A Behavioral Interpretation of Aesthetics

The Psychological Record - A behavioral interpretation of aesthetics will doubtless require a series of successive approximations to reach a wholly satisfactory formulation. The present article is...     

CSI：传播、倡导科学和理性的组织

2006年“对于声称异常现象科学调查委员会(简称CSICOP)”正式更名为“怀疑探索委员会(简称CSI)”。本文简要介绍CSICOP组织,揭示     

Negative Emotion Enhances Memory Accuracy: Behavioral and Neuroimaging Evidence

ABSTRACT— There have been extensive discussions about whether emotional memories contain more accurate detail than nonemotional memories do, or whether individuals simply believe that they have remembered emotional experiences more accurately. I review evidence that negative emotion enhances not only the subjective vividness of a memory but also the likelihood of remembering some (but not all) event details. I then describe neuroimaging evidence suggesting that engagement of emotion-processing regions (particularly the amygdala and orbitofrontal cortex) relates to the encoding and retrieval of details intrinsically linked to negative items.     

Behavioral Laws in Histories of Psychology: Psychological Science,Metascience, and the Psychology of Science

Histories of psychology frequently include statements that explicitly or implicitly express behavioral laws. Usually these "meta-historical generalizations" provide "covering laws" for explanatory accounts, contextual frames, or paradoxical con- trasts. These abstract propositions come from many sources, vary immensely in scientfic validity, and are found in several psychological publications besides histories, including book reviews, obituaries, journal articles, monographs, and trade books. Not only could the authors of these nomothetic claims make better use of empirical results in the metasciences, but these assertions themselves offer an inventory of valuable hypotheses that should inspire future research in the behavioral sciences and especially in the psychology of science.     

Art beyond Morality and Metaphysics: Late Joseon Korean Aesthetics

In the history of Chinese philosophy, Mozi calls music a “waste of resources,” considering it an aristocratic extravagance that does not benefit the everyday people. In its defense, Confucians highlight music's moral and metaphysical qualities, arguing that music aids in moral cultivation and that music's form mimics the structure of reality. The aim of this article is to show that Korean philosophers provide yet another reason to think music is important. Music, and art in general, was used to express a national identity at a time Korean philosophers were beginning to develop their own aesthetic consciousness in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. A cultural movement called Joseonpoong (???), “Joseon wind,” marked a shift away from Sinocentrism and toward Korea's own unique values and practices. The new attempt to justify art's value apart from its relationship to morality or metaphysics set Joseon thinkers apart from their Chinese predecessors. Using art for identity expression allowed the Koreans to reconceive art's value while Sinocentric cosmological and cultural views were being challenged with the introduction of Western knowledge. Art also became a tool for reversing hermeneutic injustice as new artistic practices and standards allowed the Koreans to meaningfully engage with previously neglected aspects of their lived lives.