Embracing integration and complexity: placing emotion within a science of brain and behaviour

ABSTRACT

The present paper addresses conceptual issues that are central to emotion research. What is emotion? What are its defining characteristics? The field struggles with questions like these almost constantly. I argue that definitions, and deciding what is the proper status of emotion, are not a requirement for scientific progress – in fact, they can hinder it. Therefore, “emotion” researchers should strive to develop a science of complex behaviours, and worry less about their exact nature. But for interesting behaviours, is most of the explaining that is needed present at the level of isolated systems (perception, cognition, etc.) or at the level of interactions between them? I suggest that the level of interactions is where most of the work is needed. Accordingly, I advocate that it is important to embrace integration, and not to strive to necessarily disentangle the multiple contributions underlying behaviours. More generally, it is argued that we need to revise models of causation adopted when reasoning about the mind and brain. Instead, a “complex systems” approach is required where the interactions between multiple components lead to system-level – emergent – properties that cannot be isolated or attributed to more elementary parts.     

Ego depletion in consumer behavior: A review,synthesis, and research agenda

This research aims to identify, analyze, and map the intellectual structure of the topic of ego depletion in consumer behavior through the bibliometric strategies of namely co-citation analysis and bibliographic coupling. We performed the co-citation analysis covering 20 years of research, divided into two 10-year analyses. The bibliographic coupling analysis focused on recent research covering the last decade, divided into two five-year analyses. The results presented the most important research, authors, research centers, and journals on the topic, as well as the factors derived from the co-citation and bibliographic coupling analysis, the evolution of the theme between the analysis and subsequent periods, and the agenda for future research. The main contribution of this article is the proposition of an agenda for future research on ego depletion and its effects on consumer behavior.     

Is Segmental Trunk Control Related to Gross Motor Performance in Healthy Preterm and Full-Term Infants?

Abstract

The authors’ aim was to verify the correlation between segmental trunk control and gross motor performance in healthy preterm (PT) and full-term (FT) infants aged 6 and 7?months and to verify if there are differences between groups. All infants were assessed at 6 and 7?months by means of Segmental Assessment of Trunk Control (SATCo) to identify the exact level of segmental trunk control and Alberta Infant Motor Scale (AIMS) to measure gross motor performance. A significant correlation between segmental trunk control and gross motor performance was found in healthy PT infants at 7?months and FT infants at 6?months. PT infants showed a delay on segmental trunk control at 6 and 7?months and in supported standing posture at 6?months compared with FT infants. Segmental trunk control and gross motor performance showed an important relationship in healthy PT and FT infants, mainly in sitting posture.