A critique of science and R&D-based models of endogenous growth

Conclusion We have argued against the conventional treatment of science from two directions: firstly, we show that its assumptions about the mechanics of technology transfer are at odds with what occurs in practice. Secondly, the predictions of models based on conventional assumptions receive little support empirically, and are on some occasions contradicted by the data. We believe that the weaknesses we have discussed prompt a re-analysis of science as the workings of invisible colleges. Moreover, we note that there appears, at present, to be no empirical or sound theoretical reason to suppose that, for reasons of economic growth, governments need fund science. the author of The Economic Laws of Scientific Research, Macmillan/St Martin’s Press, 1996.     

The Effects of Sad Mood on Reports of Parents’ Caregiving Behaviors

Two studies examined the hypothesis that recollections of parents’ child-rearing behaviors on the Parental Bonding Instrument (PBI: Parker, Tupling, & Brown, 1979) are influenced by current mood. Study 1 investigated the effects of sad versus neutral mood induction on PBI scores in 50 college students. Participants rated their parents as less caring following the sad mood induction than following the neutral induction. Study 2 investigated the effects of naturally occurring changes in depressive symptoms on PBI scores over a two month period. Changes in depressive symptoms correlated with changes in father care scores and tended to correlate with changes in mother care scores. Findings from both studies suggest that retrospective reports of parenting are susceptible to mood bias and highlight the limits of using cross sectional designs to explore the relationship between parenting and depression.     

Interference with judgments of control and attentional shift as a result of prior exposure to controllable and uncontrollable feedback

The experiment was carried out to determine whether exposure to an uncontrollable relationship between an action and its outcome during a non-aversive pretreatment phase would affect subsequent ratings of perceived control emitted by human participants. Its other aim was to investigate the effect of such pre-exposure on the attentional focus of humans on internal and external cues. Participants were assigned to one of three groups; an uncontrollable pretreatment, a controllable pretreatment, and no pretreatment. Participants exposed to uncontrollable outcomes (unsolvable problems) gave lower ratings of control over a produced outcome than the other two groups, indicating the interference with subsequent judgments of control. The exposure to uncontrollable outcomes also increased levels of distraction produced by an external cue in a reaction time experiment. Such an effect was not found in the groups who had not been exposed to uncontrollable outcomes. These dual effects are similar to those noted in non-humans subjected to uncontrollable outcomes.     

A reanalysis of the CARIN theory of conceptual combination

The competition among relations in nominals (CARIN) theory of conceptual combination (C. L. Gagné & E. J. Shoben, 1997) proposes that people interpret nominal compounds by selecting a relation from a pool of competing alternatives and that relation availability is influenced by the frequency with which relations have been previously associated with the modifying concept. The current authors derived relation frequencies by using a sample of compounds occurring in the British National Corpus and compared them with those derived by Gagné and Shoben. The authors demonstrated that the original relation frequencies are unrepresentative and that Gagne' and Shoben's technique for dichotomizing them into high and low is unreliable. In addition, the authors revealed anomalies in the mathematical instantiation of the CARIN model and showed that it does not provide evidence for competition among relations.     

Effect of a signalled delay between an action and outcome on human judgement of causality

Three experiments examined the influence of a stimulus inserted between an action (pressing the space bar of a computer) and an associated delayed outcome (a triangle lighting up on the screen) on ratings of the causal effectiveness of that action. In Experiment 1, subjects rated an action that produced an outcome immediately as more causally effective than an action that produced a delayed outcome. The rating of the causal effectiveness of an action that produced a delayed outcome in which the delay was filled by a stimulus was higher than the rating of actions that produced the outcome after an unsignalled delay. In Experiment 2, the effect of a stimulus presented uncorrelated with the action or the outcome was examined and found not to enhance the rating of causal effectiveness of an action that produced a delayed outcome. In Experiment 3, the degree of correlation between the stimulus and the consequence was examined. Ratings of the causal effectiveness of the action were greater the higher percentage of delay intervals that were signalled.     

Different Perspectives Regarding Quality of Life in Chronically ill and Healthy Individuals

The areas that were suggested as most important with regard to Quality of Life (QoL) were examined in groups of individuals who were healthy, and those with a chronic condition. An electronic survey was completed by 892 participants (261 healthy and 631 with a chronic condition). They answered three questions relating to QoL: what is most important to you; what areas most impact your QoL; and an open question what does QoL mean to you. Across the three questions both groups highlighted physical functioning, independence and mobility as key areas for QoL. However, the group with a chronic condition tended to find issues of functioning such as pain, fatigue, and sleep as more important to their QoL than the healthy participants. In contrast, the healthy participants tended to note the importance of relationships and family as more important than the group with a chronic condition. That there were such differences between the groups might suggest that different aspects of QoL could be rated as more important when examining this issue with samples with a chronic condition and those without such a condition.     

The working life of a medium: a qualitative examination of mediumship as a support service for the bereaved

Despite widespread scepticism, it has been estimated that around 10% of the UK adult population regularly visit a medium and television programmes showing mediumship demonstrations draw in millions of viewers. While many assume mediumship to be purely for entertainment, an alternative discourse presents it as being a service offered to comfort and support the bereaved. In this qualitative study, data were collected through semi-structured interviews with nine working mediums and examined with an interpretative phenomenological analysis which aims to understand the lived experiences of participants. Three key superordinate themes emerged, Responsibility and Ethics, Passion to Help and Therapeutic Value. These themes are discussed in terms of mediums’ perception of their work as a helping profession and an ethical framework which illustrates awareness of the vulnerability of sitters. We also consider whether mediums may be equipped to deal with sitters experiencing complicated grief.     

The Interactive Influence of Prosocial Places,Youth Population,and Poverty on Incidents of Violent Assault

The article builds on previous work by Roman and colleagues in order to specify the potential causes for increased incidents of violent assault in areas featuring a high number of prosocial institutions (i.e., schools, recreation centers). Utilizing aspects of routine activity theory and crime pattern theory, the argument is presented that both poverty and youth population will have a conditioning impact on the relationship between the presence of prosocial places and incidence of violent assault. Least squares regression was utilized in order to show that such institutions can serve as generators for offending and/or victimization, and that their location in lower income areas may magnify the problem.