Serious,Minor, and Non-Delinquents in Early Adolescence: The Impact of Cumulative Risk and Promotive Factors. The TRAILS Study

This study uses a social-ecological approach to the development of delinquency. The authors emphasize that a balance between eliminating risk and enhancing protection across domains is essential in reducing problems and promoting competence. The cumulative risk and promotive effects of temperament, family and school factors in preadolescence were examined on different groups of delinquents (based on self-report) in early adolescence. Data from the first two waves of the TRAILS study (N = 2,230) were used. The results provide evidence for a compensatory model that assumes main effects of risk and promotive factors on problem behavior. Accumulation of risks in preadolescence promoted being a serious delinquent in early adolescence, with the strongest effects for temperament. Accumulation of promotive effects decreased being a delinquent and supported being a non-delinquent. Furthermore, evidence is found for a counter-balancing effect of cumulative promotive and risk factors. Exposure to more promotive domains in the relative absence of risk domains decreased the percentage of serious delinquents. Our results did not support a protective model. Implications for prevention and intervention are discussed.     

Spinozistic Pantheism,the Environment and Christianity

I am not a pantheist and I don’t believe that pantheism is consistent with Christianity. My preferred speculation is what I call the Swiss Cheese theory: we and our artefacts are the holes in God, the only Godless parts of reality. In this paper, I begin by considering a world rather like ours but without any beings capable of sin. Ignoring extraterrestrials and angels we could consider the world, say, 5 million years ago. Pantheism was, I say, true at that time. That is my qualified endorsement of pantheism. I then use the Sin premise, namely that we are capable of sinning, to argue that beings like us are not parts of God and I examine some consequences.     

Application of the stagnant stage concept for monitoring Mn partitioning at the austenite-ferrite interface in the intercritical region for Fe–Mn–C alloys

The length of the stagnant stage during the new ferrite growth starting from a mixture of austenite and ferrite has been investigated for a Fe-0.17Mn-0.023C (wt%) alloy. It was found that the stagnant stage depends on the thermal path followed to create the mixture, and deduce that the tie-lines for austenite to ferrite transformation are quite different from those for ferrite to austenite transformation. The length of the stagnant stage is determined by the very local partitioning effect at the interface, and it can be used as a tool to monitor the Mn partitioning.     

Banking Seed: Use and Value in the Conservation of Agricultural Diversity

Since the 1930s it has been widely acknowledged that agricultural crop diversity is being lost at an alarming rate. The international response to this genetic erosion has principally taken the form of ex situ genebanks. In these facilities and in the international regulatory frameworks that now surround them, it is genetic diversity that is the focus of conservation efforts. This focus, however, passes over the many other important diversities—both biological and social (or ‘biosocial’)—that exist in, and depend on, agricultural environments. These diversities cannot be conserved in genebanks. In addition to failing to actually conserve agricultural diversity (in any full sense of the term), ex situ banking projects also produce important potential inequalities—in terms of which material is banked and who has access to it. If, however, we refuse to accept an exclusive focus on the genetic components of plants, and instead insist on a brand of conservation that includes whole biosocial, more-than-human communities, then the role of banked resources must be radically rethought. Genebanks might instead take the place of central nodes in networks of diversity sharing, helping to keep plant varieties growing and circulating. This focus, in turn, requires that we also pay more critical attention to the various economic, legal and other mechanisms that prevent or stifle the flow and development of plant genetic resources in/to agricultural communities—especially those of peasant and indigenous farmers that play such a crucial role in conserving the world's (agro)biodiversity.     

Reviews

History of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the Soviet Union 1917–1938

(Geschichte der Evangelisch‐Lutherischen Gemeinden in der Sovetunion 1917–1938) by Wilhelm Kahle, E. J. Brill, Leiden, 1974, 625 pp. No price.

Prisoners of Conscience in the USSR: Their Treatment and Conditions

Amnesty International Report, A. I. Publications (53 Theobald's Road, London, W.C.1) 1975, 154 pp., £1.00

Marxism and the Church of Rome by Hervé Leclerc, Conflict Studies (Institute for the Study of Conflict) No. 45, 1974, 13 pp., £1.00.

Questions of scientific atheism

(Voprosy Nauchnogo Ateizma) No. 16, “Mysl”, Moscow, 1974, 358 pp.     

