Evidence for recognition and recall schemata

Two experiments manipulated elements postulated to be crucial for the formation of recognition and recall schemata for discrete motor skills. Experiment 1 tested predictions for the formation of a schema to recognize novel and practiced positioning movements. Sensations of practiced locations, followed by knowledge of results, enabled accurate judgment of movement extent. The specification of distances before active practice movements did not help recognition performance. To test recall schema, Experiment 2 allowed practice with active movements over specified distances, or unspecified passive movements. The allowance of response specifications during practice provided clear superiority of recall-dependent performance. This aspect of recall memory should enable the construction of movements with extents and velocities different from those practiced.     

Real-world schemata and scene recognition in adults and children

Recognition memory for previously seen multiobject scenes was examined for different types of contextual arrangements between objects in the scenes. It was found that organized scenes with novel but possible interobject relations were recognized more accurately than either organized scenes with familiar interobject relations or unorganized scenes with impossible interobject relations. This finding was obtained for adults, 8- to 10-year-old children, and 5- to 8-year-old children who indicated concrete-operational ability in Piaget’s conservation-of-liquid quantity task. The results were interpreted in conjunction with a two-stage model of scene processing involving the formation of a schema to represent a scene (Stage 1), and the operation of the schema in governing the further processing of detailed information in the scene (Stage 2). It was concluded that preoperational children can form schemata to represent organized scenes (Stage 1), but it is not until the emergence of concrete operations that these schemata become operational with respect to guiding the further processing of information in the scene (Stage 2).     

A device for silent on-line recording of continuously changing behavioral measures

A nonintrusive method of monitoring continuously changing behavior frequently is required in experimentation with human subjects, particularly infants. The touch-sensor switch box provides the observer with an ongoing record on a polygraph and allows the observer to give undivided attention to the subject. The mode of operation is completely silent.     

Using a microcomputer for on-line psychiatric assessment

The on-line computer-assisted psychiatric system has been shown to be effective in bringing about an improvement in mental health service delivery. However, it was initially developed on a computer system that was too costly for most potential users. The present paper describes the approach used to implement the on-line assessment system on an inexpensive microcomputer, the PDP-11 V03.     

Losing claims of rights

Conclusion I have contended that acting on some principle and complaining when others act in accordance with the same principle in similar circumstances is morally improper. By wrongdoing one forfeits the right to claim the right (s)he disregards in interacting with others. This is not equivalent to a view that one's acting in a certain way justifies others acting in that way, i.e. that by wrongdoing one forfeits rights (s)he disregards in interacting with others. It may still be morally improper to treat malfeasors in the same way they treat us but, I have argued, they cannot themselves claim a right not to be treated in that way.This analysis of the right to claim rights can help explain the change in moral status of wrongdoers in two important ways. First, if there are some non-forfeitable human rights, the loss of moral standing of one who disregards those rights in others can be explained. Second, and perhaps potentially more important, if having a right implies the right holder's being justified in claiming it, we have a basis for saying all human rights are forfeitable.This second position would require a tightening of the link between the right to X and the ancillary right to claim the right to X. I have not undertaken that burden here. Instead, I argued that the loss of the right to claim is, itself, a significant loss.     

Protection of animal research subjects

The use of experimental animals, mostly rodents, in biomedical research and especially in oncology and immunology should be acknowledged with respect, recognizing the contribution of animal experimentation in the fascinating scientific progress in these disciplines of research. It is an obligation of the investigator to justify the scientific and ethical aspects of each study requiring the use of animals. The international guiding principles for using animals in biomedical research are well defined and have been distributed worldwide by the International Council for Laboratory Animal Science (ICLAS) since 1956, when this Organization was founded. In Poland the ICLAS philosophy and principles are highly respected and were implemented firstly by the members of the Commission on Biology of Experimental Animals appointed in 1962 by the Department of Medical Science of the Polish Academy of Science in Warsaw. Animal Protection Acts, first proclaimed in 1928 were gradually modified and improved. Actual legislation (enacted in 1997, 2003 and 2005) is consistent with EU Directives (86/609/EEC) and follows the internationally recommended principles that include ICLAS guidelines concerning animal welfare and care condition in biomedical research. The problem of “alternative methods” is briefly discussed. Dr. Donald Boisvert, CCAC — Canadian Council on Animal Care A lecture on the subject of this paper was presented at the 6th International Bioethics Conference entitled ‘The Responsible Conduct of Basic and Clinical Research’, held in Warsaw, Poland, 3–4 June 2005. The author is the National Representative of Polish Academy of Science to the International Council for Laboratory Animal Science (ICLAS) and a Member of the ICLAS Governing Board.     

The physician’s role in the protection of human research subjects

Responsibility for the protection of human research subjects is shared by investigators, research ethics committees, sponsors/funders, research institutions, governments and, the focus of this article, physicians who enrol patients in clinical trials. The article describes the general principles of the patient-physician relationship that should regulate the participation of physicians in clinical trials and proposes guidelines for determining when and how such participation should proceed. The guidelines deal with the following stages of the trial: when first considering participation, when deciding whether to enrol patients, when asking patients to participate, when the trial is underway and when it is completed.     

Attitude toward Christianity and paranormal belief among 13- to 16-yr.-old students

A small but statistically significant positive correlation (r = .17) was found in a sample of 279 13- to 16-yr.-old students in Wales between scores on the Francis Scale of Attitude toward Christianity and on a new Index of Paranormal Belief. These data suggest that there is little common variance between attitude toward Christianity and belief in the paranormal.     

Are generalised scalar implicatures generated by default? An on-line investigation into the role of context in generating pragmatic inferences

Recent research in semantics and pragmatics has revived the debate about whether there are two cognitively distinct categories of conversational implicatures: generalised and particularised. Generalised conversational implicatures are so-called because they seem to arise more or less independently of contextual support. Particularised implicatures are more context-bound. The Default view is that generalised implicatures are default inferences and that their computation is relatively autonomous--being computed by some default mechanism and only being open to cancellation at a second stage when contextual assumptions are taken into consideration (i.a.). It is at that second stage where contextual assumptions are considered that particularised implications are computed. By contrast, Context-Driven theorists claim that both generalised and particularised implicatures are generated by the same process and only where there is contextual support (Chierchia, 2004; Horn, 1984; Levinson, 2000 i.a.). In this paper, we present three on-line studies of the prototypical cases of generalised implicatures: the scalar implicatures 'some of the Fs' > 'not all the Fs' and 'X or Y' > 'either X or Y but not both'. These studies were designed to test the context-dependence and autonomy of the implicatures. Our results suggest that these scalar implicatures are dependent on the conversational context and that they show none of the autonomy predicted by the Default view. We conclude with a discussion of the degree to which such implicatures are purely context-driven and whether an interactionist default position may also be plausible.