Licensure in Counseling: An Alternative Direction

Bernstein, B.L, & Lecomte, C. Licensure in Psychology: Alternative Directions. Professional Psychology, 1981, 12, 200–208.     

Correction: Two-action task,testing imitative social learning in kea (Nestor notabilis)

Social learning is an adaptive way of dealing with the complexity of life as it reduces the risk of trial-and-error learning. Depending on the type of information acquired, and associations formed, several mechanisms within the larger taxonomy of social learning can be distinguished. Imitation is one such process within this larger taxonomy, it is considered cognitively demanding and is associated with high-fidelity response matching. The present study reproduced a 2002 study conducted by Heyes and Saggerson, which successfully illustrated motor imitation in budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulatus). In our study, eighteen kea (Nestor notabilis) that observed a trained demonstrator remove a stopper from a test box (1) took less time from hopping on the box to feeding (response duration) in session one and (2) were faster in making a vertical removal response on the stopper once they hopped on the box (removal latency) in session one than non-observing control group individuals. In contrast to the budgerigars (Heyes and Saggerson, Ani Behav. 64:851–859, 2002) the present study could not find evidence of motor imitation in kea. The results do illustrate, however, that there were strong social effects on exploration rates indicating motivational and attentional shifts. Furthermore, the results may suggest a propensity toward emulation in contrast to motor imitation or alternatively selectivity in the application of imitation.

     

Künstliche Intelligenz und Philosophie

Artificial Intelligence can be considered as the so far last attempt to decode the anthropological comparison between human beings and machines. Thereby it also represents in a prominent way what can be called systemic thought. Searle's conclusive argument against strong AI (that is the idea of computers having intention in a literal way) refers to his precise distinction between syntax and semantics. This difference obviously opposing some of Searle's other essential ideas will only convince if it also explains the genetic-pragmatic aspect. A theory explaining the life of mind and the possibility of understanding needs to combine representation and intention with the subjective causation of signs. At the same time they have to be contextualized within a model of teleologically interpreted life recognized with the help of self-experience and self-reflection. This suggests that AI is a simulation which wrongly believes to be a real duplication. Actually it is a semiotic reduction (syntax and semantic surface of signs only) and a psychological compensation (Turing test) connected with a genetic or abductive fallacy. The biological decontextualization, in fact the elimination of teleology and intention, the deconstruction of subjectivity, the loss of the genetic-pragmatic dimension and the abductive fallacy induce the strong AI to confuse its surface-illusion of simulated understanding with the real process itself.     

Mathematical progress: Between reason and society

It is shown how the historiographic purport of Lakatosian methodology of mathematics is structured on the theme of analysis and synthesis. This theme is explored and extended to the revolutionary phase around 1800. On the basis of this historical investigation it is argued that major innovations, crucial to the appraisal of mathematical progress, defy reconstruction as irreducibly rational processes and should instead essentially be understood as processes of social-cognitive interaction. A model of conceptual change is developed whose essential ingredients are the variability of rational responses to new intellectual and practical challenges arising in the cultural environment of mathematics, and the shifting selective pressure of society. The resulting view of mathematical development is compared with Kuhn's theory of scientific paradigms in the light of some personal communications.     

The IAT is sensitive to the perceived accuracy of newly learned associations

Three experiments tested whether the Implicit Association Test (IAT) is sensitive to the perceived accuracy of newly learned associations. In experiment 1, participants learned to associate positive or negative attributes with two novel groups. Participants in one condition were told that the attributes accurately described the groups; in a second condition, prior to learning, they were made aware that the attributes were randomly assigned to the groups. Participants were given an IAT and an explicit measure testing attitudes towards the two groups. When the participants were told that the attributes were accurate, their IAT performance and explicit measure responses indicated a preference for the more positively described group but when the attributes were known to be arbitrary, preferences were reduced according to both measures. Experiment 2 replicated these results and demonstrated that the associations were learned even in the random condition. Experiment 3 included a condition that placed “not” before each attribute, which demonstrated that people can incorporate a negative modifier into a learned association. Explicit attitudes and the IAT showed reversed preferences in this negation condition. These experiments imply that the IAT is sensitive to the perceived accuracy of learned associations. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Attention in risky choice

Previous research on the processes involved in risky decisions has rarely linked process data to choice directly. We used a simple measure based on the relative amount of attentional deployment to different components (gains/losses and their probabilities) of a risky gamble during the choice process, and we related this measure to the actual choice. In an experiment we recorded the decisions, decision times, and eye movements of 80 participants who made decisions on 11 choice problems. We used the number of eye fixations and fixation transitions to trace the deployment of attention during the choice process and obtained the following main results. First, different components of a gamble attracted different amounts of attention depending on participants' actual choice. This was reflected in both the number of fixations and the fixation transitions. Second, the last-fixated gamble but not the last-fixated reason predicted participants' choices. Third, a comparison of data obtained with eye tracking and data obtained with verbal protocols from a previous study showed a large degree of convergence regarding the process of risky choice. Together these findings tend to support dimensional decision strategies such as the priority heuristic.     

Cognitive control in number magnitude processing: evidence from eye-tracking

The unit-decade compatibility effect describes longer response times and higher error rates for incompatible (e.g., 37_52) than compatible (e.g., 42_57) number comparisons. Recent research indicated that the effect depends on the percentage of same-decade filler items. In the present study, we further examined this relationship by recording participants’ eye-fixation behaviour. In four conditions, participants had to compare item sets with different filler item types (i.e., same-decade and same-unit filler items) and different numbers of same-decade filler items (i.e., 25, 50, and 75 %). We found a weaker unit-decade compatibility effect with most fixations on tens in the condition with same-unit filler items. Moreover, the compatibility effect increased with the percentage of same-decade filler items which was accompanied by less fixations on tens and more fixations on units. Thus, our study provides first eye-tracking evidence for the influence of cognitive control in number processing.