Source credibility and the processing of refutation texts

The knowledge revision components framework (KReC) outlines the basic comprehension processes and text factors that can be accentuated to increase the potential for knowledge revision during reading. The goal of the present study was to explore source credibility as one such text factor. In Experiment 1, we established the utility of a set of refutation texts in influencing knowledge revision. Participants read ten refutation and ten control texts. The participants had faster reading times and higher posttest scores for the refutation than for the control texts, providing evidence for knowledge revision. In Experiment 2, we examined the influence of source credibility under normal reading conditions. Participants read 20 refutation texts, ten with high-credibility and ten with low-credibility sources. The reading times and posttest scores suggested that knowledge revision unfolded successfully, independent of credibility. Using the same texts, in Experiment 3 we examined the influence of direct instructions that made the credibility of the source of information more salient. When the credibility of the source was made salient, the revision process was disrupted in the low-credibility condition, as evidenced by slower reading times and lower posttest scores than in the high-credibility condition. The results add to our understanding of the factors that constrain knowledge revision during the reading of refutation texts, and are discussed in the context of the extant literature and KReC.     

Attachment theory within clinical supervision: application of the conceptual to the empirical

Attachment theory, which has demonstrated application in caregiver-child, romantic, and psychotherapeutic relationships, also appears to be supervision relevant. But bad blood between attachment theory and psychoanalysis may well have hampered considering the relevance of attachment theory for psychoanalytic supervision. This project sought to investigate the application of attachment theory to the supervision situation, with the potential implications of our findings for psychoanalytic supervision being considered. Attachment styles, leader–follower dynamics, and attachment-based expectations were explored as predictors of supervisor-trainee working alliance using a prospective, longitudinal study design. Findings revealed the importance of measuring supervision-specific attachment, the particularly problematic nature of supervisee avoidant attachment, and the potential contribution of a leader–follower framework for understanding supervisory attachment. These attachment concepts may well be useful in, and additive for, psychoanalytic supervision practice.     

The Use of Codified Law in the Rabbinic Courts of Frankfurt am Main on the Eve of the Enlightenment

During the Middle Ages and into the early modern period, rabbinic scholars of law in Franco-German communities had an at best ambivalent attitude toward the codification of Jewish law. Even Rabbi Joseph Caro’s Shul?an ˋArukh, first printed in Venice in 1565, was not well received by all. While students of the law from the lower ranks seem to have embraced the code, many leading rabbis—particularly those in sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century Poland—rejected it. In the course of the mid-seventeenth century, attitudes shifted, and Shul?an ˋArukh became the place for commentaries and learned discussions of the law. By the eighteenth century, rabbinic courts were using Shul?an ˋArukh as the basis of their legal decision making. This is confirmed, at least for Frankfurt am Main, through an examination of the legal diary of Rabbi Nathan Maas (d. 1794). In his diary, Maas not only summarized cases that he heard but also sometimes offered rationales for the court’s decisions. These précis make constant reference to Shul?an ˋArukh and its commentaries while never entering into an analysis of talmudic sources. This cannot have been because of a lack of ability, for Maas and his colleagues on the Frankfurt court were well-known scholars who published talmudic commentaries of substance. The use of a code, even by such authorities, may have been for utilitarian reasons, that is, to speed up the judicial process.     

A New Normalization Strategy for the Implicational Fragment of Classical Propositional Logic

The introduction and elimination rules for material implication in natural deduction are not complete with respect to the implicational fragment of classical logic. A natural way to complete the system is through the addition of a new natural deduction rule corresponding to Peirce’s formula (((A → B) → A) → A). E. Zimmermann [6] has shown how to extend Prawitz’ normalization strategy to Peirce’s rule: applications of Peirce’s rule can be restricted to atomic conclusions. The aim of the present paper is to extend Seldin’s normalization strategy to Peirce’s rule by showing that every derivation Π in the implicational fragment can be transformed into a derivation Π′ such that no application of Peirce’s rule in Π′ occurs above applications of →-introduction and →-elimination. As a corollary of Seldin’s normalization strategy we obtain a form of Glivenko’s theorem for the classical {→}-fragment.     

