Linear programming techniques for multidimensional analysis of preferences

This paper offers a new methodology for analyzing individual differences in preference judgments with regard to a set of stimuli prespecified in a multidimensional attribute space. The individual is modelled as possessing an ideal point denoting his most preferred stimulus location in this space and a set of weights which reveal the relative saliences of the attributes. He prefers those stimuli which are closer to his ideal point (in terms of a weighted Euclidean distance measure). A linear programming model is proposed for external analysisi.e., estimation of the coordinates of his ideal point and the weights (involved in the Euclidean distance measure) by analyzing his paired comparison preference judgments on a set of stimuli, prespecified by their coordinate locations in the multidimensional space. A measure of poorness of fit is developed and the linear programming model minimizes this measure overall possible solutions. The approach is fully nonmetric, extremely flexible, and uses paired comparison judgments directly. The weights can either be constrained nonnegative or left unconstrained. Generalizations of the model to consider ordinal or interval preference data and to allow an orthogonal transformation of the attribute space are discussed. The methodology is extended to perform internal analysis,i.e., to determine the stimuli locations in addition to weights and ideal points by analyzing the preference judgments of all subjects simultaneously. Computational results show that the methodology for external analysis is unbiased—i.e., on an average it recovers the true ideal point and weights. These studies also indicate that the technique performs satisfactorily even when about 20 percent of the paired comparison judgments are incorrectly specified.The authors wish to express their deep appreciation to J. Douglas Carroll and Joseph B. Kruskal for their most valuable comments on an earlier version of this paper.     

On the base-free measure of change proposed by Tucker,Damarin and Messick

Tucker, Damarin and Messick proposed a base-free measure of change which involves the computation of residual scores that are uncorrelated with true scores on the pretest. The present note discusses this change measure and demonstrates that, because of an incorrect derivation by the authors, properties they attribute to (the coefficient for the regression of true scores from the second testing on true scores from the first testing) are, in fact, properties ofb, the ordinary regression coefficient. A correct derivation of the initial position—change correlation in terms of is obtained, and Tucker et al.'s discussion of the law of initial values is reconsidered.The preparation of this paper was supported by the Learning Research and Development Center supported in part as a research and development center by funds from the National Institute of Education.     

The Structure of Domination Today: A Lacanian View

Two topics determine today's liberal tolerant attitude towards Others: the respect of Otherness and the obsessive fear of harassment: the Other is OK insofar as its presence is not intrusive, insofar as the Other is not really Other. The central human right in late-capitalist society, namely the right to be free from all harassment by the Other including the violent imposition of ethical norms, contrasts sharply with the violent imposition of divine Mosaic law – the Decalogue – from which the idea of human rights ultimately derives. The underlying discursive shift can be analyzed with the help of Lacan: the discourse of the Master had been replaced by university discourse. While the Master's decision is per se violent, university discourse is enunciated from the position of neutral Knowledge. The truth of the university discourse is power: the constitutive lie of the university discourse is that it disavows its performative dimension, presenting what effectively amounts to a political decision based on power as a simple insight into the factual state of things.     

Measuring grief: A short version of the perinatal grief scale

Despite a considerable number of studies, there are two major drawbacks in the literature on grief and bereavement. One is a lack of adequate and generally agreed upon measures for assessing grief. The second is a lack of ability to predict from existing measures the likelihood of what has been termed chronic or pathological grief reactions. This paper reports the results of the development of a bereavement measure for the study of perinatal loss which attempts to address these gaps. The measure is specific to a pregnancy-related loss, although it has the potential for adaptation to use for other types of loss. Analysis of responses from 138 women has resulted in the reduction of the original measure from 104 to a more manageable and almost equally comprehensive and reliable 33 items. In addition, a factor analysis has produced three factors, two of which indicate the possibility for longer-term and more severe grief reactions. Because of its sound psychometric qualities and interesting factor structure, the measure shows promise of being useful for both research and clinical purposes.This research was funded by National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Grant R01 H18431-04, with additional assistance from the Center for Social Research at Lehigh University. Dr. Potvin is supported by the Quebec Health Research Fund.     

