Effect of competitor density on the aggressiveness of juvenile white seabream (Diplodus sargus cadenati de la Paz,Bauchot and Daget, 1974)

The number of aggressive interactions displayed by juveniles of Diplodus sargus cadenati increases progressively in proportion to the number of intruders, with an upper threshold of more than 16 to 18 intruder fish. Beyond this density, resident aggressiveness decreases. The number of aggressive interactions that the resident fish devotes to expelling each intruder shows a clear and significant tendency to decrease as competitor density increases. The resident fish is incapable of rapidly evaluating the outweighing of its capacity for defense. Moreover, the strategy of aggressive defense of the resource against the density of competitors does not seem to be only profitability criteria dependent, but rather there is also a significant influence of the ability to fight shown by the resident. Aggr. Behav. 29:279–284, 2003. © 2003 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.     

Religious Ethics and the Environment

This essay discusses three recent books which each offer an integrative account of religious ethics and the environment. Religious environmental ethics is an area of inquiry within the larger field of religion and ecology. After a narrative that contextualizes the development of religious environmental ethics in relation to the environmental social movement, I describe the formation of the field including its focus on worldview, the “cosmological turn,” and its engagement with science, the “cosmic turn.” Elizabeth Johnson exemplifies the cosmic turn by developing a Christian theology of life in nature which explicitly accepts Darwin's theory of evolution. Willis Jenkins advocates a prophetic pragmatism and critiques a focus on worldview that is abstracted from practice and defers moral responsibility. Larry Rasmussen joins analysis of worldview with reflection on cross‐cultural resources for “anticipatory communities” of moral formation to catalyze change. I argue with Rasmussen that religious environmental ethics needs multiple approaches and should allow room for methodological pluralism.     

Reformation Resources for Contemporary Eco‐Justice Theology

Reformation theology has two significant contributions to make to a renewal of environmental theology. Its heritage of sin exposes the fact that human efforts at intervention in the environment are only ambiguously good and in need of redemption themselves. Its heritage of freedom exposes some efforts toward environmental healing as works‐righteousness, available to be transformed by God in hope for a heavenly and earthly future.     

An Evolutionary Perspective on Family Studies: Differential Susceptibility to Environmental Influences

An evolutionary perspective of human development provides the basis for the differential‐susceptibility hypothesis which stipulates that individuals should differ in their susceptibility to environmental influences, with some being more affected than others by both positive and negative developmental experiences and environmental exposures. This paper reviews evidence consistent with this claim while revealing that temperamental and genetic characteristics play a role in distinguishing more and less susceptible individuals. The differential‐susceptibility framework under consideration is contrasted to the traditional diathesis‐stress view that “vulnerability” traits predispose some to being disproportionately affected by (only) adverse experiences. We raise several issues stimulated by the literature that need to be clarified in further research. Lastly, we suggest that therapy may differ in its effects depending on an individual's susceptibility.     

Family Environments and Children's Executive Function: The Mediating Role of Children's Affective State and Stress

There is increasing evidence that inadequate family environments (family material environment and family psychosocial environment) are not only social problems but also factors contributing to adverse neurocognitive outcomes. In the present study, the authors investigated the relationship among family environments, children's naturalistic affective state, self-reported stress, and executive functions in a sample of 157 Chinese families. These findings revealed that in inadequate family material environments, reduced children's cognitive flexibility is associated with increased naturalistic negative affectivity and self-reported stress. In addition, naturalistic negative affectivity mediated the association between family expressiveness and children's cognitive flexibility. The authors used a structural equation model to examine the mediation model hypothesis, and the results confirmed the mediating roles of naturalistic negative affectivity and self-reported stress between family environments and the cognitive flexibility of Chinese children. These findings indicate the importance of reducing stress and negative emotional state for improving cognitive functions in children of low socioeconomic status.     

Imagining an ‘ideal school’: an approach for reflecting on principals’ educational creed

In this paper, we describe an approach to the study and development of school principals’ school creed. The approach and its underlying method are grounded in the phenomenological tradition, predominantly in the philosophy of Merleau-Ponty. School principals are asked to imagine an ideal school and present it both visually and verbally. We illustrate the potential of this process using one ideal school proposal developed by a high school principal in Israel. The paper concludes with a discussion of the implications of the approach for research, theory and practice.     

A prospective multilevel examination of the relationship between cohesion and team performance in elite youth sport

The purpose of the current research was to (a) develop and establish the factor structure of the Czech and Slovak versions of the Youth Sport Environment Questionnaire (YSEQ; Eys, Loughead, Bray, & Carron, 2009) and (b) examine the relationship between team performance and cohesion with a sample of European elite youth sport teams. At time point one, with 352 elite youth athletes from 22 teams, support was obtained for a two factor structure underlying the YSEQ. Based on data collected at the second (N = 291) and third (N = 246) time points, multilevel analyses revealed that, when controlling for midseason cohesion, midseason team performance significantly and positively predicted task and social cohesion later in the season. Neither task nor social cohesion predicted team performance. In addition to adapting the YSEQ for use in a unique context, these findings reveal the nature of the cohesion-performance relationship in elite youth sport.     

THE ATOMIC PRIESTHOOD AND NUCLEAR WASTE MANAGEMENT: RELIGION,SCI‐FI LITERATURE,AND THE END OF OUR CIVILIZATION

This article discusses the idea of an “Atomic Priesthood,” a religious caste that would preserve and transmit the knowledge of nuclear waste management for future generations. In 1981, the US Department of Energy commissioned a “Human Interference Task Force” (HITF) that would examine the possibilities of how to maintain the security of nuclear waste storage sites for 10,000 years, a period during which our civilization would likely perish, but the dangerous nature of nuclear waste would persist. One option that was discussed was the establishment of an “atomic priesthood,” an idea that science fiction writers like Isaac Asimov and Arsen Darney had already toyed with. Reading the HITF report alongside sci‐fi novels, my article will shed light on the question of how the sheer force of nuclear power (and the longevity of nuclear waste) lends itself to religious interpretations and how the idea of the atomic priesthood is connected with the utopian/dystopian aspects of nuclear power.