Clinical psychologist in primary care: controlled clinical and economic evaluation.

In a controlled, evaluated study of a behaviourally orientated clinical psychology service based in a health centre two randomised groups of patients were compared. Patients in the control group received usual primary care management; subject patients received the same, but in addition were able to consult a clinical psychologist in the health centre. Outcome was assessed by psychosocial and economic measures. These showed changes in favour of the subject condition, many of which were statistically significant.     

Pavlov as a psychologist. A reappraisal

American psychologists are informed on Pavlov's work on conditional reflexes but not on the full development of his theory of higher nervous activity. This article shows that Pavlov's theory of higher nervous activity dealt with concepts that concerned contemporary psychologists. Pavlov used the conditioning of the salivary reflex for methodological purposes. Pavlov's theory of higher nervous activity encompassed overt behavior, neural processes, and the conscious experience. The strong Darwinian element of Pavlov's theory, with its stress on the higher organisms' adaptation, is described. With regard to learning, Pavlov, at the end of his scholarly career, proposed that although all learning involves the formation of associations, the organism's adaptation to the environment is established through conditioning, but the accumulation of knowledge is established by trial and error.     

A physiologist's dialog with a psychologist

The famous polemics between I. P. Pavlov and K. S. Lashley in the pages of the "Psychological Review" in the thirties is discussed in this paper. The particular significance of this polemics for development of contemporary neuroscience is underlined, since the essentially novel concept of the brain activity mechanisms has been advanced and intelligence nature has been advanced on the basis of the synthesis of the two opposing theories, the localizationalism and equipotentialism.     

The clinical psychologist in a health centre: one year's work.

The Livingston integrated health services project is an attempt to provide a fully integrated area health service with special emphasis on developing multidisciplinary community health teams. As part of this experiment a clinical psychologist was appointed to work in general practice. Ninety-four patients with behavioural, emotional, and cognitive problems were referred in the first year (1% of the 10 000 patients registered at the practice). The psychologist thus provided treatment for some patients who would otherwise have been seen by a general practitioner with neither the time nor the training to deal adequately with their problems.     

Social cognition by food-caching corvids. The western scrub-jay as a natural psychologist

Food-caching corvids hide food, but such caches are susceptible to pilfering by other individuals. Consequently, the birds use several counter strategies to protect their caches from theft, e.g. hiding most of them out of sight. When observed by potential pilferers at the time of caching, experienced jays that have been thieves themselves, take further protective action. Once the potential pilferers have left, they move caches those birds have seen, re-hiding them in new places. Naive birds that had no thieving experience do not do so. By focusing on the counter strategies of the cacher when previously observed by a potential pilferer, these results raise the intriguing possibility that re-caching is based on a form of mental attribution, namely the simulation of another bird's viewpoint. Furthermore, the jays also keep track of the observer which was watching when they cached and take protective action accordingly, thus suggesting that they may also be aware of others' knowledge states.     

The clinical psychologist; his role in private medical practice

The independent diagnosis and treatment of mental and nervous disorders according to California law constitutes practicing medicine. By this yardstick, an increasing number of clinical psychologists are entering the private practice of medicine. The medical profession has not provided through its leadership the opportunity for clinical psychologists to utilize their skills in a legitimate and supervised way in the treatment of private patients, nor has the medical profession taken sufficient interest in modern methods of treating patients with psychogenic disorders. If the psychiatric team is a feasible and practical approach to spreading the base of psychiatric treatment in hospitals and clinics, it should be applicable to private practice settings too. In the team setting, the psychologist can render great assistance to the physician in the diagnosis and treatment of patients with psychogenic disorders without compromising the principle that the primary responsibility for the patient is the physician's. By virtue of his training and experience, it is the psychiatrist who is best qualified to supervise the work of the psychologist; and until such time as the medical profession is better acquainted with psychotherapeutic techniques, the employment of psychologist assistants should be (according to good medical practice) left to the psychiatrist. The need for some regulation of the use of the title "psychologist" is increasing in order to protect the public from quacks who pose as psychologists. However, any law which is directed toward elimination of the quack should specifically define psychotherapy and contain provisions for its use under adequate medical supervision. The medical profession is obligated to take its traditional role in providing the best possible treatment for patients who are in need of it, and psychotherapy is an inherent part of treatment.