The suffix priming effect: Further evidence for an early morpho-orthographic segmentation process independent of its semantic content

This work presents the results of a masked lexical decision experiment in which we explore the morphological parsing of Spanish suffixed or pseudosuffixed words through the suffix priming effect. Priming the bases or pseudobases with their suffixed or pseudosuffixed forms is the standard process in experiments aimed at understanding the processes underlying morphological parsing in visual word recognition with masked priming lexical decision (e.g., darkness–DARK; corner–CORN). We, however, compare the effect of suffix priming on the lexical decision of suffixed (ero–JORNALERO) and pseudosuffixed words (ero–CORDERO), as well as the effect of orthographic priming on nonsuffixed words (eba–PRUEBA). The results show that in the case of suffixed and pseudosuffixed words, related primes (ero–JORNALERO; ero–CORDERO) significantly accelerated response latencies in comparison to unrelated primes (ista–JORNALERO; ura–CORDERO), while for simple words there was no facilitation from the orthographically related prime in comparison to the unrelated prime (eba–PRUEBA; afo–PRUEBA). These results are consistent with the so-called morpho-orthographic segmentation process in the course of visual word recognition, which might also be independent of orthographic and purely semantic factors. Our results also support the view that morphological parsing takes place regardless of whether a stem is present in a word. These results complement findings from studies dealing with CORNER- and BROTHEL-like stimuli.     

Intensional Completeness in an Extension of Gödel/Dummett Logic

We enrich intuitionistic logic with a lax modal operator and define a corresponding intensional enrichment of Kripke models M = (W, , V) by a function T giving an effort measure T(w, u) {} for each -related pair (w, u). We show that embodies the abstraction involved in passing from true up to bounded effort to true outright. We then introduce a refined notion of intensional validity M |= p : and present a corresponding intensional calculus iLC-h which gives a natural extension by lax modality of the well-known G: odel/Dummett logic LC of (finite) linear Kripke models. Our main results are that for finite linear intensional models L the intensional theory iTh(L) = {p : | L |= p : } characterises L and that iLC-h generates complete information about iTh(L).Our paper thus shows that the quantitative intensional information contained in the effort measure T can be abstracted away by the use of and completely recovered by a suitable semantic interpretation of proofs.     

A new approach to the formulation and testing of learning models

It is argued that current attempts to model human learning behavior commonly fail on one of two counts: either the model assumptions are artificially restricted so as to permit the application of mathematical techniques in deriving their consequences, or else the required complex assumptions are imbedded in computer programs whose technical details obscure the theoretical content of the model. The first failing is characteristic of so-called mathematical models of learning, while the second is characteristic of computer simulation models. An approach to model building which avoids both these failings is presented under the title of a black-box theory of learning. This method permits the statement of assumptions of any desired complexity in a language which clearly exhibits their theoretical content.Section II of the paper is devoted to the problem of testing and comparing alternative learning theories. The policy advocated is to abandon attempts at hypothesis testing. It is argued that, in general, we not only lack sufficient data and sufficiently powerful techniques to test hypotheses, but that the truth of a model is not really the issue of basic interest. A given model may be true in the sense that on the basis of available evidence we cannot statistically reject it, but not interesting in the sense that it provides little information about the processes underlying behavior. Rather, we should accept or reject models on the basis of how much information they provide about the way in which subjects respond to environmental structure. This attitude toward model testing is made precise by introducing a formal measure of the information content of a model. Finally, it is argued that the statistical concept of degrees-of-freedom is misleading when used in the context of model testing and should be replaced by a measure of the information absorbed from the data in estimating parameters.I would like to express my indebtedness to Ernest W. Adams and Julian Feldman for their guidance and encouragement of the research reported here.Much of the research reported here was conducted at the University of California, Berkeley, and incorporated in a Ph.D. dissertation in Logic and the Methodology of Science [15]. The research was supported in part by the Computer Institute for Social Science Research, Michigan State University.     

Effects of perceptual and conceptual similarity in semantic priming

Summary The study investigates the different contributions to semantic priming of two components of the semantic representation underlying a word. The two components are perceptually based information and conceptually based information. Perceptual information is based on physical attributes such as shape or color, while conceptual information consists of more abstract elements such as functional attributes. The question asked in this study was whether both components would produce an effect in semantic priming. Pairs of words either related because of a conceptual property (banana-apple), a perceptual property (ball-apple), or both because of a perceptual and conceptual property (cherry-apple) were presented as prime and target in a lexical decision and a word-naming task. The results showed independent contributions of perceptual and conceptual attributes to semantic priming.This research was supported by a grant from the Dutch Organization for the Advancement of Pure Research (ZWO). All three authors are senior authors and have contributed to all parts of the project.     

How Philosophy Lost Perceptual Expertise

If we think of perceptual expertise, we might think ofa neurologist interpreting a CAT scan or an astronomerlooking at a star. But perceptual expertise is notlimited to experts. Perceptual expertise is atthe heart of our everyday competence in the world. Wenavigate around obstacles, we take turns inconversations, we make left-turns in face of on-comingtraffic. Each of us is a perceptual expert (thoughonly in certain domains). If we misunderstandperceptual expertise, we risk misunderstanding ourepistemic relationship to the world. I argue that thestandard arguments for the received view of perceptualexpertise are problematic at best. Of course, theissue of whether the received view is actually correctis an empirical issue. But the decision to adopt thereceived view, I argue, was not a scientific decision,but was made by inheriting a philosophical tradition– which many philosophers today would question.     

