Accurately locating one's spatial position in one's environment during a navigation task: Adaptive activity for finding or setting control flags in orienteering

ObjectiveThe objective of this study was to compare orienteers' modes of adaptation to different environments. Emphasis is placed on characterizing their concerns in relation to the need to accurately locate one's spatial position during orienteering.Design and methodsThe activity of eight orienteers was studied on two navigation tasks: (a) a classic orienteering task, and (b) a setting-orienteering task. The data were collected and processed using a procedure defined for course-of-action analysis. The methodology used video recordings of the orienteers in natural settings made by a glasses camera, and verbalizations during self-confrontation interviews conducted with four participants. Processing the qualitative data consisted of reconstructing the orienteers' course of experience. A further statistical analysis enabled us to identify events pertaining to map reading and pace.ResultsThe analysis uncovered similarities and differences in the sequential organization of the orienteers' activity classic and setting tasks that were related to particular phases of the two courses and to time pressure. The results stress two fundamentally different modes of navigating and locating one's spatial position in one's environment.ConclusionsThe navigation activity and its adaptive nature are discussed in relation to the significant structural characteristics of the environment. The results are put in perspective in reference to the fast-and-frugal-heuristics approach, and several perspectives for skill acquisition are examined. It is suggested that this study could have broader implications for sport psychologists and sport instructors, in various sports requiring navigational skills in complex and dynamic environments.     

The Argument From Scale Revisited

ABSTRACT

Several philosophers and scientists have claimed that modern cosmology forces us to think that humans are insignificant from the cosmic point of view. This argument for atheism derived from the scale of the universe became popular in the twentieth century, but its roots are long. Interestingly, it has not typically been considered as a very strong anti-theistic argument, and the size of the universe has also been used as proof for theism. This article offers a brief overview of how the argument from scale has been used in the past, and then discusses modern versions of it.     

How does horizontal and vertical navigation influence spatial memory of multifloored environments?

Although a number of studies have been devoted to 2-D navigation, relatively little is known about how the brain encodes and recalls navigation in complex multifloored environments. Previous studies have proposed that humans preferentially memorize buildings by a set of horizontal 2-D representations. Yet this might stem from the fact that environments were also explored by floors. Here, we have investigated the effect of spatial learning on memory of a virtual multifloored building. Two groups of 28 participants watched a computer movie that showed either a route along floors one at a time or travel between floors by simulated lifts, consisting in both cases of a 2-D trajectory in the vertical plane. To test recognition, the participants viewed a camera movement that either replicated a segment of the learning route (familiar segment) or did not (novel segment—i.e., shortcuts). Overall, floor recognition was not reliably superior to column recognition, but learning along a floor route produced a better spatial memory performance than did learning along a column route. Moreover, the participants processed familiar segments more accurately than novel ones, not only after floor learning, but crucially, also after column learning, suggesting a key role of the observation mode on the exploitation of spatial memory.     

Hardiness Promotes Work Engagement,Prevents Burnout,and Moderates Their Relationship

We examined the relationships between hardiness, work engagement, and burnout. Participants were Belgian service members involved in the International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF) operation. They completed a questionnaire containing hardiness items from the revised Norwegian Hardiness Scale, items concerning vigor and dedication from the Utrecht Work Engagement Scale, and those tapping cynicism and emotional exhaustion from the Utrecht Burnout Scale. Results showed that hardiness was positively related to dedication and vigor, and negatively to cynicism and emotional exhaustion. Our results further suggest that work engagement and burnout are the opposite ends of a continuum. However, analyses concerning the moderation effect of hardiness suggest that individual differences could imply different processes in the relationship between work engagement and burnout.     

