Social connection and social networking: Daily conflict increases nightly Facebook use among avoidant participants

Using a daily diary methodology we explored whether attachment style predicted evening Facebook use and whether this effect was moderated by daily interpersonal conflict. High anxiety participants reported spending significantly more time on Facebook at night, regardless of daily conflict. Conversely, participants high in avoidance only reported increased time on Facebook on nights following days of more (vs. less) conflict. Daily conflict did not influence time spent in face-to-face interactions for avoidant participants. Interestingly, increased time on Facebook led to lower self-esteem next day , but increased time in face-to-face interactions led to higher self-esteem. Results suggest people high in avoidance use Facebook as an indirect way to seek connection following conflict, but, ironically, Facebook fails to fulfill avoidant’s belongingness needs.     

Interviewing asylum seekers: A vignette study on the questions asked to assess credibility of claims about origin and persecution

The aim of the current vignette study is to map the style, type, and themes of questions that are asked when assessing the credibility of asylum seekers' claims. Sixty‐five officials from the Swedish Migration Agency (Migrationsverket ), were asked to respond to one out of four different vignettes that contained fictitious asylum narratives. Each vignette presented the types of problems often encountered by officials at the migration board. Two of the vignettes contained no evidence of the origin of the asylum seeker. The other two contained no evidence for the claim of persecution. The asylum officials were asked to formulate five questions that would help them to assess the veracity of the applicant's claim. Our analyses showed that they mainly formulated open questions in an information gathering style. A thematic analysis of the questions revealed that when a claim about origin was assessed, asylum officials mostly asked questions about life in the country of origin, identity documents, and the flight to Europe. When the claim about persecution was assessed, in contrast, asylum officials mostly formulated case‐specific questions (e.g., how the applicant was arrested). Hence, when the credibility of claims about origin is assessed, there seems to be a typical set of questions that asylum officials use. The asylum officials seem to assume that if the applicant is truly originating from a specific country or area, he or she should have ample knowledge about that area, its customs, and frequently encountered objects.     

Between certainty and uncertainty--observations on psychoanalysis in Russia

'Diversity', the theme of our conference, carries a subversive sub-text in totalitarian societies. This is one of the themes presented as the current revival of psychoanalysis in the more democratic post-Communist Russia is explored. The history of psychoanalysis in Russia is summarized with a focus on its politicization, which led to initial interest in its theory (by way of a misapprehension of its tenets), and then to ultimate suppression of psychoanalytic thinking as an ideology deemed antagonistic to the totalitarian regime. In contrast, features of psychoanalysis and democracy are explored for their mutual affinities. The background of the resourceful new generation of analytic therapists is discussed, especially in regard to their experience of the parallel meanings of the word 'repression' (political, psychological). There is a persistence of some traits in patients and practitioners alike that are referable to past repression, such as the newness of verbal treatments, the inhibition of psychological curiosity, the ambivalent lure of certainty, and the pressure of authoritarian introjects. It is noted that psychoanalysis has its own history of a posture opposed to pluralism and diversity, which deepens the dialogue on the mutual engagement between psychoanalysis and the vicissitudes of its history in Russian culture.     

Infants' formation and use of categories to segregate objects

Four- and-a-half-month-old infants' (N = 100) category formation and use was studied in a series of five experiments. For each experiment, the test events featured a display composed of a cylinder and a box. Previous research showed that this display is not clearly parsed as a single unit or as two separate units by infants of this age. Immediately prior to testing, infants were shown a set of category exemplars. Knowledge about this category could help infants disambiguate the test display, which contained a novel exemplar of this category. Clear interpretation of the test display as composed of two separate units (as indicated by infants' longer looking at the move-together than at the move-apart test event) was taken as evidence of category formation and use. In Experiments 1 and 5, infants' prior experience with a set of three different boxes that were similar to the test box facilitated their segregation of the test display. Experiment 2 showed that three different exemplars are necessary: prior experience with any two of the three boxes used in Experiment 1 did not facilitate infants' segregation of the test display. Experiment 3 showed that variability in the exemplar set is necessary: prior experience with three identical boxes did not facilitate infants' segregation of the test display. Experiment 4 showed that under these conditions of very brief prior exposure, similarity between the exemplar set and test box is necessary: prior experience with three different boxes that were not very similar to the test box did not facilitate infants' segregation of the test display. Together, these findings suggest that: (a) number of exemplars, variability, and similarity in the exemplar set are important for infants' category formation, and (b) infants use their category knowledge to determine the boundaries of the objects in a display.     

