The military service of combat soldiers may pose many threats to their well being and often take a toll on body and mind, influencing the physical and emotional make-up of combatants and veterans. The current study aims to enhance our knowledge about the combat experiences and the challenges that female soldiers face both during and after their service. The study is based on qualitative methods and narrative analysis of in-depth semi-structured personal interviews with twenty military veterans. It aims to analyze (...) the narratives of American and Israeli female combat soldiers regarding their military service, with emphasis on the soldiers’ descriptions, in their own words, about their difficulties, challenges, coping and successes during their service and transition to civilian life. A recurring theme in the interviews with the veterans of both militaries was the need to be heard and the fact that societies, therapists, and military institutions do not always truly listen to female veterans’ experiences and are not really interested in what actually ails them. Our research suggests that conventional methods used in research relating to veterans might at times be inadequate, because the inherent categorization might abstract, pathologize, and fragment a wide array of soldiers’ modes of post-combat being. Moreover, female veterans’ voices will not be fully heard unless we allow them to be active participants in generating knowledge about themselves. (shrink)

Our study contributes to the ongoing debate about women’s rights and religious feminism. The context for analysis of women’s experiences is the “Women of the Wall” who have been struggling for the past 30 years for their right to practice their spiritual rituals (praying at the Western Wall) in a hegemonic and masculine arena. We suggest that the “Women of the Wall” and their battle for spiritual equality threaten the hegemonic masculinity. Moreover, this feminist battle expands the feminist revolution and (...) the fights for women’s equality to the religious arena which is dominated by the hegemonic masculinity. The implementation of the Listening Guide, a feminist methodology, assists us in uncovering various voices, representing different aspects of the experiences of the “Women of the Wall” in a conflict zone. These narratives reveal juxtapositions of feelings of competence, determination and vulnerability and shed light on the women’s struggle for gender equality in a hegemonic masculine domain. (shrink)

Due to evidence that traumatic experience impacts the brain, the body (concerning sensory sensitivity), and the mind, a recent study that attempted to answer the question of whether the effects of CSA can be reversed by using a multidisciplinary approach consisting of dual treatments: hyperbaric & psychotherapy, was conducted. Its results showed that in addition to improvement of brain functionality, symptoms of distress were significantly reduced. The current paper aims to present the process as experienced by the 40 female childhood (...) sexual abuse survivor participants. Data included participants’ daily journals and drawings, and participants’ summaries presented verbally and written, 6-months after the study ended. A phenomenological analysis was used. Results showed three phases, the initial phase – remembering the trauma from both physical and cognitive aspects, the second phase - physiological relaxation as well as positive memories emerge; and, the third phase – bouncing back to life. The results are discussed in light of the study theoretical model and Lev-Wiesel (2014) childhood sexual abuse conceptualization. (shrink)

Although emotion has become one of the most popular research areas within organizational scholarship, few studies have considered its connection with unethical behavior. Using dual-process theory, we expand on the rationalist perspective within the field of behavioral ethics by considering the process through which two discrete emotions, anger and guilt, influence unethical behavior. Across two studies using different methodologies, we found that anger increases unethical behavior whereas guilt reduces unethical behavior. These effects were mediated by impulsive and deliberative processing. Overall, (...) our results shed light on distinct mechanisms through which emotions can influence unethical behavior. Both theoretical and practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

In this article, we discuss the findings of a pilot project involving online journalists and online journalism graduate students in The Netherlands regarding their experiences and professional views on ethical dilemmas specifically related to new media. This article offers an exploratory analysis of the literature regarding new media ethics, singles out a number of specific issues confronting the online professional, and measures their relative impact on the self-perception and daily practices of online journalists in The Netherlands.

We propose that not social bonding, but rather a different mechanism underlies the development of musicality: being unable to survive alone. The evolutionary constraint of being dependent on other humans for survival provides the ultimate driving force for acquiring human faculties such as sociality and musicality, through mechanisms of learning and neural plasticity. This evolutionary mechanism maximizes adaptation to a dynamic environment.

