# Question
Title: Is there a conflict between Mindfulness-based and Acceptance-based Therapies and Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)?
Mindfulness-based and Acceptance-based therapies are gaining vast momentum in the treatment of mental illnesses. These therapy modalities are seen to share some similarity with Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) (Ost, 2008), however, I am curious to know what conflicts exist in a therapist-client relationship when adopting some of the techniques/foundations from both therapy forms?

For example, in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) - defusion (the process of distancing ourselves from our throughts) seems to present some form of conflict to CBT which suggests that cognitive restructuring is fundamental to behavioural change, i.e. "trying to change our thoughts". There may be some conflict within a therapeutic setting.

**Questions:**

1. What conflicts can occur in the therapist-client relationship when using mindfulness and acceptance exercises with cognitive behaviour therapy exercises?
2. In what ways may the two groups complement each other in achieving therapeutic outcomes **^** for the client?

**^** Therapeutic outcomes can be assumed as symptomatic alleviation of the mental illness or any other positive outcome towards the alleviation of a mental illness.

Some further examples would be great.

**References:**

* Öst, L.G. (2008). Efficacy of the third wave of behavioral therapies: A systematic review and meta-analysis. *Behaviour Research and Therapy*, 46(3), pp.296-321

# Answer
> 9 votes
No takers so I've decided to do some research and theorise if there are any conflicts between these two therapy modalities. Drawing on research by Hofmann & Asmundson (2008), three distinct differences are identified between Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT):

> **The role of cognitions.** "CBT helps patients to identify, challenge, and re-evaluate these rigid rules and adopt a more relaxed and satisfying system of values in order to enhance overall life satisfaction. Instead, ACT subsumes cognitions under the more general term behavior as it is used in behavior analysis, namely “as a term for all forms of psychological activity, both public and private, including cognition” (Hayes et al., 2006, p. 2). In essence, the word cognition has a different meaning in ACT than in CBT; it is a thought process in CBT and a private behavior in ACT."
>
> **The role of emotions.** "CBT and ACT target different stages in the emotion-generative process: CBT promotes adaptive antecedent-focused emotion regulation strategies, whereas ACT counter-acts maladaptive response-focused emotion regulation strategies. The cognitive restructuring techniques used in CBT are in line with the antecedent-focused emotion regulation strategies, providing skills that are often effective in reducing emotional distress in the long term. Acceptance and mindfulness-based strategies counter suppression and, thereby, alleviate emotional distress."
>
> **Philosophical foundation.** ACT is based on functional contextualism, which has been proposed as the philosophical basis for behavior analysis to emphasize the functional relations between behavior and environmental events ... CBT is not directly linked to a particular philosophy. The philosophical foundation most closely associated with CBT is critical rationalism, an epistemological philosophy (Popper, 1959) that shares its philosophical roots with the natural sciences."

**Potential conflicts**

These are theorised based on the above differences between CBT and ACT:

* **Unclear criteria for the suitability of exercises.** Since CBT and ACT are clearly disparate therapy modalities, there is no universal guide on when and how to adopt therapeutic exercises from either CBT or ACT in combination or separately. The decision to use certain exercises is influenced highly by the therapist's subjective judgment and past experiences.
* **Unknown effects of combining CBT and ACT.** As far as I know, there are no studies on the effects of traditional exercises such as cognitive restructuring (CBT) and mindfulness practice (ACT) when combined together on specific mental illnesses. *Prima facie*, the former involves deliberate attempt to modify cognitions and the latter involves a systematic process of observing non-judgmentally cognitions. It is difficult to see no conflict without empirical counter-evidence.
* **Potential negating effects.** In ACT, Cognitive Defusion involves the process of distancing or separating oneselves metaphorically from their thoughts (Moffitt et al., 2012). If a client initially uses cognitive restructuring techniques to alleviate distress from their mental illness and this becomes conditioned - using cognitive defusion subsequently after that could negate the positive effects of the previous CBT-based technique.

**References**

* Hofmann, S.G. & Asmundson, G.J.G. (2008). Acceptance and mindfulness-based therapy: New wave or old hat? Clinical Psychology Review, 28, 1-16
* Moffitt, R., Brinkworth, G., Noakes, M. & Mohr, P. (2012). A comparison of cognitive restructuring and cognitive defusion as strategies for resisting a craved food. Psychology & Health, 27(2), 74-90

# Answer
> 4 votes
I don’t really have much in the way of scientific evidence for combining the two. I have, however, information from personal experience that many therapists tend to combine the two approaches with varying effects. I think the combination can be useful if a particular case conceptualisation is chosen and diverse techniques are utilized. (I believe this is called technical eclecticism).

Take for example, a disorder I have struggled with, Social anxiety Disorder. The CT model (1)of the disorder claims that it is maintained by maladaptive cognitions about performance on social situations and the social cost of social failure. These maladaptive cognitions lead to increased anxiety which triggers behavioral avoidance of uncomfortable situations which only maintains the anxiety. Based on this model, cognitions have to be modified in order for behavior to be changed.

According to ACT however (2), anxiety is maintained by a constant struggle with thoughts and feelings, and attachment to the literal meaning of thoughts and desire to avoid negative emotions. Thus behavioral avoidance is an extension of the desire to avoid negative experiences.

One therapist I had resolved the differences by focusing on the similarity - the behavioral component. My social anxiety was conceptualized as being maintained by behavioral avoidance. Thus, my thoughts and feelings were seen as barriers to countering that avoidance. In order to remove these barriers, she used cognitive restructuring and defusion as tools depending on the type of thought. In my experience, cognitive restructuring was most useful if there was a side of the issue that was being ignored or if i really believed the maladaptive thoughts. I found that defusion was most helpful for thoughts that hindered me even though I knew that they were untrue or that there was no way of knowing if they were true. For example, I often believed that my friends secretly did not like me and were not telling me this. The cognitive therapy approach is to label this thought as a distortion - mind reading - and attempt to come to a conclusion that can be logically come to based on the available evidence. I found this to be absolutely useless with the thought - because I was certain it was mind reading but it still held power over me. Defusion helped me to modify the power of the thought since I could not modify it. Over time, I discovered that it was helpful to me to do cognitive restructuring first to reduce the believability of a thought and then defuse the thought if I knew the logical truth but could not really believe it.

Another therapist I had helpfully illustrates the conflict with using diverse case conceptualisation. This therapist both suggested that using coping statements (realistic facts that could counter negative thoughts) was helpful and trying to decipher the real facts of a situation while in it was unhelpful which is very contradictory. He also used both ACT and CT conceptualisation in the most confusing ways. For example, he advised that mindfulness exercises not be utilized as ways to reduce anxiety but to reduce experiential avoidance (an ACT concept) yet he conceptualized exposures in the CT way, which stresses habituation and fear reduction rather than engaging in scary activities for valued living (ACT). He also stressed the importance of aiming for behavior change rather than having less anxiety (an ACT concept) yet he rated the subjective levels of distress while engaging in a task and considered an exposure a success once the distress had fallen. I think the problem was that he had taken a standard CBT social anxiety group therapy and thrown in ACT case conceptualisation without removing the elements from CBT that do not fit with the ACT approach. I was lucky that I had discovered how to use the differing strategies with the previous therapist I had. Otherwise, I would have been very confused. I don’t think any of the techniques would have negated each other - just that it would have been difficult for me to decide which technique was useful in which situation. This therapist was mostly helpful for me in teaching me the empirically supported social anxiety exposures - which happens to be largely the same for both therapies.

As an interesting side note, I later discovered I have Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder which affects me mostly when I have to sustain effort or attention on something I don’t want to do. For this problem, I have found CT to be useless because it involves telling me to do experiential experiments and to notice that I can do things well even if I have no motivation (3). The thing for me is that I know that but I still really don’t want to do the task and just won’t. Working with the second therapist in this issue was helpful because an ACT conceptualisation completely fit with the problems. And, since CBT doesn’t have a well-established protocol for ADHD, I did not have the same problems with a CBT protocol filtering in to an ACt therapy.

References:

1. Clark, D. M. & Wells, A. (1995). A cognitive model of social phobia. In R. Heimberg, M. Liebowitz, D. A. Hope, & F. R. Schneier (Eds.), Social phobia: Diagnosis, assessment and treatment. (pp. 69–93). New York: Guilford Press.
2. Dalrymple K. L., and Herbert J. D. (2007) Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Generalized Social Anxiety Disorder: A Pilot Study Behavior Modification Vol 31, Issue 5, pp. 543 - 568 https://doi.org/10.1177/0145445507302037
3. Saulsman, L., & Nathan, P. (2008). Put Off Procrastinating. Perth, Western Australia: Centre for Clinical Interventions.

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Tags: cognitive-psychology, clinical-psychology
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title: How moral reasoning is measured?

text:
# Question
Title: How moral reasoning is measured?
According to this answer, there are some kind of points used for moral reasoning. Therefore, I'm interested now, how the amount of points given for reasoning? Is there some kind of ideal moral theory used for it, or is it just how consistent the reasoning is or what?

# Answer
It really depends on your theory. If you can write measurement of morality in google scholar you would find many morality theories and attempts to measure it such as (Ziv, 1976). Most theories, as far as I know, use stories and evaluate children's responces to those theories. I'm not aware of any scale to measure moral development.

By the way, one of the most commonly used theory of moral development is Kohlberg's stage based moral development theory (Kohlberg, 1971). In that article, although I have not read fully, Kohlberg talks about some stories he used to measure moral development.

Of course there are many critiques to this stage based measurement of moral development. (Bandura 2014) can guide you on current theories. I haven't read any of those articles but they seem to be good starting point.

