Evidence for precategorical extrinsic vowel normalization

Three experiments investigated whether extrinsic vowel normalization takes place largely at a categorical or a precategorical level of processing. Traditional vowel normalization effects in categorization were replicated in Experiment 1: Vowels taken from an [?]–[ε] continuum were more often interpreted as /?/ (which has a low first formant, F ₁) when the vowels were heard in contexts that had a raised F ₁ than when the contexts had a lowered F ₁. This was established with contexts that consisted of only two syllables. These short contexts were necessary for Experiment 2, a discrimination task that encouraged listeners to focus on the perceptual properties of vowels at a precategorical level. Vowel normalization was again found: Ambiguous vowels were more easily discriminated from an endpoint [ε] than from an endpoint [?] in a high-F ₁ context, whereas the opposite was true in a low-F ₁ context. Experiment 3 measured discriminability between pairs of steps along the [?]–[ε] continuum. Contextual influences were again found, but without discrimination peaks, contrary to what was predicted from the same participants’ categorization behavior. Extrinsic vowel normalization therefore appears to be a process that takes place at least in part at a precategorical processing level.     

A modal view of the semantics of theoretical sentences

In this paper, a new account of empirical claims in structuralism is developed. Its novelty derives from the use that is made of the linguistic approach to scientific theories despite the presumed incompatibility of structuralism with that approach. It is shown how the linguistic approach can be applied to the framework of structuralism if the semantic foundations of that approach are refined to do justice to the doctrine of indirect interpretation of theoretical terms. This doctrine goes back to Carnap but has been advanced until the present day without a proper semantic explanation.     

Konzept der Mentalisierung

Mentalization is the fundamental human capacity to relate to each other as minded beings. We mentalize when we are aware of mental states in others or ourselves as persons with feelings, wishes and beliefs. That is what makes the behavior of other people meaningful to us. Fonagy and colleagues based their mentalization concept on the attachment theory and on hypotheses about the development of the self. Mentalization-based treatment relies on this concept and has been manualized and evaluated for the treatment of borderline personality disorders. Psychotherapy research supports this to some extent. The authors claim that all psychotherapeutic treatment will benefit from the understanding of mentalization and its practical applications (Allen et al. 2008). Although the concept of mentalization is not new, the integration of different theories with empirically informed knowledge into a coherent concept is new.     

Perceived Threat,Social Identification,and Psychological Well‐Being: The Effects of Political Conflict Exposure

Using data drawn from the adult population in Northern Ireland (N = 1,515), this article examines the relationship between perceived intergroup threat and psychological well‐being, taking into consideration the mediating role of social identification and the moderating role of political conflict exposure. Results by and large confirmed our predictions that perceived threat would be directly associated with poorer well‐being but would also exert a positive indirect effect on well‐being via increased social identification. However, these relationships were dependent on individuals' prior conflict exposure, such that the positive indirect relationship between perceived threat and psychological well‐being emerged only for two subpopulations: individuals who had high direct and high indirect exposure to conflict, and individuals who had low direct, but high indirect conflict exposure. No indirect effects emerged for individuals with relatively lower conflict exposure. Results are discussed with regard to their implications for research on the consequences of intergroup threat in political conflict settings and beyond.     

Manual training of mental rotation

The aim of this study was to investigate the timing relations between phonological encoding that is, the generation of an abstract phonological representation of a to-be-produced utterance and the initiation of articulation. Previous research (Meyer &; Schriefers, 1991) using a picture-word paradigm suggested that, in the production of simple one-word naming responses, a speaker completes phonological encoding of the complete word before articulation is initiated. In the present study, this question was investigated for the production of German no-determiner noun phrases (e.g. roter Tisch, “red table”;). The results showed reliable facilitation effects for distractors that are identical to the first syllable of the first word of the noun phrase. For the second syllable of the first word, only weak facilitation effects were obtained. For the second word, no significant facilitation effects were obtained. However, additional analyses showed that two groups of speakers can be distinguished, one showing only facilitation effects for the first syllable of the first word, and the other showing an additional facilitation effect for the second syllable of the first word. Together with related results, our findings lead to two conclusions. First, the (phonological) word is not the lower limit of phonological encoding before articulation can be initiated. Second, speakers can adjust the size of the advance planning unit at the phonological level based on the specific speaking context.     

Encoding Strategies in Primary School Children: Insights From an Eye-Tracking Approach and the Role of Individual Differences in Attentional Control

The authors explored different aspects of encoding strategy use in primary school children by including (a) an encoding strategy task in which children's encoding strategy use was recorded through a remote eye-tracking device and, later, free recall and recognition for target items was assessed; and (b) tasks measuring resistance to interference (flanker task) and inhibition of attention to task-irrelevant stimuli (distractibility). Results revealed that the ability to inhibit distraction and resist interference undergoes developmental changes between the ages of 7–10 years. At the same time, children's capability to strategically focus on task-relevant aspects also continues to improve in primary school years. Although there were substantial relationships between encoding strategies and later recognition, encoding strategies appeared to be unrelated to basic aspects of attentional control.     

Contradiction,Liturgy, and Freedom: Romano Guardini's Search for Meaning after the Cataclysm of World War I

This essay examines the early thought of Romano Guardini (1886‐1968). It focuses on his magisterial book The Spirit of the Liturgy and discusses its genesis, its historical, biographical, and intellectual context, and its theological and philosophical significance. In so doing, it shows how Guardini reacted to World War I and the cataclysm of his time in turning to the church and its liturgical life in order to provide a source of meaning to a disoriented generation.     

Another Solution to the Problem of Theoretical Terms

In this paper, a solution to the problem of theoretical terms is developed that is based on Carnap’s doctrine of indirect interpretation of theoretical terms. This doctrine will be given a semantic, model-theoretic explanation that is not given by Carnap himself as he remains content with a syntactic explanation. From that semantic explanation, rules for the truth-value assignment to postulates, i.e. sentences that determine the meaning of theoretical terms, are derived. The logical status of postulates will be clarified thereby in such a way that the problem of theoretical terms disappears.

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Does the Higgs Mechanism Exist?

This paper explores the argument structure of the concept of spontaneous symmetry breaking in the electroweak gauge theory of the Standard Model: the so‐called Higgs mechanism. As commonly understood, the Higgs argument is designed to introduce the masses of the gauge bosons by a spontaneous breaking of the gauge symmetry of an additional field, the Higgs field. The technical derivation of the Higgs mechanism, however, consists in a mere reshuffling of degrees of freedom by transforming the Higgs Lagrangian in a gauge‐invariant manner. This already raises serious doubts about the adequacy of the entire manoeuvre. It will be shown that no straightforward ontic interpretation of the Higgs mechanism is tenable, since gauge transformations possess no real instantiations. In addition, the explanatory value of the Higgs argument will be critically examined.