Near-death experiences and the measurement of blood gases

Although cerebral anoxia is not thought to be responsible for triggering near-death experiences (NDEs), the issue is not so clear in the case of hypercapnia. Detection of normal blood gases in Michael Sabom's (1982) case study seems to be the major reply to suggestions that hypercapnia may have a causal role in NDEs. We argue, however, that routine arterial measures of blood gases are not a reliable indicator of cerebral levels.     

Statistical simulation on microcomputers

The statistical simulation program DATASIM is designed to conduct large-scale sampling experiments on microcomputers. Monte Carlo procedures are used to investigate the Type I and Type II error rates for statistical tests when one or more assumptions are systematically violated-assumptions, for example, regarding normality, homogeneity of variance or covariance, mini-mum expected cell frequencies, and the like. In the present paper, we report several initial tests of the data-generating algorithms employed by DATASIM. The results indicate that the uniform and standard normal deviate generators perform satisfactorily. Furthermore, Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests show that the sampling distributions ofz, t, F, χ², andr generated by DATASIM simulations follow the appropriate theoretical distributions. Finally, estimates of Type I error rates obtained by DATASIM under various patterns of violations of assumptions are in close agreement with the results of previous analytical and empirical studies; These converging lines of evidence suggest that DATASIM may well prove to be a reliable and productive tool for conducting statistical simulation research.     

Neuropsychological identification of motor problems: Can we learn something from the feet and legs that hands and arms will not tell us?

The degree of structural and functional specialization that differentiates between upper and lower limb use in humans is quite unparalleled among primates. It is argued that less neural resources are devoted to leg and foot control than to arm and hand control, and that this aspect of lower limb innervation, together with the uniquely restricted use of the lower limb, renders lower limb function more sensitive to general neural insult. In addition, the status of leg and foot control differs from that of arm and hand control both early in life and during the later years of decline.     

CONVERGING METHODS FOR INVESTIGATING LEXICAL ACCESS

Abstract— In our discussion of the articles in this Special Section, we ask how well the various methods employed in these investigations can be made to converge on a common issue. We review how current evidence from positron emission tomography, studies of event-related potentials, cognitive methods, lesion studies, and network models relates to the mental processing of an ambiguous word. While many puzzles remain, we are impressed by the promising possibility of bringing these different methods together to deal with an issue central to cognition.     

Establishing operations

The first two books on behavior analysis (Skinner, 1938; Keller & Schoenfeld, 1950) had chapter-length coverage of motivation. The next generation of texts also had chapters on the topic, but by the late 1960s it was no longer being given much treatment in the behavior-analytic literature. The present failure to deal with the topic leaves a gap in our understanding of operant functional relations. A partial solution is to reintroduce the concept of the establishing operation, defined as an environmental event, operation, or stimulus condition that affects an organism by momentarily altering (a) the reinforcing effectiveness of other events and (b) the frequency of occurrence of that part of the organism's repertoire relevant to those events as consequences. Discriminative and motivative variables can be distinguished as follows: The former are related to the differential availability of an effective form of reinforcement given a particular type of behavior; the latter are related to the differential reinforcing effectiveness of environmental events. An important distinction can also be made between unconditioned establishing operations (UEOs), such as food deprivation and painful stimulation, and conditioned establishing operations (CEOs) that depend on the learning history of the organism. One type of CEO is a stimulus that has simply been paired with a UEO and as a result may take on some of the motivative properties of that UEO. The warning stimulus in avoidance procedures is another important type of CEO referred to as reflexive because it establishes its own termination as a form of reinforcement and evokes the behavior that has accomplished such termination. Another CEO is closely related to the concept of conditional conditioned reinforcement and is referred to as a transitive CEO, because it establishes some other stimulus as a form of effective reinforcement and evokes the behavior that has produced that other stimulus. The multiple control of human behavior is very common, and is often quite complex. An understanding of unlearned and learned establishing operations can contribute to our ability to identify and control the various components of such multiple determination.     

The uses of Aristotle's Rhetoric in contemporary American scholarship

In contemporary American scholarship, interpretation of Aristotle'sRhetoric has become the locus of sustained and sharp controversy. Differing views of theRhetoric and its significance have become tokens in a more general dispute about what rhetoric is or ought to be. This essay examines three central issues that have emerged in this larger arena of controversy: the relationship between Aristotelian and Platonic conceptions of rhetoric, the relationships among rhetoric, ethics, and epistemology in Aristotle, and the placement of rhetoric within Aristotle's system of arts and sciences.     

The effects of family composition,family health,parenting behavior and environmental stress on children's divorce adjustment

The traditional family composition model of children's divorce adjustment was compared to a family competence model. Subjects included 81 children whose parents remained married, were divorced, or were divorced and subsequently remarried. Divorced families had been separated for between 24 and 48 months. Custodial parents completed questionnaires regarding family functioning, occurrence of stressful life events, and child's psychosocial adjustment. Children completed questionnaires regarding parenting behaviors and self-esteem. A trained examiner conducted a structured diagnostic interview of the child. Multivariate analysis of covariance showed that family composition had a significant effect on the occurrence of stressful events and change in income but not children's adjustment. Hierarchical multiple regression correlations indicated the most powerful predictors of child adjustment were family competence variables which accounted for 21% of the variance in child adjustment scores. In contrast, family composition accounted for only 8% of variance in child adjustment scores. Further, hierarchical multiple regression correlations indicated that higher levels of family functioning were associated with families where parental hostility was low and parents displayed few rejecting behaviors while practicing consistent and appropriate discipline.