Legal Audiences

This paper approaches legal argumentation from a rhetorical perspective. It discusses the nature of the audiences that are (and should be) targeted by judges in the legal process. Judicial opinions reach diverse groups of people with very different attitudes and expectations: other judges, lawyers, litigants, concerned citizens, etc. One important way in which these groups differ is that some of them are more likely to be persuaded by legalistic, precedent or statute-based arguments, while others expect judges to decide on grounds of justice or equity. So, judges face the challenge of determining whether they should select particular groups for special attention, or whether they have alternative rhetorical means to approach the problem of audience diversity. One strategy that is likely to be recommended by rhetorical scholars is that judges should not try to accommodate the various preferences of their actual readership, but that they should rather invoke an idealized audience or some version of Chaïm Perelman’s universal audience. However, the paper tries to show that the universal audience is of limited value for a discussion about how judges ought to proceed in the face of audience diversity. In particular, the idea of a universal audience does not help judges to make the choice between a legalistic or an equity-based approach to legal decision-making. By showing that this is so, the paper also raises doubts about the common thought that to invoke the universal audience in law is to appeal to natural law (as distinct from written, positive law).     

Risk and Prisoner's Dilemma: A Reinterpretation of Coombs' Re‐parameterization

We propose a model to measure risk in a prisoner's dilemma based on Coombs' (1973) re‐parameterization of the game as an individual risk decision‐making task that chooses between a gamble of cooperation and another gamble of defection. Specifically, we propose an index, r, to represent the risk associated with cooperation relative to defection. In conjunction with Rapoport's (1967) index of cooperation (K), our formulation of risk allows us to construct games that vary in risk (as indexed by r) while controlling for cooperativeness (as indexed by K). Following utility analysis that models risk seeking as a convex utility function and risk averse as a concave function, we predict that risk‐seeking people cooperate more in games that the cooperation choice is more risky, whereas risk‐averse people cooperate more in games that the cooperation choice is less risky. In the three studies that we varied game parameters, used different measures of risk orientation and prosocial orientation and used different experimental procedures, we found robust results supporting our predictions. Theoretical analysis of our formulation further suggests that risk and cooperativeness of a prisoner's dilemma game is not entirely independent. Games that have a higher cooperativeness index are necessarily more risky. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Chronic stress-induced alterations in mouse colonic 5-HT and defecation responses are strain dependent

Mood disorders and chronic stress are frequently associated with gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms including diarrhoea or constipation. Locally produced serotonin [5-hydroxytryptamine (5-HT)] regulates GI motility and is a key factor in the pathophysiology of stress-associated GI disorders. We aimed to establish whether chronic stress can differentially affect faecal output and colon 5-HT concentration in two inbred mouse strains: BALB/c and C57BL/6 which differ in their ability to cope with stress. Adult male BALB/c and C57BL/6 mice were restrained for 2?h daily for 10 days. Defecation was monitored during each stress session. Twenty-four hours after the last session of stress, plasma corticosterone concentration was higher than control in both strains, indicative of a physiological effect of chronic stress; however, stress-induced diarrhoea was more persistent in C57BL/6 mice. Basal concentration of colon 5-HT was higher in C57BL/6 mice, and stress elicited an increase in colon 5-HT only in this strain. Finally, na?ve BALB/c mice had a higher sensitivity (incidence of diarrhoea) to 5-HT (0.33?mg/kg, i.p.) than C57BL/6 mice. Our results suggest that differential defecation responses to stress may be associated with colon 5-HT concentration, which may in turn reflect the individual sensitivity to 5-HT. In addition, C57BL/6 mice emerge as a relevant model for studying GI alterations induced by chronic stress.     

Psychometric characteristics of the Emotional Quotient Inventory, Youth Version, Short Form, in Hungarian high school students

Research on the psychometric characteristics, including factor structure, of measures assessing emotional intelligence improve our understanding of the manifest and latent dimensions of the construct. The factor structure of the Bar-On Emotional Quotient Inventory (Bar-On, 1997), despite the popularity of the measure, has been the subject of only a few studies, and there are no data available at all on its 30-item version. The aim of our study was the structural analysis of the Bar-On Emotional Quotient Inventory, Youth Version, Short Form (Bar-On & Parker, 2000). During the multiple-step statistical analysis, confirmatory and exploratory factor analyses and a combined method of these were executed on a sample of 2,380 adolescents (mean age: 17 years, 47.9 % male). The results confirmed the original 5-factor structure (Intrapersonal Emotional Quotient, Interpersonal Emotional Quotient, Stress Management, Adaptability, and Positive Impression). However, only 24 of the original 30 items could be considered as belonging to the scales. Elimination of 6 items resulted in a clearer and more coherent factorial structure, which makes the measure an adequate tool for the assessment of the emotional intelligence of adolescents and young adults in surveys of large-scale samples.     

