Understanding and Essence

Modal epistemology has been dominated by a focus on establishing an account either of how we have modal knowledge or how we have justified beliefs about modality. One component of this focus has been that necessity and possibility are basic access points for modal reasoning. For example, knowing that P is necessary plays a role in deducing that P is essential, and knowing that both P and ¬P are possible plays a role in knowing that P is accidental. Chalmers (2002) and Williamson (2007) provide two good examples of contrasting views in modal epistemology that focus on providing an account of modal knowledge where necessity and possibility are basic access points for modal knowledge, and Yablo (1993) provides a good account of how we have justified beliefs about modality. In contrast to this tradition I argue for and outline a modal epistemology based on objectual understanding and essence, rather than knowledge or justification and necessity and possibility. The account employs a non-modal conception of essence and takes objectual understanding of essence, rather than knowledge of essence to be basic in modal reasoning. I begin by articulating Kvanvig’s (2003) account of objectual understanding, on which objectual understanding of Φ is not equivalent to propositional knowledge of Φ. I then argue that an epistemology of essence that uses property variation-in-imagination is better construed as a model that delivers objectual understanding of essence rather than knowledge of essence. I argue that this is so, since the latter and not the former runs into a version of the Meno paradox. I show how this account can be applied to two issues in modal epistemology: the Benacerraf problem for modality, and the architecture of modal knowledge.     

Preventive interventions among children exposed to trauma of armed conflict: a literature review

Increasing research is available on the preconditions for child mental health and optimal development in traumatic conditions, whereas less is known how to translate the findings into effective interventions to help traumatized children. This literature review analyses the effectiveness of psychosocial preventive interventions and treatments and their theoretical bases among children traumatized in the context of armed conflicts (war, military violence, terrorism and refugee). The first aim is to evaluate the effectiveness of preventive interventions in preventing emotional distress and impairment and promoting optimal emotional‐cognitive and social development. The second task is to analyze the nature of the underlying mechanisms for the success of preventive interventions, and the theoretical premises of the choice of intervention techniques, procedures and tools. We found 16 relevant published studies, but an examination of them revealed that only four of them had experimental designs strong enough that they could be included in the meta‐analysis. While the subjective reports of the researchers suggested that systematic preventive interventions were effective in decreasing PTSD and depressive symptoms among children traumatized due to armed conflict, the more objective results of the meta‐analysis and the weaknesses in designs uncovered during the meta‐analysis undermine such a conclusion. Additionally, a majority of the reported preventive interventions focused only on children's biased cognitive processes and negative emotions, while only a few aimed at influencing multiple domains of child development and improving developmental functioning on emotional, social and psychophysiological levels. It is concluded that substantial additional work needs to be done in developing effective preventive interventions and treatments for children traumatized by exposure to war and violence. Aggr. Behav. 36:95–116, 2010. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Self-Referenced Fear and Guilt Appeals: The Moderating Role of Self-Construal

Results from 2 studies on advertising to reduce the incidence of drinking and driving show that the effect of self- vs. other-referencing on the persuasiveness of fear and guilt appeals is moderated by definitions of the self (independent vs. interdependent self-construals). For people who hold a predominantly independent self-construal, superiority of self- vs. other-referencing holds for guilt appeals, but the opposite is true for fear appeals. For people who hold a predominantly interdependent self-construal, other-referenced and self-referenced messages are equally recalled and equally favorable for both fear and guilt appeals.     

