Debunking,supervenience, and Hume’s Principle

ABSTRACT

Debunking arguments against both moral and mathematical realism have been pressed, based on the claim that our moral and mathematical beliefs are insensitive to the moral/mathematical facts. In the mathematical case, I argue that the role of Hume’s Principle as a conceptual truth speaks against the debunkers’ claim that it is intelligible to imagine the facts about numbers being otherwise while our evolved responses remain the same. Analogously, I argue, the conceptual supervenience of the moral on the natural speaks presents a difficulty for the debunker’s claim that, had the moral facts been otherwise, our evolved moral beliefs would have remained the same.     

Basic number processing in children with specific learning disorders: Comorbidity of reading and mathematics disorders

As well as being the hallmark of mathematics disorders, deficits in number processing have also been reported for individuals with reading disorders. The aim of the present study was to investigate separately the components of numerical processing affected in reading and mathematical disorders within the framework of the Triple Code Model. Children with reading disorders (RD), mathematics disorders (MD), comorbid deficits (RD + MD), and typically developing children (TD) were tested on verbal, visual-verbal, and nonverbal number tasks. As expected, children with MD were impaired across a broad range of numerical tasks. In contrast, children with RD were impaired in (visual-)verbal number tasks but showed age-appropriate performance in nonverbal number skills, suggesting their impairments were domain specific and related to their reading difficulties. The comorbid group showed an additive profile of the impairments of the two single-deficit groups. Performance in speeded verbal number tasks was related to rapid automatized naming, a measure of visual-verbal access in the RD but not in the MD group. The results indicate that deficits in number skills are due to different underlying cognitive deficits in children with RD compared to children with MD: a phonological deficit in RD and a deficit in processing numerosities in MD.     

Facilitating the highly bonded cohort: Should more be done to anticipate and reduce the potential for hyper-cohesiveness and deindividuation in therapy training cohorts in universities?

Successfully facilitating learning for small therapy training programmes requires a special understanding of the psychological work of group processes. Students in therapy training spend almost every class together over two or more years. In these student groups, or cohorts, individuals manage themselves within a unique interpersonal and intragroup dynamic. Course instructors must develop their capacity to work effectively with this specific learning milieu. At the same time, the particular dynamics of the cohort context might not be understood by university management where increasingly few cohort contexts exist for students. Consequently, phenomena arising from the specialised nature of the group environment may not be well understood outside of the expertise of the course. In the first part of the paper, the international literature about learning in cohorts is reviewed. In the second part, this reflection is further developed to explore facilitation of a group that has some features of what might be described as negative cohesiveness, or what is described in family theory as enmeshment. Some consideration as to how to anticipate and off-set potential difficulties for groups in therapy training courses is also contributed.     

脊髓损伤者生育困难与服务需求调查

对63名18岁以上未婚或已婚未生育子女的脊髓损伤者进行问卷调查,并对其中17人进行了深入访谈,了解其生育愿望、影响因素与生育服务现状,探讨解决脊髓损伤者生育困难的方法和措施.调查发现,脊髓损伤者生育愿望普遍而迫切,受到经济水平、教育背景、生活环境、其他脊髓损伤者生育经历等多方面因素影响;同时发现社会对此问题关注不够、认识不足、服务缺失.建议从改善环境、提高认识、普及知识、专业培训、建立制度等方面对脊髓损伤者提供专业化服务,解决生育困难,保障生育权力.     

The Impact of Abuse and Learning Difficulties on Emotion Understanding in Late Childhood and Early Adolescence

Children's affective experiences and cognitive abilities have an impact on emotion understanding. However, their relative contribution, as well as the possibility of an interaction between them, has rarely been examined. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the influence of severe abuse and learning difficulties on simple and complex components of emotion understanding in late childhood and early adolescence. A total of 28 older children and young adolescents were selected for the study. Half of the participants had suffered from severe abuse, and half of these abused children additionally had learning disabilities. The remaining half of the sample had no history of abuse but were matched with the abused children on learning difficulties, age and gender. The participants’ emotion understanding was assessed with the Test of Emotion Comprehension (TEC). Results showed that (a) learning difficulties but not abuse had an impact on emotion understanding, (b) there was no interaction effect of abuse and learning difficulties on emotion understanding, and (b) the observed effects of learning difficulties were most apparent for the understanding of relatively complex components of emotion and not for simple components. The results are discussed in terms of their theoretical and practical implications.     

