V. M. BEKHTEREV IN RUSSIAN CHILD SCIENCE, 1900S–1920S: “OBJECTIVE PSYCHOLOGY”/“REFLEXOLOGY” AS A SCIENTIFIC MOVEMENT

In the early 20^th century the child population became a major focus of scientific, professional and public interest. This led to the crystallization of a dynamic field of child science, encompassing developmental and educational psychology, child psychiatry and special education, school hygiene and mental testing, juvenile criminology and the anthropology of childhood. This article discusses the role played in child science by the eminent Russian neurologist and psychiatrist Vladimir Mikhailovich Bekhterev. The latter's name is associated with a distinctive program for transforming the human sciences in general and psychology in particular that he in the 1900s labelled “objective psychology” and from the 1910s renamed “reflexology.” The article examines the equivocal place that Bekhterev's “objective psychology” and “reflexology” occupied in Russian/Soviet child science in the first three decades of the 20^th century. While Bekhterev's prominence in this field is beyond doubt, analysis shows that “objective psychology” and “reflexology” had much less success in mobilizing support within it than certain other movements in this arena (for example, “experimental pedagogy” in the pre‐revolutionary era); it also found it difficult to compete with the variety of rival programs that arose within Soviet “pedology” during the 1920s. However, this article also demonstrates that the study of child development played a pivotal role in Bekhterev's program for the transformation of the human sciences: it was especially important to his efforts to ground in empirical phenomena and in concrete research practices a new ontology of the psychological, which, the article argues, underpinned “objective psychology”/“reflexology” as a transformative scientific movement.     

Pressing the Flesh: A Tension in the Study of the Embodied,Embedded Mind?*

Mind, it is increasingly fashionable to assert, is an intrinsically embodied and environmentally embedded phenomenon. But there is a potential tension between two strands of thought prominent in this recent literature. One of those strands depicts the body as special, and the fine details of a creature’s embodiment as a major constraint on the nature of its mind: a kind of new‐wave body‐centrism. The other depicts the body as just one element in a kind of equal‐partners dance between brain, body and world, with the nature of the mind fixed by the overall balance thus achieved: a kind of extended functionalism (now with an even broader canvas for multiple realizability than ever before). The present paper displays the tension, scouts the space of possible responses, and ends by attempting to specify what the body actually needs to be, given its complex role in these recent debates.     

Exploring the Effects of the Naturalistic Fallacy: Evidence That Genetic Explanations Increase the Acceptability of Killing and Male Promiscuity

The naturalistic fallacy is the erroneous belief that what is natural is morally acceptable. Two studies assessed whether people commit the naturalistic fallacy by testing whether genetic explanations for killing and male promiscuity, as compared to experiential explanations (i.e., learning/“nurture” explanations) increase acceptance of these behaviors. In Study 1, participants who read a genetic explanation for why people kill bugs viewed bug killing as more morally acceptable than participants who read an experiential explanation, although they did not reliably kill more bugs. In Study 2, men who read a genetic explanation for why men are more promiscuous than women reported decreased interest in long‐term romantic commitment compared with men who read experiential explanations and women who read either explanation.     

The Aesthetics of Imperfection Reconceived: Improvisations,Compositions, and Mistakes

Ted Gioia associated the “aesthetics of imperfection” with improvised music. In an earlier article, I extended it to all musical performance. This article reconceives my discussion, offering more precise analyses: (1) The aesthetics of imperfection is now argued to involve open, spontaneous response to contingencies of performance or production, reacting positively to idiosyncratic instruments; apparent failings in performance, and so on. Perfectionists, in contrast, prefer a planning model, not readily modified in face of contingencies. (2) Imperfection is not toleration of errors and imperfections, as Gioia assumes, but a positive aesthetic, as in Japanese wabi-sabi. Imperfections can become new styles or kinds of perfection—and so true imperfectionism is a constant striving for new contingencies to respond to. (3) A subtler, more complex relation between composition and improvisation is proposed, in which both have broad and narrow senses. Composition involves (a) works, usually desk produced and notated; or more generally, (b) putting things together in an aesthetically rewarding form. Thus, improvisation is a (broad sense) compositional method. (4) Improvisation and composition are interdependent; both involve structure and spontaneity. (5) Imperfectionism is an aesthetics of performance—of compositions as well as improvisations. Improvisation is no risker, or prone to mistakes, than performance of compositions.     

