The prefigurative politics of place-making: Analysis of a neighbourhood-based campaign for a social centre

This article analyses the production of meaning embedded in places through prefigurative practices. Although the use of space by activist groups is widely studied in the sociology of social movements and urban geography, this article extends the body of literature on place-making by analysing the prefigurative dimension between militant practices and living spaces. Drawing on walking interviews with Montreal's activists that campaigned for a social centre in Canada, this article argues that the strategies inform place-making of local grassroots mobilisations that aimed to develop urban alternatives, and that the meaning attributed to places depends on the individual and collective experience of activists engaging in prefigurative politics. In this sense, place-making derives from the lived collective experience therein and the individual's treatment of these spaces. The results show that the repetition of the action, as well as its emotional and symbolic intensity, are factors that favour the contribution of prefigurative practices to the place-making process.     

Semantic encoding deficits in a case of traumatic amnesia

A 33-year-old patient was studied neuropsychologically 19 years after sustaining severe head trauma. A recent CT scan showed lesions in the left frontal and right temporal regions. Performance on standard memory tests, both verbal and visuospatial, was extremely poor, although other intellectual functioning was relatively spared. The patient showed some interesting deficits in semantic processing. In a depth of processing task there was no advantage for words where semantic encoding had been induced. Neither was there any release from proactive interference after shifts in semantic categories. Deficits were also observed in short-term memory distractor tasks as well as in cueing tasks. These findings suggest that the cognitive deficits commonly observed in Korsakoff's disease can also be present in other amnesic disorders and may in part be related to cortical and especially frontal lobe atrophy.     

Development of the concepts of energy conservation and entropy

Development of the concepts of energy conservation and entropy was studied in children between 5 and 15 years of age. Energy conservation, as illustrated by the operation of double and colliding pendulums, was not well understood until about 15 years of age. Understanding of entropy was dependent on the particular apparatus used. When illustrated by the gradual mixing of rolling marbles of different colors, entropy was understood by 9- to 15-year-olds. But when illustrated by the eventual equalization of water levels in two interconnected containers, entropy was not well understood until about 15 years of age. Errors on a problem used to illustrate the conservation concept could often be characterized by the misapplication of the entropy concept and vice versa.     

Perception and behavior as compositions of ideals

This essay is a discussion of whether or not there are units out of which human perception, cognition, and action are constructed. It proposes that while these human activities are indeed generated from component aspects, we cannot talk of these aspects as “units” or as being directly inserted into these activities. Instead, we must describe them as “ideals” which enter into composition with one another in particular situations to generate a situationally specific structure which serves both to describe and control the situation in its particular aspects. In the process of composition, the standard form of the ideal is transformed so that the ideal may appear in a different form in each different composition. Furthermore, superficially similar compositions can arise from different combinations of ideals. These notions are shown to have the potential of unifying our accounts of a wide variety of psychological phenomena. An argument is also made that operational definition of ideals is impossible and that interpretive methods of investigation are justified.     

Effects of hearing and vision impairments on the Montreal Cognitive Assessment

Many standardized measures of cognition include items that must be seen or heard. Nevertheless, it is not uncommon to overlook the possible effects of sensory impairment(s) on test scores. In the current study, we investigated whether sensory impairments could affect performance on a widely used screening tool, the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA). Three hundred and one older adults (mean age = 71 years) completed the MoCA and also hearing and vision tests. Half of the participants had normal hearing and vision, 38% impaired hearing, 5% impaired vision, and 7% had dual-sensory impairment. More participants with normal sensory acuity passed the MoCA compared to those with sensory loss, even after modifying scores to adjust for sensory factors. The results suggest that cognitive abilities may be underestimated if sensory problems are not considered and that people with sensory loss are at greater risk of cognitive decline.     

Perceptual categorization in the cerebral hemispheres

The suggestion of a functional hemispheric dissociation in performing perceptual categorization was examined in two tachistoscopic experiments with normal adults. Subjects were required to match physically identical or similar, but nonidentical, pictures of animals. The first experiment showed no hemispheric difference and indicated that both hemispheres could resort to two different types of categorization process as a function of the simultaneous or delayed mode of presentation of the stimuli. In the second experiment, the viewing conditions were manipulated so as to afford a reduced amount of stimulus energy, and a significant left-visual-field advantage was then obtained. The results are discussed with respect to models of information processing in the cerebral hemispheres, and in relation to impairments in object recognition following brain damage.     

An evaluation of the effects of supplemental “fluency” training during maintenance

The voice onset time (VOT) of two groups of treated stutterers and a normal-speaking group was assessed by spectrographic analysis. Both groups of stutterers had significantly slower VOT than the normal speakers. The experimental group of stutterers was given 8 wk of “fluency” training designed to remediate characteristics of speech identified as related to “tenuous” fluency. The control group of stutterers received ongoing maintenance therapy. Posttreatment VOT was assessed. The experimental stuttering group had significantly decreased their VOT in the direction of the normal-speaking group, whereas the control group of stutterers had a greater VOT between pre- and posttreatment. The implication of these results for the maintenance of fluency are discussed.     

Joint independent random utility models where one of the choice structures satisfies the strict utility model

It is known that one cannot construct an independent joint random utility model for which both the preference and aversion probabilities satisfy the strict utility model. Given this result, it is natural to ask what kind of relations are possible in such contexts. Here, for instance, we demonstrate that if a structure of preference and aversion probabilities are generated by a common independent random utility model, and if the preference probabilities satisfy the strict utility model, then the preference and aversion probabilities are related by what is known as the strong acceptance condition. We also prove an appropriate converse of this result. Finally, an example is given of a process (other than the random utility model) that is compatible with the assumption that a structure of preference and aversion probabilities satisfies a common strict utility model.     

Solving deductive-reasoning problems after unilateral temporal lobectomy

The possible functional role of mental imagery in solving deductive-reasoning problems was investigated. Patients with left or right temporal lobectomies and normal control subjects had 32 different solvable three-term series problems read to them. Almost all subjects in the control and in the right-temporal-lobe groups reported consistent use of imagery in solving these problems, whereas less than half the left-temporal-lobe group reported using such a strategy. Overall, the left-temporal-lobe group was impaired relative to both the right-temporal and control groups. The right-temporal-lobe group was impaired only when the form of the question asked was not congruent with the form of the information in the premises. It was concluded that either (a) the left-temporal-lobe group had an unexpectedly large verbal comprehension deficit, or (b) the form of imagery utilized in solving deductive-reasoning problems is based upon verbal symbolic information, and as such is mediated by the left hemisphere.