Family Functioning,Parental Psychological Distress and Child Behaviours: Evidence from the Victorian Child Health and Wellbeing Study

We examined, using data from the 2006 Victorian Child Health and Wellbeing Study (VCHWS), whether family functioning is associated with parental psychological distress and children's behavioural difficulties. The VCHWS was a statewide cross‐sectional telephone survey to 5,000 randomly selected primary caregivers of 0‐ to 12‐year‐old children between October 2005 and March 2006. Only parents or guardians of children aged 4–12 years (n = 3,370) were included in this study. After adjusting for sociodemographic variables and ethnicity, parents or guardians scoring higher on the family functioning scale (i.e., from poorly functioning households) were at greater risk of psychological distress and had children with lower levels of prosocial behaviour and higher levels of behavioural difficulties relative to those from healthily functioning households. Mental health prevention programmes addressing child mental and conduct problems should consider the family environment and target those families functioning poorly.     

The Divine Truth of Mathematics and the Origins of Linear Algebra

In a work ahead of its time the German mathematician Hermann Grassmann (1809–1877) published in 1844 one of the landmark works in mathematics, his Ausdehnungslehre or Calculus of Extension. It contained the main theorems that make up what is today called linear algebra. The significance of the book was not recognized at first and it took even longer before any connection was publicly made between this work and Grassmann's training for the ministry. This was in spite of the strong influence on his thinking in general that he described coming from his teacher at Berlin, the theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher.     

初中生数学成绩、数学学业能力自我概念与数学学业情绪的关系

采用学业情绪问卷、数学学业自我概念问卷调查了370名初中学生,以探讨初中生数学学业情绪特点及其与数学成绩、数学学业能力自我概念间的关系。结果发现：（1）除积极高唤醒情绪外的其它数学学业情绪在性别上差异显著,除消极高唤醒外的其它情绪在年级上差异显著。（2）数学成绩通过数学学业能力自我概念间接预测四类数学学业情绪。结论是,初中男生数学积极情绪多于女生,女生数学消极情绪多于男生,积极情绪随年级下降,消极情绪随年级上升;初中生数学学业能力自我概念在数学成绩和数学学业情绪间起完全中介作用。     

Effects of parental expectations and cultural-values orientation on career decision-making difficulties of Chinese University students

This study examined the effects of cultural-values conflict and parental expectations on the career decision-making difficulties of university students in three cities in China (Beijing, Wuhan, and Hong Kong, N = 1342). The Multidimensional Scales of Individual Traditionality and Modernity (Yang, Yu, & Ye, 1989) were used as a measure of cultural-values conflict and cultural orientation. The Living-Up-to Parental Expectation Inventory (Wang & Heppner, 2002) was used to measure parental expectations. The Career Decision-Making Difficulties Questionnaire (Gati & Saka, 2001) was used as a dependent measure. It was found that levels of cultural-value conflict were associated with higher levels of career decision-making difficulties for students in the Chinese Mainland cities but not for students in Hong Kong. Perceived parental expectations and perceived self-performance in the expected areas were found to be predictive of career decision-making difficulties. Cultural-value orientation, especially endorsement of Chinese traditional values, was found to moderate the relationship between parental expectation and career decision-making difficulties. Theoretical, research and practical implications of findings were discussed.     

Fortune favors the bold (and the Italicized): effects of disfluency on educational outcomes

Previous research has shown that disfluency – the subjective experience of difficulty associated with cognitive operations – leads to deeper processing. Two studies explore the extent to which this deeper processing engendered by disfluency interventions can lead to improved memory performance. Study 1 found that information in hard-to-read fonts was better remembered than easier to read information in a controlled laboratory setting. Study 2 extended this finding to high school classrooms. The results suggest that superficial changes to learning materials could yield significant improvements in educational outcomes.