Victims, “Closure,” and the Sociology of Emotion

Bandes discusses the polarizing function of victim impact statements used in the context of the death penalty. The use of victim impact statements is justified in order to promote closure for the victim, but it\u27s unclear what psychological closure can be accomplished from the formal litigation process. Even if victim impact statements do help their authors, in the context of the death penalty the authors are family members of the victim, not the direct victim, and Bandes questions whether it\u27s important to further their interests at the expense of the interests of the defendant. The only recourse for the jury is to deliver a sentence of death, so the statements have the effect of polarizing the conflict in ways that Bandes thinks interfere with promoting justice

Beyond moving on : the perceptual and cognitive impacts of psychological closure

textPsychological closure is the feeling that a life experience is complete and a part of the past (Beike, Adams, and Wirth-Beaumont 2007). While research on psychological closure primarily deals with traumatic or highly aversive life experiences, psychological closure is frequently experienced and sought after in more typical consumption settings. My dissertation extends our current knowledge about the role of psychological closure by exploring emotional, cognitive, perceptual, and behavioral implications of psychological closure across a broad range of consumer experiences. The first essay aims to demonstrate that closure makes events seem distant in time and probability through emotion. It also explores resulting consumer decisions such as warranty purchase intentions. The second essay proposes and tests how psychological closure of a consumer learning experience can lead to an abstract representation of that learning experience, and consequently a heightened sense of subjective knowledge.Marketin

Investigating the Effects of Narrative Perspective on Self-Compassion, Psychological Closure, and Affect for Unresolved Memories

Unresolved memories lack closure or understanding, and feel unsettled. When describing these unpleasant memories, people can envision them from a particular vantage point (first-person vs. third-person) and use certain pronouns to refer to the self (first-person vs. third-person). This study examined how different narrative perspectives (a combination of visual imagery and pronoun use) influence ratings on self-compassion, psychological closure, and affect for unresolved memories. Research has shown that these retrieval strategies can influence the way people feel about and interpret negative events. More specifically, a distanced (vs. immersed) view can reduce negative emotionality and promote new insights. This study uniquely extends this research by examining self-compassion and closure. 120 undergraduates were recruited from the University of Windsor’s Psychology Department Participant Pool. In an experimental design, they selected an unresolved event-memory and wrote about it using a first-person or third-person narrative perspective. Those in the control condition were instructed to think about their event. All participants responded to measures of state self-compassion (SSCS-L; Neff et al., 2021), state psychological closure (PCS; Boucher et al., 2019), and state affect (PANAS; Bradley & Lang, 1994). Transitional impact, memory characteristics, and self-critical rumination were also examined. Findings regarding differences between narrative perspectives and between writing and thinking conditions will be presented. This study could hold important therapeutic applications by suggesting particular narrative interventions to aid in the resolution of troublesome memories. Keywords: autobiographical memory, emotions, retrieval strategies, adaptive copin

Psychological Closure Does Not Entail Cognitive Closure

According to some philosophers, we are “cognitively closed” to the answers to certain problems. McGinn has taken the next step and offered a list of examples: the mind/body problem, the problem of the self and the problem of free will. There are naturalistic, scientific answers to these problems, he argues, but we cannot reach them because of our cognitive limitations. In this paper, we take issue with McGinn’s thesis as the most well-developed and systematic one among the so-called “new mysterians”. McGinn aims to establish a strong, representational notion of cognitive closure: a principled inaccessibility of a true theory of certain properties of the world, but he offers arguments that only bear on difficulties with psychologically grasping the correct answers. The latter we label psychological closure. We argue that representational closure does not follow from psychological closure, and that McGinn’s case therefore falters. We could very well be able to represent the correct answer to some question, even without being able to grasp that answer psychologically. McGinn’s mistake in deriving representational closure from psychological closure rests on a fallacy of equivocation relating to the concept of ‘understanding’. By making this distinction explicit, we hope to improve our thinking about the limits of science in particular and human knowledge in general

How Emotions Unfold in Online Discussions After a Terror Attack

In the wake of a terror attack, social media is used for sharing thoughts and emotions, accessing and distributing information, and memorializing victims. Emotions are a big part of this, but there is a gap in our understanding on how those emotions evolve and what kinds of social media uses they are related to. Better understanding of the emotional and topical developments of online discussions can serve not only to fill the aforementioned gap, but also assist in developing better collective coping strategies for recovering from terror attacks. We examine what types of conversations unfolded online after the Boston Marathon Bombing and what kinds of emotions were associated with them, accounting for regional differences, and present a process model covering the general trends of such conversations. Although the phases apply to reactions to terror attacks on a general level, there are proximity-based differences to the location of the terror attack

What We Regret Most Are Lost Opportunities: A Theory of Regret Intensity

A recent theory (Roese & Summerville, 2005) has suggested that regret is intensified by perceptions of future opportunity. In this work, however, it is proposed that feelings of regret are more likely elicited by perceptions of lost opportunity: People regret outcomes that could have been changed in the past but can no longer be changed and for which people experience low psychological closure. Consistent with the lost opportunity principle, Study 1 revealed that regretted experiences in the most commonly regretted life domains are perceived as offering the least opportunity for improvement in the future, Study 2 indicated that people experience the most regret for outcomes that are not repeatable, and Study 3 revealed that perceptions of higher past than future opportunities and low psychological closure predict regret intensity. Discussion focuses on the hope inducing yet ephemeral nature of perceived future opportunity and on the relationship between dissonance reduction and closure