Improving the metric quality of questionnaire data

A procedure is proposed whereby questionnaire data, which is usually ordinal in nature and often error-ridden, may be transformed to reduce the error variance in the data and to improve the metric properties of the individual variables. The technique is suggested by a result of Eckart and Young. The properties of the method are investigated by means of a Monte Carlo study. Various matrices were generated representing the usual concept of true scores. These matrices were distorted using two levels of random errors and two kinds of categorization. The distorted matrices were in turn transformed by the proposed methods and compared to the true scores. In all cases an overall measure of similarity reveals the transformed matrices are better approximations to the true scores than the untransformed data. Some properties of the transformation are discussed and some possible applications of the general technique are suggested.     

Reformulation of the hidden variable problem using entropic measure of uncertainty

Using a recently introduced entropy-like measure of uncertainty of quantum mechanical states, the problem of hidden variables is redefined in operator algebraic framework of quantum mechanics in the following way: if A, , E(A), E() are von Neumann algebras and their state spaces respectively, (, E()) is said to be an entropic hidden theory of (A, E(A)) via a positive map L from onto A if for all states E(A) the composite state ° L E() can be obtained as an average over states in E() that have smaller entropic uncertainty than the entropic uncertainty of . It is shown that if L is a Jordan homomorphism then (, E()) is not an entropic hidden theory of (A, E(A)) via L.     

Formal aspects of Legal reasoning

This paper discusses the functions of deductive justification in ideal reconstructions of judicial reasoning. It departs from the point of judicial reasoning: explaining and justifying the judicial decision. It argues that deductive validity is not enough for good judicial argument. On the other hand, deductive justification is necessary, not only for easy cases but for hard cases as well. It draws some consequences for the concept of jumps in legal reasoning and for the traditional distinction between internal and external justification.     

Orthographic neighborhood structure and lexical access

An experiment addressed whether lexical decision response latency and error rate are influenced by orthographic neighborhood structure. It was found that words with several higher-frequency neighbors were responded to more slowly and less accurately than words with fewer higher-frequency neighbors, even though the stimulus words were matched oh number of neighbors, word frequency, neighborhood frequency, number of higher-frequency neighbors, word length, and number of syllables. The results indicate that frequency is a relative effect dependent on the structure of the neighborhood. A word at the bottom of its neighborhood will be affected by the lexical representations of its higher-frequency neighbors. However, a word at the top of its neighborhood does not appear to be affected by the lexical representations of its neighbors.Preparation of this report was supported by a University Foundation Research Grant and an Affirmative Action Faculty Development Award from San Jose State University, to Laree Huntsman. The authors thank Brian Cronk, Katherine Lemkuil, Joseph Tajnai, Ruzica Udovicic, and Michael Weinborn for their assistance with stimuli development, Nadirah Ihsan and Jeffrey Limon for their assistance with data collection, and especially Guy Woffmdin for his invaluable programming assistance.     

The relationship between intelligence and vigilance in children at risk

The purpose of this study was to compare two competing models as an explanation of the relationship between intelligence and sustained attention in educationally at-risk kindergarten children. One model assumes that lower-IQ subjects allocate greater amounts of attentional resources to information-processing tasks than higher-IQ subjects, whereas the other model assumes that a less-than optimal level of arousal is associated with decrements in task performance across time. Twenty-nine teacher-nominated at-risk and 29 normal achieving kindergarten students were administered the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence—Revised (WPPSI-R) and vigilance tasks. Signal detection measures of stimulus detectability (d), decision criterion (), correct detections, and false alarms were used to assess children's sustained attention across three time periods (2, 4, and 6 min). The important results were (a) high-risk children were inferior on dmeasures when compared to normal achieving children, (b) vigilance measures did not vary over time in either group, and (c) intelligence and vigilance shared a common factor in high-risk, but not low-risk, children. The results suggest that children educationally at risk suffer deficits related to attentional capacity for processing information. Special appreciation is expressed to Ron Jarman for his comments on the statistical analysis and the Courtenay School District, British Columbia, Canada, for providing participants. The authors also thank two anonymous reviewers who provided comments on an earlier version of this article.     

