Verbal short-term memory as an articulatory system: Evidence from an alternative paradigm

In a series of seven experiments, the role of articulatory rehearsal in verbal short-term memory was examined via a shadowing-plus-recall paradigm. In this paradigm, subjects shadowed a word target presented closely after an auditory memory list before they recalled the list. The phonological relationship between the shadowing target and the final item on the memory list was manipulated. Experiments 1 and 2 demonstrated that targets sounding similar to the list-final memory item generally took longer to shadow than unrelated targets. This inhibitory effect of phonological relatedness was more pronounced with tense- than lax-vowel pseudoword recall lists. The interaction between vowel tenseness and phonological relatedness was replicated in Experiment 3 using shorter lists of real words. In Experiment 4, concurrent articulation was applied during list learning to block rehearsal; consequently, neither the phonological relatedness effect nor its interaction with vowel tenseness emerged. Experiments 5 and 6 manipulated the occurrence frequencies and lexicality of the recall items, respectively, instead of vowel tenseness. Unlike vowel tenseness, these non-articulatory memory factors failed to interact with the phonological relatedness effect. Experiment 7 orthogonally manipulated the vowel tenseness and frequencies of the recall items; slowing in shadowing times due to phonological relatedness was modulated by vowel tenseness but not frequency. Taken together, these results suggest that under the present paradigm, the modifying effect of vowel tenseness on the magnitude of slowing in shadowing due to phonological relatedness is indicative of a prominent articulatory component in verbal short-term retention. The shadowing-plus-recall approach avoids confounding overt recall into internal memory processing, which is an inherent problem of the traditional immediate serial recall and span tasks.     

Choice with initial and terminal link reinforcement: an alternative self-control paradigm

Self-control is demonstrated when a less desirable immediate outcome is chosen to ensure a substantially better future. In a novel animal analogue of this situation, primary reinforcement was delivered in both the initial and terminal links of a concurrent chain schedule. Rats made initial link choices between equal amounts of ethanol-free or ethanol-containing milk. Choosing the ethanol-free reinforcer resulted in delivery of the larger terminal link reinforcer and was thus analogous to self-control. Self-control decreased as the delay between initial and terminal links increased. The results have implications for human choice situations where decisions are made between two immediately available reinforcement alternatives each associated with a different delayed outcome.     

The epistemology of religiosity: an Orthodox Jewish perspective

This paper focusses on the Rabbinic suggestion that the attitude of awe, rather than any particular belief, lies at the heart of religiosity. On the basis of these Rabbinic sources, and others, the paper puts forward three theses: (1) that belief is not a sufficiently absorbing epistemic attitude to bear towards the truths of religion; (2) that much of our religious knowledge isn’t mediated via belief; and (3) that make-believe is sometimes more important, in the cultivation of religiosity than is mere belief.     

Towards an epistemology of religious traditions

Summary Starting from the acceptance of the Egalitarian Principle I exhibited a version which I considered too lax (BEP) and one I considered too strict (NEP), arriving at a version (MEP) which allows that there can be tolerance-limiting reasons for adhering to traditions but only if they are based on unreasoned knowledge claims. In fact, I hold that the situation most of us find ourselves in restricts such claims on religious topics to very general ones. Hence the choice between NEP and MEP is not significant. It follows that we should take up one of two positions concerning religious traditions: either we argue from the shared assumptions of a variety of traditions without genuine participation in any of them; or we justify participation in one of them by noting various marks of reliability, such as serendipitous understanding. A version of this paper was read at the Faith and Reason Conference held at the Catholic Institute in Strathfield, October 5 and 6, 1996. I would like to thank all who participated in the discussion of my paper on that occasion. I would also like to thank the anonymous referees for Sophia for their helpful comments.     

Participatory action research with self-help groups: An alternative paradigm for inquiry and action

Conclusion I have not sought here to make a case for participatory action research as theonly mode for inquiry and action with self-help groups, but to raise issues that may help counter the dominance of the conventional model and encourage a more pluralistic scientific enterprise. Researchers must be competent in and free to use (or try to use) whatever paradigms and techniques best fit their own epistemological preferences, the phenomena they wish to understand, and the goals and resources they and their coparticipants have. In particular, the assumptions and operating styles associated with PAR seem especially relevant and useful for inquiry and action that can advance knowledge about, and contribute to the effectiveness of, self-help groups. Dogma about the proper scientific method may suit the current scientific establishment and governmental funding agencies, but it does not necessarily lead to good research, research that is valid and useful to the scholarly community and to the self-help movement.In preparing this paper I benefited enormously from the suggestions of David Bargal, Thomasina Borkman, Barry Checkoway, Thomas Powell, and Margaret Weigers. An informal version of this paper was presented at the Planning Session on Collaboration with Parent Groups, sponsored by the National Project on Self-Help Groups, funded by a grant from Maternal and Child Health (MCJ-009127).     

Ecosystemic Epistemology: Critical Implications for the Aesthetics and Pragmatics of Family Therapy

This paper proposes that family therapy be responsive to both aesthetic and pragmatic considerations. Ecosystemic epistemology, a framework of ideas based on cybernetics, ecology, and systems theory, is suggested as a way of encompassing these different perspectives. Several critical ideas, often ignored by an overemphasis on pragmatics, involve: (a) the function of language in the relation between epistemology and clinical practice; (b) healthy and pathological family ecologies; (c) art and technique in therapy; and (d) the issue of manipulation.     

