A measurement model of women's behavioral risk taking.

The current study was designed to gain a better understanding of the nature of the relationship between substance use and sexual risk taking within a community sample of women (N = 1,004). Using confirmatory factor analysis, the authors examined the factor structure of sexual risk behaviors and substance use to determine whether they are best conceptualized as domains underlying a single, higher order, risk-taking propensity. A 2 higher order factor model (sexual risk behavior and substance use) provided the best fit to the data, suggesting that these 2 general risk domains are correlated but independent factors. Sensation seeking had large general direct effects on the 2 risk domains and large indirect effects on the 4 first-order factors and the individual indicators. Negative affect had smaller, yet still significant, effects. Impulsivity and anxiety were unrelated to sexual health risk domains.     

II—Jason Stanley

ABSTRACT The central claim is that Hornsby's argument that semantic knowledge is practical knowledge is based upon a false premise. I argue, contra Hornsby, that speakers do not voice their thoughts directly. Rather, our actions of voicing our thoughts are justified by decisions we make (albeit rapidly) about what words to use. Along the way, I raise doubts about other aspects of the thesis that semantic knowledge is practical knowledge.     

The epistemological objection to modal primitivism

Modal primitivists hold that some modal truths are primitively true. They thus seem to face a special epistemological problem: how can primitive modal truths be known? The epistemological objection has not been adequately developed in the literature. I undertake to develop the objection, and then to argue that the best formulation of the epistemological objection targets all realists about modality, rather than the primitivist alone. Furthermore, the moves available to reductionists in response to the objection are also available to primitivists. I conclude by suggesting that extant theories of the epistemology of modality are not sensitive to the question of primitivism versus reductionism.

     

The Dynamic Nature of Goals and Message Production as Revealed in a Sequential Analysis of Conflict Interactions

Although message‐production theories often assume that goals behave dynamically to direct communication behavior, few studies consider the interconnectedness of goals and behavior throughout interactions. Here, the interrelationship of communication goals and tactics was examined through a sequential analysis of 47 conflict interactions between close friends or dating partners. It was posited that for both the initiators and resistors in a conflict, the importance of relational or other‐identity goals would be associated with the use of integrative tactics and the importance of instrumental or self‐identity goals would be related to the use of distributive tactics. We examined these predictions within and across partners. Analyses indicated that for both conflict initiators and resistors, the importance of a combination self/instrumental goal predicted the use of distributive tactics and the importance of an other‐identity goal lead to partner‐oriented tactics. For resistors, the importance of an instrumental goal was associated with the use of distributive tactics and the importance of a combination identity/relational goal was aligned with issue‐oriented tactics as well. Across partners, several significant patterns between one partner’s use of distributive or integrative tactics and the other partner’s goals were observed. Implications of the results for understanding conflict and message production are discussed.     

Selective impairment of phonation: A case study

A 47-year-old right-handed man underwent craniotomy for clipping of an aneurism at the trifurcation of the left middle cerebral artery. Subsequently, he suffered a left hemisphere CVA after which his speech and language resembled that of Broca's aphasia with accompanying apraxia of speech. Medical, behavioral, and acoustical data amassed over a period of several months indicated numerous contraindications to traditional diagnoses of Broca's aphasia, apraxia of speech, and dysarthria. Ultimately, it was determined that the patient had a selective impairement of phonation or laryngeal apraxia. This was illustrated dramatically when he was taught to use an electrolarynx which allowed him to bypass his disrupted phonatory system. Speaking with the electrolarynx, the patient communicated normally. Any semblance of Broca's aphasia disappeared. Supralaryngeal articulation was normal; apraxia of speech behaviors were absent. This case report indicates that dissociation of oral and laryngeal gestures due to brain injury is possible. Mechanisms underlying such a dissociation for this case are reviewed. The possibility of discrete center lesions in the frontal motor association area causing different types of apraxia of speech is discussed.     

Effects of Pointing Rate and Availability of Visual Feedback on Visual and Proprioceptive Components of Prism Adaptation

While looking through laterally displacing prisms, subjects pointed 60 times straight ahead of their nose at a rate of one complete movement every 2 or 3 s, with visual feedback available early in the pointing movement or delayed until the end of the movement. Sagittal pointing was paced such that movement speed covaried with pointing rate. Aftereffect measures (obtained after every 10 pointing trials) showed that when the limb became visible early in a pointing movement, proprioceptive adaptation was greater than visual, but when visual feedback was delayed until the end of the movement, the reverse was true. This effect occurred only with the 3-s pointing rate, however. With the 2-s pointing rate, adaptation was predominately proprioceptive in nature, regardless of feedback availability. Independent of the availability of visual feedback, visual adaptation developed more quickly with 3-s pointing, whereas proprioceptive adaptation developed more rapidly with 2-s pointing. These results are discussed in terms of a model of perceptual-motor organization in which the direction of coordinative (guidance) linkage between eye-head (visual) and hand-head (proprioceptive) systems (and consequently the locus of discordance registration and adaptive recalibration) is determined jointly by pointing rate and feedback availability. An additional effect of pointing rate is to determine the rate of discordant inputs. Maximal adaptive recalibration occurs when the input (pointing) rate matches the time constant of the adaptive encoder in the guided system.