News, October 2006

Controversy over psychologists' role in national security

The American Psychological Association (APA) has stood by its policy of allowing psychologists to act as interrogation consultants. Controversy over the issue had threatened to overshadow the organisation's annual conference held in New Orleans in August. Together with over 1600 signatories to an online petition, the pressure group Psychologists for Social Responsibility called on the APA to state 'immediately, clearly, and unequivocally that psychologists should not participate at this time in any way in national security or military interrogations'.
The dispute follows the APA's publication last year of a presidential task force report that stated psychologists may act as consultants to interrogation and information-gathering so long as they adhere to strict ethical obligations – for example, they must report any instances of torture or degrading treatment, and are forbidden from mixing the roles of healthcare provider and interrogation consultant. The APA position contrasts with that of the American Medical Association and the American Psychiatric Association (see box), both of which have barred their members from direct involvement in interrogations.
The controversy was further inflamed by media revelations that six out of ten of the presidential task force members had ties to the military, with four having been involved either at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, or in Afghanistan. In response, the APA stood by its endorsement of the task force report, but reaffirmed its position against torture and abuse, and explicitly tied its ethical policy to the United Nations Convention Against Torture.
According to Dr Stephen Behnke, the APA's ethics director, because psychologists are trained as experts in human behaviour, they can play a positive role by helping to protect against 'behavioural drift' on the part of the interrogators. 'Behavioural drift can occur in high-stress situations and involves a possible deviation from ethical behaviour. This role allows psychologists to protect the welfare of the detainee', the organisation said in a press statement.
APA President Gerald P. Koocher added: 'Our intention is to empower and encourage members to do everything they can to prevent violations of basic human rights – at Guantanamo Bay or anywhere else they may occur. It is not enough for us to express outrage or to codify acceptable practices. As psychologists, we must use every means at our disposal to prevent abuse and other forms of cruel or degrading treatment.'
The British Psychological Society's Ethics Committee was due to discuss issues concerning psychology and national security in September. Meanwhile, British psychologists are bound by the Society's code of ethics, a new version of which was published earlier this year.
Dr Richard Kwiatkowski, chair of the Society's Ethics Committee, told us that unlike the APA, it was unusual for the Society to set out ethical guidelines on specific issues: 'The BPS code says: "here are the basic principles, here are the values – now looking at these, is what you're doing right?". He continued: 'We say in the code "Thinking is not optional…" , you have to think about your action and if you think you can justify it, go ahead, but if it is questionable, then go through the appropriate stages – talk to your peers, talk to your local ethics committee, contact the BPS, and talk through the issues… We are taking this matter seriously, we are in contact with the APA, and we are going to have discussions to decide whether we need to develop specific guidelines.'
Dr Martin Crawshaw, chair of the Society's Professional Practice Board, said the controversy in America was clearly tied to the legal ambiguity of places like Guantanamo Bay. 'If the prisoners shouldn't be there in the first place, then they [psychologists] shouldn't be doing what they're doing, but then that's obviously a matter of some dispute in the American legal world,' he said. 'The closest equivalent in the UK probably involved the earlier detention of terror suspects at Belmarsh jail. I think for the individual person, whether they be a psychologist or whatever, how can they know what's legal and what isn't, if it's being argued over by government ministers and judges and QCs?'.
However, Crawshaw added that the Society's current position was clear: 'Interrogation per se isn't necessarily wrong. It's perfectly proper for police, security services, customs and exercise to want to get to the bottom of possible wrong-doing and things by questioning people, interrogating them, there's nothing wrong with that in itself. To an extent at least, psychological principles can be used to help law enforcement'.
            CJ

BOX: The different positions on interrogation
'Psychologists may serve in various national security-related roles, such as a consultant to an interrogation, in a manner that is consistent with the Ethics Code, and when doing so psychologists are mindful of factors unique to these roles and contexts that require special ethical consideration.' – American Psychological Association
'No psychiatrist should participate directly in the interrogation of a person held in custody by military or civilian investigative or law enforcement authorities, whether in the United States or elsewhere. Direct participation includes being present in the interrogation room, asking or suggesting questions, or advising authorities on the use of specific techniques of interrogation with particular detainees.' – American Psychiatric Association
'Physicians must not conduct, directly participate in, or monitor an interrogation with an intent to intervene, because this undermines the physician's role as healer.' – American Medical Association

NEW PIAGET WORK PUBLISHED
THREE papers Jean Piaget was working on before his death in 1980 have been translated into English and published in New Ideas in Psychology (see tinyurl.com/z46he). They addressed the problem that was central to his annual project, which in 1979–80 was on Reason. In so doing, they develop the research programme sketched in his first book Recherche (1918).

