ABSTRACT Recent scholarship has attempted to restore the reputation of the American electorate, even though its level of political interest and information has not measurably increased. Scott Althaus’s Collective Preferences in Democratic Politics challenges this revisionist optimism, arguing that opinion polls misrepresent the interests of a large segment of society, and that they therefore get too much attention as a guide to policy makers, because those being polled are so ill informed. But Althaus overestimates the degree to which respondent ignorance (...) is responsible for the instability of survey responses; and he is perhaps too critical of polling as the vehicle for transmitting voter interests. His analysis of information effects on political attitudes, however, raises the important question of how public opinion would be different if it were well informed. The answer is, I believe: only minimally different. (shrink)

"This book will last and last, because it contains the wisdom of two wonderfully knowing observers of our human destiny."—Robert Coles For decades Erik H. Erikson's concept of the stages of human development has deeply influenced the field of contemporary psychology. Here, with new material by Joan M. Erikson, is an expanded edition of his final work. The Life Cycle Completed eloquently closes the circle of Erikson's theories, outlining the unique rewards and challenges—for both individuals and society—of (...) very old age. (shrink)

This study aims to present culturally situated artefacts as depicted in nursing home environments and to analyse the underlying understandings of disciplining structures that are manifested in these kinds of places. Our personal geographies are often taken for granted, but when moving to a nursing home, geographies are glaringly rearranged. The study design is archival and cross‐sectional observational, and the data are comprised of 38 photographs and 13 videos showing environments from nursing homes. The analysis was inspired by the methodological (...) steps in Roper's and Shapira's description of conducting ethnography. The results are presented in four categories: (i) public areas, (ii) orderliness, (iii) staff's places and (iv) devices. The rearrangement of geography implies a degrading of agency and loss of authority over one's place. The places should be understood in their relation to the agents and their temporarily claims upon them. The material and immaterial artefacts, that is the items, people and behaviours, transform the nursing staff into ‘space invaders’. Future inquiries may take into consideration the ways that space invasion in participative space intersect and construct the identities of the agents it invades upon. (shrink)

The aim of this study was to present the functionality and design of nursing care robots as depicted in pictures posted on social media. A netnographic study was conducted using social media postings over a period of 3 years. One hundred and Seventy‐two images were analyzed using netnographic methodology. The findings show that nursing care robots exist in various designs and functionalities, all with a common denominator of supporting the care of one's own and others’ health and/or well‐being as a (...) main function. The results also show that functionality and design are influenced by recent popular sci‐fi/cartoon contexts as portrayed in blockbuster movies, for example. Robots'designs seem more influenced by popular sci‐fi/cartoon culture than professional nursing culture. We therefore stress that it is relevant for nursing researchers to critically reflect upon the development of nursing care robots as a thoughtful discussion about embracing technology also might generate a range of epistemological possibilities when entering a postmodern era of science and practice. (shrink)

With a few exceptions all the essays in this issue of Daedalus are biographies of world intellectual and political leaders. Erik Erikson's "psycho-historical" examination of Gandhi is followed by sketches of Nkrumah, Ataturk, de Gaulle, Bismarck, Andrew Johnson, Newton, James Mill, and William James. There are three exceptions to the biographical motif: 1) an essay on charisma which, although it does not go much beyond Weber, does offer a concise anatomy of the various dimensions of this slippery category which (...) is an underlying theme throughout many of the biographies; 2) a short essay proposing that obstacles to change in underdeveloped countries are connected with obstacles to the perception of change; and 3) an essay which examines the relation of the American intellectual-academic community to government during the first half of this century. Dankwart Rustow's introductory essay consists of "scattered remarks" on various methodologies for the exploration of the anatomy of leadership. His organizing themes are leadership as communication, leadership as learning process, and leadership as sense of timing.--S. O. H. (shrink)

Erik Erikson's work in psychosocial developmental theory has made valuable contributions to the field of religious ethics on some very basic issues. This paper makes scattered elements of Erikson's explicit ethical perspective available in concise fashion for critical ethical reflection. It does this in such a way as to highlight the centrally important fact for religious ethics that implicitly operative in Erikson's view is a criterion of "self-transcendence" as definitive of mature personal (fully human, ethical) development.

This article is meant to be suggestive, not thorough, in the themes presented. It is suggestive of the ways in which an existential-phenomenological approach may contribute to an understanding of a fundamental therapeutic and lived issue. Beginning with a very brief description of what is experienced as fundamental in therapy, the ground on which all other issues depend, the developmental framework of Erikson was consulted since it was assumed that therapy was a reflection of life. The most fundamental issue (...) for Erikson was the crisis of basic trust versus basic mistrust. Trust was understood and revealed by him in terms of bodily trust, ego predictability and its social aspects. Using Heidegger's Care Structure as a framework, the absence of the existential, future-oriented characteristic of trust became apparent and the contribution of a phenomenological approach became visible. In using Erikson's word "hope" for this characteristic, it became apparent that not only was the future characteristic added but that within it the bodily and ego aspects could be integrated. Some phenomenological research was referred to which demonstrated that this integration was a fuller and more accurate reflection of human experience than the more specialized psychoanalytic understanding of Erikson. Marcel's description of hope was then consulted for a further understanding of this characteristic and finally the fundamental issue in therapy was identified as a crisis of hope. We use the word hope often in our daily experience. What this article points to as a research topic which would be central to therapy and to the lived world is what we mean when we say, "I hope." The structure of the experience of hoping would reveal much of what is central to both the world of therapy and the lived world. (shrink)

