Puzzles of Discourse in Being and Time: Minding Gaps in Understanding

Abstract

This paper takes issue with Heidegger’s claim that discourse and understanding are equally basic in the constitution of our making sense of the world. I argue that Heidegger cannot consistently establish this claim, and that discourse can be thought of as being more basic than understanding. The proposed line of thinking has the advantage of shedding light on both the finitude and the normativity of our making sense of the world. Thus, by setting up an exchange with the later Wittgenstein’s discussion of rule‐following makes it possible to develop an approach to the normativity of meaning which was not readily available on Heidegger’s account. Further, the paper offers an inquiry into a certain aspect of our finite sense of the world which, in spite of Heidegger’s marked attention to finitude, was obscured by his approach to discourse. The implications of the argument might be far‐reaching. The view of a basic role of discourse can put into question Heidegger’s guiding vision according to which time alone is ultimately the fundamental constituent of our sense of what there is. The engagement with Wittgenstein indicates, in conjunction with other themes of the paper, that there are certain perspectives and issues in phenomenology which are much closer to aspects of the analytic tradition than is usually granted.     

Cerebral blood flow in 5‐ to 8‐month‐olds: Regional tissue maturity is associated with infant affect

Infancy is marked by rapid neural and emotional development. The relation between brain function and emotion in infancy, however, is not well understood. Methods for measuring brain function predominantly rely on the BOLD signal; however, interpretation of the BOLD signal in infancy is challenging because the neuronal‐hemodynamic relation is immature. Regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) provides a context for the infant BOLD signal and can yield insight into the developmental maturity of brain regions that may support affective behaviors. This study aims to elucidate the relations among rCBF, age, and emotion in infancy. One hundred and seven mothers reported their infants' (infant age M ± SD = 6.14 ± 0.51 months) temperament. A subsample of infants completed MRI scans, 38 of whom produced usable perfusion MRI during natural sleep to quantify rCBF. Mother‐infant dyads completed the repeated Still‐Face Paradigm, from which infant affect reactivity and recovery to stress were quantified. We tested associations of infant age at scan, temperament factor scores, and observed affect reactivity and recovery with voxel‐wise rCBF. Infant age was positively associated with CBF in nearly all voxels, with peaks located in sensory cortices and the ventral prefrontal cortex, supporting the formulation that rCBF is an indicator of tissue maturity. Temperamental Negative Affect and recovery of positive affect following a stressor were positively associated with rCBF in several cortical and subcortical limbic regions, including the orbitofrontal cortex and inferior frontal gyrus. This finding yields insight into the nature of affective neurodevelopment during infancy. Specifically, infants with relatively increased prefrontal cortex maturity may evidence a disposition toward greater negative affect and negative reactivity in their daily lives yet show better recovery of positive affect following a social stressor.     

Self‐esteem and emotional health in adolescents – gender and age as potential moderators

Moksnes, U. K. & Espnes, G. A. (2012). Self‐esteem and emotional health in adolescents – gender and age as a potential moderators. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 53, 483–489. The present paper investigates possible gender and age differences on emotional states (depression and anxiety) and self‐esteem as well as the association between self‐esteem and emotional states. The cross‐sectional sectional sample consists of 1,209 adolescents 13–18 years from public elementary and secondary schools in mid‐Norway. The results showed that girls reported higher scores on state anxiety and state depression, whereas boys consistently scored higher on self‐esteem in all age groups. Self‐esteem was strongly and inversely associated with both state depression and state anxiety. An interaction effect of gender by self‐esteem was found on state depression, where the association was stronger for girls than for boys. The associations found give support for the positive role of self‐esteem in relation to adolescents’ emotional health and well‐being.     

The function of language in parent‐infant psychotherapy

Parent‐infant psychotherapy, a rather new field in psychoanalysis, raises questions of how to conceptualize the clinical process. Previous publications have used semiotic concepts to account for the therapist's non‐verbal communication and investigated the countertransference, including what the baby might grasp of its variations. The present paper focuses on another argument for using verbal interventions to a baby in therapy; they present him with a symbolic order that differs from that of the parent. The qualitative difference between the parent's and the analyst's address is conceptualized by Dolto's term parler vrai. The therapeutic leverage is not the analytic interventions' lexical content but their message that words can be used to expose conflicts. Thereby, one can transform warded‐off desires into demands that can be negotiated with one's objects. The reasons why this address catches the baby's attention are discussed. A prerequisite for such attention is that the infant brain is prewired for perceiving words as a special communicative mode. Relevant neuroscientific research is reviewed in regard to this question. The presentation relies on concepts by Dolto, Lacan and Winnicott and findings from neuroscience and developmental psychology. It also briefly discusses Chomsky's linguistic concepts in relation to these therapies.     