**References:**

Bandura, A. (2014). Social cognitive theory of moral thought and action. In Handbook of moral behavior and development (pp. 69-128). Psychology Press.

Kohlberg, L. (1971). Stages of moral development. *Moral education*, 1, 23-92.

Ziv, A. (1976). Measuring aspects of morality. *Journal of Moral Education*, 5(2), 189-201.
> 2 votes

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Tags: moral-psychology
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# Question
Title: Does NMDA-receptor activation depend on neighboring AMPA-receptor activity?
This question is coming out of a couple points of confusion after I learned about about NMDA receptors' role in LTP.

I got the impression that after AMPA receptors were activated enough, which depolarizes the cell, that nearby NMDA receptors will allow Na and Ca to come into the cell.

1. Is it the local membrane potential, around those receptors that matter for a given voltage-gated NMDAR to open up? Or is there no such thing as 'local membrane potential', and the whole cell body is about the same amount of negative or positive voltage?
2. If there's no such thing as 'local membrane potential', does it matter if the AMPA receptors are activated or if other receptors are activated? Does a single neuron usually respond to more than one type of excitatory neurotransmitter? If so, couldn't the activation of any receptor that results in cell depolarization eventually cause NMDAR to open up?

# Answer
> 5 votes
Yes, there most certainly is "local membrane potential". There are two major levels of compartmentalization in dendritic processing. For one, most excitatory synapses occur onto "spines", which have a somewhat segregated environment from the rest of the dendrite. The spine neck has been estimated to have a resistance of up to 1GOhm, although measurements are very difficult, so discussion spans orders of magnitude. The other level of compartmentalization is that different dendritic branches can function somewhat independently.

It is actually extremely important that there be "local membrane potential" and that AMPA receptors only activate neighboring NMDA receptors. That is because Ca2+ coming through NMDA receptors leads (through many steps) to LTP (long-term potentiation) at that synapse. We want LTP to be synapse-specific (only the activated synapse should be strengthened). This requires that NMDA currents be specific to the synapse that had the AMPA current.

Wikipedia has an excellent article on this subject: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendritic\_spine. See especially "Modeling spine calcium transients" for discussion of the extent to which NMDA mediated Ca2+ transients are local.

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Tags: neuroscience, neurophysiology, ltp
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# Question
Title: Research on teaching / learning methods for personality types
I was reading research on learning approaches and the big five personality traits, and was wondering if anyone can recommend existing research on the **most effective learning methods for each personality type**.

Is this even a thing? Is there proof that some learning techniques can be better for some types of personalities than others?

# Answer
Starting with the most recent and working backwards, there are:

## Specifically Big 5

Von Stumm, S., & Furnham, A. F. (2012). Learning approaches: Associations with Typical Intellectual Engagement, intelligence and the Big Five. *Personality and Individual Differences*, 53(5), 720-723.
DOI: 10.1016/j.paid.2012.05.014

> **Abstract**
> Learning approaches, i.e. students’ learning strategies and motives, predict academic performance but it is not clear how much variance they share with intelligence and personality. Here, the relationship of the Big Five personality traits, intelligence, and Typical Intellectual Engagement (TIE) with deep, achieving and surface learning was explored in a sample of 579 British undergraduate students. A structural equation model showed that (a) intelligence was negligibly associated with learning approaches; (b) TIE was strongly related to all three types of learning approaches; (c) deep learning shared the greatest amount of variance with TIE, while (d) achieving learning was best explained by Extraversion, Openness to Experience, and Conscientiousness. Only 25% of the variance in surface learning was accounted for by intelligence and personality. Thus, personality traits and learning approaches share much variance but not enough to dismiss either construct as redundant.

Komarraju, M., Karau, S. J., Schmeck, R. R., & Avdic, A. (2011). The Big Five personality traits, learning styles, and academic achievement. *Personality and individual differences*, 51(4), 472-477.
DOI: 10.1016/j.paid.2011.04.019

> **Abstract**
> Personality and learning styles are both likely to play significant roles in influencing academic achievement. College students (308 undergraduates) completed the Five Factor Inventory and the Inventory of Learning Processes and reported their grade point average. Two of the Big Five traits, conscientiousness and agreeableness, were positively related with all four learning styles (synthesis analysis, methodical study, fact retention, and elaborative processing), whereas neuroticism was negatively related with all four learning styles. In addition, extraversion and openness were positively related with elaborative processing. The Big Five together explained 14% of the variance in grade point average (GPA), and learning styles explained an additional 3%, suggesting that both personality traits and learning styles contribute to academic performance. Further, the relationship between openness and GPA was mediated by reflective learning styles (synthesis-analysis and elaborative processing). These latter results suggest that being intellectually curious fully enhances academic performance when students combine this scholarly interest with thoughtful information processing. Implications of these results are discussed in the context of teaching techniques and curriculum design.

Busato, V. V., Prins, F. J., Elshout, J. J., & Hamaker, C. (1998). The relation between learning styles, the Big Five personality traits and achievement motivation in higher education. *Personality and individual differences*, 26(1), 129-140.
DOI: 10.1016/S0191-8869(98)00112-3

> **Abstract**
> In his dissertation, Vermunt \[Vermunt, J. D. H. M. (1992). Leerstijlen en sturen van leerprocessen in het hoger onderwijs. (Learning styles and guidance of learning processes in higher education). Amsterdam/Lisse: Swets and Zeitlinger\] postulated four different learning styles: a meaning directed, a reproduction directed, an application directed and an undirected style. Aim of this project is to investigate the relation between these learning styles, the big five personality traits and achievement motivation. Subjects were about 900 university students. Extraversion correlated positively with the meaning directed, reproduction directed and application directed learning style. Conscientiousness was associated positively with the meaning, reproduction and application directed learning style, and negatively with the undirected learning style. Openness to experience correlated positively with the meaning and application directed learning style, and negatively with the undirected learning style. Besides, it was found that neuroticism correlated positively with the undirected learning style and negatively with the meaning and reproduction directed learning style. Agreeableness was associated positively with the reproduction and application directed learning style. Positive correlations were found for achievement motivation with the meaning, reproduction and the application directed learning style, and a negative one with the undirected learning style. Regression analyses confirmed these patterns. Although there was some systematic overlap for the four learning styles with personality variables and achievement motivation, the conclusion is that it certainly makes sense to measure these three groups of variables separately in educational settings.

## Other personality type research

Vincent, A., & Ross, D. (2001). Personalize training: determine learning styles, personality types and multiple intelligences online. *The Learning Organization*, 8(1), 36-43.
DOI: 10.1108/09696470110366525

> **Abstract**
> Training can be personalized using online resources to determine an individual’s learning preferences and personality characteristics. This study provides an overview of learning style, personality types, and multiple intelligences theories; lists and describes selected testing instruments available on the Internet; and provides strategies for teaching and learning, considering different learning styles.

Miller, A. (1991). Personality types, learning styles and educational goals. *Educational Psychology*, 11(3-4), 217-238.
DOI: 10.1080/0144341910110302

> **Abstract**
> Attempts to broaden conceptions of learning styles to represent more adequately individual differences in motivation/emotion, as well as cognition, are limited by a paucity of relevant theory. Personality theories should, but do not, provide a satisfactory conceptual framework for this endeavour. In an attempt to remedy this situation, a new personality typology is outlined which, it is argued, provides a coherent system within which to construe and conduct research upon learning styles. The implications of the theory for educational goals, couched in terms of learning styles, also are discussed.
> 2 votes

# Answer
Chris has a nice answer which touches on some of the literature linking Big 5 personality and learning styles to academic performance. I'll reiterate that, yes, there is a meta-analytic literature that shows modest correlations between self-rated personality and academic performance (e.g., grades). e.g., see Poropat (2009). E.g., conscientiousness helps; openness also helps (although openness can sometimes be a rough proxy for self-rated intelligence).

More broadly, the general conclusion of the learning styles literature is that adapting pedagogical strategy to learning styles is not effective.

My sense of the literature is that prior knowledge and domain specific motivations are the more important things to incorporate when customising education. And that in most cases, it's better to focus on main effects of teaching approach than to focus on the interaction effect of learning style or personality with teaching approach. To put it another way: invest your energy in working out good ways to teach people in general.

### Rererences

Poropat, A. E. (2009). A meta-analysis of the five-factor model of personality and academic performance. Psychological bulletin, 135(2), 322.
> 2 votes

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Tags: learning, reference-request, personality
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title: Opposite of White Bear principle?

text:
# Question
Title: Opposite of White Bear principle?
Is there any phrase/term to describe the opposite of White Bear principle (also known as ironic process principle)? I'm looking for a word to describe the process where something eludes you the more you try to think of it (or remember it). I think I may have come across a term to describe this phenomenon but I'm not sure if such a phrase/term exists.

# Answer
> 5 votes
**Short answer**
**Over-thinking**

**Background**
**Unconscious recall of information** can be more effective than conscious recall of that same information. Disruption of the activity of the **dorsolateral prefrontal cortex** (by TMS) improved image-recall in healthy subjects (source: UC Santa Barbara). The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex is associated with executive functions including working memory and selective attention (Lehner *et al*., 2016). The effect over paying too much attention in an attempt to remember something has been referred to as over-thinking.

**Reference**
**-** Lehner *et al*., *Genomics, Circuits, and Pathways in Clinical Neuropsychiatry*, 1st ed. Elsevier (2016)

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Tags: memory, terminology, working-memory, long-term-memory
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# Question
Title: Criteria for Something to be Considered a Mental Disorder
I know this will probably be closed for being broad, but I think it certainly has an answer.

What are the criteria for something to be considered a mental disorder?