Ecosystemic Training: Conjoining Supervision and Organizational Development

Training in systems therapy is itself a systems process that is influenced by the organizational context in which it occurs. Systems trainers need to apply their skills to the interface between them and the agency, otherwise they face the danger that their impact will be eroded by organizational difficulties in “internalizing” their approach. Furthermore, there is much to be gained by working in this domain, especially if the training stimulates and becomes intertwined with organizational development. This coevolutionary process then facilitates integration of the systems model by both the trainees and the agency. Three variables, important for working at this interface, are analyzed: the approach of the supervisor, the composition and dynamics of the training group, and the treatment philosophy and work patterns of the institution. The implementation of this approach is demonstrated through a 4-year project of training and program development with Israel's Youth Protection Authority.     

The cognitive act and the first-person perspective: an epistemology for constructive type theory

The notion of cognitive act is of importance for an epistemology that is apt for constructive type theory, and for epistemology in general. Instead of taking knowledge attributions as the primary use of the verb ‘to know’ that needs to be given an account of, and understanding a first-person knowledge claim as a special case of knowledge attribution, the account of knowledge that is given here understands first-person knowledge claims as the primary use of the verb ‘to know’. This means that a cognitive act is an act that counts as cognitive from a first-person point of view. The method of linguistic phenomenology is used to explain or elucidate our epistemic notions. One of the advantages of the theory is that an answer can be given to some of the problems in modern epistemology, such as the Gettier problem.     

Preference for fixed-interval schedules: an alternative model

Pigeons were trained under concurrent chain schedules in which the initial links were equal aperiodic schedules and the terminal links were fixed-interval schedules. Choice proportions in the initial links were measured in 26 experimental conditions. The data showed the inadequacy of previous models of concurrent chain performance. A new model was suggested in which choice is a joint function of terminal-link times, overall reinforcement rates, and terminal-link entries. This model accounted for 94% of the variance in the present data and for substantial percentages of the variance in previously reported data. The model simplifies to matching between response ratios and obtained reinforcement rate ratios for simple concurrent schedule performance.     

Ecosystemic Structural Family Therapy: Theoretical and Clinical Foundations

Ecosystemic structural family therapy (ESFT) is a systemic, strength-based, and trauma-informed family therapy model that has evolved from structural family therapy (SFT; Minuchin in Families and family therapy, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, 1974). ESFT is an evidenced-based family therapy approach designed to intervene with families of children who are experiencing behavioral health problems and are at the risk of out-of-home placement. In this article we review the theoretical, applied, and empirical evolution of ESFT relative to extant SFT models. ESFT is based on the fundamental assumption that child, parental, and marital functioning are inextricably linked to their relational environment. Five interrelated constructs guide ESFT therapists in their understanding of clinical problems: family structure; family and individual emotional regulation; individual differences (e.g., historical, biological, cultural, developmental); affective proximity; and family development (Gehart 2010). ESFT has an extensive evaluation history dating back to the 1980s involving over 4,000 families in 39 different sites. While ESFT is considered evidence-based, it might be more consistent with “Practice-Based Evidence” given its long, extensive, and successful, history in the child mental health system in Pennsylvania.     

Optimality justifications: new foundations for foundation-oriented epistemology

In this paper a new conception of foundation-oriented epistemology is developed. The major challenge for foundation-oriented justifications consists in the problem of stopping the justificational regress without taking recourse to dogmatic assumptions or circular reasoning. Two alternative accounts that attempt to circumvent this problem, coherentism and externalism, are critically discussed and rejected as unsatisfactory. It is argued that optimality arguments are a new type of foundation-oriented justification that can stop the justificational regress. This is demonstrated on the basis of a novel result in the area of induction: the optimality of meta-induction. In the final section the method of optimality justification is generalized to deductive and abductive inferences.     

Memory transfer process: an extension of the Sternberg paradigm.

Research conducted by Sternberg (1969) has suggested that there is a transfer process, a cognitive process for activating stored knowledge. His research and that of those who have replicated and extended it have concentrated on distinct declarative lists of information. In two experiments, we have sought to extend this area by studying the cognitive processes for activating an action plan, a sequence of mental operations executed to achieve a goal. Results showed that (a) longer action plans took more time to activate, and (b) when the activation process was interrupted before completion, the process had to be restarted from its beginning after the interruption had been dealt with. These results were interpreted as evidence for a time-consuming transfer process in which the elements of action plans are transferred from long-term store to short-term store. These results are compared with other current data on the transfer process, and implications for the use of controlled knowledge in cognitive tasks are discussed.     

How objectivity undermines the study of personhood: Toward an intersubjective epistemology for psychological science

As a science, psychology embraces the value of objectivity. An objective observation is one that is (a) based upon publically observable phenomena (i.e., overt behavior); (b) unbiased, in the sense that it records only what was observed, without either adding or taking away from the observation, and (c) an accurate representation of the world as it truly is. To understand the person, however, it is necessary to come to grips with seemingly elusive concepts such as agency, symbolism, experience, meaning, inter-subjectivity, and morality. Such concepts make reference to phenomena that are not observable in way that one can observe objects in the physical world of space and time. In this paper, I examine how psychology's commitment to objectivity obscures our ability to understand persons. A remnant of the Cartesian distinction between a mind and body, the principle of objectivity forces psychologists to seek “objective” indicators of “subjective” processes. Following Wittgenstein and recent research on the mirror resonance system, I argue that psychological knowledge arises neither from within (subjectively) nor from without (objectively), but instead from between (intersubjectively). To understand what it means to be a person, we must abandon the false distinction between objectivity and subjectivity, and embrace an epistemology based on intersubjectivity.     

Correction to: Teleological epistemology

Philosophical Studies - In Section 3 of the original version, the Weak Evidentialist Norm is given as follows: ‘For every S, p and t, S’s coming to know p at t is...