Thinking About a Word—Love,for Example

What is it we do when we philosophize about a word? How are we to act as we ask the philosophical question par excellence, “What is … ?” These questions are addressed here with particular focus on Troy Jollimore's Love's Vision and contemporary theories of love. Jollimore's rationalist account of love, based on a specific understanding of “reasons for love,” illustrates a particular philosophical mistake: When we think about a word, we are prone to believe that even though “the sense of the word” that we investigate may be up for grabs, the other words we use when we do these investigations are not. Jollimore's exploration of love is guided by specific conceptions of “reasons” and “rationality” that remain unquestioned. The article argues that we may have to rethink a great number of words as we embark on the task of uncovering the sense of one word.     

Working with Research Integrity—Guidance for Research Performing Organisations: The Bonn PRINTEGER Statement

This document presents the Bonn PRINTEGER Consensus Statement: Working with Research Integrity—Guidance for research performing organisations. The aim of the statement is to complement existing instruments by focusing specifically on institutional responsibilities for strengthening integrity. It takes into account the daily challenges and organisational contexts of most researchers. The statement intends to make research integrity challenges recognisable from the work-floor perspective, providing concrete advice on organisational measures to strengthen integrity. The statement, which was concluded February 7th 2018, provides guidance on the following key issues:

1. § 1.
   Providing information about research integrity
    
2. § 2.
   Providing education, training and mentoring
    
3. § 3.
   Strengthening a research integrity culture
    
4. § 4.
   Facilitating open dialogue
    
5. § 5.
   Wise incentive management
    
6. § 6.
   Implementing quality assurance procedures
    
7. § 7.
   Improving the work environment and work satisfaction
    
8. § 8.
   Increasing transparency of misconduct cases
    
9. § 9.
   Opening up research
    
10. § 10.
    Implementing safe and effective whistle-blowing channels
     
11. § 11.
    Protecting the alleged perpetrators
     
12. § 12.
    Establishing a research integrity committee and appointing an ombudsperson
     
13. § 13.
    Making explicit the applicable standards for research integrity
     

     

Forecasting “friends forever”: A longitudinal investigation of sustained closeness between best friends

Using data collected across 19 years, the chief goal of this study was to discover predictors of continued relational closeness between best friends. Participants were same‐sex and cross‐sex best friend pairs recruited from a small Midwestern college. In 1983, participants completed several tests and activities designed to assess facets of intimacy, with follow‐up studies in 1987 and 2002 measuring relational closeness. Regression analysis indicates that both manifest similarity and months of closeness in 1983 are associated with relational closeness in 2002. These results suggest that the investment of resources in the friendship and similarity between friends facilitate friendship longevity and that Kelley et al.’s (1983) conceptualization of closeness as related to interdependence is empirically robust.     

Coding counsellor behaviour in motivational interviewing sessions: inter-rater reliability for the Swedish Motivational Interviewing Treatment Integrity Code (MITI)

The aim of this study was to evaluate inter-rater reliability when using the Swedish version of the Motivational Interviewing Treatment Code (MITI) as an adjunct to MI training, clinical practice and research. Coders were trained to use the MITI for scoring taped sessions. The 4-month basic training had a duration of 39 hours. Following training, 60 audio-taped live interviews were randomly assigned for MITI coding. Mean intra-class correlation (ICC) coefficients were calculated for 7 coders across all pairs of coders. Cronbach's alpha was calculated to estimate the covariance between each pair across their common interviews. Six months later, a second inter-rater reliability test was performed, when 5 coders coded the same 15 randomly selected tapes. At the second reliability testing the mean ICC was 0.81 and the mean Cronbach's alpha was 0.96. However, the ICC varied for different sub-variables of the MITI, ranging from 0.42 empathy to 0.79 for number of Closed questions. In conclusion, MITI shows promising potential to be a reliable tool to confirm and enhance MI training as well as practice in clinical settings and in evaluating MI integrity in clinical MI research. However, coder assessment of empathy and MI-spirit, "global" variables, requires further refinement.     

Measuring desire for control of health care processes

We conducted three known-groups studies to obtain discriminant validity information among potential self-report measures of the construct desire for control over health care processes. In the first study we looked at types of preparation for childbirth; in Studies 2 and 3 we investigated choice of a place in which to die and signing a Living Will. With none of the measures could we adequately distinguish those who had signed a Living Will (or intended to) from those who did not intend to sign one. The best discriminator of a choice of a place to die (hospital vs. home or hospice) and type of preparation for childbirth (Lamaze vs. other types of classes vs. no classes) was the Information subscale of Krantz's Health Opinion Survey (KHOS; Krantz, Baum, & Wideman, 1980). With the Behavioral Involvement subscale of the KHOS and our newly designed situation-specific measure of desire for control, we could only inconsistently discriminate among the groups. The generalized measure, Burger and Cooper's (1979) Desire for Control Scale, did not help us to discriminate among these groups. Correlations of these measures with demographic variables are provided and discussed.     

