28th International Congress of Psychology August 8 ... - U-netSURF

functionalist mindsets? Ramadhar Singh, Department of Psychology, National University of
Singapore, Singapore
Recent literature on dispositional attribution argues that person is distinguishable from group in
America but not in Asia, and that such cultural differences arise from analytic thoughts in
Westerners but holistic ones in Easterners. Studies of persons and groups involved in norm
violations, in contrast, show that (a) norm-violator is distinguishable from meta-norm violators
everywhere, (b) dispositional attributions are equally senstitive to situations across the globe, and
(c) culture affects actions with meta-norm violators only. Accordingly, the so-called cultural
differences in thought systems seem to be better accounted for by the social functionalist mindsets
of intuitive prudent prosecutors, principled theologians, and pragmatic politicians.
4140 STATE-OF-THE-ART
Chair: Zhongming Wang, China
Design problem solving -- Possibilities of improvement, Winfried Hacker, Institut für Allgemeine
Psychologie, Biopsychologie und Methoden der Psychologie,
Technische Universität Dresden, Germany
Real-life design problem solving means the invention of artifacts, e. g. machines, buildings or
therapeutic reatments. Its crucial phases are the early ones, i. e. task analysis and the development
of frame conceptions. So far they are poorly assisted by recent computer programs. Therefore
psychological contributions are of high interest. Two theoretically based related approaches are
well-tried: The interaction of mental and visual thinking, especially the contributions of sketching;
and the controversial role of speaking in problem-solving, especially the contributions of question
answering in triggering reflection on the own design results.
4141 STATE-OF-THE-ART
Chair: Pierre Ritchie, Canada
The involvement of psychological processes in immuno-competence: Mind and health, Wenjuan
Lin, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China
Voices have argued that the evidence for direct links between the central nervous system (CNS)
and immune system is unconvincing and that even if such links exist, they do not necessarily
include psychological processes. However, others claim that there is overwhelming evidence for
communication each way between the CNS and immune system, and that the influence of
psychological processes on immune competence is established. Which of these views is correct?
This question would be answered by focusing on recent studies conducted in our laboratory. The
studies include conditioned immunity, effect of emotional stress, and psychological intervention in
cancer patients.
4142 STATE-OF-THE-ART
Chair: Nan Sui, China
Neural foundations of threat processing in anxious subjects, Wolfgang H. R. Miltner, Department
of Biological and Clinical Psychology, Institute of Psychology, Friedrich-Schiller-University,
1098