Dating and Sexual Violence Research in the Schools: Balancing Protection of Confidentiality with Supporting the Welfare of Survivors

Rigorous research and program evaluation are needed to understand the experience of dating and sexual violence among youth and the impact of prevention and intervention efforts. Our dilemma in doing this work occurred when youth disclosed dating and sexual violence on a research survey. What responsibility do researchers have to protect survivors’ confidentiality as a research participant versus taking steps to ensure the student has the opportunity to access help? In our evaluation of a pilot dating violence prevention program, our protocols employed widely used procedures for providing resources to participants upon their completion of the survey and de‐identifying survey data. Upon reviewing preliminary survey results, we became concerned that these established procedures were not sufficient to support research participants who were adolescent survivors of dating and sexual violence. We followed a structured ethical decision‐making process to examine legal and ethical considerations, consult with colleagues, consider impacts and alternative solutions, and ultimately find a solution. Through this process, we developed procedures that balance participant confidentiality and the desire to support the welfare of survivors, which other researchers may want to employ when conducting youth sexual and dating violence research in school and community settings.     

Multisensory numerosity judgments for visual and tactile stimuli

To date, numerosity judgments have been studied only under conditions of unimodal stimulus presentation. It is therefore unclear whether the same limitations on correctly reporting the number of unimodal visual or tactile stimuli presented in a display might be expected under conditions in which participants have to count stimuli presented simultaneously in two or more different sensory modalities. In Experiment 1, we investigated numerosity judgments using both unimodal and bimodal displays consisting of one to six vibrotactile stimuli (presented over the body surface) and one to six visual stimuli (seen on the body via mirror reflection). Participants had to count the number of stimuli regardless of their modality of presentation. Bimodal numerosity judgments were significantly less accurate than predicted on the basis of an independent modality-specific resources account, thus showing that numerosity judgments might rely on a unitary amodal system instead. The results of a second experiment demonstrated that divided attention costs could not account for the poor performance in the bimodal conditions of Experiment 1. We discuss these results in relation to current theories of cross-modal integration and to the cognitive resources and/or common higher order spatial representations possibly accessed by both visual and tactile stimuli.     

When forewarning backfires: Paradoxical effects of elaborating social feedback on entrapment in a losing course of action

Entrapment occurs if people persist with losing courses of action. In two experiments, we show how elaborating social feedback (i.e., premature praise or forewarning regarding the chosen course of action) can have paradoxical effects on entrapment. The participants acted as head of a translation department and had to choose one out of four possible translation strategies for their employees. After choosing, they read four arguments (presumably written by former participants) which were either all in favor of the strategy chosen, all against it, or mixed. Half of the participants only read these arguments, whereas the other half elaborated on them by providing written comments (Experiment 1). The results showed that elaborating on other persons' arguments led to stronger entrapment, independently of whether the arguments were positive or negative. This pattern was due to biased argument processing: Whereas confirming thoughts were generated for positive arguments, negative arguments were refuted. Experiment 2 confirmed that this biased argument processing caused subsequent entrapment. These results indicate that elaborating any type of argument can lead to heightened entrapment and, hence, forewarning can backfire. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

罗尔斯契约论中的正常能力假定与能力缺陷问题

罗尔斯的契约论强调公民是正常而充分合作的社会成员,而且它还假定他们的种种天赋才能处于正常范围。在可行能力思路看来,由于这样一种契约主义的方法论,那些具有严重能力缺陷的人不能从正义原则中公平受益,他们甚至被排除在正义原则的选择过程之外了,因此这种理论没能真正保障每一个人基于正义的不可侵犯性。但在罗尔斯的契约论中,作为正常合作成员之基础的两种道德能力应当被理解为是每一个公民所拥有的,而正常能力的假定意在排除能力差异在原则选择过程中的影响,因而它反而是包容性的。在组织有序的社会中,有能力缺陷的人的一些特殊需要确实没有被当作一个基本正义问题来对待,但这一点乃是平等的政治自主性的代价。     

Der Foto-Hand-Test

Projective psychological techniques might be useful for measuring forensically relevant constructs in the context of a multimodal assessment strategy but are often considered to be deficient concerning reliability and validity. The Photo Hand Test (FHT), a German version of the Hand Test, is a diagnostic tool aimed at measuring aggressive dispositions. It uses photographs of hand gestures which test persons are required to interpret. The answers are coded and an acting-out score is computed from diverse categories.A study on the reliability and validity of the FHT protocols from 98 offenders and a comparison group of 55 non-offenders was carried out. Internal consistency coefficients of the FHT scores were low and unsatisfactory. Offenders had higher acting-out scores than non-offenders, they did not give more aggression-prone interpretations but more interpretations coded as aggression-inhibiting. Correlations of the FHT scores with self-report scales from the Antisocial Personality Questionnaire did not show the expected patterns; however, they did suggest effects of a hostility bias: persons who interpreted many hand gestures as aggression-prone did not describe themselves as highly aggressive or impulsive but were more distrustful and paranoid. This indicates a projection mechanism different from the one postulated by the FHT authors.The results suggest that FHT measures should be interpreted with caution in forensic evaluations.     

Two ways to be complex and why they matter: implications for attitude strength and lying

Integrative complexity broadly measures the structural complexity of statements. This breadth, although beneficial in multiple ways, can potentially hamper the development of specific theories. In response, the authors developed a model of complex thinking, focusing on 2 different ways that people can be complex within the integrative complexity system and subsequently developed measurements of each of these 2 routes: Dialectical complexity focuses on a dialectical tension between 2 or more competing perspectives, whereas elaborative complexity focuses on complexly elaborating on 1 singular perspective. The authors posit that many variables have different effects on these 2 forms of complexity and subsequently test this idea in 2 different theoretical domains. In Studies 1a, 1b, and 2, the authors demonstrate that variables related to attitude strength (e.g., domain importance, extremism, domain accessibility) decrease dialectical complexity but increase elaborative complexity. In Study 3, the authors show that counterattitudinal lying decreases dialectical complexity but increases elaborative complexity, implicating a strategic (as opposed to a cognitive strain) view of the lying-complexity relationship. The authors argue that this dual demonstration across 2 different theoretical domains helps establish the utility of the new model and measurements as well as offer the potential to reconcile apparent conflicts in the area of cognitive complexity.     

Reduction,externalism and immanence in Husserl and Heidegger

This paper argues that the Husserl–Heidegger relationship is systematically misunderstood when framed in terms of a distinction between internalism and externalism. Both philosophers, it is argued, employ the phenomenological reduction to immanence as a fundamental methodological instrument. After first outlining the assumptions regarding inner and outer and the individual and the social from which recent epistemological interpretations of phenomenology begin, I turn to the question of Husserl’s internalism. I argue that Husserl can only be understood as an internalist on the assumption that immanence equates with internal. This, however, is not the case as can be seen once the reduction is understood not as setting aside the existence of the world, but rather a reflection on its meaning. Turning to Heidegger, I argue that his commitment to a form of the phenomenological reduction precludes him from being either a semantic or a social externalist. The place of authenticity and the first person perspective in his work derive from his phenomenological commitments, which can be seen in his accounts of discourse and language and of falling (Verfallen). I then go on to briefly outline a more plausible basis for understanding the difference between Husserl’s and Heidegger’s phenomenologies in terms of their respective emphases on logic and on poetics.