States Are Not Basic Structures: Against State-Centric Political Theory

Abstract

Contemporary political philosophy often operates on a ‘two-tiered’ theoretical treatment of global politics, on which domestic political systems and the principles governing their internal dynamics constitute one tier, and on which the relationships between states and governing multinational institutions constitute a second. One way of grounding and justifying this approach, preferred by Rawls, is called constructivism. Constructivists describe the world as containing specific domains and domain-types of political and social interaction, and relativizes principles of justice to important versions of these—states, in the case of contemporary two-tiered political philosophy. In this paper I argue against the specifically Rawlsian account of uniting these three commitments (two-tiered political theory, constructivism, and statism) and gesture towards a general argument against the coherence of this bundle of views.     

The Kids' Empathic Development Scale (KEDS): A multi‐dimensional measure of empathy in primary school‐aged children

Empathy is an essential building block for successful interpersonal relationships. Atypical empathic development is implicated in a range of developmental psychopathologies. However, assessment of empathy in children is constrained by a lack of suitable measurement instruments. This article outlines the development of the Kids' Empathic Development Scale (KEDS) designed to assess some of the core affective, cognitive and behavioural components of empathy concurrently. The KEDS assesses responses to picture scenarios depicting a range of individual and interpersonal situations differing in social complexity. Results from 220 children indicate the KEDS measures three related but distinct aspects of empathy that are also related to existing measures of empathy and cognitive development. Scores on the KEDS show age and some gender‐related differences in the expected direction.     

The orientation of young and older adults' mental representations of their home town with familiar and new landmarks

Familiarity with an environment produces refined mental representations in adults of all ages, but it is not clear whether these representations tend to have a north-up orientation and whether familiarity facilitates the learning of new spatial information, especially in ageing. Thirty-two young and 32 older adults studied a map of their home town that included familiar and new fictitious landmarks, then performed pointing tasks, some aligned with the cardinal points south–north (SN), and others counter-aligned, north–south (NS). A measure of visuo-spatial working memory (VSWM) and a questionnaire on pleasure in exploring were also administered. The results showed that performance was better when pointing SN than NS (alignment effect), whereas pointing performance for familiar landmarks was similar for SN and NS alignments (no alignment effect). No interaction involving age was found. VSWM emerged as a significant predictor of pointing performance. Spatial mental representations of familiar environments are elaborate and flexible as regards familiar landmarks, in both young and older adults; and a familiar layout does not seem to enhance older adults' spatial memory as regards new landmarks.     

Expository Texts in First-Grade Classroom Libraries: Issues in Teacher Selection

Abstract

In 2010, the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) were adopted by most states in the US. The authors of these standards called for a shift from previous standards by recommending that young children experience a 50-50 balance between informational and literary reading. For this mixed-methods study, researchers examined the contents of 23 first-grade classroom libraries 8?years after the implementation of the CCSS to determine the percentage of expository texts found in these libraries and if these percentages differed based on the SES of the school or the number of years a teacher had been teaching. In addition, researchers interviewed twelve selected classroom teachers to gain an understanding of how they selected books for their libraries and what influenced their decisions. Results indicated that 22.8% of the texts found in first-grade classroom libraries were expository and there was no difference based on SES of the school or years a teacher had been in the classroom. Teacher interviews indicated that book cost, reading level, student interest, and genre (both narrative and expository/nonfiction) influenced their library text selections. Only two teachers indicated that the CCSS impacted their book choices.     

How to separate coordinate and categorical spatial relation components in integrated spatial representations: A new methodology for analysing sketch maps

Spatial relations between landmarks can be represented by means of categories and coordinates. In the present research, this paradigm was applied to sketch maps based on information acquired in goal-directed behaviour of exploration of a university campus area. The first aim was to investigate whether categorical and coordinate information can be considered conceptually independent in sketch maps. The second aim was to assess which kind of distance measure served better to represent coordinate information in the present case study, and finally to assess the factorial structure of coordinate and categorical data. Analytic methodology as well as statistical analysis were found to confirm that separating coordinate and categorical components was formally as well as empirically appropriate. A series of confirmatory factor analyses showed the best fit for the model with two correlated components, as well as an acceptable reliability of measures emerged. The two components were moderately correlated. Moreover, the adoption of Manhattan distance seemed to be the most effective method to represent coordinate spatial relations in spatial sketch maps of areas acquired through navigation.