Lars-Gunnar Lundh

This paper contains an analysis of the concept of nondirectivity, a discussion of some arguments against the possibility of being nondirective, and a concluding argument that nondirectivity/directivity represents a basic dimension of therapeutic relating. First, it is argued that nondirectivity should be seen as an attitude rather than a set of behaviors, and that therapeutic interventions can be either directive or nondirective. Second, three arguments against the possibility of being nondirective are discussed: the impossibility of not influencing clients, the unavoidability of biases, and clients perceiving directivity in the therapist. The suggestion is made that nondirectivity always exists in a context of directive influences, and that optimal nondirectivity requires awareness of these. Finally, it is argued that the stance of nondirectivity is more or less important to various therapists’ work, and that nondirectivity/directivity may represent a basic dimension in a potential integrative theory of psychotherapy.

In the present paper, it is argued that suggestive forms of influence are ubiquitous in human interaction, and represent a neglected phenomenon in clinical psychology and psychotherapy. This phenomenon, which is referred to as `normal suggestion', is analysed as an interpersonal priming process, whereby one person (the `suggestor') influences another (the `suggestant') to respond, feel, or think in a way that is congruent with the suggestor's feelings, intentions, beliefs, or desires. Suggestion may be intentional or unintentional on the part of the suggestor, but it always relies on automatic information processes in the suggestant. The paper discusses the psychological processes which take place in the suggestant, and in the suggestor. A theoretical framework is sketched where each social situation (including each psychotherapeutic treatment) is assumed to be characterized by a certain `suggestive climate', as a function of the frequency with which various ideas, intentions, feelings, etc, are primed. It is also assumed that each person has a certain `suggestibility profile' as a function of his or her cognitive-affective meaning structures. Finally, it is argued that it is impossible to engage in suggestion-free psychotherapy, and that the recognition of this basic fact may improve psychotherapeutic practice and minimize the potentially damaging influence of suggestion in psychotherapy.

The present paper reviews empirical research on placebo effects, and presents a cognitive-emotional model of the psychological mechanisms involved. It is argued that illness often involves psychological aspects; people not only sense their signs of physical illness, but also interpret these signs, and respond emotionally to their interpretations. Cognitions of danger (e.g. fear of dying) produce anxiety, whereas cognitions of loss (e.g. loss of one's health) produce sadness or depression. It is argued that an important part of the placebo effect is due to the development of placebo beliefs (beliefs of the form "This treatment is going to cure me"), which may counteract the kind of cognitions that produce anxiety and depression; placebo beliefs produce emotional responses (hope, calm, etc.), which are antagonistic to depression and anxiety. Further, if anxiety and depression tend to affect a person's physical health negatively, placebo beliefs may be expected to have a positive influence on physical health. Placebo effects may occur not only with pure placebos (e.g. sugar pills), but with all kinds of medical and psychological treatments; even treatments that contain active ingredients of a non-placebo nature may involve important placebo components. Placebo effects may vary in strength, depending on the therapist's behaviour (verbal information to the patient, enthusiasm, optimism, interest, etc.), and on the patient's idiosyncratic meaning structures (which invest various kinds of treatment with different placebo value).

Most present-day research on mindfulness treats mindfulness as a variable that is studied in relation to other variables. Although this research may provide us with important knowledge at the population level and mechanism level, it contributes little to our understanding of the phenomenon of mindfulness as it is experienced and enacted at the person level. The present paper takes a person-oriented phenomenological perspective on mindfulness, comparing this perspective with that of von Fircks’ (2023). In a first part of the paper, mindfulness is discussed as a phenomenological practice that can be studied by means of experimental phenomenology. It is argued that there is room for the development of an immense variety of personalized mindfulness practices that may serve people’s health and well-being. The second part of the paper contains a brief discussion of the possible role of mindful observation and reflection in psychological research. It is argued that mindfulness skills may be important both for improving the quality of phenomenological observation and to facilitate creative thinking in connection with the development of psychological theory. A main implication is that an integration between mindfulness and phenomenology may serve as an important part of this process.

