Social anhedonia has been linked to the development and exacerbation of psychosis. The present study explored the hypothesis that scores in social anhedonia are related to deictic relational responding, empathic concern, and experiential avoidance, as suggested by relational frame theory and acceptance and commitment therapy. College students (N = 110) from a Spanish university completed self-report measures of social anhedonia, empathy, and experiential avoidance. Deictic relational responding was measured by performance on a behavioral task. Sequential multiple regression indicated that deictic relational responding, empathy, and experiential avoidance have a large relationship size with social anhedonia, accounting for 26% of the total variance, and minimal overlap among each other. These data support the utility of these processes as predictors of social anhedonia, suggesting new psychological targets for its prevention and treatment. The implication of these processes for the development of psychosis should be explored.

A previous report explored the impact of a brief (four session) acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) intervention as compared with treatment as usual (TAU) on rehospitalization over 4 months in a sample of 80 inpatients with psychosis. The present study extended the follow-up period to 1 year and used a more sophisticated survival analysis to take previous hospitalization and length of the current hospitalization into account. Those in the ACT condition showed reduced hospitalization as compared to those in TAU at 4 months post discharge and again at 1 year post discharge. A test of proportionality of hazard showed that survival curves continued to diverge in the 5- to 12-month postdischarge period after adjusting for differences in the 0 to 4 month period. Future directions are discussed.

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The pros and cons of the proposal to link prescription privileges specifically to psychological training vary from the point of view of the constituencies involved. The present article analyzes those differences. Two surprising facts are noted. First, it is scientist-practitioners who are resisting the move toward prescription privileges, not so much the basic science organizations. Second, while the practice-based organizations have been avid in their support of prescription privileges, the same cannot be said for rank and file private practitioners. On closer examination, the costs, benefits, and views of the different constituencies make sense of these anomalies. The resistance to prescription privileges is not arbitrary or unreasonable and it is not likely to go away any time soon.

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