**Does a disorder need to be observable physiologically? Or is behavior/perception that is far from the norm enough?**

# Answer
This is not just a broad question, it also differs depending on the specific person holding a specific orientation working at a specific clinical/academic setting. For a DSM-V discussion, see "What is a Mental/Psychiatric Disorder? From DSM-IV to DSM-V" by Stein et al.
> 4 votes

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Tags: psychiatry, definition
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# Question
Title: Classical test theory: Covariance of two variables
I'm stuck with the definition of the Covariance in the **classical test theory** (CTT) framework: In CTT it is assumed that for two items:
$X = \tau\_x + \epsilon\_x$
$E(X) = \tau\_x$

$Y = \tau\_y + \epsilon\_y$
$E(Y) = \tau\_y$

From these assumptions it follows that: $Cov(X,Y) = E\[(\tau\_x+\epsilon\_x)\*(\tau\_y+\epsilon\_y)\] - E(\tau\_x+\epsilon\_x)\*E(\tau\_y+\epsilon\_y)$ $= E(\tau\_x\tau\_y) - E(\tau\_x)E(\tau\_y) $
$= Cov(\tau\_x,\tau\_y)$

I tried to come to the same conclusion using a slightly different approach:
$Cov(X,Y) = E((X-E(X))(Y-E(Y))$
$=E((\tau\_x+\epsilon\_x-\tau\_x)\*(\tau\_y+\epsilon\_y-\tau\_y))$
$=E(\epsilon\_x\*\epsilon\_y)$

As $E(\epsilon\_x) = 0$ the following terms should be equivalent:

$E(\epsilon\_x\*\epsilon\_y) = E\[(\epsilon\_x - E(\epsilon\_x))\*(\epsilon\_y - E(\epsilon\_y))\] = Cov(\epsilon\_x, \epsilon\_y)$

As the conclusion drawn from my approach contradicts with the first conclusion I assume that there is a flaw in my math. Unfortunately I seem to be unable to identify my mistake. Can someone point me to it?

# Answer
> 2 votes
I do not myself use classical test theory, but from a statistical point of view the answer to this should be straightforward. The answer is that you are right, and that the first solution is wrong.

An early indication that the first formula is incorrect is that a : $$ Cov(\tau\_{x},\tau\_{y}) = 0 $$ because $\tau\_{x}$ and $\tau\_{y}$ are constants (I assume $\tau\_{x}$ and $\tau\_{y}$ are constant in your question because your equations state that they are expected values, which are always constant). The formula above holds because constants can't covary with one another.

To show you are the one who is correct, we need to dig a little bit deeper. One basic property of covariance is, for $X$, $Y$ random variables and $a$, $b$ constants: $$ Cov(X+a, Y+b) = Cov(X,Y) $$ Intuitively, adding a constant to a random variable doesn't affect its linear relationship with another random variable.

In your particular example, if I understand correctly, $\epsilon\_{x}$, $\epsilon\_{y}$ are random variables, and $\tau\_{x}$, $\tau\_{y}$ are fixed constants. Plugging these into the above formula, $$ Cov(\epsilon\_{x} + \tau\_{x}, \epsilon\_{y} + \tau\_{y}) = Cov(\epsilon\_{x}, \epsilon\_{y}) $$ And of course, using the notation in your question, $X$ = $\tau\_{x}$ + $\epsilon\_{x}$= $\epsilon\_{x}$ + $\tau\_{x}$ and $Y$ = $\tau\_{y}$ + $\epsilon\_{y}$= $\epsilon\_{y}$ + $\tau\_{y}$. Therefore, using the variables from your question, $$ Cov(X,Y) = Cov(\epsilon\_{x}, \epsilon\_{y}) $$

# Answer
> 1 votes
Thank you very much for your insightful comment. I think I know now the source of the problem. On the lecture slides I took the first approach from, it would have been necessary to disentangle the the true value of the population $\tau\_{pop}$ (defined as the expected value of the mean of all $X\_i$) and the true value of a person $i$ $\tau\_{i}$ in that population. If you do that, you come to the right solution:

$X\_i = \tau\_{x\_i}+\epsilon\_{x\_i}$ and $E(X\_i) = \tau\_{x\_i}$
$X\_{x\_{pop}} = \tau\_{x\_{pop}}+\epsilon\_{x\_{pop}}$ and $E(X\_{x\_{pop}}) = \tau\_{x\_{pop}}$

the above equations are equivalent for Y.
For computing the Covariance one would be using the individual values $X\_i$ and $Y\_i$ and the means in the populaiton $X\_{pop}$ and $Y\_{pop}$. It follows:

$Cov(X,Y) = E\[(X\_i-E(X\_{pop}))(Y\_i-E(Y\_{pop}))\]$
$ = E\[(\tau\_{x\_i}+\epsilon\_{x\_i}-\tau\_{x\_{pop}})\*(\tau\_{y\_i}+\epsilon\_{y\_i}-\tau\_{y\_{pop}})\]$
$ = E(\tau\_{x\_i}\tau\_{y\_i})+E(\tau\_{x\_i}\epsilon\_{y\_i})-E(\tau\_{x\_i}\tau\_{y\_{pop}}) + E(\epsilon\_{x\_i}\tau\_{y\_i})+E(\epsilon\_{x\_i}\epsilon\_{y\_i})-E(\epsilon\_{x\_i}\tau\_{y\_{pop}})-E(\tau\_{x\_{pop}}\tau\_{y\_i})-E(\tau\_{x\_{pop}}\epsilon\_{y\_i})+E(\tau\_{x\_{pop}}\tau\_{y\_{pop}})$ As the error terms are assumed to be uncorrelated with each other and the true values in CTT:
$= E(\tau\_{x\_i}\tau\_{y\_i})-E(\tau\_{x\_i}\tau\_{y\_{pop}})-E(\tau\_{x\_{pop}}\tau\_{y\_i})+E(\tau\_{x\_{pop}}\tau\_{y\_{pop}})$
$= E\[(\tau\_{x\_i}-\tau\_{x\_{pop}})(\tau\_{y\_i}-\tau\_{y\_{pop}})\]$

So the expected covarance of $X$ and $Y$ is only determined by the covariance of the true values $\tau\_x$ and $\tau\_y$

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Tags: measurement, test
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# Question
Title: What brain wave states are associated with hypnosis?
What brain wave states are most correlated with deep hypnosis?

# Answer
Hypnotic states are associated with increased theta wave activity. Hypnotically susceptible participants also exhibit hemispheric beta wave asymmetry, but non-susceptible participants do not (Sabourin, Cutcomb, Crawford and Pribram, 1990).

**References**

* Sabourin, M. E., Cutcomb, S. D., Crawford, H. J., & Pribram, K. (1990). EEG correlates of hypnotic susceptibility and hypnotic trance: Spectral analysis and coherence. International Journal of Psychophysiology, 10(2), 125-142.
> 8 votes

# Answer
There is a really nice and recent review about the current state of research regarding hypnosis, which also cites the resource of another answer here). I will quote here the part about EEG studies but would recommend to read the whole article (if you can't access the article, sci-hub can probably help you).

> 3.1. The EEG spectrum
>
> Historically, the most popular approach to understanding the neural substrates of hypnosis has been to examine EEG correlates of hypnotizability and changes in the EEG spectrum which occur when hypnosis is induced (e.g., Lee et al., 2007; for a comprehensive listing of studies, see Hinterberger et al., 2011; Vaitl et al., 2005). Many of these studies were “fishing expeditions”, conducted in the hopes that they would yield interesting results, rather than tests of specific hypothesis about the nature or locus of electrocortical changes associated with hypnosis. Still, they were not always without some theoretical rationale, however weak. For example, in the late 1960s it was suggested that hypnotizability and hypnosis were associated with increased density of alpha activity in the EEG – a hypothesis which drew strength from early reports of increased alpha density in Zen and yoga meditation, as well as the meditation-like experiences once thought to be produced by EEG alpha biofeedback. Similar considerations, as well as speculations concerning the relevance of 40-Hz activity to focused arousal, perceptual binding, and consciousness itself, prompted investigation of the gamma band of the EEG (DePascalis, 1999, 2007). Finally, in a manner reminiscent of the 19th-century analogy between hypnosis and sleep, the association between theta activity and hypnagogic imagery led some investigators to focus on this portion of the EEG spectrum (Sabourin et al., 1990; Williams and Gruzelier, 2001).
>
> The most thorough of these studies was reported by Ray et al., who took advantage of advanced EEG technology to examine alpha, beta, and theta activity recorded separately from frontal, temporal, parietal, and occipital sites of both left and right hemispheres in hypnotizable and insusceptible male and female college students before and after a hypnotic induction (Graffin et al., 1995; Ray, 1997). As might be imagined, given the 3 × 4 × 2 × 2 × 2 × 2 design, the results of this experiment were quite complex. Analysis of baseline differences, before hypnotic induction, revealed higher theta power in hypnotizable compared to insusceptible subjects, especially in frontal and temporal areas. Hypnotizable subjects showed greater resting alpha activity only in the temporal area. The induction of hypnosis decreased theta activity in hypnotizable subjects, while increasing it among insusceptibles, particularly in parietal and occipital areas. Alpha activity generally increased across all sites in all subjects, consistent with enhanced relaxation and reduction of visual activity. Graffin et al. interpreted the changes in theta as indicative of heightened concentration among hypnotizable subjects, but the fact that theta activity decreased in hypnotizable subjects and increased in insusceptible subjects suggests that, following the induction of hypnosis, both groups of subjects were actually in very similar cortical states.

