On the minimal relative motion principle—lateral displacement of a contracting bar

Xausa, Beghi, and Zanforlin (J. Math. Psychol. 45(4) (2001) 635) provide an account of perceptual organization based on their ‘minimal relative motion’ principle. They claim that this principle can account for the percept generated by a contracting bar that is simultaneously translating laterally. We critique the mathematical analysis provided in the aforementioned paper. We conclude that the ‘minimal relative motion’ principle, in the form presented, cannot adequately explain the percept reported by observers.     

小学生数学示例学习的信息加工过程实验研究

该研究试图让小学生通过示例学习的方式学习小数乘小数知识。口语报告分析及后测表明,小学四年级学生已具备示例学习的能力。实验还通过口语报告的个案分析,揭示示例学习的信息加工过程,并探讨了经过改进的口语报告分析法的应用问题。     

抗SARS中若干价值观的一项调查

运用情境性故事投射法．以抗SARS为背景编撰关于公正、关爱、公众、敬业、宽容诸价值观念为主题的五个情境故事为刺激材料,以427名大学生和职业青年为对象进行了问卷调查,对他们在与抗SARS有关的上述五个价值观念上的反应倾向及其积极性反应倾向在个体、社会、原则三水平理由上的特点作了探究。     

The Emperor's clothes: Some serious problems in psychoanalytic training

The author discusses some of the key problems in psychoanalytic training, in particular those problems that stem from the power differential between training analysts and students in training. One effect of this differential can be that some students feel a pressure to comply with their teachers and supervisors, even their training analyst, in ways that can be seriously detrimental to their development. Further, when something goes wrong in a student's training, how is this to be viewed by those in charge of the training? Also, how are complaints dealt with? Is suffi cient weight given to external reality? Too often training analysts, and training committees, get into pathologising a student in a process that should be recognised as ‘wild analysis in committee’, rather than considering more carefully the external realities that may be affecting a student's progress in the training. This ‘analysis’ in committee should never be allowed. There is an urgency for immediate changes to be made in psychoanalytic training so that the problems discussed, with more care being taken, should be prevented from happening. Too often, however, an institutional resistance to change dominates discussions in committee, and in society meetings, with the result that little or no change takes place even after years of debate.     

Dogmatism and the distinctiveness of opposite vs. different cognitive systems: Release from proactive inhibition for shifts within- and between-dimensions of meaning

In a series of three experiments, encoding distinctiveness in a release from proactive inhibition paradigm was investigated as a function of dogmatism. Significant differences in release from proactive inhibition between high and low dogmatic individuals were found for shifts within meaning dimensions (from one end of a dimension to the other end) but not for shifts between different dimensions of meaning. The results were discussed in terms of the emphasis on belief vs. disbelief systems in dogmatism, motivational processes in cognition, and recent work on individual differences in social cognition.     

Do People Order Cues by Retrieval Fluency when Making Probabilistic Inferences?

In multiple‐cue probabilistic inferences, people infer alternatives' unknown values on decision criteria, using alternatives' attributes as cues. Some inferential strategies, like take‐the‐best, assume that people consider relevant cues sequentially in order of decreasing validity. This assumption has been deemed cognitively implausible by some, who suggest memory retrieval principles to guide cue order. We test whether memory‐based inferences are better described by a model considering cues in order of validity or in order of memory retrieval. In an experiment, we manipulated the frequency with which cues appeared in a learning phase, increasing retrieval fluency of cue values related to the more frequently appearing cue. In a subsequent decision phase, participants made a series of two‐alternative decisions based on the learned cue values. We compared two sequential sampling models, which differed in whether cues are sampled in order of subjective cue validity or in order of retrieval fluency. To model retrieval order of cues in the fluency sampling model, we used the declarative memory theory embedded in the ACT‐R cognitive architecture. Most participants' decisions were best described by the model sampling cues in order of memory retrieval. Only a minority of participants were classified as sampling cues by validity. Our result suggests that retrieval fluency is the primary driver of cue order in inferences from memory, irrespective of the cues' validities. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Divergent effects of detachment from work: a day-level study on employee creativity

Detachment from work during non-work time is generally related to a decrease in work-related strain. However, it might also hamper employees’ generation of new and useful ideas about work by completely shutting off work-related thoughts and/or feelings outside of work. In this day-level study, we used a within-person design to investigate the role of cognitive and emotional detachment from work during non-work time in relation to equivalent types of job demands and job resources, in the prediction of employee creativity. Cognitive detachment from work refers to mentally disconnecting from work and no longer thinking about job-related issues, whereas emotional detachment from work refers to affectively disconnecting from work and no longer experiencing job-related emotions. Survey data were gathered over the course of eight consecutive days from 151 health care employees. Multi-level analyses revealed that: (1) cognitive detachment was positively related to creativity, irrespective of the level of cognitive job demands and resources; (2) high emotional job demands in combination with either low levels of emotional detachment or high levels of emotional job resources were positively related to creativity. This day-level study provides insight into the relation between detachment from work and creativity from a process perspective, by showing specific conditions under which different types of detachment from work benefit employee creativity.     

Social representations of refugees: Place of origin as a delineating resource

This study investigated social understandings of refugees from Africa in a regional town in NSW, Australia. Drawing from Social Representations Theory (Moscovici, 1984 ), the study investigated whether place of origin (Africa) mediated understandings held about refugees. Two studies were conducted. In the first study, a between‐subjects manipulation using word association tasks revealed that the super‐ordinate term Refugees, and Refugees from Africa shared a common core of elements (poor, war). Although sharing a core, these representations were differentiated by peripheral elements which concurred with social understanding of Africa (e.g. disease), and media portrayal of refugees/asylum seekers (e.g. boat). The salience of these meanings in the community was further explored using a self‐report questionnaire. Results suggested that place of origin, manifested as peripheral representational elements, may play an important role in differentiating, orientating and linking specific refugee groups to particular socio‐political contexts. Further, we contend that place of origin may be understood as a discursive resource, deployed for rhetorical ends. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Partition epistemology and arguments from analogy

Nineteenth and twentieth century philosophies of science have consistently failed to identify any rational basis for the compelling character of scientific analogies. This failure is particularly worrisome in light of the fact that the development and diffusion of certain scientific analogies, e.g. Darwin’s analogy between domestic breeds and naturally occurring species, constitute paradigm cases of good science. It is argued that the interactivist model, through the notion of a partition epistemology, provides a way to understand the persuasive character of compelling scientific analogies without consigning them to an irrational or arational context of discovery.     

The development of idiom comprehension: an investigation of semantic and contextual processing skills

Two experiments compared 7- and 8-year-olds' and 9- and 10-year-olds' ability to use semantic analysis and inference from context to understand idioms. We used a multiple-choice task and manipulated whether the idioms were transparent or opaque, familiar or novel, and presented with or without a supportive story context. Performance was compared with that of adults (Experiment 1) and 11- and 12-year-olds (Experiment 2). The results broadly support Cacciari and Levorato's global elaboration model of figurative competence with a notable exception: Even the youngest children were able to use semantic analysis to derive the meanings of transparent idioms as well as being sensitive to meaning in context. The findings show that young children process language at both the small-grain phrase level and the discourse level to establish figurative meaning, and they demonstrate that the language processing skills that aid idiom comprehension, as well as idiom knowledge itself, are still not fully developed in 11- and 12-year-olds.