A collection of essays on methodology by practitioners of various disciplines. Raymond Aron, in discussing evidence and inference in history, touches on the old problems of uniqueness, relativism, periodization and pattern in history. H. M. Hart and J. T. McNaughton discuss the special problems of evidence which arise in a legal context. Erik Erikson emphasizes the subjective aspects of the clinical psychologist's method of interpreting evidence. Martin Deutsch writes about the role of theoretical assumptions in interpreting evidence in nuclear (...) research. Paul Lazarsfeld's essay, probably the best, deals with problems of logic and technique in social research. The symposium concludes with a case study by Jacob Fine: the investigation of a problem in medical research. The philosophical content of most of the essays is small, though they provide material of which the philosophical methodologist must take account.—R. S. (shrink)

The twentieth century has been described as the time of man’s discovery of himself; few have contributed more to this cause than Erik Erikson. _The Clinical Erik Erikson: A psychoanalytic method of engagement and activation_ highlights Erikson’s transforming contributions to the field of psychoanalysis and honors his legacy by providing unpublished clinical case illustrations of his actual psychotherapeutic work. The publication of case material—simple memorable fragments and clinical vignettes— brings the reader into Erikson’s consultation room, providing (...) a portrait of his clinical technique and demonstrating how he actually worked. Stephen Schlein, an authority on Erikson, presents an illuminating account of Erikson’s pioneering work through an exhaustive search of his early monographs on child psychoanalysis, clinical writings, psychotherapeutic case studies, and participation at case conferences at The Austen Riggs Center. Erikson’s writings reveal a psychoanalytic method of extraordinary richness that emphasizes essential ingredients of an interpersonal-relational clinical method and articulates interactional dimensions that have restorative potential. His vision focuses on the relationship, its powerful affects, and a belief that human beings have a potent capacity for real change. This book will be essential reading for psychoanalysts and psychoanalytic psychotherapists. (shrink)

On Yongjo, King of Korea, 1694-1776, Confucianism and kingship. Examines the individual's sense of achievement, drawing the current thinking of anthropology and psychology into the framework constructed by contemporary philosopher Hans-Georg Gadamer. Also considers other modern thought in delineating the relationship between self and history. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.

This study uses a psychobiographic research method as a means to explore and describe the life of lyricist, Anthony Kiedis. Kiedis’s history is investigated through the lens of Erik Erikson’s theory of identity development. Using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) as a means to platform the psychobiographic methodology, this study explores Kiedis’s creativity and writing as intrinsic aspects of his identity. In addition, the analysis attempts to understand how Kiedis resolved his identity crises, and puts forward a presentation of Kiedis’s (...) subjective experiences of his identity development. Through this in-depth analysis, the study concludes that Kiedis is engaged in an infinite moratorium, and in so doing demonstrates the value of using the combined methods of IPA and psychobiography to understand the human condition. (shrink)

Since 1950, Erik Erikson's emphasis on ego-identity formation as the crucial task of adolescence has been the framework for almost all subsequent research and programming to empower positive adolescent development. Chatlos has recently described a “Framework of Spirituality” and contends that identity formation significantly interferes with and should occur after a spiritual transformational process for optimal and more meaningful adolescent development. This article reviews the current status of research in identity formation, including religious and spiritual identity formation contributing to (...) his conclusion, and describes the spiritual transformational process that is proposed to be central to positive adolescent development. A possible link between systemic focus on identity formation and current social upheaval is also identified. (shrink)

In this article I uncover, describe, and analyze two native Chinese theories by way of exploring the commentarial tradition through the centuries on two passages from Confucian classics: Mengzi 孟子 4B12 and Analects 論語 11.25. One view I explore is of the child as a cluster of role-specific duties, whereupon debates regard proper behavior for a junior in society; a second conception is of the child as an existential quality to be preserved or rediscovered, or a special stage in life (...) to be honored, whereupon the debates within the commentaries regard effective methods for preserving or rediscovering one’s human nature. In concluding, I compare this latter conception of children with the theories on childhood development articulated by the great 20th-century developmental psychologist Erik Erikson , whose views inform a number of seminal and important studies on children in China. I show how the latter Confucian view and Erikson’s are substantively different and yet can be seen as complementary. (shrink)

Nietzsche’s name has become almost synonymous with militant atheism. Born into a pious Christian family, this son of a Lutheran pastor declared himself the Antichrist. But could this have been yet another of his masks of hardness? Nietzsche rarely revealed his innermost self in the published writings, and this can be gleaned mainly from his private letters and the accounts of friends. These sources bring to light the philosopher’s inner struggle with his own, deeply religious nature.Losing his father at a (...) young age was a calamity from which Nietzsche never recovered, and I argue that his famous thought-image “God is dead” was a transfiguration of the painful memory of this loss. In this essay, I trace Nietzsche’s tortuous path from an ardent devotee of God to a vociferous critic of Christianity, a path that was punctuated with veiled longings for a loving deity. Deep in his heart, he remained faithful to Christian ideals. Rather like Cordelia, the only truly loving daughter of King Lear, Nietzsche refused to utter words of intense affection and reverence, as these had been blatantly devalued and corrupted. Instead, he adopted a mask of a wrongdoer and a blasphemer who took not the punishment but the guilt.Nietzsche’s attitude to religion is discussed from the perspective of his life, his personality, and his mental condition. The discussion draws on psychoanalytical concepts of Freud, Erikson, Winnicott and Kohut. This is not an exclusive reading, but complementary to other studies in this field. (shrink)

