"Crisis” and “re-foundation” of psychology – outmoded topics of theoretical-psychological discourse? Retrospections and Assessments

In the 1970-80ies critical assessments of the problematic state of psychology as science were flourishing, stressing the theoretical disintegration and practical irrelevance of psychological basic research and connecting both defects to a misplaced dependence of mainstream psychology on a scientistic notion of scientific cognition. Talks of a crisis in psychology were gaining ground again. Controverting the paradigmatic maturity vs. the pre-/non-paradigmatic state of our discipline or, alternatively, its necessarily multi-paradigmatic character, the quest for unification as against a programmatic theoretical pluralism became a top issue of scholarly dispute. The institutionalisation of ISTP in 1985 and its initial epistemological and meta-theoretical core themes clearly reflected this pervasive trend. Some 35 years later, it has become noticeably quiet about such concerns, and there is no evidence of a renewal of large-scale discussions on a foundational crisis in psychology, let alone of ambitious attempts at theoretical unification or re-foundation – despite the fact that none of the “epistemopathologial“ (Koch, 1981) diagnoses of traditional variable-psychology have been refuted or lost strategic importance. Combining historical retrospection with an exemplary analysis of topical theoretical-psychological subjects, the aim of my paper is to get a clearer idea of where Theoretical Psychology currently stands in regard to the meta-scientific study of psychological theory-problems

terraphilia

University of Michiganhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/144742/1/terraphilia_Maiers.pd

Sensation Seeking and Attitudes towards Substance Use in Athletes and Non-Athletes

We examined differences between athletes and non-athletes on sensation seeking and attitudes towards substance use. We found that there was no significant difference between athletes and non-athletes on sensation seeking nor on attitudes about alcohol, tobacco, cocaine, marijuana, or ecstasy. However, athletes trended toward more favorable views about alcohol use than non-athletes. Overall, college students higher in sensation seeking had more positive attitudes about substances. Though conclusions are limited by the small sample size, sensation seeking college students may be at increased risk for substance use.https://idun.augsburg.edu/zyzzogeton/1006/thumbnail.jp

Six-locus high resolution HLA haplotype frequencies derived from mixed-resolution DNA typing for the entire US donor registry

AbstractWe have calculated six-locus high resolution HLA A∼C∼B∼DRB3/4/5∼DRB1∼DQB1 haplotype frequencies using all Be The Match® Registry volunteer donors typed by DNA methods at recruitment. Mixed resolution HLA typing data was inputted to a modified expectation–maximization (EM) algorithm in the form of genotype lists generated by interpretation of primary genomic typing data to the IMGT/HLA v3.4.0 allele list. The full cohort consists of 6.59million subjects categorized at a broad race level. Overall 25.8% of the individuals were typed at the C locus, and 5.2% typed at the DQB1 locus, while all individuals were typed for A, B, DRB1. We also present a subset of 2.90million subjects with detailed race/ethnic information mapped to 21 population subgroups, 64.1% of which have primary DNA typing data across at least A, B, and DRB1 loci. Sample sizes at the detailed race level range from 1,242,890 for European Caucasian to 1,376 Alaskan Native or Aleut. Genetic distance measurements show high levels of HLA genetic divergence among the 21 detailed race categories, especially among the eight Asian–American populations. These haplotype frequencies will be used to improve match predictions for donor selection algorithms for hematopoietic stem cell transplantation and improve the accuracy in modeling registry match rates

Singular Perturbations of the Quadratic Map

University of Minnesota Duluth 2015 UROP pape