Stress during puberty boosts metabolic activation associated with fear-extinction learning in hippocampus, basal amygdala and cingulate cortex

Adolescence is characterized by major developmental changes that may render the individual vulnerable to stress and the development of psychopathologies in a sex-specific manner. Earlier we reported lower anxiety-like behavior and higher risk-taking and novelty seeking in rats previously exposed to peri-pubertal stress. Here we studied whether peri-pubertal stress affected the acquisition and extinction of fear memories and/or the associated functional engagement of various brain regions, as assessed with 2-deoxyglucose. We showed that while peri-pubertal stress reduced freezing during the acquisition of fear memories (training) in both sexes, it had a sex-specific effect on extinction of these memories. Moreover hippocampus, basal amygdala and cingulate and motor cortices showed higher metabolic rates during extinction in rats exposed to peri-pubertal stress. Interestingly, activation of the infralimbic cortex was negatively correlated with freezing during extinction only in control males, while only males stressed during puberty showed a significant correlation between behavior during extinction and metabolic activation of hippocampus, amygdala and paraventricular nucleus. No correlations between brain activation and behavior during extinction were observed in females (control or stress). These results indicate that exposure to peri-pubertal stress affects behavior and brain metabolism when the individual is exposed to an additional stressful challenge. Some of these effects are sex-specific.     

Acoustic markers associated with impairment in language processing in Alzheimer's Disease

This study broaches in a novel way the analysis of cognitive impairment characteristic of the early stages of Alzheimer's Disease (AD). Specifically, we attempt to determine the acoustic speech parameters that are sensitive to the onset of the disease, and their association with the language deficit characteristic of AD. Speech analysis was carried out on 21 elderly patients with AD using Praat software, which analyzes the acoustic components of speech. The data obtained were subjected to stepwise regression, using the overall scores obtained in the test as the criterion variable, and the scores on the frequency, amplitude and periodicity variables as predictors of performance. We found that the percentage of voiceless segments explains a significant portion of the variance in the overall scores obtained in the neuropsychological test. This component seems to be related mainly to the patient's ability in phonological fluency. This finding could permit the creation of a diagnostic test for AD through analysis of the acoustic speech parameters at very low cost in terms of both time and resources.     

Cross-cultural confirmatory factor analysis of the CES-D in Spanish and Mexican dementia caregivers

The Center for Epidemiologic Studies-Depression Scale (CES-D) is the most frequently used scale for measuring depressive symptomatology in caregiving research. The aim of this study is to test its construct structure and measurement equivalence between caregivers from two Spanish-speaking countries. Face-to-face interviews were carried out with 595 female dementia caregivers from Madrid, Spain, and from Coahuila, Mexico. The structure of the CES-D was analyzed using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis (EFA and CFA, respectively). Measurement invariance across samples was analyzed comparing a baseline model with a more restrictive model. Significant differences between means were found for 7 items. The results of the EFA clearly supported a four-factor solution. The CFA for the whole sample with the four factors revealed high and statistically significant loading coefficients for all items (except item number 4). When equality constraints were imposed to test for the invariance between countries, the change in chi-square was significant, indicating that complete invariance could not be assumed. Significant between-countries differences were found for three of the four latent factor mean scores. Although the results provide general support for the original four-factor structure, caution should be exercised on reporting comparisons of depression scores between Spanish-speaking countries.     

Congruent visual information improves traffic signage

In the last five decades, cognitive scientists and the psychologists of reasoning have dedicated a lot of effort designing usable traffic signs. This study investigated the interference effect produced by the position of the sign elements in traffic signage on response accuracy and reaction time. Sixteen drivers performed a flanker interference reaction time task. Incongruent graphical/space solutions, actually used for the airport stack-type sign, lead to increased reaction time and a reduction in the proportion of correct answers. These results suggest that incongruent visual information should be avoided, as this might impair drivers’ performance. These findings provide important information for the specification of future signage design guidelines and for improving road safety.     

Comprehension and utilisation of pointing gestures and gazing in dog–human communication in relatively complex situations

The aim of the present investigation was to study the visual communication between humans and dogs in relatively complex situations. In the present research, we have modelled more lifelike situations in contrast to previous studies which often relied on using only two potential hiding locations and direct association between the communicative signal and the signalled object. In Study 1, we have provided the dogs with four potential hiding locations, two on each side of the experimenter to see whether dogs are able to choose the correct location based on the pointing gesture. In Study 2, dogs had to rely on a sequence of pointing gestures displayed by two different experimenters. We have investigated whether dogs are able to recognise an ‘indirect signal’, that is, a pointing toward a pointer. In Study 3, we have examined whether dogs can understand indirect information about a hidden object and direct the owner to the particular location. Study 1 has revealed that dogs are unlikely to rely on extrapolating precise linear vectors along the pointing arm when relying on human pointing gestures. Instead, they rely on a simple rule of following the side of the human gesturing. If there were more targets on the same side of the human, they showed a preference for the targets closer to the human. Study 2 has shown that dogs are able to rely on indirect pointing gestures but the individual performances suggest that this skill may be restricted to a certain level of complexity. In Study 3, we have found that dogs are able to localise the hidden object by utilising indirect human signals, and they are able to convey this information to their owner.