Heimat und das Fremde

Ohne ZusammenfassungKyushu Dental CollegeIch danke der Heinrich-Herz-Stiftung des Landes Nordrhein-Westfalen für die Finanzierung eines Forschungsaufenthalts in Wuppertal sowie den Professoren Dr. Klaus Held und Antonio Aguirre, dann Dr. Heinrich Hüni, für ihre Anregungen. Dr. Hans Rainer Sepp gab viele aufschlußreiche Hinweise und hat sich des sprachlichen Gewands dieses Aufsatzes angenommen.     

Does the contextual interference effect last over extended transfer trials?

The contextual interference effect (random practice yields better transfer and retention compared to blocked practice) detected in a study of 24 boys and 33 girls randomly selected (M age = 10.5 yr., SD = .6) performing a linear positioning motor task seemed to dissipate in extended transfer trials.     

How Different Guilt Feelings Can Affect Social Competence Development in Childhood

The authors examined how the two different dimensions of guilt feelings, needed for reparation and fear of punishment, could influence social conduct, such as prosocial and aggressive behaviors, and how they are linked to popularity in childhood. The authors hypothesized a theoretical model that they tested, fitting it with empirical data obtained from a sample of 242 Italian children 9–11 years old. Both dimensions of guilt predict prosocial and aggressive behaviors. Specifically, the feeling of guilt linked to the need for reparation tends to negatively predict aggressive behaviors, and positively predict prosocial behaviors. The feeling of guilt linked to the fear of punishment, on the contrary, tends to positively affect aggressive and negatively affect prosocial conducts in children. These results highlight that the different feelings of guilt can represent a relevant risk or protective factor for the development of social competence in childhood. Limitations, strengths, and further development of the present study are discussed.     

Everyday aesthetics in action: Parkour eyes and the beauty of concrete walls

Parkour is a physical discipline practised in public and semi-public spaces, most often in urban environments. In this article, the potential of parkour to open up new perspectives on everyday surroundings will be considered. Special attention will be paid to the ways in which practitioners of parkour (traceurs) build unique and highly embodied relationships with their daily space. Emotions that they attach to their environments and their aesthetic appreciation of mundane surroundings will be explored. The interpretations are based on in-depth interviews with traceurs in two cities in Finland, Helsinki and Jyväskylä. For them, the most inspiring environments combine different heights with solid structures that provide a good grip. Concrete is considered the ideal material, and suburban landscapes, which are often thought of as boring or even ugly by other urban dwellers, are highly valued among traceurs. Traceurs speak of ‘parkour eyes’, a specific way of looking; gradually, places which have not previously been seen as attractive or appealing start to reveal interesting details and opportunities for inventive practice. Although parkour does not leave any physical traces on the environment, it has the potential to make mundane environments visible as well as to reveal some of the aesthetic potential imbedded therein. In doing so, parkour questions established ideas of interesting and valuable environments and reassesses the aesthetic values of our everyday environments.     

Children's performance in mental rotation tasks: orientation-free features flatten the slope

Studies of the development of mental rotation have yielded conflicting results, apparently because different mental rotation tasks draw on different cognitive abilities. Children may compare two stimuli at different orientations without mental rotation if the stimuli contain orientation-free features. Two groups of children (78 6-year-olds and 92 8-year-olds) participated in an experiment investigating development of the ability to mentally rotate and the ability to recognize and use orientation-free features. Children compared two stimuli, one upright and one rotated, and responded as quickly as possible indicating whether the stimuli were the same or different. The stimuli were either two panda bears or two ice-cream cones with three scoops of ice-cream of different colors. The panda bears were either identical or mirror images. The cones were either identical, mirror images, or non-mirror images. Response times increased linearly as a function of the angle of orientation when stimuli were the same and when the stimuli were mirror images. But response times were much less dependent on angle of orientation for non-mirror image stimuli. Children as young as 6 years recognized orientation-free stimulus features and responded without mentally rotating when the task permitted this strategy.     

An application of DSM-IV's outline for cultural formulation: Understanding conduct disorder in Latino adolescents

In the established guidelines for providers of services to ethnic, linguistic, and culturally diverse populations, the American Psychological Association addressed the need for practitioners to consider the role that culture and ethnicity plays in the psychosocial development of culturally diverse populations. Currently, there are over 24 million Latinos in the United States, and this population is expected to quadruple in size to over 81 million in the year 2050. This discussion of a case example highlights the appropriateness of utilizing the outline for cultural formulation in working with Latino adolescents diagnosed with Conduct Disorder. As indicated by the DSM-IV's outline for cultural formulation, this discussion addresses the importance of assessing the following: 1) Cultural identity of the individual; 2) Cultural explanations of the individual's illness; 3) Cultural factors related to psychosocial environment and levels of functioning; 4) Cultural elements of the relationship between the individual and the clinician; 5) Overall cultural assessment for diagnosis and care. In particular, the discussion focuses on specific reasons why the utilization of the outline for cultural formulation can greatly assist the clinician in understanding many psychosocial elements unique to treating Conduct Disorder in the Latino adolescent.     

Peer isolation and drug use among white non-Hispanic and Mexican American adolescents.

The social-emotional characteristics and drug-use patterns of adolescents who reported having no friends (i.e., isolates) were compared to those of adolescents in drug-using and non-drug-using peer groups. Adolescents who did not have drug-using peers reported the lowest drug use and those with drug-using peers had the highest drug use, with adolescents who were isolated falling in between. Isolated youth reported more shyness, greater feelings of alienation, and lower social acceptance than did those in the other groups. Isolated youth also reported more anger and depression than did youth with non-drug-using peers, but less anger and equivalent depression when compared to adolescents with drug-using peers. Results are discussed in terms of social-emotional characteristics of isolated youth and risk/protective factors.     

Disregarded Conflicting Results with Prior Research: A Case Report in a Leading Biomedical Journal

Bibliographic negligence, i.e. omission of citation of the relevant work of other researchers, is possibly the most common type of research misconduct, leading to unfair loss of priority of authorship and undermining the reward system of science. We report a case of bibliographic negligence which we recently suffered from a leading biomedical journal. The case is discussed in the context of the editorial policy of the journal and of relevant ethical guidelines. Scientific journals should develop codes of conduct for citations. In addition, the implications and consequences of bibliographic negligence deserve thorough investigation.