When the New Guinea Psychologist ceased publication, psychology in Papua New Guinea effectively lost its voice. The journal had been closely linked with both the P.N.G. branch of the Australian Psychological Society (A.Ps.S.) and the Psychological Services Branch of the Public Service Commission. The decision to wind-up the A.Ps.S. in Papua New Guinea was taken in anticipation of independence, and the same event saw substantial changes in the personnel of the Public Service. As a result, the New Guinea Psychologist also went out of existence, and the only journal in P.N.G. devoted specifically to the publication of psychological reports and discussion became extinct.

In the post-independence years, many changes occurred in melanesian psychology, but they were less adequately discussed and publicised than in earlier times. Research did not cease; if anything it expanded during that time. However, the absence of a readily identifiable forum for psychological discussion meant that most research received less attention from practicing psychologists in P.N.G. because the material was published in reports, which had limited circulation, or in overseas journals, or was not publishld at all. The final issue of New Guinean Psychologist was published in December 1974, by which time both Editors had left the country. Plans for the further development of the journal never came to fruition. The purpose of the present paper is to review developments in psychology since 1974.

To ensure that psychological procedures fit into the community, seven dimensions of ‘appropriateness’ must be evaluated. Counselling training, which has been provided to community workers, is considered in terms of these criteria including its relevance to dealing with the behavioural problems of urban Papua New Guineans.

Thirty photographs depicting diverse emotional expressions were shown to a sample of Melanesian students who were assigned to either a face plus context or face alone condition. Significant differences between the two groups were obtained in a substantial proportion of cases on Schlosberg's Pleasant Unpleasant, and Attention – Rejection scales and the emotional expressions were judged to be appropriate to the context. These findings support the suggestion that the presence or absence of context is an important variable in the judgement of emotional expression and lend credence to the universal process theory.

Research on perception of emotions has consistently illustrated that observers can accurately judge emotions in facial expressions (Ekman, Friesen, & Ellsworth, 1972; Izard, 1971) and that the face conveys important information about emotions being experienced (Ekman & Oster, 1979). In recent years, however, a question of interest has been the relative contributions of facial cues and contextual information to observers' overall judgements. This issue is important for theoretical and methodological reasons. From a theoretical viewpoint, unravelling the determinants of emotion perception would enhance our understanding of the processes of person perception and impression formation and would provide a framework for research on interpersonal communication. On methodological grounds, the researcher's approach to the face versus context issue can influence the type of research procedures used to analyse emotion perception. Specifically, much research in this field has been criticized for use of posed emotional expressions as stimuli for observers to evaluate. Spignesi and Shor (1981) have noted that only one of approximately 25 experimental studies has utilized facial expressions occurring spontaneously in real-life situations.