Spontaneous adaptation explains why people act faster when being imitated

The human ability to perform joint actions is often attributed to high-level cognitive processes. For example, the finding that action leaders act faster when imitated by their partners has been interpreted as evidence for anticipation of the other’s actions (Pfister, Dignath, Hommel, & Kunde, 2013). In two experiments, we showed that a low-level mechanism can account for this finding. Action leaders were faster when imitated than when counterimitated, but only if they could observe their partner’s actions (Exp. 1). Crucially, when due to our manipulation the partner’s imitative actions became slower than the counterimitative actions, leaders also became slower when they were imitated, and faster when counterimitated (Exp. 2). Our results suggest that spontaneous temporal adaptation is a key mechanism in joint action tasks. We argue for a reconsideration of other phenomena that have traditionally been attributed solely to high-level processes.     

Slot Mereology Revised

The paper suggests two revisions of K. Bennett's system of slot mereology. The revisions do not touch on the philosophical rationale for this system, but are focused on certain logical deficiencies in her formalisation.     

When Authoritarians Confront Prejudice. Differential Effects of SDO and RWA on Support for Hate‐Speech Prohibition

Two nationwide representative studies (N = 653 adolescents; N = 1007 adults) investigated the psychological correlates of the intention to penalize public expressions of prejudice in the form of support for hate‐speech prohibition. We presented participants with preselected examples of hate speech from the Internet and other mass media and assessed their willingness to support the prohibition of public expressions of such remarks. Both studies found that social dominance orientation and right‐wing authoritarianism are positively correlated with outgroup prejudice, but they have differential effects on hate‐speech prohibition. Social dominance orientation was positively related to the acceptance of hate speech, whereas right‐wing authoritarianism was positively related to hate‐speech prohibition. In discussing this counterintuitive finding, we suggest that right‐wing authoritarians are particularly vigilant toward norm violations—and this makes them more punitive toward counternormative expressions of prejudice, such as hate speech.     

Emotional Distress Associated with Surgical Treatment and its Relationship with Coping Profiles Among Chronically ill Older Patients

The study determines the patterns of coping styles among older patients with hip osteoarthritis and assesses the derived profiles in terms of perceived stress and anxiety before and after arthroplasty. Sixty-one hospital patients (mean age 70.3 years) were analysed one day before arthroplasty and three months after. The participants were assessed with the Brief-COPE (coping style), PSS-10 (perceived stress) and STAI (anxiety) psychometric tests. Four coping patterns were yielded using data clustering: rational, enterprising (resourceful), potentially maladaptive and flexible. Repeated measures ANOVA indicated a main effect within subjects but did not indicate that decreases of stress and anxiety varied differently between groups. Cluster 1 (a coping profile characterised by high helplessness, low active coping, high avoidance) reported significantly greater stress and anxiety than all other groups before and after hip replacement, while clusters 2 (flexible), 3 (resourceful) and 4 (rational) were characterised by similar levels of anxiety and stress. Older patients with osteoarthritis might differ in terms of emotional response to surgical treatment. Screening for coping styles at admission to hospital may indicate more vulnerable individuals.     

Measuring Cultural and Creative Activities in European Cities: Challenges and Practical Problems with Existing Indices

For decades, the focus of cultural, social, and economic policies has been shifting to cities. Cities with the highest concentration of creative employment have demonstrated the greatest resilience in the post-2008 economic recovery. Although, over the last few years, there has been an explosion of cultural or creative related indices for cities, no single reference index is commonly accepted. The main thrust of this article is the provision of a systematic and practical framework for a common point of departure for future index developers. To this end, 38 of the most influential culture and creativity indices were reviewed. By adoption of the indicator-driven approach, 16 dimensions corresponding to aspects of culture and creativity were identified in the city context. These dimensions are presented in a novel taxonomy of 3 clusters that aims to distinguish indicators capturing core cultural and creative activities from those oriented on measuring cities’ organic background or socio-economic outcomes of the aforementioned activities. In addition, the main obstacles most commonly faced by index developers are described and grouped into 4 distinct conceptual challenges, namely (a) precision, (b) diversity, (c) comparability, and (d) spillover. Each challenge is discussed in detail, accompanied by a systematic approach to its solution.     

The role of rehearsals in self-generated prospective memory tasks

In order to inquire into the nature of retrieval in prospective memory in a naturalistic context, we investigated the number and circumstances of rehearsals of different kinds of intentions to be pursued during a single time period. Thirty-six students were given four minutes to generate a list of tasks they were planning to perform over the course of 10 days. During this retention interval, they were provided with pocket-size diaries in which they recorded the details of each occasion they thought about the tasks previously listed. As to the nature of any triggers or cues that prompted rehearsal, the participants were asked to choose one of three alternatives: (1) association with an internal or an external cue that accidently appeared in the surroundings (accidental rehearsals), (2) deliberate thinking, e.g. while planning (self-initiated rehearsals), (3) recollection that spontaneously popped into one's mind for no apparent reason (no-trigger rehearsals). The results showed that thoughts about intended actions appeared more often after accidental cues than for no apparent reason. However, the relative contribution of self-initiated triggers to the rehearsal process was substantial: Most importantly, it was the self-initiated rehearsal that differentiated between executed and unexecuted actions. In addition, the most activated intention resulted in a higher frequency of no-trigger and self-initiated rehearsals than the remaining intentions. Finally, perceived intention importance was positively related to both the number of rehearsals and the likelihood of successful task completion. The results are discussed with regard to which factors may be crucial for the successful performance of participants' own self-generated intentions in a natural setting. The role of deliberate rehearsal in specifying the details of the intended action and its designated retrieval context is highlighted.     

Does identification predict community involvement? Exploring consequences of social identification among the Jewish minority in Poland

Previous research indicated that people who strongly identify with their own group are more involved in the group's actions. The current study examines the relation between three dimensions of group identification (affect, ties, centrality) and forms of community involvement among members of the Jewish minority in Poland. The strength of ingroup ties predicted involvement in the ethnic minority community. The link between identification and involvement was mediated by the cultural dominance. The reported study was the first quantitative survey of the Jewish community in post‐War Poland. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Annotation Theories over Finite Graphs

In the current paper we consider theories with vocabulary containing a number of binary and unary relation symbols. Binary relation symbols represent labeled edges of a graph and unary relations represent unique annotations of the graph’s nodes. Such theories, which we call annotation theories, can be used in many applications, including the formalization of argumentation, approximate reasoning, semantics of logic programs, graph coloring, etc. We address a number of problems related to annotation theories over finite models, including satisfiability, querying problem, specification of preferred models and model checking problem. We show that most of considered problems are NPTime- or co-NPTime-complete. In order to reduce the complexity for particular theories, we use second-order quantifier elimination. To our best knowledge none of existing methods works in the case of annotation theories. We then provide a new second-order quantifier elimination method for stratified theories, which is successful in the considered cases. The new result subsumes many other results, including those of [2, 28, 21].