Reasons and Value – in Defence of the Buck-Passing Account

In this article, I will defend the so-called buck-passing theory of value. According to this theory, claims about the value of an object refer to the reason-providing properties of the object. The concept of value can thus be analyzed in terms of reasons and the properties of objects that provide them for us. Reasons in this context are considerations that count in favour of certain attitudes. There are four other possibilities of how the connection between reasons and value might be formulated. For example, we can claim that value is a property that provides us with reasons to choose an option that has this property. I argue that none of these four other options can ultimately be defended, and therefore the buck-passing account is the one we ought to accept as the correct one. The case for the buck-passing account becomes even stronger, when we examine the weak points of the most pressing criticism against this account thus far.     

Practical Reasons and the Redundancy of Motives

Jonathan Dancy, in his 1994 Aristotelian Society Presidential Address, set out to show 'why there is really no such thing as the theory of motivation'. In this paper I want to agree that there is no such thing, and to offer reasons of a different kind for that conclusion. I shall suggest that the so-called theory of motivation misconstrues the question which it purports to answer, and that when we properly analyse the question and distinguish it clearly from other questions with which it should not be confused, we do not need a theory of motivation at all.     

Three Conceptions of Rational Agency

Rational agency may be thought of as intentional activity that is guided by the agent's conception of what they have reason to do. The paper identifies and assesses three approaches to this phenomenon, which I call internalism, meta-internalism, and volitionalism. Internalism accounts for rational motivation by appeal to substantive desires of the agent's that are conceived as merely given; I argue that it fails to do full justice to the phenomenon of guidance by one's conception of one's reasons. Meta-internalism explains this phenomenon by postulating higher-order dispositions, consitutive of (rational) agency itself, which causally interact with the agent's normative beliefs to produce corresponding motivations to action. I show that meta-internalism comes to grief over cases of akrasia, insofar as it leaves no room for the capacity for rational guidance when agents voluntarily act at variance with their judgments about what they have reason to do. Volitionalism, I contend, improves on both internalism and meta-internalism. Its distinctive feature is the postulation of a kind of motivation that is directly subject to the agent's control, and independent of the dispositions and desires to which the agent is passively subject.     

小学儿童记忆中组织策略发展的实验研究

本研究探讨了小学儿童组织策略的发展,结果表明:1.小学儿童组织策略的发展可分为产生性缺损和成熟运用组织策略两个主要阶段。第一个阶段根据是否伴随中介性缺损又可分为两个亚阶段。2.导致产生性缺损的原因有:(1)缺乏对记忆手段和记忆目标之间的功能关系的清晰认识;(2)不能清楚地认识策略的有效性,以及常运用自己熟悉的、简单的、但也相对无效的策略;(3)较差的有关记忆材料的知识基础以及较低的认识发展水平。     

Mapping Moral Motivation

In this paper we defend a version of moral internalism and a cognitivist account of motivation against recent criticisms. The internalist thesis we espouse claims that, if an agent believes she has reason to A, then she is motivated to A. Discussion of counter-examples has been clouded by the absence of a clear account of the nature of motivation. While we can only begin to provide such an account in this paper, we do enough to show that our version of internalism can be defended against putative counter-examples. All theories of motivation which take what motivates to be a psychological state run foul of the following plausible constraint: the reason why you ought to do an action and the reason why you do it can be the same. In our view, however, while what motivates is a reason (which is a fact) the state of being motivated is a cognitive stage, viz. the belief that one has reason to act. In cases where the agent's relevant beliefs are false, then she has no reason to act, but nontheless her action can be explained in other ways.     

The relationship between autonomous motivation and goal pursuit: A cross‐cultural perspective

People pursue their goals for different reasons, and previous research has distinguished two types of autonomous reason: relationally autonomous reasons (RARs) and personally autonomous reasons (PARs). The present study examines how RARs and PARs predict goal performance and well‐being differently for people in individualistic and collectivistic cultures. Participants included 250 American and 246 Chinese undergraduate students. They listed two of the most important goals they were currently pursuing, and completed survey measures to assess their RARs, PARs, goal effort and progress, and personal and collective self‐esteem. The moderating effect of culture on how RARs and PARs influence goal outcomes was tested through structural equation modelling analyses, so that both RARs and PARs could be incorporated into the analyses. The results indicate cultural differences in the degree to which PARs and RARs relate to goal performance and well‐being. Implications regarding the role of autonomy in different cultures are discussed.     

Effects of antecedent variables on disruptive behavior and accurate responding in young children in outpatient settings

The effects of manipulations of task variables on inaccurate responding and disruption were investigated with 3 children who engaged in noncompliance. With 2 children in an outpatient clinic, task directives were first manipulated to identify directives that guided accurate responding; then, additional dimensions of the task were manipulated to evaluate their influence on disruptive behavior. With a 3rd child, similar procedures were employed at school. Results showed one-step directives set the occasion for accurate responding and that other dimensions of the task (e.g., preference) functioned as motivating operations for negative reinforcement.     

Acting in our interests: Relational self-construal and goal motivation across cultures

Relationally-autonomous reasons (RARs) are motives for behavior that take into account one’s close relationships. A cross-cultural model tested the hypotheses that (a) people with a highly relational self-construal will pursue their goals for RARs, and (b) RARs will predict positive goal outcomes after controlling for variance explained by personally-autonomous reasons (PARs) and social support. One hundred seventy Americans and 219 Japanese completed a well-being and self questionnaire then generated and rated seven goals on several attributes. Results showed that relational self-construal was associated with RARs for goals. RARs predicted effort directly and predicted progress and purpose in life indirectly for both groups. In addition, Americans and Japanese differed in the types of goals they pursued and the degree to which social support predicted effort. Implications for self, culture, and motivation research are discussed.

ENHANCING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF A PLAY INTERVENTION BY ABOLISHING THE REINFORCING VALUE OF STEREOTYPY: A PILOT STUDY

An alternating treatments design compared one condition in which a child with autism was allowed to engage in stereotypy freely prior to the intervention (abolishing operation component) to a second condition without the free‐access period. Levels of stereotypy and problem behavior were lower and levels of functional play were higher in the condition with the abolishing operation component. These data provide preliminary support for the use of abolishing operations in interventions to increase the play skills of children with autism.     

FURTHER EVALUATION OF ANTECEDENT SOCIAL EVENTS DURING FUNCTIONAL ANALYSIS

The value of a reinforcer may change based on antecedent events, specifically the behavior of others (Bruzek & Thompson, 2007). In the current study, we examined the effects of manipulating the behavior of the therapist on problem behavior while all dimensions of reinforcement were held constant. Both participants' levels of problem behaviors increased as a function of the altered behavior of the therapist without direct manipulation of states of satiation or deprivation.