Institutional creativity and pathologies of potential space: The modern university

Abstract

This paper proposes the applicability of object relations psychoanalytic conceptions of dialogue (Ogden, 1986 Ogden, T. 1986. The matrix of the mind, London: Karnac.  [Google Scholar], 1993 Ogden, T. 1993. “On potential space”. In In one's bones: The clinical genius of Winnicot, Edited by: Goldman, D. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aaronson.  [Google Scholar]) to thinking about relationships and relational structures and their governance in universities. It proposes that:

• the qualities of dialogic relations in creative institutions are the proper index of creative productivity; that is of, as examples, ‘thinking’ (Evans, 2004 Evans, M. 2004. Killing thinking: The death of the universities, London: Continuum.  [Google Scholar]), ‘emotional learning’ (Salzberger-Wittenburg et al., 1983 Salzberger-Wittenburg, I., Henry, G. and Osborne, E. 1983. The emotional experience of learning and teaching, London: Routledge.  [Google Scholar]) or ‘criticality’ (Barnett, 1997 Barnett, R. 1997. Higher education: A critical business, Buckingham: Open University Press.  [Google Scholar]);

• contemporary institutions' explicit preoccupation in assuring, monitoring and managing creative ‘dialogue’ can, in practice, pervert creative processes and thoughtful symbolic productivity, thus inhibiting students' development and the quality of ‘thinking space’ for teaching and research.

In this context the paper examines uncanny and perverse connections between Paulo Freire's (1972 Freire, P. 1972. Pedagogy of the oppressed, London: Penguin.  [Google Scholar]) account of educational empowerment and dialogics (from his Pedagogy of the oppressed) to the consumerist (see, for example, Clarke & Vidler, 2005 Clarke, J. and Vidler, E. 2005. Creating citizen-consumers: New labour and the remaking of public services. Public Policy and Administration, 20: 19–37.  [Google Scholar]) rhetoric of student empowerment, as mediated by some strands of managerialism in contemporary higher education. The paper grounds its critique of current models of dialogue, feedback loops, audit and other mechanisms of accountability (Power, 1997 Power, M. 1997. The Audit Society: Ritual's of verification, Oxford: Oxford University Press.  [Google Scholar]; Strathern, 2000 Strathern M. Audit cultures: Anthropological studies in accountability, ethics and the academy London Routledge 2000 [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), in a close analysis of how creative thinking emerges.

The paper discusses the failure to maintain a dialogic space in humanities and social science areas in particular, exploring psychoanalytic conceptions from Donald Winnicott (1971 Winnicott, D. W. 1971. Playing and Reality, London: Routledge.  [Google Scholar]), Milner (1979 Milner, M. 1979. On not being able to paint, New York: International Universities Press.  [Google Scholar]), Thomas Ogden (1986 Ogden, T. 1986. The matrix of the mind, London: Karnac.  [Google Scholar]) and Csikszentmihalyi (1997 Csikszentmihalyi, M. 1997. Creativity, New York: Harper Perennial.  [Google Scholar]). Coleridge's ideas about imagination as the movement of thought between subjective and objective modes are discussed in terms of both intra- and inter-subjective relational modes of ‘dialogue’, which are seen as subject to pathology in the pathologically structured psychosocial environment. Current patterns of institutional governance, by micromanaging dialogic spaces, curtail the ‘natural’ rhythms and temporalities of imagination by giving an over-emphasis to the moment of outcome, at the expense of holding the necessary vagaries of process in the institutional ‘mind’. On the contrary, as this paper argues, creative thinking lies in sporadic emergences at the conjunction of object/(ive) outcome and through (thought) processes.     

An existential framework of spirituality

A holistic approach to spirituality indicates a spiritual development that is relevant for all students and not just for those who have a religious background. However, debates in England surrounding spirituality in education often generally locate it within the religious domain (Blake, 1996 Blake, N. (1996). Against spiritual education. Oxford Review of Education, 22(4): 443–456.  [Google Scholar];Carr, 1995 Carr, D. (1995). Towards a distinctive conception of spiritual education. Oxford Review of Education, 21(1): 83–98.  [Google Scholar], 1999 Carr, D. (1999). Spiritual language and the ethics of redemption: a reply to Jim Mackenzie. Journal of Philosophy of Education, 33(3): 451–461.  [Google Scholar];Isherwood, 1999 Isherwood, L. (1999). Liberating spirituality: empowered people for a world in need of passion. British Journal of Religious Education, 21(2): 80–89.  [Google Scholar]). Conceptualizing spirituality in such a way tends to deny access to this development for non‐religious students or students in non‐religious contexts. Alternatively the other approaches to spirituality have adopted non‐religious viewpoints (see Erricker, 2003 Erricker, C. (2003). Against the protection of childhood innocence. International Journal of Children's Spirituality, 8(1): 3–7.  [Google Scholar], p. 7). Such either/or approaches work against the notion that spirituality should be conceived as intrinsic to the enterprise of education. This paper offers a brief view of a more elaborate existential framework of spirituality which has been developed in order to transcend the religious/secular divide. A short account of Existentialist philosophy is provided before an outline of the framework is discussed.     

