Integrating Covariates into Social Relations Models: A Plausible Values Approach for Handling Measurement Error in Perceiver and Target Effects

The Social Relations Model (SRM) is a conceptual and analytical approach to examining dyadic behaviors and interpersonal perceptions within groups. In an SRM, the perceiver effect describes a person's tendency to perceive other group members in a certain way, whereas the target effect measures the tendency to be perceived by others in certain ways. In SRM research, it is often of interest to relate these individual SRM effects to covariates. However, the estimated individual SRM effects might not provide a very reliable measure of the true, unobserved SRM effects, resulting in distorted estimates of associations with other variables. This article introduces a plausible values approach that allows users to correct for measurement error when assessing the association of individual SRM effects with other individual difference variables. In the plausible values approach, the latent, true individual SRM effects are treated as missing values and are imputed from an imputation model by applying Bayesian estimation techniques. In a simulation study, the statistical properties of the plausible values approach are compared with two approaches that have been used in previous research. A data example from educational psychology is presented to illustrate how the plausible values approach can be implemented with the software WinBUGS.     

Who’s afraid of the big bad wolf? The interweaving of values and science

The role of values in the scientific process is widely debated. But evidence and values cannot be neatly separated. Instead, values infuse the entire scientific process, starting with the choice of research questions. Research avenues are selected based on prior beliefs about the workings of the world. In fact, informally assigned prior probabilities and normalizing constants play an essential role in distinguishing causes from correlations and ignoring irrelevant associations that would otherwise be suggested by raw data. But since these initial probabilities often have a heterogeneous pedigree – often not all that went into their formation is known or knowable – it becomes difficult to cleanly separate evidence from values. At the same time, this reality does not undermine science’s unique status in generating knowledge. This is because it is not the evidence per se generated by science, but rather the method by which science generates it, that justifies science’s privileged role.     

Evidence: wanted,alive or dead

This paper is meant to link the philosophical debate concerning the underdetermination of theories by evidence with a rather significant socio-political issue that has been taking place in Canada over the past few years: the so-called ‘death of evidence’ controversy. It places this debate within a broader philosophical framework by discussing the connection between evidence and theory; by bringing out the role of epistemic values in the so-called scientific method; and by examining the role of social values in science. While it should be admitted that social values play an important role in science, the key question for anyone who advocates this view is: what and whose values? The way it is answered makes an important epistemic difference to how the relation between evidence and theory is appraised. I first review various arguments for the claim that evidence underdetermines theory and shows their presuppositions and limitations, using conceptual analysis and historical examples. After broaching the relation between evidence and method in science by highlighting the need to incorporate epistemic values into the scientific method, my discussion focuses on recent arguments for the role of social values in science. Finally, I address the implications of the approach outlined for the current ‘death of evidence’ debate in Canada.     

Public concerns about violent video games are moral concerns—How moral threat can make pacifists susceptible to scientific and political claims against violent video games

Public discussions about the harmfulness of violent media are often held in the aftermath of violent felony. At the same time, we know little about whether and how experiencing real‐life violence impacts the way laypersons perceive and evaluate debates about virtual violence. In Study 1, we provided data indicating that both real‐life violence and violent video games are perceived as morally threatening by people who regard nonviolence to be an important moral value (i.e., pacifists). In Study 2, we hypothesized and found that when pacifists perceive threat from the presence of real‐life violence, they are especially susceptible to scientific and political claims indicating that violent video games are harmful. Our findings are in line with the value protection model and research on the psychological consequences of threat. Implications of the present findings are discussed with regard to a better understanding of the violent video games debate in the general public.     

LANGUAGE AS A VALUES‐REALIZING ACTIVITY: CARING,ACTING, AND PERCEIVING

A problem for natural scientific accounts, psychology in particular, is the existence of value. An ecological account of values is reviewed and illustrated in three domains of research: carrying differing loads; negotiating social dilemmas involving agreement and disagreement; and timing the exposure of various visual presentations. Then it is applied in greater depth to the nature of language. As described and illustrated, values are ontological relationships that are neither subjective nor objective, but which constrain and obligate all significant animate activity physically, socially, and morally. As an embodied social activity, conversational dialogue is characterized in terms of values, pragmatics, and presence rather than in terms of syntactic and semantic rules. In particular the nature of dialogical arrays is explored, and the hypothesis that language is an action system, a perceptual system, and a caring system is explored. Language expands horizons and makes it possible for humans to realize their calling as culture makers and caretakers.     

