In defense of "lineal causality"

It has often been said that ideas about lineal and circular causality may be theoretically profound, but that the reputed impossibility of lineal causality seems to fly in the face of our experience and our common sense. The above humorous jibe at theory goes straight to the heart of the matter. Bateson's epistemology of lineal and circular causality does not describe our everyday experience. Bateson's epistemology explains our experience.     

On sentential anagrams: Making sentences out of words

Perception and production of language often have a problem-solving component to them, and this has not been much studied. The present article describes an exploratory approach to some aspects of production which required college students to reorder sentential anagrams. The main finding was that the number of words to be ordered was the greatest influence on performance, whereas little if any influence was exerted by the grammatical variables studied. Although the problem-solving process does not model all language use, it may model the more creative aspect, in which people try to make nonstandard statements. In contrast to a common current view that sentences are holistic, well-formed linguistic objects in mind, the present work emphasizes the developmental and interactive aspect of language production.This work was supported by Grant A7655 from the National, Research Council of Canada and by Leave Fellowship W 760 174 from Canada Council.     

A neuropsychological assessment of dual-task costs in closed-head injury patients using Cohen’s effect size estimation method

A test of whether patients suffering from a severe closed-head injury (CHI) were affected by disproportionate dual-task costs compared to those of healthy control participants was carried out through a direct comparison of CHI effects on dual-task (psychological refractory period, or PRP) performance and on single-task performance. In the dual-task condition of the present experiment, independent choice-responses were required to two sequential stimuli presented at a variable stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA). A significant delay of the reaction time (RT) to the second stimulus was reported by both CHI patients and controls at short (SOA) compared to long SOA, i.e., a PRP effect. The PRP effect was more pronounced for CHI patients than controls. In the single-task condition, a single choice-response was required to a stimulus presented in isolation. The RT produced by CHI patients in the single-task paradigm was longer than the RT produced by controls. CHI effects on dual-task performance and on single-task performance were compared following (1) their transformation into Cohen’s ds, and (2) the application of a correction algorithm taking into account the different reliability of single-task and dual-task measures. The analysis of Cohen’s ds revealed that CHI effects on performance were, if anything, smaller in the dual-task condition than in the single-task condition. The results imply that CHI patient’s slower responding in single- and dual-task performance reflects a single common cause—slowing of the central processing.     

Bidirectional semantic priming in the attentional blink

The time course of semantic priming between two associated words was tracked using rapid serial visual presentation of two synchronized streams of stimuli appearing at about 20 items/sec, each stream including a target word. The two words were semantically related or unrelated and were separated by stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs) of 0–213 msec. Accuracy in reporting the first target (T1) versus the second target (T2) has been shown to interact dramatically with SOA over this range. The materials were in English in Experiment1 and Italian in Experiment2. T1 was semantically primed only at short SOAs, whereas T2 was primed at all SOAs (Experiment 1) or at all SOAs except the shortest one (Experiment2). The results indicate a strong competition between target words early in processing, with T2 often becoming the first word identified at short SOAs, thus priming T1.     

Cross-modal attentional deficits in processing tactile stimulation

In order to substantiate recent theorization on the possible links between the causes of the attentional blink and the psychological refractory period phenomena (e.g., Jolicoeur, 1999a), four experiments are reported in which two target stimuli, T₁ and T₂, were presented in different modalities at varying stimulus onset asynchronies (SOAs), with each stimulus being associated with a distinct task, Task₁ and Task₂. In Experiment 1, T₁ was a tone, and Task₁ was a speeded vocal response based on pitch. T₂ was a brief press applied to either of two distal fingerpads, and Task₂ was a speeded manual response based on tactile stimulus location. In Experiment 2, the same T₁ as that used in Experiment 1 was presented, and in Task₁ the subject either made a speeded vocal response based on pitch or ignored T₁. T₂ was a masked tactile stimulation, and Task₂ was an unspeeded manual discrimination of the tactile stimulation location. This Task₂ was maintained in Experiments 3 and 4. The auditory T₁ was replaced with a white digit embedded in a rapid serial visualization presentation of a stream of black letters, and in Task₁ the subject either made an unspeeded decision based on T₁ identity or ignored T₁. In all the experiments, the results showed an SOA-locked impairment in Task₂. As SOA was decreased, reaction times in the speeded Task₂ of Experiment 1 increased, and accuracy in the unspeeded Task₂ of Experiments 2–4 decreased. The SOA-locked impairment was almost eliminated when T₁ could be ignored or was absent. The results are discussed in terms of central processing limitations as the cause of such effects.     

