Mental age and cognitive stage in young handicapped and at-risk children

This research addressed the question of whether stage-related patterns of early cognitive development, reported for normally developing children in the first two and a half years of life, may also characterize the development of at-risk and handicapped children when mental age rather than chronological age is used to organize the data. Performance on a psychometric infant test and two neo-Piagetian-based stage measures was assessed for 95 at-risk and handicapped children. Mental age predicted cognitive level of performance for levels 1 to 3, representing the first year and a half of development, but did not predict the highest level, symbolic functioning. In addition, transition points between levels were observed at mental ages similar to the chronological ages when these transitions have been reported for normally developing infants, for all but the last level. The significance of the correspondence between the psychometric measure and the stage measures is discussed and several alternatives for the breakdown at the highest level are considered.     

Comparison of metabolic rates, language, and memory in subcortical aphasias

Four patients with subcortical lesions and either aphasia or amnesia were compared to four patients with cortical lesions and aphasia. Each patient had [18F] fluorodeoxyglucose positron-emission computed tomography, language, and memory evaluations. Marked metabolic depression was found in the thalamus and caudate in all patients. The subcortical patients had only mild left-cortical changes, while the cortical patients showed marked cortical metabolic changes in the left hemisphere. Language changes were mild in the subcortical patients, while moderate to severe in the cortical patients. All patients showed severe verbal memory dysfunction. The only common abnormalities in the two groups were metabolic changes in the thalamus and severity of verbal memory dysfunction. These findings suggest a relationship between verbal memory and thalamic function.     

Effect of donor resources on recipient self-esteem and self-help

A 2 (aid vs no aid) × 2 (high vs low resource potential donor) between subjects design tested the effects of aid and donor resources on recipient self-perceptions and subsequent self-help behavior. The results were characterized by interactions between the two factors. Subjects who received aid from a low resource donor perceived themselves more positively and engaged in less self-help than subjects in the no-aid low resource potential donor condition. In contrast, subjects who received aid from a high resource donor perceived themselves less positively and tended to engage in more self-help behavior than subjects in the no-aid high resource potential donor condition. The relationship between threat to self-esteem inherent in aid and subsequent self-help is discussed in terms of self-esteem theory.     

Cheating,intention, and punishment from an equity theory perspective

Male college students were given the opportunity to deliver aversive noise to a partner (confederate) contingent on the partner's “mistakes” in a learning task. Subjects were either not informed about a reward or told that they, their partner, or a charity would receive a monetary reward for speedy learning. Half of the subjects observed the confederate cheat, while half did not observe any deceptive behavior. The intensity of punitive behavior seemed to vary in accordance with predictions derived from equity theory. That is, cheating for a charity, a “good cause” resulted in less intense punishment than did cheating for selfish gain. On the other hand, mistakes, uncomplicated by cheating, which deprived a charity were punished more intensely than were mistakes whose only result accrued to the confederate himself.     

Correlations of glucose metabolism and structural damage to language function in aphasia

Studies of aphasic patients using [18F]fluorodeoxyglucose positron computed tomographs have shown areas of metabolic depression in the left hemisphere larger than the area of infarction noted on CT. To evaluate these metabolic differences in relationship to language abnormalities, 11 patients had metabolic scans, CT, and were administered the Boston Diagnostic Aphasia Battery and the Porch Index of Communicative Ability. Correlation analyses were computed between metabolic, CT, and language data. CT demonstrated reliable correlations of speaking, oral reading, and repetition to Wernicke' area, consistent with current anatomic language models, while metabolic data from areas posterior, inferior, and superior to the traditional Wernicke's area and the head of the caudate nucleus also had reliable correlations with aphasic language function. The utilization of both structural and metabolic brain measures may improve our understanding of the anatomy of language as related to aphasia.     

Some aspects of language comprehension in anterior aphasia

The competency of language comprehension was evaluated in three groups: anterior aphasics, posterior aphasics, and normal control subjects. Test material was divided into two sentence groups (Fill in the Blank and True/False) emphasizing either (1) semantic, “real world,” identity words or (2) syntactic, relational words, and one paragraph interpretation task. Matching auditory and visual (written) presentations were given. The control subjects performed almost flawlessly but many errors were made by each aphasia group. Qualitative study revealed a marked difference in the comprehension problem of the two groups. The anterior aphasic group performed well on semantically weighted sentences but made errors on syntactically weighted material, regardless of mode of presentation. In contrast, the posterior aphasics made almost the same number of errors on both types of material, regardless of mode of presentation. These findings support the concept of defective language comprehension in anterior aphasia and further suggest that the defect centers on the syntactical structures which are also poorly handled in expressive output.     

Asymmetries for the categorization of kanji nouns, adjectives, and verbs presented to the left and right

Kanji is one form of written Japanese in which the symbolic/analytic characteristics of language are dissociated from systematic phonetic characteristics; as such, it makes possible a more careful test of which aspect of language is responsible for the frequently observed superior left-hemisphere performance. In this study, subjects were asked to categorize tachistoscopically presented kanji as nouns, adjectives, or verbs. The previously reported (Hatta 1977, Neuropsychologia, 15, 685–688) left-visual-field advantage for kanji was found only in the case of nouns. Adjectives and verbs were processed more rapidly and correctly in the right visual field.     

AD HOMINEM ARGUMENTS AND INTELLIGENT DESIGN: REPLY TO KOPERSKI

Abstract Jeffrey Koperski claims in Zygon (2008) that critics of Intelligent Design engage in fallacious ad hominem attacks on ID proponents and that this is a “bad way” to engage them. I show that Koperski has made several errors in his evaluation of the ID critics. He does not distinguish legitimate, relevant ad hominem arguments from fallacious ad hominem attacks. He conflates (or equates) the logical use of valid with the colloquial use of valid. Moreover, Koperski doesn't take seriously the legitimate concerns of the ID critics, and in doing so, commits the straw man fallacy. In the end, I show that no one disagrees with the criticism of improper use of fallacies as methods of evaluation. But what constitutes proper, relevant evaluation of the ID theorists and their motivation is a matter of dispute. And sometimes attacking a person as a method of evaluation is justified, and thus is not fallacious. The definition of ad hominem arguments as either a “good way” or a “bad way” rests on justification, which I argue ID opponents have. The basis for these good objections relies on the motivation many Christians have to share their faith with non‐Christians, which they call the “great commission.”     

Three Models of Sequential Belief Updating on Uncertain Evidence

Jeffrey updating is a natural extension of Bayesian updating to cases where the evidence is uncertain. But, the resulting degrees of belief appear to be sensitive to the order in which the uncertain evidence is acquired, a rather un-Bayesian looking effect. This order dependence results from the way in which basic Jeffrey updating is usually extended to sequences of updates. The usual extension seems very natural, but there are other plausible ways to extend Bayesian updating that maintain order-independence. I will explore three models of sequential updating, the usual extension and two alternatives. I will show that the alternative updating schemes derive from extensions of the usual rigidity requirement, which is at the heart of Jeffrey updating. Finally, I will establish necessary and sufficient conditions for order-independent updating, and show that extended rigidity is closely related to these conditions.