The Phenomenological Dimension of Meaning: Words,Vowels, Phonemes As Ways To Sing The World,To Celebrate The World,and To Live It

This is commentary on Cornejo’s Intersubjectivity as co-phenomenology: from the holism to the being-in-the-world-with-others, co-phenomenology, in which meaning is defined as a construal of phenomenological experience, it is not an individual creation, but rather an intersubjective one. In this paper the basic question is how language expresses the world and things and, consequently, what vision of the world is expressed by language and what relationship it creates with the real. Language is a set of differences between signs and meanings. It lives for and by this constant aspiration to say the inexpressible, to capture the elusive. Language tries to express the driving inner movement of the real through references and interlacing, by multiplying the relational threads of meanings. For example, the phonetic gesture performs for the speaker and his listener a certain structuring of experience, a certain modulation of existence. This is a communicative dimension in which meaning is always a process. It is the situation of co-feeling between subjects, in which understanding is achieved, as defined by Cornejo in his essay.

Activities, self-referent memory beliefs, and cognitive performance: evidence for direct and mediated relations

In this study, the authors investigated the role of activities and self-referent memory beliefs for cognitive performance in a life-span sample. A factor analysis identified 8 activity factors, including Developmental Activities, Experiential Activities, Social Activities, Physical Activities, Technology Use, Watching Television, Games, and Crafts. A second-order general activity factor was significantly related to a general factor of cognitive function as defined by ability tests. Structural regression models suggested that prediction of cognition by activity level was partially mediated by memory beliefs, controlling for age, education, health, and depressive affect. Models adding paths from general and specific activities to aspects of crystallized intelligence suggested additional unique predictive effects for some activities. In alternative models, nonsignificant effects of beliefs on activities were detected when cognition predicted both variables, consistent with the hypothesis that beliefs derive from monitoring cognition and have no influence on activity patterns.     

Introspection &; remembering

We argue that episodic remembering, understood as the ability to re-experience past events, requires a particular kind of introspective ability and understanding. It requires the understanding that first person experiences can represent actual events. In this respect it differs from the understanding required by the traditional false belief test for children, where a third person attribution (to others or self) of a behavior governing representation is sufficient. The understanding of first person experiences as representations is also required for problem solving with images. In support of this argument we review developmental evidence that children’s episodic remembering is independent of and emerges after mastery of the false belief task but emerges together with the use of imagery for solving visual rotation tasks.     

"Despair" induced by extinction trials in the water maze: relationship with measures of anxiety in aged and adult rats

We have previously reported that extinction of escape behavior in the water maze due to the removal of the platform coincided with the development of behavioral "despair" in aged and adult rats, as assessed by immobility. The present study examines further predictions derived from the hypothesis that the withholding of reinforcement induces behaviors akin to depression. We tested for correlations between extinction performance and immobility, as well as between immobility and measures of anxiety in aged and adult rats. Age comparisons were also performed on these variables. Forty aged and 29 adult male Wistar rats (24 and 3 months old, respectively) were examined in the open field, black/white box and elevated-plus maze followed by 6 days of training in the water maze hidden platform task and 8 days of extinction without the platform. Indices of immobility increased over trials of extinction, with the aged showing higher levels, earlier onsets and larger slope increases of immobility than the adults. A lower resistance-to-extinction was predictive of more "despair" in both age groups. Between-group differences in the open field, black/white box and elevated-plus maze indicated that the aged showed more anxiety-like behavior than the adults and/or explored these environments less. Within the aged group, indicators of fearfulness in the three tests were predictive of higher levels of "despair". The extinction-despair model is held to provide the promise of a conceptual and empirical model of human depression that is the consequence of withdrawal of reinforcement.     

Associative memory and the medial temporal lobes

Associative recognition and recall depend on structures in the medial temporal lobes (MTLs). There is disagreement about whether associative memory is functionally heterogeneous, whether it is functionally distinct from intra-item associative memory and how the MTLs contribute to this kind of memory. Despite an increase in research on associative memory, work has lacked a theoretical framework to guide design and interpretation of studies. One view provides a useful framework by postulating that associative memories differ in the degree to which their informational components converge in MTL structures that create familiarity-supporting or recollection-supporting memory representations. Using this framework, we consider psychological, lesion and functional imaging evidence, highlighting how informational convergence in the brain underlies the associative nature of both memory and perception.     

Changes in Multidigit Synergies and Their Feed-Forward Adjustments in Multiple Sclerosis

The authors explored the changes in multidigit synergies in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) within the framework of the uncontrolled manifold hypothesis. The specific hypotheses were that both synergy indices and anticipatory synergy adjustments prior to the initiation of a self-paced quick action would be diminished in the patients compared to age-matched controls. The MS patients and age-matched controls (n = 13 in both groups) performed one-finger and multifinger force production tasks involving both accurate steady-state force production and quick force pulses. The patients showed significantly lower maximal finger forces and a tendency toward slower force pulses. Enslaving was increased in MS, but only in the lateral fingers (index and little). Indices of multifinger synergies during steady-state force production were lower in MS, mainly due to the lower amount of intertrial variance that did not affect total force. Anticipatory synergy adjustments were significantly delayed in MS. The results show that MS leads to significant changes in multidigit synergies and feed-forward adjustments of the synergies prior to a quick action. The authors discuss possible contributions of subcortical structures to the impaired synergic control.     

From Equality‐Based Respect to Environmental Activism: Antecedents and Consequences of Global Identity

Global identity reflects social identification with the world and the largest, most inclusive human ingroup and is generally associated with behavior that serves the world and all humans, such as transnational cooperation or proenvironmental engagement. While the outcomes of being globally identified are well‐established, the antecedents of global identity are only partially explored. Drawing from research suggesting that respect fosters identification in small groups, we argue that the general experience of being respected as an equal by others increases global identification. In an online study with 469 Germans (students and nonstudents), we tested the relation between equality‐based respect and global identification in a structural equation model, with proenvironmental intentions and donation behavior as outcome variables. As expected, equality‐based respect, but not other forms of social recognition (need‐based care and achievement‐based social esteem), predicted global identity while higher global identity, in turn, predicted proenvironmental activism. These effects were substantial beyond known predictors of proenvironmental behavior and thus suggest that equality‐based respect represents an important facet of responses to global challenges.     

Do People Order Cues by Retrieval Fluency when Making Probabilistic Inferences?

In multiple‐cue probabilistic inferences, people infer alternatives' unknown values on decision criteria, using alternatives' attributes as cues. Some inferential strategies, like take‐the‐best, assume that people consider relevant cues sequentially in order of decreasing validity. This assumption has been deemed cognitively implausible by some, who suggest memory retrieval principles to guide cue order. We test whether memory‐based inferences are better described by a model considering cues in order of validity or in order of memory retrieval. In an experiment, we manipulated the frequency with which cues appeared in a learning phase, increasing retrieval fluency of cue values related to the more frequently appearing cue. In a subsequent decision phase, participants made a series of two‐alternative decisions based on the learned cue values. We compared two sequential sampling models, which differed in whether cues are sampled in order of subjective cue validity or in order of retrieval fluency. To model retrieval order of cues in the fluency sampling model, we used the declarative memory theory embedded in the ACT‐R cognitive architecture. Most participants' decisions were best described by the model sampling cues in order of memory retrieval. Only a minority of participants were classified as sampling cues by validity. Our result suggests that retrieval fluency is the primary driver of cue order in inferences from memory, irrespective of the cues' validities. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.