The phenomenology of embodied others is a relatively unexplored research area, which is relevant to the ethics of both personal and professional relationships. Although the experience of embodiment is a central theme in phenomenological philosophy, previous work in this area has been mostly focused on the experience of the embodied self. The purpose of the present chapter is to widen the embodiment perspective to the experience of embodied others, to embodied relationality, and to the bioethics of relating to patients seen as embodied others.

The introduction of the concept of mentalization in psychological science by Fonagy and colleagues has opened up new perspectives for the understanding of psychopathology, psychotherapy, and child development. The present study reviews the theory of mentalization, with a focus on its 4 dimensions (cognitive/ affective, implicit/explicit, self/other, and external/internal), and some unclear points and unresolved issues are identified. Mentalization theory is then contrasted with the theory of primary intersubjectivity, which is often seen as an incompatible approach to the development of social understanding. It is argued that this theory, at least in 1 of its interpretations, is not only compatible with mentalization theory, but may also possibly contribute to the resolution of some problems in mentalization theory. More specifically, it is argued that mentalization originally develops in the context of primary intersubjectivity, and that primary intersubjectivity is a basic prerequisite for the development of mentalization; but also that there is a considerable overlap between the concepts of primary intersubjectivity and those of implicit and externally focused mentalization.

The difficulties of demonstrating that any specific form of psychotherapy is more effective than any other has led to the formulation of the so-called Dodo Bird Verdict (that all forms of therapy are equally effective) and to the suggestion that what really matters for therapeutic efficiency are factors that are common to different forms of therapy. The term “common factors”, however, is seldom defined in an unambiguous way. In this paper, two different models of “common factors” are differentiated, and their implications are compared. The first model is referred to as the Relational-Procedural Persuasion (RPP) model and is primarily based on the writings of Frank and Wampold; according to this model effective psychotherapy requires a good therapeutic relationship, a specified therapeutic procedure, and a rhetorically skilful psychotherapist who persuades the client of a new explanation that provides new perspectives and meanings in life. The contents of these procedures and perspectives, however, are less important – according to this model, the treatment procedures are beneficial to the client because of the meaning attributed to these procedures rather than because of the specific nature of the procedures. The other model, the Methodological Principles and Skills (MPS) model, is based on the assumption that effective psychotherapy relies on common methodological principles that are instantiated in various ways in different forms of psychotherapy, and on the therapist’s capacity of applying these principles in a skillful way. According to this model, method matters, and it is possible to improve existing methods. Whereas the MPS model carries a hope for the improvement of psychotherapy, the RPP model implies a more pessimistic view of psychotherapy as forever bound by the limits of the Dodo Bird Verdict. It is concluded that psychotherapy research may benefit from using the MPS model as a working hypothesis, but that a comprehensive model of common factors in psychotherapy also needs to integrate important insights from the RPP model, as well as an understanding of the structural characteristics that psychotherapy shares with other kinds of social interaction.

This paper argues for a distinction between meaning structure and mental representation, and presents the outlines of a theoretical model of their interrelationship. Meaning structures are defined as structures in the human mind/brain which develop as the combined result of genetic predispositions and individual experience, and lead to relatively stable patterns of perceiving, thinking, feeling, behaving, etc. Mental representation is defined as the aspect of mental processes which involves imagining and thinking of things that are not perceptually present. It is suggested that the mind includes a central network of meaning structures (CNMS) for the storage of information, and a number of other subsystems (e.g.. perceptual systems, behavioral systems, and a verbal system) for the processing of externally and internally generated information. Against the dualcoding theory, it is argued that there is one code for the long-term storage of information, but several codes for the processing of information. Mental representations are seen as products of activation that is spread from the CNMS to more peripheral systems. The spread of activation from the CNMS to perceptual systems results in mental imagery; when activation spreads to the verbal system the result is conceptual thinking; and when activation spreads to behavioral systems it produces intentions. It is argued that this conceptual model can help to solve some basic theoretical problems that have plagued cognitive psychology.

