Landmark Frames of Reference in Interactive Route Description Tasks

The current study investigated the use of frames of reference in an asymmetrical spatial dialogue task. Participants navigated through a real environment by following instructions provided by other participants guiding them over the phone. The dialogues were transcribed and analysed to locate the introduction of landmarks. We examined which frames of reference were used to introduce these landmarks and how far their use was determined by each participant's role within the dyads (i.e. guide vs. guided person). Results revealed that both partners contributed to the dialogue by introducing landmarks. However, the guides introduced more landmarks than the guided persons and were also more likely to use perspective taking when doing so. These results are discussed in the light of perspective taking and collaboration in dialogue. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Capturing egocentric biases in reference reuse during collaborative dialogue

Words that are produced aloud—and especially self-produced ones—are remembered better than words that are not, a phenomenon labeled the production effect in the field of memory research. Two experiments were conducted to determine whether this effect can be generalized to dialogue, and how it might affect dialogue management. Triads (Exp. 1) or dyads (Exp. 2) of participants interacted to perform a collaborative task. Analyzing reference reuse during the interaction revealed that the participants were more likely to reuse the references that they had presented themselves, on the one hand, and those that had been accepted through verbatim repetition, on the other. Analyzing reference recall suggested that the greater accessibility of self-presented references was only transient. Moreover, among partner-presented references, those discussed while the participant had actively taken part in the conversation were more likely to be recalled than those discussed while the participant had been inactive. These results contribute to a better understanding of how individual memory processes might contribute to collaborative dialogue.     

La production et la compréhension de références dans les théories psychologiques actuelles du dialogue

Dialogue is a joint activity during which at least two partners interact in order to reach a common goal. Throughout the interaction, each speaker resorts to a number of processes, which contribute to dialogue success. Several theoretical approaches have been developed in order to account for these processes. Among these approaches, the collaborative approach can be considered as the most influent one in the field. This approach offers a global framework for dialogue by pointing out that interactively building up mutual knowledge allows partners to adapt to each other during the remainder of the interaction. This implies that speakers frequently resort to costly inferential processes to determine what their partner is likely to know and what he or she is also likely to ignore. However, this approach has seriously been challenged by the egocentric approach, which suggests that speakers sometimes fail to take into account their partners’ dialogic needs. Furthermore, recent work within this approach has pointed out that adaptation is not systematically necessary for dialogue to succeed – rather, individual processes at play within each speaker incidentally contribute to mutual understanding. The probabilistic approach offers a means to overcome the apparent discrepancy between collaboration and egocentrism by showing how the processes at play during reference production and comprehension may be simultaneously affected by both kinds of influences. Moreover, the relative weighting of each kind of influence depends on the characteristics of the dialogue situation per se: speakers are more or less likely to act collaboratively depending on the situation they find themselves in. Finally, the interactive alignment model offers a qualitatively different framework for dialogue, as it suggests that most dialogic behaviors can be accounted for by one single automatic process. The aim of the current review is to provide a thorough presentation of each of these approaches, and to determine to what extent they are compatible with each other, on one hand and how they differ, on the other. We also raise the question of the apparent easiness of dialogue, looking at how – according to each approach – speakers deal with the individual and collective costs inherent in dialogue. We finally point out a number of issues that remain to be addressed in this research field.     

On Trygve Braatøy’s concept of analytic love. An assumption on the actuality of one of the pioneers in Norwegian psychoanalysis

Is analysis still a cure of love? And is the analyst’s love and warm feelings for his patient a prerequisite for doing psychoanalysis? Trygve Braatøy addresses these complex matters in his book from 1954. The concept of love and its relation to sexuality is discussed, and how to understand love in the analytic setting. His points of view are compared with Freud’s and those of some second-generation analysts, his Norwegian colleagues and contemporary analysts, as well as modern writers. Braatøy defines himself as a true Freudian, but his clinical theory regarding love and countertransference has strong resemblances to Rank and Ferenczi and his followers, both in Europe and USA. Braatøy sums up that the therapist’s capacity to love and have a surplus of warmth ought to be the most prominent factor when selecting candidates for psychoanalytic training. Braatøy is a modern writer, with his ideas founded on clinical experience and intuition.     

Children with autism are impaired in the understanding of teaching

Children learn novel information using various methods, and one of the most common is human pedagogical communication or teaching – the purposeful imparting of information from one person to another. Neuro‐typically developing (TD) children gain the ability to recognize and understand teaching as a core method for acquiring knowledge from others. However, it is not known when children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) acquire the ability to recognize and understand teaching. This study (total N = 70) examined whether children with ASD recognize the two central elements that define teaching: (1) that teaching is an intentional activity; and (2) that teaching requires a knowledge difference between teacher and learner. Theory of mind understanding was also tested. Compared to individually matched TD children, high cognitively functioning children with ASD were impaired in their comprehension of both components of teaching understanding, and their performance was correlated with theory of mind understanding. These findings could have broad implications for explaining learning in children with autism, and could help in designing more effective interventions, which could ultimately lead to improved learning outcomes for everyday life skills, school performance, health, and overall well‐being.     

Beliefs About Tobacco, Health, and Addiction Among Adults in Cambodia: Findings from a National Survey

There remains a very high rate of smoked and smokeless tobacco use in the Western Pacific Region. The most recent findings from national adult tobacco surveys indicate that very few daily users of tobacco intend to quit tobacco use. In Cambodia, a nation that is predominantly Buddhist, faith-based tobacco control programs have been implemented where, under the fifth precept of Buddhism that proscribes addictive behaviors, monks were encouraged to quit tobacco and temples have been declared smoke-free. In the present study, we included items on a large national tobacco survey to examine the relation between beliefs (faith-based, other) about tobacco, health, and addiction among adults (18 years and older). In a stratified, multistage cluster sample (n = 13,988) of all provinces of Cambodia, we found that (1) 88–93% believe that Buddhist monks should not use tobacco, buy tobacco, or be offered tobacco during a religious ceremony; (2) 86–93% believe that the Wat (temple) should be a smoke-free area; (3) 93–95% believe that tobacco is addictive in the same way as habits (opium, gambling, alcohol) listed under the fifth precept of Buddhism; and (4) those who do not use tobacco are significantly more likely to cite a Buddhist principle as part of their anti-tobacco beliefs. These data indicate that anti-tobacco sentiments are highly prevalent in the Buddhist belief system of Cambodian adults and are especially evident among non-users of tobacco. Our findings indicate that faith-based initiatives could be an effective part of anti-tobacco campaigns in Cambodia.