Decent Work and Work Motivation in Knowledge Workers: the Mediating Role of Psychological Capital

This article aimed to investigate the role of Decent Work as a predictor of different types of Work Motivation and to explore the possible role of Psychological Capital in mediating this relationship. The Decent Work Questionnaire, the Multidimensional Work Motivation Scale, and the Psychological Capital Questionnaire were administered to 3004 knowledge workers, in Portugal and Brazil. Results from Structural Equation Modeling analyses support the hypothesized model, showing the predictor role of Decent Work and complete and partial mediation effects of PsyCap in different relationships between DW and Work motivation variables. The results also support the idea that a decent work context predicts more autonomous work motivations again with the mediation of PsyCap. In sum, the results suggest that decent work plays an important role in promoting a positive approach to work, and that Psychological Capital is an important mediating variable in the promotion of autonomous Work motivation. Limitations and practical implications conclude the article.     

Hippocampal PKA/CREB pathway is involved in the improvement of memory induced by spermidine in rats

Spermidine (SPD) is an endogenous polyamine that modulates N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor function, and has been reported to facilitate memory formation. In the current study we determined whether or not the PKA/CREB signaling pathway is involved in SPD-induced facilitation of memory of inhibitory avoidance task in adult rats. The post-training administration of the cAMP-dependent protein kinase (PKA) inhibitor, N-[2-bromocinnamylamino)ethyl]-5-isoquinoline sulfonamide [H-89, 0.5 ρmol intrahippocampal (ih)] or the antagonist of the NMDA receptor polyamine-binding site (arcaine, 0.02 nmol ih) with SPD (0.2 nmol ih) prevented memory improvement induced by SPD. Intrahippocampal administration of SPD (0.2 nmol) facilitated PKA and cAMP response element-binding protein (CREB) phosphorylation in the hippocampus 180 min, but not 30 min, after administration, and increased translocation of the catalytic subunit of PKA into the nucleus. Arcaine (0.02 nmol) and H-89 (0.5 ρmol) prevented the stimulatory effect of SPD on PKA and CREB phosphorylation. These results suggest that memory enhancement induced by the ih administration of SPD involves the PKA/CREB pathways in rats.     

Technology, Methodology and Intervention: Performing Nanoethics in Portugal

During the last few decades we have witnessed a proliferation of exercises dealing with the public participation of citizens in various different dimensions of their societies, including issues of science and technology. On the one hand, these mechanisms provide more robust forms of public engagement with matters that were traditionally dealt with by experts; on the other hand, they raise concerns relating to their design, efficiency or potential for the empowerment of citizens. As part of the EC-funded project DEEPEN (Deepening Ethical Engagement and Participation in Emerging Nanotechnologies) a research team in Coimbra, Portugal, was put in charge of identifying the ethical and social “impacts” of emerging nanotechnologies, transforming the traditional focus groups through the incorporation of two methodological innovations: the Pedagogy of the Oppressed and the Theatre of the Oppressed. This article reflects on the outcomes and complexities of the introduction of these two methodologies. Since the participants had little or no information on nanotechnologies, we reflect on the politics of these focus groups by exploring how issues of intervention, subjectivity, representation and agency were interconnected during this exercise of public participation in Science and Technology, analyzing the role of social sciences in developing nanoethics.     

Collective rationality in interactive decisions: evidence for team reasoning

Decision theory and game theory rest on a fundamental assumption that players seek to maximize their individual utilities, but in some interactive decisions it seems intuitively reasonable to aim to maximize the utility of the group of players as a whole. Such team reasoning requires collective preferences and a distinctive mode of reasoning from preferences to decisions. Findings from two experiments provide evidence for collective preferences and team reasoning. In lifelike vignettes (Experiment 1) and abstract games (Experiment 2) with certain structural properties, most players preferred team-reasoning strategies to strategies supporting unique Nash equilibria, although individually rational players should choose equilibrium strategies. These findings suggest that team reasoning predicts strategy choices more powerfully than orthodox game theory in some games.     

Hand-movement profiles in a tactual—tactual matching task: Effects of spatial factors and laterality

We examined the effect of spatial factors and hemispheric lateralization upon hand-scanning strategies in 14 right-handed men tested in a tactual—tactual matching task. The experiment involved comparisons (judgments of same or different) between two objects sequentially touched by the fingertips of the left or right hand. Stimuli were made of smoothly joined cubes whose junctions were not haptically discernible. Exploratory strategies were inferred from the durations and locations of hand contacts with any of the cubes composing the stimuli. Accuracy was greater when the same stimulus was touched twice by the same hand than when different hands were used to feel it. With regard to strategies, both hands touched the upper parts of the object longer than the lower parts. Subjects also inspected more portions of the objects ipsilateral to the hand used. Overall differences in time spent touching cubes were greater for the right hand than for the left hand, showing that touch times were less evenly distributed on object parts for the former than for the latter. In this study, the process of information gathering by touch appears to be determined by the intertwining integration of contextual factors (e.g., stimulus position in space), biomechanical constraints on hand movements, and such cognitive factors as hemispheric differences on the ability to encode spatial pattern information.     

Categorizing facial identities, emotions, and genders: attention to high- and low-spatial frequencies by children and adults

Three age groups of participants (5-6 years, 7-8 years, adults) matched faces on the basis of facial identity. The procedure involved either low- or high-pass filtered faces or hybrid faces composed from two faces associated with different spatial bandwidths. The comparison stimuli were unfiltered faces. In the three age groups, the data indicated a significant bias for processing of low-pass information in priority. In a second task, participants were asked to identify the emotion (smiling or grimacing) or gender (male or female) of hybrid high-pass/low-pass faces. Opposite results emerged in the two tasks irrespective of the age group; the gender discrimination task indicated a bias for low-pass information, and the emotion task indicated a bias for high-pass information. These differences suggest independent processing routes for functionally different types of information such as emotion, gender, and identity. These routes are already established by 5 years of age.     

Activation of adenosine receptors in the posterior cingulate cortex impairs memory retrieval in the rat

Adenosine A1 and A2A receptor agonists and antagonists have been reported to alter learning and memory. The aim of our study was to investigate the involvement of adenosinergic system in memory retrieval into posterior cingulate cortex (PCC) of Wistar rats. To clarify this question, we tested specifics agonist and antagonists of adenosine A1 and A2A receptors in rats submitted to a one-trial inhibitory avoidance task. The stimulation of adenosine A1 and A2A receptors by CPA and CGS21680, respectively, impaired memory retrieval for inhibitory avoidance task, into PCC. These findings provide behavioral evidence for the role of adenosinergic system in the memory retrieval into PCC.