Do we need a concept of disease?

The terms “health”, “disease” and “illness” are frequently used in clinical medicine. This has misled philosophers into believing that these concepts are important for clinical thinking and decision making. For instance, it is held that decisions about whether or not to treat someone or whether to relieve someone of moral responsibility depend on whether the person has a disease. In this paper it is argued that the crucial role of the ‘disease’ concept is illusory. The health/disease distinction is irrelevant for most decisions and represents a conceptual straightjacket. Sophisticated and mature clinical decision making requires that we free ourselves from the concept of disease.     

Should persuasion be affective or cognitive? The moderating effects of need for affect and need for cognition

Three experiments tested the hypothesis that need for affect and need for cognition influence receptivity to affect- and cognition-based persuasive messages. Experiment 1 found that an affective message elicited more positive attitudes among individuals high in need for affect and low in need for cognition, whereas a cognitive message elicited more positive attitudes among individuals low in need for affect and high in need for cognition. Experiment 2 found that individual differences in need for affect influenced receptivity to an affect-based (but not cognition-based) message, whereas individual differences in need for cognition influenced receptivity to a cognition-based (but not affect-based) message. Experiment 3 found that individual differences in need for affect were associated with increased recognition of information from an affect-based (but not cognition-based) message, whereas individual differences in need for cognition were associated with increased recognition of information from a cognition-based (but not affect-based) message. Overall, the studies point to the importance of individual differences in need for affect and need for cognition in understanding how individuals respond to different types of persuasive messages.     

What do you (think you) need? Perceived vs. experienced effects of need fulfillment on well-being

We compared two approaches towards assessing inter-individual differences in the effect of satisfaction and frustration of basic needs (autonomy, competence, relatedness) on well-being: perceived need effects (beliefs about the effect of need fulfillment on one’s well-being) and experienced need effects (the within-person coupling of need fulfillment and well-being). In two studies (total N = 1281), participants reported perceived need effects in a multidimensional way. In Study 2, daily need fulfillment and affective well-being were additionally assessed (daily-diary study; ten days). Associations between perceived and experienced need effects were significant (albeit small) for all three frustration dimensions, but only for one satisfaction dimension (relatedness), suggesting that they capture different constructs and might be related to different outcomes.     

The role of passion,need satisfaction,and conflict in athletes’ perceptions of burnout

This research examined the role of harmonious and obsessive passion in athletes’ perceptions of burnout. Two studies using correlational designs were carried out with different samples of athletes of varied skill levels. In Study 1, we found that obsessive passion was positively, and harmonious passion negatively, associated with burnout perceptions in athletes. Results of Study 2 replicated the findings of Study 1 and in addition used Structural Equation Modeling analyses to support the mediating role of conflict and need satisfaction in the relation between types of passion for sport and athletes’ perceptions of burnout. Furthermore, it was found that harmonious passion for a second activity was associated with lower athletes’ perceptions of burnout; while obsessive passion for a second activity was directly associated with it. The results have important implications for theory and research on passion as well as burnout in sport.     

In need of liberation or constraint? How intergroup attitudes moderate the behavioral implications of intergroup ideologies

This study examined how behavioral responses to ideologies prompting other- or self-focus during intergroup exchanges depend on what individuals see when they look out at an outgroup interaction partner or in toward themselves. Specifically, we predicted that the outward focus on learning about and from outgroup members encouraged by multiculturalism would benefit lower-prejudice individuals (LPs) but instead amplify the implications of negative perceptions for higher-prejudice individuals (HPs). In contrast, we predicted that the evaluative concerns and self-focus induced by anti-racism would harm LPs’ behavior by leading them to second-guess acting on positive impulses but improve HPs’ behavior by leading them to rein in unfavorable reactions. Results were generally consistent with these predictions. Color-blindness had a negative effect not moderated by prejudice. These results suggest that tailoring the ideology promoted in a specific setting to the particular individuals who will be exposed to it might enhance the effectiveness of intervention efforts.     

Do we need an existential philosophy of the railway? Why then a philosophy of sport?

