vol. 1 núm. 2 (2005)

After being published Walden Two was rejected due to false conceptions that suggested that the novel was the defense and representation of the economic and social values of capitalism. However a more detailed analysis shows how the construction of the society proposed by Skinner critiques the fundamental pillars of the current economic and social paradigms such as egotism as the base for social welfare, the growing acquisition of material goods as the motor of the economy and "freedom" according to the capitalistic dogmas. Although Walden Two is a utopia, it reveals how is necessary to introduce the principles of the behavior engineering, aspect that has not been widely considered by fields like Economics and Politics, if we want to solve the problems that the current social structure suffers. Key words: behavior analysis, cultural psychology, economic, Walden Two, behavior engineering.

This article presents the phenomenon of the harassment labor (mobbing) like a disfuncional and frequent situation in the organizational context that, in addition, is perpetuated and fed by the symmetrical scaling of violence that Colombia lives. To confront the phenomenon is an opportunity to fulfill the social, professional and enterprise responsibility, which favors, as well, development ethical contexts. An urgent attention is sets out as much from legal thing as from organizational psychology for the sake of improving the quality of labor life. Key words: organizational psychology, mobbing, violence, aggression.

This research inquire into the predictors of the Burnout Syndrome in a sample of 255 students of a nursing technician course. Demographic and school variables were evaluated as well as perceived stress factors related to school. Burnout was evaluated by the adapted version of the Maslach Burnout Inventory - General Survey, the MBI-SS (Maslach Burnout Inventory - Student Survey), directed to the student population. Results show that the perceived stress in conciliating work, the technician course, the study and leisure activities, to carry out exams and class works at the same time, the age and the student' expectation levels predict exhaustion. The accomplishment of exams and class works, the lack of positive feedback and the perceived stress in conciliating study and family predicts the levels of perceived competence. Finally, the perceived stress related to the lack of positive feedback and the relationship with colleagues are the cynicism dimension levels predictors. Key words: Syndrome of Burnout, predictors, exhaustion, stress, students.

The purpose of the current study was to determine whether psychological variables such self-efficacy perception and anxiety maintain a relation with academic performance in a group of 120 secondary (high school) students attending a private school in Bogotá. For this, the scale of generalized self - efficacy (GSS) and the state-trait anxiety inventory (STAI) was applied. The results demonstrated that self-efficacy is directly and significantly associated with general academic performance, meanwhile anxiety does not present a significant association. The examination by knowledge areas indicates that both self-efficacy and anxiety turns out to be significant for the prediction of academic performance. The anxiety contextual role, as well as its possible mediation in self-efficacy and academic achievement is discussed. Key words: self- efficacy, anxiety, and academic performance.

This article discusses how health practices focused on women construct significance on health and feminine body since such practices produce certain ways of being, living and feeling that build ways of being woman or man. Data from a research that took place in an academic health service, with women that went under breast and uterus cancer prevention examinations from May to December 2002 are shown. Data production was accomplished through health practices observations and interviews with service's users. Feminist Studies and mainly authors with post-structuralists theorizations were the theoretical bases. We hope this work contributes to the reflection about health practices focused on women, making possible a broader understanding about feminine and allowing room to ways of being in the world other than those the hegemonic point of view states as appropriate. Key words: feminine body, health and genre.

The Darwin's theory of evolution suggests the mechanism of natural selection in order to explain how species adapted, survived and evolved; and the mechanism of the sexual selection in order to explain its reproduction. In this way, he postulates that the adaptive characteristics are reproduced more successively than the maladaptative characteristics. In agreement with this, natural selection would have to favor heterosexualidad since this facilitates the reproduction and genes propagation. But what happens with the sexual direction that does not favor the Darwinian thesis (for example the homosexual dad) and why has stayed throughout time? The investigation in this area has been centered in hormonal aspects, cerebral differentiation and genetic, throwing incoherent results. Based * on the thesis that the human sexual direction, and especially homosexual direction, is as complex as to be described and explained so single by a model or a discipline. A revision becomes of the different investigation areas on sexual direction and the incapability of the evolutionary theories to give account of this is suggested. Key words: evolution, direction sexual, natural selection, sexual selection, homosexuality, heterosexuality, bisexuality.

