Children's understanding of communicative intentions in the middle of the second year of life

Two tasks were administered to 40 children aged from 16 to 20 months (mean age = 18;1), to evaluate children's understanding of declarative and informative intention [Behne, T., Carpenter, M., & Tomasello, M. (2005). One-year-olds comprehend the communicative intentions behind gestures in a hiding game. Developmental Science, 8, 492–499; Camaioni, L., Perucchini, P., Bellagamba, F., & Colonnesi, C. (2004). The role of declarative pointing in developing a theory of mind. Infancy, 5, 291–308]. In the first task, children had to respond to the experimenter who pointed at a distal object; in the second task, children had to find a toy in a hiding game after the experimenter indicated the correct location either by pointing or by gazing. In the first task, most children responded to the declarative gesture by “commenting” on the pointed object instead of just looking; however, looking responses were more frequent than commenting responses. In the second task, children chose the correct location of the object significantly more frequently when the informative gesture was the point than when it was the gaze; moreover, there were significantly more correct choices than incorrect choices in the point but not in the gaze condition. Finally, no significant relation was found between tasks. Taken together, the findings support the view that infants’ developing understanding of communicative intention is a complex process in which general cognitive abilities and contextual factors are equally important.     

A postulate-based analysis of comparative preference statements

There has been a growing interest in the study of preferences for their utility in solving problems related to decision making. Most of the preference representation languages developed in the literature are based on comparative preference statements since they offer a simple and intuitive way for expressing preferences. They can be further interpreted following different semantics, imparting a greater flexibility on how outcomes can be compared. So far the main objective has been to rank-order the set of outcomes given a set of comparative preference statements and one or several semantics. Tackling this problem from a different angle, we look into the behavioural aspects of the preference semantics and statements by attempting to formalise the intuition behind them using postulates studied in preference logics and non-monotonic reasoning. We select the postulates w.r.t. three criteria: coherence, syntax independence and inference. Thus, our analysis provides a means to determine those properties that are satisfied for a given preference semantics.     

Social cognition, artefacts, and stigmergy: A comparative analysis of theoretical frameworks for the understanding of artefact-mediated collaborative activity

Collective behaviour is often characterised by the so-called ‘coordination paradox’: looking at individual ants, for example, they do not seem to cooperate or communicate explicitly, but nevertheless at the social level cooperative behaviour, such as nest building, emerges, apparently without any central coordination. In the case of social insects such emergent coordination has been explained by the theory of stigmergy, which describes how individuals can effect the behaviour of others (and their own) through artefacts, i.e., the product of their own activity (e.g., building material in the ants’ case). Artefacts clearly also play a strong role in human collective behaviour, which has been emphasised, for example, by proponents of activity theory and distributed cognition. However, the relation between theories of situated/social cognition and theories of social insect behaviour has so far received relatively little attention in the cognitive science literature. This paper aims to take a step in this direction by comparing three theoretical frameworks for the study of cognition in the context of agent–environment interaction (activity theory, situated action, and distributed cognition) to each other and to the theory of stigmergy as a possible minimal common ground. The comparison focuses on what each of the four theories has to say about the role/nature of (a) the agents involved in collective behaviour, (b) their environment, (c) the collective activities addressed, and (d) the role that artefacts play in the interaction between agents and their environments, and in particular in the coordination of cooperation.     

Detecting contingency: A key to understanding development of self and social cognition

Abstract:  Detecting contingency between self-produced actions and the consequences plays a crucial role for basic cognitive functions, such as construction of self body-image and tool-use. This paper reviews our recent studies focusing on the temporal aspect of contingency. Three studies concerning the detection of proprioceptive-visual contingency in infants, children and adults are summarized. All of these studies use delayed self-image as a tool to investigate the temporal aspect of contingency detection. Based on the results of these studies and related preceding research, the paper proposes the ubiquity of a contingency detector among the development of self and social interaction.     

脑功能定位在社会认知研究中的作用及其启示

本文阐述了脑功能定位的具体技术及其与社会心理现象相结合的心理神经模型。这种结合的趋势有助于促进神经科学和社会心理学的发展,有助于解释社会心理现象中固有的一些具体问题。同时,由于社会心理现象的复杂性,因此并不一定都适合直接进行脑功能定位。     

社会认知视野中的自尊研究

从社会认知的视角研究自尊是当前自尊研究的主流。文章着重从自尊的概念架构、自尊的征机制以及自尊结构的测量三个方面回顾了社会认知理论关于自尊的研究成果,特别是社认知关于内隐自尊概念的提出,从全新的角度阐释了自尊结构及其心理机制,为自尊研究供了新的方法论思想和概念化框架。     

