Senior capstone design and ethics: A bridge to the professional world

A senior level capstone design experience has been developed and offered with a particular emphasis on many of the professional issues raised in Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) Engineering Criterion IV. The course has sought to develop student awareness of the ethical foundation of the engineering profession, the global and societal framework within which engineers practice, and the environmental impact on engineering. The capstone design course also focused upon improving the technical communications skills of the graduating senior class with both extensive instruction in writing and multiple workshops dealing with the art of making an effective oral presentation. The effectiveness of the design course was assessed using Kirkpatrick’s model for evaluating training programs. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the “Ethics and Social Responsibility in Engineering and Technology” meeting, New Orleans, 2003.     

Cortical regions associated with different aspects of object recognition performance

In the present object recognition study, we examined the relationship between brain activation and four behavioral measures: error rate, reaction time, observer sensitivity, and response bias. Subjects perceptually matched object pairs in which structural similarity (SS), an index of structural differentiation, and exposure duration (DUR), an index of task difficulty, were manipulated. The SS manipulation affected the fMRI signal in the left anterior fusiform and parietal cortices, which in turn reflected a bias to respond same. Conversely, an SS-modulated fMRI signal in the right middle frontal gyrus reflected a bias to respond different. The DUR manipulation affected the fMRI signal in occipital and posterior fusiform regions, which in turn reflected greater sensitivity, longer reaction times, and greater accuracy. These findings demonstrate that the regions most strongly implicated in processing object shape (SS-modulated regions) are associated with response bias, whereas regions that are not directly involved in shape processing are associated with successful recognition performance.     

Repetition blindness: out of sight or out of mind?

Does repetition blindness represent a failure of perception or of memory? In Experiment 1, participants viewed rapid serial visual presentation (RSVP) sentences. When critical words (C1 and C2) were orthographically similar, C2 was frequently omitted from serial report; however, repetition priming for C2 on a postsentence lexical decision task was equivalent whether or not C1 was similar to C2. In Experiment 2, participants monitored RSVP sentences for a predetermined target. Participants frequently failed to detect the target when it was preceded by an orthographically similar word. In Experiment 3, the authors investigated the role of the attentional blink in this effect. These experiments suggest that repetition blindness is a failure of conscious perception, consistent with predictions of the token-individuation hypothesis.     

Perceptions of Ethical Behaviour among Business Faculty in Canada

Faculty members at Canadian business schools were surveyed regarding their ethical perceptions of behaviours related to undergraduate instruction. Fifty-five behavioural statements were listed and respondents were asked to rate the extent to which they felt each behaviour was ethical or unethical. The only item that respondents endorsed as unequivocally unethical (90% indicated it was definitely unethical) was Becoming sexually involved with an undergraduate in one of your classes. We also compared the results of our sample to those of an American sample. Overall, an interesting pattern of differences emerged between the responses obtained in Canada and the U.S. In general, the direction of the significant differences was such that Canadian professors viewed the behaviours in question as less ethical than did their American counterparts.     

Evidential Atheism

Here is a new version of the Evidential Problem of Evil.Theists claim that it is reasonable for atheists to believethat if God did exist, suffering would look just as it does now. I endorse this claim, however it cannot be deployedagainst my argument without the following epistemic principle:what we see makes p likely only if it is reasonable tobelieve it would be discernibly different if p were false. I demonstrate that this principle is mistaken. The paperalso responds to objections from Alvin Plantinga and PeterVan Inwagen that Gods existence is compatible with pointlessnatural evil. In particular, I argue that appeals to vaguenessdo not support the compatibility claim.     

