On the record

"The critical factor is our beliefs about what's going to happen to us. You don't have to rely on drugs to see profound transformation."

--Irving Kirsch, psychologist at the University of Connecticut, who attributes the success of Prozac and similar drugs to the placebo effect, New York Times, Jan. 9.

"Oncology involves more than treating a pure physiological process like a broken bone."

--Richard Suinn, former APA president, on the need for psychologists to participate in cancer treatment, Washington Post, Jan.18.

"Not only do [the incompetent] reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the ability to realize it."

--Justin Kruger, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Illinois, and David Dunning, professor of psychology at Cornell University, on people who do things badly but think they do them well, New York Times, Jan. 18.

"It's absurd. Where's the data? This theory doesn't fit what we know about sexual assault."

--Robert Geffner, psychologist and president of the Family Violence and Sexual Assault Institute in San Diego, on the theory by anthropologists that rape is a "natural, biological" phenomenon springing from men's evolutionary urge to reproduce, USA Today, Jan. 18.