Optimal Predictions in Everyday Cognition: The Wisdom of Individuals or Crowds?

Griffiths and Tenenbaum (2006) asked individuals to make predictions about the duration or extent of everyday events (e.g., cake baking times), and reported that predictions were optimal, employing Bayesian inference based on veridical prior distributions. Although the predictions conformed strikingly to statistics of the world, they reflect averages over many individuals. On the conjecture that the accuracy of the group response is chiefly a consequence of aggregating across individuals, we constructed simple, heuristic approximations to the Bayesian model premised on the hypothesis that individuals have access merely to a sample of k instances drawn from the relevant distribution. The accuracy of the group response reported by Griffiths and Tenenbaum could be accounted for by supposing that individuals each utilize only two instances. Moreover, the variability of the group data is more consistent with this small-sample hypothesis than with the hypothesis that people utilize veridical or nearly veridical representations of the underlying prior distributions. Our analyses lead to a qualitatively different view of how individuals reason from past experience than the view espoused by Griffiths and Tenenbaum.     

Bioethics in the Making: “Ideal Patients” and the Beginnings of Face Transplant Surgery in Mexico

Medical teams around the world are increasingly gaining ethical clearance to utilise face transplant surgery as a reconstructive surgical procedure. Analysis of the beginnings of the operation in Mexico vis-à-vis the early uptake of the procedure in France reveals that this controversial experimental medical field has become loaded with national significance. The primary issue of dispute has been the dependence on life-threatening immunosuppressant therapy in a procedure that treats otherwise biologically healthy people. Attempts to resolve related debate has resulted in the emergence of what my interlocutors refer to as an “ideal patient”, a person whose particular state of health and suffering render them operable within the current biomedical constraints. Drawing together the idiom of coproduction with the concept of sociotechnical imaginaries shows how this imagined patient category was refracted and stabilised as it entered into the Mexican context whilst producing patients and surgical experts as particular types of bioethical subjects. The flexibility and normative value of the “ideal patient” mobilises and is mobilised by surgeons, who themselves emerge as national bioethical subjects responsible for saving the face of nations in the midst of broader changes surrounding how State's should respond to medical advancement.     

Understanding Satisfaction: An Analysis of the Meaning Potential of the Word “Satisfaction” in Everyday Norwegian Language

Satisfaction with life is often considered to be a component of or a synonym for subjective well-being. However, the meaning of “satisfaction” is rarely discussed in the scientific literature. The purpose of this study was to examine the meaning potential of the Norwegian term for satisfaction (tilfredshet). A conceptual analysis was conducted based on the qualitative responses of 276 Norwegian adults to the question “What is satisfaction for you?” Based on principles of thematic analysis, text data units were examined to develop a framework of recurrent themes and superordinate categories. The analysis demonstrated that the word “satisfaction” in everyday Norwegian language does not unequivocally point toward a unitary, clear-cut affective or evaluative phenomenon. Instead, its meaning potential was found to include material, physiological and interpersonal conditions, activities, internal psychological states, and circumstances and contexts of well-being, connected by temporal and causal assumptions. In addition to hedonic understandings, eudaimonic and processual conceptualizations of satisfaction were identified. Findings support a conceptual co-existence of satisfaction as satisficing (conditions evaluated as good enough) and as more optimal fulfilment (conditions evaluated as good). Further qualitative studies of conceptual understanding across cultural contexts and languages are recommended.     

“In the Face,a Right Is There”: Arendt,Levinas and the Phenomenology of the Rights of Man

This paper examines the differences between the thought of Hannah Arendt and Emmanuel Levinas concerning the “Rights of Man”, in relation to stateless persons. In The Origins of Totalitarianism, Arendt evinces a profound scepticism towards this ideal, which for her was powerless without being tethered to citizenship. But Arendt’s own idea of the “Right to have Rights” is critiqued here as being inadequate to the ethical demand placed upon states by refugees, in failing to articulate just what states might be responsible for. I argue that the ethical philosophy of Levinas meets this lacuna in Arendt’s thought, via his concept of the Face as the locus of human dignity and to which states can be recalled to responsibility. Levinas wrote several papers on what he called “the phenomenology of the Rights of Man”, and in his phrase, which provides a summation of precisely what is lacking in Arendt’s arguments: “In the face – a right is there”.     

