Thinking about the Needy: A Reprise

This article discusses Jan Narvesons Welfare and Wealth, Poverty and Justice in Todays World, and Is World Poverty a Moral Problem for the Wealthy? and their relation to my Thinking about the Needy, Justice, and International Organizations. Section 2 points out that Narvesons concerns differ from mine, so that often his claims and mine fail to engage each other. For example, his focus is on the poor, mine the needy, and while many poor are needy, and vice versa, our obligations may differ regarding the poor than regarding the needy. Also, Narveson invokes a narrow conception of morality as those rules that government or society may compel people to follow. Given a broader, more plausible, conception of morality, many of Narvesons claims actually support my substantive views. Section 3 shows that many of Narvesons claims are relevant to the best means of aiding the needy, but do not challenge the validity of that end. This is true, for example, of his claims about the role of poor governments, the importance of freedom, the undesirability of mere handouts, and the effects of bad economic policies. Section 4 defends the importance of my distinction between acting justly and acting for reasons of justice. It illustrates that on several widely shared conceptions of justice there might be agent-neutralreasons of justice to aid the needy, even if from an agent-relative perspective one would not be acting unjustly if one failed to do so. Section 5 contests Narvesons portrayal of egalitarianism as concerned about inequality of wealth, per se, as insensitive to prior wrongs, and as holding that the worse-off have a right to be made better off at the expense of the well-off. In addition, it rejects Narvesons contention that egalitarians violate impartiality, and aim to impose their personal tastes on others. Section 6 challenges a fundamental assumption underlying Narvesons doctrine of mutual advantage. In addition, it denies that egalitarians are irrational merely because equality can conflict with the pareto principle. More generally, by appealing to impersonal ideals, it challenges the widely held view that the pareto principle is a condition of rationality. Section 7 argues that Narvesons meta-ethical assumptions are controversial, internally inconsistent, in tension with his normative views, and ultimately a version of skepticism. In addition, it challenges Narvesons view about the role intuitions play in moral theory. Section 8 clarifies points where Narvesons discussion of my views may be misleading. Finally, the paper notes the role that moral reasons may play in deliberation and action, but emphasizes the philosophical and theoretical nature of my work. My aim is to determine the moral considerations that are relevant to how people should act regarding the needy. Whether people will actually be moved to so act, for those reasons or otherwise, is another matter.     

Self-Concept,Motivational Orientation,and Help-Seeking Behavior in Mathematics: A Study of Adults Returning to High School

The purpose of this study was to explore relations between mathematics achievement, self-concept, goal orientation, intrinsic motivation, and help-seeking behavior among adults studying for a high school diploma. Participants in this study were 145 adults (55 males and 90 females) enrolled in nine first year high school classes for adult students at five high schools in three cities in Norway. The age of the students varied from 18 to 52 years. Data were analyzed by means of structural equation modeling. The results indicate that mathematics self-concept in adult years build strongly on achievement in school years and that it is predictive of adult students’ goal orientation, intrinsic motivation, and learning strategies. Three weakly correlated dimensions of goal orientation predicted interest and help-seeking behavior in mathematics lessons differently.     

The Influence of Positive Affect on Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation: Facilitating Enjoyment of Play,Responsible Work Behavior,and Self-Control

Two experiments demonstrated that positive affect fosters intrinsic motivation, as reflected by choice of activity in a free-choice situation and by rated amount of enjoyment of a novel and challenging task, but also promotes responsible work behavior in a situation where the work needs to be done. Where there was work that needed to be done, people in the positive-affect condition reduced their time on the enjoyable task, successfully completed the work task, but also spent time on the more enjoyable task. These results indicate that positive affect does foster intrinsic motivation, and enjoyment and performance of enjoyable tasks, but not at the cost of responsible work behavior on an uninteresting task that needs to be done. Implications for the relationship between positive affect and such aspects of self-regulation as forward-looking thinking and self-control are discussed.

Understanding physical activity declines during COVID-19: The affective repercussions of disruption to exercise routines

Recent research has examined psychological factors that forestalled declines in physical activity (PA) during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. Surprisingly, there has been limited evidence of an association between intrinsic motivation (IM) and PA. We reasoned that IM may have not predicted PA because COVID-19 restrictions limited opportunities to engage in exercise in ways that produced positive affective experiences (i.e., inherent rewards). Using data from a cross-sectional survey (N = 373 participants), we tested a moderated mediation model that predicted perceived changes to affective experiences during exercise would mediate the association between disruption to one’s exercise routine and self-reported declines in PA, and that effects would be moderated by IM. Evidence of moderated mediation was found, suggesting that disruptions to exercise routines were associated with fewer positive affective experiences during exercise that predicted declines in PA engagement, especially for people who typically exercised for intrinsic reasons.     