Numerical and nonnumerical estimation in children with and without mathematical learning disabilities

There are currently multiple explanations for mathematical learning disabilities (MLD). The present study focused on those assuming that MLD are due to a basic numerical deficit affecting the ability to represent and to manipulate number magnitude (Butterworth, 1999 Butterworth, B. 1999. The mathematical brain, London, , United Kingdom: Macmillan.  [Google Scholar], 2005 Butterworth, B. 2005. “Developmental dyscalculia”. In Handbook of mathematical cognition, Edited by: Campbell, J. I. D. 455–467. New York, NY: Psychology Press.  [Google Scholar]; A. J. Wilson &; Dehaene, 2007 Wilson, A. J. and Dehaene, S. 2007. “Number sense and developmental dyscalculia”. In Human behavior, learning, and the developing brain: Atypical development, 2nd, Edited by: Coch, D., Dawson, G. and Fischer, K. 212–237. New York, NY: Guilford Press.  [Google Scholar]) and/or to access that number magnitude representation from numerical symbols (Rousselle &; Noël, 2007 Rousselle, L. and Noël, M. P. 2007. Basic numerical skills in children with mathematics learning disabilities: A comparison of symbolic vs non-symbolic number magnitude processing. Cognition, 102(3): 361–395. [Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). The present study provides an original contribution to this issue by testing MLD children (carefully selected on the basis of preserved abilities in other domains) on numerical estimation tasks with contrasting symbolic (Arabic numerals) and nonsymbolic (collection of dots) numbers used as input or output. MLD children performed consistently less accurately than control children on all the estimation tasks. However, MLD children were even weaker when the task involved the mapping between symbolic and nonsymbolic numbers than when the task required a mapping between two nonsymbolic numerical formats. Moreover, in the estimation of nonsymbolic numerosities, MLD children relied more than control children on perceptual cues such as the cumulative area of the dots. Finally, the task requiring a mapping from a nonsymbolic format to a symbolic format was the best predictor of MLD. In order to explain these present results, as well as those reported in the literature, we propose that the impoverished number magnitude representation of MLD children may arise from an initial mapping deficit between number symbols and that magnitude representation.     

Cluster Subtypes in the Children's Category Test Standardization Sample

Representative profile subtypes, based on subtest error scores, were examined in the standardization sample of the Children's Category Test (CCT; Boll, 1993), with separate analyses for the younger subgroup (ages 5–8 years; CCT-1) and the older subgroup (ages 9–16 years; CCT-2). Two-stage cluster analysis identified three reliable subtypes for the CCT-1, and four reliable subtypes for the CCT-2. Both level and pattern of performance differences contributed to the differentiation of subtypes. The clusters that varied in level of performance differed significantly in age and in level of performance on an independent memory measure, but not in gender or educational background. The distinct patterns of CCT subtest performance exhibited by the other clusters could not be reduced to any of these variables, suggesting that such patterns reflect relatively unique variations in specific aspects of problem solving. Guidelines for the consideration of clinically obtained CCT error subtest profiles are provided.     

Normalization in the courtroom: Does the formation of a group norm affect how judges adjust prosecutors' demands?

Legal archives concerning a new type of offence first introduced onto the French statute books in 2005 reveal a normalization effect over the following 2 years in judges' sentence decisions but not in prosecutors' sentence demands. We examine the hypothesis that the formation of a normally accepted range of sentences will influence how judges respond to the extremity of the prosecutor's initial sentence demand. In line with a normalization perspective, results reveal that judges were less influenced by extreme (out‐of‐range) sentence demands but more influenced by moderate (in‐range) sentences in 2007 than in 2005. Over time, it seems that a shared standard of reference is established, which appears to lead judges to adjust moderate prosecutor demands less and extreme prosecutor demands more. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

What do people mean when speaking of evilness?

The term evilness started to become popular in social psychology after the publication in 1999 of the special issue edited by Arthur G. Miller, "Perspectives on evil and violence". It is usually used to define behaviors that are extremely and strongly harmful. However, the concept is still imprecise and needs to be empirically delineated. This article attempts to answer the following questions. What is evilness? What is the difference between aggression and evilness? We conducted several studies with three goals: to analyze how laypersons and experts define evilness, to verify whether laypeople distinguish between different intensities of evilness, and to determine the dimensions that predict aggression and evilness. The results offer preliminary answers to the three questions.