Blame game in private investigation reports: The case of Deloitte examination at Telenor VimpelCom

Business and public organisations hire fraud examiners to conduct private investigations when there is suspicion of misconduct or financial crime. Fraud examiners carry out their investigation based on a mandate. Often, individuals in the organisation are suspects. The blame game hypothesis is concerned with factors that cause blame attribution to some individuals but not to others. In this case study, only executives were blamed who had not disclosed corruption information to a major shareholder and to the chief executive officer.     

Meta-analysis of the reduced relative feedback frequency effect on motor learning and performance

A fundamental motor learning principle conveyed in textbooks is that augmented terminal feedback frequency differentially affects motor learning and performance. The guidance hypothesis predicts that relative to a reduced frequency of feedback, providing learners with feedback following every practice trial enhances practice performance but degrades subsequent motor learning. This change in effectiveness for each relative feedback frequency is called a reversal effect, and because it is thought that practice variables can have distinct impacts on learning and performance, delayed retention tests are considered the gold standard in motor learning research. The objectives of this meta-analysis were to a) synthesize the available evidence regarding feedback frequency, performance, and motor learning to test whether there are significant changes in effectiveness from acquisition and immediate retention to delayed retention, b) evaluate potential moderators of these effects, and c) investigate the potential influence of publication bias on this literature. We screened 1662 articles found in PubMed and PsycINFO databases as well as with reference tracing and a targeted author search. A final sample of 61 eligible papers were included in the primary analysis (k = 75, N = 2228). Results revealed substantial heterogeneity but no significant moderators, high levels of uncertainty, and no significant effect of reduced feedback frequency at any time point. Further, multilevel analyses revealed no evidence of a significant change in effect from acquisition or immediate retention to delayed retention. Z-curve analysis suggested the included studies were severely underpowered. These results suggest that robust evidence regarding feedback frequency and motor learning is lacking.     

语义关联性对重复知盲效应的影响：来自汉语成语的证据

重复知盲是在快速系列视觉呈现任务中对第二个重复刺激的加工缺陷。以汉语中反义字和成语为实验材料,采用全部报告任务,探讨刺激的语义关联性对重复知盲的影响。实验1以汉语单字为材料,采用单因素三水平（目标刺激之间的语义关系：无关、相同、相反）被试内设计,结果是重复字产生重复知盲效应,反义字产生语义启动效应。实验2以成语为材料,采用2（目标刺激之间的语义关系：相同、无关）×2（位置：前位置、后位置）设计,结果是语义关联性消解了重复知盲效应。结果表明：（1）反义字不产生重复知盲效应。（2）语义关联性消解成语中重复字的重复知盲效应。（3）实验结果支持竞争假设。     

论法官的角色伦理

法官的角色伦理研究是一个有别于法官职业道德研究的理论视角。法官是一个角色丛 ,包括了官员和司法者二重基本角色 ,所以 ,法官的角色伦理不只是对其作为一个职业者的规范 ,而是二重角色规范的综合体 ,它反映了社会对法官的综合道德评价。作为“官”的角色 ,它被赋予的特殊道德要求是公仆意识、廉洁和公正 ;作为司法者 ,其特殊的职业伦理是刚毅、谨慎和勤勉。法官角色伦理建设是以理性人与经验人的统一为人性假设前提的 ,其基本思路是立足于制度道德建设 ,加强思想道德教育 ,适度进行奖惩。总之 ,一个有别于法官职业道德的理论视角 ,对于法官的道德建设具有重大的理论意义和实践价值。     

Objective and epistemic gradability: Is the new angle on the Knobe effect empirically grounded?

According to the New Angle, any explanation of the Knobe effect must be gradable and asymmetric. It has been argued that only Hindriks’ approach meets both criteria. First, we argue that Holton’s hypothesis also meets the criteria. Second, we show that the authors are not justified in taking the criteria to be empirically justified. We have failed to replicate the asymmetry result in two experiments. Moreover, gradability can be objective or epistemic. We show that the New Angle presupposes objective gradability. In our experiments, the patterns of responses to questions about epistemic and objective gradability are the same, irrespective of whether the feature is objectively gradable (e.g., blameworthiness) or not (e.g., intentionality). Our results thus question the extent to which the New Angle is empirically grounded. Moreover, they raise doubt whether the answers to questions about epistemic and objective gradability can be taken at face value at all.