“American” as a Proxy for “Whiteness”: Racial Color-Blindness in Everyday Life

This article discusses racial color-blindness as it relates to a modern strategy used by both Whites and People of Color (POC) to mask their discussions of race and privilege. People who endorse racial color-blindness tend to believe that race should not matter and currently does not matter in understanding individuals’ lived experiences. Therefore, racially color-blind individuals use strategies to justify their racial privilege and racist beliefs and attitudes. One such strategy is to use the term “American” as a proxy for “White” in describing instances of White privilege as norms and to hide discussions of race more generally. Study 1 findings show that there are many different socially constructed definitions for the term American. Study 2 findings reveal differences in definitions for American depending on an individual’s race and generational status.     

Delayed disclosure of disability related needs: Experiences of “at-risk” students in a South African university

The present study explored disability disclosure influences on university students, and specifically the types of supports the students perceive to need. Informants were three differently abled students (female = 1 and males = 2). They participated in semi-structured and focus group interviews on their delayed disability disclosure. Thematic analysis of the data revealed students to contend with inaccessibility of information on support mechanisms, low self-confidence, stigma and doubt, and embarrassment to negotiate support. To best support students with disabilities in their disability disclosure, student counselling services should prioritise dealing with their anxieties and follow this up by supporting them in balancing their disability and academic needs.     

Acting Nasty in the Face of Failure? Longitudinal Observations of “Hard-to-Manage” Children Playing a Rigged Competitive Game with a Friend

Peer problems are almost universal among children with disruptive behavior disorders, and have been linked to social information processing deficits that lead to heightened threat responses (K. A. Dodge, 1980). This 2-year longitudinal study uses direct observations to examine the real-life significance of this finding. Forty hard-to-manage children and 40 typically developing control children were filmed at ages 5 and 7 playing a rigged competitive game in which they experienced a clear threat of losing. Group differences in negative behavior (hard-to-manage > controls) were stable over time and independent of verbal ability. Predictors of individual differences in negative behavior were also examined. Previous studies with this sample have shown that at 4 years of age, the hard-to-manage children displayed elevated frequencies of violent pretend play (J. Dunn & C. Hughes, 2001), coupled with poor performance on tests of executive function and theory of mind (C. Hughes, J. Dunn, & A. White, 1998). In this study, 4-year-olds whose pretend play indicated a preoccupation with violence were more likely to respond negatively to the threat of losing a competitive game at age 5 and at age 7. Four-year-olds who performed poorly on tests of theory of mind and executive function showed higher rates of negative behavior at age 5 but not age 7. These findings highlight just a few of the multiple paths leading to peer problems among children with disruptive behavior problems.     

Facing Down the Representation of An Impossibility: Indigenous Responses to a ‘Universal’ Problem in the Repatriation Context

This paper explores the ways Native Americans and Native Hawiians have responded to what Ernesto Laclau has called ‘the representation of an impossibility’—the discursive crisis faced by non-dominant groups who seek to advance rights claims in ways that are culturally rooted but universally audible to ideologically dominant audiences. Taking the NAGPRA law of 1990 as its case study, this paper asserts the need for a re-theorisation of indigenous religious discourse in order to illuminate the ways native peoples build rather than concede agency through self-representations in the current political moment. Pursuing this argument, the paper charts an analytical course specifying the relationship of rights claims to discourse, hegemony, articulation, tradition, and religion. The paper then focuses upon specific examples of religious claims in the context of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act to demonstrate the ways Native Americans have faced down an ‘impossibility’.     

Uncanny Resonances: A Discussion of “Did You Say He Has a Hitler Mustache?: Analytic Vulnerability and Destabilization in the Face of Trauma”

Silverman’s moving essay is replete with vulnerability and uncanny resonances. I try to enter her experience and imagine its possible meaning and impact on Silverman and then on me, as discussant. Finally, I play with Silverman’s clinical material and explore the potential consequences of other ways of moving in the therapeutic moment. When can we usefully engage our experience (in general) and of the uncanny (in particular) with our patient? What factors (theoretical and personal) might inform our choice to self-disclose or contain? Rather than privileging either way of working, I suggest that there’s an upside and an underbelly to every clinical move—to holding, to self-disclosure, to the mutual analysis of enactments, and to neutral interpretation and imagine some of these clinical consequences.     

Carrying the Burden: Counselors of Color’s Experiences of Microaggressions in Counseling

In this secondary analysis using a previous dataset, the authors explored, via a phenomenological research tradition, how 8 counselors of color responded to clients’ microaggressive behaviors. Researchers identified 3 major themes in the data: (a) buffering and bracing for racial microaggressions, (b) experiencing the intrusions of racial microaggressions, and (c) strategizing and responding in session. The authors apply the Multicultural and Social Justice Counseling Competencies (Ratts, Singh, Nassar-McMillan, Butler, & McCullough, 2015) to their findings as a framework for considering practice and training implications.     

