A Review of Single-Case Research in Sport Psychology 1997–2012: Research Trends and Future Directions

Single-case research methods are an important facet of applied sport psychology because they provide a framework for researchers and practitioners to outline intervention effects across time with individuals or groups. This paper reviews the research published since Hrycaiko and Martin's (1996) milestone overview of single-case research in sport psychology. Specifically, we examined the literature between 1997 and 2012 and located 66 studies that met our inclusion criteria of assessing interventions in sport psychology. The review summarizes the body of research, outlines trends, considers the limitations of the extant literature, and identifies areas that require further investigation for future single-case research.     

On the Ethics of Facial Transplantation Research

Transplantation continues to push the frontiers of medicine into domains that summon forth troublesome ethical questions. Looming on the frontier today is human facial transplantation. We develop criteria that, we maintain, must be satisfied in order to ethically undertake this as-yet-untried transplant procedure. We draw on the criteria advanced by Dr. Francis Moore in the late 1980s for introducing innovative procedures in transplant surgery. In addition to these we also insist that human face transplantation must meet all the ethical requirements usually applied to health care research. We summarize the achievements of transplant surgery to date, focusing in particular on the safety and efficacy of immunosuppressive medications. We also emphasize the importance of risk/benefit assessments that take into account the physical, aesthetic, psychological, and social dimensions of facial disfiguration, reconstruction, and transplantation. Finally, we maintain that the time has come to move facial transplantation research into the clinical phase.     

Can Counterfactuals Really Be about Possible Worlds?

The standard view about counterfactuals is that a counterfactual (A > C) is true if and only if the A‐worlds most similar to the actual world @ are C‐worlds. I argue that the worlds conception of counterfactuals is wrong. I assume that counterfactuals have non‐trivial truth‐values under physical determinism. I show that the possible‐worlds approach cannot explain many embeddings of the form (P > (Q > R)), which intuitively are perfectly assertable, and which must be true if the contingent falsity of (Q > R) is to be explained. If (P > (Q > R)) has a backtracking reading then the contingent facts that (Q > R) needs to be true in the closest P‐worlds are absent. If (P > (Q > R)) has a forwardtracking reading, then the laws required by (Q > R) to be true in the closest P‐worlds will be absent, because they are violated in those worlds. Solutions like lossy laws or denial of embedding won't work. The only approach to counterfactuals that explains the embedding is a pragmatic metalinguistic approach in which the whole idea that counterfactuals are about a modal reality, be it abstract or concrete, is given up.     

The Role of Pre- and Postnatal Timing of Family Risk Factors on Child Behavior at 36 months

Children growing up in disharmonious families with anxious/depressed mothers are at risk for emotional and behavioral difficulties, however whether these associations reflect postnatal environment, prenatal exposure, or an overall liability is still unclear. This study used prospectively collected data from 24,259 participants of the Norwegian Mother and Child Cohort Study (MoBa). Mothers reported on anxiety/depression and family disharmony twice in pregnancy and twice post pregnancy, as well as on their child’s physical aggression and crying behavior at age 36 months. First, results from an autoregressive cross-lagged model showed a substantial stability in both maternal anxiety/depression and family disharmony from pregnancy to 18 months postnatal, but there was no indication that family disharmony led to maternal anxiety/depression, or the other way around. Second, structural equation models further suggests that the main risk derived from an overall liability, that is, a lasting effect of family risks that spanned the two time periods.     

From cognition’s location to the epistemology of its nature

One of the liveliest debates about cognition concerns whether our cognition sometimes extends beyond our brains and bodies. One party says Yes, another No. This paper shows that debate between these parties has been epistemologically confused and requires reorienting. Both parties frequently appeal to empirical considerations and to extra-empirical theoretical virtues to support claims about where cognition is. These things should constrain their claims, but cannot do all the work hoped. This is because of the overlooked fact, uncovered in this paper, that we could never distinguish the rival views empirically or by typical theoretical virtues. I show this by drawing on recent work on testing, predictive accuracy, and theoretical virtues. The recommendation to emerge is that we step back from debate about where cognition is, to the epistemology of what cognition is.     