Fear conditioning and extinction in anxiety- and depression-prone persons

Anxiety and depression frequently co-occur and may share similar deficits in the processing of emotional stimuli. High anxiety is associated with a failure in the acquisition and extinction of fear conditioning. Despite the supposed common deficits, no research has been conducted on fear acquisition and extinction in depression. The main aim of the present study was to investigate and compare fear acquisition and extinction in anxiety- and depression-prone participants. Non-clinical anxious, depressive, anxious-depressive and control participants performed a fear discrimination task. During acquisition, the CS+ predicted an aversive event (unconditioned stimulus, US) and the CS? safety (no US). During extinction, the CS+ was no longer followed by the US, rendering it (temporarily) into a safety signal. On each CS participants rated their US expectancy; skin conductance responses (SCRs) were measured throughout. The expectancy scores indicated that high anxiety resulted in less safety learning during acquisition and extinction; no effect of depression was observed. SCRs showed that high-anxiety persons displayed less discrimination learning (CS+ minus CS?) during acquisition than low-anxiety persons. During extinction, high-depression persons demonstrated more discriminative SCR than low-depression persons. The observed discrepancies in response patterns of high-anxiety and -depression persons seem to indicate distinctive information processing of emotional stimuli.     

Whose Fault? The Origins and Evitability of the Analytic–Continental Rift

This is a broad survey of the chronology of the rift between continental and analytic philosophy, starting in 1899. Whereas at that time there was no discernible divide, as the twentieth century progresses we can see a gradual parting of the ways in which philosophy was done, culminating in a period of maximum separation in 1945-68, followed by some convergence. There is one substantial historical thesis proposed, and facts are adduced from the chronology to back it up: that the divide was never absolute, never purely geographical, and above all that it was not inevitable, but was largely the product of accidental historical circumstances, of which the most crucial was the flourishing of totalitarianism in Europe and the disruption caused by two world wars.     

Scientific Discovery With Law-Encoding Diagrams

This article introduces the concept of law-encoding diagrams (LEDs) and presents the argument that they have had a role in scientific discovery that has not been previously recognized. An LED is a representation that correctly encodes the underlying relations of a law, or a system of simultaneous laws, in the structure of a diagram by the means of geometric, topological, and spatial constraints, such that the instantiation of a particular diagram represents a single instance of the phenomena or a particular case of the law(s). Examples of LEDs in the history of science are discussed, and the benefits of using LEDs in discovery are considered. LEDs are distinguished from other forms of diagrammatic representation. Previous work on the computational modeling of diagrammatic law induction is reinterpreted in terms of the search for diagrammatic constraints of LEDs. A general characterization of the role of LEDs in discovery is considered, and a framework for classifying processes of discovery based on LEDs is proposed.     

Thinking Outside the Square: Business Students' Conceptions of Creativity

Creativity is an important attribute of a successful graduate of higher education, recognised by universities and employers alike. In this paper, we investigate ideas about creativity that were discussed during interviews by a group of business students at a university in Sydney, Australia. Using a phenomenographic approach, we identified three levels of conceptions of creativity, labeled Definition, Attribute, and Comprehensive, from the narrowest and most limited to the broadest and most inclusive. We discuss the characteristics of these different ways of viewing creativity and the pedagogical implications of our findings for business education (and higher education generally).     

A Shortened Spanish Version of the Emotional Creativity Inventory (the ECI-S)

Feeling, thinking, and acting creatively contribute to the originality and effectiveness with which people face challenges, solve problems, or make decisions. The only self-perception instrument that evaluates the ability to experience and express emotions in a novel, effective, and authentic way is the Emotional Creativity Inventory (ECI). The aim of this study was to develop a shortened Spanish version of the ECI (the ECI-S) and to validate it in a sample of 1,145 higher education students (650 women and 495 men). The internal structure, internal consistency, and temporal stability of the instrument were examined, as was its external validity. The results of the confirmatory factor analysis corroborated the three-factor structure of the original scale (Preparedness, Novelty, and Effectiveness/Authenticity). Moreover, these dimensions showed adequate internal consistency and temporal stability. The study also provided external validation data based on the relationship between emotional creativity and emotional intelligence, cognitive creativity, personality, and gender. Overall, the results indicate that the ECI-S is a useful tool for evaluating perceived emotional creativity during the preparation and verification phases of the creativity process.