右侧颞顶联合区及道德加工脑网络的功能连接预测社会性框架效应：来自静息态功能磁共振的证据

社会性框架效应指个体进行社会性决策时, 描述方式(即框架)对其选择倾向的影响。采用“伤害/帮助框架”范式, 本研究在行为上发现了显著的框架效应：被试在伤害框架下比帮助框架下, 更倾向于选择利他选项, 这可能是由于伤害框架凸显了伤害他人的后果及有意性, 从而提高了道德冲突水平。在神经活动上发现(1)静息态下, 右侧颞顶联合区(TPJ)的低频振荡振幅(ALFF)与框架效应强度存在显著正相关; (2)道德加工相关脑区构成的局部脑网络内部的功能连接强度(FC)能够有效预测框架效应强度。本研究首次利用静息态功能连接探讨个体的社会性决策受到语言表述方式影响的神经机制, 为进一步揭示社会决策中的个体差异提供了神经学证据。     

Support for the Populist Radical Right: Between Uncertainty Avoidance and Risky Choice

The last several decades have witnessed a structural change in politics toward cultural and identity conflicts, accompanied by the rise of populist radical right (PRR) parties. However, we know surprisingly little about the psychological or cognitive-motivational factors underlying PRR support. We claim that uncertainty avoidance (UA)—an epistemic avoidance motivation—represents a central motive because UA resonates with the PRR platform and precedes common predictors of PRR voting. Using data from the 2017 Austrian National Election Study, we found that UA was indeed indirectly associated with a higher likelihood of PRR voting. This association is because greater UA fostered right-wing sociocultural views, whereas associations with populist attitudes or expected government competence were more ambiguous. PRR parties appear to offer “certainty,” but as extreme parties, they also remain a “risky choice.” We conclude by discussing the contribution of a cognitive-motivational account to explain PRR voting.     

Effects of right and left hemisphere damage on performance of the "Right Hemisphere Communication Battery"

A Hebrew adaptation of Gardner and Brownell's (1986) "Right Hemisphere Communication Battery" (HRHCB) was administered to 27 right brain-damaged (RBD) patients, 31 left brain-damaged (LBD) patients, and 21 age-matched normal controls. Both patient groups showed deficits relative to controls and overall there was no difference between the two patient groups. A factor analysis of patients' scores on the HRHCB yielded two interpretable factors, a verbal and a nonverbal one. These factors were not lateralized. Performance of patients on the HRHCB correlated significantly and positively with performance on most tests of basic language functions, measured with a Hebrew adaptation of the "Western Aphasia Battery" (HWAB) and with other cognitive functions measured with standardized neuropsychological tests. There were stronger correlations of HRHCB with subtests of the HWAB in LBD patients and with nonlanguage cognitive tests in RBD patients. In the LBD group, HRHCB subtests' scores correlated negatively with lesion extent in frontal and temporal perisylvian regions. Such localization was not observed in RBD patients. The results argue against selective right hemisphere (RH) involvement in the RHCB, alleged to measure pragmatic aspects of language use, and show, instead, bilateral involvement. The results also argue against a modular organization of these functions of language use, especially in the RH.     

Right Action as Virtuous Action

I argue in favour of the central claim of virtue-ethical accounts of right action: that right action is virtuous action. First, I disambiguate this claim and argue for a specific interpretation of it. Second, I provide reasons to prefer target-centred over both agent-centred and motive-centred accounts of virtuous action. Third, I argue that an action is right if, only if, and because it is overall virtuous. Finally, I respond to important arguments to the contrary.     

Cerebral perfusion and neuropsychological follow up in mild traumatic brain injury: Acute versus chronic disturbances?