Antecedents and Civic Consequences of Choosing Real versus Ersatz Social Activities

Social capital (Coleman, 1990 Coleman, J. S. 1990. Foundations of social theory, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.  [Google Scholar]), democracy's wellspring (Putnam, 1993 Putnam, R. D. 1993. Making democracy work: Civic traditions in modern Italy, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.  [Google Scholar]; Tocqueville, 1835 Tocqueville, A. 1835. Democracy in America, Edited by: Mansfield, H. C. and Winthrop, D. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.  [Google Scholar]/2000), must now accrue within a social fabric that has been changed by the ubiquitous adoption of technologies such as television and the Internet. Three studies (N = 313) of college students supported a theory of ersatz social behavior, which proposed that: a) the use of technological (replacement/ersatz) alternatives to real social interaction may be less conducive to the skill building and opinion formation that foster social capital; b) ersatz activities involve fewer costs (effort, risk of rejection) than real interactions; and c) ersatz alternatives are regularly chosen, even though real interaction is ostensibly preferred. The results provide increased understanding of when and how mediated interaction can be detrimental to social capital formation.     

Sustained suppression in congruency tasks

In a list version of the Stroop task, Thomas (1977 Thomas, JK. 1977. Stroop interference with word or hue pre-exposure. Dissertation Abstracts International, 38: 1450 [Google Scholar]) observed that Stroop interference was smaller when the irrelevant word was repeated through parts of the list. MacLeod (1991 MacLeod, CM. 1991. Half a century of research on the Stroop effect: An integrative review. Psychological Bulletin, 109: 163–203. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) formulated the sustained-suppression hypothesis for this effect. It is assumed that the automatic response activation on the basis of the irrelevant word is selectively suppressed. In this paper this hypothesis is further investigated. In a serial Stroop task with short response–stimulus interval (RSI) we demonstrate that the Stroop effect disappears when the irrelevant word is repeated, whereas the Stroop effect is evident when the word changes. With a long RSI, there is no influence of the sequence of the irrelevant word. The same pattern of results is observed in a flanker task. The results are discussed in terms of the activation-suppression model (Ridderinkhof, 2002 Ridderinkhof, KR. 2002. Micro- and macro-adjustments of task set: Activation and suppression in conflict tasks. Psychological Research, 66: 312–323. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) and the sustained-suppression hypothesis.     

“You Just Know It’s the Only Thing You Can Think”: A Conversation with Chodorow

ABSTRACT

Nancy Julia Chodorow (1944–) is a pioneer feminist theorist who brought together academic fields of sociology, anthropology, and psychoanalysis in her work related to feminist theories and psychoanalysis. Her first book, The Reproduction of Mothering: Psychoanalysis and the Sociology of Gender (1978 Chodorow, N. J. (1978; second ed. 1999). The reproduction of mothering: Psychoanalysis and the sociology of gender. Berkeley: University of California Press. [Google Scholar]), gave primacy to a more generalized account of the developmental and familial origins of prevalent psychological differences between femininity and masculinity from a psychoanalytic sociological viewpoint. Her later books, Femininities, Masculinities, Sexualities: Freud and Beyond (1994 Chodorow, N. J. (1994). Femininities, masculinities, sexualities: Freud and beyond. Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky. [Google Scholar]), The Power of Feelings: Personal Meaning in Psychoanalysis, Gender, and Culture (1999 Chodorow, N. J. (1999). The power of feelings: Personal meaning in psychoanalysis, gender, and culture. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. [Google Scholar]), and Individualizing Gender and Sexuality: Theory and Practice (2012 Chodorow, N. J. (2012). Individualizing gender and sexuality: Theory and practice. New York and London: Routledge.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), bring in a rich interplay among socio-structural influences (i.e., culture) as well as intra- and inter-psychic dynamic processes, emphasizing more the importance of individuality and subjectivity. Based on an interview I had with Chodorow on the development of her thought, this paper gives Chodorow’s account of her personal history and academic background, current manifestations in feminist social science research and feminist psychoanalysis based on her contribution and legacy, and reflective narratives on the unfolding of feminist and psychoanalytic theories from the 1970s onward. Chodorow’s note to the next generation of feminist psychotherapists is also included.     