“Never Again the Everyday”: On Cinema,Colportage and the Pedagogical Possibilities of Escapism

Studies in Philosophy and Education - This article is a philosophical analysis of escapism as a pedagogical possibility, with a particular focus on TV series. Taking my own, as well as students,...     

“They Say That You Are a Danger But You Are Not”: Representations and Construction of the Moral Self in Narratives of “Dangerous Individuals” 1

This article is based on an analysis of narratives of 26 offenders with mental health problems living in the United Kingdom. It explores the impact of an ascribed dangerous status and the construction of the self as moral and responsible in response to this label with reference to the literature on denial, deviance disavowal and other “techniques of neutralization” and Goffman's presentation of self. Two dominant strands are identified in relation to the construction of moral self-hood: “Not my fault” and “Good at heart” narratives. “Techniques of neutralization” are widely drawn on, particularly denial of responsibility in the “Not my fault” narratives that seek to explain anti-social behavior with reference to external forces such as a hostile environment inhibiting their ability to control their lives. In contrast, “Good at heart” narratives draw on the essentially good and moral nature of the inner-self. Both are used as evidence of sharing and adhering to moral norms in order to present an acceptable and credible self.     

Happiness Inducing Behaviors in Everyday Life: An Empirical Assessment of “The How of Happiness”

The frequency of Happiness Inducing Behaviors (HIB) was assessed in a survey of 903 university students; measures of Big Five personality traits and happiness were also obtained. Students reported engaging in many HIBs about 1–3 times per week. Analysis of HIB yielded three factors: Positive/Proactive Behaviors; Spiritual Behaviors; and Physical Health Behaviors. Positive/Proactive behaviors predicted significant additional variance in happiness beyond the variance predictable from Big Five personality traits. Mediation analysis suggested that effects of Big Five traits on happiness may be mediated to varying degrees by engagement in Positive/Proactive Behaviors and Physical Health Behaviors. Additional analyses examined possible moderation of the association between HIB and happiness by gender and Big Five traits; the strength of association between behavior and happiness did not differ between women and men, or across people with different scores on Big Five traits. This study provides additional evidence that naturally occurring behaviors are predictive of happiness in everyday life and confirms earlier findings about the degree to which behaviors mediate effects of Big Five traits on happiness.     

Embodiment and Estrangement: Results from a First-in-Human “Intelligent BCI” Trial

While new generations of implantable brain computer interface (BCI) devices are being developed, evidence in the literature about their impact on the patient experience is lagging. In this article, we address this knowledge gap by analysing data from the first-in-human clinical trial to study patients with implanted BCI advisory devices. We explored perceptions of self-change across six patients who volunteered to be implanted with artificially intelligent BCI devices. We used qualitative methodological tools grounded in phenomenology to conduct in-depth, semi-structured interviews. Results show that, on the one hand, BCIs can positively increase a sense of the self and control; on the other hand, they can induce radical distress, feelings of loss of control, and a rupture of patient identity. We conclude by offering suggestions for the proactive creation of preparedness protocols specific to intelligent—predictive and advisory—BCI technologies essential to prevent potential iatrogenic harms.

     

Estimating the Prevalence of Gender-Biased Language in Undergraduates’ Everyday Speech

Sex Roles - Research has shown that language can be gender-biased; however, little research has investigated the prevalence of this bias in everyday speech. Using recordings sampled from...     

German Muslims and the ‘Integration Debate’: Negotiating Identities in the Face of Discrimination

Based on five focus groups (total N?=?56) with German Muslims, we analyze discourses on the experience of discrimination and feelings of national and religious attachment. The focus groups took place in mid to late 2010 in four German cities. Whereas only few participants describe personal discrimination by non-Muslim Germans, almost all participants complain about being collectively discriminated and rejected. This perception triggers processes of confirming their original cultural identity, primarily their Muslim affiliation and of strengthening the boundary towards the wider society. The analysis of the discourse shows the participants to fall back into an essentialized way of thinking that makes their ethnic being incompatible with being German; and they resort to their Muslim roots as a cultural resource for identity construction and self-worth. Others cope with their feeling of rejection by engaging in local politics and sports activities that allows them to attribute themselves a hyphenated identity as Turkish-Germans. The findings are discussed in terms of social identity, psychological essentialism, transnationalized religion, and boundary making.