Social outcomes in childhood brain disorder: a heuristic integration of social neuroscience and developmental psychology

The authors propose a heuristic model of the social outcomes of childhood brain disorder that draws on models and methods from both the emerging field of social cognitive neuroscience and the study of social competence in developmental psychology/psychopathology. The heuristic model characterizes the relationships between social adjustment, peer interactions and relationships, social problem solving and communication, social-affective and cognitive-executive processes, and their neural substrates. The model is illustrated by research on a specific form of childhood brain disorder, traumatic brain injury. The heuristic model may promote research regarding the neural and cognitive-affective substrates of children's social development. It also may engender more precise methods of measuring impairments and disabilities in children with brain disorder and suggest ways to promote their social adaptation.     

Adorno,Interpretation, and the Body

Abstract

Adorno sees experience as intrinsically interpretative. As interpretation requires normative constraints, in order to guide and channel this interpretative engagement, this opens the question of how experience acquires its motivating criteria. If experience is from the first criterially structured, how are these criteria acquired? Moreover, as these criteria are acquired in isolation from experience – as they are the precondition of that experience – are these criteria sensitive to the particularity of the experiences they produce? In order to address these questions, and the problems they threaten to create for Adorno’s epistemology, I look at Adorno’s theory of impulse and cognition. I argue that Adorno grounds the criterial structure of experience and reason in self-preservation. This provides both a motivation and a determining constraint on the criterial structure of experience. It is also a determining influence which is epistemically flexible and compatible with Adorno’s project of tracing the ‘non-identical’.     

Sub-Abstract Bodies: The Epistemic and Ethical Role of the Body-Mind Relationship in Adorno’s Philosophy

Abstract

The aim of this paper is threefold. In the first place, I should like to show that Adorno’s philosophy is dependent, to a degree perhaps not always directly recognized in the literature, on a deeply contentious view on the relationship between the mind and the body. In order to show this, I explore and bring out the epistemic and ethical stakes for Adorno’s theory of the relationship between mind and body. Secondly, I move to better articulate precisely what Adorno’s view on the nature of this relationship is. I hold that his position revolves around positing a porous boundary between the domains of the somatic and the cognitive. In closing, I show that Adorno’s account relies on this domain boundary being unidirectionally porous, in that determination of somatic impulses by cognitive content does not seem a live option for Adorno. I go on to note that this smuggles in a dubious position which does a lot of unearned work. The stakes which his implicit account of the body and mind relationship served to secure thereby come once more to look highly vulnerable.     

Psychologists' attitudes toward aids

Abstract

Practicing psychologists in all areas of the country will see an increasing number of persons at risk for AIDS, or with AIDS-related illnesses. Previous research has shown that AIDS elicits negative reactions from the general public and from certain health care professionals. In the current study, a national sample of randomly selected practicing psychologists completed attitude measures after reading vignettes that described a male patient with either AIDS or leukemia who was either homosexual or heterosexual. Respondents evaluated the AIDS patient more negatively and reported less willingness to interact with him in a professional role or in casual social situations. It is important to develop training and continuing education programs to prepare psychologists to deal with persons affected by AIDS.     

Divine Foreknowledge and Freedom of the Will: Contemporary Work Revisits Calvinism

Books reviewed: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski, ‘Recent Work on Divine Foreknowledge and Free Will’ in Robert Kane (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Free Will Millard J. Erickson, What Does God Know and When Does He Know It?     

Locus of control and academic achievement in high school students

This study investigated the hypothesized relationship between internal locus of control and academic achievement among a sample of 187 students in Grades 8 through 12 using the Nowicki-Strickland Locus of Control Scale for Children. Analysis indicated that students in the higher GPA group reported higher scores on internal locus of control.     

Variables influencing the neural correlates of perceived risk of physical harm

Many human activities involve a risk of physical harm. However, not much is known about the specific brain regions involved in decision making regarding these risks. To explore the neural correlates of risk perception for physical harms, 19 participants took part in an event-related fMRI study while rating risky activities. The scenarios varied in level of potential harm (e.g., paralysis vs. stubbed toe), likelihood of injury (e.g., 1 chance in 100 vs. 1 chance in 1,000), and format (frequency vs. probability). Networks of brain regions were responsive to different aspects of risk information. Cortical language- processing areas, the middle temporal gyrus, and a region around the bed nucleus of stria terminalis responded more strongly to high- harm conditions. Prefrontal areas, along with subcortical ventral striatum, responded preferentially to high- likelihood conditions. Participants rated identical risks to be greater when information was presented in frequency format rather than probability format. These findings indicate that risk assessments for physical harm engage a broad network of brain regions that are sensitive to the severity of harm, the likelihood of risk, and the framing of risk information.     

Hispanic and black American adolescents' beliefs relating to sexuality and contraception

Popular beliefs and level of scientific knowledge regarding sexuality and contraception were elicited from black and Hispanic inner-city adolescents. Significant differences were found: Hispanic males were the most knowledgeable, Hispanic females the least, and black males and females were intermediate. A cultural basis for the dramatic difference between Hispanic male and female scores is suggested and the need to design culturally appropriate sexuality education classes is discussed. In addition, the data depicted two conflicting beliefs that were held simultaneously by many of the adolescents: Contraception is "good" because it prevents pregnancy, and it is "bad" because the various birth control methods carry serious health hazards for users.