Non-LIFO Execution of Cognitive Procedures

Many current theories of human problem solving and skill acquisition assume that people work only on the unsatisfied goal that was created most recently. That is, the architecture obeys a last-in-first-out (LIFO) constraint on the selection of goals. This restriction seems necessary for the proper functioning of automatic learning mechanisms, such as production compilation and chunking. It is argued that this restriction is violated by some subjects on some tasks. In particular, 8 subjects (from a sample of 26) execute subtraction procedures in a way that violates the LIFO constraint. Although there is a great deal of between- and within-subject strategy variation in the 8 subjects' behavior, it can be simply explained by hypothesizing that (1) the goal selection is not necessarily LIFO, (2) goal selection knowledge is represented by explicit preferences, and (3) the 8 subjects have just a few preferences that are overgeneralized, overspecialized, or missing. The rest of their preferences are correct. On the other hand, LIFO-based models seem unable to explain the strategy variations in any simple way. Thus, it seems that part of the flexibility in human problem solving comes from having a choice of which goal to work on next. Fortunately, it is simple to ammend automatic learning mechanisms so that they will function correctly in a non-LIFO architecture.     

Exploring Women Track and Field Athletes' Meanings of Muscularity

Women athletes often struggle with attaining the muscular body needed to compete successfully, while at the same time negotiating expectations to conform to a lean and toned ideal. The purpose of this study was to explore women track and field athletes’ meanings of muscularity. Four adult and four adolescent women participated in focus groups and one-on-one interviews, exploring issues surrounding the body, including ideals and expectations. The participants also took photographs to represent their perceptions of their own muscularity. Four themes emerged: (a) many faces of muscularity, (b) a blurred line between appearance and performance, (c) a culture of comparison, and (d) a journey towards self-acceptance. Muscularity was identified as a complex and context specific experience, reflecting the multiple meanings of muscularity and the periods of struggle on the journey towards self-acceptance of the body.     

Religion,Family, and Career among Graduate Students in the Sciences

Concerns about family life push some students away from a career in science or lead them away from particular career paths within science. Religion has been shown to have an influence on individuals’ values concerning both family and work. This study uses data from a survey of U.S. graduate students in five science disciplines to estimate a structural equation model examining paths between religiosity, work and family values, and intent to pursue different careers within science. The analysis finds that religiosity is positively associated with the importance placed on family and, through this mediator, is associated with a lower intent to pursue research‐focused academic jobs and higher intent to pursue teaching‐focused academic jobs. We discuss the implications of these findings, particularly as the analysis shows that women and some racial and ethnic minority students are more religious than their male and white peers.     

Viewing the Disney Movie <Emphasis Type="Italic">Frozen</Emphasis> through a Psychodynamic Lens

The Disney movie Frozen is the fifth highest grossing movie of all time. In order to better understand this phenomenon and to hypothesize as to why the movie resonated so strongly with audiences, we have interpreted the movie using psychodynamic theory. We pay particular attention to the themes of puberty, adolescence and sibling relationships and discuss examples of ego defenses that are employed by the lead character in relation to these concepts.     

Obligation as Optimal Goal Satisfaction

Formalising deontic concepts, such as obligation, prohibition and permission, is normally carried out in a modal logic with a possible world semantics, in which some worlds are better than others. The main focus in these logics is on inferring logical consequences, for example inferring that the obligation O q is a logical consequence of the obligations O p and O (p → q). In this paper we propose a non-modal approach in which obligations are preferred ways of satisfying goals expressed in first-order logic. To say that p is obligatory, but may be violated, resulting in a less than ideal situation s, means that the task is to satisfy the goal p ∨ s, and that models in which p is true are preferred to models in which s is true. Whereas, in modal logic, the preference relation between possible worlds is part of the semantics of the logic, in this non-modal approach, the preference relation between first-order models is external to the logic. Although our main focus is on satisfying goals, we also formulate a notion of logical consequence, which is comparable to the notion of logical consequence in modal deontic logic. In this formalisation, an obligation O p is a logical consequence of goals G, when p is true in all best models of G. We show how this non-modal approach to the treatment of deontic concepts deals with problems of contrary-to-duty obligations and normative conflicts, and argue that the approach is useful for many other applications, including abductive explanations, defeasible reasoning, combinatorial optimisation, and reactive systems of the production system variety.     

Will They or Won’t They? Secret Telling in Interpersonal Interactions

This study investigated predictors of within-gender secret telling. Eighty-eight participants were exposed to either a “positive” or a “negative” secret about another individual. Just under 20% of participants told the secret. Conscientiousness, secret condition, empathy, and the conscientiousness by secret condition interaction had effects on the rate of secret telling, χ² (5,82) = 17.78, p = .003, AIC = 80.60. Conscientiousness had a negative effect on secret telling among participants that told the “negative” secret.     

Semisimple Varieties of Modal Algebras

In this paper we show that a variety of modal algebras of finite type is semisimple iff it is discriminator iff it is both weakly transitive and cyclic. This fact has been claimed already in [4] (based on joint work by the two authors) but the proof was fatally flawed. Dedicated to the memory of Willem Johannes Blok     

Predictors and outcomes of cyberbullying among college students: A two wave study

Existing research on cyberbullying has primarily focused on adolescents in cross-sectional survey studies, with less research focusing on college students or employed adults over longer periods of time. To extend this literature, the current study examined new predictors and outcomes of cyberbullying perpetration (CP) and victimization (CV) among college students from two different universities that were followed across two time points. Risk factors were measured in line with previous theoretical models, including biological or personality-related variables (e.g., low self-control, dark-side personality traits, empathy) and environmental variables (e.g., perceived social support, lack of rule clarity, and internet use). Additionally, we examined several possible outcomes of CV and CP. Results from path analyses revealed that involvement with traditional bullying (either as a perpetrator or a victim) as well as Machiavellianism significantly predicted CV and CP. With regard to the cross-lagged associations between CV and CP, we found that Time 1 CV predicted time 2 CP, but Time 1 CP did not predict Time 2 CV. That is, being a victim of cyberbullying during the Fall semester predicted involvement as a perpetrator in the Spring semester. However, being a perpetrator during the Fall semester did not predict being a victim during the Spring semester. Regarding outcomes, we found that CV significantly predicted anxiety, depression, and helping behavior, and CP significantly predicted deviant behavior, but not GPA nor alcohol consumption. These findings have practical implications for college students as well as university student support services.