It is important to understand, from the pharmacological point of view, what is alcohol and how it acts in the organism. There is no a simple cause, but a complex interaction of neurochemical, physiological, psychological and social factors that give rise to this serious drug-dependent illness. The psycho-physiological and drug-dynamic action of the alcohol is basically depressive due to the reduction of the synaptic transmission in the human nervous system. It is a well-known fact that the excessive consumption of alcohol causes a chronic and acute dysfunction of the brain, producing disorders in the central nervous system, presenting alterations in the memory and in the intellectual functions such as calculations, comprehension and learning. The metabolism of alcohol will take place in the liver, producing an alcoholic-fat liver bigger in size and ending in necrosis and serious inflammation of the liver. This is called alcoholic hepatitis and if the person continues drinking cirrhosis of the liver will be developed. Alcohol has also been related to changes in the myocardium and it has been seen in healthy animals that the speed of contraction of the cardiac muscle as well as the maximum tension achieved by that contraction decrease in the presence of alcohol, and therefore, the strength of each contraction and the increase of pressure in the left ventricle are less and the hert cannot act as a pump. Key words: Alcoholism, physiology, neuro-chemistry, cirrhosis, drug-addiction, excitability.

From the lands of the Psycoimmunology, the present revision intends a panoramic look to its main postulations, investigation lines and perspectives. Therefore, some historical aspects about the relationship between psychic life and health were approached initially; later on aspects like the physiology of the immune system were revised specifying kinds of both, acquired and natural immunity. Subjects as interactions among immune system and brain were revised from the experimental evidence, and summarized in four groups: immune-response conditioning, brain injures, stress and immunity, and at last emotions and immunity. Finally were contemplated some methods for the study of the immune system as the rehearsals In vitro, effusion citometry and rehearsals alive. As final observations, the whole literature suggests relationship among immune system and diverse psychic states. Nevertheless, some questions from this unquestionable relationship even arise without having a satisfactory answer. Key words: psychoneuroimmunology, immune system, immunity, brain.

The present reflection seeks to socialize and discuss some vital topics used in the constructionism. This intellectual movement is a kind of psychology but its position goes beyond, constituting an epistemology which explores with a different lens the variety of psycho and metapsychological knowledge. The principles that in some way are present along these lines are: our capability of relating, the doubt concerning all knowledge, relativity, and the questioning of what's supposedly unquestionable. A peculiar intention of this assay is to comprehend constructionism as a daily look into academy, in order to claim discourses as commitments of social beings in their daily life, implying the coordination of actions going beyond simple speculations. Key words: constructionism, meta-theory, relation, cognitivism, meaning.

The modern version of the psychotherapy as a technical matter, has conducted to the psychology, in the field of the clinic and the mental health, has to be required an ethics of the foresight in the action and has to recognize the Emergency of the Principle of the Responsibility, adjusted to the own human circumstances of the therapeutic encounter. In this context the presentation, themselves center in Reflecting on an old and new hypothesis, that of the convergence between the Wisdom and the Technical Knowledge; therefore we present in a succinct way the conceptual dimensions and pragmatists in which they are supported the Psychotherapy systemic to resolve the dilemma. These they are among others the dimensions to show: the vulnerability of the human nature and the Heuristics of the fragility; the distinctions between the technical controls and the to know ecological as base; the morale and the ethics beyond the individual, that is to say the ethics Ecological, and finally the to Know about the Possible like principle generator of the human encounter. The previous analysis attempted to show the vision of a complex, symbolic, and relational Psychology, that attempted to resolve the worries epistemology of the Psychology in the modernity. Key words: systemic therapy, technical knowledge, relational psychology, psychopathology, heuristic, fragility.

The following theoretical revision aim was to study the impact of the psycho-social variables on the quality of life in people with chronic diseases. The health concept is considered as a behavior associated in the style of life. Quality of life concept and its main multidimentional aspects are defined, and the importance of the quality of life evaluation in chronic patients is justified. Additionally, some researches which evaluate the importance than psychological and social variables plays in the maintenance, recovery or loss of the health in five different chronic diseases: infarct, diabetes, cancer, AIDS and renal insufficiency, have been summarized. Key words: psycho-social aspects, quality of life, chronic diseases.