A Single‐Stage Approach to Learning Phonological Categories: Insights From Inuktitut

To acquire one’s native phonological system, language‐specific phonological categories and relationships must be extracted from the input. The acquisition of the categories and relationships has each in its own right been the focus of intense research. However, it is remarkable that research on the acquisition of categories and the relations between them has proceeded, for the most part, independently of one another. We argue that this has led to the implicit view that phonological acquisition is a “two‐stage” process: Phonetic categories are first acquired and then subsequently mapped onto abstract phoneme categories. We present simulations that suggest two problems with this view: First, the learner might mistake the phoneme‐level categories for phonetic‐level categories and thus be unable to learn the relationships between phonetic‐level categories; on the other hand, the learner might construct inaccurate phonetic‐level representations that prevent it from finding regular relations among them. We suggest an alternative conception of the phonological acquisition problem that sidesteps this apparent inevitability and acquires phonemic categories in a single stage. Using acoustic data from Inuktitut, we show that this model reliably converges on a set of phoneme‐level categories and phonetic‐level relations among subcategories, without making use of a lexicon.     

"Seesaw of emotions" and compliance: beyond the fear-then-relief rule

Previous researchers have found that people who experience anxiety whose source is abruptly eliminated usually respond positively to various requests addressed to them. The authors of the present study used 3 experiments to demonstrate that a sudden withdrawal of positive emotions leads to a similar effect (i.e., increased compliance to requests and commands). The mechanism underlying this effect is probably related to how each emotion generates its own specific behavior program. When this program suddenly proves to be inadequate to new, modified external circumstances, the person begins to function mindlessly. The authors propose the term seesaw of emotions for situations in which a sudden retraction of the external sources of affect (regardless of its type) leads to an individual's increased compliance.     

试论营养支持在中晚期癌症患者治疗中的理性选择

几乎所有中晚期癌症患者治疗中都会或多或少应用到临床营养支持治疗,适时、正确地应用对部分中晚期患者极具积极意义,而选择性地对一部分晚期患者有限应用甚至放弃,可能是更为理性的选择.从癌的本质出发,科学地应用营养不良筛选及评定方法,使临床营养支持治疗成为中晚期癌症患者的真正需要.     

From Hiroshima to the Present

After a childhood spent playing battle games, I went into the Navy during the war, and stayed in for 6 years, but when I visited Hiroshima I realized that I must study why people wanted to kill each other. I did a psychology degree and Ph.D., and then trained at the Institute, meanwhile working at the Cassel Hospital under the inspiration of Tom Main.     

试论营养支持在中晚期癌症患者治疗中的理性选择

几乎所有中晚期癌症患者治疗中都会或多或少应用到临床营养支持治疗,适时、正确地应用对部分中晚期患者极具积极意义,而选择性地对一部分晚期患者有限应用甚至放弃,可能是更为理性的选择。从癌的本质出发,科学地应用营养不良筛选及评定方法,使临床营养支持治疗成为中晚期癌症患者的真正需要。     

From the casino to the jungle

Clear-cut cases of decision-making under risk (known probabilities) are unusual in real life. The gambler’s decisions at the roulette table are as close as we can get to this type of decision-making. In contrast, decision-making under uncertainty (unknown probabilities) can be exemplified by a decision whether to enter a jungle that may contain unknown dangers. Life is usually more like an expedition into an unknown jungle than a visit to the casino. Nevertheless, it is common in decision-supporting disciplines to proceed as if reasonably reliable probability estimates were available for all possible outcomes, i.e. as if the prevailing epistemic conditions were analogous to those of gambling at the roulette table. This mistake can be called the tuxedo fallacy. It is argued that traditional engineering practices such as safety factors and multiple safety barriers avoid this fallacy and that they therefore manage uncertainty better than probabilistic risk analysis (PRA). PRA is a useful tool, but it must be supplemented with other methods in order not to limit the analysis to dangers that can be assigned meaningful probability estimates.     

From the numinous to the sacred

Abstract :  Jung took the idea of the 'numinous' from Rudolf Otto's book Das Heilige (E.T. The Idea of the Holy ) and made it central to his understanding of religion. However, as Lucy Huskinson has recently pointed out, this involves a misreading of Otto's work in which we have to look beyond the numinous (which is the non-rational factor in religion) towards the 'holy' which, like a symbol, holds the rational and non-rational aspects of religious experience together in a personally transformative way. This understanding of the spiritual and psychological journey is supported by case material in which a numinous experience, arising in the context of intensive analytical psychotherapy, proved to be but the first step in a process which led, through a period of mourning, towards the development of the patient's capacity to symbolize. In the light of this, the author suggests that the sacred is to be found in the capacity for a certain quality of symbolic relatedness—to self and other—which may or may not be attended by numinous experience.     

