Keeping track of what’s right

Abstract

In this paper, we argue that ordinary judgments about core normative topics purport to attribute stable, objective properties and relations. Our strategy is first to analyze the structures and practices characteristic of paradigmatically representational concepts such as concepts of objects and natural kinds. We identify three broad features that ground the representational purport of these concepts. We then argue that core normative concepts exhibit these same features.     

How do we track invisible objects?

We previously demonstrated that observers in multiple object tracking experiments can successfully track targets when all the objects simultaneously vanish for periods lasting several hundred milliseconds (Alvarez, Horowitz, Arsenio, Dimase, &; Wolfe, 2005). How do observers do this? Since observers can track objects that move behind occluders (e.g., Scholl &; Pylyshyn, 1999), they may treat a temporal gap as a case of complete occlusion. If so, performance should improve if occlusion cues (deletion and accretion) are provided and items disappear and reappear one by one (asynchronously), rather than simultaneously. However, we found better performance with simultaneous than with asynchronous disappearance (Experiment 1), whereas occlusion cues were detrimental (Experiment 2). We propose that observers tolerate a gap in tracking by storing the current task state when objects vanish and resuming tracking on the basis of that memory when the objects reappear (a task-switching account).     

Are psychological studies of religion on the right track?

Researchers in psychology of religion in America and Britain have inherited the theoretical and research traditions established by W. James, S. Freud and J. Dittes. New nomothetic or theoretical frameworks have been called for in order to organize a plethora of idiographic data. A response to the call has been slow, but Paul Pruyser designated at least six areas in which the development of psychology of religion might most fruitfully occur; and the suggestion has been that altered states of consciousness research is perhaps the most important item of all six to consider for research methodology. This particular item, it was broadly suggested, may possibly serve as a bridge between East and West, thereby bringing psychologists of religion out of the darkness of Western methodological ethnocentrism, and into the light of cross-cultural, universally-applicable concerns sought in the spirit of the scientific study of religion. Psychologists of religion must rely on the tradition of Religion-swissenschaft for much of the ‘non-reducible’ data they study. Although the preponderence of general activity in the field is occurring in America, little attention along these lines is evident there. In Britain, the discipline is floundering. Yet, in spite of its quandaries, recognition of the need to encounter Eastern psychologies and religions, perhaps by means of the ‘bridge’ of altered states of consciousness research, appears to be more clearly stated in Britain (though infrequent, often obscure) than it has been elsewhere.     

Inference to the best explanation: does it track truth?

In the form of inference known as inference to the best explanation there are various ways to characterise what is meant by the best explanation. This paper considers a number of such characterisations including several based on confirmation measures and several based on coherence measures. The goal is to find a measure which adequately captures what is meant by ‘best’ and which also yields the truth with a high degree of probability. Computer simulations are used to show that the overlap coherence measure achieves this goal, enabling the true explanation to be identified almost as often as an approach which simply selects the most probable explanation. Further advantages to this approach are also considered in the case where there is uncertainty in the prior probability distribution.     

Comment on “group shift to caution at the race track”

A recent study by McCauley, Stitt, Woods, and Lipton on the effects of three-person group discussions at the race track claims a systematic shift toward greater caution in betting choices, a result in contrast with the typical laboratory finding of group risky shifts. This study is criticized for an apparent statistical oversight. It is quite plausible that an apparent cautious shift could have arisen as an artifact of the distribution of original positions of the bettors being skewed in the risky direction. This type of potential artifact has been discussed before in the risky shift literature, but is especially stark in the present context. It is recommended as standard procedure for the present data and other similar data that initial group position be indexed with the median rather than the mean, or that other precautions be taken to eliminate the confounding effects of skewness on the assessment of risky or cautious group shifts.     

Do people automatically track others’ beliefs? Evidence from a continuous measure

Recent findings suggest that tracking others’ beliefs is not always effortful and slow, but may rely on a fast and implicit system. An untested prediction of the automatic belief tracking account is that own and others’ beliefs should be activated in parallel. We tested this prediction measuring continuous movement trajectories in a task that required deciding between two possible object locations. We independently manipulated whether participants’ belief about the object location was true or false and whether an onlooker’s belief about the object location was true or false. Manipulating whether or not the agent’s belief was ever task relevant allowed us to compare performance in an explicit and implicit version of the same task. Movement parameters revealed an influence of the onlooker’s irrelevant belief in the implicit version of the task. This provides evidence for parallel activation of own and others’ beliefs.     

