Rhythm length and hemispheric asymmetry

Conflicting evidence has appeared in the literature concerning hemispheric asymmetry in the perception of rhythm. The present study investigated the effects of rhythm length on relative cerebral dominance. Twenty-four subjects were presented with sequences of one to four time intervals bounded by light flashes. The subjects' task was to determine if two such sequences were the same or different. The first rhythm was presented in both visual fields and the second only to one visual field. Reaction times and number of errors were recorded. It was found that increasing rhythm length resulted in a shift in cerebral dominance from left to right hemisphere. An interpretation of these findings was suggested in terms of the preferred mode of processing of each hemisphere, analytic vs. holistic.     

中美欧高血压指南之比较

通过高血压的定义、分类,危险因素评估,危险分层及治疗,比较了中国、美国、欧洲高血压治疗指南相同和不同,这对于我国高血压的防治有十分重要的意义.     

A cross‐cultural examination of Aboriginal and European Canadian mothers' beliefs regarding proactive and reactive aggression

The purpose of the present study was to examine the maternal beliefs and practices regarding preschool children's proactive and reactive aggression, within a cross‐cultural framework. Participants included 30 Aboriginal and 45 European Canadian mothers of preschoolers who provided their emotional reactions, causal attributions, socialization strategies, and parenting goals in response to children's aggressive behaviours. Results supported previous research that both groups of mothers generally responded negatively to both types of aggression, although there were differences in the extent of negative emotional responses expressed by mothers in the two cultures depending on the type of aggression. Mothers believed that reactive aggression was due to more external causes than proactive aggression and generally used more power assertive strategies in response to proactive versus reactive aggression. Aboriginal mothers were less anxious and used less power assertive strategies than European Canadian mothers. These findings speak to the importance of examining both similarities and differences in mother's beliefs and practices across cultures. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

“Sad day for the UK”: The linking of debates about settling refugee children in the UK with Brexit on an anti-immigrant news website

This article uniquely demonstrates how UK debates about supporting child refugees during the “refugee crisis” came to be used as support for leaving the European Union (EU). The research question “how did users of a news website respond to a report about the UK government's decision to allow child refugees into the UK?” is addressed with a rigorous discursive analysis of an internet discussion forum on the anti-immigrant website MailOnline consisting of 2,014 unique posts, with a reach of 30 million viewers. Analysis demonstrated that (1) child refugees were presented as adults, (2) allowing in refugees was presented as a “burden” on taxpayers, (3) the decision was presented as opposed to the public's will, and (4) this was used as a warrant for leaving the EU. The significant implication of this analysis is that political attempts at associating the refugee crisis with the EU may have been successful in this context.     

Facts as Social Action in Political Debates about the European Union

This article focuses on the argumentative role of making factual claims and counterclaims in broadcast political debates. Despite the rise of “post‐truth politics,” this article argues that orientations to issues of “fact” and “truth” are a live and controversial matter when debating the European Union. Using Discursive Psychology (DP), the analysis is on how politicians use fact‐based (counter)claims in multiparty interactions, in the form of debates about the United Kingdom and the European Union. Three types of factual challenges are presented to illustrate the rhetorical function of claims: challenging the essence of an argument, providing another fact to recontextualize the preceding fact and using hypothetical scenarios to undermine facts. The analysis demonstrates that the use of facts is a highly strategic, argumentative, matter. This study, understood against a backdrop of the rise of post‐truth politics, highlights that concepts of “fact” and “truth” are not done away with; rather they are an argumentative resource and need to be understood in their fragmentary and rhetorical context.     

Effects of vision and cognitive load on anticipatory and compensatory postural control

