Conceptual complexity and construct validity

Despite a century of methodological and conceptual advances in the technology of psychosocial measurement, poor correspondence between indicators and the constructs they are intended to represent remains a limiting factor to the accumulation of scientific knowledge. Longstanding conventions in measurement may contribute to the failure to develop optimal criteria. These conventions include the focus on complex over simple constructs and the use of multi-item measures of disparate content to represent those constructs. Several arguments suggest that such a measurement model compromises the potential for developing measures that accurately reflect psychosocial phenomena. The article concludes with some preliminary suggestions concerning an alternative model that may address this construct validity problem more effectively.     

Detection and resolution of audio-visual incompatibility in the perception of vowels

If audio and video recordings of a talker speaking consonant-vowel syllables containing different consontants are approximately synchronised, observers may fail to detect conflict between the modalities and perceive consonants presented in neither individual modality. The present experiments demonstrate an analogous effect in the perception of vowels. Vision can bias the identity of an acoustical vowel to be more like the vowel presented visually, even when observers detect conflict and are instructed to report only what they hear. The size of the effect is positively related to the size of the physical difference between the visible configuration of the lips and the configuration that would naturally accompany the acoustical vowel. In demonstrating these and other phenomena in audio-visual speech perception, observers behave as if they compute a continuous estimate of the filter function of the vocal tract from both visual and acoustical evidence. If the visual evidence is potent, observers may appear to interpret the acoustical evidence in novel ways. However, these compromises can be predicted from known patterns of acoustical similarity and visual distinctiveness and do not require ad hoc explanations involving categorical levels of perceptual process.     

Can the 8-coil Shakti alter subjective emotional experience? A randomized, placebo-controlled study

At present, a commercially available device (the 8-coil Shakti) claims to produce weak and complex magnetic fields that alter neurobiological processes. The effects of the Shakti on emotional responses to photographs that varied on emotional valence were investigated. Participants (N = 37) were exposed to either 30 min, of magnetic fields or a sham condition and rated their emotional reactions to a set of 54 color photographs. Although participants indicated significantly different emotional responses to images with distinct emotional valences, exposure to magnetic fields did not affect these responses, nor significantly interact with image emotional valence. Although the device's "amygdala signal" had no effect on the emotive response to images in this study, additional investigations examining the effects of weak and complex magnetic fields on various aspects of perception and cognition are warranted.     

The Emotional City: Refugee Settlement and Neoliberal Urbanism in Calgary

Based on a case study in Calgary, we frame refugee (re)settlement through literature in emotional geography and argue that the logistics of settlements are emotional as well as pragmatic. Social agencies play a crucial role in the settlement of refugees, especially the government-sponsored class. Personal connections with a settlement worker make the negotiation of the city emotional from the outset. In addition, accessible public spaces and institutions help create positive emotional attachments. Other aspects, such as limited mobility and dispersed settlement, construct obstacles and intensify a sense of isolation. Neoliberal urban policy has made the settlement process in Canada more difficult.     

Social support,occupational stress and anxiety

When occupational stressors, that is stress-producing environmental circumstances (SPECs) in the workplace, lead to anxiety, this anxiety is considered work-related strain. Social support is frequently recommended as a treatment of such strain, because it is expected to help in one of three ways: by directly reducing the anxiety, by interacting with SPECs to reduce the strength of their effects on anxiety, and by weakening the strength of the SPECs themselves. Future research on anxiety and social support in conjunction with work-related SPECs could shed new light on the relations among these three, variables by employing one or more of three approaches: designing investigations that allow stronger causal inference, testing hypotheses derived from theory, and examining potential cross-cultural differences in the nature of and reactions to social support.