In The Four Realms of Existence: A New Theory of Being Human, Joseph LeDoux (2023) argues for a conceptualization of being human in terms of four hierarchically integrated realms of existence: biological, neurobiological, cognitive, and conscious. Although LeDoux’s perspective is thought-provoking, it also raises several questions. One question is how to differentiate the conscious realm from the cogni-tive realm. Another question is where feelings and non-verbal expressions fit into LeDoux’s picture. An overarching question is also: why four realms of existence?

This book is an introduction to the Free Energy Principle (FEP) and Active Inference. The FEP has been described as new paradigm with potential to unify the biological and cognitive sciences. According to the FEP, living organisms persist by minimizing their free energy (which can be variously translated as uncertainty, surprise, prediction error, or discrepancies between model and world). Active Inference means that we can resolve uncertainty (or discrepancies between model and world) in basically two ways: by perception (i.e., changing our mind to fit the world) and by action (i.e., changing the world to make it fit our preferences and beliefs). The FEP and Active Inference represent a conceptual framework that may have potential to contribute to a unification of psychological science.

In this book, Anil Seth advocates a predictive processing approach to the understanding of conscious experience, which he claims would amount to something like a Copernican revolution. In three separate parts of the book, Seth discusses conscious level, conscious content, and conscious self. Among the strengths of the book is an ambition to stay close to the rich phenomenology of conscious experiences. The phenomenological openness, however, is counteracted by an ambition to reduce all aspects of consciousness to predictive processing.

The terms “relation” and “technique” are frequently used in discussions of what is effective in psychotherapy, but often as referring to two conceptually separate categories. The present paper questions this dichotomy between “relationship” and “technique”. This is done on the basis of a theoretical analysis of these concepts and the variety of phenomena they refer to. Basically, it is argued for a differentiation between two subcategories of techniques: (a) relational techniques, which the therapist uses in the interaction with the patient, and which are central to psychodynamic approaches, and (b) self-techniques, which the therapist teaches the patient to use (or applies to him/herself), and which are central to cognitive-behavioral approaches to therapy. In addition, it is argued that the therapeutic relationship involves a number of non-technical aspects that also need to be systematically addressed. In this perspective, technique and relationship are partly overlapping categories. Techniques are defined as sociocultural procedures that appear in books, manuals or other practically transferable knowledge, and are made available to individuals through various kinds of training, education, and apprenticeship. At the psychological level the learning of self-techniques and relational techniques involves the acquisition of skills and attitudes, and results in personal knowledge. From an integrative perspective, it is of interest not only to explore the variety of techniques that exist in the psychotherapy field, but also to subject these to a thematic analysis for the purpose of identifying the more or less general methodological principles and skills that are involved.

Common conclusions from traditional psychotherapy research are that we still do not know how or why even our most well studied interventions produce change, and that there is little evidence that any form of psychotherapy is generally more effective than any other. This has led some researchers to the so called Dodo Bird Verdict, that all forms of psycho- therapy are equally effective, and to the conclusion that what is at work are “common factors” that have little to do with treatment method. An alternative explanation, however, is that the traditional research paradigm is insufficiently sensitive to provide us with the required kind of knowledge. First, the outcome in typical RCTs is averaged across individuals, and at best complemented by a search for predictors in the form of stable individual differences. This means that this research stays at a group level of analysis and is insensitive to variation and change in individual patients. Second, the independent variable in RCTs does not consist in any well controlled psychological intervention, but in large scale treatment packages that contain a large number of interventions over a considerable time period. In other words, this research is insensitive to the effects of specific treatment interventions. Third, traditional psychotherapy research is insensitive to the therapist and patient as in di- vidual persons, and their specific interaction. It is argued that a person-oriented approach to psychotherapy, which is idio- graphic, holistic and interactional, may be able to overcome some of these problems by being more sensitive to (1) the treatment course of individual patients, and patterns during that course; (2) the effects of the specific interventions that are implemented over time, and (3) the personal characteristics of patient and therapist, and nuances of their interaction.