Where’s the cookie? The ability of monkeys to track object transpositions

Object permanence is the ability to represent mentally an object and follow its position even when it has disappeared from view. According to Piaget’s 6-stage scale of the sensorimotor period of development, it seems that object permanence appears in Stage 4 and fully develops in Stage 6. In this study, we investigated the ability of some species of monkeys (i.e. pig-tailed macaque, lion-tailed macaque, Celebes crested macaque, barbary macaque, De Brazza’s monkey, L’Hoest’s monkey, Allen’s swamp monkey, black crested mangabeys, collared mangabeys, Geoffroy’s spider monkey) to track the displacement of an object, which consisted of a reward hidden under one of two cups. Our findings showed that the examined subjects possess Stage 6 of object permanence. We then compared our results with data on apes and dogs participating in Rooijakkers et al. (Anim Cogn 12:789–796, 2009) experiment, where the same method was applied. The monkeys examined by us performed significantly better than the dogs but worse than the apes. In our experiment, the monkeys performed above chance level in all variants, but it should be noted that we observed significant differences in the number of correct choices according to the level of a variant’s complexity.     

To grandmother's house we go? Around the bend on the “mommy track”

This paper focuses on caregiving issues and their salience for women as the primary providers of care to elderly relatives. Assignment to caregiving roles on the basis of gender reflects cultural values and has important social, psychological, and economic implications. Advances in biomedical technology are changing the nature and duration of women's traditional responsibilities for elder care, and present trends suggest that long-term care concerns will continue to gain in prominence as the American population ages. Socialization processes and demographic factors impose greater caregiving burdens on women than on men. A resurgence of interest in family responsibility for elder care, arising out of growing public concern over rapidly rising costs, also affects women disproportionately. The greatest danger is that serial caregiving will compound and reinforce women's current disadvantages in the labor market. Policies that move toward more equitable distribution of caregiving burdens are clearly overdue.     

Violence in sports and among sportsmen: a single or two‐track issue?

The object of this study is to find our whether there are differences between the forms of violence exerted by sportsmen and those represented within sports areas. Three hundred competitors from five sports disciplines (karate, basketball, table tennis, swimming and shooting) were approached and filled out a questionnaire. Results showed (1) sportsmen do not exert the same forms of violence depending on the sport and that there are similarities between the forms of violence in sports and those represented in the sporting field which supports the “homological assumption” [Bourdieu, 1979 ]; (2) the frequency and degree of the forms of violence relate to one another and differentiate sports significantly, thus confirming the influence of their level; and (3) a cross‐matching of the forms of violence and their level shows an uneven distribution of the sports in three “classes”. Therefore, these overall results show that the forms of violence, their frequency and their degree are particularly effective variables when accounting for differences in “relations” violence in sports and among sportsmen. Aggr. Behav. 32:1–10, 2006. © 2006 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Fine motor skill proficiency in typically developing children: On or off the maturation track?

Fine motor skill proficiency is an essential component of numerous daily living activities such as dressing, feeding or playing. Poor fine motor skills can lead to difficulties in academic achievement, increased anxiety and poor self-esteem. Recent findings have shown that children’s gross motor skill proficiency tends to fall below established developmental norms. A question remains: do fine motor skill proficiency levels also fall below developmental norms? The aim of this study was to examine the current level of fine motor skill in Irish children. Children (N = 253) from 2nd, 4th and 6th grades (mean age = 7.12, 9.11 and 11.02 respectively) completed the Fine Motor Composite of the Bruininks Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency 2nd Edition (BOT-2). Analysis revealed that only 2nd grade children met the expected level of fine motor skill proficiency. It was also found that despite children’s raw scores improving with age, children’s fine motor skill proficiency was not progressing at the expected rate given by normative data. This leads us to question the role and impact of modern society on fine motor skills development over the past number of decades.     

How does attention select and track spatially extended objects? New effects of attentional concentration and amplification

Real-world situations involve attending to spatially extended objects, often under conditions of motion and high processing load. The present experiments investigated such processing by requiring observers to attentionally track a number of long, moving lines. Concurrently, observers responded to sporadic probes as a measure of the distribution of attention across the lines. The results revealed that attention is concentrated at the centers of lines during tracking, despite their uniformity, and that this center advantage grew as the lines became longer: Not only did observers get worse near the endpoints, but they became better at the lines' centers, as if attention became more concentrated as the objects became more extended. These results begin to show how attention is flexibly allocated in online visual processing to extended dynamic objects.     

