Behavioural and ERP Effects of Cognitive and Combined Cognitive and Physical Training on Working Memory and Executive Function in Healthy Older Adults

Cognitive and physical training have been shown to be effective in improving older adults’ cognition. However, it is not yet clear whether combined cognitive and physical training offers an advantage compared to cognitive training alone. Twenty-two older adults performed cognitive or combined cognitive and physical training in order to compare their effects on working memory event-related potentials (ERPs) and on working memory and executive function performance. Before and after eight weeks of training, performance in Plus Minus, Flanker, Updated Span, and Complex Span tasks was measured, and ERPs were registered during performance of an n-back task (0-back, 2-back, and 3-back). Post-training behavioural improvement was observed in Updated Span, Complex Span, and n-back tasks. During the n-back task, the N2/P3 complex was modulated by training, with a decrease in N2 amplitude and an increase in P3 amplitude in the posttraining session compared to the pretraining session. These changes in ERP components suggest that both types of training potentially reduce the need for attentional control to perform the tasks correctly and increase working memory capacity. Thus, based on our data, no conclusion can be reached on the direct advantage of combined training, either at behavioural or at neural level. However, the present study might suggest an indirect advantage of such a combined training, because the cognitive benefit was found to be highly similar in both types of training. Using combined cognitive and physical training may produce a potential improvement in general fitness and an increased appeal of training.     

廖平对《春秋》经的认识

廖平对《春秋》经的认识,有前后两个阶段的变化。在廖平的经学史研究阶段,认为《春秋》是孔子所制作的“经”,包含了孔子的“素王制作”之义,即为后世的“一王之法”;在其经学理论的建构时期,《春秋》经被廖平作为其建构孔经“人学”的经典。事实上,《春秋经》廖平的孔经天人体系中只不过是一种工具符号,且随着廖平经学理论的变化,被不断地赋予不同的功能。     

论《管子》的激励思想及对现代人力资源管理的启示

激励是人力资源管理中的一个重要问题。在齐文化的代表作《管子》中就记录了春秋时期著名政治家、思想家管仲在治国实践中所倡导的各种激励思想和方法,具体体现为:以满足个体需要为出发点的激励思想;领导者率先垂范的激励思想;赏罚分明的激励思想。这些激励思想对于现代人力资源管理具有重要的借鉴意义。     

Who Cares About Human Rights?

Previous studies of human rights attitudes are reviewed, new measures are reported, and a three-factor model is identified (Human Rights Endorsement, Commitment, and Restriction). Individual differences that predict attitudes on each factor overlapped but differed. Dispositional empathy, education, and global knowledge contributed to an endorsement of human rights ideals, but none of these affected commitment or restriction. Globalism (vs. nationalism) and principled moral reasoning strengthened human rights commitment, while ethnocentrism and the social dominance orientation weakened it. Authoritarianism, ethnocentrism, and belief that the world cannot be changed increased a willingness to restrict the rights of unpopular groups, while principled moral reasoning and self-rated liberalism decreased it. In short, the individual differences that influence human rights attitudes depend substantially upon which dimension of these attitudes is considered.     

人类行为的进化论解释及其特征

进化论用于解释人类行为的合理性依赖于对进化论结构的理解,而不能通过直接肯定或否定人类行为有无某种生物学的结构基础来回答.如果进化论是对现象系统的描述,那它在原则上就不能用于对人类行为进化的研究.进化论应被看作是对一类物理系统的定义,理论定义系统与现象系统也只能在现象层面上同构.人类行为进化解释的恰当性,就在于人类行为系统与进化论定义系统在经验上的适合达到了期望的程度.     

A JANUS FACE UPON RELIGION FROM SCIENTIFIC MATERIALISM

Abstract. Bjørn Grinde's article is a Janus face from a scientific insider looking out toward religion and from a religious outsider looking in. His scientific story of the evolutionary and present advantages of religion is laudable but incomplete, as the logic of commitment strategies might provide a fuller account of what produces the value of religious faith. His scientific presuppositions nevertheless might be taken as exhibiting some hubris, particularly in the limits of his instrumental ethics. Finally, the variety and potential incommensurability of both theistic and nontheistic religious views render his distinction between “minimal” and “elaborated” views of God problematic as a route to finding a scientifically credible view by which science might move to optimize the value of religion. Nevertheless, the goal of doing so might be supported by several structural features of religious views, of individual transformation and of hopes for the future, which may be supported by the evolutionary logic of commitment strategies at both individual and group levels.     

幼儿人际领域能力自我知觉特点的研究

运用结构性会谈,了解幼儿对自己的人际关系及增进人际关系的能力和手段的知觉,并采用提名法了解幼儿的实际人际地位作为与其主观知觉相对照的客观指标。结果显示：1)幼儿对自己的人际能方表现出非常积极的知觉倾向;2)幼儿对人际喜恶原因的认识与其采用什么手段增进他人喜欢的反应相对一致,且体现了个体的内在需要和成人的教育影响。     

Standards for Health Care Chaplaincy in Europe: Questions from an Orthodox Perspective

The Standards' ecumenical implications are critically assessedin view of the risks which their cross-denominational or cross-faithcooperation implications on the one hand, and, on the otherhand, their secular commitments to mutual learning, non-proselytizing,professionalism, and efficiency assessment might carry for chaplains'properly spiritual orientation. The problem posed by the ambiguityof language is raised as a warning that concepts like humandignity have a profoundly different meaning in secular and Christiancontexts. Invoking such concepts can be seriously misleading.     

The Tri-Council Policy Statement and Research in Cyberspace: Research Ethics, the Internet, and Revising a ‘Living Document’

Increasingly, the Internet is proving to be an important research tool. Today, cyberspace affords researchers easy access to traditionally difficult to reach populations, a host of virtual communities, and a wealth of data created through computer-mediated-communication. This newfound research frontier brings with it, however, a multiplicity of ethical concerns, including: (1) whether the Internet constitutes a private or public space; (2) whether the human subject paradigm is appropriate when considering the ethics of Internet research; and (3) whether cyber participants/‘speakers-as-writers’ and communities should be guaranteed confidentiality and anonymity when researchers contain or consider them in research. This paper examines these specific ethical concerns as they relate to Canada's Tri-Council Policy Statement: Ethical Conduct for Research Involving Humans, which, as yet, does not explicitly address ethics involved in Internet research. I propose that in large part the Internet is by definition a public site of activity, and as such, many posters cannot expect their texts to remain confidential, nor their names anonymous, and that the human subject paradigm is highly problematic in terms of regulating ethics involved in some research generated through new information technologies. This is most expressly the case with computer-mediated-communication, which, in light of the Tri-Council Policy Statement, can be viewed as theoretically akin to public entertainment and performance. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

人类基因组计划及基因革命对伦理的挑战

人类基因组序列的测定和研究具有重大的科学价值和经济价值,同时,也带来一系列社会问题。基因组计划和基因革命对伦理造成了致命的冲击。人类基因商品化对公正原则提出了挑战;基因设计引发生命唯物化,引起了人类的尊严危机;优生运动有可能违背自主原则和平等原则。人类基因组计划应坚持那些体现了人类及其社会本性、价值和尊严的伦理原则即不伤害人、尊重人、有益于人、公正对待人,以及人与人之间互相团结等。