RECOVERY THROUGH VOLUNTEERING
PRELIMINARY research suggests a strong link between volunteering and the recovery of people who experience mental illness, a new independent study reveals.
The ongoing research undertaken by the Institute of Psychiatry, found that 85 per cent of participants independently surveyed in the Capital Volunteering project reported positive outcomes from getting involved, despite the underlying isolation experienced by many within the community.
- www.capitalvolunteering.org.uk.
 

QUICK LESSON
A SINGLE, 45-minute educational session can help improve GPs' beliefs about schizophrenia, a Turkish study has found (Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences). For example, before the session, 25 per cent of 54 GPs agreed with the statement 'schizophrenia patients are untrustworthy', whereas three months after the session, only 15 per cent of them did. The intervention also increased the proportion of GPs, from 35 to 45 per cent, who believed patients with schizophrenia can be treated.
 

BIG ISSUES DAY
A BRITISH Psychological Society College of Fellows event will be held on 3 October, at the Society's London office in Tabernacle Street. The topic is Promoting Mental Health and Well-being in Communities: Psychological Perspectives. Contact [email protected] for information and to register.

 

When is a significant effect meaningless?

By reporting a tiny but significant effect of 'psychokinesis' – the ability to influence physical matter using thought power alone – a meta-analysis of over 300 experiments has prompted a debate about just how small an effect has to be before it is deemed meaningless.
Writing in Psychological Bulletin, Holger Bosch, Fiona Steinkamp and Emil Boller put spoon-bending and dodgy séances to one side and concentrated only on modern studies that tested people's ability to use their mental will to influence the ratio of 1s and 0s produced by a random number generator. A conservative analysis of the combined data revealed a minuscule (a 'proportion index' of 0.500035; i.e. slightly more 1s than 0s), but significant (p<0.05) effect of participants' intention on random number generator output.
The anomaly of three exceptionally large studies, all of which reported an effect in the opposite direction to participants' intention, combined with a tendency for smaller studies to report more positive results, led Bosch and colleagues to declare the existence of psychokinesis 'unproven'. However, their further conclusion that the observed psychokinesis effect would, if genuine, be of 'fundamental importance' provoked a robust response from commentators writing in the same journal.
'The psychokinesis research synthesised by Bosch et al. is a particularly cogent example of a paradigm that seems virtually invulnerable to falsification,' David Wilson and William Shadish wrote. 'What effect size would be so small that psychokinesis researchers would agree to give up the hypothesis?' they asked.
According to Wilson and Shadish, part of the problem lies with the principle of null hypothesis testing. In statistics, the null hypothesis is that there is no effect, or no difference between two populations. But critics of null hypothesis testing argue that in real life, differences will always be found if you look hard enough, and that what matters is the size and nature of the difference. In psychokinesis research, wrote Wilson and Shadish, 'it may always be plausible to argue that ever larger sample sizes may eventually have sufficient power to distinguish between the null and an effect'.
Using a hypothetical coin-tossing game, Wilson and Shadish calculated what difference the kind of psychokinesis effect sizes estimated by the meta-analysis would have in the real world. If a player won a pound for every head and lost a pound for every tail, using psychokinesis would leave the player just £48 up after hundreds of thousands of tosses, over two months of continuous play. 'This is not of great fundamental importance,' they concluded.
However, another commentator on the meta-analysis, Dr Dean Radin at the Institute of Noetic Sciences, told The Psychologist that Wilson and Shadish were making a common mistake by confusing small effect size with immediate pragmatic importance. 'The magnitude of the charge on the electron is extremely small, but after gaining an improved understanding of this minuscule charge we eventually powered the world,' he said. 'Similarly, the energy within a single atomic isotope undergoing radioactive decay is inconsequential. But as we understood the processes underlying radiation we eventually ushered in the atomic age. Likewise, if there is indeed a mind–matter interaction then its eventual pragmatic consequences are probably far greater than electricity or atomic power.'
Co-author of the meta-analysis, Dr Fiona Steinkamp of Edinburgh University, agreed. 'It is strange', she told us, 'that whenever people bring up this issue, they always use the example about how much money you could earn by using it, as if
that were the only criterion by which to judge its worth. I think if it could be demonstrated beyond all reasonable doubt that a true [psychokinesis] effect, however small, is possible, this could be of fundamental importance. Firstly, it would demonstrate that something is possible that we cannot currently explain and that may not be explicable with our current (lack of) knowledge. In addition, if such an effect, even small, were possible, it may be possible to influence events at a micro level, such as synapses in the brain or even at a quantum level. An effect at the quantum level would be very small but would still be important.'    CJ