Person‐Group Value Congruence and Subjective Well‐Being in Students from Argentina,Bulgaria and Finland: The Role of Interpersonal Relationships

The present study examined the relations between personal values, value congruence, interpersonal relationships and subjective well‐being in psychology/education and business students from Argentina (N = 275), Bulgaria (N = 182) and Finland (N = 148). Regression analyses showed, first, that there were no direct relations between higher order value priorities and life satisfaction (LS), positive affect (PA) or negative affect (NA). Second, objective value‐congruence (VC)—the similarity between individual and group values—was positively related to LS and PA, and negatively related to NA. Most importantly, the effects of VC on LS, NA and PA were partially mediated by good interpersonal relationships. Our results show that interpersonal relationships are facilitated by sharing values similar to those of one's fellow students. More generally, personal values per se appear not to be associated with subjective well‐being, more important is how these values fit into the social context. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Pluralism and values in education in Hungary – changes between 1990 and 2012

Value transmission is a fundamental task of schools. However, the question arises as to how far prevailing political and social conditions shape the functioning of a country or a region’s school system. In other words: what effect do they have on the choice of values to be transmitted at schools? Are there any fundamental social values that are shared by different cultures at different times? Are there values that exist independently of social and political systems? These questions have a special relevance in Eastern and Central European countries like Hungary where political and social changes in the twentieth century had a crucial effect on the set of values that were transmitted by the school system. The aim of this study is to describe how the value transmitting role of the Hungarian school system has changed as a consequence of political transformations in recent decades.     

Engineering Values Into Genetic Engineering: A Proposed Analytic Framework for Scientific Social Responsibility

Recent experiments have been used to “edit” genomes of various plant, animal and other species, including humans, with unprecedented precision. Furthermore, editing the Cas9 endonuclease gene with a gene encoding the desired guide RNA into an organism, adjacent to an altered gene, could create a “gene drive” that could spread a trait through an entire population of organisms. These experiments represent advances along a spectrum of technological abilities that genetic engineers have been working on since the advent of recombinant DNA techniques. The scientific and bioethics communities have built substantial literatures about the ethical and policy implications of genetic engineering, especially in the age of bioterrorism. However, recent CRISPr/Cas experiments have triggered a rehashing of previous policy discussions, suggesting that the scientific community requires guidance on how to think about social responsibility. We propose a framework to enable analysis of social responsibility, using two examples of genetic engineering experiments.     

Engaging Australian Aboriginal youth in mental health services

It is currently estimated that up to 40% of Aboriginal youth (aged 13–17) will experience some form of mental health problem within their lifetime. Of greater concern is the evidence that indicates that Aboriginal youth fail to access mental health services commensurate with this need. This is due, in part, to the characteristically monocultural nature of service delivery of existing services. This paper overviews a model that has been developed specifically for the engagement of Aboriginal youth (aged 13–17 years) in mental health settings. Importantly, a mix of urban (N = 43) and rural (N = 68) Aboriginal youth were represented within the sample to determine its efficacy across different language and tribal groups. The model proved to be effective in engaging 97% of Aboriginal youth (n = 108), with only a small number not effectively engaged (n = 3). The model provides a foundation for the further development of evidence‐based models of best practice that have so far provided to be elusive within this complex field.     

要注意中药对肝的损伤作用

含有生物碱类、皂苷类、萜类、毒蛋白类、重金属类成分的中药易致急性肝损伤.中药对肝脏损伤的原因及机制较为复杂,可能与药物对肝脏的直接毒性或特异性体质有关.此外,中药炮制方法、给药途径、剂型、剂量、疗程及配伍不当也会引起药物性肝损伤.中药所致的药物性肝损伤的诊断主要依据用药史、发病的时间、过程和临床表现并排除其他因素.治疗可选用还原型谷胱甘肽、S-腺苷蛋氨酸、多烯磷脂酰胆碱、熊去氧胆酸、水飞蓟素等药物,重症可选择人工肝脏支持治疗.