I would say the summary is: It's complicated.
> 3 votes

# Answer
I am studying hypnotherapy at University and this is what I have learnt.

During the induction stages of hypnosis, the body becomes more and more relaxed and the brain enters changing levels of brain wave pattern. There are five brainwave frequencies, however there are four main different brainwave patterns when looking at hypnosis. These are Beta wave pattern, Alpha wave pattern, Theta wave pattern and Delta wave pattern as measured by an EEG (Electroencephalograph).

In the fully engaged and focused state, the brain will show a Beta wave pattern which is from 15 to 40 cycles per second

In a restful state, the brain will show an Alpha wave pattern which is from 9 to 14 cycles per second

In a deeper state of hypnosis, similar to dreaming and some meditative states, the brain shows a Theta wave pattern which is from 4 to 8 cycles per second

And in the deepest state of hypnosis, the brain shows a Delta wave pattern which is from 1 to 4 cycles per second and it is associated with deep dreamless sleep. The deeper the sleep, the higher the amount of delta waves.

The other brainwave frequency is Gamma (40Hz - 70Hz) associated with Processing of various attended stimuli (visual, auditory, touch) and the grouping of the various features of a given stimulus, particularly visual, into a coherent whole.

An important point is that there is no such thing as a “gamma state” of mind. Gamma waves largely play a supporting – though integral- role in the brain. From an EEG point of view, they will be present mostly while a subject is awake, but they will always be supported by other waves in the beta, alpha, theta, or delta ranges.

Brainwave patterns change in a gradual way. That is to say that it will not switch immediately from say 27Hz (27 cycles per second - Beta Waves) to 2Hz (2 cycles per second - Delta Waves). The frequency of brainwaves gradually decreases and increases as required. The speed of gradual change in brainwave frequency however can be fast or slow depending on the individual and the ability of the hypnotherapist. During reorientation, the brainwave patterns will gradually increase towards the Beta waves bringing the client back to full state of awareness.

All the above mentioned brainwave frequencies are normally present together in the brain. However, the dominant frequency in the EEG pattern determines what shall be called the current state of the brain. If the amplitude of the alpha range frequencies is highest, then the brain is said to be in the alpha stage. Note, that other frequencies still exist and it is impossible to give any "exact frequency your brain is operating on." However, for simplification purpose, it is often assumed that such a single frequency exists.

In general, we are accustomed to using the beta brain rhythm. When we diminish the brain rhythm to alpha, we put ourselves in the ideal condition to learn new information, keep facts, perform elaborate tasks, learn languages and analyse complex situations etc. Meditation, relaxation exercises, and activities that enable the sense of calm, also enable this alpha state. Considered as an integral part of the relaxation process before sleep. The alpha frequency band has been studied extensively in meditations of various kinds (like Zen, TM etc) and in almost all cases an increase in the alpha waves has been noted during meditation.

In the Theta state associated with dreams, deep meditation, sleep, and hypnosis, this is seemed to be involved with short-term memory. It is a state of somnolence with reduced consciousness. The theta-state is described by sleep researchers as stage 1 sleep or the twilight state. In this state, subjects pass out of the alert alpha-state into a theta-state in which they lose their sense of lying in bed, though still being awake.

Subjects can be easily awoken from this stage of sleep, and it has many interesting properties. For a brief time as we lie in bed at night, neither fully awake nor yet asleep, we pass through a twilight mental zone like a state of reverie. Many people associate this drowsy stage with hallucinatory images, more fleeting and disjointed than dreams, and compare it to the viewing of a speeded-up, jerky series of photographic slides. A host of artists and scientists have credited the imagery of this twilight state with creative solutions and inspiration for their work.

Meditative states associated with the increased presence of delta waves seem to occur mostly in very experienced practitioners, possibly because entering a delta state and maintaining consciousness at the same time is tremendously difficult.

Sources: Chrysalis Courses and Brain Wave Frequencies
> 2 votes

# Answer
Excellent observations. Read my article online The Dream as Posthypnotic Command Here is the Abstract The posthypnotic command is issued in deep hypnosis when a subject’s brainwaves are in theta mode of 4-7 cycles per second. This is the same frequency that the dream state features. It suggests that dreaming and deep hypnosis are equivalent states. The word hypnosis, meaning a condition of sleep, suggests that the ancients understood this equivalence. When a subject in deep hypnosis is commanded to execute a certain task at a given time after ‘waking up’, the subject will do so at exactly the designated time. When asked for a reason for his action, the answer will never be correct, for while under hypnosis he was asked by the hypnotist to forget the command. But the subject will certainly have a perfectly rational explanation no matter how absurd the order may have been. This is precisely the case when we are asked to give an explanation for any action we have executed. If my hypothesis is right, our answer to the same question is equally wrong, yet perfectly rational. Indeed, while we have no idea where our motivation arises and where our ideas come from, we are in the same position of darkness as the hypnotised subject. My research in dreams has convinced me that dreams are the source of our inspiration and motivation. Evidence for this comes from creative people who have received ideas from their dreams or have been presented with solutions by them to their problems. Famous scientific discoveries have been made with the help of dreams by Thomas Edison, Kekulé, Otto Loewi and Elijah Howe, for instance. Among the men of creative writing Robert Louis Stevenson stands out, for he deliberately invoked his dreams to provide him with new plots for stories. But he also suspected that the honing and reworking of his dream plots was also done for him by his “Brownies and Little People” of the night. Like the posthypnotic suggestion, the dream has a timing device determining when a dream or part of it should manifest in waking time. Perhaps the most convincing evidence for this is Michael Barnsley’s twenty-year nightmare that taunted him to put the wires of a matrix in order. Since he had no idea of what the matrix was supposed to do, he was naturally unable to solve the problem posed to him. The nightmare only ceased after he met Benoit Mandelbrot who had by then invented a computer program for fractal math, a program that provided all the necessary information for Barnsley to understand the dream that ended the nightmares by providing him with the solution of the confused wires of the dream matrix. This dream gave him the circuitry that led to the invention of image compression software. The wet dream, which occurs at the end of the night of dreams and is a heightened sexual state, indicated by morning erections, shows that the sexual content of the dream forces the dreamer, who by then is free of the nightly muscle inhibitors, to act it out. This leads us to surmise that the sexual aspect of the dream tends to manifest on the dream day. A thorough investigation of this circumstance proved the inference right. This led me to devise a test of the dream’s power to compel us to execute its content. It entails the interpretation of the sexual meaning of the dream and making a prediction on account of it. The corresponding manifestations verify my theory. I found support in my view that dreams were posthypnotic commands in the experimentations of Professor Libet, who found that our decisions were made unconsciously up to half a second before we became conscious of them. They demonstrate that our decisions are made unconsciously. There is no better explanation of this process than the dream. In short, the subjects tested by Libet would have dreamt the experiments ahead of time, thus providing them with the appropriate dream memory. It was this that determined the unconscious choices of the experimentees, registering half a second before becoming conscious fact. The somnambulist provides another factor that supports the hypothesis that dreams are posthypnotic commands. He, like the wet dreamer, is in a state of reduced muscle inhibition and is consequently free to act out his dreams. I realise that there is considerable controversy with regard to the causes of sleepwalking. But the difference between the wet dreamer and the somnambulist is minimal. Indeed, why would the dream state be constrained by muscle inhibition if it were not for the prevention of acting out what the dreamer experiences? Clearly somnambulism is a most illustrative case of dreams being posthypnotic commands. There can be little doubt that the dream is very much a posthypnotic command, signalling that our life is in the hands of a Master Hypnotist of infinite capacity.
> -1 votes

# Answer
> There does seem to be changed activity in the brain, however. The most notable data comes from electroencephalographs (EEGs), measurements of the electrical activity of the brain. Extensive EEG research has demonstrated that brains produce different brain waves, rhythms of electrical voltage, depending on their mental state. Deep sleep has a different rhythm than dreaming, for example, and full alertness has a different rhythm than relaxation.
>
> In some studies, EEGs from subjects under hypnosis showed a boost in the lower frequency waves associated with dreaming and sleep, and a drop in the higher frequency waves associated with full wakefulness. Brain-wave information is not a definitive indicator of how the mind is operating, but this pattern does fit the hypothesis that the conscious mind backs off during hypnosis and the subconscious mind takes a more active role.
>
> Researchers have also studied patterns in the brain's cerebral cortex that occur during hypnosis. In these studies, hypnotic subjects showed reduced activity in the left hemisphere of the cerebral cortex, while activity in the right hemisphere often increased. Neurologists believe that the left hemisphere of the cortex is the logical control center of the brain; it operates on deduction, reasoning and convention. The right hemisphere, in contrast, controls imagination and creativity. A decrease in left-hemisphere activity fits with the hypothesis that hypnosis subdues the conscious mind's inhibitory influence. Conversely, an increase in right-brain activity supports the idea that the creative, impulsive subconscious mind takes the reigns. This is by no means conclusive evidence, but it does lend credence to the idea that hypnotism opens up the subconscious mind.
>
> Whether or not hypnosis is actually a physiological phenomenon, millions of people do practice hypnotism regularly, and millions of subjects report that it has worked on them. In the next section, we'll look at the most common methods of inducing a hypnotic trance.

Source: How Hypnosis Works at How Stuff Works
> -2 votes

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Tags: cognitive-neuroscience, hypnosis
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# Question
Title: Reason for Inter-stimulus-Interval in psychology studies
In many of the studies that I have read or participated in, I have seen that they show a blank screen between two stimuli. For example, in a study by Cohen et al. (2017), a training paradigm was used where a flanker task was shown, followed by a blank screen for (1000 - Reaction Time) ms, followed by an emotional or neutral image. I've cited this study just as an example, but I've seen similar blank screens in many other studies. My question is:

**What is the reason for showing the blank screen?** What would have happened if they showed the emotional/neutral image right after the flanker task?