Review must be backed by action

Educational psychologists (EPs) have welcomed a report into the contribution they are making to the government's Every Child Matters agenda – but they have raised concerns that the positive messages it carries may not be backed up with action by the government.
The comprehensive review of educational psychology services in England and Wales, compiled by researchers at the School of Education of Manchester University, was commissioned by the Department for Education and Skills. It concluded that EPs contribute positively to all aspects of the Every Child Matters agenda, and that they work effectively in a multi-agency context.
The report also found that 'EPs have been too heavily involved in statutory assessments and that this has prevented them from expanding their work into other areas where they can maximise the impact of their psychological skills and knowledge'. A significant proportion of stakeholders felt that an alternative provider might, in some circumstances, have been able to carry out some aspects of the work that an EP might presently carry out.
Dr Sandra Dunsmuir, Chair of the Division of Educational and Child Psychology of the British Psychological Society, said: 'This report demonstrates how much educational psychology has to offer, but we are spread very thinly and face a national shortage of suitably qualified educational psychologists with more retiring than entering it as a career. In particular, there is an urgent need to establish a stable funded training route if the needs of vulnerable children are to be properly addressed.
'It is perhaps ironic that this report is published just days after we find there are more than 3000 government press officers, yet the fact is there are only 2000 educational psychologists.We urge the government to examine this report carefully and to plan for investment in this service which is desperately understaffed and overstretched.'    JS
- To view the report see tinyurl.com/rt6fe.

Suicide watch

Only a minority of people who think about committing suicide actually go ahead and make a suicide attempt. Is there something different about these people – some way, perhaps, to identify those people who are at most risk?
In a study in Psychological Medicine (see tinyurl.com/rvj2s), Kate Fairweather and colleagues identified 522 people (aged between 20 and 44) from a massive community survey who said they had thought about taking their own life in the last year. Among these people, just under 10 per cent also reported that they had made an attempt on their life.
The researchers found those individuals who had actually attempted suicide, rather than just thinking about it, were more likely to have serious ill-health, to be unemployed and to have poor relationships with their friends and family. And these factors had a cumulative effect – a participant with two of these factors was three times more likely to have attempted suicide; someone with all three factors was 11 times more likely to have made an attempt.
Surprisingly perhaps, rates of self-reported depression and anxiety were no greater among the suicide attempters than among those who only thought about suicide.
There were also gender- and age-specific associations. For example, among men only, those reporting high levels of 'mastery' (feeling in control of the forces affecting their lives) were 20 per cent less likely to attempt suicide. '…[T]he male role prescribes autonomy, self-confidence and being goal-orientated. Accordingly, males who believe they are lacking in these domains may feel socially marginalised or incompetent', the researchers said.
Among people aged between 40 and 44, unemployment was a particular risk, increasing the likelihood of a suicide attempt nine-fold. Perhaps people in this age group were particularly dependent on their workplace for social support.
'Contrary to the view that mental health differentiates suicide attempters from ideators…', the researchers concluded, '…This [research] suggests that mental health professionals may be able to intervene in the progression of ideation into attempt if they identify recent instances of upsetting social interactions, diagnosis of a disabling physical illness or recent job losses.'    CJ
 

SPICE UP THE MIND
THE occasional curry could help stave off the mental decline associated with old age, according to a report in the American Journal of Epidemiology. Among 1010 people aged between 60 and 93 years, researchers at the National University of Singapore found those who reported eating curry occasionally, or very often, scored significantly better on the mini mental state exam than those who said they never ate curry. It's thought curcumin, from the curry spice, turmeric, may help reduce beta-amyloid, a protein associated with the development of Alzheimer's disease.