Written on the body: Deliberate self-harm as communication

The inability to manage distress would be problematic at any time; but it is especially problematic when distress is accompanied by (or made up of) feelings of rage, cruelty and self-hatred. I will argue here that people who self-harm are communicating rage and hostility to themselves and others in ways that often leave them frustrated and hopeless; and leave professional carers aghast. I will conclude with some ideas about psychological therapies that may help such people; drawing very much upon the work of colleagues in the forensic psychotherapy field: especially Anne Aiyegbusi (2004 Aiyegbusi, A. 2004. “Forensic mental health nursing: Care with security in mind”. In A matter of security: The application of attachment theory to forensic psychiatry and psychotherapy, Edited by: Pfafflin, F. and Adshead, G. 167–192. London: Jessica Kingsley.  [Google Scholar]), Anna Motz (2008 Motz, A. 2008. The psychology of female violence: Crimes against the body, 2nd edn, Hove: Brunner Routledge.  [Google Scholar], 2009 Motz, A. 2009. Managing self harm: Psychological perspectives, London: Routledge.  [Google Scholar]) and Estela Welldon (1992).     

Knowledge-How and Epistemic Value

A conspicuous oversight in recent debates about the vexed problem of the value of knowledge has been the value of knowledge-how. This would not be surprising if knowledge-how were, as Gilbert Ryle [1945, 1949 Ryle, Gilbert 1949. The Concept of Mind, London: Hutchinson's University Library.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]] famously thought, fundamentally different from knowledge-that. However, reductive intellectualists [e.g. Stanley and Williamson 2001 Ryle, Gilbert 1949. The Concept of Mind, London: Hutchinson's University Library.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]; Brogaard 2008, 2009 Brogaard, Berit 2009. What Mary Did Yesterday: Reflections on Knowledge-Wh, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 78/2: 439–67.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 2011 Brogaard, Berit 2011. Knowledge-How: A Unified Account, in Knowing How: Essays on Knowledge, Mind, and Action, ed. John Bengson and Marc A. Moffett, New York: Oxford University Press: 136–60. [Google Scholar]; Stanley 2011a Stanley, Jason 2011a. Knowing (How), Noûs 45/2: 207–38.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 2011b Stanley, Jason 2011b. Know How, Oxford: Oxford University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]] maintain that knowledge-how just is a kind of knowledge-that. Accordingly, reductive intellectualists must predict that the value problems facing propositional knowledge will equally apply to knowledge-how. We show, however, that this is not the case. Accordingly, we highlight a value-driven argument for thinking (contra reductive intellectualism) that knowledge-how and knowledge-that come apart.     

Counselling in Action: A multimodal assessment and rational emotive behavioural approach to stress counselling: a case study

This paper demonstrates how the multimodal approach, developed by Arnold Lazarus (1989 Lazarus A.A. 1989 The practice of multimodal therapy: systematic, comprehensive and effective psychotherapy Baltimore John Hopkins University Press  [Google Scholar]), can be used to aid assessment of a client suffering from the effects of chronic, work-related stress. A rationale is provided for integrating the multimodal approach with rational emotive behaviour therapy theory, techniques and strategies (Kwee & Ellis, 1997 Kwee M. Ellis A. 1997 Can multimodal and rational emotive therapy be reconciled? Journal of Rational-Emotive & Cognitive-Behaviour Therapy 15 2 95 132 [Crossref] [Google Scholar]). A modality profile and a second order BASIC I.D. profile were developed and used as the link between assessment and the stress counselling programme (Palmer, 1992 Palmer, S. 1992. Multimodal assessment and therapy; a systematic, technically eclectic approach to counselling, psychotherapy and stress management. Counselling, 3(4): 220–224.  [Google Scholar]). A range of assessment tools were used to assess progress and a session by session report is provided.     