One reason I can think of is that it is shown to keep the starting point of different stimulus constant between different participants. Is there any other reason?

# Answer
> 2 votes
If you've ever tried doing an experiment with no inter-stimulus interval (ISI), you know from first-hand experience that it makes a difference in several ways:

1. If the task is about reaction times, you don't really have time to prepare. I.e. there is an attention-based interference effect. For Flanker tasks, Stroop tasks, go-nogo tasks, etc., you want to measure the optimal performance and hence you add ISI to reduce the interference. In other tasks, you set a short ISI exactly because of the interference effect, e.g. in some conditions of Conner's Continuous Performance Test, on Vigilance tasks to keep challenging attention (see e.g.McCormack, 1958), etc. Low ISIs are also quite useful for Task-Induced Stress.
2. There are other carry-over effects than a reduced/biased attention. For example, repetition priming is substantially reduced for longer ISI's (e.g., Ferrand, 1996). If you are not studying repetition priming, such effects constitute noise or a confounder, so you want to reduce it by having reasonable ISIs.
3. With ISI=0, the next stimulus appears to be caused by your response, so it feels like your key stroke "belongs" to the new stimulus rather than the previous. This can be confusing.

# Answer
> 1 votes
I cannot access the paper due to the paywall, and admitteldy, I am not familiar with the Flanker Task, but I am with the closely related Stroop task. Anyway, the between-trial times may substantially affect the results, because the conflict effect of flanker interference decreases with repeated testing, especially following incongruent/conflict conditions in what is known as the Gratton Effect (Blais *et al*., 2014). Hence, the method of the cited study (1 second - reaction time) standardizes the inter-stimulus interval, which is apparently a major player in subject performance in a Flanker task (source: Wiki page).

<sub>**Reference**
**-** Blais *et al*., *Front Psychol* (2014); **5**: 1207)</sub>

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Tags: measurement, methodology, experimental-psychology, psychophysics
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# Question
Title: What is the term for the "knowing what you think but can't explain it" phenomenon?
I think we all experience this phenomenon once in a while, and I am experiencing it right now. It's the feeling that whatever word one tries to say it seems to be wrong (for them) or confusing (for the listeners), and would require a period of time to think out the right word that they have already known. If severed, it can lead to frustration, but it's not really about feeling insecurity.

What is the word for that?

# Answer
> 2 votes
# Mental block

> A mental block is an uncontrollable suppression, or repression of painful or unwanted thoughts/memories. Also can be an inability to continue or complete a train of thought, as in the case of writer's block. In the case of writer's block, many find it helpful to take a break and revisit their topic.

You can also check out a list of synonyms and related words for "forgetful and forgetfulness".

# Answer
> 2 votes
**TOT:** tip of the tongue phenomenon. There are several hypotheses to explain it and some neuroimaging has been done as well.

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Tags: cognitive-psychology, memory, terminology, working-memory
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title: How can I not get a joke in my dream?

text:
# Question
Title: How can I not get a joke in my dream?
# The Dream

Today I had a dream. I was in class where I and my classmate were chosen to be examined. Once seated in front of the teacher we got our questions. She accidentally saw mine and made a funny remark about it. I did not get it at first and so I just smiled in a general way. Since in real life she is used to me getting her jokes she immediately explained it to me. Only then did I understand it and had a good laugh.

# The Question

How can I not get a joke made de facto by myself (even though on behalf of someone else) in a dream?

# Answer
> -1 votes
It maybe the joke was the dream-equivalent of a MacGuffin, a fuzzy, unimportant placeholder that wasn’t materialized into actual language, and that the point of the scene was to experience awkwardness, embarrassment, inferiority or exclusion that others had the upper-hand with in-group knowledge unavailable to the subject?

It would fit that what seems real in a dream isn’t necessarily real... that the idea of certainty came from the dream while waking up, but the actual content of that certainty likely never existed.

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Tags: dreams
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title: Is hypnosis really concentration/focus?

text:
# Question
Title: Is hypnosis really concentration/focus?
It's widely claimed that hypnosis is a state of highly focused attention.

But I've also seen many claims that the hypnotic state is about accessing the subconscious mind directly, essentially "bypassing" consciousness.

However there lies a dissonance; all the material I ever read about focus (mostly from Daniel Goleman and Leonard Mlodinow) indicates that focus is a conscious phenomenon.

Can anyone please clarify?

# Answer
> 5 votes
The answer lies in what is known of the conscious, unconscious and the presconscious parts of the mind, with preconscious is the scientific name for the subconscious, however, for the purposes of this answer and because of how the theory of hypnosis is put together, I will refer to the preconscious as the subconscious.

When I was learning about the basis of hypnosis in formal training, I was taught to visualise the mind as the following diagram

<sup>**Image: CCF diagram from my training notes** \- the "memories and belief system" part of the diagram is the subconscious part of the mind. The CCF (the orange part of the diagram) is the filter between the conscious and subconscious parts of the brain. It compares a new situation with our memories, belief system and morals.</sup>

## Formation of our beliefs and morals

Internal and external influences form our belief system which is stored in our subconscious mind. External influences involve things within our environment. Internal influences involve things we ‘know’ to be true. I said ‘know’ because what we believe to be true and what is actually true, correlates with the things we have learnt during our lives. Our belief systems are built from the moment we are born. Our external influences such as what we have seen, touched, tasted, smelt and heard, help us to learn things whilst a baby. Listening to words and speech patterns from our parents help us to learn our language including names for objects.

As we get older and start to be able to wander around and explore our environment our parents tell us things such as “Don’t touch that it’s hot” or “Don’t eat that or you will be ill”. We were told that the grass is green and the sky is blue. Cultural influences start playing a role too such as the idea that pink is a girls colour and blue is for boys, Barbie dolls are for girls and action men are for boys. We took those ideas on as literal truth.

As we got older, experiences begin to confirm some of those ideas. Some got hurt by the heat of a cup of tea. Some got ill from trying the berries we were told not to eat. In these ways we had a model of the world confirmed and constructed.

Some of those beliefs were absolutely correct, we tested the ideas and had them confirmed by outside sources. Some beliefs may have been left untested but nevertheless all the beliefs in turn developed what many call the, Conscious Critical Faculty (CCF) (Watts, n.d.).

The CCF (the orange part of the diagram) is the filter between the conscious and subconscious parts of the brain. It compares a new situation with our memories and belief system and morals. Everything stored in the subconscious is essential for your survival. If the CCF encounters something which goes against the belief systems or morals, stored in the subconscious, it throws the idea out and the belief systems remains intact and life can continue.

But what if there are falsehoods stored in the belief system? Phobias can develop and other damaging effects can take place. This part of the belief system can be built by other people who are unfortunately basing their information on their own belief systems. These in turn were given to them by people who formed their own belief systems. What can we do about this?

Take a situation where comments from adults, taught someone when they are a child, that they are selfish, unattractive or lacking intelligence. Once these ideas have taken hold it is very difficult to try and change these beliefs at a conscious level and remove them from the subconscious mind as the CCF will take over and reject opposing beliefs. This can be damaging to the confidence and opportunities in that persons adult life. This is why it’s so easy to give advice but so difficult for some others to take it even when you know it is correct. For a more effective way of doing this, we need to bypass the Conscious Critical Faculty in order for the correct belief system to be accepted.

There are a number of ways that new information can be pushed past the CCF. (Burns, 2009)

They include:

* Repetition
* Shock
* Hypnosis

## Repetition

Selfishness and altruism, attractiveness and unattractiveness, intelligence and lack of intelligence etc. taught as a child or later instilled in adult life is often a result of repetitive comments. The same goes for trust and distrust in certain people or animals. How this happens is for example:-

1. A belief that no man can be trusted is put to you on a repetitive basis
2. This is usually backed up by other people’s actions. Maybe a man disappointed you in the past
3. The concept or belief becomes part of your belief system because no one in your circle of friends can give you an opposing concept or belief to compare it to
4. This in turn affects the way you act towards men
5. This then causes some men to react in a way which can be perceived to reinforce your belief

Repetitive affirmations and confirmations over time can rectify falsehoods in belief systems.

## Shock

Shock that someone may experience as a result of a traffic accident for example, can induce unhesitating acceptance of thoughts and beliefs. (Burns, 2009) If the thought is given where someone says “that looks bad, I bet that hurts” then of course they will become extremely aware of the pain and in turn may develop a severe aversion to getting into a car again. Other traumas can have similar effects.

If you look at someone suffering from the trauma of war, rape or sexual assault, this trauma will lodge the memory of what happened straight in the subconscious and develop either conflicting belief systems which cause more problems, or immediately alter the belief system completely. Counselling sessions can dredge up those painful memories and the resulting shock induced can open the client to opposing thoughts and beliefs which can help to correct the faulty belief system.

## Hypnosis

Hypnosis is a natural state of mind where acceptable selective thinking is established, concentration is enhanced and the Conscious Critical Factor is bypassed, opening the subconscious mind to suggestion. With the subconscious mind open to suggestion without interference by the CCF, therapy will be able to work more quickly (Watts, n.d.) by installing correcting belief systems.

The hypnotic state can be induced by reading, carrying out a repetitive task or listening to a hypnotherapist’s hypnotic induction routine. Watching television can induce a hypnotic state which helps to explain how effective on-screen advertising can be.