Synchronistic mind‐matter correlations in therapeutic practice: a commentary on Connolly (2015)

This commentary adds some ideas and refinements to the inspiring discussion in a recent paper by Connolly ( 2015 ) that makes use of a dual‐aspect framework developed by us earlier. One key point is that exceptional experiences (of which synchronicities are a special case) cannot in general be identified with experiences of non‐categorial or acategorial mental states. In fact, most exceptional experiences reported in the literature are experiences of categorial states. Conversely, there are non‐categorial and acategorial states whose experience is not exceptional. Moreover, the psychodynamics of a synchronistic experience contain a subtle mesh of interacting processes pertaining to categorial, non‐categorial and acategorial domains. We outline how this mesh may be addressed in particular cases of synchronicity described by Connolly.     

Everyday‐like memory for objects in ageing and Alzheimer's disease assessed in a visually complex environment: The role of executive functioning and episodic memory

To investigate everyday memory, more and more studies rely on virtual‐reality applications to bridge the gap between in situ approaches and laboratory settings. In this vein, the present study was designed to assess everyday‐like memory from the virtual reality‐based Human Object Memory for Everyday Scenes (HOMES) test (Sauzéon et al., 2012 , Exp. Psychol., 59, 99) in ageing and in Alzheimer's disease (AD). Two aims motivated this study: the first was to assess multiple processes of episodic memory (EM) functioning embedded within contexts closely related to real life in ageing and AD using the multi‐trial free‐recall paradigm, and the second aim was to evaluate the mediating effects of executive functioning (EF), EM, and subjective memory complaints (SMCs) on age differences in the HOMES measures and in AD. To this end, the HOMES test and neurocognitive tests of EF and EM were administered to 23 younger adults, 23 older adults, and 16 patients with AD. The results were: firstly, compared to young adults, elderly adults presented only free‐recall decline that almost disappeared in recognition condition whereas AD patients exhibited a poor clustering, learning, and recognition performance, and also a high amount of false recognition; secondly, age differences as well as AD related deficits on the HOMES test were mediated by both memory and EF measure while those observed on false memory indices were only mediated by EM measure; thirdly, the HOMES indices are related to SMCs even when episodic or EF measures are controlled. Overall, the results supported the fact that the VR‐based memory test is an appropriate device to capture age‐related differences as well as the AD effect with respect to both in situ and laboratory settings.     

Within‐subject analysis of a prevention strategy for problem behavior

Although decades of research on functional analysis methodology have identified common contingencies that maintain problem behavior and effective interventions, relatively little research has been conducted on strategies to prevent the initial development of problem behavior. We conducted a 2‐part case study, the purposes of which were to illustrate the use of sensitivity tests as the bases for intervention (Study 1) and subsequently to assess the efficacy of a prevention strategy using a single‐subject design (Study 2). Results showed that the sensitivity tests identified establishing operations that may set the occasion for the development of problem behavior and that interventions based on differential reinforcement prevented increases in the severity of problem behavior relative to untreated and control baselines. Benefits and limitations to this individualized approach to prevention are discussed.     

Theory‐of‐Mind development and early sibling relationships after the birth of a sibling: Parental discipline matters

This study investigated relations among children's Theory‐of‐Mind (ToM) development, early sibling interactions, and parental discipline strategies during the transition to siblinghood. Using a sample of firstborn children and their parents (N = 208), we assessed children's ToM before the birth of a sibling and 12 months after the birth, and sibling interactions (i.e., positive engagement and antagonism) and parental discipline strategies (i.e., child‐centred and parent‐centred discipline) at 4 and 8 months in the first year of siblinghood. Structural equation modelling analyses revealed that children's ToM before the birth of the sibling predicted children's positive engagement with the infant sibling, whereas children's antagonistic behaviours towards the infant sibling negatively predicted children's ToM at 12 months, but only when mothers used low levels of child‐centred discipline. These findings emphasize the role of parents in the development of young children's social‐cognitive understanding in the context of early sibling interactions.

Highlights

• This study investigated relations among firstborns' Theory‐of‐Mind (ToM), early sibling relationships, and parental discipline during the first year of siblinghood.
• Multigroup analyses showed that ToM predicted higher sibling positive engagement, and early sibling antagonism predicted poorer ToM when mothers used low child‐centred discipline.
• Parental discipline plays an important role in the development of young children's social understanding and sibling relationships as early as the first year of siblinghood.