This article discusses two puzzles regarding identity questions: (i) certain definites cannot occur in the post-copular position of identity questions; and (ii) the same definites are the only possible answers to identity questions with post-copular names. We demonstrate that the range of these definites crucially depends on interlocutors' shared assumptions about how entities in the physical surroundings are perceived and categorized. We propose that these definites are directly referential in the sense of Kaplan (1989a,b), and only contribute the referent itself (...) to the semantic composition. To explain the asymmetry between perceptually grounded descriptions and proper names, we draw on Gupta's (1980) framework of relative identity. This analysis suggests that direct reference is not always determined lexically, but is—at least in part—a pragmatic phenomenon. More generally, this phenomenon shows that natural language is sensitive to the source of information in the common ground. (shrink)

This introduction to the role of information structure in grammar discusses a wide range of phenomena on the syntax-information structure interface. It examines theories of information structure and considers their effectiveness in explaining whether and how information structure maps onto syntax in discourse. Professor Erteschik-Shir begins by discussing the basic notions and properties of information structure, such as topic and focus, and considers their properties from different theoretical perspectives. She covers definitions of topic and focus, architectures of grammar, information (...) structure, word order, the interface between lexicon and information structure, and cognitive aspects of information structure.In her balanced and readable account, the author critically compares the effectiveness of different theoretical approaches and assesses the value of insights drawn from work in processing and on language acquisition, variation, and universals. This book will appeal to graduate students of syntax and semantics in departments of linguistics, philosophy, and cognitive science. (shrink)

Research in School-Based Art Therapy has been widely discussed in recent years, and the number of studies that examine staff perceptions and the special characteristics of art therapy within the education system has risen considerably. The current study explored the critical issue of adolescent clients’ perceptions of art therapy in school, from their point of view as clients. The methodology and data analysis were conducted according to the principles of Consensual Qualitative Research (CQR). The sample was composed of 12 adolescent (...) clients, aged 14–18 (M = 16), who took part in in-depth semi-structured interviews. The findings were organized into five domains that emerged from the interviews: referrals and initial engagement with therapy, the setting within school, the nature of art therapy at school, the relationship with the art therapist, and the impact of art therapy on these clients. The analysis revealed that although some participants initially agreed to art therapy because it got them out of class and let them have fun instead, they realized after a period of time of art therapy that they were engaged in a personal and emotional process focusing on them which allowed them to express their feelings without the fear of judgment. Participants at times used the word “mother” to describe their relationship with the art therapist, and stated that the presence of the art therapist at school made them feel safer and helped them deal with day-to-day problems. School-based... (shrink)

The Star of Redemption is proposed as a criticism of Hegel’s thought and its logic of the Aufhebung, but Rosenzweig does not deny the truth of Hegel’s system, only the idea that it is absolute. From this point of view, Rosenzweig takes up “another” Hegel: that of his early writings—from which he draws Hegel’s conception of love—and that of The Phenomenology of Spirit—in which he searches for a system that is linked to experience. Based on these particular aspects of Hegel’s (...) philosophy, and moving beyond them, Rosenzweig builds a relational philosophy, whose elements are not sublated, but coexist with each other. We will analyze the fracture of Totality in the triad God-Mad-World to study their effective relationship through love, and the necessary link between Judaism and Christianity as a way of aniticipating Redemption. Having this link in mind, and against Hegel’s conception, Rosenzweig maintains that both religions share a common content, and that their relation is symbolized by the word “and”. (shrink)

The notion of common ground is important for the production of referring expressions: In order for a referring expression to be felicitous, it has to be based on shared information. But determining what information is shared and what information is privileged may require gathering information from multiple sources, and constantly coordinating and updating them, which might be computationally too intensive to affect the earliest moments of production. Previous work has found that speakers produce overinformative referring expressions, which include privileged names, (...) violating Grice’s Maxims, and concluded that this is because they do not mark the distinction between shared and privileged information. We demonstrate that speakers are in fact quite effective in marking this distinction in the form of their utterances. Nonetheless, under certain circumstances, speakers choose to overspecify privileged names. (shrink)

Some views of holism fail to fully encapsulate the structure and independence of consciousness while others are reductionist in their insistence on a strict structure. After examining holism and mental state consciousness, I move to my own proposal for the structure of consciousness: experiential swaths. By highlighting the phenomenal interdependence of some aspects of consciousness without conceding that all aspects are so strongly intertwined, experiential swaths allow for further conceptual structurization within consciousness.

