Between reality and imagination: when is spatial updating automatic?

Spatial updating has been shown to occur automatically and operate on both real and imagined environments. In three experiments, we compared spatial updating in real and imagined environments and examined when automatic spatial updating occurs. Participants learned the locations of real objects in a room and imagined being in their kitchens. They turned to face either the kitchen or the room targets and pointed to the targets before and after turning. Although objects in the real environment were automatically updated when the participants turned in the imagined environment, targets in the imagined environment were not automatically updated when the participants turned in the real environment. However, explicit spatial updating of imagined environments was as efficient as that of real environments. Automatic updating of the real objects required perceptual experience of these targets, either visually or by touch, and did not occur when the targets were described verbally. Implications for spatial cognition research are discussed.     

Memory failures appraisal in younger and older adults: role of individual difference and event outcome variables

The authors examined the role of individual difference and event outcome variables in younger and older adults' memory failures appraisal. Participants read vignettes that described fictitious younger characters (in their 20s-30s) or older characters (in their 60s-70s) who had experienced a minor or severe consequence of their forgetfulness. The authors solicited attribution ratings on the potential causes of the forgetfulness and memory opinion ratings. Younger and older adults' ratings were largely similar, although age differences occurred on the effort and luck attribution scales. The consequences of the forgetting had a sizable impact on both the attribution and memory opinion ratings. Individual differences in self-reported memory had a relatively small impact on causal attribution and memory opinion ratings. These results suggested that people weigh their judgments of fictitious forgetful characters against event outcomes more so than ageist beliefs that portray a negative image of cognitive competence in later life.     

Subjective experience and the attentional lapse: task engagement and disengagement during sustained attention

Three experiments investigated the relationship between subjective experience and attentional lapses during sustained attention. These experiments employed two measures of subjective experience (thought probes and questionnaires) to examine how differences in awareness correspond to variations in both task performance (reaction time and errors) and psycho-physiological measures (heart rate and galvanic skin response). This series of experiments examine these phenomena during the Sustained Attention to Response Task (SART, Robertson, Manly, Adrade, Baddeley, & Yiend, 1997). The results suggest we can dissociate between two components of subjective experience during sustained attention: (A) task unrelated thought which corresponds to an absent minded disengagement from the task and (B) a pre-occupation with one's task performance that seems to be best conceptualised as a strategic attempt to deploy attentional resources in response to a perception of environmental demands which exceed ones ability to perform the task. The implications of these findings for our understanding of how awareness is maintained on task relevant material during periods of sustained attention are discussed.     

Activation and Use of Racial Stereotypes in Personnel Decisions: A Test of Two Theories1

This research tested contrasting predictions about activation and use of racial stereotypes in personnel decisions. Devine's (1989) theory' holds that stereotyped inferences should be apparent when decisions are time constrained and judges have little opportunity to suppress automatically activated stereotypes. Gilbert & Hixon's (1991) busy-ness model implies that stereotypes are unlikely to be activated and to influence the decisions of judges unless these decisions are not time-constrained. Participants were allowed 90 s or 180 s to evaluate Black and White candidates for football managerial positions requiring aggressiveness (linebacker coach) or cognitive prowess (general manager). Only when decisions were not time constrained did participants show stereotyped judgments by favoring Whites for the general manager's position and overranking Blacks for linebacker coach. This pattern was consistent with Gilbert & Hixon's busy-ness model and contrary to Devine's theory of automatically activated stereotypes.     

Evaluation from the inside: Participatory evaluation of agricultural research in the Philippines

This paper discusses the experience of a Philippines-based agricultural research program, where participatory evaluation is embedded in a broader, user-centered participatory research approach. Three case projects illustrate and analyze participatory evaluation of agricultural research in a developing country context. Different evaluation types are identified and their use in different phases of the research process is discussed. These field experiences show how “evaluation from the inside” can contribute to effective research planning and implementation, particularly in enhancing sensitivity to user needs and situations. network for user participatory rootcrop R&D sponsored by the International Potato Center in Asia. Under his leadership, UPWARD has increasingly sought to build participatory monitoring and evaluation into the network’s research and development activities. He has a Ph.D. in communication and innovation studies from Wageningen Agricultural University in The Netherlands. Prior joining UPWARD, Campilan worked with the International Institute of Rural Reconstruction and the Philippine Root Crop Research and Training Center. His research interests include communication of innovations, institutional linkage development, participatory research methods and tools, and strengthening local knowledge systems. From 1991 until 1997 he was coordinator of Users’ Perspectives With Agricultural Research and Development (UPWARD) network. He was previously based in Latin America. His main research interests include the socioeconomic and cultural aspects of crop genetic diversity conservation and utilization involving ethnobotanical studies, on-farm conservation, and work on seed systems. He is also interested in research on rural enterprise development. He has been actively involved in capacity building initiatives among national agricultural researchers, especially in participatory research methods and planning techniques. He can be contacted CIP-ESEAP, Kebun Percobaan Muara, Jalan Raya Ciapus, Bogor 16610, Indonesia, fax (62 251) 316 264, e-mail: G.Prain@cgiar.org. Her major responsibilities include facilitating the network’s activities on sustainable crop management R&D and on capacity building in participatory approaches and methods. At the UPWARD coordinating office, she is in charge of training, publications, and information management. She has extensive training and hands on experience in the use of participatory methods and tools, particularly through a Philippines project on soil resource management for sweetpotato production. She has an MSc in family resource management and development communication from the University of the Philippines at Los Ba?os. Her research interests include sustainable crop management, strengthening local R&D capacity, and field testing participatory methods and tools.     

The effects of practice on object-based, location-based, and static-display inhibition of return

We report two experiments that examine the effects of practice on object-based, location-based, and static-display inhibition of return (IOR). The results are clean All three effects get smaller with practice. These findings are at odds with the results of Müller and von Mühlenen (1996), who failed to observe object-based IOR and detected no effect of practice on static-display IOR. However, their subjects were more practiced than ours prior to data collection. We suggest, therefore, that the reducing effect of practice on IOR might have occurred in their unrecorded practice sessions. We also discuss a two-process model in which IOR is seen as the net effect of underlying inhibitory and excitatory processes. In such models (e.g., Solomon & Corbit,1974), practice often results in a reduction of the net effect of the two processes.     

The heart of consequentialism

Conclusion My goal in this paper was to argue that consequentialism should be construed as the view that the better a state of affairs the better the action that produces it and the more moral reason there is to perform that action. I call this view BETTER. I tried to show that treating this rather than a claim about the right as crucial to consequentialism had significant advantages. Finally, I demonstrated the relevance of my account to the issue of whether consequentialism is correct. It doesn't provide a conclusive answer to that question (we should be suspicious if it did) but allows us to see it in a new light and hopefully, suggests new and fruitful ways to tackle it.I am grateful to Daniel Howard-Snyder for help with this paper and to David McNaughton and Piers Rawling for correspondence regarding some of their views. Thanks also to an anonymous referee atPhilosophical Studies for comments.