Geoffrey W. Sutton PhD, Psychology and Culture

I’ve been thinking about hope this year. I wrote about hope in Living Well . And I‘ve studied hope based on Charles R. Snyder’s hope theory . I’m writing about hope because I am organizing some thoughts about hope as found in the four themes of advent: hope, peace, love, and joy. Although typically depicted by four candles around a Christ candle in a wreath, I think a diagram makes more sense, though clearly less picturesque. The Christmas story links hope to Mary's child, Jesus. When Jesus arrives, he comes with a message of love, which is linked to joy and peace.  Then, the paradox of hope occurs. When the hoped for person arrives, hope ends.  This is the paradox of hope. Hope disappears when it is fulfilled,  but love, joy, and peace are enduring qualities. Hope is powerful when Snyder’s identified twin components are present: (1) a goal, which is a focused desire that energizes our quest and (2) a pathway to reach that ...

I first learned about a Reverse Advent Calendar from English friends who were collecting items for a local charity. There are several helpful sites online, which offer ideas on how to create your own calendar. The idea is to help children approach Christmas with an attitude of giving rather than getting. Of course, the lesson is important for adults as well. Families can do something as simple as putting a pound or dollar (or more) in a container each day, which will be donated to a local food pantry or other community charity at the end of December. Another approach is to place food items or clothes in baskets for each day leading up to Christmas and donate them to a charity. Another suggestion is to organise four bags or baskets to hold items related to nativity themes as suggested by  https://buildfaith.org/reverse-advent/ . The themes focus on the newborn Jesus and his need for food, warmth, care for the parents and care for the newborn. These themes translate ...

On Remembrance Sunday, I shared a post about Queen Elizabeth II being the only living Commander in Chief who served in World War II. As a young woman she served in a way that women were welcomed in uniform in those days. What amazed me is the number of people who gave my post a like or "love" in a short period of time. At one point, the post got a positive click about every minute, which is much higher than my usual posts. Of course, the group was composed of people of British origin. Still, the question may be asked why is she so popular? And, is there anything leaders may learn from such high levels of public support? Oh, by the way, Queen Elizabeth II and her family are of great interest to many Americans as well so, it's not just the British. Princess Elizabeth WW II service The Queen's popularity ratings run above 80% in various surveys. That's high for a national leader. Most leaders won't be kings or queens or even presidents ...

Respect consists of the ways people treat their leaders and other group members. Core features of respect include social status and likeability ( See Psychology of Respect ). Honesty In a 2014 survey by Kouzes and Posner of over 100,000 people, honesty was the highest quality ( CEO ). Honest communication is often supported by facts that can be checked by others. Honesty promotes trust and credibility. One major lapse in integrity can dash a career. Apologies may help but for many, trust is gone forever. Politicians often get little respect because they fail to deliver on their promises. A CEO will be ousted when a promised result doesn’t happen. But politicians seem to get away with failed promises when they can blame the failure on a competitor, opposition party, or foreign power. Golden Rule Leaders gain or lose respect depending on how people perceive them as following the Golden Rule - Treat others as you would like to be treated. Respect is a relational ...

Much has been written about the power of forgiveness to help people reduce their current distress from hurts, which may have las ted for years. Studies have demonstrated that forgiveness has biological correlates related to stress. The hurts addressed by forgiveness have been called "social pain." Acetaminophen is a commonly used effective medication for physical pain. A new study by George Slavich and his colleagues looks at the interaction of forgiveness and acetaminophen on the reduction of social pain. Their article is an editor's choice selection in the current Annals of Behavioral Medicine ( December, 2019 ). Following is a quote from their article abstract. Results As hypothesized, acetaminophen reduced participants’ social pain levels over time but only for those exhibiting high levels of forgiveness (i.e., 18.5% reduction in social pain over 20 days). Conclusions These data are the first to show that forgiveness and acetaminophen have interactive eff...

In Christian texts, people may be possessed by demons. When possessed they act in ways that scare others and cause harm. The demons speak to other humans. And in response to Jesus Christ, or the apostles, the demons may be “cast out” of a person. In contemporary Christianity, the “casting out” has been known as deliverance or exorcism. Some groups believe that a place may be possessed by evil spirits thus, deliverance or exorcism may apply to both people and places. In general, protestant Christians use the term deliverance and Catholics use the term exorcism and follow a particular process (a rite) of exorcism. The term possessionists has been used to refer to people who believe in the phenomenon of people possessed by evil spirits even if they are not possessed ( Giordan & Possamai, 2016 ). About Devils and Demons A 2016 Gallup poll report indicated that 89% of Americans believe in God, but this is lowered by 10% if given the option that they are not s...

In  Living Well   chapter 7, I wrote about the importance of finding rest. Rest is more than sleep, but sleep is clearly a part of feeling well-rested and new research links sleep to brain processes important to thinking. According to the National Sleep Foundation , recommendations for sleep vary with age. For example, teens need 8-10 hours and older adults need 7-8 hours. But, not all sleep is quality sleep. A research summary in Scientific American  led me to the 11 October 2019 article in Science by Cirelli and Tononi. Here's a quote: Sleep is essential for the brain: Learning and memory benefit from sleep, whereas sleep loss causes cognitive impairment that can only be reversed by sleep (1, 2). The pressure for sleep increases with time spent awake, and sleep need also depends on the richness of the waking experience and the amount of learning (1, 3).  As Emily Willingham summarized in the Scientific American article, the link between sleep and brain f...