Depue & Collins's model of incentive-motivational modulation of goal-directed behavior subserved by a medial orbital prefrontal cortical (MOC) network is appealing, but it leaves several questions unanswered: How are the stimuli that elicit an incentive motivational state selected? How does the incentive motivational state created by the MOC network modulate behavior? What is the function of the dopaminergic input to the striatum? This commentary suggests possible answers, based on the open-interconnected model of basal-ganglia-thalamocortical circuits, in which the limbic circuit selects (...) goals and, via its connections with the motor and the associative circuits, directs behavior according to those goals, elaborating on the role of dopamine. (shrink)

Findings from two experiments argue in favor of the superiority of default, preferred interpretations over non-default less favored counterparts, outshining degree of non-salience, non-literalness, contextual strength, and negation. They show that, outside of a specific context, the default interpretation of specific negative constructions is a non-salient interpretation 1; their non-default interpretation is a salience-based alternative. In contrast, the default interpretation of the affirmative counterparts is a salience-based interpretation ; their non-default interpretation is a non-salient alternative. When in equally strongly supportive (...) contexts, default yet non-salient negative sarcasm is processed faster than non-default, non-salient yet affirmative sarcasm and faster than non-default yet salience-based negativ.. (shrink)

The Optimal Innovation Hypothesis, following from the Graded Salience Hypothesis, is being reviewed and revisited. The attempt is to expand the notion of Optimal Innovation to allow it to apply to both stimuli’s coded meanings as well as their noncoded, constructed interpretations. According to the Optimal Innovation Hypothesis, Optimal Innovations, when devised, will be more pleasing than nonoptimally innovative counterparts. Unlike such competitors, Optimal Innovations deautomatize familiar coded alternatives, which invoke unconditional responses alongside novel but distinct ones, allowing both responses (...) to interact. Conversely, the Revised Optimal Innovation Hypothesis, introduced and tested here, follows from the Defaultness Hypothesis. It posits that both default lexicalized meanings and default constructed interpretations might be qualifiable for Optimal Innovation once they are deautomatized by nondefault, context-dependent counterparts. Such nondefault Optimal Innovations will be pleasing, more pleasing than default and nondefault counterparts not qualifiable for Optimal Innovation. Results of two experiments support the Revised Optimal Innovation Hypothesis, while further corroborating the Defaultness Hypothesis. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Der Islam Jahrgang: 93 Heft: 1 Seiten: 290-295.

Culture provides people with rich, detailed, implicit, and explicit knowledge about associations and contingencies. These culture-based expectations allow people to get through their days without much systematic reasoning. Experimental designs that unpack these situated effects of culture on thinking, feeling, and doing can advance bias research and direct policy and intervention.

Are grounded procedures such as cleansing value-neutral main effects? Culture-as-situated-cognition theory suggests otherwise. Societies differ in how frequently they trigger membership and individualizing cultural mindsets and their linked mental-procedures – connecting and separating, respectively. Commonly triggered mindsets feel fluent. Fluency feels good. Cleansing can separate from but also connect to others in the form of membership-based rituals.

People can imagine their future selves without taking future-focused action. Identity-based motivation theory explains why. Hoerl & McCormack outline how. Present-focused action prevails because future “me” feels irrelevant to the choices facing current “me” unless future “me” is experienced as occurring now or as linked to current “me” via if-then simulations. This entails reasoning in time and about time.

Culture-as-situated cognition theory provides insight into the system 1 monitoring algorithm. Culture provides people with an organizing framework, facilitating predictions, focusing attention, and providing experiential signals of certainty and uncertainty as system 1 inputs. When culture-based signals convey that something is amiss, system 2 reasoning is triggered and engaged when resources allow; otherwise, system 1 reasoning dominates.