Young infants' expectations about hidden objects

Infants aged 3-5 months (mean of approximately 4 months) were given a novel anticipatory looking task to test object permanence understanding. They were trained to expect an experimenter to retrieve an object from behind a transparent screen upon hearing a cue ("Doors up, here comes the hand"). The experimenter then hid the object behind one of two opaque screens and after either 2 or 8s gave the "doors up" cue. Infants looked to the correct location after the two-second delay, but not after the eight-second delay. This indicates a brief memory that the object is present behind the occluder. The study provides converging evidence that infants grasp object permanence by a young age. The novel anticipatory looking paradigm helps rule out counter-explanations applied to violation-of-expectation tasks.     

A secret agent? How infants learn about the identity of objects in a causal scene

Four experiments examined the role of correlations between dynamic and static parts on 12- to 16-month-olds' ability to learn the identity of agents and recipients in a simple causal event. Infants were habituated to events in which objects with a dynamic or static part acted as an agent or a recipient and then were tested with an event in which the part-causal role relations were switched. Experiment 1 revealed that 16-month-olds, but not 12-month-olds, associate a dynamic part with the role of agent and a static part with the role of recipient. Experiment 2 showed that 12- and 16-month-olds do not associate a static part with the role of agent or a dynamic part with the role of recipient. Experiment 3 demonstrated that 14-month-olds will learn the relations presented in Experiment 1 and Experiment 2. Experiment 4 revealed that 12-month-olds were able to discriminate the two geometric figures in the events. The results are discussed with respect to infants' developing ability to attend to correlations between dynamic and static cues and the mechanism underlying early object concept acquisition.     

Motor facilitation following action observation: a behavioural study in prehensile action

Previous research has shown that the observation of actions and the execution of actions activate common neural systems. More recently, we have presented data showing that action observation of prehension primes subsequent execution (Castiello, Lusher, Mari, Edwards, & Humphreys, 2002). In the current paper we examined action priming under conditions in which the size of the prime did not predict the size of the target (only 20% of trials were valid). We demonstrated reliable priming under these conditions, consistent with the effect occurring automatically. In addition, we show priming even when observers saw just the object rather than the object and a reaching action on the prime trial. We discuss the findings in relation to the role of mirror neurons and object affordances.     

Field Independence and Change Agent Correlation in Emerging Communities of Irian Jaya,Indonesia

Communities that are limited by oral traditions find theological truths communicated by missions a challenge to understand. Currently, linguists work in many of these minority language groups in order to create vital written languages and produce various literature titles that include the Scriptures. Development of a writing system requires indigenous language assistants who are adept in drawing meaning from unfamiliar cultural paradigms and accurately articulating them. Empirical studies in cognitive style conducted among the minority language groups of Irian Jaya, Indonesia show a correlation between field independence (a dimension of cognitive style) and the ability to grasp abstract linguistic concepts. The Brantley/Larsen Test was developed to identify language assistants, also known as change agents, in a culturally appropriate manner for Irian Jaya. Furthermore, this study suggests that the church would benefit from community lay counselors who manifest field independence, which indicates comprehension of abstract and complex linguistic notions found in Scriptures.Indonesia as Organizational Consultant;     

Style in Philosophy: Part I

In this article, I attempt to restore the philosophical significance of that nonformalizable, noniterable, "singular' element of natural language that I call "style." I begin by critically addressing the exclusion of such instances of natural language by both semantics-oriented logical analysis and a restricted variation of structuralist linguistics. Despite the obvious advantages – with regard to style – of "pragmatic"approaches to language, such pragmatism merely returns to rule-determination in the guise of "normativity." Although style by definition resists any kind of rule-determination – whether posed in terms of semantics or intersubjective regulations of speech-acts – there can be no consideration of language that ignores the persistence of style in natural language. In terms of cognition, any discursive agent understands more than allowed by either semantics or speech-act theory. I ascribe this element of excessive signification to the role of style. My principal thesis is twofold: (1) a hermeneutic approach (exemplified by Schleiermacher) to literature should reveal the heuristically decisive role played by style in philosophy; and, more radically still, (2) style, in fact, may be crucially determinative of philosophical discourse in general. I suggest that a closer scrutiny of the lesser-known works of Ludwig Wittgenstein, conventionally regarded as having dreamt of a "philosophy without style," may consolidate the restoration of style's philosophical import.     

The role of parents' self-esteem, mastery-orientation and social background in their parenting styles

In order to examine the extent to which parents' levels of education, financial resources, self-esteem, and their mastery-orientation versus task-avoidance are associated with their parenting styles and parental stress, data from two studies were analyzed. In Study I, parents of 105 6 to 7-year old children were asked to fill in scales measuring their parenting styles and parental stress, mastery-orientation, financial resources, and their level of education. In Study II, 235 parents were asked to fill in the same scales. An identical pattern of results was found in the two studies. Parents' self-esteem and their use of mastery-oriented strategy were found to be associated with authoritative parenting and low parental stress, whereas parents' low level of education was related to an authoritarian parenting style. The results further showed that the impact of parents' self-esteem on authoritative parenting and parental stress was partly mediated by their use of a mastery-oriented strategy.