Intentionality in Reference and Action

This essay asks whether there is a relation between action-serving and meaning-serving intentions. The idea that the intentions involved in meaning and action are nominally designated alike as intentionalities does not guarantee any special logical or conceptual connections between the intentionality of referential thoughts and thought-expressive speech acts with the intentionality of doing. The latter category is typified by overt physical actions in order to communicate by engaging in speech acts, but also includes at the origin of all artistic and symbolic expression such cerebral and linguistic doings as thinking propositional thoughts. There are exactly four possibilities by which meaning and action intentionalities might be related to be systematically investigated. Meaning-serving and action-serving intentionalities, topologically speaking, might exclude one another, partially overlap with one another, or subsume one in the other or the other in the one. The theoretical separation of the two ostensible categories of intendings is criticized, as is their partial overlap, in light of the proposal that thinking and artistic and symbolic expression are activities that favor the inclusion of paradigm meaning-serving intentions as among a larger domain of action-serving intentions. The only remaining alternative is then developed, of including action-serving intentions reductively in meaning-serving intentions, and is defended as offering in an unexpected way the most cogent universal reductive ontology in which the intentionality of doing generally relates to the specific intentionality of referring in thought to the objects of predications, and of its artistic and symbolic expression.     

Cognitive Abilities of Elite Nationally Ranked SCRABBLE and Crossword Experts

Theoretical models of working memory suggest that the simultaneous processing and storage of information is carried out either as separate or binded mechanisms. We explored working memory capacity and strategy in two elite groups of experts to test the separate versus binded hypotheses. Visuospatial and verbal abilities were measured in elite nationally ranked SCRABBLE and crossword experts and compared with college students matched on quantitative and verbal SAT scores, both exceeding 700 on average. SCRABBLE and crossword experts significantly outperformed college students on all cognitive measures. The crossword experts scored significantly higher on a test of analogies than SCRABBLE experts, but performance for cognitive ability tasks did not significantly differ between expert groups. The techniques and strategies used during competitive play, however, did differ significantly. Findings suggest that visuospatial and verbal working memory capacities of SCRABBLE and crossword experts are binded and occur at extraordinarily high levels. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Investigating Maternal Touch and Infants' Self‐Regulatory Behaviours during a Modified Face‐to‐Face Still‐Face with Touch Procedure

Maternal touch and infants' self‐regulatory behaviours were examined during a modified Still‐Face with Touch (SF + T) procedure. Mothers and their 5½‐month‐old infants participated in one period of Normal interaction followed by three SF + T periods. Maternal functions of touch, and infants' self‐regulatory behaviour, affect, and attention were evaluated. Contrary to a typical SF procedure, the amount of smiling remained high while fretting remained low. High levels of maternal touching and variations in the functions of maternal touch were observed across periods. Playful touch remained high while there was an increase in nurturing touch and a decrease in attention‐getting touch from the Normal to all SF + T periods. Similar amounts of self‐regulatory behaviours were observed across periods with the exception of a decrease in bidirectional exchanges during the SF + T periods. Finally, across periods, maternal touch and infants' self‐regulatory behaviours were found to be temporally organized with infants' affect and attention. Examining how mothers use touch when other forms of communication are absent increased our understanding of the role of touch in infants' emotion regulation. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Does emotional reasoning change during cognitive behavioural therapy for anxiety?

Emotional reasoning refers to the use of subjective emotions, rather than objective evidence, to form conclusions about oneself and the world. It is a key interpretative bias in cognitive models of anxiety disorders and appears to be especially evident in individuals with anxiety disorders. However, the amenability of emotional reasoning to change during treatment has not yet been investigated. We sought to determine whether emotional reasoning tendencies change during a course of routine cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT). Emotional reasoning tendencies were assessed in 36 individuals with a primary anxiety disorder who were seeking treatment at an outpatient clinic. Changes in anxiety and depressive symptoms as well as emotional reasoning tendencies after 12 sessions of CBT were examined in 25 individuals for whom there was complete data. Emotional reasoning tendencies were evident at pretreatment assessment. Although anxiety and depressive symptoms decreased during CBT, only one of six emotional reasoning interpretative styles (pertaining to conclusions that one is incompetent) changed significantly during the course of therapy. Attrition rates were high and there was not enough information regarding the extent to which therapy specifically focused on addressing emotional reasoning tendencies. Individuals seeking treatment for anxiety disorders appear to engage in emotional reasoning, however routine individual CBT does not appear to result in changes in emotional reasoning tendencies.     

Breadth versus depth: Cumulative risk model and continuous measure prediction of poor language and reading outcomes at 12

This study examines whether, and how, multiple risks in early childhood are associated with an increased likelihood of a poor language or literacy outcome in early adolescence. Using data from 210 participants in the longitudinal Twins Early Developmental Study, we focus on the following risk factors at age 4: family risk, and poor language, speech, emergent literacy and nonverbal skills. The outcomes of interest at age 12 are language, reading fluency and reading comprehension. We contrast a ‘cumulative risk’ model, counting the presence or absence of each risk factor (breadth), with a model that also considers the severity of the early deficits (depth). A ‘cumulative risk index’ correlated modestly but significantly with outcome (r = 0.32–0.40). Odds ratios confirmed that having many risk factors (3–6) confers a higher probability of a poor outcome (OR 7.86–17.71) than having one or two (OR 3.65–7.28). Logistic regression models showed that predictive validity is not improved by including information about the severity of each deficit. Even with rich information on children's risk status at age 4, we can make only a moderately accurate prediction of the likelihood of a language or literacy disorder 8 years later (Area Under the Curve = 0.74–0.84; Positive Predictive Value = 0.33–0.55, Negative Predictive Value = 0.86–0.91). Taken together, and consistent with the idea of ‘cumulative risk’, these results suggest that the breadth of risk is a core predictor of outcome, and furthermore, that the severity of early deficits does not add significantly to this prediction.     

Executive abilities in children with congenital visual impairment in mid-childhood

The role of vision and vision deprivation in the development of executive function (EF) abilities in childhood is little understood; aspects of EF such as initiative, attention orienting, inhibition, planning and performance monitoring are often measured through visual tasks. Studying the development and integrity of EF abilities in children with congenital visual impairment (VI) may provide important insights into the development of EF and also its possible relationship with vision and non-visual senses. The current study investigates non-visual EF abilities in 18 school-age children of average verbal intelligence with VI of differing levels of severity arising from congenital disorders affecting the eye, retina, or anterior optic nerve. Standard auditory neuropsychological assessments of sustained and divided attention, phonemic, semantic and switching verbal fluency, verbal working memory, and ratings of everyday executive abilities by parents were undertaken. Executive skills were compared to age-matched typically-sighted (TS) typically-developing children and across levels of vision (mild to moderate VI [MVI] or severe to profound VI [SPVI]). The results do not indicate significant differences or deficits on direct assessments of verbal and auditory EF between the groups. However, parent ratings suggest difficulties with everyday executive abilities, with the greatest difficulties in those with SPVI. The findings are discussed as possibly reflecting increased demands of behavioral executive skills for children with VI in everyday situations despite auditory and verbal EF abilities in the typical range for their age. These findings have potential implications for clinical and educational practices.