Searching where the treasure is: on the emergence of human companion animal partnership (HCAP)

Animal Cognition - In our view, the discipline, often referred to as human–animal interaction (HAI), lacks a well-defined conceptual framework. It is too narrow both with respect to the...     

Maximization and Search for Alternatives in Decision Situations With and Without Loss of Options

Maximizing tendency has been associated with greater accumulation of choice alternatives prior to selection of a preference. It is not known whether this search behavior extends to situations in which accumulation of new choice alternatives comes with the potential loss of existing ones. In Study 1, we replicate the original finding of greater accumulation of choice alternatives, using a computer‐based laboratory task. We then provide evidence, in Studies 2 and 3, that when potential loss of existing options is incorporated into the task, maximization is associated with less rather than more search for additional options. Maximization components of decision difficulty and alternative search, but not high standards or satisficing, explain this behavior. Other task measures are also collected, but few maximization‐related differences are observed. The findings support an interpretation of maximizers as decision makers who are as concerned with the potential loss of existing options as with the loss of undiscovered future ones. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hallucinations in the psychotic state: Psychoanalysis and the neurosciences compared

In this contribution, which takes account of important findings in neuroscientific as well as psychoanalytic research, the authors explore the meaning of the deep‐going distortions of psychic functioning occurring in hallucinatory phenomena. Neuroscientific studies have established that hallucinations distort the sense of reality owing to a complex alteration in the balance between top‐down and bottom‐up brain circuits. The present authors postulate that hallucinatory phenomena represent the outcome of a psychotic's distorted use of the mind over an extended period of time. In the hallucinatory state the psychotic part of the personality uses the mind to generate auto‐induced sensations and to achieve a particular sort of regressive pleasure. In these cases, therefore, the mind is not used as an organ of knowledge or as an instrument for fostering relationships with others. The hallucinating psychotic decathects psychic (relational) reality and withdraws into a personal, bodily, and sensory space of his own. The opposing realities are not only external and internal but also psychic and sensory. Visual hallucinations could thus be said to originate from seeing with the ‘eyes’ of the mind, and auditory hallucinations from hearing with the mind's ‘ears’. In these conditions, mental functioning is restricted, cutting out the more mature functions, which are thus no longer able to assign real meaning to the surrounding world and to the subject's psychic experience. The findings of the neurosciences facilitate understanding of how, in the psychotic hallucinatory process, the mind can modify the working of a somatic organ such as the brain.     

Mental Files and Rational Inferences

Abstract

My goal in this paper is to discuss the ‘Fregean’ account of inferences proposed by Recanati in his Mental Files (Oxford University Press, 2012). I raise the following dilemma for the mental files theory. (a) If the premises of certain inferences involve ‘the same file’ in a strict sense of the expression, then files cannot play the role of modes of presentation. (b) If, on the other hand, the files involved in the premises are ‘the same’ only in a loose sense, then the notion of file sameness plays no role in accounting for rational inferences, contra Recanati’s Fregean account.     

Construing multiple ingroups: Assessing social identity inclusiveness and structure in ethnic and religious minority group members

The combination of multiple social identities into a coherent ingroup construal is of immediate relevance in today's complex and diverse societies. This paper proposes a conceptual and operational framework to examine how individuals subjectively construe their ingroup in the context of multiple, cross‐cutting group memberships. The subjective combination of multiple social identities is described in terms of structure (social identity structure) and inclusiveness (social identity inclusiveness (SII)). Two studies assess SII and social identity structure in community samples to whom the subjective combination of multiple, cross‐cutting ingroups is of particular relevance: a sample of Turkish‐Belgian Muslims (Study 1) and Turkish‐Australian Muslims (Study 2). Across both studies, SII uniquely predicted attitudes toward a range of outgroups, over and above identification with singular ingroups. Moreover, a wide range of social identity structures were identified, further attesting to broad individual differences in the construal of the perceived ingroup. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.