Content analysis of infanticide and neonaticide cases in the UK

Twenty cases, 14 infanticides and 6 neonaticides committed between 1989 and 2020 by biological mothers were analysed using Smallest Space Analysis for the presence of themes. Three themes associated with offender motivation were identified: Desperation, Disturbance and Rejection. Desperation theme included variables suggesting the mother committed the crime as a result of distress or perceived necessity. Disturbance suggested the motivation behind the offence to be as a result of the mother's caregiving role being disturbed; and the Rejection theme explained complete maternal rejection of the infant or new-born as the motivation behind the crime. Alongside the themes, three core variables were identified to be common for the crime regardless of motivation: the crime being committed at Home, the victim Female, and the crime being Denied by the mother. The implications of the findings are discussed including the potential for an investigative support tool and developing understandings of neonaticide and infanticide as separate crimes.     

算法决策趋避的过程动机理论

算法常用于决策, 但相较于由人类做出的决策, 即便内容相同, 算法决策更容易引起个体反应的分化, 此即算法决策趋避。趋近指个体认为算法的决策比人类的更加公平、含有更少的偏见和歧视、也更能信任和接受, 回避则与之相反。算法决策趋避的过程动机理论用以解释趋避现象, 归纳了人与算法交互所经历的原初行为互动、建立类社会关系和形成身份认同三个阶段, 阐述了各阶段中认知、关系和存在三种动机引发个体的趋避反应。未来研究可着眼于人性化知觉、群际感知对算法决策趋避的影响, 并以更社会性的视角来探究算法决策趋避的逆转过程和其他可能的心理动机。     

Effects of compounding drug-related stimuli: escalation of heroin self-administration

Previous experiments have demonstrated that presenting independently established discriminative stimuli in compound can substantially increase operant responding maintained by food reinforcement or shock avoidance. Recently, this phenomenon was also shown to occur with cocaine self-administration. The present study further assessed the generality of these stimulus-compounding effects by systematically replicating them with heroin self-administration. Rats' nose-poke responses produced intravenous heroin (0.025 mg/kg per infusion) on a variable-ratio schedule when either a tone or a light was present. In the absence of these stimuli, responding was not reinforced. Once discriminative control by the tone and light had been established, the stimuli were presented in compound under extinction (with heroin discontinued) or maintenance conditions (with heroin available during test-stimulus presentations). In extinction, the tone-light compound increased responding approximately threefold compared to tone or light alone. Under maintenance conditions, compounding increased heroin intake approximately twofold. These effects closely matched those obtained earlier with cocaine. This consistency across pharmacological classes and across drug and nondrug reinforcers further confirms that (a) self-administered drugs support conditioning and learning in a manner similar to that supported by other reinforcers; and (b) multiple drug-related cues interact in lawful and predictable ways to affect drug seeking and consumption.     

Adolescents’ Change in Motivation as a Result of Buddhist Education: How Does It Make a Difference in Their Learning Outcomes?

Motivation significantly influences students’ learning outcomes. Changing their learning motivation improves their performance. This study used an exploratory sequential mixed methods approach, with the participation of 140 adolescents attending retreats at three Zen monasteries belonging to the Truc Lam (Bamboo Forest) Zen sect, to examine how they changed their motivation, what made them change, and how the change improved their learning outcomes. The study also evaluated the effect of gender and age on changes in motivation. The results indicated that many teenagers had changed from extrinsic to intrinsic motivation thanks to Dharma lessons, teacher support, and leisure activities. Compared to students who maintained their extrinsic motivation unchanged, they had better learning outcomes. Age, but not gender, had a considerable effect on changes in teenagers’ motivation. These findings provide more evidence for extending Buddhist education and conducting further research on young Buddhist learners’ motivation in various contexts.     

Levels and change in autonomous and controlled work motivation in older workers—The role of proximity to retirement and sense of community at work

Previous studies suggest a preretirement disengagement process from work, which includes reduced work motivation. In this study, we investigated changes in autonomous and controlled work motivation over two years among participants of the Health, Aging and Retirement Transition in Sweden (HEARTS) study. We found stability in both types of motivation; however, those who retired after the study period showed more distinct declines in autonomous motivation. A stronger sense of community at work was related to level, but not change in autonomous motivation. Intra-individual fluctuations in the expected retirement age did not predict work motivation or vice versa. Future studies are needed to better understand the antecedents and consequences of preretirement declines in autonomous work motivation.     

Déterminants de la procrastination académique : motivation autodéterminée,estime de soi et degré de maximation

We aimed (1) to examine the link between procrastination and academic success in students from French university, and (2) to explore whether self-determined motivation, self-esteem, and degree of maximization are good predictors of procrastination. Four scales (procrastination, self-determined motivation, self-esteem, and degree of maximization) were given at the beginning of the first semester (T1; n = 952) and at the end of the first semester (T2; n = 691). Results indicated that (1) academic procrastination is negatively correlated to academic success and (2) the three predictors (self-determined motivation, self-esteem, and degree of maximization) explained relatively well procrastination at T1 and T2.