Perceptual grouping does not affect multi-attribute decision making if no processing costs are involved

Adaptive strategy selection implies that a decision strategy is chosen based on its fit to the task and situation. However, other aspects, such as the way information is presented, can determine information search behavior; especially when the application of certain strategies over others is facilitated. But are such display effects on multi-attribute decisions also at work when the manipulation does not entail differential costs for different decision strategies? Three Mouselab experiments with hidden information and one eye tracking experiment with an open information board revealed that decision behavior is unaffected by purely perceptual manipulations of the display based on Gestalt principles; that is, based on manipulations that induce no noteworthy processing costs for different information search patterns. We discuss our results in the context of previous findings on display effects; specifically, how the combination of these findings and our results reveal the crucial role of differential processing costs for different strategies for the emergence of display effects. This finding describes a boundary condition of the commonly acknowledged influence of information displays and is in line with the ideas of adaptive strategy selection and cost–benefit tradeoffs.     

Neue Entwicklungen in der allgemeinen psychoanalytischen Psychosomatik

Psychoanalysis has played a pivotal role for developments in psychosomatics both on a conceptual and an institutionalization level. In contemporary psychosomatics there is a focus on conceptual models that concentrate on psychic structure, the processing of emotions and embodiment. Alongside these, the questions arise on how psychoanalytic views on psychosomatic disorders in a more classical sense will develop further and their relevance for current developments. This article gives a brief historical overview of some central concepts in psychoanalytic psychosomatics and shows how these are resumed in what can be distinguished as six aspects of contemporary psychoanalytic psychosomatics. This is demonstrated by a brief case report. The article closes with some proposals for the clinical practice.     

Thinking with Beauvoir on the Freedom of the Child

Among philosophers, Simone de Beauvoir is unique in treating childhood as a philosophical phenomenon. In both The Ethics of Ambiguity and The Second Sex, she examines the relationship between childhood and human freedom and considers its role in the development of subjectivity. Despite this, few sustained analyses of her treatment of the phenomenon exist. I argue that Beauvoir's conception of childhood is not uniform, but changes from The Ethics of Ambiguity to The Second Sex. Whereas the former presents children as lacking moral freedom, as not fully sovereign individuals, the latter suggests that children are just as free as adults. When children do not fully possess or exercise freedom, it is not because they are not in a position to do so, but rather because various social institutions hinder them. I find this position useful for developing a phenomenological account of childhood as a site for freedom. Hence, Beauvoir becomes a source for thinking of issues in philosophical anthropology concerning the temporality of human existence and the nature of human agency over a lifespan.