Biases in intuitive reasoning and belief in complementary and alternative medicine

Very little is known about the reasoning underlying beliefs in complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). This study examined whether CAM beliefs can be better explained with intuitive reasoning, paranormal beliefs and ontological confusions of physical, biological and mental phenomena than with 12 variables that have typically been used to explore the popularity of CAM, namely gender, education, income, age, health, desire to control treatment, satisfaction with conventional medicine and world view (unconventional, feministic, environmentalist, exotical and natural). A representative sample of Finnish people (N = 1092) participated in the study. The results showed that intuitive thinking, paranormal beliefs and ontological confusions predicted 34% of the variation in CAM beliefs, whereas the 12 other variables increased the prediction only by 4%. The results help to explain individual, cultural and situational differences in the popularity of CAM and to differentiate between CAM statements that can be scientifically examined from those that cannot.     

Some Evidence is False

According to some philosophers who accept a propositional conception of evidence, someone's evidence includes a proposition only if it is true. I argue against this thesis by appealing to the possibility of knowledge from falsehood.     

South African Educators' Voice on the Potential Role of Traditional Healers (THs) in Education Support Services

The aim of this qualitative research was to explore and describe perceptions of the potential role of traditional healers in education support services. Participants were 42 teachers (males = 13, females = 29) from a school district in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. Interview and questionnaire data were collected and analysed, using a phenomenological method. Two main themes emerged from the analysis for the role of THs as education support providers: as 1) representatives of African culture and 2) contributors towards harmonising diversity in schools. The recommendations made were in line with the findings.     

Sourcing stereotypes: constructing and challenging simplified knowledge

The social media uproar in Fall 2017 over a nursing textbook chart that presented generalised characterisations of minority groups generated an assumption that medical training needs more Religious Studies expertise. Analysing the sources that the chart cited, we trace the authors’ assertions to studies of varying quality and identify several specific processes involved in simplifying knowledge for dissemination, as the authors disregarded the limits of each specific study and ignored counter-evidence or otherwise evaded critical scrutiny. Comparing this example to examples from world religions discourse illustrates both differences and similarities in the process of constructing simplified presentations. While both presumably developed out of good intentions, they generate significant problems in their effort to shape material to support larger arguments. Thus, scholars across disciplines should critique and complicate their own processes for generating simplified knowledge.     

Healers,Leaders and Entrepreneurs: Shamanic Revival in Southern Siberia

While it is generally agreed that in the postmodern world all tradition is invented, in many post-colonial contexts the emerging identities are spelled out in the idiom of ‘traditional heritage’. This article considers the social field of ‘shamanism’ as it has been shaped in the post-Soviet years in Tuva, an autonomous republic within the Russian Federation in Southern Siberia, and analyses Tuvan shamanism as a product of local historical and social forces, and global processes. Based on both the ethnography of the organisational structure of contemporary Tuvan shamanism, and portraits of different categories of practitioners, the article analyses continuity and change in various aspects of what is locally seen as ‘traditional knowledge’, and discusses different skills, orientations, and divisions of labour among the practitioners. Shamanism in post-Soviet Siberia is seen as a postmodern religious movement enmeshed in global structures and processes, and it is only in this context that a local tradition can become alive and meaningful again.     

Test anxiety and comprehension efficiency: The role of prior knowledge and working memory deficits

The hypotheses that test anxiety is associated with a deficit in prior knowledge and/or working memory capacity, that anxiety impairs comprehension efficiency, and that deficits in knowledge and capacity underlie the efficiency impairment, were tested. In Study 1, high-anxiety students were characterized by lower scores in several vocabulary measures, compared with low-anxiety students. In Study 2, high-anxiety individuals showed inferior working memory capacity to low-anxiety individuals under evaluative stress conditions, but not under non-stress conditions. In Study 3 high-anxiety subjects exhibited lower efficiency scores than low-anxiety subjects in expository texts without a summary: The former employed a greater amount of reading time than the latter to acquire an equivalent amount of information. In addition, the disadvantage in efficiency associated with anxiety was removed when differences in vocabulary knowledge were partialled out statistically. Instead, that disadvantage was only reduced, but not eliminated, when differences in transitory working memory capacity were partialled out. Therefore, the prior knowledge deficit hypothesis accounts for the impairment in reading efficiency associated with high anxiety better than the transitory working memory reduction hypothesis.     

Integrating different types of knowledge in supervision

The present article examines ways to integrate two, often contradictory, types of knowledge in supervision, which are sometimes represented either by supervisors or supervisees, and sometimes by different parts in the supervisee. These types of knowledge are in a dialectic relationship: they may define each other and at the same time influence and shape each other, yet remain two separate sources for understanding the therapeutic experience. One type is the primary, vague, and intuitive knowledge about patients and therapist–patient interactions, derived from actual participation in the therapeutic relationship. The other type is knowledge derived from theory, experience acquired mainly outside of the specific therapy, and dialog with colleagues.     

Activity experiences shape perceived fitness trajectories: Results from a 6-month randomized controlled trial in older women

ABSTRACT

In this study we addressed the subjective benefits of activity interventions that were designed to improve cognitive fitness in old age. Two hundred and fifty-nine women (aged 70–93 years) were randomized to participate in an exercise or a computer course or a control condition for 6 months. Subjective ratings of the perceived change of cognitive and physical fitness components were captured before, during, after the intervention interval, and at a 10-month follow-up. Positive and negative affect levels and objective cognitive fitness parameters served as possible covariates. Multilevel modeling revealed that the computer group rated memory and concentration as having improved at 4 months and again at 6 months. The exercise group, in contrast, perceived physical capacities as maintained or improved. The characteristics of the activity experience seem to determine the perceived fitness changes. We conclude that actual learning experiences improve one's self-concept of abilities.     

Age-related changes in the appreciation of novel metaphoric semantic relations

ABSTRACT

In the present study we tested the possibility that older adults differ from younger adults in their appreciation of metaphoric semantic relations, and that age-related changes occur due to the perception of novel metaphors. In the first experiment 35 younger (mean age?=?23.1) and 35 older adults (mean age?=?75.3) were asked to rate the plausibility of metaphoric, literal, and unrelated word pairs. Relative to young participants, older participants rated fewer expressions as metaphorically plausible. The second experiment was conducted to examine whether the findings of the first experiment could be accounted for by an age-associated difference in the appreciation of metaphors with different levels of familiarity. In the second experiment, 25 younger (mean age?=?24.4) and 25 older adults (mean age?=?77.5) were asked to rate the familiarity level of the plausible metaphoric expressions. Relative to young participants, older participants rated fewer expressions as novel and more expressions as familiar. The results suggest that novelty plays an important role in appreciating the plausibility of semantic relationships, and age-related changes are associated with the appreciation of the novelty of expressions.