Efficacy of a Brief Relaxation Training Intervention for Pediatric Recurrent Abdominal Pain

This study is a preliminary investigation of the efficacy of a brief intervention for recurrent abdominal pain (RAP) via a multiple baseline across subjects design. The intervention consisted of a single 1-hour session including psychoeducation and coaching of breathing retraining; the length, duration, and content of the intervention were designed with a goal of maximum portability to primary-care settings. Five children with recurrent abdominal pain participated in this study, 1 of whom served as a pilot participant. Children received the intervention at 1-week intervals. Parent and child reports of each child's abdominal pain, general somatic complaints, functional disability, and anxiety were collected throughout the study. All children participated in a 3-month follow-up session. Results indicated that this brief intervention was successful in lessening abdominal pain, as demonstrated by decreased Abdominal Pain Index (API) scores in two children and decreased abdominal pain following breathing retraining practice in all children. The intervention was also successful in decreasing some children's general somatic symptoms. Functional disability and anxiety symptoms remained consistent for all children throughout the study, which may be due to low levels of these symptoms pretreatment. Limitations and directions for future research are discussed.     

Post-response stimulation and the Simon effect: Further evidence of action-effect integration

The recently proposed action-concept view of perceptual-motor behaviour posits that a stimulus which consistently follows a certain response will become associated with that response. Some evidence in favour of this view comes from the finding that the size of the Simon effect can be altered by the inclusion of post-response stimuli. However, only one study has investigated the effects of including same-side in addition to opposite-side post-response stimuli, as well as a neutral Simon condition, and, possibly because of a failure of random assignment, the results from that study were inconclusive. In light of this limitation, a Simon experiment was performed in which the location of post-response stimulation was manipulated within subjects. The results showed that: (1) the Simon effect can both decrease and increase in the presence of post-response stimuli, and (2) the amounts of Simon interference and Simon facilitation are both affected by post-response stimuli, whereas performance on neutral trials is not. These findings provide additional support for the action-concept view and suggest that further research concerning this new approach is warranted.     

Why Maximize Expected Choice-Worthiness?1

This paper argues in favor of a particular account of decision-making under normative uncertainty: that, when it is possible to do so, one should maximize expected choice-worthiness. Though this position has been often suggested in the literature and is often taken to be the ‘default’ view, it has so far received little in the way of positive argument in its favor. After dealing with some preliminaries and giving the basic motivation for taking normative uncertainty into account in our decision-making, we consider and provide new arguments against two rival accounts that have been offered—the accounts that we call ‘My Favorite Theory’ and ‘My Favorite Option’. We then give a novel argument for comparativism—the view that, under normative uncertainty, one should take into account both probabilities of different theories and magnitudes of choice-worthiness. Finally, we further argue in favor of maximizing expected choice-worthiness and consider and respond to five objections.     

Between-dimension flanker effects: A clarification with encouraging implications

Models of selective and divided attention have evolved to be remarkably similar (e.g., Cohen & Shoup, 1997; Mordkoff & Yantis, 1993). One remaining difference between these models is the inclusion of all-or-none gates within a recent model of selective attention; the existence of these gates is supported by the absence of a between-dimension flanker effect. However, the existence of these gates is also inconsistent with a recent model of divided attention. In the present experiment, the evidence in favor of all-or-none gates was explored, with the following result: When the task involves colors and letters as the stimuli, and when display features are presented at equal rates, no evidence of these gates is observed. Although other issues remain to be resolved, these findings bode well for the general goal of a unified model of divided and selective attention.     

Fairness and futility

International Journal for Philosophy of Religion - William Lane Craig argues that both God and immortality are required for life to have meaning; life is futile without either of the two. I argue...     

Can parts cause their wholes?

Synthese - Part–whole causation (PWC) is the thesis that some causes are part of their effects. PWC has been objected to because of its incompatibility with the criterion that causes not be...