人际交往中的认知偏差简析

现代社会个人的成长和发展离不开有效的人际交往,而人际交往中的认知偏差往往会影响人们人际交往的效果和质量,了解和认清人际交往中的认知偏差有利于我们建立良好的人际关系。文章对可能影响人际交往的首因效应、晕轮效应、刻板印象、基本归因偏差、虚假一致偏差及当事人与旁观者归因分歧的含义、表现和原因作了简要分析,以期能帮助人们对人际交往中的认知偏差加以防范和纠正,提高人们的人际交往能力。     

自我概念对主观幸福感预测的内隐社会认知研究

从内隐社会认知的观点出发研究自我概念和主观幸福感的结构,并在此基础上探讨自我概念对主观幸福感的影响,得到以下结论:在中国大学生样本中(1)自我概念是双重的,存在外显自我和内隐自我两种成分;(2)主观幸福感结构是双重的,存在外显幸福感和内隐幸福感两种成分;(3)自我概念对主观幸福感的预测模型为:外显自我预测外显幸福感,内隐自我预测内隐幸福感。     

A comparative analysis of the effects of social skill training and teacher-directed contingencies on social behavior of preschool children with disabilities

This study investigated the effects of an analog social skill training program and a teacher-directed contingency strategy on promoting social responding among four preschool children with mild disabilities and their peers. The social skill training program consisted of five lessons targeting the skill areas: Initiating, responding, and maintaining social interactions. The teacher directed contingency consisted of prompting target children when they were not socially involved with peers, and providing verbal praise when they were socially involved with peers. Subjects were divided into two training pairs and received both interventions in a reversal design. Presentation order was counterbalanced across the two training pairs. Results indicated that the teacher directed contingency was more effective in promoting higher levels of social responding in a free-play setting. Results also suggest that social skill training may not always be a necessary prerequisite to promote increased social interactions among children who display low rates of social interaction with peers, but possess necessary skills.     

大学生人格类型与专业认同间的关系研究

本研究对旅游管理专业大学生进行了MBTI人格测验,并采用问卷调查与内隐联想测验(IAT)两种方式了解被试的专业认同状况。研究发现样本的专业认同存在显著的外显—内隐分离,在内隐层面上缺乏足够认同。性别、人格类型与专业认同之间存在一定关联,部分人格维度可作为判断大学生专业认同状况的有效变量。     

五岁儿童自主性与权威认知的相关研究

本研究采用实验室观察法对五岁儿童自主性与权威认知之间的关系进行探讨。结果表明:(1)五岁儿童自主性与权威认知间相关显著,权威认知水平高的儿童自主性发展水平高,权威认知水平低的儿童自主性发展水平低;(2)五岁儿童权威认知与自主性三个维度间相关均显著。权威认知水平高的儿童,其自我依靠、自我控制和自我主张水平高;权威认知水平低的儿童,其自我依靠、自我控制和自我主张水平低。     

A content analysis of the conversational behavior of accepted and rejected children

The present study was designed to assess whether the conversational behavior of children separated into accepted, rejected, and mixed-status dyads differed along the dimensions of listening to, paying attention to, and indicating interest in their dyadic partner. Conversations of 40 third-grade dyads were analyzed as they occurred in a 2- min waiting period and a 4- min conversation period. Seventeen categories of verbal behaviors that indexed these dimensions were used as content codes. Multivariate analyses of variance performed on the observational data yielded significant main effects for status, sex, and experimental condition. Results are interpreted in terms of previous social skills research, and suggestions for future research are offered.     

A comparative analysis of the validity of several approaches to the scoring of the behavior of the preterm infant

A group of very low birthweight preterm infants (mean WEIGHT = 1193.6 g; mean gestational AGE = 31.1 weeks) were examined with the PREMIE. The PREMIE is a modification of the scoring system of the full term Brazelton Neonatal Behavioral Assessment (BNBAS) examination for use with preterm infants. Infants were assessed during the acute phase of cardio-respiratory illness (mean AGE = 7 days) and during the recovery phase (mean AGE = 22 days). Many modifications in procedure were required. Several analyses were performed to assess the redundancy and the comparative validity of the scoring systems of the PREMIE, the BNBAS, and the BNBAS + (the BNBAS plus a set of five additional preterm items). Results indicated that the three scoring systems were highly redundant, that they were equally related to physiologic and clinical variables, and that they were similar in their sensitivity to behavioral change and stability. Overall the results offered little in the way of differentiating among these three scoring systems with this group of infants, raising doubts about the need to use the PREMIE or other scoring systems like it for many research purposes.