A lively debate has arisen about the need and the character of phenomenology—of phenomenology in general and of sports phenomenology in particular. This paper responds to Irena Martínková and Jim Parry who ‘defended’ philosophical phenomenology against my critique of their book about phenomenological approaches to sport. Where the defense maintains the existence of one single and correct phenomenology, understood as a sort of existential philosophy, this paper argues for a diversity of different types of phenomenology and more concretely for a phenomenological method that goes ‘back to phenomena.’     

Developmental aspects of consciousness: how much theory of mind do you need to be consciously aware?

When do children become consciously aware of events in the world? Five possible strategies are considered for their usefulness in determining the age in question. Three of these strategies ask when children show signs of engaging in activities for which conscious awareness seems necessary in adults (verbal communication, executive control, explicit memory), and two of the strategies consider when children have the ability to have the minimal form of higher-order thought necessary for access consciousness and phenomenal consciousness, respectively. The tentative answer to the guiding question is that children become consciously aware between 12 and 15 months (+/-3 months).     

Does a theory of language need a grammar? Evidence from Hebrew root structure

Hebrew constrains the occurrence of identical consonants in its roots: Identical consonants are acceptable root finally (e.g., skk), but not root initially (e.g., kks). Speakers' ability to freely generalize this constraint to novel phonemes (Berent, Marcus, Shimron, & Gafos, 2002) suggests that they represent segment identity-a relation among mental variables. An alternative account attributes the restriction on identical phonemes to their feature similarity, captured by either the number of shared features or their statistical frequency. The similarity account predicts that roots with partially similar consonants (e.g., sgk) should be at least as acceptable as roots with fully identical consonants (e.g., skk), and each of these roots should be less acceptable than dissimilar controls (e.g., gdn). Contrary to these predictions, three lexical decision experiments demonstrate that full identity is more acceptable than partial similarity and (in some cases) controls. Speakers' sensitivity to consonant identity suggests that linguistic competence, in general, and phonology, in particular, encompass a computational mechanism that operates over variables. This conclusion is consistent with linguistic accounts that postulate a symbolic grammatical component that is irreducible to the statistical properties of the lexicon.     

The effects of redundant communications on the behavior of listeners: Does a picture need a thousand words?

Using a referential communication paradigm, two types of, informative messages, contrastive and redundant, were compared developmentally in terms of their relative effects on the accuracy of listeners' responses as a function of task variables. Contrastive messages contained the minimal information necessary to distinguish a referent from a nonreferent. Redundant messages contained additional information. We predicted that redundant messages would be more effective than contrastive ones when the stimulus array was too complex for a listener to notice all aspects of it in the allotted time. Also manipulated were the order of presentation of the message and array and the delay between the two in order to determine how these factors would contribute to task complexity. Subjects were first-and third-graders and college students. The stimuli were drawings of cartoonlike figures. The results confirmed our predictions for the older subjects but not for the younger ones. The discussion of the data centered on why the picture-message sequence, was a more difficult sequence than the message-picture one for all age groups.     

No need for an intention to deceive? Challenging the traditional definition of lying

According to the traditional definition of lying, somebody lies if he or she makes a believed-false statement with the intention to deceive. The traditional definition has recently been challenged by non-deceptionists who use bald-faced lies to underpin their view that the intention to deceive is no necessary condition for lying. We conducted two experiments to test whether their assertions are true. First, we presented one of five scenarios that consisted of three different kinds of lies (consistent bald-faced lies, conflicting bald-faced lies, and indifferent lies). Then we asked participants to judge whether the scenario at hand was a lie, whether the speaker intended to deceive somebody, and how they would judge the behavior in terms of morality. As expected, our results indicate that the intention to deceive is not a necessary condition for lying. Participants rated indifferent lies to be lies and judged that no intention to deceive was involved in these cases. In addition, all bald-faced lies were evaluated as lies. However, participants widely ascribed an intention to deceive to bald-faced lies, which thus might not apply as counterexamples against the traditional definition of lying. Besides, lies are judged as morally wrong regardless of an intention to deceive.     