Computer Modeling and the Fate of Folk Psychology

Although Paul Churchland and Jerry Fodor both subscribe to the so-called theory-theory – the theory that folk psychology (FP) is an empirical theory of behavior – they disagree strongly about FP's fate. Churchland contends that FP is a fundamentally flawed view analogous to folk biology, and he argues that recent advances in computational neuroscience and connectionist AI point toward development of a scientifically respectable replacement theory that will give rise to a new common-sense psychology. Fodor, however, wagers that FP will be largely preserved and vindicated by scientific investigations of behavior. Recent findings by developmental psychologists, I argue, will push both Churchlandians and Fodorians toward the pessimistic view that FP is a misguided theory that will never be displaced, because it is, so to speak, built into our cognitive systems. I explore the possibility of preserving optimism by rejecting the theory-theory and adopting the simulation theory , a competing view developed by Robert Gordon, Alvin Goldman, and Jane Heal. According to simulationists, common-sense interpretation of behavior is accomplished by means of pretense-like operations that deploy the cognitive system's own reasoning capabilities in a disengaged manner. Since on this view no theory-like set of principles would be needed, the simulation theory seems to enjoy a simplicity advantage over the theory-theory. Steven Stich and Shawn Nichols, however, contend that as the cognitive system would require special mechanisms for disengaged operation, the simplicity question cannot be resolved until suitable computational models are developed. I describe a set of models I have constructed to meet this need, and I discuss the contribution such models can make to determining FP's fate.     

Developmental Links Between Trajectories of Physical Violence,Vandalism, Theft,and Alcohol-Drug Use from Childhood to Adolescence

Differences in developmental trajectories of physical violence, vandalism, theft, and alcohol-drug use from ages 10 to 15 were studied. For females and for males, three trajectories of theft and of alcohol-drug use increased from 10 years to 15 years, while only the high trajectory of vandalism increased from ten to 14. All trajectories of physical violence decreased. Children who engaged in the high trajectories of vandalism, theft, and alcohol-drug use had a high probability of also being high in physical violence. Compared to males, females were less likely to be on the high trajectory of physical violence, and their trajectories of other antisocial behaviors were less strongly associated with high levels of physical violence. The results suggest that physical violence during pre-adolescence and adolescence has a different developmental pattern than other forms of antisocial behavior, and that its relation to these other forms of antisocial behavior differs by sex.     

Common Genetic but Specific Environmental Influences for Aggressive and Deceitful Behaviors in Preadolescent Males

Although both aggressive (AGG) and deceitful behaviors (DEC) are symptoms of childhood conduct problems, few studies have examined common vs. specific etiological influences. Early intervention is encouraged for conduct problems and findings from genetically informative studies can suggest whether interventions should focus on conduct problems in general or groupings of conduct problems more specifically. Twin model-fitting analyses were conducted on same and different teacher ratings of AGG and DEC for 872 9-year old male twin pairs. Common genetic influences were found to underlie the susceptibility for both AGG and DEC. The same teacher ratings resulted in somewhat higher heritability estimates than different teacher ratings. Results also indicated stronger environmental effects for DEC as compared with AGG, with a significant shared environmental component for same teachers and a substantial non-shared environmental component for different teachers. Our data suggest that AGG and DEC share risk genes and environmental factors may differentiate these two types of conduct problems. Characterizing these specific environmental factors may be useful when developing interventions.     

Monism and Material Constitution

Are the sculpture and the mass of gold which permanently makes it up one object or two? In this article, we argue that the monist, who answers ‘one object’, cannot accommodate the asymmetry of material constitution. To say ‘the mass of gold materially constitutes the sculpture, whereas the sculpture does not materially constitute the mass of gold’, the monist must treat ‘materially constitutes’ as an Abelardian predicate, whose denotation is sensitive to the linguistic context in which it appears. We motivate this approach in terms of modal analyses of material constitution, but argue that ultimately it fails. The monist must instead accept a deflationary, symmetrical use of ‘materially constitutes’. We argue that this is a serious cost for her approach.