A Test of the Perfectionism Social Disconnection Model among Ethnic Minority Youth

Perfectionistic self-presentation (PSP) has been identified as a vulnerability factor in the development of depressive disorders during early adolescence. The Perfectionism Social Disconnection Model (PSDM) offers a theoretical framework suggesting PSP leads to depressive symptoms via interpersonal problems and social disconnection. Previous studies have supported the role of social disconnection as a mediator in the relation between PSP and suicidal ideation, but have not evaluated interpersonal problems in the model. Furthermore, the generalizability of the model has not been established for community and ethnic minority samples. Using cross-sectional data, the present study addresses these gaps by evaluating the PSDM and including social anxiety and loneliness as indicators of interpersonal problems and social disconnection, respectively, as predictors of youth depressive symptoms. The sample includes 289 (51.2% females) predominately low income and Latino and African American youth in fifth through seventh grade in three public schools. As predicted, social anxiety mediates the relationship between both PSP and loneliness and PSP and depressive symptoms. Moreover, mediational analyses indicate that social anxiety accounts for the relation between PSP and depression. Consistent with the PSDM model, the relationship between PSP and youth depressive symptoms is mediated sequentially through both social anxiety and loneliness, but primarily among the Latino sample.     

On How to Get Beyond the Opening Stage

Any well-structured argumentative exchange must be preceded by some preparatory stages. In the pragma-dialectical four-stage model of critical discussion, the clarification of issues and positions is relegated to the confrontation stage and the other preparatory matters are dealt within the opening stage. In the opening stage, the parties involved come to agree to discuss their differences and to do so by an argumentative exchange rather than by, say, a sequence of bids and offers. They should also come to agree on the rules of dialogue, on roles, on logical principles, on types of argument, and on the propositions that can be used as basic premises. All in all, a lot of work needs to be done before the first topical argument can be put forward. Especially the opening stage seems prone to further disagreements and protracted discussions, e.g., about the admissibility of particular kinds of argument or particular basic premises. There is also the problem that a successful opening stage threatens to settle matters beforehand and thus put the argumentation stage out of business. The paper suggests some measures that could alleviate the workload of the opening stage, without making the argumentation stage otiose.     

Social Disconnection and Hazardous Drinking Mediate the Link Between Perfectionistic Attitudes and Depressive Symptoms

According to the perfectionism social disconnection model (PSDM), perfectionism leads to social disconnection (e.g., isolation, loneliness, and alienation) which brings about depressive symptoms. The present study extended the PSDM by testing a dual-pathway mediation model wherein social disconnection and hazardous drinking were hypothesized to explain why perfectionistic attitudes (e.g., intense self-criticism, evaluative concerns, and unrealistic goal-setting) result in depressive symptoms. A sample of 216 college students participated. The present study utilized a cross-sectional design and self-report questionnaires. The hypothesized model fit the data well, with social disconnection and hazardous drinking mediating the perfectionistic attitudes-depressive symptoms link. Students high in perfectionistic attitudes report feeling isolated, lonely, and alienated. To escape this powerful sense of not belonging, these students turn to alcohol in a self-destructive way. Suffering from the ill effects of social disconnection and hazardous drinking, students high in perfectionistic attitudes are vulnerable to depressive symptoms.     

From the perverse pact to universal conflicts

We psychoanalysts – as split subjects – are not immune to charismatic leaders who preach violence against selected targets depicted as the cause of all evils. Freud, in Group psychology and the analysis of the ego, alerted us against such leaders, who can manipulate by transforming us into an uncritical mass. This would be the social equivalent of the perverse pact in repressive desublimation between the superego and the id at the expense of the ego: the latter is put to sleep, and the superego exhorts the id to do violence and regress. Socially, these perverse pacts often take place with the superego represented by charismatic leaders who foster identification with themselves, put the egos of their audiences to sleep through manipulation and thus address an amorphous mass that they can direct towards violence and destruction. An event in which such a phenomenon apparently occurred will be discussed to show how urgent it is to revisit psychoanalytic writings on these matters in order to withstand the temptation to be herded by manipulative leaders. This will certainly protect psychoanalysis and allow for its transmission. It is up to us to exercise the critical analysis that psychoanalytic tools equip us for so that we can detect such summons to perverse pacts and denounce them.     

从城市激进分子到农村革命家:20世纪20年代至1937年的毛泽东

本文从讲述毛泽东的政治生涯开始,涵盖了他漫长人生的前半生.在本文所涵盖的时期结束时,毛泽东成为了党的余部的领导人,这时党刚刚从第二次几近灭绝的大围剿中幸存下来,必须适应新的环境和中国西北的人民群众,乃至应对来自日本的新威胁.因此,只有作为毛泽东后期生涯的序幕时,早期毛泽东看起来才有吸引力——这个时期,他正等待时机登上历史舞台.然而,毛泽东对中国农村革命的成功领导并非由偶然性或者深层的历史进程所决定.从本质上讲,毛泽东政治思想基础是在1937年打下的.虽然1937年最迫切的问题不是农村阶级斗争,而是抗日战争和毛泽东领导地位的巩固,但是农村革命再次成为1945年至1949年与国民党之间的国内战争的主要驱动力.