Harmony,structure, and force in the Essai analytique sur les facultés de l'âcme of Charles Bonnet

The psychological works of Charles Bonnet of Geneva (1720–1793) have customarily been read as part of the mentalistic traditions of associationism or Leibnizianism. They are better understood as part of a campaign—directed against the radical Enlightenment —to reclaim the human body for religion by the paradoxical strategy of incorporating a materialist conception of the human mind into the framework of divine providence. Bonnet's embodied psychology treats the soul as an intrinsically indeterminate force, and attributes the capacity of the mind to organize experience to highly specialized fibers, providentially constructed to correspond to the created world.     

A defense of the very idea of moral deference pessimism

Philosophical Studies - Pessimists think that there is something wrong with relying on deference for one’s moral beliefs—at least if one is morally mature. Call this no deference. They...     

Speaker’s reference,stipulation, and a dilemma for conceptual engineers

Philosophical Studies - Advocates of conceptual engineering as a method of philosophy face a dilemma: either they are ignorant of how conceptual engineering can be implemented, or else it is...     

Negotiator cognitions: A descriptive approach to negotiators' understanding of their opponents

Substantial evidence exists that negotiators frequently fail to attain readily available and mutually beneficial outcomes. This paper provides a preliminary model of why these failures occur. We assume that negotiators are decision makers, and that their errors derive from cognitive processes ignored by utility-maximization theories. We focus on one part of the model: the systematic tendency to ignore the cognitions of opponent negotiators. Empirical evidence clarifying negotiators' cognitive processes is generated using verbal protocol techniques in a controlled negotiation task. The results show that subjects simplify the negotiation task, in part by ignoring contingencies introduced by the knowledge possessed by their opponents. The discussion focuses on how subjects simplify the task and how the decision-making perspective helps redirect the negotiation literature.     

Young children's social networks as a function of age and dysfunction

Social networks provide a larger context than that of the nuclear family in which the child develops. In order to examine the networks of young children, mothers of 75 handicapped children, aged 3 to 6 years, and a matched sample of normal children were surveyed in terms of people in the child's network and frequency of daily contact. The effects of age of subject and handicapping condition on social network composition and contact were of interest. Handicapping condition played a much greater role in the network composition than did chronological age. Handicapped children had larger networks, although they did not have daily contact with network members compared to normal children. Handicapped children thus were not isolated, but appeared to have a large network composed of relatives and adults and, to a lesser extent, peers. Normal children showed a developmental shift, in terms of an increase in the proportion of peers to adults, from 3 to 6 years, whereas handicapped children did not show this change. It is suggested that the handicapped child's developmental delay and caregiving demands may necessitate greater and more prolonged adult contact, which, consequently, constrains the nature of the social network in terms of adult and peer composition. Insufficient peer contact may restrict the handicapped child's opportunity to learn important social skills.     

The relationship between STD locus of control and STD acquisition among adolescent girls

This longitudinal study examined adolescent girls' perception of control over sexually transmitted disease (STD) acquisition. Participants were asked questions regarding their perception of their STD locus of control (internal control; control by parents, partners, peers, and health care providers; and chance) at two waves of data collection. Of the 116 participants (mean age = 17 years), 82% were African-American and 18% were Caucasian. Responses to the measure of locus of control were significantly correlated across a 6-month interval. The responses regarding internal control, control by partner, and chance were not related to the acquisition of an STD in the next 6 months. Further, they were not influenced by an STD in the preceding 6 months. These results indicate that responses to a locus of control measure were stable over a 6-month period, and internal, partner, and chance locus of control perceptions seem to be neither determined by STD experience nor directly related to future STD acquisition. However, understanding an individual's locus of control may be helpful in providing appropriate counseling. Future research could examine how adolescent girls form their perceptions of control over STD acquisition.     

Speech treatment and support group experiences of people who participate in the National Stuttering Association

Support groups are rapidly becoming an important part of the recovery process for many people who stutter, and a growing number of speech-language pathologists (SLPs) are encouraging their clients to participate in support groups. At present, however, little is known about the individuals who join stuttering support groups and the benefits they derive from their participation. This study surveyed members of the National Stuttering Association (NSA) to learn about their experiences in support groups, as well as their experiences in speech therapy. Respondents were 71 people who attended the 1999 NSA conference in Tacoma, WA. The majority of respondents had participated in treatment several times during their lives, using a variety of techniques. Respondents who had participated in fluency-shaping treatments were more likely to report that they had experienced a relapse than those who had participated in stuttering modification or combined treatments. Also, there was a strong positive correlation between respondents' satisfaction with treatment and their judgments of clinicians' competence, suggesting that improved training for SLPs should lead to improved treatment for people who stutter. Results will be used to provide a foundation for further evaluations of the benefits of support group participation for people who stutter. EDUCATIONAL OBJECTIVES: The reader will learn (a) that many people who participate in the NSA have had numerous and varied experiences with speech treatment throughout their lives, (b) which aspects of treatment and support group participation are seen as most beneficial for people who participate in the NSA.     

Biobehavioral responses to stress in females: tend-and-befriend, not fight-or-flight

The human stress response has been characterized, both physiologically and behaviorally, as "fight-or-flight." Although fight-or-flight may characterize the primary physiological responses to stress for both males and females, we propose that, behaviorally, females' responses are more marked by a pattern of "tend-and-befriend." Tending involves nurturant activities designed to protect the self and offspring that promote safety and reduce distress; befriending is the creation and maintenance of social networks that may aid in this process. The biobehavioral mechanism that underlies the tend-and-befriend pattern appears to draw on the attachment-caregiving system, and neuroendocrine evidence from animal and human studies suggests that oxytocin, in conjunction with female reproductive hormones and endogenous opioid peptide mechanisms, may be at its core. This previously unexplored stress regulatory system has manifold implications for the study of stress.     

Satiation in name and face recognition

Massive repetition of a word can lead to a loss of meaning (i.e., semantic satiation). Satiation is a general property of neurons and so it would be expected that semantic satiation would be found for stimuli other than words. Three experiments examined the occurrence of satiation for the repetition of names, the visualization of faces, and the repetition of faces. Reaction times to a decision based on a repeated name or face were longer following 30 repetitions than following 3 repetitions, indicating that satiation had occurred. Mere visualization over the same time interval, however, did not elicit satiation effects.