Introduction: Levinas and Education: The Question of Implication

Studies in Philosophy and Education -     

The relationship between blood lead, bone lead and child intelligence.

We report associations between serial measures of blood lead and intelligence in children age 10-12 years, half heavily exposed to lead from the prenatal period onward, and half relatively unexposed. For a subsample, we examine bone lead-IQ associations, comparing them with bone lead associations. Both blood and bone lead levels were associated with intelligence decrements, small relative to the contribution of social factors. For each doubling of Tib-Pb, Full Scale, Performance, and Verbal IQ decreased by an estimated 5.5, 6.2, and 4.1 points, respectively. Bone lead-IQ associations were stronger than those for blood lead, which nonetheless provide robust analogues. Current BPb, easy to obtain, provides a useful means for assessing Pb exposure/IQ associations.     

GENDER-RELATED DISCOURSES AS MEDIATORS IN THE ASSOCIATION BETWEEN INTERNALIZATION OF THE THIN-BODY IDEAL AND INDICANTS OF BODY DISSATISFACTION AND DISORDERED EATING

This study examined whether the gender-related discourses of self-objectification, self-silencing, and anger suppression mediated the association between internalization of the thin-body ideal and body dissatisfaction and eating pathology. We employed a cross-sectional design to study both university ( n  = 140) and community ( n  = 76) samples of women from Ireland ranging from 17 to 30 years of age ( M  = 21.48,  SD  = 3.05). Structural equation modeling was used to test for mediation, with the final model suggesting that gender-related discourses (silencing the self/anger suppression and body surveillance) mediated the association between thin-body ideal internalization and attitudes and behaviors characteristic of disordered eating. Limitations of the current study and directions for future research are highlighted.     

Enhanced preference for a flavour following reversed flavour—glucose pairing

In two experiments hungry rats showed enhanced preference for a flavour as a result of a procedure whereby the flavour followed presentation of 10% glucose—i.e. the reverse of the usual sequence. This provides the first example of excitatory conditioning resulting from reversed pairing involving an appetitive reinforcer. Experiment 1 compared a Cinnamon group, for which ingestion of glucose was followed after 3 min by cinnamon and on other days water was followed by wintergreen, with a Wintergreen group in which wintergreen followed glucose and cinnamon followed water. In a final 2-bottle test relative preference for cinnamon was greater in the Cinnamon than in the Wintergreen group. This effect was replicated in Experiment 2, which compared an Immediate group, for which, as above, drinking glucose was followed 3 min later by access to cinnamon, with a Delay group, for which there was a delay of 1 hr between glucose and subsequent access to cinnamon. Enhanced preference for cinnamon was found only in the Immediate group and appeared after only four glucose-cinnamon pairings. An important finding came from a choice test between glucose and saccharin in which the Immediate group showed a weaker preference for glucose than the Delay group. This indicated that a novel flavour may overshadow the association between the flavour of glucose and its consequences, which normally serves to enhance preference for glucose.     

THE SHIFT IN POWER WITH AGE Changes in Perception of the Power of Women and Men Over the Life Cycle

Previous research has described an apparent shift in perceived interpersonal power towards equality between men and women later in life. This study investigated (a) whether the "shift in power with age" would appear in the Israeli kibbutz, (b) the role of the "parental emergency" in the shift, and (c) whether changes in behaviors or attitudes best account for the shift. One hundred twenty younger and older Israeli women and men, half from the city and half from the kibbutz, wrote TAT stories, which were then rated for overall power of the female and male characters, their power strategies, and their motives. A shift in perceived power with age was found in both the city and the kibbutz. Parental status reduced the power of the woman and increased the power of the man only in the city, whereas the reverse was true in the kibbutz. These results counter the "parental emergency" explanation for the shift in power with age. Furthermore, older women used traditionally feminine power strategies, but their behavior was evaluated as more powerful than the same behavior in younger women. Thus, it is not the behaviors but rather people's evaluation of the behaviors that changes across the life span of the individual.