The one,the true,the good… or not: Badiou,Agamben, and atheistic transcendentality

Continental Philosophy Review - This article offers a reading of the “transcendental” character of Alain Badiou’s and Giorgio Agamben’s ontologies. While neither Badiou nor...     

The role of executive functions in social impairment in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by socio-communicative impairments. Executive dysfunction may explain some key characteristics of ASD, both social and nonsocial hallmarks. Limited research exists exploring the relations between executive function and social impairment in ASD and few studies have used a comparison control group. Thus, the objective of the present study was to investigate the relations between executive functioning using the Behavioral Rating Inventory of Executive Functioning (BRIEF), social impairment as measured by the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS), and overall autistic symptomology as measured by the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS) in children and adolescents with and without ASD. Seventy children and adolescents diagnosed with ASD and 71 typically developing controls were included in this study. Findings showed that behavioral regulation executive processes (i.e., inhibition, shifting, and emotional control) predicted social function in all children. However, metacognitive executive processes (i.e., initiation, working memory, planning, organization, and monitoring) predicted social function only in children with ASD and not in typically developing children. Our findings suggest a distinct metacognitive executive function-social symptom link in ASD that is not present in the typical population. Understanding components of executive functioning that contribute to the autistic symptomology, particularly in the socio-communicative domain, is crucial for developing effective interventions that target key executive processes as well as underlying behavioral symptoms.     

Care Orientation in the Teens as a Predictor of Young Adult Psychosocial Adjustment

The transition from adolescence to young adulthood is a watershed period in development that carries risk for poor psychosocial adjustment. It also carries potential for positive transitions into the caregiving roles and responsibilities of adult life. Research to date has predominantly focused on adolescent predictors of problematic rather than positive transitions; yet predictors of the latter hold equal (if not greater) promise for informing health promoting interventions. The purpose of this study was threefold: (1) to use Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) to define patterns of psychosocial adjustment and maladjustment in young adulthood (21-years of age); (2) to examine the unique role of adolescent prosocial behaviour (e.g., volunteering and civic engagement) in promoting adjustment and reducing maladjustment in young adulthood; and, (3) to examine whether protective developmental relationships are maintained after adjustment for other covariates including socio-economic background factors and personality characteristics. Data were drawn from the Victorian cohort of the International Youth Development Study (IYDS; N = 2407), a representative sample of students in Victoria, Australia. Students were assessed in Grade 9 (Mean age = 15-years) and followed up at age 21-years. LPA identified three psychosocial adjustment classes at age 21 defined as: (1) Adjusted (24.8 %); (2) Normative (63.9 %); and, (3) Maladjusted (11.3 %). Adolescent volunteering, belief in a moral order, family opportunities for prosocial behaviour, and commitment to school were associated with enhanced adjustment and reduced maladjustment in young adulthood. Findings highlight the potential benefit of interventions designed to enhance adolescent prosocial behaviours and care orientation in promoting healthy transitions into young adult life.     

The effectiveness of positive psychology interventions in enhancing positive behaviors and family relationships in Hong Kong: A community-based participatory research project

This paper describes a program of brief, universal, positive psychology-based interventions to increase targeted behaviors that enhance family relationships, developed and delivered to over 1500 participants using a community-based participatory approach. The cluster-randomized design combined interventions based on one of three themes (gratitude, hope, or open-mindedness) in one of two structures (intervention, or intervention with planning). The latter structure supplemented with materials and exercises derived from the Health Action Process Approach model of behavior change. Planning was more effective in increasing attitude and intention to perform behaviors, frequency of the targeted behaviors, and family health and happiness (Cohen’s ds: 0.10–0.16, p < 0.05), particularly in the theme targeting open-mindedness. Qualitative data supported effectiveness. This project was a first effort to develop a large-scale preventive psychological intervention in an understudied culture with the goal of maximizing acceptability and utilization by involving community stakeholders in every stage of the design.     

Perceptions of injustice in intercultural relations

Perceptions of injustice are likely to occur in intercultural relations because cultures often define justice and its implementation differently. This article reviews factors and processes that are unique to intercultural relations and that may give rise to feelings of injustice during intercultural interactions. Antecedents that can trigger a sense of injustice with regard to distributive, procedural, and retributive justice are reviewed. The consequences of perceived injustice are also analyzed. The implications of our analysis for research and practice are discussed.     

Examining the cross‐cultural validity of the positive affect and negative affect schedule between an Asian (Singaporean) sample and a Western (American) sample

The positive affect and negative affect schedule (PANAS) is a popular measure of positive (PA) and negative affectivity (NA). Developed and validated in Western contexts, the 20‐item scale has been frequently administered on respondents from Asian countries with the assumption of cross‐cultural measurement invariance. We examine this assumption via a rigorous multigroup confirmatory factor analysis, which allows us to assess between‐group differences in both strength of scale item‐to‐latent factor relationship (metric invariance test) and mean of each scale item (scalar invariance test), on a large sample of 1,065 respondents recruited from Singapore (Asian sample) and the United States (Western sample). We found that two items assessing PA (“excited” and “proud”) and three items assessing NA (“guilty,” “hostile,” and “ashamed”) exhibited metric noninvariance whereas 11 of the remaining metric invariant items exhibited scalar noninvariance, suggesting that the PA and NA constructs differ from what the PANAS is expected to measure for Asian respondents. Our findings serve as a cautionary note to researchers who intend to administer the PANAS in future studies as well as to researchers interpreting the results of past studies involving respondents from Asian countries.     

殊化信任与泛化信任在人际信任行为路径模型中的作用

该研究探讨不同社会情景下,泛化信任、殊化信任以及可信任性知觉等对信任行为起作用的理论模型。223名工人被试平均年龄24岁。用结构方程模型中的路径分析验证该模型,结果表明,各种拟合指标十分理想。三种交往情景下的人际信任路径模型之间的异同主要表现在：（1）殊化信任在所有情景下对信任行为都有直接而显著的作用;（2）泛化信任则只在与熟人和陌生人交往时才起作用;（3）与目标人物的关系越疏远,对他们作出信任行为时所需要的心理资源也越多。     

The sociocultural and psychological adaptation of Chinese migrant adolescents in Australia and Canada

This study aimed to investigate the adaptation of Chinese migrant adolescents in Australia and Canada, in terms of their academic achievement, parent—child conflict, and stress, in the light of various societal, situational, and individual variables. The participants included 75 Chinese‐Canadian and 92 Chinese‐Australian high school students. The results suggested that academic achievement in the host society was influenced by societal level variables such as auspices of immigration, and situational and individual variables such as amount of social support available, age, and their definitions of success. For parent—child conflict and stress level, they were related to the situational variable, social support, rather than to societal variables. There was also some evidence to indicate that the three adaptation outcome variables were related.     

The effects of alternatives on the salience of reward allocation norms

In a dyadic bargaining situation there is considerable evidence that the alternative outcomes of the bargainers (if they cannot reach agreement) have important effects on bargaining outcomes. Under the assumption that situational factors affect the nature of the relation between the alternatives of the bargainers and bargaining outcomes, the effects of two factors were assessed: the relative size of the reward to be negotiated (excess of prize minus alternatives) and the magnitude of the difference in the alternatives of the two bargainers. Using college students as subjects, the predictions of two models were also contrasted: the equal excess model and Shapley-w. The relative size of the prize did not have a significant effect on the accuracy of the two models, but the magnitude of the difference in alternatives had marked effects. The results also suggest that the Shapley-w model may be more accurate when the bargainers are relatively inexperienced and cooperatively oriented, whereas the equal excess model may be more accurate when the bargainers are relatively sophisticated and competitively oriented.