The purpose of the present chapter is to discuss whether psychological science today is in a state of crisis, and if so how that crisis is to be characterized. Three aspects of a possible crisis are discussed: a replicability crisis, a normativity crisis, and a validity crisis. It is argued that the present crisis goes deeper than being merely a replicability crisis. There are also signs of a normativity crisis, due to a social incentive system that is not conducive to scientific progress, and a validity crisis due to a variable-oriented approach that is not suitable to the scientific problems that need to be solved. Whereas the normativity crisis requires changes in the social incentive system operating in the scientific community, the validity crisis requires a change of paradigm from a variable-oriented to a more person-oriented approach. These questions are illustrated with examples from the field of psychotherapy research.

Background: Several researchers have argued that disturbances in embodiment play an important role in the development of psychological health problems among adolescents. The purpose of the present study was to use the 12-item Embodiment Scale (ES-12), with its three subscales Harmonious Body (HB), Disharmonious Body (DB), and Body for Others (BO), (1) to identify subgroups of adolescents with different profiles on the ES-12 scales, and (2) to see how these profiles are associated with patterns of psychological health problems. Methods: The participants were 530 adolescents with a mean age of 14 years (SD = 0.89), who filled out the ES-12 and measures of disordered eating, non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI), anxiety, and depression. Hierarchical cluster analysis was used to divide the sample into (1) subgroups with different profiles of HB, DB and BO and (2) subgroups with different psychological health profiles. Cross-tabulation was used to study associations between different embodiment profiles and different patterns of psychological health problems. Results: Five different profiles of embodiment were identified: Strong Embodiment, Average Embodiment, Weak Embodiment, Body for Others, and Low Body Harmony. Five different psychological health profiles were identified: Multiple Problems, Multiple Problems without NSSI, Disordered Eating Only, Average Psychological Health, and a Healthy profile. Cross-tabulation showed that individuals with a Strong Embodiment profile were over-represented among adolescents in the Healthy cluster, and that individuals with the Weak Embodiment profile were over-represented in both Multiple Problems clusters. Individuals with a Body for Others profile were over-represented among adolescents with a Disordered Eating Only profile but not among adolescents with Multiple Problems profiles. Conclusions: These findings align with theoretical frameworks which emphasize the importance of embodiment for the understanding of psychological health problems. At the same time, the results go against theories that attribute a central role to high levels of experienced Body for Others for the development of psychological health problems.

Background: Adolescence is characterized by large bodily changes and a heightened body-focus. It is also a sensitive period for the onset of various forms of psychopathology. Previous longitudinal studies have shown that body dissatisfaction is a predictor of disordered eating, non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI), and depression among adolescents. Body dissatisfaction, however, only represents one aspect of bodily self-experience. Another aspect is embodiment, defined as the anchoring of one’s identity in bodily self-experience. Research in this area, however, has been hampered by the lack of a psychometrically sound measure of embodiment that can be administered to adolescents. The purpose of the present study was to develop a brief measure of embodiment suitable for young adolescents. Methods: A 12-item Embodiment Scale (ES-12) was developed and underwent confirmatory factor analysis and tests of internal consistency, test-retest reliability, measure invariance, subscale inter-correlations, and construct validity. Incremental validity was analyzed to see if the ES-12 could predict disordered eating, non-suicidal self-injury, depression, and anxiety, above and beyond that of a measure of body dissatisfaction. Results: The ES-12 was found to exhibit robust psychometric properties, such as a distinct three-factor structure, strong internal consistency, and good test-retest reliability. It demonstrated good convergent and divergent validity, indicating that its three subscales—Harmonious Body, Disharmonious Body, and Body for Others—are significantly associated with a range of psychological health issues in adolescents. In addition, the ES-12 demonstrated consistent incremental validity by predicting disordered eating, NSSI, depression, and anxiety, beyond that of a measure of body dissatisfaction. Conclusions: The results suggest that ES-12 is a useful instrument in research on the experience of embodiment among adolescents.

