THE LIMITS OF A TECHINICAL CONCEPT OF A GOOD MARRIAGE: EXPLORING THE ROLE OF VIRTUE IN COMMUNICATION SKILLS

Teaching communication skills is one of the most common approaches used to improve couples' relationships. These skills are typically presented as content‐free techniques that are value neutral. Yet, marital therapists frequently see that exercising communication skills, particularly in conflict situations, can be quite difficult, requiring personal strengths such as self‐restraint, courage, generosity, justice, and good judgment. These personal strengths are virtues that are presupposed in communication skills and are necessary for their successful use. The traditional attempt to see marital therapy as value neutral has made it difficult to recognize the importance of these virtues. Therapists might be more effective if they could help couples to identify and cultivate underlying character strengths necessary for good communication. This paper presents an Aristotelian reading of virtues in marriage that can broaden our understanding of marriage and open new avenues for helping couples

A Phenomenological Reformulation of Psychological Science: Resources and Prospects

The question I explore in this chapter is whether the reigning self-understanding of psychological science, the investigation of mind-independent causes of human behavior, is sufficient. Specifically, I explore the possibility that the existential and phenomenological traditions, particularly Charles Guignon’s work, can provide the resources for a reinterpretation that enhances scientific psychology and its societal contributions. Although psychology offers a pathway to understanding human motivations and actions, the discipline’s research tradition explores human nature primarily by abstracting individuals from their historical, social, interpersonal, and life contexts and seeking causal explanations for atomistically defined “behaviors.” The concept of behavior is itself a highly abstract notion that portrays human action in terms of discrete units of activity that can be isolated and studied in highly contrived contexts. I explore this question with an in-depth examination of a single neuropsychological study of honesty and dishonesty. Although I will refer primarily to this one study, the important features of this investigation are quite typical in psychological research. By focusing on one study, I can provide an in-depth analysis of how experimental research tacitly relies on broader contexts of meaning that are obscured by its methods. I chose this study because of its strengths in using very sophisticated methods to investigate an intriguing problem. If anything, this particular study is closer to understanding its subjects as full-bodied agents in a meaningful world than most psychological investigations are. Even so, it is clear that it woefully underestimates the humanity of its research subjects

Asking the Best Questions and Interpreting Wisely in Research

Psychologists have avidly pursued a natural scientific model of research in which we have sought to investigate timeless and universal phenomena to discover the underlying laws that govern the operations of psychological phenomena. Psychologists have traditionally seen this pursuit of knowledge as a disinterested truth seeking that is disengaged from personal and political biases and values, and independent of the scientist's character. Given the success and prestige of the natural sciences, it is no wonder that psychologists have attempted to emulate them. The epistemic goals and methods of a natural scientific approach have been under attack from many quarters, which the author touched on in chapter 1. In this chapter the author continues to examine the appropriateness of a natural scientific model by contrasting it with a phronetic approach to inquiry, which highlights researchers' judgment and the goods that they seek. Moreover, it is argued that the investigator's character, particularly the capacity for practical wisdom, plays a crucial role in the conduct of science. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2009 APA, all rights reserved

Aristotle on Eudaimonia: On the Virtue of Returning to the Source

Psychologists are increasingly interested in the topic of eudaimonia, a term adopted from ancient Greek philosophers (with most modern views traceable to Aristotle), referring to human flourishing. Conceptual confusion remains because investigators generally have not clarified how and why they have appropriated Aristotle’s concept of eudaimonia. This chapter presents a close interpretation of Aristotle’s view and explores continuities and discontinuities in psychologists’ application of this original concept to provide a theoretical baseline and increase conceptual clarity. Eudaimonia is explored as an ethical concept referring to the best kind of life, which is an outgrowth of humans’ natural endowments. Eudaimonia is a form of activity (that includes subjective experience, but is not limited to it), comprised by the pursuit of ends that are choiceworthy for human beings. Eudaimonia is a unified way of life, but it has multiple constituents (e.g., belonging, justice, and social harmony). Eudaimonia is related to, but distinct from pleasure (hedonia). Human flourishing is a matter of a complete life that encompasses virtue or excellence, and Aristotle saw it as the ultimate aim of human life. The chapter concludes with several major challenges for eudaimonia researchers

The Deep Psychology of Eudaimonia and Virtue: Belonging, Loyalty and the Anterior Cingulate Cortex

Aristotle’s function argument suggests that the human good is found in the excellent expression of natural human functions and that virtues are the character strengths that make it possible to fulfill those functions. An evolutionary understanding of human nature recognizes humans as an ultrasocial species that features group living, cooperation, and profound interdependence. Group inclusion was essential to survival and reproduction during human evolution. Therefore, a social exclusion detector is an extremely important adaptation that enables the individual to monitor the threat of ostracism. Social exclusion activates a key part of the neural network that registers physical pain, the anterior cingulate cortex, making social exclusion literally painful. The human function of group living is fulfilled by activities that promote belonging, a central human good. Extensive research documents the essential role of belonging in human flourishing. The primary virtue associated with belonging is loyalty, and belonging is the direct, everyday expression of group membership

Choosing Well in Clinical Practice

This chapter looks at where to find guidance for deciding what is most significant in what clients present, for deciding how to understand their difficulties, and for recognizing what form to give interventions. It begins with some obvious sources taught in psychology programs: psychotherapy research and psychotherapy theory. However, the author feels that the three major elements of practical wisdom described elsewhere in the book can help us to understand and practice good decision making for the complexity and uncertainty that psychotherapists face. These elements are further expounded upon in this chapter. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2009 APA, all rights reserved