The Mediating Role of Romantic Desolation and Dating Anxiety in the Association Between Interpersonal Competence and Life Satisfaction Among Polish Young Adults

This study investigates the role of romantic desolation on life satisfaction in young adulthood. Using data from a Polish sample of 330 (205 females and 125 males) young adults aged 20–30, who completed Polish versions of the Satisfaction With Life Scale, Dating Anxiety Scale, Interpersonal Competence Questionnaire-Revised, and Social and Emotional Loneliness Scale for Adults-Short Form, romantic desolation (romantic loneliness and lack of a romantic partner) and dating anxiety were tested as mediators of the association between interpersonal competence and life satisfaction. Results revealed that single individuals reported lower life satisfaction and higher romantic loneliness than did partnered individuals. At the same time, no differences emerged between single and partnered individuals in dating anxiety or interpersonal competence. Structural equation modeling results showed that low interpersonal competence has an indirect effect on romantic desolation through higher levels of dating anxiety. Also, dating anxiety had an indirect effect on lower life satisfaction through increased romantic desolation. These results highlight the important role of dating anxiety and romantic desolation for explaining why low interpersonal competence is associated with diminished life satisfaction in young adults.     

Zombie multiculturalism meets liberative difference: searching for a new discourse of diversity

This paper grapples with an unresolved tension – twenty-first century Britain is indelibly multicultural and yet diversity is increasingly depicted as a threat to social cohesion. A society characterised by superdiverse cities where some suggest that ‘multiculturalism has failed’. On the basis of an analysis of three dominant theoretical and ideological discourses – community cohesion, multiculturalism and interculturalism – it will be argued that there is an urgent need to forge a new understanding of diversity that can counter the zombie discourse that characterises current debates about diversity in Britain. Difference will be framed as a potential source of mutual liberation, not a problem seeking a solution. It will be argued that a critical engagement with political theology can help us to fashion a new discourse of diversity that is characterised by a hermeneutics of liberative difference, which can help to defeat the zombies sucking the life out of diverse Britain.     

Visual re-identification of individual objects: a core problem for organisms and AI

Two open questions about the visual re-identification of individual objects over extended time periods are briefly reviewed: (1) How much a priori information about the nature of objects, identity and time is required to support robust individual object re-identification abilities? and (2) how do epistemic feelings, such as the feeling of familiarity, contribute both to object re-identification and to the perception of opportunities and risks associated with individual objects and their affordances? The ongoing interplay between experiments that can be carried out with human subjects and experiments made possible with robotic systems is examined. It is suggested that developmental robotics, including virtual-reality simulations of robot–environment interactions, may provide the best route to understanding both the implementation of epistemic feelings in humans and their functional contribution to the identification of persistent individual objects.     

Kant's Two Perspectives on the Theological Task

Proponents of 'the poetic hypothesis>> in Kant interpretation assume that the third Critique provides the necessary and sufficient conditions for understanding the nature of all theological discourse. This article opens with the assumption – taken from one of Kant's last works – that philosophy and theology must always remain in conflict. Then, by way of an abductive comparison of Gordon Kaufman and Adina Davidovich, I demonstrate that the poetic hypothesis leads to religious compromises that contradict this assumption. To conclude, I argue for an understanding of the motif of holism that is better able to uphold Kant's notion of conflict.     

How to build a brain: from function to implementation

To have a fully integrated understanding of neurobiological systems, we must address two fundamental questions: 1. What do brains do (what is their function)? and 2. How do brains do whatever it is that they do (how is that function implemented)? I begin by arguing that these questions are necessarily inter-related. Thus, addressing one without consideration of an answer to the other, as is often done, is a mistake. I then describe what I take to be the best available approach to addressing both questions. Specifically, to address 2, I adopt the Neural Engineering Framework (NEF) of Eliasmith &; Anderson [Neural engineering: Computation representation and dynamics in neurobiological systems. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003] which identifies implementational principles for neural models. To address 1, I suggest that adopting statistical modeling methods for perception and action will be functionally sufficient for capturing biological behavior. I show how these two answers will be mutually constraining, since the process of model selection for the statistical method in this approach can be informed by known anatomical and physiological properties of the brain, captured by the NEF. Similarly, the application of the NEF must be informed by functional hypotheses, captured by the statistical modeling approach.     

Choice strategies in multiple-cue probability learning

Choice strategies for selecting among outcomes in multiple-cue probability learning were investigated using a simulated medical diagnosis task. Expected choice probabilities (the proportion of times each outcome was selected given each cue pattern) under alternative choice strategies were constructed from corresponding observed judged probabilities (of each outcome given each cue pattern) and compared with observed choice probabilities. Most of the participants were inferred to have responded by using a deterministic strategy, in which the outcome with the higher judged probability is consistently chosen, rather than a probabilistic strategy, in which an outcome is chosen with a probability equal to its judged probability. Extended practice in the learning environment did not affect choice strategy selection, contrary to reports from previous studies, results of which may instead be attributable to changes with practice in the variability and extremity of the perceived probabilities on which the choices were based.     

When Women Become More Hostilely Sexist toward their Gender: The System-Justifying Effect of Benevolent Sexism

Two longitudinal studies examined the system-justifying effect of women’s benevolent sexist ideology in New Zealand female undergraduate samples. Women’s endorsement of benevolent sexism predicted longitudinal changes in hostile sexist attitudes toward their gender over 6-month (study 1; n?=?117) and 12-month (study 2; n?=?76) periods. Consistent with Ambivalent Sexism Theory, these findings indicate that women’s endorsement of benevolent sexism disarms resistance to, and increases their endorsement of, more hostile forms of sexism directed toward their gender. However, the disarming effect of benevolent sexism occurred only for women high in Right-Wing Authoritarianism (study 2), suggesting that threat-driven authoritarian motivations for collective security and social cohesion cause women to actively participate in an ideological system that perpetuates gender inequality.     

Relationship satisfaction determines the association between Epstein–Barr virus latency and somatic symptoms after the loss of a spouse

The loss of a spouse is associated with a host of negative health outcomes. While bereaved individuals commonly report somatic symptoms, no investigations exist of the association between reactivation of latent Epstein–Barr virus (EBV) and somatic symptoms among this population. Further, how an individual perceives the quality of their lost relationship in retrospect may impact loss outcomes. Among 99 bereaved spouses, elevated EBV antibody titers were associated with somatic symptoms for those who retrospectively reported high or mean levels of relationship satisfaction (RS), but not among those less satisfied. Further, higher RS was associated with greater grief symptoms. This study identifies higher retrospective RS as a possible risk factor for negative physical and mental health outcomes during bereavement.