As individual persons, we are all embodied in the sense that we have a body with certain needs, sensory systems, feelings, and capacities. Humans and some other animals also have an experience of embodiment, defined as an experience of “my body”. This is a combined experience of having a body (the body as an object that can be perceived, imagined, thought about, and evaluated according to different standards) and being this body (the subjective experience of the felt body). The latter is not about the body as an object but is focused on how the body feels. The main claims of the present paper are (1) that we have a need to feel embodied, and that this is important for the development of self-identity, interpersonal relations, well-being, and flourishing in general; and (2) that experiences of feeling embodied can serve as important motives, both in a positive sense (embodiment motivation) and a negative sense (disembodiment motivation). In the present paper, felt embodiment motivation is illustrated by the motivation to feel one’s body (1) in its vitality and capacities, both in rest and in movement (e.g., physical activity and dancing), and in its expressiveness; (2) as being an integrated part of wholesome environments, and (3) in pleasurable and loving bodily contact with significant others. Disembodiment motivation is defined as the motive to avoid or reduce bodily self-experiences, for example due to physical or emotional pain or other forms of bodily discomfort. In brief, the present paper outlines a new area of research: embodiment motivation, defined as the motivation to feel one’s own body, its vitality, capacities, and expressiveness, its embeddedness in wholesome environments, and the embodied contact with others, and its opposite: disembodiment motivation.

The purpose of the present paper is to describe and discuss the concept of _hunter mode_, as introduced by Meidell (2022) in her autobiographical description of anorexia nervosa. Hunter mode is a sought-after state that is reached through self-starvation and that transforms a person's experiences into a crystal-clear perception and a sense of vitality. Although partly touched upon already by Hilde Bruch in the _Golden Cage_ (1978), she merely described this state as an _effect_ of prolonged starvation and not a mode _actively sought_. Hunter mode is illuminated by relating it to the writings of phenomenological philosophers and theoretical clinicians such as Merleau-Ponty, Winnicott, Legrand, and Fuchs, among whom the body ecstatic plays an important part in shaping human psychology. The purpose of these analyses is to make a core symptom of anorexia nervosa, self-starvation, more comprehensible when explored at the person level. We suggest that a failure to address these aspects of starvation, uncomfortable as they may be, could impede the understanding of important dynamics underlying anorexia and which may be important to find less destructive ways to engage the body. Our suggestion is that hunter mode could be a key to unlock one of the enigmas of anorexia nervosa—why starvation becomes so desirable and difficult to stop adhering to—and a phenomenon that could be addressed clinically.

abstract: The purpose of the present paper is to describe and discuss the concept of hunter mode, as introduced by Meidell (2022) in her autobiographical description of anorexia nervosa. Hunter mode is a sought-after state that is reached through self-starvation and that transforms a person's experiences into a crystal-clear perception and a sense of vitality. Although partly touched upon already by Hilde Bruch in the Golden Cage (1978), she merely described this state as an effect of prolonged starvation and not a mode actively sought. Hunter mode is illuminated by relating it to the writings of phenomenological philosophers and theoretical clinicians such as Merleau-Ponty, Winnicott, Legrand, and Fuchs, among whom the body ecstatic plays an important part in shaping human psychology. The purpose of these analyses is to make a core symptom of anorexia nervosa, self-starvation, more comprehensible when explored at the person level. We suggest that a failure to address these aspects of starvation, uncomfortable as they may be, could impede the understanding of important dynamics underlying anorexia and which may be important to find less destructive ways to engage the body. Our suggestion is that hunter mode could be a key to unlock one of the enigmas of anorexia nervosa—why starvation becomes so desirable and difficult to stop adhering to—and a phenomenon that could be addressed clinically.

The purpose of the present paper is to describe and discuss the concept of hunter mode, as introduced by Meidell (2022) in her autobiographical description of anorexia nervosa. Hunter mode is a sought-after state that is reached through self-starvation and that transforms a person’s experiences into a crystal-clear perception and a sense of vitality. Although partly touched upon already by Hilde Bruch in the Golden Cage (1978), she merely described this state as an effect of prolonged starvation and not a mode actively sought. Hunter mode is illuminated by relating it to the writings of phenomenological philosophers and theoretical clinicians such as Merleau-Ponty, Winnicott, Legrand, and Fuchs, among whom the body ecstatic plays an important part in shaping human psychology. The purpose of these analyses is to make a core symptom of anorexia nervosa, self-starvation, more comprehensible when explored at the person level. We suggest that a failure to address these aspects of starvation, uncomfortable as they may be, could impede the understanding of important dynamics underlying anorexia and which may be important to find less destructive ways to engage the body. Our suggestion is that hunter mode could be a key to unlock one of the enigmas of anorexia nervosa—why starvation becomes so desirable and difficult to stop adhering to—and a phenomenon that could be addressed clinically.

