Below is the introduction to a fascinating paper the whole of which can be reached HERE

The following is a contribution to Serendip by Phouttasone (Pilou) Thirakoul, who wrote it during her senior year (1996-1997) as a Psychology major and Neural and Behavioral Sciences concentrator at Bryn Mawr College. Pilou’s essay provides a useful introduction to both Buddhist thinking in relation to brain and behavior, and to a branch of western psychology which, with its stress on active generation and regeneration of self, is of considerable interest from a Serendip perspective. Pilou’s essay also represents an example of the benefits to be gained by looking at problems from multiple perspectives, and as encouragement to further thinking about the relations between psychological, neuroscientific, and spiritual approaches to problems of consciousness and self-hood.

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BUDDHIST MEDITATION AND PERSONAL

CONSTRUCT PSYCHOLOGY

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Introduction

This paper seeks to examine the phenomenon of Buddhist meditation within the context of a Western psychological personality theory called Personal Construct Psychology. Formulated nearly twenty-five hundred years apart (Buddhist meditation by the 5th century B.C. Indian teacher Siddhartha Gautama; the Psychology of Personal Constructs, by the 20th century A.D. American psychologist George Kelly), the doctrines expressed in each tradition inevitably reveal differences between one another. But what is most fascinating is that even despite their differences, striking and illuminating points of correspondence can be observed between the principles of meditation and the theory of human consciousness articulated by Kelly. In light of the growing Western interest in meditative practice as a potentially useful tool in clinical practice and research, and in light of the sustained popularity of George Kelly’s constructivist theory of personality in clinical application, it seems worthy to explore possible commonalities between them.

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the

PhD. Summaries are HERE

SEE also Learning Motivation for Success