Explicating pluralism: Where the mind to molecule pathway gets off the track—Reply to Bickle

It is argued that John Bickle’s Ruthless Reductionism is flawed as an account of the practice of neuroscience. Examples from genetics and linguistics suggest, first, that not every mind-brain link or gene-phenotype link qualifies as a reduction or as a complete explanation, and, second, that the higher (psychological) level of analysis is not likely to disappear as neuroscience progresses. The most plausible picture of the evolving sciences of the mind-brain seems a patchwork of multiple connections and partial explanations, linking anatomy, mechanisms and functions across different domains, levels, and grain sizes. Bickle’s claim that only the molecular level provides genuine explanations, and higher level concepts are just heuristics that will soon be redundant, is thus rejected. In addition, it is argued that Bickle’s recasting of philosophy of science as metascience explicating empirical practices, ignores an essential role for philosophy in reflecting upon criteria for reduction and explanation. Many interesting and complex issues remain to be investigated for the philosophy of science, and in particular the nature of interlevel links found in empirical research requires sophisticated philosophical analysis.     

Primary teachers’ perceptions that impact upon track recommendations regarding pupils’ enrolment in secondary education: a path analysis

In less meritocratic educational systems, teachers’ decision-making processes and their perceptions of pupils are essential for the practice of pupils’ allocation at transitory moments. The present study investigated how perceptions held by teachers impact upon teacher track recommendations regarding pupils’ enrolment in secondary education in Flanders. By means of structural equation modelling, we studied the hypothesised impact of pupils’ cognitive (i.e. maths skills, language skills and technical skills) and non-cognitive (i.e. school-appropriate behaviours and personal-social behaviours) attributes and of teacher–pupil relationships, as perceived by the teachers. Additionally, we addressed the hypothesised (mediated) impact of perceived parental involvement in education and parents’ socio-economic status (SES) and ethnicity, as social and cultural parental background characteristics. Results show that teacher track recommendations are best directly predicted by pupils’ perceived maths skills. Also pupils’ perceived school-appropriate behaviours and parents’ SES substantially and directly predict teacher track recommendations. Teacher track recommendations are further indirectly affected by perceived parental involvement in education, parents’ SES and parents’ ethnicity.     

Dogs’ ability to follow temporarily invisible moving objects: the ability to track and expect is shaped by experience

Animal Cognition - Visually tracking a moving object, even if it becomes temporarily invisible, is an important skill for animals living in complex environments. However, this ability has not been...     

How do warnings influence cyclists' reaction to conflicts? Comparing acoustic and vibro-tactile warnings in different conflicts on a test track

An on-bike warning system has great potential to increase safety of cyclists. For an effective warning system, the implementation of warning signals is fundamental. However, more knowledge about the cyclist specific design of warnings and the influence of warnings on the cyclist is needed. To analyze the benefit of warnings in conflicts and the reaction pattern of cyclists we conducted a test-track experiment. We evaluated the data of 62 participants who were divided into three warning groups (between-subjects) and encountered different situations (within-subjects). The warning groups either received acoustic, vibro-tactile or no warnings. The situation variable consisted of three conflicts and two false warnings in the groups with warnings.We measured significantly shorter reaction times of persons who received acoustic and vibro-tactile warnings compared to the persons without warning. Furthermore, acoustic warnings led to shorter reaction times compared to vibro-tactile warnings. The reaction pattern was described by different bicycle dynamics variables. It was mostly influenced by the situation and rarely by the warning group. Based on the velocity curves and reaction times we identified learning effects describing how the warned participants adopted the warning system over the five situations.These findings indicate that a warning system offers great safety benefits to cyclists. Based on the current results, acoustic warnings are recommended when an urgent reaction is required.     

Effects of explanation-based knowledge regarding system functions and driver’s roles on driver takeover during conditionally automated driving: A test track study

The present study was designed to examine the influence of explanation-based knowledge regarding system functions and the driver’s role in conditionally automated driving (Level 3, as defined in SAE J3016). In particular, we studied how safely and successfully drivers assume control of the vehicle when encountering situations that exceed the automation parameters. This examination was conducted through a test-track experiment. Thirty-two younger drivers (mean age = 37.3 years) and 24 older drivers (mean age = 71.1 years) participated in Experiments 1 and 2, respectively. Adopting a between-participants design, in each experiment the participants were divided into two age- and sex-matched groups that were given differing levels of explanation-based knowledge concerning the system limitations of automated driving. The only information given to the less-informed groups was that, during automated driving, drivers may be required to occasionally assume control of the vehicle. The well-informed groups were given the same information, as well as details regarding the auditory-visual alerts produced by the human–machine interface (HMI) during requests to intervene (RtIs), and examples of situations where RtIs would be issued. Ten and nine RtI events were staged for each participant in Experiment 1 and 2, respectively; the participants performed a non-driving-related task while the automated driving system was functioning. For both experiments it was found that, for all RtI events, more participants in the well-informed groups than the less-informed groups successfully assumed control of the vehicle. These results suggest that, in addition to providing information regarding the possible occurrence of RtIs, explanations of HMI and RtI-related situations are effective for helping both younger and older drivers safely and successfully negotiate such events.