This study assessed the effects of vision and cognitive load on anticipatory postural adjustments (APAs) and compensatory postural adjustments (CPAs) in response to an externally triggered postural perturbation. A ball-hitting test was repeated under different visual conditions (eyes open, EO; eyes closed, EC) and cognitive loads (no load, 3-subtraction task, time-limited 3-subtraction task). Data were collected separately for I) surface electromyography from the right side of the biceps brachii (BIC) and erector spinae (ES) to detect the latency and response intensity (RI); and II) displacement of the centre of pressure (ΔCOP) to detect the standard deviation (ΔCOP_SD) and maximum value (ΔCOP_max) in the anterior-posterior direction. Compared with the results under the EC condition, the ES latency was shorter and the RI of the BIC was lower under the EO condition. Accordingly, the ΔCOP_SD and ΔCOP_max were increased in the APAs phase and decreased in the CPAs phase. Cognitive load had no effect on APAs and CPAs or on ΔCOP in the APAs phase. However, ΔCOP_max was decreased in the CPAs phase during the EC condition. In conclusion, vision played an important role in APAs and CPAs for muscle activation and ΔCOP. Cognitive load had no effect on neuromuscular APAs or CPAs except when the postural perturbation occurred when visually unexpected.     

The Roman Catholic Church of Norway and migration challenges

Ever since its re-establishment in Norway in 1843, the Roman Catholic Church has grown steadily. On 1 January 2017, the church had a total membership of approximately 150,000. The reason for the latest, and certainly largest, wave of Catholic migrants to settle in Norway is labour migration resulting from the eastward expansion of the EU in 2004, when Poland and Lithuania joined. About half the Catholic population of Norway originates from these two countries. This article focuses on the following research question: How does the Roman Catholic Church in Norway, represented by sisters in religious communities, priests and ecclesiastical employees, respond to the large influx of Catholic migrants to Norway? The study is based on a qualitative survey consisting of semi-structured interviews with 10 informants, all religious sisters, priests or ecclesiastical employees. Although some informants admit that the strong growth resulting from migration has posed problems, such as tendencies to form ‘parallel congregations’ based on ethnic origin, most expressed a positive view of this influx of migrants and of the future of the Catholic Church in Norway.     

Enacting collective support for the European integration: Participation in pro‐integration action and preference for specific transnational acculturation strategies

We propose that collective support for European integration is mani‐fested in 2 distinct forms: first, as engagement in socio‐political action by citizens who seek to change their nation and its status in Europe. Second, it is manifested as a transnational acculturation process that impacts on both nations and their citizens. These processes potentially engage social identities at 3 levels: national, European and as supporters of the European integration. Here, we examine these different levels of identification as part of a model predicting collective support for the European integration. To capture the dimension of transnationality, we collected data from 2 Romanian samples, 1 of participants living in their country of origin (N = 203), and 1 of participants living as migrants outside Romania (N = 196). We found that identification as a pro‐integration supporter flows from European and Romanian national identifications and is an excellent predictor of collective support for European integration in both its forms. We conclude by discussing how our findings can be applied to the design of intervention strategies and policies to promote support for the European Union and the integration process in the current socio‐political climate (where the unity and the very existence of European Union are under threat).     

Transnational intervention and its limits: the case of interwar Poland*

This article reassesses the efforts by western Jews to rescue their imperilled European brethren in the years before and during the Second World War. It goes beyond the conventional question, “Could more have been done to rescue European Jewry?” Rather, the article explores what Jewish leaders learned about the global practice of philanthropic relief during the decades before the rise of European fascism and hyper-nationalism. It then asks how this accumulated knowledge may have informed their decisions once they understood the dangers faced by Jews in Germany, Poland, and Romania. This holistic analysis of actions taken by transnational leaders accounts for operational precedents, geo-politics, migration regimes, diaspora networks, organizational history, intra-communal relations, and economics and contemporary orientations toward aid. All these create a realistic reckoning of the strengths and limitations of Jewish transnationalism at the time, allowing us to transcend value-based judgements of this painful chapter in Jewish history.     

Religion in the Treaty of Lisbon: Aspects and Evaluation

Religion is now firmly present in the Treaty of Lisbon. This article analyses whether the presence of religion in this Treaty is a reflection of the religious component of European identity and the successful campaign of the Christian churches. I compare the initial objectives of the churches with the results achieved and pay attention to the identity-related debates which took place when the provision for religion was elaborated and discussed. Although one cannot claim that the churches fully achieved their initial goals, it should be taken into account that they acted in a situation of strong secular resistance. Therefore, the text of the Treaty of Lisbon reflects the struggle between religious and secular actors; however, generally speaking, it provided better opportunities for the churches to exercise their influence on the supra-national European level and confirmed the strong presence of the religious component in European identity.