Organizational Citizenship Behavior in Sport: Relationships with Leadership,Team Cohesion,and Athlete Satisfaction

The purpose of this study was to introduce the construct of organizational citizenship behavior (OCB; Organ, 1988 Organ, D. W. 1988. Organizational citizenship behavior: The good soldier syndrome, Lexington, MA: Lexington Books. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) into the sport psychology literature and examine its utility in sport. Based upon OCB research in the organizational literature, the Multidimensional Model of Leadership (MML; Chelladurai, 1978 Chelladurai, P. 1978. “A contingency model of leadership in athletics”. In Unpublished doctoral dissertation, Waterloo: University of Waterloo, Canada.  [Google Scholar]), the conceptual framework of team cohesion (CFC; Carron & Hausenblas, 1998 Carron, A. V. and Hausenblas, H. A. 1998. Group dynamics in sport, 2nd., Morgantown, WV: Fitness Information Technology.  [Google Scholar]), and a model of athlete satisfaction (MAS; Chelladurai & Riemer, 1997 Chellardurai, P. and Riemer, H. A. 1997. A classification of facets of athlete satisfaction. Journal of Sport Management, 11: 133–159.  [Google Scholar]) were selected as theoretically sound antecedents to be associated with OCB in sport. A total of 193 student-athletes from a large Division I university and a smaller Division III university representing a variety of sports participated in the study. Results of the study provide preliminary evidence for OCB as a unique and meaningful construct in sport and support many of the predictions hypothesized in the MML, CFC, and MAS. Results are discussed in the context of previous literature as well as theoretical, research, and practical implications.     

Exploring the Relationship Between Interrater Correlations and Validity of Peer Ratings

A field study was conducted to investigate the relationship between interrater correlations and validity estimates of peer ratings. Validity coefficients and interrater correlations were calculated for 281 work units in a large law enforcement organization in Israel. The main result was a weak positive linear relationship between these two variables. Furthermore, in some of the analyses conducted, a nonlinear quadratic component in the relationship between these measures was evident. Validity was low only when interrater correlation was very low (r = .4 and less). Above this level, validity was stable and almost did not change as interrater correlation increased. This finding, together with other studies (Borman, 1975 Borman, W. C. 1975. Effects of instructions to avoid halo error on reliability and validity of performance evaluation ratings. Journal of Applied Psychology, 60: 556–560. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Buckner, 1959 Buckner, D. N. 1959. The predictability of ratings as a function of interrater agreement. Journal of Applied Psychology, 43: 60–64.  [Google Scholar]; Freeberg, 1969 Freeberg, N. E. 1969. Relevance of rater-ratee acquaintance in the validity and reliability of ratings. Journal of Applied Psychology, 53: 518–524.  [Google Scholar]; Weekley & Gier, 1989 Weekley, J. A. and Gier, J. A. 1989. Ceilings in the reliability and validity of performance ratings: The case of expert raters. Academy of Management Review, 32: 213–222.  [Google Scholar]), cast doubt on the assertion that interrater correlation in the field of performance rating is a proper measurement of reliability.     

The Role of Comprehension Processes in Communication and Persuasion

The impact of media communications on attitude formation and change clearly depends on how the messages are comprehended. Although the role of comprehension processes in communication and persuasion has a long history in social psychology (cf. Hovland, Janis, & Kelley, 1953 Hovland, C. I., Janis, I., & Kelley, H. H. (1953). Communication and persuasion. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. [Google Scholar]; McGuire, 1964 McGuire, W. J. (1964). Inducing resistance to persuasion. In L. Berkowitz (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (Vol. 1, pp. 191–229). New York, NY: Academic Press. [Google Scholar], 1968 McGuire, W. J. (1968). Personality and susceptibility to social influence. In E. F. Borgatta & W. W. Lambert (Eds.), Handbook of personality theory and research (pp. 1130–1187). Chicago, IL: Rand McNally. [Google Scholar], 1972 McGuire, W. J. (1972). Attitude change: An information processing paradigm. In C. G. McClintock (Ed.), Experimental social psychology (pp. 108–141). New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston. [Google Scholar]; Wyer, 1974 Wyer, R. S. (1974). Cognitive organization and change: An information-processing approach. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. [Google Scholar]), it has received little attention in media research. In this article, we discuss both theory and research that have implications for how the comprehension of communication at early stages of processing can impact attitudinal responses to media communications, including print and broadcast advertising, narrative television programming, newspaper articles, political messages, and donation appeals.     