From Higgins (1973) to Iatridou and Varlokosta (1998), connectivity has been considered in the literature to be a defining characteristic of specificational pseudoclefts. This paper argues against this view based on an analysis of specificational pseudoclefts in Hebrew. Pseudoclefts in Hebrew are interesting in two ways. First, predicational and specificational pseudoclefts are distinguished lexically in the choice of the copula. Second, specificational pseudoclefts fall into two classes, each exhibiting a different set of connectivity effects. The connectivity pattern in Hebrew is (...) accounted for following Jacobson (1994) and Sharvit (1999), who assume that connectivity effects are independent of each other and derive them as a by-product of semantic equation. It is shown that this pattern cannot be obtained using any single grammatical operation, such as reconstruction or coping, which would necessarily derive all connectivity effects at once. (shrink)

In this paper we show that focus structure determines the interpretation of bare plurals in English: topic bare plurals are interpreted generically, focused bare plurals are interpreted existentially. When bare plurals are topics they must be specific, i.e. they refer to kinds. After type-shifting they introduce variables which can be bound by the generic quantifier, yielding characterizing generics. Existentially interpreted bare plurals are not variables, but denote properties that are incorporated into the predicate.The type of predicate determines the interpretation of (...) its bare plural subject. The individual/stage-level distinction, though important, is not sufficient: since only arguments can be topics, only those stage-level predicates which have locative arguments can have existential bare plural subjects.Certain verbs (e.g., hate) fail to incorporate their bare plural objects; therefore no existential reading of the object is available. We provide a novel solution to this puzzle based on the following two claims: (i) incorporated bare plurals do not introduce discourse referents; (ii) nonincorporating verbs are presuppositional. (shrink)

Inspired by early proposals in philosophy, dominant accounts of language posit a central role for mutual knowledge, either encoded directly in common ground, or approximated through other cognitive mechanisms. Using existing empirical evidence from language and memory, we challenge this tradition, arguing that mutual knowledge captures only a subset of the mental states needed to support communication. In a novel theoretical proposal, we argue for a cognitive architecture that includes separate, distinct representations of the self and other, and a cognitive (...) process that compares these representations continuously during conversation, outputting both similarities and differences in perspective. Our theory accounts for existing data, interfaces with findings from other cognitive domains, and makes novel predictions about the role of perspective in language use. We term this new account the Multiple Perspectives Theory of mental states in communication. (shrink)

This Article calls for a departure from the ‘positivist–professional’ definition of Elder Law. It offers a new definition that demands answers regarding the justifications for this legal area and the normative base that should guide its content. The paper draws on findings from a qualitative study with grown children who have an elderly parent in need. These findings point toward a) a preliminary theoretical framework that justifies a special area of Elder Law, embracing and transcending that of anti-ageist law, and (...) b) the relevance of Family Law jurisprudence as a normative inspiration for this legal area. (shrink)

This article suggests enacting an accession tax instead of the estate duty – which was repealed in Israel in 1981. This suggestion evolves from historical and normative explorations of the tension between perceptions of familial intergenerational property rights and justifications for the “death tax,” as termed by its opponents, i.e., estate and inheritance tax. First, the Article explores this tension as expressed in the history of the Israeli Estate Duty Law. This chronological survey reveals a move from the State’s taken-for-granted (...) interest in revenue justifying the Law’s enactment in 1949; moving on to the “needy widow” and “poor orphan” in whose name the tax was attacked during the years 1959–1964, continuing to the abolition of the tax in 1981 in the name of efficiency and the right of the testator to transfer his wealth to his family, and finally cumulating with the targeting of tycoon dynasties that characterizes the recent calls for reintroducing the tax. Next, based on the rich literature on the subject, the Article maps the arguments for and against intergenerational wealth transfer taxation, placing the Israeli case in larger philosophical, political, and pragmatic contexts. Lastly, it associates the ideas of accession tax and “social inheritance” with inspirational sources for rethinking a realistic wealth transfer taxation to bridge the gap between notions of intergenerational familial rights and intergenerational social justice. (shrink)

This paper examines the ways Israeli law differentiates betweensingle and married women. The first section explores the littlewe know of single women and single mothers' realities. The secondsection analyses Israeli laws related to military service,housing assistance, homemakers' status in the social securitysystem, ways of becoming a mother, and public support formothers. The legal analysis reveals complex distinctions betweensingle and married women ranging from ignoring single women whenthey have no children and encouraging them to marry, toambivalence towards single women who want (...) to conceive, and ontosubstantial public support for single women who are alreadymothers. The article points to directions of change needed so thelaw will adequately address single women's choices and needs. (shrink)