Contrary to Eliot’s charge that Hamlet is lacking in literary form, the philosophical form of the Cartesian Cogito, which Hamlet embodies in terms of the instability of the Cogito’s determined reason and determined madness, and complicates in terms of not having the theological backing that is offered to the Cogito’s philosophical “blind spot,” provides insight into Hamlet’s response to his mother’s sexual behavior. Correspondingly, Erikson’s insight that doubt is the brother of shame explains how Hamlet, burdened by his unguarded (...) philosophical doubts about the ontological and moral nature of the Ghost and its command of revenge, negatively projects his sense of shame into his perception of his mother’s behavior; thus filling the gap of Eliot’s objective correlative. (shrink)

BackgroundDrawing from Erikson’s theory, Domino and Affonso constructed the Inventory of Psychosocial Balance, a scale with satisfactory reliability and validity. However, the lack of a credible Chinese version of the scale may hinder research on ego development in Taiwan. The aim of the present study was to construct a short form Chinese IPB. In addition, factor analysis was employed to shorten the original 120-item scale to make it suitable for application in the older adults in the future.MethodsThe study involved (...) three steps: The first step was to establish the 120-items of the Chinese Inventory of Psychosocial Balance, and we conducted translation, back-translation, expert validity, and reliability of pilot study for this step. Following the first step was to construct the short-form C-IPB in the second step, and the CIPB-SF was developed via item analysis and factor analysis. Finally, we assessed the reliability and validity of the CIPB-SF via structural equation model in the third step.ResultsThree hundred eight older adults without cognitive disorder completed the IPB. The 40-item CIPB-SF was completed through item analysis and factor analysis. The internal consistency test of CIPB-SF and the eight stages were good. The CIPB-SF had acceptable validity, except in the intimacy and identity stages, in which validity was only fair. Compared with the IPB, the CIPB-SF had good reliability and acceptable validity. However, because of its conciseness, the 40-item CIPB-SF was more suited for application among the Chinese elderly population because its application avoids physical overload.ConclusionThe CIPB-SF served as a concise scale for assessing ego development in our study. This scale can also serve as a useful tool for convenient screening in the future. (shrink)

Erikson is Professor of Human Development at Harvard, a psychoanalyst, and the author of the widely influential books, Young Man Luther, and Childhood and Society. What is the relevance of his latest book to philosophy? One answer is that Erikson deals with several concepts of personal identity which philosophers will recognize as corresponding to historical philosophic positions. He does not choose between these disparate views, but correlates them, treating each as partial, and learning about his complex subject from (...) the habits of syntax appropriate to each. Erikson divides personal identity into the "I," the "selves," and the "ego," on the grounds that these terms provide a way to distinguish roles and "counterplayers" of various functionings of human personality. We need these various terms to designate identity as viewed from without and from within. Erikson's "selves" are what the "I" reflects on when it views the body, the personality, or the social roles to which it is attached. The counterplayers of the "selves" are the "others" of Existentialism. Erikson's reflective "I," like the subject of Descartes' cogito, is "the center of awareness in a universe of experience in which I have a coherent identity... am in possession of my wits and able to say what I see and think." With Descartes, Erikson finds the unique counterplayer to the "I" in the Deity; the repository of the vitality which is being affirmed of itself in each awareness of the "I." Erikson's "ego" corresponds to the Self of Hume's Treatise, undiscoverable beneath its particular perceptions. The "ego" is necessarily unconscious; we are aware of its work but never of it. As of Hume's self, we can say of it that it has the task of turning passive into active, screening and organizing the impositions of the internal and external environment in such a way that they bring about volitions. Like Hume, Erikson feels philosophers and psychologists have "created nouns such as the 'I' or the 'self', making imaginary entities out of a manner of speaking" and that we would be mistaken to give ontological status to these particles. Perhaps Erikson would accept a statement of the contemporary philosophical form: "The several designations of 'selves', etc., are instrumental in explaining complex personal identity feelings or events." In other parts of the book Erikson uses William James as an example of creative identity, discusses the concept of "negative identity", and in the last three chapters discusses aspects of personal identity in the disequilibrium of the young, the races, and women. The book contains Erikson's writings on identity over a twenty-year period. However, in areas of common interest to psychoanalytic theory and philosophy, the requirements of Erikson's clinical work have suggested relationships between concepts different from the relationships often assumed by philosophers. Thus, on personal identity, criteria of ideological soundness of a society, and the determinants of empirical perception, the addition of Erikson's insights may give the philosopher a multidimensional glimpse of the field wherein he labors.--M. B. M. (shrink)