Why does visual working memory ability improve with age: More objects,more feature detail,or both? A registered report

We investigated how visual working memory (WM) develops with age across the early elementary school period (6–7 years), early adolescence (11–13 years), and early adulthood (18–25 years). The work focuses on changes in two parameters: the number of objects retained at least in part, and the amount of feature-detail remembered for such objects. Some evidence suggests that, while infants can remember up to three objects, much like adults, young children only remember around two objects. This curious, nonmonotonic trajectory might be explained by differences in the level of feature-detail required for successful performance in infant versus child/adult memory paradigms. Here, we examined if changes in one of two parameters (the number of objects, and the amount of detail retained for each object) or both of them together can explain the development of visual WM ability as children grow older. To test it, we varied the amount of feature-detail participants need to retain. In the baseline condition, participants saw an array of objects and simply were to indicate whether an object was present in a probed location or not. This phase begun with a titration procedure to adjust each individual's array size to yield about 80% correct. In other conditions, we tested memory of not only location but also additional features of the objects (color, and sometimes also orientation). Our results suggest that capacity growth across ages is expressed by both improved location-memory (whether there was an object in a location) and feature completeness of object representations.     

Standardisation in the Field of Nanotechnology: Some Issues of Legitimacy

Nanotechnology will allegedly have a revolutionary impact in a wide range of fields, but has also created novel concerns about health, safety and the environment (HSE). Nanotechnology regulation has nevertheless lagged behind nanotechnology development. In 2004 the International Organization for Standardization established a technical committee for producing nanotechnology standards for terminology, measurements, HSE issues and product specifications. These standards are meant to play a role in nanotechnology development, as well as in national and international nanotechnology regulation, and will therefore have consequences for consumers, workers and the environment. This paper gives an overview of the work in the technical committee on nanotechnology and discusses some challenges with regard to legitimacy in such work. The paper focuses particularly on stakeholder involvement and the potential problems of scientific robustness when standardising in such early stages of the scientific development. The intention of the paper is to raise some important issues rather than to draw strong conclusions. However, the paper will be concluded with some suggestions for improving legitimacy in the TC 229 and a call for increased public awareness about standardisation in the field of nanotechnology.     

Facilitating Ethical Reflection Among Scientists Using the Ethical Matrix

Several studies have indicated that scientists are likely to have an outlook on both facts and values that are different to that of lay people in important ways. This is one significant reason it is currently believed that in order for scientists to exercise a reliable ethical reflection about their research it is necessary for them to engage in dialogue with other stakeholders. This paper reports on an exercise to encourage a group of scientists to reflect on ethical issues without the presence of external stakeholders. It reports on the use of a reflection process with scientists working in the area of animal disease genomics (mainly drawn from the EADGENE EC Network of Excellence). This reflection process was facilitated by using an ethical engagement framework, a modified version of the Ethical Matrix. As judged by two criteria, a qualitative assessment of the outcomes and the participants’ own assessment of the process, this independent reflective exercise was deemed to be successful. The discussions demonstrated a high level of complexity and depth, with participants demonstrating a clear perception of uncertainties and the context in which their research operates. Reflection on stakeholder views and values appeared to be embedded within the discussions. The finding from this exercise seems to indicate that even without the involvement of the wider stakeholder community, valuable reflection and worthwhile discourse can be generated from ethical reflection processes involving only scienitific project partners. Hence, the previous assumption that direct stakeholder engagement is necessary for ethical reflection does not appear to hold true in all cases; however, other reasons for involving a broad group of stakeholders relating to governance and social accountability of science remain.     

Standardising Responsibility? The Significance of Interstitial Spaces

Modern society is characterised by rapid technological development that is often socially controversial and plagued by extensive scientific uncertainty concerning its socio-ecological impacts. Within this context, the concept of ‘responsible research and innovation’ (RRI) is currently rising to prominence in international discourse concerning science and technology governance. As this emerging concept of RRI begins to be enacted through instruments, approaches, and initiatives, it is valuable to explore what it is coming to mean for and in practice. In this paper we draw attention to a realm that is often backgrounded in the current discussions of RRI but which has a highly significant impact on scientific research, innovation and policy—namely, the interstitial space of international standardization. Drawing on the case of nanoscale sciences and technologies to make our argument, we present examples of how international standards are already entangled in the development of RRI and yet, how the process of international standardization itself largely fails to embody the norms proposed as characterizing RRI. We suggest that although current models for RRI provide a promising attempt to make research and innovation more responsive to societal needs, ethical values and environmental challenges, such approaches will need to encompass and address a greater diversity of innovation system agents and spaces if they are to prove successful in their aims.