On the Ethics of Democratic Access to Web Information

Floridi’s work, although diverse and multifaceted, portrays a solid coherence across his different lines of work. Among his wealth of interests and results, we highlight his recent work on information logics, on the ethics of information technology, and his rigorous (and vigorous) philosophical analysis of recent technological trends and developments in information technology. In the present article we illustrate, by means of some connecting arguments, the diversity and coherence of Floridi’s work. We also show how his work, although fundamentally philosophical in nature, can be used to build solid foundations for scientific and entrepreneurial endeavours of higher quality. More specifically, we discuss how the combination of results from the three lines of work referred to above can be used as ground for the organisation of higher quality programmes to augment the capabilities and effectiveness of governmental systems through information and communications technology, a trend that has been explored in many nations and that has been coined Electronic Government. Electronic Government programmes that improve the capabilities of citizens to interact with each other and with governments, as well as the capabilities of governments to listen to the needs and aspirations of citizens, have the potential to contribute to the construction of more democratic states. Electronic Government systems that rely on ready made models to prescribe to citizens how best they should interact with each other and with the public administration are, however, by construction non-democratic. Hence, it can be a moral and ethical matter for governments to choose which line of technological development they take.     

Predicting occupational interests and choice aspirations in Portuguese high school students: A test of social cognitive career theory

The predictive utility of social cognitive career theory’s (SCCT) interest and choice models was examined in a sample of 600 Portuguese high school students. Participants completed measures of occupational self-efficacy, outcome expectations, interests, social supports and barriers, and choice consideration across the six Holland (1997) RIASEC types. The integrated interest-choice model fit the data well across Holland types and generally supported the hypotheses that self-efficacy and outcome expectations jointly predict interests, and that interests mediate the relations of self-efficacy and outcome expectations to choice consideration. Contrary to SCCT, however, social supports and barriers related to choice consideration indirectly, through self-efficacy, rather than directly. The implications of these findings for further research on the cross-cultural validity of SCCT are considered.     

Autonomy and interdependence: beliefs of Brazilian mothers from state capitals and small towns

This study aimed to investigate characteristics of Brazilian mothers' beliefs system, in the dimensions of autonomy and interdependence. A group of 600 women, half from state capitals and half from small towns, participated in the study. They were individually interviewed with Scales of Allocentrism, Beliefs about Parental Practices and Socialization Goals. Paired and Independent samples t tests and Multivariate GLM were performed. The results indicate that although mothers from both contexts value autonomy, mothers inhabiting small towns considered the relational dimension as the most important; whereas mothers inhabiting capitals valued equally both dimensions, either in their beliefs about practices or in the socialization goals for their children. Mothers from small towns have a higher mean score for allocentrism than mothers living in capitals. Thus, place of residence proved to be a relevant variable in the modulation of maternal beliefs. Educational level was not a significant factor in the variables considered and with this group of mothers. The study results are discussed in terms of their contribution to the understanding of the complex relationship between dimensions of autonomy and interdependence in mothers' beliefs system.     

Aesthetic preferences and the attribution of meaning: Environmental categorization processes in the evaluation of urban scenes

In the context of research into scenic quality, the purpose of the present paper is to establish categories of urban landscapes on the basis of users' aesthetic judgements. It also explores the role that the restorative capacity of a place—in terms of the attentional restoration theory (ART)—together with a set of aesthetic attributes, may play in more or less valued places in a city. A total of 132 residents from Málaga (Spain) were chosen, with the city providing the physical framework for environmental reference. A questionnaire designed for easy self‐administration by subjects was used to collect information. Subjects were asked to identify three places in Málaga that they considered to be most attractive and three that they considered least attractive. Participants were asked to evaluate both the restorative properties—in terms of the ART—and the extent to which their first choice displayed certain environmental characteristics. Participants expressed a clear aesthetic preference for recreational sites for leisure/walking as well as those closely linked to the city's historical‐cultural identity. The research also identified other categories of visual settings that could be used as a focal point around which to centre future samples of scenes in a city context. Finally, the results obtained from the characterization of more and less attractive places, from the variables used in this study, shed light on the dimensions of underlying meaning that individuals use to categorize their environment and reinforce the idea that environmental aesthetics seem to play an important role in individuals' general well‐being.     

An Overview of Possibilistic Handling of Default Reasoning, with Experimental Studies

This paper first provides a brief survey of a possibilistic handling of default rules. A set of default rules of the form, “generally, from α deduce β”, is viewed as the family of possibility distributions satisfying constraints expressing that the situation where α and β is true has a greater plausibility than the one where a and - β is true. When considering only the subset of linear possibility distributions, the well-known System P of postulates proposed by Kraus, Lehmann and Magidor, has been obtained. We also present two rational extensions: one based on the minimum specificity principle and the other is based on the lexicographic ordering. The second part of the paper presents an empirical study of three desirable properties for a consequence relation that capture default reasoning: Rationality, Property Inheritance and Ambiguity Preservation. An experiment is conducted to investigate 13 patterns of inference for the test of these properties. Our experimental apparatus confirms previous results on the relevance of System P, and enforces the psychological relevance of the studied properties.     