Since Erik Erikson's clinical and psychohistorical writings of the 1950s and 1960s, the notion of identity has served as a bridge between formulations of personality development and the psychosocial aspects of cultural cohesiveness. More recently, under the influence of a postmodern perspective, clinical writers have questioned the notion of a stable, integrative identity or self as an organizing agent in human behavior. In the area of gender identity, particularly, feminist theorists have criticized the construction of polarized gender identities both (...) for their psychological inadequacy and their cultural bias.A parallel line of criticism has developed at the cultural or historical level. Writers such as Benedict Anderson and Ernest Gellner have effectively contrasted the shallow ideological and historical roots of nationalism with the effort to base national identity on the appeal to tradition and continuity. Other writers have emphasized the heterogeneous condition of the contemporary nation in a postcolonial world. They contrast a static concept of cultural or national identity to a more fluid notion which incorporates the ongoing process of displacement that, they argue, characterizes national discourse. The identity structures that emerge from this critique, both within a clinical and a historical setting, are more ambiguous and unstable, and reflect the heterogeneous experience of contemporary culture.World historians such as William McNeill and Theodore von Laue have cited the boundedness of historians within their own cultural identities as a significant obstacle to the development of an intercultural approach to world history. These postmodern reformulations of identity theory challenge the notion of cultural boundedness by emphasizing the discontinuities endemic to modern life and the inescapably plural character of contemporary identity. (shrink)

This article examines the way aspects of recent history were excluded in key studies emerging from psychoanalytic social psychology of the mid-20th century. It draws on work by Erikson, Marcuse and Fromm, but focuses in particular on Alexander Mitscherlich. Mitscherlich, a social psychologist associated with the later Frankfurt School, was also the most important psychoanalytic figure in postwar Germany. This makes his work significant for tracing ways in which historical experience of the war and Nazism was filtered out of (...) psychosocial narratives in this period, in favour of more structural analyses of the dynamics of social authority. Mitscherlich’s 1967 work The Inability to Mourn, co-authored with Margarete Mitscherlich, is often cited as the point at which the ‘missing’ historical experience flooded back into psychoanalytic accounts of society. I argue that this landmark publication does not hail the shift towards the psychoanalysis of historical experience with which it is often associated. These more sociological writers of the mid-century were writing before the impact of several trends occurring in the 1980s–90s which decisively shifted psychoanalytic attention away from the investigation of social authority and towards a focus on historical trauma. Ultimately this is also a narrative about the transformations which occur when psychoanalysis moves across disciplines. (shrink)

In this paper, I consider Goodman’s philosophy in relation to psychotherapeutic interpretation. Goodman argues that we shouldunderstand our knowledge as a creative symbolic construction, and not as a set of ideas that match reality. The notion of “the world” does no epistemological work. Using an example of psychotherapeutic interpretation found in Erik Erikson’s writings, I argue that whileErikson suggests that he discovers in the patient’s showings and tellings the patient’s message and its meaning, I argue (with Goodman) that (...) class='Hi'>Erikson creates a narrative identity for his patient. The self is not found but fashioned, and it is deemed the true self because it coheres with Erikson’s general theoretic standpoint and is found to be cognitively and practically helpful for the patient. The conclusion is that selves, like worlds, are largely creative constructs. (shrink)

Preface and acknowledgments -- The American independent tradition: Loewald, Erikson, and the (possible) rise of intersubjective ego psychology -- From Freud to Erikson -- Civilization and its discontents and beyond: drives, identity, and Freud's sociology -- the question of a weltanschauung, thoughts for the times on war and death, and why war: whatever happened to the link between psychoanalysis and the social? -- Born into a world at war: affect and identity in a war baby cohort -- The (...) psychoanalytic vision of Hans Loewald -- The psychoanalytic vision of Hans Loewald -- Reflections on Loewald's internalization, separation, mourning, and the superego -- A different universe: reading Loewald through on the therapeutic action of psychoanalysis -- American independence: theory and practice -- From behind the couch: uncertainty and indeterminacy in psychoanalytic theory and practice -- Listening to James McLaughlin: tribute to an American independent -- Regard for otherness: reading Warren Poland -- Individuality as bedrock in the consulting room and beyond -- Toward an American independent tradition: recapitulation -- Beyond the dyad: individual psychology, social world -- Why is it easy to be a psychoanalyst and a feminist but not a psychoanalyst and a sociologist? -- Afterword: could you direct me to the individuology department? -- Could you direct me to the individuology department psychoanalysis, the academy, and the self. (shrink)