Resolving Distressing Autobiographical Memories: The Role of Perspective in Imagery, Writing, and Self-Reflection

This program of research consists of three studies centered on the development and validation of a measure of psychological closure along with an investigation of how different strategies for recalling and writing about unresolved autobiographical events inform attributions of closure and aspects of emotion (valence, intensity, and reaction). Study 1 (Ntotal =601) centered on the construction of the Psychological Closure Scale (PCS). This began with a multifaceted conceptualization based on a thorough review of definitions and theoretical contexts. Factor analyses revealed a robust, good-fitting, and reliable structural solution. The PCS contains 42 items that assess seven facets of event resolution: finality, understanding, felt distance, emotional relief, changed experience, less preoccupation, and reduced need to act. Model fit was replicated using independent MTurk (Study 2) and undergraduate (Study 3) samples. Study 2 (N = 182) examined issues of construct validity for the PCS. Convergent and discriminant validity were supported via statistically meaningful correlations amongst the PCS and theoretically related constructs (e.g., unfinished business resolution), along with the lack of correlations with theoretically unrelated constructs (e.g., event impact). Study 3 (N = 351) used a 15-minute randomized control writing paradigm to explore changes in closure and emotion at retrieval and 1-2 days later. Participants selected an unresolved event and were instructed to write about it using one of two narrative perspective shift sequences: third-person to first-person (shift-to-first) vs. first-person to third-person (shift-to-third). First-person entailed recalling and visualizing the event as if through one’s own eyes and writing about it using the pronoun, ‘I’. Third-person involved envisioning the event as if through the eyes of an observer and writing about it using the pronouns ‘He’, ‘She’, or ‘They’ to refer to the self. Participants were then prompted to use one of two mental foci to continue writing about their event: an experience focus consisted of reporting on the event’s concrete details, whereas a coherence focus entailed reporting on its self-narrative significance. The control condition was instructed to think about their event in a “true and honest manner.” All participants completed the PCS, emotion, and exploratory items (cognitive avoidance, centrality of event) immediately following the manipulation and 1-2 days later. The shift-to-first condition reported greater closure, relative to the shift-to-third and control conditions, particularly on subscales pertaining to finality, understanding, emotional release, mental liberation, and behavioural deactivation. These effects were greater when followed by an experience (not coherence) focus, however mental focus conditions showed no difference on closure. The shift-to-first condition also indicated less negative affect, emotional intensity, and reactivity than the other conditions. The magnitude of these effects remained after 1-2 days. All writing conditions showed increases in closure over time along with decreases in negative affect, while the control condition showed no change. The shift-to-first condition also reported less cognitive avoidance and less event centrality to identity and life story relative to the other groups. This research offers a new measure of psychological closure with preliminary evidence of good psychometric properties. It also addresses theoretical and empirical discrepancies concerning the function and adaptive value of imagery and narrative perspectives, identifies effective shift sequences that support greater resolution, and suggests possible mechanisms by which this occurs. Theoretical and clinical implications along with future directions are discussed. Closure, memory-induced emotion regulation, and adaptive self-reflection are thought to be facilitated by features of the retrieval context that support sufficient distance from, followed by engagement with, unresolved past events, elements within the events, and the self as rememberer, tied to the present

Improving the Odds of Government Accountability in the Disaster-Prone Era: Using the 9/11 Fund Factors to Remedy the Problem of Toxic Katrina Trailers

This article analyzes the dangers surrounding the toxicity levels in the trailers issued to Katrina survivors by FEMA, and identifies serious medical complications stemming from the temporary homes. Lack of government oversight in the process led to the distribution of formaldehyde-laced trailers that cost the government more than $2 billion and continue to poison residents years after the storm. Furthermore, the failures connected to disaster relief are even more disturbing in this disaster-prone era. More importantly, this paper also proposes the creation of a Toxic Trailer Fund to compensate residents of toxic FEMA trailers. Using the factors implicitly established by the 9/11 Fund – the national perspective, the uniqueness of the circumstances, the need for physical and psychological closure and the prompt and predictable alternative to litigation – this article makes an argument for providing relief to toxic trailer residents. First, this fund is demanded to redress compounded government harms. Further, this fund will serve the important principle of good government by strengthening government accountability

Early interventions following exposure to traumatic events: psychological debriefing and the law

Defines Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and discusses the advantages of providing "Critical Incident Stress Debriefing" (CISD) to those who have witnessed traumatic events to prevent them developing PTSD. Outlines the development of CISD, the procedure itself and concerns arising from medical studies into its effectiveness. Examines the legal implications, including the existence of a duty of care to provide CISD or liability for debriefings which are negligently provided. Sets out briefly the status of psychological debriefing amongst support organisations