“Do I really need it?”: An explorative study of acceptance and usage of in-vehicle technology

The vehicle is increasingly equipped with additional technology assisting and entertaining the driver. To improve the systems and increase their usage, it is important to understand what influences the acceptance of technology in the vehicle. An online survey was conducted assessing which systems drivers own and use in their vehicles today. For the equipped systems, the reasons why N = 304 drivers do not use their in-vehicle technology were qualitatively explored. An inductive content analysis revealed 13 categories in total. The three categories “Need”, “Context and Task”, and “Reliability” were associated with Perceived Usefulness while “Increased Effort” and “Aversion” were associated with Perceived Ease of Use (Venkatesh, 2000). In addition, the influencing factors are further extended with the “Preference for Own Action”, “Distrust”, “Safety”, “Knowledge”, and “Habit”. The findings reveal subjectively important antecedents of the acceptance of in-vehicle technology and provide new insights, especially on usage barriers. An Integrated Acceptance Model (IAM) is derived from the identified categories to inform future research and facilitate a holistic view on factors influencing technology acceptance.     

Recipient need and efficacious caring as moderators of helpers’ reactions to rejection and acceptance

Two experiments support and extend the thesis that rejection of their help is stressful for would-be helpers, and that it leads to “damage controlling” reactions whose eventual goal is to restore their self-image of being efficacious at helping and caring. American college students were invited to offer help, if they wished, to a poorly performing (confederate) recipient who then either rejected or accepted it. Rejected helpers expressed relatively negative affect, biased postdictions of low acceptance, claims of low decision control, recipient- and self-devaluation, and less desire for further association. Individual differences in self-perceived “efficacious caring” and manipulated level of recipient need were shown to moderate some of these outcome reactions. Violated expectancy of acceptance was shown to mediate some of these reactions. Studies were cited showing the generalizability of these findings and theoretical framework to applied contexts and across cultural settings.     

Parasites of the mind. Why cultural theorists need the meme’s eye view

Are there any such things as mind parasites? By analogy with biological parasites, such cultural items are supposed to subvert or harm the interests of their host. The hypothesis of cultural parasitism has appeared in different guises in the burgeoning field of cultural evolution. To unpack the notion of mind parasites, we first clear some conceptual ground around the concept of cultural adaptation and its relation to human agency. We then formulate Millikan’s challenge: how can cultural items develop novel purposes of their own, cross-cutting or subverting our own personal purposes? If this central challenge is not met, talk of cultural ‘parasites’ or ‘selfish memes’ remains vacuous. First, we discuss why other attempts to answer Millikan’s challenge have failed. In particular, we put to rest the claims of panmemetics, a somewhat sinister worldview according to which human culture is nothing more than a swarm of selfish agents, plotting and scheming behind the scenes. Next, we reject a more reasonable, but still overly permissive approach to mind parasites, which equates them with biologically maladaptive culture. Finally, we present our own answer to Millikan’s challenge: certain systems of misbelief can be fruitfully treated as cultural parasites, designed by cultural evolution to subvert the interests of their human hosts. As a proof of concept, we discuss witchcraft beliefs in early modern Europe, and show how the meme’s eye view promises to shed new light on a mystery that historians and social scientists have been wrestling with for decades.     

Do we need visual subjects?

It is widely accepted within contemporary philosophy of perception that the content of visual states cannot be characterized simply as a list of represented features. This is because such characterization leads to the so-called ‘Many Properties’ problem, that is, it does not allow us to explain how the visual system is able to distinguish between scenes containing different arrangements of the same features. The usual solution to the Many Properties problem is to characterize some basic elements of content as subjects, to which features are attributed by a predication-like relation. In this paper, I reconsider this solution and claim that the Many Properties problem can be solved without postulating such subjects. What is more, I argue that an alternative approach has stronger justification given the empirical data concerning human vision.     

A cognitively-gated place? The role of need for closure in a biased perception of the place’s past

Biased memory of the past is often a starting point for intergroup conflicts. In three correlational studies, we examined the relationship between need for closure (NFC) and historical ethnocentric bias, a tendency to overestimate the role of one’s ethnic group in the multicultural history of the city of residence. In addition, we checked whether this relationship would be mediated by an individual preference for essentialist places. We found that higher NFC was related to increased historical ethnocentric bias. Moreover, this relation was mediated by preference for an essentialist type of a place. Our results may contribute to understanding the role of individual differences and preferred type of place in shaping a biased representation of the past. Furthermore, our research findings point to the importance of raising awareness of the multicultural past among high NFC individuals.