The Effects of Athlete Retirement on Parents

It is often parents who introduce their children to competitive sports and parents who then provide remarkable emotional and material support across their children's athletic careers (Bloom, 1985 Bloom, B., ed. 1985. Developing talent in young people, New York: Ballantine Books.  [Google Scholar]; Côté, 1999 Côté, J. 1999. The influence of the family in the development of talent in sport. The Sport Psychologist, 13: 395–417. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). Considerable research documents athletes’ retirement experiences (Baillie, 1993 Baillie, P. 1993. Understanding retirement from sports: Therapeutic ideas for helping athletes in transition. The Counseling Psychologist, 21: 399–409.  [Google Scholar]; Baillie & Danish, 1992 Baillie, P. and Danish, S. J. 1992. Understanding the career transition of athletes. The Sport Psychologist, 6: 77–98. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]; Svoboda & Vanek, 1982 Svoboda, B. and Vanek, M. 1982. “Retirement from high level competition”. In Mental training for coaches and athletes, Edited by: Orlick, T., Partington, J. and Salmela, J. 166–175. Ottawa: Coaching Association of Canada.  [Google Scholar]; Werthner & Orlick, 1982 Werthner, P. and Orlick, T. 1982. Retirement experiences of successful Olympic athletes. International Journal of Sport Psychology, 17: 337–363.  [Google Scholar]), yet none explores the effects of retirement on parents. The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of athletes’ disengagement from sport on parents. In-depth interviews were conducted with six parents of former female elite gymnasts who had been retired for three to five years and the data analyzed inductively (Côté, Salmela, Baria, & Russell, 1993 Côté, J., Salmela, J., Baria, A. and Russell, S. 1993. Organizing and interpreting unstructured qualitative data. The Sport Psychologist, 7: 127–137. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Lally & Kerr, 2005 Lally, P. S. and Kerr, G. 2005. The career planning, athletic identity and student role identity of intercollegiate student-athletes. Research Quarterly for Exercise and Sport, 76: 275–285. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Miller & Kerr, 2002 Miller, P. S. and Kerr, G. 2002. The athletic, academic, and social experiences of intercollegiate student-athletes. Journal of Sport Behavior, 25: 346–367.  [Google Scholar], 2003 Miller, P. S. and Kerr, G. 2003. The role experimentation of intercollegiate student-athletes. The Sport Psychologist, 17: 197–220.  [Google Scholar]). Their daughters’ withdrawal from gymnastics and their own immediate disengagement from the world of elite sport had a tremendous impact on the participants’ personal and social relationships, leaving them struggling with weighty self-doubts over their failure to intervene with abusive coaches.     

Expert and “novice” problem solving strategies in chess: Sixty years of citing de Groot (1946)

In a famous study of expert problem solving, de Groot (1946 de Groot, A. D. 1946. Het denken van den schaker, Amsterdam: Noord Hollandsche.  [Google Scholar]/1978 de Groot, A. D. 1965. Thought and choice in chess, The Hague: Mouton Publishers.  [Google Scholar]) examined how chess players found the best move. He reported that there was little difference in the way that the best players (Grand Masters) and very good players (Candidate Masters) searched the board. Although this result has been regularly cited in studies of expertise, it is frequently misquoted. It is often claimed that de Groot found no difference in the way that experts and novices investigate a problem. Comparison of expert and novice chess players on de Groot's problem shows that there are clear differences in their search patterns. We discuss the troublesome theoretical and practical consequences of incorrectly reporting de Groot's findings.     

The Roots of Envy: The Unaesthetic Experience of the Tantalized/Dispossessed Self

In this paper I suggest that no matter how omnipotent, destructive, or perverse the currents of entitlement and hatred are that envy coils around, envy often serves as a fig-leaf for desire—a psychic figuration of refused desire. This claim invites us to consider the vicissitudes of maternal subjectivity in order to understand the patient's unconscious envy. Whereas Klein's focused on the wish to spoil the good object or take something away from her, my emphasis is on the self and the archaic wish/need to feel at-one-with/the same as the object which, when not realized, can transform into destructive envy. This paper attempts to develop the following three claims: (a) the idea of lack, abjection and/or humiliation as a narcissistic precondition for unconscious envy; (b) envy as a phantasied, pre-emptive means of identifying with the object once normal identificatory processes have gone awry (Benjamin, J., 1988 Benjamin, J. 1988. The bonds of love: Psychoanalysis, feminism, and the problem of domination New York: Pantheon..  [Google Scholar], 1995 Benjamin, J. 1995. Like subjects, love objects: Essays on recognition and sexual difference New Haven, CT: Yale University Press..  [Google Scholar]); and (c) the role of the analyst's subjectivity and unconscious communication in provoking or mitigating the patient's unconscious envy (Spillius, 1993 Spillius, E. B. 1993. Varieties of envious experience.. International Journal of Psycho-Analysis, 74: 1199–1213. [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar])—specifically, the analyst's unconscious countertransference identification.     

