Achieving Transparency: An Argument For Enactivism

The transparency of perceptual experience has been invoked in support of many views about perception. I argue that it supports a form of enactivism—the view that capacities for perceptual experience and for intentional agency are essentially interdependent. I clarify the perceptual phenomenon at issue, and argue that enactivists should expect to find a parallel instance of transparency in our agentive experience, and that the two forms of transparency are constitutively interdependent (Section 1). I then argue that i) we do indeed find such parallels: the way in which an action is directed towards its goal through our bodily movements parallels the way in which an experience is directed towards its object through our perceptual sensation (Section 2), and ii) reflecting on sensorimotor skills shows why the two instances of transparency are constitutively interdependent (Section 3). Section 4 gives reasons for generalizing beyond the cases considered so far by applying the enactive view to Kohler's landmark studies of perceptual adaptation. The final section clarifies the form of enactivism to which the previous sections point. The view that emerges is one whereby our perceptual and practical skills are interrelated aspects of a single capacity to have one's mind intentionally directed upon the world. The transparency of experience, on this view, is achieved in virtue of our capacities as agents as much as it is given in virtue of our capacities as perceivers.     

Individual temporal differences in precompetition anxiety and hormonal concentration

This investigation explored individual differences in hormonal concentration and directional perception of anxiety 24hrs, 2hrs and 1 hr before an important competition. Those who perceived their anxiety level as positive to performance (i.e. facilitators) showed an increase in testosterone concentration as time-to-event approached that contrasted markedly with those who perceived their anxiety intensity as negative to performance (i.e. debilitators). The facilitatory group also exhibited a lower cortisol response 2 hrs and 1 hr, relative to 24 hrs before the event, whilst the response of the debilitatory group was elevated as time-to-event approached. Finally, the facilitatory group evidenced a trend towards rapid elevations in all of the catecholamines, whilst the concentration amongst the debilitatory group remained stable as the event approached. The findings add further substance to the veracity of the directional construct in acting as the important distinguishing variable which accounts for significant individual differences. Additionally it addresses the mechanism by which the relationship between anxiety direction and performance may be brought about. Such underpinning biochemical mechanisms offer one possible yet long awaited explanation to aid our understanding of the pre-event anxiety direction response of competitive individuals.     

An investigation of repetition and language processing in a case of conduction aphasia

A study is reported of a single case of conduction aphasia. A battery of tasks designed to investigate the parameters of the patient's severe repetition deficit is supplemented by tests of several language functions. The results provide extensive information on a wide range of the patient's language abilities and are used to evaluate the adequacy of four models that have been offered to account for conduction aphasia. An argument is made in support of the suggestion that the syndrome of conduction aphasia should be divided into two subgroups based on patients' ability to select and realize phonemes in speech output. It is concluded that the best explanation for the disorder of patients with repetition deficit but without significant speech output problems is the hypothesis that repetition ability is compromised by a pathological limitation of auditory-verbal short-term memory. This hypothesis is extended to account for the pattern of results obtained in the language tasks.     

UCS duration and conditioned suppression: Acquisition and extinction between-groups and terminal performance within-subjects

Two experiments demonstrated a positive monotonic relation between UCS duration and conditioned suppression ranging from no suppression at 0.05 sec to nearly complete suppression at 3.0 sec. In Exp 1, 5 acquisition groups were run at 0.5 mA. No suppression occurred at the shortest duration, approximately 50% suppression by Session 3 in two intermediate groups (0.2 and 0.5 sec) and nearly complete suppression by Session 3 at the two longest durations (1.0 and 3.0 sec). The relation between UCS duration and recovery of responding during extinction followed a parallel pattern. In Exp 2, terminal performance was studied within-subjects and the same relation was replicated.     

The Relationship Between Immediate Turnover and Employee Theft in the Restaurant Industry

This paper explores the relationship between immediate turnover and employee theft. Study 1 examined turnover and theft data from a large fast-food chain. The results suggested a relationship between theft and turnover rates. In Study 2, a laboratory study designed to test the causation of the relationship, participants indicated that they would be more likely to steal when they were leaving in two weeks than when leaving in two years. There was no significant interaction with management control. Results suggest that managers might reduce theft by implementing specific strategies when they are aware that employees are terminating employment.     

Perceptual automaticity in expert chess players: Parallel encoding of chess relations

A check detection task in a 5 × 5 section of the chessboard, containing a King and one or two potential checking pieces was employed. The checking status (i.e., the presence or absence of a check) and the number of attackers (one or two) were manipulated. It was found that the reaction time cost for adding a distractor was differentially greater inno trials thanyes trials for novice, but not for expert, chess players. In addition, we contrasted standard check detection trials with trials in which one of two attackers was cued (colored red) and the task was to determine the checking status of the cued attacker while ignoring the other attacker. We documented a Stroop-like interference effect on trials in which a cued nonchecking attacker appeared together with an attacker that was checking (i.e., incongruent). These findings suggest automatic and parallel encoding procedures for chess relations in experts.     

Nonautomatic emotion perception in a dual-task situation

Are emotions perceived automatically? Two psychological refractory period experiments were conducted to ascertain whether emotion perception requires central attentional resources. Task 1 required an auditory discrimination (tone vs. noise), whereas Task 2 required a discrimination between happy and angry faces. The difficulty of Task 2 was manipulated by varying the degree of emotional expression. The stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) between Task 1 and Task 2 was also varied. Experiment 1 revealed additive effects of SOA and Task 2 emotion-perception difficulty. Experiment 2 replicated the additive relationship with a stronger manipulation of emotion-perception difficulty. According to locus-of-slack logic, our participants did not process emotional expressions while central resources were devoted to Task 1. We conclude that emotion perception is not fully automatic.