A Phenomenal Case for Sport

The article attempts to show some limitations to reductive accounts in science and philosophy of body-mind relations, experience and skill. Extensive literature has developed in analytic philosophy of mind recently due to new technology and theories in the neurosciences. In the sporting sciences, there are also attempts to reduce experiences and skills to biology, mechanics, chemistry and physiology. The article argues there are three fundamental problems for reductive accounts that lead to an explanatory gap between the reduction and the conscious experience. First, reductive accounts deal with objective observations; conscious experiences are subjective. Second, subjective experience seems difficult to identify with physical events described by chemistry, biology, mechanics or neurophysiology. Finally, sport involves knowing how and knowing how is also difficult to reduce to propositional knowledge, which is the reductive scientific/philosophical project. The article argues that sport provides an excellent platform to better understand what is wrong with reductive analysis in body-mind relations, since both conscious experience and knowing how are fundamental to sport performance.     

Manipulation of visual information does not change the accuracy of distance estimation during a blindfolded walking task

While humans rely on vision during navigation, they are also competent at navigating non-visually. However, non-visual navigation over large distances is not very accurate and can accumulate error. Currently, it is unclear whether this accumulation of error is due to the visual estimate of the distance or to the locomotor production of the distance. In a series of experiments, using a blindfolded walking test, we examine whether enhancing the visual estimate of the distance to a previously seen target, through environmental enrichment, visual imagery, or repeated exposure would improve the accuracy of blindfold navigation across different distances. We also attempt to decrease the visual estimate in order to see if the opposite effect would occur. Our results would indicate that manipulation of the static visual distance estimate did not change the navigation accuracy to any great extent. The only condition that improved accuracy was repeated exposure to the environment through practice. These results suggest that error observed during blindfold navigation may be due to the locomotor production of the distance, rather than the visual process.     

Marginally Good

Abstract

This article describes the early pioneering work of an online librarian in one of the first religiously-oriented, Internet-based colleges. Despite their lack of accreditation and neglect of information infrastructure, these degree programs are often quite popular with the general public. The author takes a critical look at library services and accreditation issues for these types of degree-granting college programs.     

Exploring the Judgment–Action Gap: College Students and Academic Dishonesty

This study examined differences between university students who were caught and sanctioned for cheating, students admitting to cheating but who were not caught, and students reporting that they had never cheated. Our findings showed that noncheaters are older, have better grade point averages, and have more sophisticated moral and epistemological reasoning skills. Qualitative analyses revealed that denial of responsibility and injury were the most common neutralization techniques and differed between the sanctioned and self-reported cheaters. We discuss the need to examine the extent to which reasoning skills have a causal impact on cheating behaviors.     

The “religiosity gap” in a clinical setting: experiences of mental health care consumers and professionals

ABSTRACT

In Western countries, professionals in mental health care (“professionals”) tend to be less religious than “consumers”. This qualitative study explores the meaning of this “religiosity gap” for professionals and consumers in mental health care. Both a regular, secular and a Christian clinic in the Netherlands participated in this study. Content analysis was applied to 35 consumer interviews and 18 interviews with professionals. Consumers reported negative experiences (e.g., perceived disrespect and a lack of confidence) and/or negative expectations (e.g., misunderstanding and misinterpretation) related to a religiosity gap. They also mentioned advantages of a “religiosity match”, like safety and confidence and appreciated professionals’ religious/spiritual self-disclosure. Professionals in secular care setting tended to avoid religion and spirituality. In both clinics, they tended to neutralise religious/spiritual differences and be reticent in self-disclosure. Professionals are recommended to recognise the relevance of a religiosity gap and to consider different strategies in approaching religion/spirituality.     

How farsighted are behavioral tendencies of approach and avoidance? The effect of stimulus valence on immediate vs. ultimate distance change

Research suggests that affective stimuli facilitate behavior that causes a compatible change in distance (i.e., approach positive and avoid negative stimuli). In natural settings, however, behavior often causes different consequences at different points in time. It is unclear whether affective stimuli interact with immediate or ultimate action-consequences (i.e., consequences that are more removed in time). To shed light on this, we tested whether stimulus valence facilitates behavior that ultimately causes a compatible change in distance, even when this behavior immediately causes an incompatible distance change. Participants moved a manikin on a computer screen toward or away from a positive or negative word. On half of the trials, moving the manikin ultimately in one direction required an initial movement in the opposite direction. Results from two studies showed that stimulus valence facilitated ultimate-compatible distance change regardless of the initial direction. This suggests that affective stimuli facilitate behavior that is relatively farsighted.     

Distorted distance estimation induced by a self-relevant national boundary

Six experiments explored the possibility that the categorization of self versus not-self can distort visual estimations of distance. In Experiments 1-3, Americans overestimated the distance between a U.S. location and a foreign location relative to a visually equidistant U.S. location. In Experiment 4, Canadians overestimated foreign relative to Canadian locations. Experiment 5 showed that this effect occurs even when the domestic context is not physically contiguous. Experiment 6 showed that distance distortion occurs only when crossing one’s own border to a foreign location, not when crossing borders from one foreign location to another. Thus, crossing the psychological boundary between self and not-self creates a visual illusion that distorts on-line distance estimates.     

Approaching math increases math = me and math = pleasant

In two studies, we examined the effect of extensive practice in approaching math on implicit identification with math, implicit math attitudes, and behavior during a math test. The results from Study 1 demonstrated that women trained to approach math showed more identification with and positive implicit attitudes toward math than women trained to avoid math. Notably, this latter pattern of findings was only evident for women low in initial identification with this field. The results from Study 2 replicated these findings by showing that women who were initially low in math identification and trained to approach math showed more implicit identification with math and attempted more items on a math test than women trained to respond to math in a neutral way. The implications of these findings for current theorizing on the gender gap in women’s representation in math related careers are discussed.     

The predictive value of numerical magnitude comparison for individual differences in mathematics achievement

Although it has been proposed that the ability to compare numerical magnitudes is related to mathematics achievement, it is not clear whether this ability predicts individual differences in later mathematics achievement. The current study addressed this question in typically developing children by means of a longitudinal design that examined the relationship between a number comparison task assessed at the start of formal schooling (mean age = 6 years 4 months) and a general mathematics achievement test administered 1 year later. Our findings provide longitudinal evidence that the size of the individual’s distance effect, calculated on the basis of reaction times, was predictively related to mathematics achievement. Regression analyses showed that this association was independent of age, intellectual ability, and speed of number identification.     

Children’s mapping between symbolic and nonsymbolic representations of number

When children learn to count and acquire a symbolic system for representing numbers, they map these symbols onto a preexisting system involving approximate nonsymbolic representations of quantity. Little is known about this mapping process, how it develops, and its role in the performance of formal mathematics. Using a novel task to assess children’s mapping ability, we show that children can map in both directions between symbolic and nonsymbolic numerical representations and that this ability develops between 6 and 8 years of age. Moreover, we reveal that children’s mapping ability is related to their achievement on tests of school mathematics over and above the variance accounted for by standard symbolic and nonsymbolic numerical tasks. These findings support the proposal that underlying nonsymbolic representations play a role in children’s mathematical development.