Calling the beautiful game ugly: A response to Davis

In a previous article (Kretchmar 2005 Kretchmar, S. 2005. Game flaws. Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, XXXII(1): 36–48.  [Google Scholar]), I identified problems in a certain species of games and traced these harms to something I called a ‘game flaw’. Unfortunately, ‘the beautiful game’ is a member of that species. I say it is unfortunate because Paul Davis (2006 Davis, P. 2006. Game strengths. Journal of the Philosophy of Sport, XXXIII(1): 50–66.  [Google Scholar]), when taking me to task for providing an argument that, in his terms, was ‘not especially compelling’, focused on the game of soccer (hereafter, football). The issue over which we contended is one of ‘time management’– that is, how game initiation, duration and closure are structured. I suggest that two basic methods for managing such requirements are available. Games take place during a stipulated amount of time or for a specified number of events. In my original article, I identified four fundamental problems that may accompany time-regulated games. In this essay, I attempt to fortify those claims against Davis's criticisms.     

Higher-order preferences and the Master Rationality Motive

The cognitive critique of the goals and desires that are input into the implicit calculations that result in instrumental rationality is one aspect of what has been termed broad rationality (Elster, 1983 Elster, J. 1983. Sour grapes: Studies in the subversion of rationality, Cambridge, , UK: Cambridge University Press. [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). This cognitive critique involves, among other things, the search for rational integration (Nozick, 1993 Nozick, R. 1993. The nature of rationality, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.  [Google Scholar])—that is, consistency between first-order and second-order preferences. Forming a second-order preference involves metarepresentational abilities made possible by mental decoupling operations. However, these decoupling abilities are separable from the motive that initiates the cognitive critique itself. I argue that Velleman (1992 Velleman, J. D. 1992. What happens when somebody acts?. Mind, 101: 461–481. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) has identified that motive (“the desire to act in accordance with reasons”), and that it might be operationalisable as a thinking disposition at a very superordinate cognitive level. This thinking disposition, the Master Rationality Motive, is likely to be of particular importance in explaining individual differences in the tendency to seek rational integration. Preliminary research on related constructs suggests that this construct is measurable.     

Holistic representation of negative numbers is formed when needed for the task

Past research suggested that negative numbers are represented in terms of their components—the polarity marker and the number (e.g., Fischer & Rottmann, 2005 Fischer, M. and Rottmann, J. 2005. Do negative numbers have a place on the mental number line?. Psychology Science, 47(1): 22–32.  [Google Scholar]; Ganor-Stern & Tzelgov, 2008 Ganor-Stern, D. and Tzelgov, J. 2008. Negative numbers are generated in the mind. Experimental Psychology, 55(3): 157–163.  [Google Scholar]). The present study shows that a holistic representation is formed when needed for the task requirement. Specifically, performing the numerical comparison task on positive and negative numbers presented sequentially required participants to hold both the polarity and the number magnitude in memory. Such a condition resulted in a holistic representation of negative numbers, as indicated by the distance and semantic congruity effects. This holistic representation was added to the initial components representation, thus producing a hybrid holistic-components representation.     

Criteria for basic emotions: Is DISGUST a primary “emotion”?

Tornochuk and Ellis argue that DISGUST should be considered a basic emotional system, on a par with the other basic emotional systems such as SEEKING, FEAR, RAGE, LUST, CARE, PANIC and PLAY, which constitute the groundwork for a cross-species emotion neuroscience with immediate implications for understanding emotional imbalances that characterise psychiatric disorders. Disgust is clearly a basic sensory/interoceptive affect (Rozin & Fallon, 1987 Rozin, P. and Fallon, A. 1987. A perspective on disgust. Psychological Review, 94: 23–41. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), and a socially constructed moral emotion (Haidt, 2003a Haidt, J. 2003a. “The moral emotions”. In Handbook of affective sciences, Edited by: Davidson, R. J., Scherer, K. R. and Goldsmith, H. H. 852–870. New York: Oxford University Press.  [Google Scholar], b Haidt, J. 2003b. The emotional dog and its rational tail: A social intuitionist approach to moral judgment. Psychological Review, 108: 814–834.  [Google Scholar]), but perhaps it is a category error to classify disgust as a basic emotion. It is more akin to a sensory affect. If we consider sensory disgust to be a basic emotional systems, then why not include hunger, thirst, fatigue and many other affective states of the body as emotions?