Abstract
The articles in this issue include experimental research and clinical studies on the bidirectional process of connecting experience and words, which we term the Referential Process (RP). These concluding notes focus on new questions and new directions for research. Studies now under way include characterization and measurement of the Arousal function of the referential process, which involves how people talk when the connection to specific ideas is not yet fully developed, and new research on paralinguistic features of interpersonal communication. Further work in these areas will involve automatic transcription technology to incorporate pitch, rate of speech and loudness, as well as development of a Time-DAAP program to enable such assessment. Research is also needed to investigate the relationship between language and underlying physiological and neurological mechanisms. These relationships can be examined using physiological measures such as galvanic skin response (GSR) and changes in heart rate and respiration. While fMRI scans are not compatible with tasks requiring speech production, fMRI compatible tablet systems are available for writing tasks. Participants may also be scanned while reading literary passages that show differences in RP functions. A major goal of our research program is the application of RP measures in large scale treatment efficacy and effectiveness studies evaluating particular treatment forms. The computerized referential process procedures have the potential to study whole trajectories of large numbers of treatments; and also to identify important turning points within treatments and within sessions. The interpretation of these measures in the context of a systematic theory of treatment process has the value of enabling results that are not only statistically powerful but clinically significant as well. Other potential areas of study include application of the language measures in large scale studies of political, religious and literary discourse.
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Notes
The project was presented by Tocatly as a Masters level project in the Clinical Psychology Doctoral Program at the City College of New York.
Additional data related to the language measures applied to protocols of experimental tasks has been developed by Murphy. See www.thereferentialprocess.org for findings related to these studies.
The seminar carried out at the New York Psychoanalytic Society and Institute involves application of computerized measures and discussion by clinicians of a treatment presented by the treating therapist. The measures sometimes open new perspectives for the therapist and participating clinicians; the clinical discussion points to interactions that are not captured by the measures and enables their further development.
References
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Bucci, W., Maskit, B. Concluding Notes and Future Directions. J Psycholinguist Res 50, 231–237 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10936-020-09741-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10936-020-09741-4