Animals,humans and x-men: Human uniqueness and the meaning of personhood

Research in animal intelligence suggests to some that humans are different only in degree from animals, possibly eroding the traditional theological doctrine of the imago dei. In this paper, several critical boundary areas between humans and animals are examined for scientific evidence about human distinctiveness. These include communication and language capacity, cultural creativity, spirituality, and ethical capacity. Chimpanzee language studies and research in Neanderthal mentality are examined as the closest known natural approximations to human communication and intelligence. The implications of the findings are explored in relation to human culture, ethics, and spirituality in a context consistent with evolutionary continuity. Aspects of human uniqueness are apparent, can be fruitfully encompassed in the idea of personhood, and are coherent with Trinitarian theology's anthropological focus.     

Personhood: Elusive But Not Illusory

Bioethics as a field has been fortunate that its values and concerns have mirrored the values and concerns of society. In light of the September 11th attacks, it is possible that we are witnessing the beginning of a transition in American culture, one fraught with implications for bioethics. The emphasis on autonomy and individual rights may come to be tempered by greater concern over the collective good. Increased emphasis on solidarity over autonomy could greatly alter public response to research abuses aimed at defense from bioterrorism, to privacy of genetic information, and to control of private medical resources to protect the public health.     

Cosmopolitan ethics and global legalism

This article analyses the legal and ethical dimensions of the wide gap between commitments to universal human rights and the reality of their widespread and systematic abuse, particularly as related to poverty and inequality. The argument put forward is that, properly conceived, global legalism, that is, the quest to apply the rule of law across and among states and societies, and cosmopolitan ethics, both support restricting harms imposed on weak and vulnerable individuals worldwide by an unjust institutional order. Therefore, those who have tended to value either a global rule of law or cosmopolitan ethics independently have good reason to pursue their requirements together. The article also considers the problem of legalism and cosmopolitanism being used by powerful agents in global politics to enhance their prerogatives and their freedoms from legal and ethical restraints.     

Looking at others through implicitly or explicitly prejudiced eyes

It is well known that we utilize internalized representations (or schemas) to direct our eyes when exploring visual stimuli. Interestingly, our schemas for human faces are known to reflect systematic differences that are consistent with one's level of racial prejudice. However, whether one's level or type of racial prejudice can differentially regulate how we visually explore faces that are the target of prejudice is currently unknown. Here, White participants varying in their level of implicit or explicit prejudice viewed Black faces and White faces (with the latter serving as a control) while having their gaze behaviour recorded with an eye-tracker. The results show that, regardless of prejudice type (i.e., implicit or explicit), participants high in racial prejudice examine faces differently than those low in racial prejudice. Specifically, individuals high in explicit racial prejudice were more likely to fixate on the mouth region of Black faces when compared to individuals low in explicit prejudice, and exhibited less consistency in their scanning of faces irrespective of race. On the other hand, individuals high in implicit racial prejudice tended to focus on the region between the eyes, regardless of face race. It therefore seems that racial prejudice guides target-race specific patterns of looking behaviour, and may also contribute to general patterns of looking behaviour when visually exploring human faces.     

Psychoanalysis and the regulation of society

Multiple losses can be associated with both infertility and child sexual abuse. This work seeks to explore the ways in which such connections can affect a survivor who subsequently experiences infertility and who may choose to pursue medical treatment. The potential consequences of such mirroring are explored from the perspective of counselling practice under the provisions of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act (1990).     

Differential impact of relevant and irrelevant dimension primes on rule-based and information-integration category learning

Research has identified multiple category-learning systems with each being “tuned” for learning categories with different task demands and each governed by different neurobiological systems. Rule-based (RB) classification involves testing verbalizable rules for category membership while information-integration (II) classification requires the implicit learning of stimulus–response mappings. In the first study to directly test rule priming with RB and II category learning, we investigated the influence of the availability of information presented at the beginning of the task. Participants viewed lines that varied in length, orientation, and position on the screen, and were primed to focus on stimulus dimensions that were relevant or irrelevant to the correct classification rule. In Experiment 1, we used an RB category structure, and in Experiment 2, we used an II category structure. Accuracy and model-based analyses suggested that a focus on relevant dimensions improves RB task performance later in learning while a focus on an irrelevant dimension improves II task performance early in learning.     

