Retest reliability of the Rosenzweig Picture-Frustration Study and similar semiprojective techniques

Surveys the evidence for the reliability of the Adult, Adolescent and Children's Forms of the Rosenzweig Picture-Frustration (P-F) Study. Analysis of variance and split-half methods, which assume item homogeneity and internal consistency, may be appropriate to psychometric tests, but they are not apposite to projective and semi-projective techniques. The implications of applying such criteria are critically examined, with the P-F Study as an example to demonstrate their nonapplicability. Investigations on retest (total test) reliability from the laboratory of the senior author and from those of other investigators demonstrate statistically significant consistency for the main scoring categories of the P-F, especially those relating to directions of aggression. Implications for other semiprojective techniques are expounded.     

Disagreement in Scientific Ontologies

The aim of this article is to discuss the nature of disagreement in scientific ontologies in the light of case studies from biology and cognitive science. I argue that disagreements in scientific ontologies are usually not about purely factual issues but involve both verbal and normative aspects. Furthermore, I try to show that this partly non-factual character of disagreement in scientific ontologies does not lead to a radical deflationism but is compatible with a “normative ontological realism.” Finally, I argue that the case studies from the empirical sciences challenge contemporary metaontological accounts that insist on exactly one true way of “carving nature at its joints.”     

Dogs learn to solve the support problem based on perceptual cues

Numerous recent studies have investigated how animals solve means-end tasks and unraveled considerable variation in strategies used by different species. Domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) have typically performed comparably poorly in physical cognition tasks, but a recent study showed that they can solve the on–off condition of the support problem, where they are confronted with two boards, one with a reward placed on it and the other with a reward placed next to it. To explore which strategies dogs use to solve this task, we first tested 37 dogs with the on–off condition tested previously and then tested subjects that passed this condition with three transfer tasks. For the contact condition, the inaccessible reward was touching the second board. For the perceptual containment condition, the inaccessible reward was surrounded on three sides by the second board, but not supported by it, whereas for the gap condition, discontinuous boards were used. Unlike in the previous study, our subjects did not perform above chance level in the initial trials of the on–off condition, but 13 subjects learned to solve it. Their performance in the transfer tasks suggests that dogs can learn to solve the support problem based on perceptual cues, that they can quickly adopt new cues when old ones become unreliable, but also that some apparently inherent preferences are hard to overcome. Our study contributes to accumulating evidence demonstrating that animals typically rely on a variety of perceptual cues to solve physical cognition tasks, without developing an understanding of the underlying causal structure.     

Understanding Brute Facts

Brute facts are facts that have no explanation. If we come to know that a fact is brute, we obviously don’t get an explanation of that fact. Nevertheless, we do make some sort of epistemic gain. In this essay, I give an account of that epistemic gain, and suggest that the idea of brute facts allows us to distinguish between the notion of explanation and the notion of understanding.I also discuss Eric Barnes’ (1994) attack on Friedman’s (1974) version of the unification theory of explanation. The unification theory asserts that scientific understanding results from minimizing the number of brute facts that we have to accept in our view of the world. Barnes claims that the unification theory cannot do justice to the notion of being a brute fact, because it implies that brute facts are gaps in our understanding of the world. I defend Friedman’s theory against Barnes’ critique.     

Correction: Two-action task,testing imitative social learning in kea (Nestor notabilis)

Social learning is an adaptive way of dealing with the complexity of life as it reduces the risk of trial-and-error learning. Depending on the type of information acquired, and associations formed, several mechanisms within the larger taxonomy of social learning can be distinguished. Imitation is one such process within this larger taxonomy, it is considered cognitively demanding and is associated with high-fidelity response matching. The present study reproduced a 2002 study conducted by Heyes and Saggerson, which successfully illustrated motor imitation in budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulatus). In our study, eighteen kea (Nestor notabilis) that observed a trained demonstrator remove a stopper from a test box (1) took less time from hopping on the box to feeding (response duration) in session one and (2) were faster in making a vertical removal response on the stopper once they hopped on the box (removal latency) in session one than non-observing control group individuals. In contrast to the budgerigars (Heyes and Saggerson, Ani Behav. 64:851–859, 2002) the present study could not find evidence of motor imitation in kea. The results do illustrate, however, that there were strong social effects on exploration rates indicating motivational and attentional shifts. Furthermore, the results may suggest a propensity toward emulation in contrast to motor imitation or alternatively selectivity in the application of imitation.

     

Asymmetrical friendships? People are willing to risk COVID-19 infection from friends but are reluctant to pass it on to them

Although most protective behaviors related to the COVID-19 pandemic come with personal costs, they will produce the largest benefit if everybody cooperates. This study explores two interacting factors that drive cooperation in this tension between private and collective interests. A preregistered experiment (N = 299) examined (a) how the quality of the relation among interacting partners (social proximity), and (b) how focusing on the risk of self-infection versus onward transmission affected intentions to engage in protective behaviors. The results suggested that risk focus was an important moderator of the relation between social proximity and protection intentions. Specifically, participants were more willing to accept the risk of self-infection from close others than from strangers, resulting in less caution toward a friend than toward a distant other. However, when onward transmission was the primary concern, participants were more reluctant to effect transmission to close others, resulting in more caution toward friends than strangers. These findings inform the debate about effective nonclinical measures against the pandemic. Practical implications for risk communication are discussed.     

Processing of metaphoric language: An investigation of the three-stage model of metaphor comprehension

Recent experiments that have compared processing of metaphoric and literal language in light of the three-stage model have methodological weaknesses. The study reported in this paper was designed to circumvent these weaknesses. Findings of this study demonstrated longer reading times for metaphors when compared to literals. This result lends support to the three-stage model and to the possibility that serial processing occurs during metaphor comprehension.We would like to thank Dr. Andrew Ortony for kindly providing us with the paragraphs used as stimulus materials in this study. We would also like to thank Dr. Herbert Roitblat for his many helpful comments on earlier versions of this paper.