IN SICKNESS AND IN HEALTH
YOUR husband or wife might be responsible for you living longer. In a Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health study, of nearly 67,000 people interviewed in 1989, 5876 (8.8 per cent) had died before 1997. Controlling for age, health and socioeconomic factors, a team at the University of California found the death rate among those who had never married was 58 per cent higher than among their married peers. Unmarried participants were at greater risk of death from murder infectious disease, accidents, cardiovascular disease, and suicide. The association was stronger among men.

WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING
SHARING their bed could dull men's brains, according to a study presented at the Forum of European Neuroscience. Researchers at the University of Vienna compared the daytime mental performance of eight couples after they had either slept alone or together. Both men and women slept better alone, but the mental performance of men particularly suffered after a night with their partner and their stress hormones were more affected.

BA Festival of Science

Christian Jarrett reports from the British Association Festival of Science in Norwich.

TEACHERS who instruct their pupils to sit on their hands and to face the front have got it all wrong, according to research presented by Gwyneth Doherty-Sneddon (University of Stirling) and Karen Pine (University of Hertfordshire).
Confronted with a difficult question, a child's wandering gaze is not a sign that they're daydreaming, but rather an indication that they're thinking hard (see archive article at www.bps.org.uk/7nge). With so much visual information bombarding their brains, looking away can help them concentrate. But young children don't do it enough. Whereas eight-year-olds spend 80 per cent of the time looking away when answering a hard question, five-year-olds only look away an average of 40 per cent of the time. And crucially, research has found that encouraging five-year-olds to look away more can improve their performance on challenging yet solvable questions.
Teachers need to be informed about this research. According to a study Doherty-Sneddon has in press, teachers said they interpret more gaze aversion as an indication of less understanding, less interest, and a sign that the child has given up thinking.
'One thing that teachers and parents are terribly guilty of is jumping in too quickly and this can disrupt children's learning', Doherty-Sneddon said. 'Gaze aversion provides a really useful cue to "think time" – knowing how long to give children to answer a question.'
Meanwhile, Karen Pine argued that young children's hand gestures shouldn't be dismissed as restless fidgeting, rather the movements help them 'think, speak and learn'. Common sense suggests children gesture when they don't know the words, or because they're copying adults. But children gesture more as their vocabulary grows; their gestures are often unique; they gesture when alone; and even blind babies gesture in ways similar to sighted babies – all of which shows that children need neither a model nor an observer to gesture. 'It's not just interpersonal, gesture is an intrapersonal phenomenon,' Pine said.
Pine's research has shown that children's gestures are several months ahead of their speech. She asked dozens of children to balance a bar on a fulcrum and to explain how they'd done it. Their verbal explanations would often be meaningless, but alongside their words, many of them employed two stereotypical gestures – a sweeping, horizontal movement conveying 'length' and an up-down movement conveying 'weight' – betraying a conceptual understanding beyond that revealed by their words. Indeed, following a short lesson on balance, those children who previously used these gestures were more likely to comprehend the principles of balance than were children who hadn't used the gestures.
Pine has also completed research showing that gestures help children find the words they're looking for. She found children successfully named twice as many pictures when they were free to gesture compared with when their hands were constrained by mittens velcroed to the table.
'Kids should never be prevented from gesturing. Teachers telling kids to sit on their hands is the worse thing that they can do,' Pine said. 'Kids know more than they can tell. They have a second language – gestures – and we need to learn how to interpret it.'

Problem solving in theory and practice

THE brain's strength is in fuzziness rather than logic, said Peter Naish (Open University), which is why we're rather poor at puzzles like the infamous THOG problem (see figure). The THOG problem states that something is a THOG if it is either the correct shape (triangle vs. circle) or colour (red vs. green), but not both. If the first red triangle is a THOG, your task is to say which, if any, of the other shapes are also THOGS. The problem is easy to solve once it is recognised as what's known in logic as an 'exclusive or (XOR)' problem, but most people find it difficult because these kinds of situation are rare in everyday life. 'Presumably we haven't evolved to solve these' Naish said.
On a more applied level, in the interests of patient safety, Professor Dianne Parker (University of Manchester) has conducted interviews and focus groups to help improve problem solving and procedures in the NHS (see tinyurl.com/mb7d6). Last year 2159 patients died and 4529 were severely harmed because of avoidable mistakes by healthcare professionals. Yet simple standardisation could help reduce these incidents. For example, remarkably, the convention for whether the healthy or diseased breast is marked prior to a mastectomy currently varies from one hospital to the next. 'Standardisation is resisted in healthcare as a threat to autonomy,' Parker said.