Beyond perception: Testing for implicit conceptual traces in high-load tasks

The present commentary addresses the main results obtained in the Butler and Klein [Butler, B. C., & Klein, R. (2009). Inattentional blindness for ignored words: Comparison of explicit and implicit memory tasks. Consciousness and Cognition, 18, 811–819.] study and discusses them in relation to the Perceptual Load Theory of Lavie [Lavie, N. (1995). Perceptual load as a necessary condition for selective attention. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 21, 451–68.]. The authors claim that the use of implicit indexes of conceptual distractor processing in high-load situations would be an important addition to the load literature, which would benefit the research field regardless of their positive or negative findings.     

Science,spirituality and truth: acknowledging difference for spiritual dialogue and human well‐being

This article seeks to explain why spiritual education must be clear about the nature of spiritual knowledge and truth and how it differs from the knowledge and truth generated by science. The author argues this is important in order that spirituality and science are equally valued, and in order that spiritual pedagogy appropriately reflects the nature of spiritual truth in the context of spiritual diversity and commitment. Based on these arguments, and inspired both by the ideas of inter‐faith dialogue and the philosophy of Michael Bakhtin, the author then suggests a dialogical approach to spiritual pedagogy for spiritual development and wellbeing. The article suggests education will best enhance human wellbeing if it is positive about the contributions of both science and spirituality, and if it promotes understanding of spiritual difference and commitment.     

概念转变理论及其发展述评

概念转变是心理与教育领域的热点问题。20多年来,研究者从不同的背景和视角研究概念转变的过程与机制,提出了基于认识论、本体论和朴素理论的多个概念转变理论,成为后续概念转变研究的理论框架。随着研究的深入,这些概念转变理论得以继承和发展,表现为融入了社会、情感等因素并具整合的趋势。本文对当前国际主流的概念转变理论及其发展加以评述,并从问题、方法和视角等方面对未来的概念转变研究加以展望,提出构建更具普适性的概念转变理论框架的设想     

What’s in a (Role) Name? Formal and Conceptual Aspects of Comprehending Personal Nouns

Two eye-tracking studies assessed effects of grammatical and conceptual gender cues in generic role name processing in German. Participants read passages about a social or occupational group introduced by way of a generic role name (e.g., Soldaten/soldiers, Künstler/artists). Later in the passage the gender of this group was specified by the anaphoric expression diese Männer/these men or diese Frauen/these women. Testing masculine generic role names of male, female or neutral conceptual gender (Exp. 1) showed that a gender mismatch between the role name’s conceptual gender and the anaphor significantly slowed reading immediately before and after the anaphoric noun. A mismatch between the antecedent’s grammatical gender and the anaphor slowed down the reading of the anaphoric noun itself. Testing grammatically gender-unmarked role names (Exp. 2) revealed a general male bias in participants’ understanding, irrespective of grammatical or conceptual gender. The experiments extend previous findings on gender effects to non-referential role names and generic contexts. Theoretical aspects of gender and plural reference as well as gender information in mental models are discussed.     

A Dissociation between Symbolic Number Knowledge and Analogue Magnitude Information

Semantic understanding of numbers and related concepts can be dissociated from rote knowledge of arithmetic facts. However, distinctions among different kinds of semantic representations related to numbers have not been fully explored. Working with numbers and arithmetic requires representing semantic information that is both analogue (e.g., the approximate magnitude of a number) and symbolic (e.g., what / means). In this article, the authors describe a patient (MC) who exhibits a dissociation between tasks that require symbolic number knowledge (e.g., knowledge of arithmetic symbols including numbers, knowledge of concepts related to numbers such as rounding) and tasks that require an analogue magnitude representation (e.g., comparing size or frequency). MC is impaired on a variety of tasks that require symbolic number knowledge, but her ability to represent and process analogue magnitude information is intact. Her deficit in symbolic number knowledge extends to a variety of concepts related to numbers (e.g., decimal points, Roman numerals, what a quartet is) but not to any other semantic categories that we have tested. These findings suggest that symbolic number knowledge is a functionally independent component of the number processing system, that it is category specific, and that it is anatomically and functionally distinct from magnitude representations.     

先天聋人的语音、正字法意识和概念知识结构

先天聋人对书面词语基本没有语音意识。他们主要采用视知觉策略识别书面词语,其词语词法技能发展滞后。由于缺乏语音经验,他们大脑皮层的发育受到严重影响,概念知识结构也呈现不对称性。尽早实施手语教育和正字法教育,不仅有助于提高聋儿童的手语语音意识和书面词语识别技能,也能促进他们的认知能力正常发展     

Cross-cultural investigations of stress: Conceptual and methodological considerations

Cross-cultural studios on stress are confounded by conceptual, methodological and applied problems. Although several comprehensive definitions of stress have been offered, the conceptual schema from which the definitions emerge reflect a Western perspective and are not always relevant when transposed into other cultures. The word stress itself is not easily translated into other languages which creates a problem for research workers in non-Western cultures. While studies in India of Westernized executives in organizations using Western models have offered valuable insights into problems related to organizational structures, executive stress, etc., they do not tell us a great deal about the nature and experience of stress in the rest of the population. A brief history of stress research is offered with a concentration on stress research in India. Conceptual and methodological issues are discussed leading to an assessment of the difficulties of stress research in India.     

Hoisted by their own petards: Philosophical positions that self-destruct

Philosophers have not resisted temptation to transgress against the logic of their own conceptual structures. Self-undermining position-taking is an occupational hazard. Philosophy stands in need of conceptual therapy.The author describes three conceptions of philosophy: the narcissistic, disputatious, and therapeutic. (i) Narcissistic philosophy is hermetic, believing itself to contain all evidence that can possibly be relevant to it. Philosophy undertaken in this spirit has led to defensive, monadically isolated positions. (ii) Disputatious philosophies are fundamentally question-begging, animated by assumptions that philosophical adversaries reject. (iii) The intention of therapeutic philosophy is to study philosophical positions from the standpoint of their internal consistency, or lack of it. In particular, its interest is in positions that either compel assent, because they cannot be rejected without self-referential inconsistency, or self-destruct because self-referential inconsistency cannot be avoided. The article's focus is on the latter. Several examples of self-undermining positions are drawn from the history of philosophy, exemplifying two main varieties of self-referential inconsistency: pragmatical and projective.     

REALISM AND OPENNESS IN SCIENTIFIC INQUIRY

Abstract. Intrinsic to rigorous knowledge of God is the recognition that positive theological concepts and statements about God arising under the compelling claims of God's reality upon the human mind must have an open revisable structure. A similar combination of critical realism and ontological openness is apparent in the profound change that has taken place in the rational structure of rigorous science from the radical dualism and closed causal system of classical mechanics to the unifying world view and open dynamic field-theories of modern physics. It is argued that the intersection of theological and natural science in their epis-temological foundations can enhance their ontological commitment and heuristic thrust.