## References

Burns, J., 2009. *Beating the barriers to making life changes*. \[Online\] Available at: http://www.somersethypnotherapy.com/articles-by-John-Burns/beating-barriers-to-change.pdf

Watts, T., n.d. \*The Conscious Critical Faculty. \[Online\] Available at: http://www.selfhypnosis.com/the-conscious-critical-faculty

# Answer
> 0 votes
I would model it as an extreme, prolonged version of captivation.

The conscious mind goes on a tea break when there is loud, rhythmic music with synchronized light effects, stimulus that overwhelms the mind so it likely gives up trying to process it at a high level, and instead “goes along” with it... dancing, etc.

Dissecting when someone becomes highly-attracted to someone else.. external distractions are eliminated, perception of time slows down, the sympathetic nervous system activates strongly to record the event long-term, the superego and most of the ego fall silent and whatever happens at the focus basically goes in to the mesmerized essentially verbatim as they perceived it.

**Shaky speculation land:** Maybe the evolutionary psych purpose could be allowing true-believer followers to experience unquestionably loyal to their cult leader? Or a mate to another mate. Even a mentor to mentee. ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯

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Tags: consciousness, attention, unconscious, hypnosis, concentration
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# Question
Title: Does neurodynamics have any relation to psychodynamics?
From Neural oscillation - Wikipedia:

> Neural oscillations are commonly studied from a mathematical framework and belong to the field of "neurodynamics", an area of research in the cognitive sciences that places a strong focus upon the dynamic character of neural activity in describing brain function.

From Psychodynamics - Wikipedia:

> Psychodynamics, also known as psychodynamic psychology, in its broadest sense, is an approach to psychology that emphasizes systematic study of the psychological forces that underlie human behavior, feelings, and emotions and how they might relate to early experience. It is especially interested in the dynamic relations between conscious motivation and unconscious motivation.

When I was watching this artwork, I didn't know about neurodynamics and thought that it was completely about psychodynamics, because I thought the emergence and dissipation of the waves in the artwork were about consciousness and subconsciousness. This thought is strengthened in this letter:

> Mental awareness and ‘I’ emerge as a secondary phenomenon from the primary stream of thinking-in-movement.

I know psychodynamics is regarded as pseudoscience for the lack of evidence, but it's still useful enough for some specific psychological disorders. And as neurodynamics is about oscillation and psychodynamics was inspired from thermodynamics, if we can find the link between the two in physics (which they should), then we will see the link between the two.

So does neurodynamics have any relation to psychodynamics?

Related: Is there a difference between physiological stimulations and psychological stimulations?

# Answer
> 3 votes
I believe I can see where the confusion lies when comparing the interesting artwork with psychodynamic theory. The artwork you linked uses Neurological data to form images, whereas you may be getting confused with the famous Rorschach test otherwise known as the Inkblot test, and how the inkblot images are interpreted by the viewer.

Many psychologists in the United Kingdom do not trust its efficacy and it is rarely used, however, it is used by some mental health organisations such as the Tavistock Clinic (BBC, 2012).

The artwork with the "emergence and dissipation of waves" is using neurodynamic data and the Rorschach test is a psychodynamic test.

**Neurodynamics** relates to, or involves the dynamics of communication between different parts of the nervous system (Source) and the earliest document I can find relating to it is an unclassified document held by the DTIC (US Defence Technical Information Center) (Rosenblatt, 1961). Shacklock (1995) also talks about neurodynamics in the realm of physiotherapy.

**Psychodynamics**, as stated in the Wikipedia article you linked, is about the dynamic relations between conscious motivation and unconscious motivation that underlie human behavior, feelings, and emotions and how they might relate to early experience.

So the two are not related, and in fact are very different.

A combination of the 2 sets of theories can be seen to be **Neuropsychodynamics** as in Miller (1990).

## References

BBC (2012). *Dr Inkblot* BBC Radio 4
Review available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01l0kch

Miller, L. (1990). Neuropsychodynamics of alcoholism and addiction: Personality, psychopathology, and cognitive style. *Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment*, 7(1), 31-49.
DOI: 10.1016/0740-5472(90)90034-N PMID: 2179572

Rosenblatt, F. (1961). *Principles of neurodynamics. perceptrons and the theory of brain mechanisms* (No. VG-1196-G-8) DTIC \[Unclassified PDF\]
Available from: http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/AD0256582

Shacklock, M. (1995). Neurodynamics. *Physiotherapy*, 81(1), 9-16.
DOI: 10.1016/S0031-9406(05)67024-1

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Tags: cognitive-psychology, cognitive-neuroscience, theoretical-neuroscience, brain-waves, neuropsychology
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# Question
Title: Does EMDR legitimately treat any condition?
Are there any studies not funded by friends or beneficiaries of EMDR that prove it helps with a strong p-value?

# Answer
> 6 votes
## TLDR: EMDR seems to be equally efficacious to other therapies.

Davidson & Parker, (2001) conducted a meta-analysis.

> Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR), a controversial treatment suggested for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and other conditions, was evaluated in a meta-analysis of 34 studies that examined EMDR with a variety of populations and measures. Process and outcome measures were examined separately, and EMDR showed an effect on both when compared with no treatment and with therapies not using exposure to anxiety-provoking stimuli and in pre–post EMDR comparisons. However, no significant effect was found when EMDR was compared with other exposure techniques.

Rothbaum, Astin, & Marsteller, (2005). Looked at EMDR with Rape Victims.

> This controlled study evaluated the relative efficacy of Prolonged Exposure (PE) and Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) compared to a no‐treatment waitlist control (WAIT) in the treatment of PTSD in adult female rape victims (*n* = 74). Improvement in PTSD as assessed by blind independent assessors, depression, dissociation, and state anxiety was significantly greater in both the PE and EMDR group than the WAIT group (*n* = 20 completers per group). PE and EMDR did not differ significantly for change from baseline to either posttreatment or 6‐month follow‐up measurement for any quantitative scale.

Seidler, & Wagner, (2006) conducted another meta-analytic study.

> The superiority of one treatment over the other could not be demonstrated. Trauma-focused CBT and EMDR tend to be equally efficacious. Differences between the two forms of treatment are probably not of clinical significance. While the data indicate that moderator variables influence treatment efficacy, we argue that because of the small number of original studies, little benefit is to be gained from a closer examination of these variables. Further research is needed within the framework of randomized controlled trials.

## References

Davidson, P. R., & Parker, K. C. (2001). Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR): A meta-analysis. *Journal of consulting and clinical psychology*, 69(2), 305. DOI: 10.1037/0022-006X.69.2.305 PMID: 11393607
**Free PDF:** https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/d703/9ab57fabe1a3b0aee33bf558b95cf228700c.pdf

Rothbaum, B. O., Astin, M. C., & Marsteller, F. (2005). Prolonged exposure versus eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) for PTSD rape victims. *Journal of traumatic stress*, 18(6), 607-616.
DOI: 10.1002/jts.20069
**FREE PDF:** https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/d5cd/abbee19ef9886327fd77be0587e6826842d6.pdf

Seidler, G. H., & Wagner, F. E. (2006). Comparing the efficacy of EMDR and trauma-focused cognitive-behavioral therapy in the treatment of PTSD: a meta-analytic study. Psychological medicine, 36(11), 1515-1522.
DOI: 10.1017/S0033291706007963

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Tags: therapy
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# Question
Title: Is there a database of disgusting images for stimuli for experimental study of disgust?
I'm looking for a set of images that evoke a disgust reaction. In particular, I'm looking for disgusting *objects* (e.g. feces, maggots). Is there a database of images like this? It would be especially useful if there were norming or rating data on how disgusting people found the images.

# Answer
> 7 votes
Try the IAPS--International Affective Picture System; they have disgusting images as well as norming procedures and data. You can read about it here and request it (as long as you have a faculty advisor) here.

# Answer
> 2 votes
You may also have a look at the EmoMadrid-database, which can also be accessed for free and the author's do not mention any restrictions of whom they give it to. Here are the instructions on how to get access.

# Answer
> 2 votes
There is one for Trypophobia Image Detector - Browser Plugin using Deep Learning (repo: https://github.com/cytadela8/trypophobia).

> **Download the data set v2** prepared in 2017-09
>
> *Note: The provided images may be or not be subjected to copyright. By downloading the data set you agree to use it only for research purposes.*
>
> * **6.5k** trypophobia triggering images obtained from:
> * **10.5k** neutral images obtained from Google images using own scrapper:
>     + **10k** by supplying it 5k randomly chosen words from this english dictionary and downloading 2 images per word
>     + **192** with *bushes* keyword (introduced in v2 to eliminate false positives for greenery)
>     + **181** with *grass* keyword (since v2)
>     + **98** with *forest* keyword (since v2)

Full disclosure: it was prepared by two of my mentees. I also used it in Detecting trypophobia triggers project at the Aspects of Neuroscience hackathon.

In general, you may want to look up trypophobia Wikipedia entry before using any image search.

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Tags: methodology, data
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# Question
Title: Can calmness happen during the fight-flight response?
In the question How do certain individuals, like Quang Duc, develop the ability to remain calm when enduring significant nociceptive pain?, one answer says that it was the high level of cortisol that numbing his pain. But that's numb, not calm. I don't think calmness can happen during stressful situations.

So to check that answer, can calmness happens during the fight-flight response?

# Answer
With looking at the possibility of calmness during stress and trauma, you only have to look at the situation with rape victims and soldiers witnessing severe traumatic events who dissociate (Ellert, et al. 2011)(Waller, et al. 2001) during the event.

Dissociation is a psychological defence mechanism (Cardeña, 1994) which helps the person to get through the situation with as little harm as possible. Think about it like throwing a switch on conscious awareness.

