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In my comfortable 21st-century existence, I can have no concept of what life was like for soldiers in the First World War. I have read of 'These boys with old, scared faces,' as Siegfried Sassoon wrote in Craiglockhart, where he was being treated for shell-shock. 'Their cowed subjection to the ghosts of friends who died, their dreams that drip with murder.' But my view of the conflict is probably shaped more by Blackadder than anything else.
In an impressive opening session at the Society's Annual Conference in Birmingham in May, Professor Sir Simon Wessely took aim at the 'mythologising' of war. Our 'veterans' need feelings of understanding, not pity, he concluded. 'We should see them for what they are, not what we think they should be.' Discussant and former war correspondent Kate Adie questioned a focus on the personal emotional. 'You don't walk around the place in conflict musing on how your inner person is faring.'
It was a thought-provoking start to another excellent event. I hope you enjoy our extensive coverage.
Dr Jon Sutton
Managing Editor
@psychmag
Contents
Beyond the mythology of war
Our coverage from the Society's Annual Conference, which took place in Birmingham in May. Topics include parental alienation, psychologists as expert witnesses, special educational needs, intimate partner violence, students and alcohol, memory, behaviour change, and more.
News
The BRAIN initiative; Pint of Science; and the cycle-ology of the Tour de France
Society
President's column; Francis Report; and more
Beliefs about autobiographical memory... and why they matter
Martin Conway, Lucy Justice and Catriona Morrison
On the trail of the successful psychopath
Sarah Francis Smith, Ashley Watts and Scott Lilienfeld
EMDR - More than just a therapy for PTSD?
Robin Logie considers a therapy whose mechanism remains unexplained
New voices: To the left - pseudoneglect
Joanna Brooks with the latest in our series
Letters
Austerity; being a man; the NHS; the World Cup; dyslexia; a pure psychology challenge; and more
Digests
Tiredness and attention, responses to workplace crisis, and speech fillers, in the latest from our free Research Digest (see www.researchdigest.org.uk/blog)
Interview
Gail Kinman and Almuth McDowall meet Ellen Ernst Kossek, President of the Work Family Researchers Network
Careers
The importance of positive risk taking and dignity of failure, with Steven Sharman; and we talk to Andy Evans about his work with performers
One on one
with Ian Parker, Fellow of the Society, practising psychoanalyst in Manchester and Professor of Management, University of Leicester
Reviews
The Life Scientific with Professor Sir Michael Rutter; Incognito; 1984; Blurred Lines; and book reviews
...looks back
Psychology to win the war and make a better peace: Ben Harris on a 1943 book that sold 400,000 copies
Seven years ago
For our archive, including 'Questioning the science and politics of happiness', visit The Psychologist website at www.thepsychologist.org.uk
Series:
SKU: PUB-CAT-1567