Cognitive rigidity in patients with depression and fibromyalgia

Background/ObjectiveThe comorbidity of depression and fibromyalgia chronic syndrome has been well documented in the literature; however, the cognitive structure of these patients has not been assessed. Previous results reported variability in cognitive rigidity in depressive patients, the key for this might be the presence of chronic physical pain such as fibromyalgia. The present study explores and compares the cognitive rigidity and differentiation, between patients with depression with and without fibromyalgia syndrome.MethodThirty one patients with depression and fibromyalgia were matched, considering age, sex and number of depressive episodes, with 31 patients with depression but without fibromyalgia diagnosis. Cognitive rigidity and differentiation were measured with the repertory grid technique.ResultsThe results indicated that depressed patients with fibromyalgia presented higher levels of depressive symptoms, greater cognitive rigidity and lower cognitive differentiation than those without fibromyalgia.ConclusionsThe results might inform future treatments to address the cognitive structure of these patients.     

Best professional practices when approaching religiosity/spirituality in psychotherapy in Brazil

The religiosity/spirituality (R/S) dimension is recognised as an important component of the concept of health advocated by the World Health Organization; however, it does not appear in the undergraduate Psychology curricula in the Brazilian context, revealing a gap in the way this theme has been covered. In order to identify the professional reality of Brazilian psychotherapists in relation to this theme, this study aimed to identify what constitutes the best professional practices when approaching R/S in psychotherapy. We interviewed 24 psychotherapists of both sexes, with a mean age of 36.43, from two medium‐sized cities of two Brazilian states. According to the interviewees, the best practices considered when addressing R/S, that is, the most appropriate actions/attitudes, are as follows: (a) Respect; (b) Knowing how to separate what is from the psychotherapist and from the patient/client; (c) Recognising the theme as an integrative dimension of the human being; (d) Knowing how to listen; (e) Questioning the role of R/S in the life of the patients/clients; (f) Knowledge about the subject matter; and (g) Not imposing knowledge, practices or doctrine. These practices were revealed as the skills, competencies and knowledge needed to deal with the subject and highlight important references to think about the theme in psychotherapy, guiding the formation of new professionals and updating practising psychotherapists.     

Psychometric properties of a Spanish version of the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) in general population

This is the first study that provides normative, reliability, factor validity and discriminant validity data of the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI; Beck, Epstein, Brown, & Steer, 1988) in the Spanish general population, Sanz and Navarro's (2003) Spanish version of the BAI was administered to 249 adults. Factor analyses suggested that the BAI taps a general anxiety dimension comprising two related factors (somatic and affective-cognitive symptoms), but these factors hardly explained any additional variance and, therefore, little information is lost in considering only full-scale scores. Internal consistency estimate for the BAI was high (alpha = .93). The BAI was correlated .63 with the BDI-II and .32 with the Trait-Anger scale of the STAXI 2, but a factor analysis of their items revealed three factors, suggesting that the correlations between the instruments may be better accounted for by relationships between anxiety, depression, and anger, than by problems of discriminant validity. The mean BAI total score and the distribution of BAI scores were similar to those found in other countries. BAI norm scores for the community sample were provided from the total sample and from the male and female subsamples, as females scored higher than males. The utility of these scores for assessing clinical significance of treatment outcomes for anxiety is discussed.     

Creating new social identities in children through critical multicultural media: the case of Little Bill

Multicultural education emerged from the political struggles of the 1960s and 1970s and advocated the inclusion of women and ethnic and racial groups in school curricula and children's media. Recently multiculturalism has evolved to include a critical perspective by focusing on stigmatized social identities such as race, class, sexuality, ethnicity, and disability. Little Bill, a children's animated television series, is an example of applied critical multiculturalism. In this chapter, we present a case study of one episode, "A Ramp for Monty," to illustrate the merits of this approach, which may increase the number of social identities children relate to and increase the degree of understanding they may bring to the differences inherent in social identities.     

文明的"早生晚熟"和"晚生早熟"--中、英两国文明特征的比较与反思

本文从经济形态、政治制度、社会结构、思想观念、人格特征五个方面对中英两国文明进行观照,认为中英文明分别具有“早生晚熟”和“晚生早熟”的不同特征,而这又是与双方文明进程迥然、专制程度差异、社会结构有别以及对待传统态度不同分不开的。正是这些差别造成了中华文明从先行到落后,而英国文明虽后来反居上。因此,只有丢掉包袱。轻装上阵。中华民族才能浴火重生。