Whilst some define dissociation as a combination of 2 distinct psychological mechanisms (Brown, 2006), the psychobiological mechanism of dissociation is little understood; but, when someone is dissociated from the event, the detachment of conscious awareness from the event can make the person appear very calm.

## References

Brown, R. J. (2006). Different types of “dissociation” have different psychological mechanisms. *Journal of Trauma & Dissociation*, 7(4), 7-28.
DOI: 10.1300/J229v07n04\_02

Cardeña, E. (1994) The domain of dissociation. In: *Dissociation: Clinical and theoretical aspects*, Edited by: Lynn, S. J. and Rhue, J. W. 5–31. New York, NY: Guildford Press.

Ellert R. S. Nijenhuis PhD & Onno van der Hart PhD (2011) Dissociation in Trauma: A New Definition and Comparison with Previous Formulations, *Journal of Trauma & Dissociation*, 12(4), 416-445.
DOI: 10.1080/15299732.2011.570592

Waller, G., Hamilton, K., Elliott, P., Lewendon, J., Stopa, L., Waters, A., ... & Hargreaves, I. (2001). Somatoform dissociation, psychological dissociation, and specific forms of trauma. *Journal of Trauma & Dissociation*, 1(4), 81-98.
DOI: 10.1300/J229v01n04\_05
> 3 votes

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Tags: cognitive-psychology, cognitive-neuroscience, emotion, stress, meditation
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# Question
Title: How to statistically test whether parents and children share similar humor styles?
I have data from children and their parents on their humor styles (using the Humor Styles Questionnaire by Martin (2003)).

**For the adult version:** It's a 32-item measure, with 4 subscales for each humor style (Affiliative, Aggressive, Self-Defeating, and Self-Enhancing) so there's 8 items for each subscale.

**For the children's version:** There are 24 items, with 4 subscales so 6 items per humor style. The items for the children are on a 4-point scale and the parents are on a 7-point scale.

**Research Question:** I want to assess whether children share humor styles with their parents.

What kind of test would help me find out if children have the same humor styles as their parents?

**References**

Martin, R. A., Puhlik-Doris, P., Larsen, G., Gray, J., & Weir, K. (2003). Individual differences in uses of humor and their relation to psychological well-being: Development of the Humor Styles Questionnaire. *Journal Of Research In Personality*, 37(1), 48-75. doi:10.1016/S0092-6566(02)00534-2

# Answer
Assuming the data are dyadic (i.e., one child per parent), you would probably focus on correlating child scores with parent scores.

Hopefully, you have a sense of how the child and parent scales align. Hopefully, they are designed to measure equivalent constructs albeit with different items.

The fact that you've used different scales is a potential confound. Presumably, the are good reasons for this given that the humour of children and adults is expressed quite differently. But that's something, you'll have to reason through in terms of measurement and theory.

The fact that the scales have different numbers of items and response options is mostly irrelevant. As soon as you start using different items, then you've essentially got different variables.

Although not relevant to you, more commonly, data involving dyads involves using the same instruments. e.g., husbands and wive both completing the same measure of big 5 personality. In that case, you can do lots of things, like comparing descriptive statistics, ICCs, and other values. David Kenny has lots of resources in that case on dyadic data analysis: http://www.davidakenny.net/dyad.htm
> 3 votes

# Answer
I'm not sure about my answer but first of all, to have comparable variables, I think you need to divide children's scores to 4 and their parent's to 7. As far as I understood you want to understand if two groups (parents and children) have similar humor styles. I think you can do 2\*4 mixed anova to solve this problem. Your parent and child variables can be within factor because they are paired with each other. Your sub-categories can be between factor. In the results, first, you need to look if age influences the humor score. If it did you can say that they have at least some diffirences in some categories. Then you can check the interaction. If there is no interaction between age and style, parents and their children are certainly different. If there is a interaction, you can look in which categories age doesn't differ significantly from each other. And you can say in ... category parents and children have similar humor styles and in ... they differ from each other significantly. I hope that I could express myself clearly.
> 1 votes

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Tags: developmental-psychology, statistics, test, analysis
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# Question
Title: When to use standard versus moderator regression techniques for the most parsimonious approach?
I know how to run multiple regressions (SMR, HMR, and MMR) in SPSS but I'm still a little vague on when it's appropriate to use each of them to achieve the best and most parsimonious result. (SPSS being the mathematical software, SMR being standard multiple regression, HMR being hierarchical multiple regression, and MMR being moderated multiple regression, SMR and SPSS are further explained in this video, hierarchical multiple regression in this video, and moderated multiple regression in this blog post).

e.g. in a case where I want to see the impact of social anxiety, and sense of humour on life satisfaction, I hypothesise that both social anxiety and sense of humour will be individually associated with life satisfaction.

When controlling for age, gender and anxiety, participants high in sense of humour will have higher life satisfaction.

Also, when excluding variables of age and gender, I predict that the negative association between anxiety and life satisfaction will be stronger for those with low sense of humour ratings.

I feel that for most of these questions, the answers could be found using an SMR, and the last question, with an MMR, but is there a simpler and more parsimonious way to do this? Can I gather the data for the first few questions from the MMR analysis, for example?

# Answer
> 2 votes
You write:

> When controlling for age, gender and anxiety, participants high in sense of humour will have higher life satisfaction.

This is standard regression. Predictors that are control variables are the same as any other predictors, it's just that their inclusion in the model is mostly there to facilitate a desired interpretation of a focal predictor.

> Also, when excluding variables of age and gender, I predict that **the negative association between anxiety and life satisfaction will be stronger for those with low sense of humour ratings**.

Here you have described a moderation hypothesis. i.e., in regression terms, you might express it like this:

```
lifesat ~ anxiety * humour

```

However, technically, you have not assigned anxiety or life satisfaction a particular status as the outcome variable. Whether you "exclude age and gender" is irrelevant to the status of the hypothesis as a moderation hypothesis.

You ask specifically:

> I feel that for most of these questions, the answers could be found using an SMR, and the last question, with an MMR, but is there a simpler and more parsimonious way to do this? Can I gather the data for the first few questions from the MMR analysis, for example?

Don't be afraid to run several regression models. Ultimately, a moderator regression is simply a model with an interaction term. Adding predictors generally alters the regression coefficients for other predictors (an exception would be for orthogonal variables, such as in experiments).

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Tags: statistics, analysis, regression
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# Question
Title: How to fit an ex-wald distribution model with R?
I'm working on reaction time data. I want to fit the data with an ex-wald model but I only found one paper which interpreted the fitting with S. But I don't know S. Are there any ways to fit the RT data with R, python or Matlab?

# Answer
> 2 votes
This seems promising. I haven't used it

Heathcote, A. (2004). Fitting Wald and ex-Wald distributions to response time data: An example using functions for the S-PLUS package. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, & Computers, 36(4), 678-694. http://www.tascl.org/uploads/4/9/3/3/49339445/26\_.pdf

It does include s-plus code in a supplement to the journal article: https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758%2FBF03206550

Often S-plus can be used in R, sometimes with some adjustments.

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Tags: reaction-time
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# Question
Title: Is serotonin conclusively linked to depression?
Some highlights from the article "The Depressing News about Anti-Depressants":

> ever since a seminal study in 1998, whose findings were reinforced by landmark research in The Journal of the American Medical Association last month, that evidence has come with a big asterisk. Yes, the drugs are effective, in that they lift depression in most patients. But that benefit is hardly more than what patients get when they, unknowingly and as part of a study, take a dummy pill—a placebo. As more and more scientists who study depression and the drugs that treat it are concluding, that suggests that **antidepressants are basically expensive Tic Tacs.**
>
> One team of researchers wondered if antidepressants were "a triumph of marketing over science." Even defenders of antidepressants agreed that the drugs have "relatively small" effects. "Many have long been unimpressed by the magnitude of the differences observed between treatments and controls," psychology researcher Steven Hollon of Vanderbilt University and colleagues wrote—"what some of our colleagues refer to as 'the dirty little secret.' "In Britain, the agency that assesses which treatments are effective enough for the government to pay for stopped recommending antidepressants as a first-line treatment, especially for mild or moderate depression.
>
> But if experts know that antidepressants are hardly better than placebos, few patients or doctors do. Some doctors have changed their prescribing habits, says Kirsch, but more "reacted with anger and incredulity."
>
> Doctors see with their own eyes, and feel with their hearts, that the drugs lift the black cloud from many of their depressed patients. But since doctors are not exactly in the habit of prescribing dummy pills, they have no experience comparing how their patients do on them, and therefore never see that a placebo would be almost as effective as a $4 pill. "When they prescribe a treatment and it works," says Kirsch, "their natural tendency is to attribute the cure to the treatment." Hence the widespread "antidepressants work" refrain that persists to this day.
>
> Right about here, people scowl and ask how anti-depressants—especially those that raise the brain's levels of serotonin—can possibly have no direct chemical effect on the brain. Surely raising serotonin levels should right the synapses' "chemical imbalance" and lift depression. Unfortunately, the serotonin-deficit theory of depression is built on a foundation of tissue paper. How that came to be is a story in itself, but the basics are that in the 1950s scientists discovered, serendipitously, that a drug called iproniazid seemed to help some people with depression. Iproniazid increases brain levels of serotonin and norepinephrine. Ergo, low levels of those neurotransmitters must cause depression. More than 50 years on, the presumed effectiveness of antidepressants that act this way remains the chief support for the chemical-imbalance theory of depression. Absent that effectiveness, the theory hasn't a leg to stand on. Direct evidence doesn't exist. Lowering people's serotonin levels does not change their mood. And a new drug, tianeptine, which is sold in France and some other countries (but not the U.S.), turns out to be as effective as Prozac-like antidepressants that keep the synapses well supplied with serotonin. The mechanism of the new drug? It lowers brain levels of serotonin. **"If depression can be equally affected by drugs that increase serotonin and by drugs that decrease it," says Kirsch, "it's hard to imagine how the benefits can be due to their chemical activity."**

Is this article true? What evidence is there that serotonin is linked to depression?

