The adaptive behavior line of investigation, which is considered as a bionic approach to development of systems of artificial intelligence, is characterized. One of the topical problems in the framework of this approach is the stimulation of searching animal behavior. A general scheme of searching adaptive behavior with inertial switching between search tactics is presented. A particular model of larvae of caddis flies building a case-house from particles of different sizes and searching or gathering suitable particles is investigated.

http://www.springerlink.com/content/p8730841n1p18l3x/

Alcohol abuse is defined as a pattern of drinking that results in one or more of the following situations within a 12-month period:
• Failure to fulfill major work, school, or home responsibilities
• Drinking in situations that are physically dangerous, such as while driving a car or operating machinery
• Having recurring alcohol-related legal problems, such as being arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol or for physically hurting someone while drunk
• Continued drinking despite hav
Alcoholism, or alcohol dependence, is the most severe form of alcohol abuse. It is a chronic disease characterized by the consumption of alcohol at a level that interferes with physical and mental health and with family and social responsibilities. An alcoholic will continue to drink despite serious health, family, or legal problems.
• Alcoholism is influenced by both genetic and environmental factors. Alcoholism is chronic: It lasts a person’s lifetime. It usually follows a pr ing ongoing relationship problems that are caused or worsened by the drinking.
edictable course and has recognizable symptoms.
Alcohol abuse and alcoholism cut across gender, race, and ethnicity. Nearly 14 million people in the United States are dependent on alcohol. More men than women are alcohol dependent or have alcohol problems. Alcohol problems are highest among young adults ages 18-29 and lowest among adults ages 65 and older. Also, people who start drinking at an early age have a greater chance of developing alcohol problems at some point in their lives.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/conditions/alcohol-abuse

Ambulatory assessment represents a powerful research tool in lifespan psychology because it allows assessing the within-person variability of developmental processes as it occurs within context-specific influences of people’s natural environments. Following a discussion of historical origins, we review four current research themes in developmentally relevant ambulatory assessment studies that use electronic devices as assessment instruments: (a) affective-motivational development, (b) social contexts of development, (c) age-related challenges and everyday functioning, and (d) cognitive development. Overall, the reviewed research demonstrates that ambulatory assessment complements traditional developmental study designs and laboratory assessments in important ways. Acknowledging the strengths and limitations of ambulatory assessment approaches, we propose that ambulatory assessment will benefit lifespan psychologymost if it becomes an integral part of multimethod investigations of developmental phenomena that balance the external and internal validity of findings. Future research should strengthen the lifespan perspective in ambulatory assessment approaches, combine multiple indicators (subjective and objective) of successful development, and attend to the fact that individual development often interacts with significant others.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6X0G-4WDDXRK-2&_user=10&_coverDate=12/31/2009&_alid=1380486521&_rdoc=3&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_cdi=7214&_docanchor=&view=c&_ct=110963&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=c07b3ff2afd24d630ccf2b0dcfe9c222

Environmental psychology as a specialized discipline within psychology has lost much of its visibility as a unique area within psychology over the past decade. Some of this loss is bad; whereas much of it is surprisingly good–let me explain.

The bad part is that much of the initial impetus for environmental psychology came from the mutual desire of social scientists and designers, particularly architects, to work together to create buildings that would work better for people. Unfortunately that initial enthusiasm has since waned, at least within the United States.

The good part is that much of what environmental psychology brought to psychology has been fully adopted into mainstream psychology. There are many reflections of this. Submission rates for manuscripts to the three major journals in the field, Environment and Behavior, the Journal of Environmental Psychology, and the Journal of Architectural and Planning Research are all very high. Environmental psychology course offerings are at an all time high in North America with new editions of the two best selling textbooks (Bell Fisher Baum and Greene; Gifford) either just out or impending; two new texts have been published in the past year in the U.S. (Mc Andrew; Veitch & Arkelin), and Bonnes and Secchiaroli’s text has been published in Italy; and several additional texts are nearing completion.