One way to conceptualize human life is to describe it as a process through which the biological body is progressively transformed into a psychological one through its mentalization and symbolization. This process occurs through the relational field, which begins with caregiver-infant proto-conversations and develops through adolescence into the ongoing complex interpersonal relational network we call society and culture. The essence and the problems of adolescents are intricately tied to the social and cultural contexts in which they experience life. Therefore, adolescence (...) cannot be understood if all the levels that it expresses are not taken into consideration. We identify three psycho-historical phases through which adolescence has changed in the past century: Oedipal; Narcissistic; and Post-narcissistic. In this last phase due to the psychological and historical failure of the narcissistic ideals, the ideal is mingling with the real in a wholly new way. This process has overturned Erikson's paradigm: identity, opposed and defined by a dichotomic otherness, must be transformed into a fluid integration of similarities and differences negotiated and developed through empirical interpersonal intersubjective experiences. This, in our perspective, is a possible key to understand the rapid change in the nature of consciousness, selfhood, and gendering in today's western world, together with some important psychopathological disorders which describe the new creative challenges of today's adolescents. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Should We Live Forever? The Ethical Ambiguities of Aging by Gilbert MeilaenderCharles L. Kammer IIIShould We Live Forever? The Ethical Ambiguities of Aging Gilbert Meilaender grand rapids, mi: eerdmans, 2013. 135 pp. $18.00.Should We Live Forever? The Ethical Ambiguities of Aging provides a helpful focus on both aging and research being done to extend human life expectancy. As Gilbert Meilaender notes, human beings have always longed for an (...) extended as well as a more generative life span. He raises the question, however, of whether these two desires stand in opposition. Built into our very biology is the “survival instinct,” along with the imaginative ability to transcend our biological limits. Together they generate a religious legacy of imagining life after death. But Meilaender believes we have moved into a different time. Citing John Gray, he asserts that “the hope of life after death has been replaced by the faith that death can be defeated” (xi).Meilaender presents scientific research on antiaging while observing that there is little cultural reflection on its impacts or desirability. This book steps in to provide a reflection on these larger questions from the perspective of the virtues, or what constitutes a truly “good and human” life. As the author notes, our reflections on aging and immortality are tied to our assumptions of what it means to be human. This is evident, for example, among members of the transhumanist movement, which envisions a human brain freed from dependence on a biological body. He surmises that our scientific quest for immortality may have its roots in the human quest to overcome contingency and its associated anxiety; it is in many ways the embodiment of our wish to be “gods” who have total control over our destinies.Meilaender uses classic and modern Western philosophers and theologians (including Aristotle, Augustine, Søren Kierkegaard, and Karl Barth) as well as the work of life-stage theorists (Erik Erikson and Bernard Williams) who contribute to the discussion of what constitutes a “fully human life.” Would biological immortality make a life more fully human, or is it rooted in a crass form of narcissism that makes our own survival more important than the needs and perhaps even the possibility of future generations?The book closes with a brief conversation between three friends who represent different perspectives, a useful discussion tool for raising the deeper issues presented in the book. According to the first view, we are biological organisms with prescribed natural limits; fulfillment therefore comes through accepting and finding provisional fulfillment in each of our life stages. The [End Page 216] second perspective sees human freedom and reason as the fundamental characteristics of being human and so advocates expanding life expectancy and following wherever human creativity leads. The third observes that we are constrained by our biology and yet are also free, both bound and transcendent. This perspective, however, notes that what we truly desire is not an indefinite extension of life but something richer and fuller that transcends any possibility that humans can create. Our longing is not actually a desire for more but a desire for something other than what continued existence can provide.Meilaender’s engagement of the deeper questions presented by the scientific attempt to “cure” aging and extend life indefinitely is, finally, a powerful Christian apologetic that is nevertheless respectful of other positions. If the book has a limitation, it lies in the failure to engage non-Western traditions that perceive and address the issues from much different frameworks. It also does not address the possibility that perhaps being human is to live with the awareness and resignation that, while we have a deep desire for something qualitatively fuller and richer, this is a longing that can never be fulfilled.Charles L. Kammer IIIThe College of WoosterCopyright © 2016 Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

This book explores major theoretical issues in the study of an individual life through its focus on Jean-Paul Sartre. Sartre's quest for an "existential psychoanalysis" led him to develop what he called "true novels" in the landmark studies of Flaubert and others. In clarifying Sartre's philosophical ideas in relation to the analysis of the self, Stuart L. Charme examines the attraction/repulsion of Freudian concepts and explores parallels to Erikson's ego psychology. Certain "mythic" qualities in religious biography and autobiography are (...) seen as central to Sartre, who presents lives--including his own--as normative models. The book concludes by making a provocative link between the modern preoccupation with self-analysis in biography and autobiography and a fundamental religious need that was once fulfilled by primitive myth. (shrink)

Doll, R. C. Foreword.--Conant, J. B. The education of American teachers.--Holt, J. How children fail.--Dewey, J. Democracy and education.--Whitehead, A. N. The aims of education.--Goodman, P. Compulsory mis-education.--Erikson, E. H. Childhood and society.--Rogers, C. R. On becoming a person.--Bruner, J. S. The process of education.--Silberman, C. E. Crisis in the classroom.

The paper begins with the account of a focus group discussion of Hungarian female managers who demonstrated high level of trust. Drawing on the discussion the author explores the nature of trust and looks at works and research findings in different disciplines. In psychology Erikson’s findings on human growth and development are discussed. Representatives of Eastern and Western philosophy are quoted to highlight the underlying differences of thinking in relation to trust. The impact of cultural heritage and the influence (...) of the environment on trust add further dimensions to the argument. In conclusion it is suggested that management education could be a platform for further research and exploration of trust in individuals and organisations. (shrink)