Maternal experience of their infants’ crying in the context of war trauma: Determinants and consequences

We examined, first, how prenatal maternal mental health and war trauma predicted mothers’ experience of their infant crying, indicated by emotions, cognitions, and behavior; and second, how these experiences influenced the mother–infant interaction and infant development. Participants were 511 Palestinian mothers from the Gaza Strip, reporting their war trauma, symptoms of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, and perceived stress during pregnancy (Time 1). They reported experiences of infant crying at 4 months (Time 2), and the mother–infant interaction and infant sensorimotor and language development at 12 months of infants’ age (Time 3). Results revealed that maternal mental health problems, but not war trauma, were important to experiences of infant crying. A high level of PTSD symptoms predicted negative emotions evoked by infant crying, and high depressive symptoms predicted low active and positive responses to crying. Unexpectedly, high prenatal perceived stress predicted high active and positive responsiveness. Concerning the consequences, mothers’ sensitive interpretation of infant crying predicted optimal infant sensorimotor development, and mothers’ active and positive responses predicted high emotional availability in mother–infant interaction. Crying is the first communication tool for infants, and mothers’ sensitive responses to crying contribute to infant well-being. Therefore, reinforcing mother's optimal responses is important when helping war-affected dyads.     

Undoing the Effects of Seizing and Freezing: Decreasing Defensive Processing of Personally Relevant Messages

Health messages are directed at those who are at risk of incurring adverse consequences. However, previous experiments have found that people process personally relevant health messages in a biased, defensive manner. We examine the role of elaboration as a mechanism to encourage less biased processing of personally relevant health appeals. Results demonstrate that high-relevance consumers freeze on the threatening information, leading to lower change appraisal (perceived severity, self-efficacy, and response efficacy) and decreased message persuasion. For these individuals, renewed elaboration on the consequences of caffeine (Experiment 1) and olestra (Experiment 2) consumption reduces defensive processing. This elaboration "unfreezes" message processing, leading to greater change appraisal and increased persuasion. These experiments provide guidelines for practitioners to design more effective messages.     

Remembrance of Eyewitness Testimony: Effects of Emotional Content,Self‐Relevance,and Emotional Tone1

This experiment concerned the effects of emotional content, self‐relevance, and emotional tone of testimony on memory. Eyewitness accounts of 4 events were constructed that systematically differed in emotionality and self‐relevance. The testimony, captured on videotape, was expressed with or without negative emotion. After viewing one of the videotaped accounts, participants were administered cued‐recall and recognition memory tests. Significant main effects indicated that participants best remembered testimony that was emotional in content, self‐relevant, and negatively expressed. Although emotional content and self‐relevance interacted to affect state anxiety, the latter did not mediate memory effects. Overall, significant gender differences in state anxiety but not memory emerged. Implications for understanding the influence of emotion on juror memory are discussed.     

Prospective and retrospective duration judgments: A meta-analytic review

A meta-analytic review compared prospective and retrospective judgments of duration, or duration judgment paradigm. Some theorists have concluded that the two paradigms involve similar cognitive processes, whereas others have found that they involve different processes. A review of 20 experiments revealed that prospective judgments are longer and less variable than are retrospective judgments. Several theoretically important variables moderate these effects, especially those concerned with information processing activities. Therefore, somewhat different cognitive processes subserve experienced and remembered duration. Attentional models are needed to explain prospective judgments, and memory-based models are needed to explain retrospective judgments. These findings clarify models of human duration judgment and suggest directions for future research. Evidence on duration judgments may also influence models of attention and memory.     

Self-concept and need for achievement of men with physical disabilities.

Self-concept and need for achievement of athletically active and relatively inactive American males with physical disabilities were investigated using the Tennessee Self-Concept Scale Counseling Form (Fitts, 1965) and the Thematic Apperception Test (McClelland, Clark, Roby, & Atkinson, 1949). The subjects were 45 men, ranging from 18 to 40 years old, with physical disabilities. We hypothesized that subjects in the athletically active group had a more favorable mean self-concept and a higher mean need for achievement than subjects in the inactive group. Fifty able-bodied subjects, composing two counterpart groups, were also included in the study. It was hypothesized that the differences regarding the criterion variables between disabled and able-bodied counterpart groups would be negligible. The results of an analysis of variance (ANOVA) and an analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) supported the hypothesis that predicted significant differences at the .025 alpha level between the athletic and the inactive disabled groups. Age, education, and level of disability were treated as covariates. The results of this study also supported the hypothesis that predicted negligible differences (p less than .10) between the disabled subjects and the able-bodied counterpart groups.