The Cognitive Relation in a Formal Setting

This paper proposes a formal framework for the cognitive relation understood as an ordered pair with the cognitive subject and object of cognition as its members. The cognitive subject is represented as consisting of a language, conequence relation and a stock of accepted theories, and the object as a model of those theories. This language allows a simple formulation of the realism/anti-realism controversy. In particular, Tarski’s undefinability theorem gives a philosophical argument for realism in epistemology. Special Issue Formal Epistemology II. Edited by Branden Fitelson     

整体-局部范式下的负启动效应

在通常的负启动范式基础上 ,以小数字构成的大数字 ,即以同时具有整体特征和局部特征的复合数字为实验材料 ,采用数字命名任务 ,将刺激画面中复合数字的数目和注意指向作为变量进行实验。大学生充任被试。结果发现 ,在单个复合数字条件下对同一客体的非注意指向的特征进行忽略重复 ,注意整体时出现负启动 ,而注意局部时不出现负启动 ;在两个复合数字条件下对启动刺激中充当干扰项的复合数字进行忽略重复 ,则注意整体与注意局部都出现了负启动。该研究表明 ,在不同注意指向时 ,整体 -局部范式下的负启动效应具有知觉组织的层次性 ,并显示出客体内选择和客体间选择对负启动的不同影响。     

EFFECTS OF A VARIABLE-RATIO REINFORCEMENT SCHEDULE WITH CHANGING CRITERIA ON EXERCISE IN OBESE AND NONOBESE BOYS

The effects of a variable-ratio schedule of reinforcement on pedaling a stationary exercise bicycle were examined. Three obese and three nonobese 11-year-old boys were individually tested five times weekly for approximately 12 weeks. A changing-criterion design was used in which each successive criterion was increased over mean performance rate in the previous phase by approximately 15%. The contingencies of the successive criteria resulted in systematic increases in rate of exercise for all children. Final variable-ratio rates were higher than those under fixed ratios found in previous research, with rates for 2 of the 3 obese boys approximating those of the nonobese.     

Development of manipulatory skills and the deployment of attention

Two independent tasks, object manipulation and auditory-visual matching, were used to examine the relationship between developing manual action skills and attention to intermodal object properties in 3.5- and 5.5-month-olds. Although handling skills improved with age, with older infants demonstrating more varied manipulation, there were no age differences for the matching task. When grouped by handling skills, a significant interaction between skill and event type was found for the two age groups combined and for 5.5-month-olds alone. Auditory-visual matching of social events did not vary with handling skills, whereas auditory-visualmatching of object events did. Infants at higher skill levels responded similarly to social and object events, whereas less skilled infants' matching preferences were weaker for object events. These findings indicate that infants increase their attention to auditory and visual properties of objects as this information becomes useful for guiding new actions. This effect is independent of age due to considerable individual variability in the development of object handling skills.     

Cognitive influences on cross-language speech perception in infancy

Previous research has shown that young infants can discriminate both native and nonnative phonetic contrasts with ease. By 10 to 12 months of age, however, infants—like adults—typically have difficulty discriminating consonant contrasts that are not used to distinguish meaning in their native language. Although the timing of this change in speech perception has been firmly established, little is currently known about the processes or mechanisms involved in this selective and adaptive reorganization in nonnative phonetic discrimination. This study was designed to determine if there is a relation between age-related changes in speech perception performance and other developing cognitive abilities. A total of 40 8- to 10-month-old infants were tested on a nonnative consonant discrimination task and then on two additional tasks (a visual categorization task and an object search task) in an attempt to determine whether changes in nonnative consonant perception coincide with changes in these other areas of cognitive/perceptual functioning. The results indicate that changes in task performance occur in synchrony across all three tasks, and that this synchrony is not explained by simple age effects. These findings suggest that domain-general cognitive/perceptual competencies may influence developmental changes in speech perception by the end of the 1st year of life.     

Destructive and reparative transference in multiple levels of group psychotherapy

Group members are challenged to form psychologically meaningful relationships with therapists, other members, and the group as a whole. The way in which individuals perceive this challenge is based on their past experiences. Early relationships establish a perceptual frame in which fears of being hurt and concern about hurting others coexist. Balance between these two ways of generating meaning enables individuals to form relatively healthy relationships. Imbalance in this perceptual frame results in distorted perceptions and maladaptive patterns emerging as transference manifestations. Working through involves repeatedly addressing distortions as members relate to therapists, others and the group as a whole.     

Farting as a defence against unspeakable dread

This paper describes some features of the behaviour of a severely disturbed adopted latency boy. Peter was born premature, suffered several early hospitalizations and surgical operations, and at 2 months of age was removed from his mother's care by Social Services for neglect and abandonment.
Although his subsequent development has been clouded by a series of losses and sudden changes of caregivers, Peter has maintained an unexpected desire to relate, showing considerable innate resilience. When feeling endangered, Peter had developed a defensive olfactive container using his bodily smell and farts to envelop himself in a protective cloud of familiarity against the dread of falling apart, and to hold his personality together.
In the paper Fordham's views of development and Anzieu's concept of psychic envelopes constitute the theoretical underpinning. Bion's concepts of beta- and alpha-elements are discussed in relation to Jung's views on symbolic development and psychological containment.     

Relations between baseline contingencies and equivalence probe performances

Following the emergence of two three-member equivalence classes (A1B1C1 and A2B2C2), 5 college students were exposed to one or more changes in the reinforcement contingencies controlling baseline conditional discriminations. AC relations were either reversed (i.e., C2 was reinforced and C1 punished when A1 was the sample; C1 was reinforced and C2 punished when A2 was the sample) or arranged randomly (i.e., C2 and C1 were reinforced and punished equally often in the presence of A1 and A2). In a third condition, the original AB and AC relations were reversed. Results showed that although baseline conditional discrimination performances were under the control of reinforcement contingencies, and performances on symmetry trials varied with baseline responding for 3 of 4 subjects when contingencies were reversed, performances on transitivity probes remained consistent with the initial equivalence class. These inconsistencies between probe and baseline performances were striking because conditional discriminations are thought to be the determinants of equivalence class performance. Similarly, the contrast between performances on symmetry and transitivity probes was of theoretical interest because equivalence classes are defined by congruent patterns of responding on probe trials.     

SCIENTISM, INTERPRETATION, AND CRITICISM

Abstract. What is the relationship between natural science, social science, and religion? The dominant paradigm in contemporary social science is scientism, the attempt to apply the methods of natural science to the study of society. However, scientism is problematic: it rests on a conception of natural science that cannot be sustained. Natural scientific understanding emerges from an instrumental and objectifying relation to the world; it is oriented toward control and manipulation of the physical world. Social-scientific understanding, by contrast, must begin with a practical and meaningful relation to the world: it is oriented toward the mediation of values and objective possibilities in the social world. Social science is therefore a form of practical reason based on objective claims. But while social-scientific understanding starts with interpretation, its possibilities by no means end there. In particular, by developing abstract and objectified models of society as a system, social science opens existing social organization to critical reflection. Religion, by contrast, is a form of speculative reason about ultimate values, based on subjective claims of religious experience. Social science nevertheless shares with religion an orientation toward values and concern with the “good life.”