Children's Risky Play from an Evolutionary Perspective: The Anti-Phobic Effects of Thrilling Experiences

This theoretical article views children's risky play from an evolutionary perspective, addressing specific evolutionary functions and especially the anti-phobic effects of risky play. According to the non-associative theory, a contemporary approach to the etiology of anxiety, children develop fears of certain stimuli (e.g., heights and strangers) that protect them from situations they are not mature enough to cope with, naturally through infancy. Risky play is a set of motivated behaviors that both provide the child with an exhilarating positive emotion and expose the child to the stimuli they previously have feared. As the child's coping skills improve, these situations and stimuli may be mastered and no longer be feared. Thus fear caused by maturational and age relevant natural inhibition is reduced as the child experiences a motivating thrilling activation, while learning to master age adequate challenges. It is concluded that risky play may have evolved due to this anti-phobic effect in normal child development, and it is suggested that we may observe an increased neuroticism or psychopathology in society if children are hindered from partaking in age adequate risky play.     

Aesthetics Makes Nothing Happen? The Role of Aesthetic Properties in the Constitution of Non‐aesthetic Value

The relationship between aesthetic value and other moral and cognitive values has been a key theme within contemporary aesthetic discussion. In this article, I explore once again the implications of this relationship, but from what I think might be a different angle. With few exceptions, notably Dominic Lopes, most of the contributions to this issue have dealt with the impact that moral or cognitive values could possibly have on the overall aesthetic value of a work of art. In this article, I explore instead how aesthetic properties or merits could play a role in explaining moral and cognitive properties. To do so, I first offer some examples that I think may reasonably exemplify the phenomenon we are considering. Second, I argue that a proper account of interactionism should meet at least two constraints: the relevance constraint and the autonomy constraint. Finally, I try to clarify how it is possible that aesthetic properties substantially contribute to other values by appealing to the notions of expression and the affective character of aesthetic properties.     

INCREASING THE ACCURACY OF CORRECTIONS FOR RANGE RESTRICTION: IMPLICATIONS FOR SELECTION PROCEDURE VALIDITIES AND OTHER RESEARCH RESULTS

The common practice in meta-analyses and in individual studies of correcting for direct range restriction even though range restriction is actually indirect has long been known to lead to undercorrection, but this error has been assumed to be small. Using validity generalization data sets for 4 jobs, this study calibrated this error by comparing meta-analysis results based on corrections for direct range restriction with the more accurate results from a recently developed method of correcting for indirect range restriction. It was found that, on average, correction for direct range restriction resulted in substantial underestimation of operational validities for both job performance measures (21%) and training performance measures (28%). In addition, 90% credibility values were on average underestimated by 38%–40%. In addition to the implications for personnel selection, these findings suggest that similar underestimation of important relationships has occurred in other areas of research, with potential implications for theory development.