Synchronicity and psychotherapy: Unconscious communication in the psychotherapeutic relationship.

Psychotherapy ◽  
1998 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 13-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen Marlo ◽  
Jeffrey S. Kline
2007 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 391-410 ◽  
Author(s):  
Justine Cassell ◽  
Andrea Tartaro

What is the hallmark of success in human–agent interaction? In animation and robotics, many have concentrated on the looks of the agent — whether the appearance is realistic or lifelike. We present an alternative benchmark that lies in the dyad and not the agent alone: Does the agent’s behavior evoke intersubjectivity from the user? That is, in both conscious and unconscious communication, do users react to behaviorally realistic agents in the same way they react to other humans? Do users appear to attribute similar thoughts and actions? We discuss why we distinguish between appearance and behavior, why we use the benchmark of intersubjectivity, our methodology for applying this benchmark to embodied conversational agents (ECAs), and why we believe this benchmark should be applied to human–robot interaction.


2018 ◽  
pp. 422-428
Author(s):  
S. Nassir Ghaemi

Until the 1960s, physicians in the United States could legally prescribe “placebo” on a prescription pad and handed to a patient. It was not unethical to do so. Placebo had long been known to be an effective treatment for various medical conditions. For millennia, physicians new that many of their treatments were ineffective and that many conditions could not be treated. Instead of giving treatments that have some pharmacological properties, which meant they would have some side effects and be harmful in some way, it was viewed as more ethical to give an inert pill, a placebo, which would cause no direct pharmacological harm. The view was that the patient might get some psychological benefit from the apparent treatment. The placebo response involves two major aspects: natural history and psychological expectation. Too much attention is given to the latter and not enough to the former. Clinicians see patients improve, as in acute depressive episodes, due to natural history, but they attribute such benefit to the drugs they use, or their psychotherapeutic relationship. Often Nature deserves the credit, and clinicians need to pay more attention to the natural course of psychiatric illnesses.


2019 ◽  
Vol 39 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 182-183
Author(s):  
Melvin Bornstein

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