Framing experts' (dis)agreements about uncertain environmental events

Agreements and disagreements between expert statements influence lay people's beliefs. But few studies have examined what is perceived as a disagreement. We report six experiments where people rated agreement between pairs of probabilistic statements about environmental events, attributed to two different experts or to the same expert at two different points in time. The statements differed in frame, by focusing on complementary outcomes (45% probability that smog will have negative health effects vs. 55% probability that it will not have such effects), in probability level (45% vs. 55% probability of negative effects), or in both respects. Opposite frames strengthened disagreement when combined with different probability levels. Approximate probabilities can be “framed” in yet another way by indicating reference values they are “over” or “under”. Statements that use different directional verbal terms (over vs. under 50%) indicated greater disagreement than statements with the same directional term but different probability levels (over 50% vs. over 70%). Framing and directional terms similarly affected consistency judgments when both statements were issued by the same expert at different occasions. The effect of framing on perceived agreement was significant for medium (10 and 20 percentage points) differences between probabilities, whereas the effect of directional term was stable for numerical differences up to 40 percentage points. To emphasize agreement between different estimates, they should be framed in the same way. To accentuate disagreements or changes of opinion, opposite framings should be used.     

幼儿看图叙述中心理状态术语的使用与错误信念理解关系的短期跟踪研究

摘 要：为探明汉语儿童看图叙述中心理状态术语的应用及与错误信念理解能力的关系,并追踪二者相互作用的方向,本研究以101名3-5岁儿童为研究对象,纵向探查了前后相隔3个月的儿童看图叙述中心理状态术语使用情况和错误信念能力的发展状况,并从横向和纵向两个时间点分别探讨了心理状态术语的运用与错误信念理解的关系。结果表明：3-5岁儿童错误信念理解能力快速发展;儿童看图叙述中使用较多的愿望术语和情绪术语,信念术语应用相对较少,且认知词汇类型较少。控制了一般语言能力和年龄之后,仅在第一次测验上,情绪术语、信念术语仍然与同期及后期错误信念理解能力存在显著相关。     

How is God-talk logically possible? A sketch for an argument on the logic of ‘God’

In this paper I want to argue for the optimal way to characterise the logical and semantical behaviour of the singular term ‘God’ used in religious language. The relevance of this enterprise to logical theory is the main focus as well. Doing this presupposes to outline the two rivaling approaches of well-definition of singular terms: Kripke’s (“rigid designators”) and Hintikka’s (“world-lines”). ‘God’ as a “rigid designator” is purified from all real-life-language-games of identification and only spells out a metaphysical tag, which favours the view of “anything goes”. Instead, ‘God’ as a “world-line,” plus two ways of quantification, is much more flexible to theological traditions, teachings of the church, religious practices and personal feelings. Thus, it provides a sufficiently well-defined singular term for the purposes of logical theory. The whole sketch is based on Jaakko Hintikka’s logical ideas, mainly on his responses to different authors in PJH. I have systematically omitted direct references to his texts because I have modified considerably his ideas for my own purposes.     

What can we learn from toddlers about categorical perception of color? Comments on Goldstein, Davidoff, and Roberson

We comment on Goldstein, Davidoff, and Roberson’s replication and extension (Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 102, 219-238 [2009]) of our study of the effect of toddlers’ color term knowledge on their categorical perception (CP) of color (Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 90, 114-141 [2005]). First, we discuss how best to assess color term knowledge when concerned with the effects of language on color CP. A reanalysis of our data indicates that even toddlers who do not know the terms for the relevant focal colors still show CP. Second, we comment on Goldstein and colleagues’ finding of blue-purple CP, as we did, but not of blue-green CP in Himba toddlers. We present contrasting data from Wright (unpublished PhD thesis, University of Surrey, 2006) that demonstrates blue-green CP in Himba toddlers. Finally, we discuss the limitations of the approach taken by all of these investigations and discuss theoretical accounts of the origin and nature of color CP.     