Abbreviations: NRH - normative reasons hypothesis; NVH - norm violation hypothesis; DQ - degree question; DAQ - degree of agreement question     

Countering anti-Muslim attitudes among Christian and religiously unaffiliated 13- to 15-year-old students in England and Wales: testing the contact hypothesis

ABSTRACT

Drawing on data provided by 5,811 students from schools in England, Wales, and London who self-identified as either ‘no religion’ or as Christian, this study explored the effect of the contact hypothesis (having friends who are Muslims) on scores recorded on the seven-item Scale of Anti-Muslim Attitude (SAMA), after controlling for type of school (with or without a religious character), location (England, Wales, and London), personal factors (sex and age), psychological factors (extraversion, neuroticism, and psychoticism) and religious factors (self-assigned affiliation as Christian, worship attendance, and belief in God). The data demonstrated the positive effect of having friends who are Muslim on lowering anti-Muslim attitudes. The path is then described from educational research to curriculum development in the design of resources that offer young learners vicarious experience of having friends who are Muslims.     

Happiness in modern society: Why intelligence and ethnic composition matter

Recent developments in evolutionary psychology suggest that living among others of the same ethnicity might make individuals happier and further that such an effect of the ethnic composition on life satisfaction may be stronger among less intelligent individuals. Data from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health showed that White Americans had significantly greater life satisfaction than all other ethnic groups in the US and this was largely due to the fact that they were the majority ethnic group; minority Americans who lived in counties where they were the numerical majority had just as much life satisfaction as White Americans did. Further, the association between ethnic composition and life satisfaction was significantly stronger among less intelligent individuals. The results suggest two important factors underlying life satisfaction and highlight the utility of integrating happiness research and evolutionary psychology.     

The relationships between quantity‐number competencies,working memory,and phonological awareness in 5‐ and 6‐year‐olds

In this study, the interdependencies among phonological awareness, verbal working memory components, and early numerical skills in children 1 year before school entry are addressed. Early numerical skills were conceptualized as quantity‐number competencies (QNC) at both basic (QNC Level 1) and advanced (QNC Level 2) levels. In a sample of 1,343 children aged 5 and 6, structural equation modelling provided support for the isolated number words hypothesis (Krajewski & Schneider, 2009, J. Exp. Child Psychol., 103, 516–531). This hypothesis claims that phonological awareness contributes to the acquisition of QNC Level 1, such as learning the number word sequence, but not of QNC Level 2, which requires the linkage of number words to quantities. In addition, phonological awareness relied on verbal working memory, especially with regard to the phonological loop, central executive, and episodic buffer. The results were congruent with the idea that phonological awareness mediates the impact of verbal working memory on QNCs. The relationships between verbal working memory, phonological awareness, and QNCs were comparable in monolingual and bilingual children.     

Attentional focus effects on joint covariation in a reaching task

Adopting an external focus of attention (EF) has been found beneficial over internal focus (IF) for performing motor skills. Previous studies primarily examined focus of attention (FOA) effects on performance outcomes (such as error and accuracy), with relatively less emphasis on movement coordination. Given that human movements are kinematically and kinetically abundant (Gefland & Latash, 1998), FOA instructions may change how motor abundance is utilized by the CNS. This study applied the uncontrolled manifold analysis (UCM) to address this question in a reaching task. Healthy young adults (N = 38; 22 ± 1 yr; 7 men, 31 women) performed planar reaching movements to a target using either the dominant or nondominant arm under two different FOA instructions: EF and IF. Reaching was performed without online visual feedback and at a preferred pace. Joint angles of the clavicle-scapula, shoulder, elbow, and wrist were recorded, and their covariation for controlling dowel endpoint position was analyzed via UCM. As expected, IF led to a higher mean radial error than EF, driven by increases in aiming bias and variability. Consistent with this result, the UCM analysis showed that IF led to higher goal-relevant variance among the joints (V_ORT) compared to EF starting from the first 20% of the reach to the end. However, the goal-irrelevant variance (V_UCM)—index of joint variance that does not affect the end-effector position—did not show FOA effects. The index of stability of joint coordination with respect to endpoint position (ΔV) was also not different between the EF and IF. Consistent with the constrained action hypothesis, these results provide evidence that IF disrupted goal-relevant joint covariation starting in the early phases of the reach without affecting goal-irrelevant coordination.