Speech samples in analysis of language attitudes

Samples of speech obtained under naturalistic conditions were combined with subjective reaction tests to measure attitudes toward dialect interaction and language change. A specific sound change, the merger of American English vowels in words like caught and cot, was investigated. Early results of the experiments indicated that this change was socially motivated, but later, more sophisticated experiments indicated that arguments for a social motivation for this particular change are too simplistic and rest upon too slender an empirical base. Experiments in the interaction of phonology and perception show that for this sound change various psycholinguistic factors, especially difficulties in discriminating among speech sounds, have to be taken into account.Support for the research reported on in this paper was provided by the Danforth Foundation, the University of Oregon, the University of Tromsø, and the University of Cincinnati. Earlier, partial versions were presented at the Fifth Western Conference on Linguistics, the Fourth Annual Colloquium on New Ways of Analyzing Variation in English, the Second Annual Kentucky Interdisciplinary Conference on Linguistics, and the 1976 Midwest Meeting of the American Dialect Society. The paper has benefited from the many constructive remarks it has drawn at these meetings. Those inaccuracies and examples of plain wrong-headedness that remain are, of course, entirely my own.     

A psychological pulse train: how young children use this cognitive framework to structure simple rhythms

Summary This paper examines the reproduction of both regular rhythms and irregular sequences by 5- and 7-year-old children, concentrating on the important role played by their organization around a pulse train. It is shown that: (a) the closer rhythms are to a regular beat the easier they are to reproduce and the greater are the improvements with age; (b) memory capacity is limited by the number of pulses around which the rhythm is organized rather than by the number of elements it contains; (c) all the children's productions contain two interval lengths that are in a ratio close to 1:2 and arranged in preferential sequences which we have called stereotypes; (d) arrhythmic sequences can only be reproduced if the intervals undergo a systematic distortion towards regularity. These results are interpreted in relation to a pulse-train hypothesis which states that on hearing a rhythm an internal clock or time base is evoked around which the rhythm is structured.     

A Translation of Intuitionistic Predicate Logic into Basic Predicate Logic

Basic Predicate Logic, BQC, is a proper subsystem of Intuitionistic Predicate Logic, IQC. For every formula in the language {, , , , , , }, we associate two sequences of formulas 0,1,... and 0,1,... in the same language. We prove that for every sequent , there are natural numbers m, n, such that IQC , iff BQC n m. Some applications of this translation are mentioned.     

Assessment of identity status in college women using Outer Space and Inner Space interviews

Ego identity status was assessed using two interviews, one based on Outer Space issues and the other based on Inner Space issues, as described by Erikson. Sixty-nine college women were classified in one of four identity statuses for each interview. Additional data were obtained on age, level of ego development, and cognitive style. As predicted, subjects in the high identity statuses (Moratorium and Achievement) showed higher levels of ego development and a more mature cognitive style than subjects in the low statuses (Diffusion and Foreclosure). Outer Space statuses showed a positive relationship to age, but Inner Space statuses did not. Factor analysis showed that the interviews measure separate aspects of identity. Consideration of these results led to the suggestion that Outer Space as well as Inner Space issues are central to female identity status.This article is based on a dissertation submitted to the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Temple University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Ph.D. degree.     

The Client Is the Most Important Common Factor: Clients' Self-Healing Capacities and Psychotherapy

I first briefly review the dodo bird verdict and suggest that we should be responding to it by looking for a new way to conceptualize how therapy works. Then I describe the dominant medical or treatment model of psychotherapy and how it puts the client in the position of a dependent variable who is operated on by supposedly potent therapeutic techniques. Next I argue that the data do not fit with this model. An alternative model is that the client is the most important common factor and that it is clients' self-healing capacities which make therapy work. I then argue that therapy has two phases—the involvement phase and the learning phase—and that the involvement phase is the most important. I next review the five learning opportunities provided by therapy. Finally, I argue that a relational model of therapy focused on consultation, collaboration, and dialogue is better than a treatment model.     

On the Way to a Postmodern Curriculum Theory -- Moving from the Question of Unity to the Question of Difference

This article will examine the consequences of highlighting subject and difference in one of the curriculum theories that has been inspired by postmodernism. The term postmodernism is here first and foremost meant to signify the attempt to combine politics and morality with epistemology in accordance with Levinas, Lyotard and Bauman. The article will highlight some themes that need to be developed further for a postmodernism-inspired curriculum theory. A starting-point is a critique of the type of curriculum theory which has its base in the new sociology of education. From this critique, focused on universal claims, the Habermasian-inspired universalism is quickly and critically dropped and left behind, and another form of reasoning is embarked upon. The latter is inspired by a minotarian politics concept and tries to dissolve universalism as a prerequisite for critical conversations. With this background and with the help of Levinas, the article sets out to talk about difference without reduction to the Same and finally suggest a direction for a postmodern curriculum theory with a normative focus on knowledge.