An interpretation of Babette's Feast as a parable of trauma

In this paper I use the film Babette's Feast as a parable to portray the impasse that often arises out of the experience of complex trauma. The experience of such trauma invokes a crisis of reality. It overflows the boundaries of rational containment. There are no mechanisms with which to apprehend such an event, and consequently it cannot be comprehended; because it cannot be comprehended it cannot be processed. The film Babette's Feast encapsulates the predicament of the individual ensnared in the web of trauma. Although removed from the location and events of her trauma, Babette remains the resident of an austere and colourless environment, her gifts repressed, her brilliance unseen. Healing comes to Babette through her willingness to revisit her true self, a self that has been crushed under the weight of grief and trauma. This revisiting costs her all she has. Yet, it is in this revisiting that she not only frees herself from the austerity of her environment but also engenders purpose and hope within the community who have taken her in. The dissonance of her life is paralleled by the dissonance of the life of the community in which she lives; it is the harmonizing of these dissonances which cannot be spoken that finally gives articulation to the incoherence of Babette's trauma.     

Music interferes with learning from television during infancy

Infants are frequently exposed to music during daily activities, including free play, and while viewing infant‐directed videotapes that contain instrumental music soundtracks. In Experiment 1, an instrumental music soundtrack was played during a live or televised demonstration to examine its effects on deferred imitation by 6‐, 12‐, and 18‐month‐old infants. Transfer of information was indexed via deferred imitation of the target actions following a 24‐h delay. For half the infants, the music context was also reinstated at the time of test. Performance by experimental groups was compared to that of a baseline control group that participated in the test session without prior exposure to the demonstration. Imitation performance was above baseline for the live groups but not for the video groups regardless of age or the music context at test. In Experiment 2, we added matched sound effects to the video demonstration and infants performed above baseline. We conclude that the music track creates additional cognitive load, disrupts selective attention to the target actions and inhibits transfer of learning from television of the imitation task. Music may impair an infant's ability to translate information from a two‐dimensional to three‐dimensional world even if the auditory context remains the same. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The relative importance of math‐ and music‐related cognitive and affective factors in predicting undergraduate music theory achievement

Based on research identifying relations between math and music, we aimed to identify the group of cognitive and affective factors related to math and music theory that best explained undergraduate music theory achievement. Using dominance analysis, we predicted the music theory course grades of 230 undergraduate music majors. Potential predictors were narrowed from measures of knowledge, aptitude, experience, confidence, and anxiety in both music theory and math as well as spatial skills and reading test scores. Results suggested that ACT math scores and music theory confidence were important predictors for Music Theories I and II grades. Music Theory I was also predicted by aptitude‐based music theory skills, and Music Theory II was also predicted by math course experience. These findings provide evidence for a relation between math and music theory and support the use of several readily available measures for college‐level music instructors to identify students who may struggle in music theory.     

THEOLOGY AND COSMOLOGY: A CALL FOR INTERDISCIPLINARY ENRICHMENT

Today, there is a growing interest in interdisciplinary studies between theology and natural sciences. This article will reveal some “core” problems in this interdisciplinary relationship. It investigates how cosmic eschatology and natural sciences can benefit the most from each other while dealing with the scenarios which cosmology presents. Doing so, the main emphasis will be on rediscovering the impact of the Resurrection in Christian theology and the possibility of launching a dialogue between natural sciences and theology concerning the new heaven and the new earth.     

REACTING TO CONSECRATING SCIENCE: WHAT MIGHT AMATEURS DO?

In Consecrating Science: Wonder, Knowledge, and the Natural World, Lisa H. Sideris makes a compelling case that a new cosmology movement advocates for a new, universal, creation story grounded in the sciences. She fears the new story reinforces elite power structures and anthropocentrism and thus environmental degradation. Alternatively, she promotes genuine wonder which occurs in experiences of the natural world. As Sideris focuses on the likely logical outcome of the assumptions and arguments of the new cosmologies, she does not investigate whether and how people react to these new myths. I suggest that methods of documentary studies, applied to popular book reviews on Amazon and Goodreads, shed light on the ramifications of the new cosmologies among the general public. While many reviewers exhibit attitudes and behaviors that would concern Sideris, responses are far from univocal. Using this case as a guide, I suggest that attention to the experience of laypeople could contribute productively to religion and science research in general.     

Preferences and Children's Use of Gender-Stereotyped Knowledge About Musical Instruments: Making Judgments About Other Children's Preferences

A developmental model of gender-stereotype acquisition (Martin, 1989) proposes that by the age of 8 years children draw upon information about gender-stereotyped interests as well as other children's sex when deciding how much other children would like different activities; younger children rely on sex only when making such decisions. We examined whether the judgments that children made about other children's preferences were different from those that they made about their own preferences for masculine and feminine musical instruments. Three hundred twelve children aged 8–9 years ranked 6 instruments in order of preference, and rated on a 4-point scale how much they would like to play each one. Children were then asked to decide how much other children would like to play each instrument. Only girls' own preferences for feminine instruments differed according to the gender-stereotyping of their most-preferred instrument. Judgments about how much other children would like masculine and feminine instruments did not differ according to those children's gender-stereotyped interest. Children made stereotypical predictions about the preferences of children of unknown sex who played either a masculine or feminine instrument. Implications for a theoretical account of the development of children's gender-stereotypes are discussed.     

心理契约:概念、理论模型以及最新发展研究

文章简要回顾了组织行为学中有关心理契约的系列研究,包括概念的提出,理论模型,分类及测量,探讨了该领域的主要理论体系及分歧、论辩焦点,对在新经济背景下心理契约的新变化．新发展以及相关研究做了阐述,并在最后对该领域理论发展的前景作了展望。     

Which Time for Eschatology? Relativity Theory,Local and Cosmic Times,and the End of the Universe

The aim of this article is to formulate the theological notions of the end and fulfilment of the universe before the background of relativity theory and cosmology, in particular the lack of a global passage of time. It argues that the “arrow” of time is a local phenomenon, linked essentially to recording objects. On this basis, it makes the case that the notions of a common end of all local times and of a final, timeless state of the universe are viable independently of a global direction of time.     

语言和音乐层级结构的加工

语言和音乐在呈现过程中, 小单元相互结合组成更大的单元, 最终形成层级结构。已有研究表明, 听者能够将连续的语流和音乐切分成层级结构, 并在大脑中形成层级表征。在感知基础之上, 听者还能将新出现的语言和音乐事件整合到层级结构之中, 形成连贯理解, 最终顺利地完成交流过程。未来研究应剖析边界线索在层级结构感知中的作用, 考察不同层级整合过程的影响因素, 进一步探索语言和音乐层级结构加工的关系。     

工会实践对员工工作幸福感的影响：基于工具-情感的双路径视角

日益僵化的传统管理手段、多元化的新生代员工利益诉求, 以及频发的企业劳资冲突, 导致中国基层工会在劳资关系中日趋式微, 进而陷入组织不愿投资、员工主动抛弃的双重困境。基于“工具-情感”双路径的视角和遵循“情境-认知”的逻辑框架, 为了在理论上和实证上回答“加强工会的实践效用能否给企业带来回报”这一问题, 拟通过在组织层次和个体层次测量工会实践的跨层次研究方法, 探讨工具性/情感性工会实践是否能够通过缓解劳资冲突提高员工工作幸福感这一理论问题, 并进一步研究在这一作用链上的边界条件。如此便揭示了基层工会在实现劳资双赢的实质性价值以及对员工幸福感的影响功效, 既是对管理科学“有良心研究”的伦理回应, 也是加强基层工会组织建设的重要策略。