Background Preserving persons’ dignity is integral to nursing. More research is needed to explore how a diversity of patients, particularly those that experience illness from a young age, experience dignity. Aim Describe the characteristics of dignity for persons living with serious illness. Research design Using a secondary data set of twenty audio-recorded interviews, a thematic content analysis was conducted to identify characteristics of dignity. The research team employed van Gennip et al.’s, 2013 “Model of Dignity in Illness” (1) to create (...) a codebook, which the authors utilized to independently code twenty narrative interview transcripts. Participants and research context Twenty persons living with serious illness of heart failure and/or dialysis-dependent renal failure who were admitted in an acute care hospital. Ethical considerations This study was approved on August 26, 2019, by the Colorado Multiple Institutional Review Board (COMIRB) IRB Protocol #19-1874. Findings Early-onset participants expressed markedly different dignity concerns than late-onset participants. In the individual domain, early-onset participants felt that their illness was “normal”; they did not experience the “healthy person to patient” transition described by older onset participants. In the relational domain, early-onset participants expressed that their relationships had already integrated their illness while late-onset participants felt that their illness harmed many of their relationships. In the societal domain, early-onset participants described dignity concerns related to how society impacted their ability to financially support themselves during their illness. Discussion Differences in the dignity experience of early-onset and late-onset participants are informed by Erikson’s “Model of Development” and by Aranda and Jones feminist critique of dignity in healthcare. Conclusions Persons with early-onset illness experience dignity differently. Awareness of the importance of work and financial independence to the experience of dignity for seriously ill patients may enhance persons’ dignity experience. (shrink)

Abstract:The Confucian classic Great Learning (Daxue 大學) articulates in a sequence eight human aims for the good life. There have been various interpretations of the relations of these aims. This essay problematizes these interpretations and proposes a solution that the sequence of these Confucian human aims is developmentally temporal yet not stage-exclusive. I illustrate such an account by drawing on the model of Erik Erikson's developmental theory. Accordingly, while there is a temporal progression in achieving these aims, they nevertheless (...) should be pursued concurrently throughout most of a person's life. (shrink)

An important aspect of human development in midlife is, according to E. Erikson’s theory, the successful resolution of the crisis between generativity and stagnation. Generativity is understood as focusing one’s energy on productivity and creativity - the creation of new works and ideas dedicated to future generations. It is assumed that generativity results from personal needs and constitutes a response to the social expectations directed at individuals. Concern for the next generation does not go hand-in-hand with concern for the (...) personal development of a person in midlife and this imbalance may lead to a psychological discomfort and a sense of martyrdom. Accordingly, it can therefore be concluded that a person focusing on the well-being of the social environment and neglecting her/himself is incapable of feeling that they are a subject that manages their fate and makes decisions enabling them to achieve personal psychological well-being. It could, therefore, be expected that the fulfilment of generative goals may lead to a reduction in the psychological well-being of a representative of middle adulthood. Empirical data has not confirmed this expectation. (shrink)

This essay accounts for the adolescent popularity of The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged by arguing that both novels indirectly appropriate the mid-twentieth-century figure of the rebel. By denying their “prime movers” much of a childhood, however, both novels heroize rebels who never suffer the dilemma that defines the adolescent according to Erik H. Erikson: the struggle between identity and role confusion. Following Erikson and Julia Kristeva, this essay reads Rand's prime movers as figures of a post-Oedipal fantasy of (...) self-reconciliation and career-oriented drive—figures who invite their reader into the fantasy of a life lived without adolescence's defining identity crisis. (shrink)

First published in 1999, this engaging interdisciplinary study of romantic science focuses on the work of five influential figures in twentieth-century transatlantic intellectual history. In this book, Martin Halliwell constructs an innovative tradition of romantic science by indicating points of theoretical and historical intersection in the thought of William James ; Otto Rank ; Ludwig Binswanger ; Erik Erikson ; and Oliver Sacks. Beginning with the ferment of intellectual activity in late eighteenth-century German Romanticism, Halliwell argues that only with (...) William James’ theory of pragmatism early in the twentieth century did romantic science become a viable counter-tradition to strictly empirical science. Stimulated by debates over rival models of consciousness and renewed interest in theories of the self, Halliwell reveals that in their challenge to Freud’s adoption of ideas from nineteenth-century natural science, these thinkers have enlarged the possibilities of romantic science for bridging the perceived gulf between the arts and sciences. (shrink)

The aim of this exploratory cross-sectional study was to examine the associations among relationship status, identity processes, and self-construals among Polish young adults. The theoretical framework of the study consisted of Erikson’s psychosocial theory of human development, the dual-cycle model of identity formation, and the concept of independent and interdependent self-construals. A total of 291 university students aged 20-25 completed the Dimensions of Identity Development Scale and Self-Construal Scale. Results showed that single individuals scored higher on exploration in breadth, (...) exploration in depth, and ruminative exploration, and lower on commitment making and identification with commitment than did partnered individuals. Further, single and partnered individuals did not differ in the area of independent and interdependent self-construals. Discriminant function analysis revealed that especially ruminative exploration and exploration in breadth were important variables for discriminating single from partnered status. (shrink)

Feeling old: being in a phase of transition in later life The aim of the study was to illuminate very old persons’ experiences of feeling old in order to get a nuanced understanding of the ageing process in later life. Fifteen persons 85–96 years of age, living in their own homes, were interviewed in‐depth. Data were analysed utilising a phenomenological‐hermeneutic approach. Eight persons reported that they felt old. The experience of feeling old entailed four characteristics: being able to date the (...) beginning of feeling old, fear of helplessness and of being unable to manage one’s life situation, not recognising one’s former self, and feeling different from others. These characteristics corresponded to the main properties of a transition process. The comprehensive understanding was that the very old persons who also felt old were in a phase of transition. The distinguishing qualities of those that felt old were also found to be in line with the dystonic dominance in the ninth stage designated by Joan Erikson of the previously described life cycle. Knowledge about transition processes and sensitivity to very old people’s experiences of feeling old are of great importance to nursing in order to provide adequate health care services and prevent unhealthy transitions. (shrink)

For lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer youth, identity development is one of the most critical developmental task. LGBTQ youth are shown to be at risk for a variety of risk factors including depression and suicidal ideation and attempts due to how their identities are appraised in heteronormative societies. However, most LGBTQ educational psychology research have highlighted protective factors that are primarily relevant to support LGBTQ white-youth. One of the major developmental theories, Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development, has identified (...) adolescence as the period where identity development occurs. However, through an intersectional lens, identity development appears to encompass more than adolescence but also emerging adulthood, a developmental stage not accounted for by Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development. The primary goal of this study is to seek to understand and question Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development through an intersectional lens of an autoethnography of my LGBTQ experiences. An autoethnographic approach [diary entries, conversations, interview, social media websites and blogs, and drawing ] is used to understand my LGBTQ-person of color experiences of “coming out” or self-disclosure during my adolescence through emerging adulthood. Data was collected on April 2020 and spanned from 2006 through 2020 to account for the developmental period of adolescence and emerging adulthood. Thematic analysis revealed four themes across the two developmental periods: confusion and conflict between my gay and ethnic identity as a closeted adolescent, my first “coming out” as a gay adolescent and “it got better,” frustration arising from the internal conflict between my gay and POC identity as an emerging adult, and frustration arising from external experiences with the flaws of LGBTQ community inclusivity. Results reflected a continuous theme of identity exploration and struggle through both adolescence and emerging adulthood, highlighting the need for future research to replicate similar experiences from other intersectional individuals during emerging adulthood stage, a developmental stage that is considered in between Erikson’s adolescent and young adulthood developmental stage. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Feminist Perspectives on Bioethics*Pat Milmoe McCarrick (bio) and Martina Darragh (bio)The literature of feminist bioethics has flourished in the last decade. Women’s health care, women’s role both as patient and health care professional, the many new reproductive technologies, the exclusion of women as research subjects, as well as the broader topic of feminist contributions to ethical theory itself, have all become topics of interest for feminist bioethical writers.Although feminism (...) is anything but a monolithic enterprise, Karen Lebacqz’ essay on feminism in the new, revised Encyclopedia of Bioethics (II A, 1995) says that “all feminists agree that women are oppressed and this oppression is wrong.” Rosemarie Tong refines this statement to include variations of feminism: “... feminist theory is not one, but many theories or perspectives and... each feminist theory or perspective attempts to describe women’s oppression, to explain its causes and consequences, and to prescribe strategies for women’s liberation” (VII, Tong 1989). She describes different feminist views in Feminine and Feminist Ethics (II A, 1993), labelling them liberal, Marxist, radical, psychoanalytic, socialist, existentialist, and postmodern. Alison Jaggar critiques these different forms of feminism in Feminist Politics and Human Nature, and Susan Sherwin applies these perspectives to the field of bioethics in No Longer Patient: Feminist Ethics and Health Care.One of the central activities in current feminist bioethics is a revisitation of ethical theory itself. There is a distinction between “feminine” and “feminist” ethics in this field (II A, Tong 1993). “A feminine approach to ethics consists of observations of how the traditional approaches to ethics fail to fit the moral experiences and intuitions of women. In contrast, a feminist approach to ethics applies a specifically political perspective and offers suggestions of how ethics must be revised if it is to get at the patterns of dominance and oppression as they affect women” (IV, Sherwin 1992). Carol Gilligan’s two books, In a Different Voice and Mapping the Moral Domain, Nel Noddings’s Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics and Moral Education, and Virginia Held’s Feminist Morality: [End Page 85] Transforming Culture, Society, and Politics can be thought of as feminine critiques of contemporary ethics.Gilligan’s notion of the “ethics of care” has served as a point of departure for a discussion of a type of relational ethics that focuses on concrete experiences, pairs emotions with reason, and balances justice with care. This “ethics of care” has been both celebrated and criticized. The concept of “care” in ethics dates back to the “cura” tradition of care in ancient Rome and was further developed by philosophers Soren Kierkegaard and Martin Heidegger and psychologists Rollo May and Erik Erikson. Nursing theorists have built on this tradition both in theory and in practice (II A, Reich, Care, Encyclopedia of Bioethics, 1995). “Care” often is discussed in opposition to the liberal notion of “justice” (III, Sterba, Justice, Encyclopedia of Bioethics, 1995).Gilligan’s theory was developed to provide a counter model to Lawrence Kohlberg’s six steps in the development of a human moral nature: (1) acting to avoid punishment, (2) acting to promote reciprocity, (3) conforming to get approbation, (4) respecting authority to maintain social order, (5) acting freely if others are not harmed, and (6) following self-legislated, self-imposed, universal principles of justice, reciprocity, and respect for the dignity of humans as individuals. In contrast, Gilligan holds that the moral self is an individual working with other individuals to identify mutually agreeable solutions to thorny human relations problems. Gilligan called Kohlberg’s the male moral point of view as an ethics of justice and hers the female moral view as an ethics of care. Her levels are (1) inward-directed care, (2) other-directed care subjugating personal wants and needs to others (eventually leading to anger), (3) a philosophy of care that balances egoism and altruism, recognizing the women’s connection to others and theirs to her.According to Jocelyn Downie and Susan Sherwin (IV, 1993), oppression, as used by feminists, is understood as an interlocking series of restrictions and barriers that reduce the options available to members of a group defined by morally insignificant characteristics, here gender. The literature itself can be... (shrink)