In a subgroup of patients with mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) residual symptoms, interfering with outcome and return to work, are found. With neuropsychological assessment cognitive deficits can be demonstrated although the pathological underpinnings of these cognitive deficits are not fully understood. As the admission computed tomography (CT) often is normal, perfusion CT imaging may be a useful indicator of brain dysfunction in the acute phase after injury in these patients.In the present study, directly after admission perfusion CT imaging was performed in mild TBI patients with follow-up neuropsychological assessment in those with complaints and a normal non-contrast CT. Neuropsychological tests comprised the 15 Words test Immediate Recall, Trailmaking test part B, Zoo Map test and the FEEST, which were dichotomized into normal and abnormal. Perfusion CT results of patients with normal neuropsychological test scores were compared to those with abnormal test scores.In total eighteen patients were included. Those with an abnormal score on the Zoo Map test had a significant lower CBV in the right frontal and the bilateral parieto-temporal white matter. Patients with an abnormal score on the FEEST had a significant higher MTT in the bilateral frontal white matter and a significant decreased CBF in the left parieto-temporal grey matter. No significant relation between the perfusion CT parameters and the 15 Words test and the Trailmaking test part B was present.In conclusion, impairments in executive functioning and emotion perception assessed with neuropsychological tests during follow up were related to differences in cerebral perfusion at admission in mild TBI. The pathophysiological concept of these findings is discussed.     

Repetition priming reveals hemispheric differences in compound word processing

The left (LH) and right (RH) hemispheres are thought to implement different mechanisms for visual word recognition; the LH’s parallel encoding strategy is more efficient than the RH’s serial, letter-by-letter analysis. Here we examine differences in hemispheric language processing strategy by investigating repetition priming of compound words (e.g. buttercup) and their constituents (e.g. butter, cup). Eighty-eight right-handed participants (29 M, 59 F) completed a lexical decision experiment in which centrally-presented compounds primed related (whole compound, first constituent, second constituent) and unrelated targets presented laterally to the left or right visual field; participants made button-press word/nonword decisions. Consistent with the LH parallel/RH serial distinction, repetition priming prompted an RH advantage for first constituents, whereas the LH performed equally efficiently in response to both first and second constituents. These data thus highlight differences in the hemispheres’ language processing strategies, offering new evidence supporting a relative parallel/serial distinction in LH/RH visual word recognition.     

Living under threat: Mutual threat perception drives anti‐Muslim and anti‐Western hostility in the age of terrorism

This research demonstrates a common psychology of outgroup hostility driven by perceived intergroup threat among three groups and seven cultural contexts: non‐Muslim Westerners, Muslims in Western societies, and Muslims in the Middle East. In Study 1, symbolic, but not realistic and terroristic threats, predicted non‐Muslim Norwegians' intentions to join anti‐Islamic movements. In Study 2, symbolic and realistic, but not terroristic threat, predicted non‐Muslim Americans' willingness to persecute Muslims. In Studies 3 and 4, symbolic threat predicted support and behavioral intentions against the West among Swedish and Turkish Muslims. Finally, in Study 5, a comparison demonstrated that symbolic and realistic threats had the same effects on violent intentions among non‐Muslim and Muslim Danes, and Muslims in Afghanistan. Meta‐analysis showed that symbolic threat was most strongly associated with intergroup hostility. Across studies, participants with high religious group identification experienced higher levels of threat. Implications for intergroup research and prejudice reduction are discussed.     

Predicting Political Biases Against the Occupy Wall Street and Tea Party Movements

Accusations of hypocrisy have flown against both supporters and opponents of the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) and Tea Party movements. Integrating the ideologically objectionable premise model (IOPM), a newly devised model of political judgment, with political tolerance research, we find that how the political activities of OWS and Tea Party demonstrators are described determines whether or not biases against these groups emerge among people low and high in right‐wing authoritarianism (RWA). Specifically, people low in RWA were more biased against the Tea Party than OWS regardless of whether the groups engaged in normatively threatening or reassuring political behavior, whereas people high in RWA were more biased against OWS than the Tea Party when the groups engaged in normatively threatening (and therefore objectionable), but not normatively reassuring (and therefore acceptable) behavior. These findings further support the IOPM's contention that premise objectionableness, not right‐wing orientation, determines biases in political judgment.     

RIGHT ACT, VIRTUOUS MOTIVE

Abstract: The concepts of virtue and right action are closely connected, in that we expect people with virtuous motives to at least often act rightly. Two well-known views explain this connection by defining one of the concepts in terms of the other. Instrumentalists about virtue identify virtuous motives as those that lead to right acts; virtue-ethicists identify right acts as those that are or would be done from virtuous motives. This essay outlines a rival explanation, based on the "higher-level" account of virtue defended in the author's Virtue, Vice, and Value . On this account rightness and virtue go together because each is defined by a (different) relation to some other, more basic moral concept. Their frequent coincidence is therefore like a correlation between A and B based not on either's causing the other but on their being joint effects of a single common cause.