Knowing how to look predicts the ability to draw realistically

Some young children are able to create stunningly realistic drawings resembling those of adult artists. What perceptual abilities underlie this talent? This study examined two candidate skills on which adult artists excel: the ability to segment a complex form mentally (measured by the Block Design Task) and the ability to see hidden forms (measured by the Group Embedded Figures Test). Sixty‐seven 6‐ to 13‐year‐olds with a wide range of drawing abilities completed these tasks as well as an IQ test and an observational drawing task. While children who scored high on drawing realism outperformed those who scored low in drawing realism on both perceptual tasks, only detection of embedded figures predicted drawing realism. This occurred independently of age, gender, years of training, and verbal and non‐verbal IQ. There are certainly many contributors to this complex ability, but one component appears to be the tendency to see things more as they really are and thereby recognize the continuous contour of an object despite interference from other overlapping objects.     

语篇阅读理解中人物性格模型的建构

采用实时窗口阅读技术,通过操纵特征段落性质和屏蔽段落长度两个变量,探讨人物性格模型在语篇阅读中的建构和影响因素。在研究所用材料中,特征段落描述能反映主人公性格的典型行为或不能反映其性格的一般行为,使其与目标句分别形成冲突或无关关系,考察读者能否利用这些内隐式的行为描述建构人物的性格模型。同时,改变屏蔽段落长度,形成局部或整体联贯两种条件,考察不同联贯类型的影响作用。结果发现：在不论整体还是局部联贯条件下,读者均能利用内隐的行为描述建构人物性格模型,并能应用该模型预期人物的后续行为。     

"Demographic Futures for Christianity and the World Religions"

Abstract :  Since before 1970 Christian researchers have been tracking the massive demographic shift of Christianity to the Southern Hemisphere and noting the increasingly religious nature of populations around the world. At the same time, writers on the future of religion have been drawn to extreme portrayals of decline or revival of religion. However, the world's religious situation is replete with detailed information, drawn from enormous data collections on religious affiliation and questions about religion in government censuses. Quantitative tools, utilizing this information in the context of demography provide a more nuanced view of humankind's religious future. Demographic trends coupled with conservative estimates of conversions and defections envision over 80% of the world's population will continue to be affiliated with religions 200 years into the future. This religious future will have a profound influence on Christian theology, relations between religions, and the interaction between religion and politics.     

Cosmopolitanism and Global Justice

Philosophical attention to problems about global justice is flourishing in a way it has not in any time in memory. This paper considers some reasons for the rise of interest in the subject and reflects on some dilemmas about the meaning of the idea of the cosmopolitan in reasoning about social institutions, concentrating on the two principal dimensions of global justice, the economic and the political.Opening address of the Mini-Conference on Global Justice, American Philosophical Association Pacific Division, 2004 Annual Meeting, Pasadena, California, March 27, 2004. I am grateful for comments to Darrel Moellendorf and to my copanelists Michael Blake, Kristen Hessler, Jon Mandle, Mathias Risse and Leif Wenar.     

Local and global processing: observations from a remote culture

In Experiment 1, a normal adult population drawn from a remote culture (Himba) in northern Namibia made similarity matches to [Navon, D. (1977). Forest before trees: The precedence of global features in visual perception. Cognitive Psychology, 9, 353-383] hierarchical figures. The Himba showed a local bias stronger than that has been previously observed in any other non-clinical human population. However, in Experiment 2, their recognition of normal or distorted ("Thatcherized") faces did not appear to have been affected by their attention to detail as has been suggested for autistic populations. The data are consistent with a cultural/experiential origin for population differences in local processing and suggest that attention to the local and global properties of stimuli may differ for hierarchical figures and faces.     

时间修饰词内隐记忆的实验研究

用词汇线索联想的内隐记忆实验范型,对48个时间修饰词进行概念启动效应的实验研究,探讨时间修饰词内隐记忆的特点和内隐时间表征存在的可能性。结果表明：学过的词和末学过的词之间词汇线索联想的启动值有显著差异;词汇线索联想和词汇线索回忆两种作业平均击中率的差异效应显著;被试完成两种作业依据的判定标准依次为：词的意义、词的时间属性(长度、时间单位)、过去生活经验等。对时间修饰词的内隐表征进行了初步讨论。     

Education for Citizenship in an Era of Global Connection

Higher education makes an importantcontribution to citizenship. In the UnitedStates, the required portion of the ``liberalarts education' in colleges and universitiescan be reformed so as to equip students for thechallenges of global citizenship. The paperadvocates focusing on three abilities: theSocratic ability to critize one's owntraditions and to carry on an argument on termsof mutual respect for reason; (2) the abilityto think as a citizen of the whole world, notjust some local region or group; and (3) the``narrative imagination,' the ability to imaginewhat it would be like to be in the position ofsomeone very different from oneself. The paperdiscusses the role of the ``liberal arts'curriculum in U.S. education and asks howEuropean universities, with their differentstructure, might promote these three abilities.     

Beyond the Crisis of the Globalized “World System”: the Need For a New Civil Society

In my view, we need a sociological analysis to show how the crisis stemmed from a certain set-up of the so-called global society. Such a set-up is the product of a long historical development, which goes beyond the financial crisis’ outbreak in 2008. The question I ask is the following: from a sociological standpoint, why did this crisis break out? And what remedies can be put in place? The measures adopted these days cannot solve the crisis, but, for a number of reasons, they can at most provide temporary stoppers and remedies.     

右侧基底节损伤遗忘症患者的知觉性启动效应与语义性启动效应的分离与定位

采用偏好、自由联想、字根补笔和字辨认等4项任务观察一例单纯性右侧基底节损伤遗忘症患者和两组正常对照的启动效应。结果发现：（1）该患者知觉性启动效应障碍,而语义性启动效应正常。认为知觉性启动效应的神经学基础可能在基底节。（2）该患者知觉性启动效应与语义性启动效应分离。认为神经组织的损伤可导致不同形式启动效应的分离,提出内隐记忆或启动效应的不同形式可能存在不同的神经学基础。