The present paper outlines the nature of a three-dimensional ontology and the place of psychological science within this ontology, in a way that is partly similar to and partly different from that of Pérez-Álvarez. The first dimension is the material realities, and involves different levels (physical, chemical, biological, psychological, etc.), where each level builds on a lower level but also involves the development of new emergent properties, in accordance with Bunge’s emergent materialism. Each level involves systems, with components, structures and mechanisms, and an environment. This dimension can be studied with natural scientific methods. The second dimension is the subjective-experiential realities, and refers to our subjective perspective on the world. In accordance with Husserl’s phenomenology, it is argued that this subjectivity does not exist in the world (i.e., should not be reified as an object among other objects), but represents a perspective on the world that we enter in our capacity as conscious human beings. Essential characteristics of this subjectivity (such as intentionality, temporality, embodiment, and intersubjectivity) can be explored by phenomenological methods. The third dimension is the social-constructional realities, and includes social institutions, norms, categories, theories, and techniques. It is argued that psychological science spans over all three dimensions. Although almost all psychological research by necessity starts from a problem formulation where the subjective-experiential dimension plays an essential role (either explicitly or implicitly), most of present-day psychological research clearly emphasizes the material dimension. It is argued that a mature psychological science needs to integrate all three dimensions.

Antonio Damasio is known for his research on consciousness from a neurological and evolutionary perspective. His latest book, Feeling and Knowing: Making Minds Conscious, starts by focusing on the development, around 3.8 billion years ago, of living organisms with homeostatic processes that involve a “non-explicit” form of intelligence in the service of self-preservation. Here we find sensing, but still no feelings nor mental processes; yet these early forms of sensing are seen as a necessary basis for the development of feelings and consciousness. With the development of organisms with nervous systems, starting around 500 million years ago, feelings and “minding” (in the form of images of the surrounding environment) enter the scene. Feelings are seen to have their origin in the nerve cells’ close interaction with the biochemical processes that occur in the homeostatic regulation of the body. In this interaction between nervous systems and the bodily interior, feelings emerge as subjective experiences of homeostatic bodily processes. Consciousness is described by Damasio as involving an experience of ownership of one’s body, feelings, perspectives, etc. Because consciousness represents a further developmental stage on top of feelings, it cannot be based solely on the nervous system. Although Damasio sees the nervous system as a critical contributor to the development of minds and consciousness, he emphasizes that any theory that relies exclusively on the nervous system to account for minds and consciousness is likely to fail. Damasio’s book contains many innovative parts, that may stimulate new thinking and new research on these matters. It also illustrates how discussions about the nature of sentience, feeling and consciousness all too often suffer from an insufficient differentiation between distinct kinds of phenomena, and the need for an improved conceptual apparatus for a more nuanced description of the phenomena involved.

In a previous paper (Lundh, 2023), it was argued that psychological science can be seen as having three main branches, corresponding to three levels of research: research at the person level, at the population level, and at the mechanism level. The purpose of the present paper is to discuss the critique that has been raised against this model by Lamiell (2024) and Nilsson (2024) and to elaborate and specify the three-branch model in more detail. This is done by an incorporation of Nilsson’s concept of person-sensitivity into the model, and by a clearer differentiation between the two contrasts involved: (1) the methodological focus either on individual persons or on populations of individuals; and (2) the theoretical focus either on whole-person functioning or on sub-personal mechanisms.

