interested in the socially constructed aspects of the DSM doesn't mean that what they have to say is relevant anymore.

Anyone they will shock or surprise with this book is someone who knows nothing about the last 40 years of science and the philosophy and method of it. But it's one in the eye of any positivist scientist who hasn't read a science book since Wittgenstein died.

Christ Hotspur you get through your stuff quickly. I like it for the one midly postive report you gave it, in that it does give a good chart of the rise and fall of certain disorders. I find it good for a quick check about the status of disorders with each chamge. Sorry if my recommendation lightened your pocket:o

hotspur

Odysseus wrote: »

Sorry if my recommendation lightened your pocket:o

Oh I wouldn't worry about that, my new books got this month total now runs at 13 or 14. Just received Cognitive Therapy of Substance Abuse and Cognitive Therapy in Practice - a Case Formulation Approach in the post today.

Speaking of the DSM, I'm planning to read up on positive psychology in a couple of months and one of the books I plan to get is obverse of the DSM - it's an 800 page tome detailing study of positive characteristics and virtues by Peterson and the founder of positive psychology Martin Seligman:
http://www.amazon.com/Character-Strengths-Virtues-Handbook-Classification/dp/0195167015

Here's a TED talk by Seligman:
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/martin_seligman_on_the_state_of_psychology.html