服部宇之吉的《心理学讲义》

日本学者服部宇之吉的《心理学讲义》（中文版）形成于他自1902年在中国京师大学堂开始的心理学教学活动,出版于1905年11月。该书在日本发行而在中国发售,它是面向中国学生的心理学教材。服部宇之吉将中国传统文化融入了科学心理学教材,肯定了中国传统文化的心理学意义。《心理学讲义》具有明显的进化论取向以及为教育服务的倾向。服部宇之吉的心理学教学是现代科学心理学在中国高等教育体系中传播的开端。《心理学讲义》是以知、情、意三分法为基础的心理学体系。中国早期心理学术语与日本心理学中的同形汉字有着紧密联系,服部宇之吉直接采用日本心理学界通用的术语以解决汉语心理学术语的创制困难。     

Color terms and color concepts

In their lead articles, both Kowalski and Zimiles (2006) and O'Hanlon and Roberson (2006) declare a general relation between color term knowledge and the ability to conceptually represent color. Kowalski and Zimiles, in particular, argue for a priority for the conceptual representation in color term acquisition. The complexities of the interaction are taken up in the current commentary, especially with regard to the neuropsychological evidence. Data from aphasic patients also argue for a priority for abstract thought, but nevertheless it may still be that the use of color terms is the only way in which to form color categories even if both linguistic and attentional factors play an important role.     

颜色词与颜色认知的关系

颜色词作为一个特殊词类,是探讨语言与认知关系的重要途径。文章综述了颜色知觉和颜色词分类等领域的研究,重点介绍了有关颜色词与认知的两种理论：颜色词的普遍进化理论和语言关联性假设,前者认为颜色词与颜色认知是相对独立的,后者认为语言与认知相互影响。文章综述了与这两种理论有关的一些最新研究进展,并对该领域研究提出一些新的研究思路,如研究颜色词的联想意义、颜色词与民族心理、复合颜色词的加工及对认知的影响、通感现象、颜色词的概念组织等。     

Conceptual and linguistic representations of kinds and classes

We investigate the hypothesis that our conceptual systems provide two formally distinct ways of representing categories by investigating the manner in which lexical nominals (e.g., tree, picnic table) and phrasal nominals (e.g., black bird, birds that like rice) are interpreted. Four experiments found that lexical nominals may be mapped onto kind representations, whereas phrasal nominals map onto class representations but not kind representations. Experiment 1 found that phrasal nominals, unlike lexical nominals, are mapped onto categories whose members need not be of a single kind. Experiments 2 and 3 found that categories named by lexical nominals enter into both class inclusion and kind hierarchies and thus support both class inclusion (is a) and kind specification (kind of) relations, whereas phrasal nominals map onto class representations which support only class inclusion relations. Experiment 4 showed that the two types of nominals represent hierarchical relations in different ways. Phrasal nominals (e.g., white bear) are mapped onto classes that have criteria of membership in addition to those specified by the class picked out by the head noun of the phrase (e.g., bear). In contrast, lexical nominals (e.g., polar bear) specify one way to meet the criteria specified by the more general kind concept (e.g., bear). Implications for the language-conceptual system interface, representation of hierarchical relations, lexicalization, and theories of conceptual combination are discussed.     

“Heaven and Hell on Earth” A critical discourse analysis of religious terms in Norwegian autobiographies describing personal experience of mental health problems

This article explores the use of religious terms in six Norwegian autobiographies written between 1925 and 2005 by people who themselves have been patients in the mental health services. Through a critical discourse analysis, we discuss the functions of religious discourse in the texts and its position in contrast to the medical discourse predominant in today's mental health services. It was found that religious (predominantly Christian) terms were used to varying degrees in all autobiographies as a means to capture the immensity and inherent ambivalence characteristic of mental health problems. Despite the “medical turn” in professional mental health discourse, there is no clear evidence of a decrease in the use of religious terms from the oldest to the most recent text. We propose that professional mental health workers to a larger extent take into account the religious dimension in therapy, and reflect on its larger historical and sociocultural context.     

Looking for Whitehead

Saul Kripke in his revolutionary and influential series of lectures from the early 1970s (later published as the book Naming and Necessity) famously resurrected John Stuart Mill's theory of proper names. Kripke at the same time rejected Mill's theory of general terms. According to Kripke, many natural kind terms do not fit Mill's account of general terms and are closer to proper names. Unfortunately, Kripke and his followers ignored key passages in Mill's A System of Logic in which Mill enunciates a sophisticated and detailed theory of natural kind terms that anticipates and is in some ways superior to Kripke's.