There are different ways of dividing psychology into subdisciplines. The purpose of the present paper is to explore one specific meta-perspective on psychological science, seen as having three main branches: person psychology, population psychology, and mechanism psychology, linked to three different levels of research. Person-level research focuses on psychological phenomena as experienced and enacted by individual persons in their interaction with other persons and other parts of the environment, and in their development over time. Population-level research focuses on populations of individuals, frequencies of various psychological phenomena in a population, risk factors, and population-level effects of various psychological interventions. Mechanism-level research focuses on psychological func-tioning as explained in terms of neurophysiological mechanisms and information processes at a sub-personal level. It is argued that the failure to differentiate clearly between research questions at these three levels lead to questionable research practices. Most notably, a failure to differentiate clearly between the population level and the person level leads to problem-method mismatches in the form of re-searchers trying to answer questions about persons by research on populations. Also, because of a failure to differentiate between the person level and the mechanism level, explanations in terms of sub-personal mechanisms are too often seen as providing answers about what occurs at the person level, thereby failing to study persons as intentional agents in interaction with other persons and other parts of the environment. It is argued that a clear differentiation between three levels of psychological science – population, person, and mechanism – may contribute to an increased clarity in these matters and may thereby contribute to the development and maturation of psychological science.

The present paper argues that experimental phenomenology has an important role to play in research on mindfulness. Experimental phenomenology is defined as a subcategory of phenomenology (defined as the science of our subjective experience of being in the world), which explores the effects of intentional variations of subjective experiencing (direction of attention and choice of attitude) on subsequent experience. To count as experimental phenomenology, both the independent and dependent variable have to be phenomenological. Because mindfulness involves paying attention to present experience with a specific attitude, it is well suited for experimental-phenomenological research. What makes experimental phenomenology into a scientific endeavor is the intersubjective nature of this kind of study: potential effects described by one person can be subjected to replication both by the same person, and by other persons. Also, conclusions drawn on the basis of this kind of study are hypothetical and provisional, and may be modified or specified on the basis of further study. In this paper, the principles of experimental phenomenology are illustrated by (a) variations of a given mindfulness practice (the body scan), and (b) the construction of a personalized mindfulness practice (mindful driving). Finally, three varieties of experimental phenomenology in research on mindfulness are discussed: (1) the use of qualitative methods to analyze mindfulness practices and their potential effects, (2) idiographic research with the use of single-subject designs and experience sampling, and (3) randomized controlled studies of the effects of mindfulness practices on present experience.

The experience of embodiment is a central theme in phenomenological philosophy and has recently received increasing attention also within psychological science. In the present paper we argue (1) that the experience of embodiment represents a fundamental synthesis of having a body (the body as an object) and being a body (the body as felt “from within”); (2) that this synthesis is basic to an individual’s experience of self-identity; (3) that each individual, as an existential task, has to develop their specific version of the embodiment synthesis; (4) that these syntheses can be more or less harmonious or disharmonious, and that disharmonious syntheses are associated with psychological distress and psychopathology. Different phenomenological accounts of possible variants of disharmonious embodiment, as found in the literature on eating disorders, are discussed and compared. Finally, some research implications and clinical implications are discussed.

Cognitive bias (Stroop interference and implicit memory bias) for masked and unmasked threat words (illness words and negative emotion words) was investigated for its associations with emotion (anxiety, anger/aggression, and positive affect) and somatic complaints in a randomly selected community sample of 138 individuals. Because measures of cognitive bias are inherently bipolar, the data were tested for both linear and curvilinear trends. Cross-sectional analysis showed that the associations between somatic anxiety and Stroop interference for unmasked threat words were better described in terms of curvilinear than linear models, and that degree of somatic complaints was associated with Stroop facilitation for masked threat words. Longitudinal analysis showed that Stroop interference for masked threat words predicted lack of positive affect during an ensuing eight weeks daily recording period. Implicit memory bias was found to be negatively associated with measures of anger/aggression,both in the cross-sectionaland longitudinal analyses. We suggest that: (a) cognitive bias should be treated as a bipolar construct in future research; (b) the phenomenon of Stroop facilitation for threat words deserves further exploration; and (c) more research should address the question about the relationship between cognitive bias and other emotions than anxiety (e.g., positive affect and anger).