The Predictive Brain

During the lengthy and complex process of human evolution our ancestors had to adapt to extremely testing situations in which survival depended on making rapid choices that subjected muscles and the body as a whole to extreme tension. In order to seize a prey traveling at speeds that could reach 36 km per hour Homo sapiens had just thousandths of a second in which to anticipate the right moment and position himself before the prey arrived. He also had to prepare the appropriate gesture, tensing his muscles and overcoming the resistance determined by body weight. While we are no longer faced with an environment that is anything so threatening, our brain continues to use these mechanisms day in day out to save time and energy, enabling us to avoid situations of danger, sense in advance the intentions of an interlocutor, and more besides. In this article we set out to show that our brain is not only a reactive mechanism, capable of reacting quickly to the stimuli that arrive from the external environment, but is above all a pro-active mechanism that allows us to make hypotheses, anticipate the consequences of actions, and formulate expectations: in short, to wrong foot an adversary.     

Do Near-Death Experiences Provide a Rational Basis for Belief in Life after Death?

In this paper I suggest that near-death experiences (NDEs) provide a rational basis for belief in life after death. My argument is a simple one and is modeled on the argument from religious experience for the existence of God. But unlike the proponents of the argument from religious experience, I stop short of claiming that NDEs prove the existence of life after death. Like the argument from religious experience, however, my argument turns on whether or not there is good reason to believe that NDEs are authentic or veridical. I argue that there is good reason to believe that NDEs are veridical and that therefore it is reasonable to believe in the existence of what they seem to be experiences of, namely, a continued state of consciousness after the death of the body. I will then offer some comments on the philosophical import of NDEs, as well as reflections on the current state of contemporary philosophy in light of the neglect of this phenomenon.     

Motor movement matters: The flexible abstractness of inner speech

Inner speech is typically characterized as either the activation of abstract linguistic representations or a detailed articulatory simulation that lacks only the production of sound. We present a study of the speech errors that occur during the inner recitation of tongue-twister-like phrases. Two forms of inner speech were tested: inner speech without articulatory movements and articulated (mouthed) inner speech. Although mouthing one’s inner speech could reasonably be assumed to require more articulatory planning, prominent theories assume that such planning should not affect the experience of inner speech and, consequently, the errors that are “heard” during its production. The errors occurring in articulated inner speech exhibited the phonemic similarity effect and the lexical bias effect—two speech-error phenomena that, in overt speech, have been localized to an articulatory-feature-processing level and a lexical—phonological level, respectively. In contrast, errors in unarticulated inner speech did not exhibit the phonemic similarity effect—just the lexical bias effect. The results are interpreted as support for a flexible abstraction account of inner speech. This conclusion has ramifications for the embodiment of language and speech and for the theories of speech production.     

Self‐promotion Statements in Video Resumes: Frequency,intensity, and gender effects on job applicant evaluation

Although video resumes have received a substantial amount of media attention and there seems to be a growing awareness among Human Resource professionals of video‐based job applications, little is known about the effect of video resumes on applicant evaluation. This research investigates the effectiveness of self‐promotion within the context of video resumes. Self‐promotion frequency and intensity and applicant gender were manipulated. Ratings by recruiters and college students indicate that high levels of self‐promotion in video resumes are ineffective for male applicants and potentially detrimental for female applicants. Job applicants should use caution when attempting to promote themselves using video resumes. More research is needed on impression management tactics used at the earliest stages of selection and on the mechanisms operating within video resumes that impact applicant evaluation.     

Some Changing Aspects of the Self-Concept of Pubescent Males

Fifty Ss initially rated themselves and a friend on intelligence. Ss were then divided into High and Low Acceptance groups using a self-ideal discrepancy. It was predicted that the High Acceptance group would generally rate themselves higher on the self-concept measures than would the Low Acceptance group. Further, and most importantly, it was predicted that the High group would rate their friend's intelligence as similar to their own, while the Low group would rate their friend higher than themselves and, therefore, closer to their ideal. The predictions were generally supported, although the High group failed to exhibit the expected trait similarity. It was concluded that a trait complementarity model was most appropriate for interpreting the results of both groups.