Emotions' impact on viewing behavior under natural conditions.

Human overt attention under natural conditions is guided by stimulus features as well as by higher cognitive components, such as task and emotional context. In contrast to the considerable progress regarding the former, insight into the interaction of emotions and attention is limited. Here we investigate the influence of the current emotional context on viewing behavior under natural conditions.In two eye-tracking studies participants freely viewed complex scenes embedded in sequences of emotion-laden images. The latter primes constituted specific emotional contexts for neutral target images.Viewing behavior toward target images embedded into sets of primes was affected by the current emotional context, revealing the intensity of the emotional context as a significant moderator. The primes themselves were not scanned in different ways when presented within a block (Study 1), but when presented individually, negative primes were more actively scanned than positive primes (Study 2). These divergent results suggest an interaction between emotional priming and further context factors. Additionally, in most cases primes were scanned more actively than target images. Interestingly, the mere presence of emotion-laden stimuli in a set of images of different categories slowed down viewing activity overall, but the known effect of image category was not affected. Finally, viewing behavior remained largely constant on single images as well as across the targets' post-prime positions (Study 2).We conclude that the emotional context significantly influences the exploration of complex scenes and the emotional context has to be considered in predictions of eye-movement patterns.

The renewal of humanism in European psychotherapy: developments and applications.

In Europe, humanistic psychotherapy is becoming increasingly widespread. Not only are the explicitly "humanistic" psychotherapies being robustly used, they are increasingly being integrated into approaches not traditionally viewed as humanistic. One can therefore observe a progression in the personalization of methodology within European modes of practice. In the past several decades, humanistic psychology has inspired the expanding use of existential-phenomenological modes of practice. This theoretical base, coupled with recent trends in person-centered systems theory, points toward an invigorating future for humanistic forms of practice in Europe, despite the political trends toward psychotherapeutic practice in Germany.

A European perspective on the position papers.

Our comments begin with a short review of some of the differences in narratives concerning the history and the origin of humanistic psychology (HP) between the United States-portrayed in several of the position papers-and Europe. Second, we discuss the effectiveness and conceptual understanding of HP and its implication for training. Third, we make reference to humanistic therapeutic goals and the humanistic background of multicultural modalities. Our proposition is that the term "humanism," as it is used in some of the articles, needs significant clarification for it to be a viable working concept within this modality and other modes of practice. Finally, although appreciating the focus given to common aspects in both "contextual cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT)" and HP, we claim that some methodological stances, which might be seen as leading to a "dead end" from the perspective of cognitive-behavioral therapy research, are essential for HP and, moreover, connect HP to the modern interdisciplinary discourses of systems science.