Causal explanations for lack of pregnancy applying the common sense model of illness representation to the fertility context

Abstract

Objectives: The current study explored causal explanations for lack of pregnancy and association with help-seeking behaviour. Differences based on gender and country Human Development Index were examined.

Design: A mixed method design was used.

Main outcome measures: Data were drawn from the International Fertility Decision-Making Study, a cross-sectional study of 10,045 individuals (1690 men; 8355 women) from 79 countries. Respondents rated to what extent they believed their lack of pregnancy was due to something they or their partner had done/not done or other factors and described their reasons for making this rating.

Results: Respondents were aged 18–50 (M?=?31.83) years, partnered and had been trying to achieve a pregnancy/father a child for over six months (M?=?2.8 years). Men and women primarily believed their lack of pregnancy was due to medical problems or chance/bad luck. Thematic analysis of textual responses from 29.7% of the sample found that respondents focused on their personal experience or a salient life event when describing the cause of their lack of pregnancy. Women expressed more regret and helplessness about causes than men. Significant country differences were observed.

Conclusions: Individuals may develop inaccurate causal explanations based on their personal experiences. Access to accurate information is necessary to facilitate timely help-seeking.     

Rights for me but not for thee: Restriction of human rights based on group membership and threat perceptions

Policies aimed at limiting border crossing and influencing other cultural values have been enacted domestically and internationally in the name of security. However, do these decisions concerning such tradeoffs resonate equally across all groups? In two studies, we probe the moderating impact of intergroup threat on the inclination to restrict human rights. In Study 1, we employ a unique economic tradeoff model to directly compare the value of security with the rights of either citizens or non-citizens. In Study 2, we broaden these findings by examining whether support for infringements on the right to privacy varies among diverse groups. Across both studies, our results consistently show that an increase in intergroup threat corresponds to heightened restriction of rights, but only when contemplating individuals who are not citizens, such as non-citizens, residents, or foreigners. We propose future research directions that include promoting the concept of a global community and exploring altruistic behaviours associated with rights protection.     

Exploring the implications of social change for human development: Perspectives,issues and future directions

Researchers have investigated the implications of social change for human development from different perspectives. The studies published in this special section were conducted within Greenfield's theoretical framework (2009). The findings concerning links between specific sociodemographic features (e.g., commercial activities, schooling) and individual cognition and social behaviour are particularly interesting because they tap the underlying forces that drive human development. To further understand the issues in these studies and in the field, a pluralist‐constructive perspective is discussed, which emphasises the integration of diverse values and practices in both Western and non‐Western societies and its effects on the development of sophisticated competencies in individual adaptation to the changing global community. In addition, several issues are highlighted and some suggestions are provided for future explorations in this field.     

Human pelvis motions when walking and when riding a therapeutic horse

A prevailing rationale for equine assisted therapies is that the motion of a horse can provide sensory stimulus and movement patterns that mimic those of natural human activities such as walking. The purpose of this study was to quantitatively measure and compare human pelvis motions when walking to those when riding a horse. Six able-bodied children (inexperienced riders, 8–12 years old) participated in over-ground trials of self-paced walking and leader-paced riding on four different horses. Five kinematic measures were extracted from three-dimensional pelvis motion data: anteroposterior, superoinferior, and mediolateral translations, list angle about the anteroposterior axis, and twist angle about the superoinferior axis. There was generally as much or more variability in motion range observed between riding on the different horses as between riding and walking. Pelvis trajectories exhibited many similar features between walking and riding, including distorted lemniscate patterns in the transverse and frontal planes. In the sagittal plane the pelvis trajectory during walking exhibited a somewhat circular pattern whereas during riding it exhibited a more diagonal pattern. This study shows that riding on a horse can generate movement patterns in the human pelvis that emulate many, but not all, characteristics of those during natural walking.