# Answer
> 14 votes
It's all about the receptors, really. There are 7 families of serotonin receptors that perform different functions within the brain, and according to Wikipedia 14 different subtypes have been discovered.

The article assumes that a blanket level of serotonin would be sufficient to "perk" up the brain, wherein it is much more complicated. Serotonin serves to modulate the level of excitation or inhibition depending on the circumstances. Most of the "effect" from today's antidepressants is related to modulating projections from the dorsal raphe in the brainstem to dopaminergic neurons in the frontal cortex, but some of the serotonergic neurons in the basal ganglia can be hyperactive in situations where there is mild psychosis. So, depending on the etiology of the depression, suppressing those neurons local to that portion of the anatomy can actually be helpful.

So, it's less to do with the transmitter that is being discussed, and everything to do with which subtypes of receptors are being agonized or antagonized. While we have learned a tremendous amount about the relationships between neurotransmitters at different nuclei, we still have a lifetime or more of research to go.

# Answer
> 10 votes
I suppose at face value, the answer to the question "Is serotonin *linked* to depression?" would 'yes'. However, if the question was "Is Major Depressive Disorder or Dysthimia the result of deficits in serotonergic signaling?" the answer becomes much less black-and-white. First, to piggyback on Chuck's response, it is very important to consider 5-HT (serotonin) receptor subtypes, since different subtypes can play significantly different roles in modulating a massive amount of cognitive and physiological processes. These range from autonomic functions such as pupil dilation, appetite, sexual arousal etc..., to high level cognitive and social behaviors/functions such as aggression, mood, impulsiveness, addiction etc. It is a gross oversimplification to think in terms of "more" or "less" serotonin being the grand underlying factor in depression. Certainly, like most every aspect of a biological system, there are going to be consequences when there are critical deficits or excessive amounts of neuromodulatory chemicals such as serotonin, but there are many other factors that clinicians and researchers have found to be important relative to depression.

Some of these are not surprising and pretty intuitive, such as dysregulation of other neurotransmitter systems, particularly monoamines such as dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine as these chemicals also modulate mood and arousal.

Recent research has also shown that antidepressants such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs), serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs) and monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs), to name a few, owe their therapeutic qualities, at least secondarily, to increased neurogenesis in hippocampus which also explains the improvement in general cognitive function many depressed individuals report when successfully treated. (1) Some researchers argue that this is actually the primary mechanism underlying the attenuation of depressive symptoms when using these pharmacological therapies.

Other connections have been made to increased inflammation (2) as an important factor in depression. Depressive symptoms have actually been shown to be *caused* by long term interactions from adipose tissue (a major source of inflammation) on neural regulatory systems.

So, I'll wrap this up by saying that yes, serotonin is *linked* to depression. The link is still just that, a link. For a variety of historical reasons, relating serotonin to depression somehow comes off as a hot topic of debate, but this is because of gross oversimplifications that are provided to the public by the media, pharmaceutical companies, clinicians and even the researchers studying depression and the neurophysiology behind it.

1. Castrén E (March 2005). "Is mood chemistry?". Nat Rev Neurosci. 6 (3): 241–6. doi:10.1038/nrn1629. PMID 15738959.
2. Shelton RC, Miller AH. Inflammation in depression: is adiposity a cause? Dialogues Clin Neurosci. 2011;13(1):41-53.

# Answer
> 7 votes
Although I did not want to post anymore, lol (and btw it has nothing to do with drama, its cause I spend too much time here and its distracting me from my real job too much), I wanted to enlighten and challenge the typical SSRI theory.

I think Chuck already owned it quite a bit though. Anyways,

Meet Tianeptine:

What is Tianeptine? Tianeptine is a novel french pharmaceutical that is actually a selective serotonin reuptake ENHANCER. Wtf? An enhancer? But I want more serotonin flooding my synapses!

Tianeptine is kind of a weird drug as it seems to do many things. For instance, it can give one an initial stimulatory affect through some crazy downstream dopamine processes.

The general theory as to why it works (I've actually taken it before, I don't think I was consistent enough though), can be summed up in a weird and hard to describe way: it promotes neurogenesis to certain parts of your brain that have apparently been injuried over the years or worn out. I always thought the concept was interesting in that it's one of the only drugs that really has a long term outcome of not taking it anymore.

The french are very clever sometimes. But yeah, if SSRI's work AND SSRE's work? Then...is it really all serotonin?

# Answer
> -2 votes
Now I didn't read the whole discussion beforehand, just skimmed through it. Maps.org /Yale Uni is doing quite a bit interesting research on the topic, having better results than any existing antidepressants could dream of. Psilocybin/ LSD/ DMT/ MDMA could be far out to read up on, but psychedelics/ empathogens may be the future answer to a part of the question.

If you check out the Cochrane library on LSD, they also show a significant effect on the global brain communication after intake, which may be beneficial to reset the "loops" that the depressed/ dysfunctional/ addictive brain is in.

I also like the "Deep Rest" (ref: Jim Carrey?) interpretation of depression. It comes to tell your body to take some time off, de-stress, process known or unknown traumas and to find who you are and your purpose here on earth -whatever that may be. Most people don't have time to get to know themselves today, so they rather work long hours to fit into the majority of well adjusted misfits.

For me, I get energy from learning new things at my own pace, finding new subjects of digging into, sharing and discussing knowledge and philosophy, helping people where I can ++. Many places pay people who doesn't even truly care, or care for the wrong reasons, to do these things. But now we're over to worldbuilding.

Follow the money, and you are on the right path to the wrong solution.

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Tags: neuroscience, abnormal-psychology, depression, neuro-transmitters
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title: "Need" vs "Want" in psychology

text:
# Question
Title: "Need" vs "Want" in psychology
In marketing the terms needs and wants are usually used to refer to different concepts. It is not clear to me what exactly they mean.

In psychology what are the definitions for needs and wants? What is the difference between them?

# Answer
Research in neuroscience allowed to distinguish two concepts: "liking" and "wanting". Berridge and colleagues distinguished two different brain mechanisms for that.

* By injecting a tiny droplet of amphetamine drug in the **nucleus accumbens (dopamine system)**, they noted an increase of the incentive salience that cues trigger for their reward *without altering other components of desire or reward.*
* Experimentally, they also found that the generation of pleasure “liking” is more restricted neurochemically: opioid stimulation but not dopamine stimulation in some limbic strutures can enhance “liking”, whereas “wanting” is enhanced by both.

Research suggest that liking and wanting belongs to two different pathways mediated by opioid and dopamine circuits. This distinction between liking and wanting could lead to ambivalent processes individuals could like what they do not want and want what they do not like.

To conlude, according to Berridge there are different **"hedonic hotspots"** in the brain that, according to the types of valences of the external stimuli, may modulate different processes such as: wanting, liking and 'needing'

References :

Wanting and Liking: Observations from the Neuroscience and Psychology Laboratory
> 3 votes

# Answer
Difference between 'need' and 'want' is pretty dynamic. However, the difference can be appreciated by answering a simple question, 'What if you don't get what you say you need/want?' If the absence of a particular thing creates a void in your life, then it's 'needed', else if its absence creates a manageable unease then it's only 'wanted.

The dynamic nature can be appreciated by a simple example. Telephone was a want, or some say a luxury in India back in 1980s, but today it's a need, or a necessity. Internet connectivity is somewhere between a need and want in India, but Canada has declared it as a 'right', that is, it has become a need in Canada.

Historically speaking, individual and species survival was the only need in paleolithic age, however with neolithic revolution, a permanent shelter became a need, and with the rise of civilizations, surplus food became a need because people needed to be free to carry out secondary and tertiary activities. Hence, the difference between 'need' and 'want' is based on historical, social, psychological, cultural and technological context.

Marketing people exploit these parameters to convert their product just from being a 'want' to being a 'need'. In corporate world they call it 'customer education'. Colgate advertisements told Indians in 1990s that salt can injure gums and therefore we shall use the tooth-paste instead of salt,converting a want into a need; fast-forward to 2015, the advertisements are asking if our tooth-paste contains salt, creating more want of a product which has already become a need!
> 1 votes

# Answer
@jsakaluk's excellent, well supported answer to Is Maslow's hierarchy of needs really accurate at labeling sex as a physiological "need"? gave a good rundown of the definition.

> Definitions of "Needs", "Motives", etc., are dime-a-dozen. Though I don't necessarily agree with all the ingredients, I like how well explicated the criteria by Baumeister and Leary (1995) are, according to whom a fundamental need should:
>
> 1. produce effects readily under all but adverse conditions
> 2. have affective consequences
> 3. direct cognitive processing
> 4. lead to ill effects (such as on health or adjustment) when thwarted
> 5. elicit goal-oriented behavior designed to satisfy it (subject to motivational patterns such as object substitutability and satiation)
> 6. be universal in the sense of applying to all people
> 7. not be derivative of other motives
> 8. affect a broad variety of behaviors
> 9. have implications that go beyond immediate psychological functioning

## References

Baumeister, R. F., & Leary, M. R. (1995). The need to belong: desire for interpersonal attachments as a fundamental human motivation. *Psychological Bulletin*, 117(3), 497-529.
DOI: 10.1037/0033-2909.117.3.497 PMID: 7777651
> 1 votes

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Tags: terminology, motivation
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