Recent Anglophone scholarship has successfully shown that Nietzsche's thought makes important contributions to a wide range of contemporary philosophical debates. In so doing, however, scholarship has lost sight of another important feature of Nietzsche's project, namely his desire to challenge the very conception of philosophy that has been used to assess his merits as a philosopher. In other words, contemporary scholarship has overlooked Nietzsche's contributions to metaphilosophy, i.e. debates around the nature, methods, and aims of philosophy. This important new collection (...) of essays brings together an international group of distinguished scholars to explore and discuss these contributions and debates. It will appeal to anyone interested in metaphilosophy, Nietzsche studies, German studies, or intellectual history. (shrink)

In a study that goes beyond the ego affirmed by Freudian psychology, David Levin offers an account of personal growth and self-fulfillment based on the development of our capacity for listening. Drawing on the work of Dewey, Piaget, Erikson, and Kohlberg, he uses the vocabulary of phenomenological psychology to distinguish four stages in this developmental process and brings us the significance of these stages for music, psychotherapy, ethics, politics, and ecology. This analysis substantiates his claim that the development of (...) our listening capacity is a process that fits Foucault's conception of a practice of the self, forming our character as social beings and moral agents. David Levin contends that our self- development as auditory beings is necessary for the achievement of a just and democratic society. (shrink)

R. S. Bluck’s engaging volume provides an accessible introduction to the thought of Plato. In the first part of the book the author provides an account of the life of the philosopher, from Plato’s early years, through to the Academy, the first visit to Dionysius and the third visit to Syracuse, and finishing with an account of his final years. In the second part contains a discussion of the main purpose and points of interest of each of Plato’s works. There (...) is a chapter on Plato’s central doctrine, the Theory of Ideas, and a translation of Plato’s Seventh Letter , which not only provides valuable additional material for the study of Plato’s thought but also contains a vivid account of many incidents in Plato’s life. (shrink)

This book examines Augustine's description of the actually existing world, especially that aspect most important for the human pursuit of happiness: the human being and God. It begins with an overview of the characteristics of the human individual and the context in which they must live out their lives, a context dominated by two seemingly contradictory realities: the existence of God and the existence of evil.

The article examines the problem of individual identity formation in modern conditions of neoliberalism. It is noted that the research of subjectivity, «I» (self), which is the source and condition for the formation of individual identity, actualizes the study of this problem in many social and humanitarian sciences. In the context of socio-philosophical analysis, identity represents itself as a complicated dynamic phenomenon that constantly needs new definitions, clarifications and additions. The effectiveness of using E.Erikson’s theory of individual identity in (...) modern conditions, its significance for the formation of «I» and P.Ricker’s concept of personalistic identity are analyzed. It has been clarified that a new request for the conceptualization of identity has been formed now, which is conditioned of the collapse of political ideologies, in particular, the communist one, the significant crisis of modern neoliberal ideology and the persistent search for new forms of collective involvement or solidarity of people in the current era of globalization. However, various forms of collective identity are imposed by society, its numerous communities, ideology, state institutions, mass media, social networks with their computer capabilities, dominance of advertisements, etc. Therefore, it is not surprising that now individuals are trying to find their own identity, going out from under the pressure of the collective, mainly discursive forms of identity, and already these efforts do not depend on them to a certain extent. The construct «collective identity» in many cases does not reflect the social I (social me) of the individual, as it was conceived in the last century, because society and its communities, which involve active, mobile and changing structures, cannot be thought in terms of subjectivity. Analogies and comparisons do not work here either on a conscious or unconscious level. In the studying identity, there is a significant problem of the transition from the individual to the collective level and vice versa. A collective or group does not have the qualities of individuality with its diversity of characteristics. Taking into account the conducted consideration, it can be stated that approaches to the formation of identity are now acquiring a profound semantic transformation. An assumption was made, which needs to be carefully investigated in the future, according to which the process of partial or complete absorption of individual identity by its collective forms is currently taking place. That’s why, there is an urgent need for the formation of a new interdisciplinary approach to the research of personal identity in the modern digital society. (shrink)

Ego psychology, more existential than scientific in tone, has made psychoanalytic theory more congenial to historical studies, especially when they deal with creative and conflicted leaders. Erikson's concept of the identity crisis points to the intersection of family-centered conflicts with social and cultural history. It also orients the historian to the reanimation of problems in earlier stages of the life-cycle, the importance of work to identity formation, and the neurotic function of over-identification with a troublesome parent. Phenomenologically descriptive rather (...) than causally explanatory, psycho-biography mediates between Freud's naturalism and Collingwood's idealism by relating conscious and unconscious purposes. It establishes congruences and resonances, helping to explain in narrative form the meaning, timing, and urgency of a leader's characteristic ideas. (shrink)