Listening comprehension and working memory are impaired in attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder irrespective of language impairment

This study investigated listening comprehension and working memory abilities in children with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), presenting with and without language impairments (LI). A 4-group design classified a community sample (n = 77) of boys aged 9–12 into ADHD, ADHD + LI, LI, and Normal groups. Children completed tests of basic language and cognitive skills, verbal and spatial working memory, and passage-level listening comprehension. Multivariate analyses and post hoc comparisons indicated that ADHD children who did not have co-occurring LI comprehended factual information from spoken passages as well as normal children, but were poorer at comprehending inferences and monitoring comprehension of instructions. ADHD children did not differ from normal children in verbal span, but showed significantly poorer verbal working memory, spatial span, and spatial working memory. The ADHD + LI and LI groups were most impaired in listening comprehension and working memory performance, but did not differ from each other. Listening comprehension skills were significantly correlated with both verbal and spatial working memory, and parent–teacher ratings of inattention and hyperactivity/impulsivity. Findings that children with ADHD but no LI showed subtle higher-level listening comprehension deficits have implications for both current diagnostic practices and conceptualizations of ADHD.     

Response to Difficult Patients in Group Analysis: The Personification of I:A/M

The author focuses on the application of Hopper's proposal of an additional basic assumption (I:A/M) using a model of clinicians' theories: bridging theory, psychological theory, and clinical theory (Michels, 1999). This paper will describe the potential for advances in understanding particular group formations seen in clinical practice and other settings.     

Face recognition and emotional valence: processing without awareness by neurologically intact participants does not simulate covert recognition in prosopagnosia

Covert face recognition in neurologically intact participants was investigated with the use of very brief stimulus presentation to prevent awareness of the stimulus. In Experiment 1, skin conductance response (SCR) to photographs of celebrity and unfamiliar faces was recorded; the faces were displayed for 220 msec and for 17 msec in a within-participants design. SCR to faces presented for 220 msec was larger and more likely to occur with familiar faces than with unfamiliar faces. Face familiarity did not affect the SCR to faces presented for 17 msec. SCR was larger for faces of good than for faces of evil celebrities presented for 17 msec, but valence did not affect SCR to faces displayed for 220 msec. In Experiment 2, associative priming was found in a face familiarity decision task when the prime face was displayed for 220 msec, but no facilitation occurred when primes were presented for 17 msec. In Experiment 3, participants were able to differentiate evil and good faces presented without awareness in a two-alternative forced-choice decision. The results provide no evidence of familiarity detection outside awareness in normal participants and suggest that, contrary to previous research, very brief presentation to neurologically intact participants is not a useful model for the types of covert recognition found in prosopagnosia. However, a response based on affective valence appears to be available from brief presentation.     

Visual perspective taking for avatars in a Simon task

In modern digital applications, users often interact with virtual representations of themselves or others, called avatars. We examined how these avatars and their perspectives influence stimulus–response compatibility in a Simon task. Participants responded to light/dark blue stimuli with left/right key presses in the presence of a task-irrelevant avatar. Changes in stimulus–response compatibility were used to quantify changes in the mental representation of the task and perspective taking toward this avatar. Experiments 1 and 2 showed that perspective taking for an avatar occurred in orthogonal stimulus–response mappings, causing a compatibility effect from the avatar’s point of view. In the following two experiments we introduced a larger variety of angular disparities between the participant and avatar. In Experiment 3, the Simon effect with lateralized stimulus positions remained largely unaffected by the avatar, pointing toward an absence of perspective taking. In Experiment 4, after avatar hand movements were added in order to strengthen the participants’ sense of agency over the avatar, a spatial compatibility effect from the avatar’s perspective was observed again, and hints of the selective use of perspective taking on a trial-by-trial basis were found. Overall, the results indicate that users can incorporate the perspective of an avatar into their mental representation of a situation, even when this perspective is unnecessary to complete a task, but that certain contextual requirements have to be met.     

Can one ever be too wealthy or too chaste? Searching for nonlinearities in mate judgment

In 3 studies, the authors searched for nonlinearities as possible clues to context-sensitive mechanisms involved in mating decisions. Participants judged targets' sexual desirability, marital desirability, or social status on the basis of information about income or number of past sexual partners. Because one cannot know in advance where nonlinearities occur or measure all values of independent variables, a "zoom and focus" method was used. The authors began by sampling a wide range of values, followed by successively more focused examination of potentially interesting regions. Across studies, income and desirability were linked exponentially, particularly for male targets and marriage partners. Sexual partners and desirability were sometimes linked nonmonotonically, with more partners first increasing, then decreasing, desirability. The authors discuss how nonmonotonic functions may suggest competing underlying processes.