Connecting here and there: A model of long‐distance relationship maintenance

This study examines a model of long‐distance relationship maintenance. The model captures the relational cognition and communication partners enact before, during, and after periods of separation to sustain relational quality. Phase 1 of this study, through inductive analysis, identified 178 forms of maintenance. Phases 2 and 3 employed factor analysis and produced support for a 10‐factor model. Subsequent tests assessed how these factors predicted intimacy, satisfaction, and stress for long‐distance dating partners. Although several of the factors were significant predictors, the effects were not uniform. The strength and directionality of effects depended on the interactional style of partners' maintenance (i.e., intrapersonal, dyadic, or network) and the time of its enactment (i.e., before, during, or after periods of separation).     

Unfixing Design Fixation: From Cause to Computer Simulation

This paper argues that design fixation, in part, entails fixation at the level of meta‐representation, the representation of the relation between a representation and its reference. In this paper, we present a mathematical model that mimics the idea of how fixation can occur at the meta‐representation level. In this model, new abstract concepts derived from the meta‐representation are not simple combinations of the design ideas expressed in the primary representation. Instead, the process of meta‐representation corresponds to the abstraction of new features at a higher, hierarchically separated level of representation from an existing one. We show a computational process of pattern extraction from existing design representations that results in the crystallization of design ideas or ‘chunks’ at an abstract level. The relation between the representation and its referent is explicitly described in these ‘chunks’, yet the ‘chunks’ have different properties from the properties of the original representation.     

Gender-related personality traits and interpersonal resource exchange among brother—sister relationships

Brother-sister relationships are understudied within the field of personal relationships. Accordingly, the present study examines patterns of interpersonal resource exchange (drawing upon resource exchange theory; Foa & Foa, 1974), along with influences of gender-related personality traits (i.e., agency and communion) on individuals’giving of interpersonal resources (i.e., affection and respect), among 79 brother-sister pairs. Consistent with predictions, brothers’and sisters’exchanges of both affection and respect were positive and significant. Also, consistent with predictions, communion was a positive and significant predictor of respectful behavior among sisters. However, contrary to hypotheses, communion did not achieve or approach significance as a predictor of respectful behavior among brothers, nor did communion achieve or approach significance as a predictor of affectionate behavior among sisters or brothers Implications for the study of male-female relationships in general—and brother-sister relationships in particular—are discussed.     

A longitudinal analysis of financial loss,anxiety, destructive conflict,and relational maintenance

This study examined how destructive conflict behavior and relational maintenance behavior are linked to financial loss in adult romantic relationships. Based on conservation of resources (COR) theory, it was hypothesized that financial loss indirectly (through anxiety) predicts increased destructive conflict behavior and decreased relational maintenance behavior. Across three waves of data, results indicated that financial loss significantly predicted passive‐destructive conflict behavior (i.e., neglect) through anxiety. Financial loss did not, however, directly or indirectly predict active‐destructive conflict behavior (i.e., exit). Financial loss negatively predicted relational maintenance behavior, but that effect was found only from Wave 1 to Wave 2 and was not mediated by anxiety. Overall, results support COR theory and identify some of the specific relational consequences of financial difficulty.     

CONFLICT MANAGEMENT, EFFICACY, AND PERFORMANCE IN ORGANIZATIONAL TEAMS

The study empirically links conflict management literature with research on efficacy and organizational teams. Sixty-one self-managing teams with 489 employees were recruited from the production department of a leading electronic manufacturer. Structural equation analysis supports the model that a cooperative instead of competitive approach to conflict leads to conflict efficacy that in turn results in effective performance as measured by managers. Findings suggest how organizational teams can be prepared to make use of their autonomy to deal with problems and conflicts so that they are productive.