A bilateral advantage for storage in visual working memory

Various studies have demonstrated enhanced visual processing when information is presented across both visual hemifields rather than in a single hemifield (the bilateral advantage). For example, Alvarez and Cavanagh (2005) reported that observers were able to track twice as many moving visual stimuli when the tracked items were presented bilaterally rather than unilaterally, suggesting that independent resources enable tracking in the two visual fields. Motivated by similarities in the apparent capacity and neural substrates that mediate tracking and visual working memory (WM), the present work examined whether or not a bilateral advantage also arises during storage in visual WM. Using a recall procedure to assess working memory for orientation information, we found a reliable bilateral advantage; recall error was smaller with bilateral sample displays than with unilateral displays. To demonstrate that the bilateral advantage influenced storage per se rather than just encoding efficiency, we replicated the observed bilateral advantage using sequentially presented stimuli. Finally, to further characterize how bilateral presentations enhanced storage in working memory, we measured both the number and the resolution of the stored items and found that bilateral presentations lead to an increased probability of storage, rather than enhanced mnemonic resolution. Thus, the bilateral advantage extends beyond the initial selection and encoding of visual information to influence online maintenance in visual working memory.     

Monitoring same/different discrimination behavior in time and space: Finding differences and anticipatory discrimination behavior

Discrimination behavior in a standard, two-alternative forced choice same/different task is usually measured by the pigeon’s pecking one or the other of two arbitrary report areas. We found that pigeons make anticipatory, discriminative responses to the visual display during the stimulus observing period prior to the availability of the report areas; the spatial distribution of these anticipatory discriminative responses strongly correlated with the upcoming choice response. These anticipatory pecks provide evidence that the process of discrimination occurs well before the moment of choice and that key aspects of this process can be revealed by looking at the distribution of observing responses. We also manipulated the variability of the displayed items to study the nature of these anticipatory responses; again, the spatial distribution of responding during the stimulus observing period strongly correlated with the upcoming choice response. The distribution of these prechoice pecks supports the theory that pigeons search for differences in the displayed items. If differences are found, then pigeons prepare to report “different”; if not, then they report “same.”     

Quantity,not quality: the relationship between fluid intelligence and working memory capacity

A key motivation for understanding capacity in working memory (WM) is its relationship with fluid intelligence. Recent evidence has suggested a two-factor model that distinguishes between the number of representations that can be maintained in WM and the resolution of those representations. To determine how these factors relate to fluid intelligence, we conducted an exploratory factor analysis on multiple number-limited and resolution-limited measures of WM ability. The results strongly supported the two-factor model, with fully orthogonal factors accounting for performance in the number-limited and resolution-limited conditions. Furthermore, the reliable relationship between WM capacity and fluid intelligence was exclusively supported by the number factor (r=.66), whereas the resolution factor made no reliable contribution (r=−.05). Thus, the relationship between WM capacity and standard measures of fluid intelligence is mediated by the number of representations that can be simultaneously maintained in WM, rather than by the precision of those representations.     

Improving Generalization of Academic Skills: Commentary on the Special Issue

Behavior analysts have long been interested in developing and promoting the use of effective generalization strategies for behavioral interventions. Perhaps because research on academic performance has lagged behind in the field of applied behavior analysis, far less research on this topic has been conducted for academic performance problems. The purpose of this article is to comment on the six reports of experimental studies that make up this special issue. The methods investigated by the authors in this special issue are innovative and raise many intriguing questions that should fuel further research and development of strategies for improving generalized academic skills. The article concludes with thoughts about what we know as a field, and what has yet to be examined through future research.     

Approaches to Wittgenstein: Collected Papers

Book reviewed:
Brian McGuinness, Approaches to Wittgenstein: Collected Papers , Routledge, 2002, xv + 299 pp, £55.00