The Cambridge series on environment and behavior and Gower’s Ethnoscape series are both selling very well and each series has several volumes in the pipeline. Furthermore, individual volumes continue to proliferate both in North America as well as in Europe. The Handbook of Environmental Psychology sold out its press run and has now been reissued by Krieger Publications. Both Environment and Behavior and Journal of Environmental Psychology have had strong sales of individual volumes or collected articles compiled into books.

North and South American (EDRA), European (IAPS), Japanese (MERA) and Australian/New Zealand (PAPER) organizations are devoted to the study of human behavior and the physical environment. Each manages a regular conference, publishes proceedings, either annually or bi-annually, and sponsors a newsletter. Both Sweden and Spain have national task forces that regularly meet. Estonia has recently sponsored an international conference and publication.

There has also been widespread incorporation of environmental psychology into other areas of psychology. The handbooks of both social and health psychology have chapters devoted to environmental topics; health psychology, the largest growing sector of psychology in North America, routinely incorporates measures of social and physical environmental characteristics. The new edition of the handbook of psychophysiology will contain a major chapter on the physical environment and physiology.

Cognitive sciences have incorporated cognitive mapping as a major research area into their field as witnessed by the proliferation of articles within cognitive journals on spatial memory, wayfinding, and computational models of environmental cognition. Indeed, amongst the earliest intellectual origins of environmental psychology was concern amongst perceptual psychologists about the ecological validity of traditional approaches to the study of perception.

Child psychology as well as life span development research continue to examine the role of both the immediate and background setting as they contribute to healthy development. Developmentalists also maintain a strong ecological perspective in their examination of the role of different childcare settings as well as aging in place options as they impact young and old individuals, respectively. Environmental education is a major subarea within educational curricula and practice.

In addition many leading applied and social psychology texts continue to have chapters devoted to environmental psychology. Several introductory books also include sections on applications of psychology with prominent coverage to environmental issues. Finally, the Journal of Social Issues, a major international journal devoted to psychology and public policy, has had recent special issues on environmental stress, residential mobility, environmental attitudes, human dimensions of global change, environmental hazards, and in 1966, published one of the seminal volumes outlining the field of environmental psychology.

http://www.ucm.es/info/Psyap/iaap/evans.htm

Ambulatory assessment represents a powerful research tool in lifespan psychology because it allows assessing the within-person variability of developmental processes as it occurs within context-specific influences of people’s natural environments. Following a discussion of historical origins, we review four current research themes in developmentally relevant ambulatory assessment studies that use electronic devices as assessment instruments: (a) affective-motivational development, (b) social contexts of development, (c) age-related challenges and everyday functioning, and (d) cognitive development. Overall, the reviewed research demonstrates that ambulatory assessment complements traditional developmental study designs and laboratory assessments in important ways. Acknowledging the strengths and limitations of ambulatory assessment approaches, we propose that ambulatory assessment will benefit lifespan psychologymost if it becomes an integral part of multimethod investigations of developmental phenomena that balance the external and internal validity of findings. Future research should strengthen the lifespan perspective in ambulatory assessment approaches, combine multiple indicators (subjective and objective) of successful development, and attend to the fact that individual development often interacts with significant others.

The case for a materialist foundation for psychology is described in which theoretical unification emerges as an on-going historical process, not as a state. Theoretical indeterminacy is overcome through appeal to evolutionary and historical contexts which allow evaluation of theories in terms of essentiality and relevance.

The problems of theoretical indeterminacy, disunity and fragmentation in psychology will not be solved by the revival of any form of positivism (e.g., Staats, 1986). It is well known that the Humean epistemology that defined positivism made it impossible to find a satisfactory solution to the problem of objectivity, and that, as a result, the ultimate goal of a unified science remained chimerical. Many psychologists saw that down the positivist epistemological road lay the dreaded end of solipsism (e.g., Wertheimer, 1972, p. 126). The only reasonable alternative between the Scylla of solipsism and the Charybdis of dogmatism seemed to be some form of metaphysical pluralism. Some of us settled, in short, -however uncomfortably- for the indeterminacy and fragmentation that mark what others now see as a crisis in our discipline.

Despite all the critiques of positivism, we seem to be no further ahead. The reason is that most critiques have not penetrated to the skeptical-subjectivist epistemology that is the root cause of its problems. As a result, the tendency has been to reject the scientistic appearances of positivism, while preserving its essential defect, which, from the point of view of objectivity, and therefore also of theoretical determinacy and unification, is the inability to specify an independently existing, nonarbitrary ground to serve as a basis for resolution of theoretical differences.

Philosophical materialism claims to avoid this defect. If, as materialism claims, such a ground exists and is knowable, then the foundation of a unified conception of science is possible. I can only hope to [p. 30] sketch out this possibility here.

http://www.comnet.ca/~pballan/TheorUnifPsyc%28Tolman1988%29.htm

Over the past 30 years there have been revolutionary changes in the organizational context. The globalization of industries has offered unique and unprecedented opportunities for creating wealth and organizational efficiency. Consider, for example, the fact that the revenue enjoyed by the Microsoft corporation is greater than the GDP of many European countries. Such macro-economic shifts and increasing focus on business conglomeration have brought about radical changes in work patterns. Many employees now telecommute to work from home, via a computer network and the internet (see Daniels, Lamond & Standen 2000). In tandem, work psychology has responded to this challenge and shifted focus from more physical and mechanistic skills, to those about the social context of work and the assessment of cognitive demands brought about by increased use of information technology

http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-81299944.html

Two newly published University of Arizona studies suggest that superficial relationships can not only result in feelings of detachment, but also contribute to certain health-related problems.

“There is an association between social networks and health but the precise mechanism is not understood,” said Stacey Passalacqua, who recently earned her UA doctorate in interpersonal and health communication with a minor in psychology.

Passalacqua and Chris Segrin, the UA communication department head and lead author on the papers, decided to study individual perceptions of stress and social support to understand ways loneliness may be linked to health.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100622091746.htm

I argue that the roots of an adequate integration of evolution into psychology are not to be found in evolutionary psychology, but rather in evolutionary developmental biology (evo–devo). To this end, I provide an overview of evo–devo and explore the limited role that behavioral sciences have played in its genesis. I then motivate an evo–devo approach to psychobiology, and sketch desiderata for the success of this enterprise. In particular, I elucidate what it means to take both development and evolution seriously, and argue for the primacy of developmental analysis in the exploration of (human) behavior and its evolution.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VD4-4PP1YN4-4&_user=10&_coverDate=12%2F31%2F2008&_rdoc=6&_fmt=high&_orig=browse&_srch=doc-info%28%23toc%235972%232008%23999739996%23697532%23FLA%23display%23Volume%29&_cdi=5972&_sort=d&_docanchor=&_ct=6&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=3b7ad0d502a5d7c02c1bb3037d7c7768

School psychologists work within the educational system to help children with emotional, social, and academic issues. The goal of school psychology is to collaborate with parents, teachers, and students to promote a healthy learning environment that focuses on the needs of children.

School psychology is still a relatively young profession. The National Association of School Psychology (NASP) was established and formally recognized as a doctoral specialty by the American Psychological Association (APA) in 1968. In 2002, U.S. News and World Report named school psychology one of the top ten “hot professions.” Many school psychologists in the field are retiring, creating a demand for qualified school psychologists.
ISSUES IN PSYCHOLOGY

APA Ethics Office
APA’s Ethics Office promotes ethics throughout the field of psychology. The Office supports the Ethics Committee in adjudicating ethics complaints, offers educational workshops and seminars, provides ethics consultations, and serves as a resource to members and the Association in addressing new ethical dilemmas as psychology grows and evolves as a discipline. If you are an APA member, the Ethics Office is here to serve you. Please let us know how we may best do so.

http://psychology.about.com/od/careersinpsychology/tp/psychology-career-trends.htm