A fundamental assumption of theories of decision-making is that we detect mismatches between intention and outcome, adjust our behavior in the face of error, and adapt to changing circumstances. Is this always the case? We investigated the relation between intention, choice, and introspection. Participants made choices between presented face pairs on the basis of attractiveness, while we covertly manipulated the relationship between choice and outcome that they experienced. Participants failed to notice conspicuous mismatches between their intended choice and the outcome (...) they were presented with, while nevertheless offering introspectively derived reasons for why they chose the way they did. We call this effect choice blindness. (shrink)

The notion of the sublime, used to describe a particular kind of overwhelming or exhilarating aesthetic experience, has garnered a great deal of attention by philosophers, critical theorists and literary scholars. In the midst of this growing body of literature, Professor Jane Forsey published an article asking whether an aesthetic theory of the sublime is even possible, and argued provocatively in the negative. Claiming that efforts to explain the sublime inevitably result in theories that are either contradictory or incoherent, Forsey (...) posed a challenge to anyone who takes the sublime seriously as an aesthetic category. This volume brings together an international slate of philosophers and scholars of the sublime, who have been invited to respond to, and critically engage with, Forseys article. Unlike other monographs and anthologies that deal broadly with the sublime in aesthetics, this collection examines specific conceptual problems with the very foundations of sublime theory in a manner that is tightly focused and rigorous. It represents a variety of approaches that defend the sublime, and concludes with an original response by Professor Forsey to her critics. (shrink)

By comparing alternative evolutionary models, the International Sexuality Description Project marks the transition of evolutionary psychology to the next level of scientific maturation. The lack of final conclusions might partly be a result of the composition of the Sociosexual Orientation Inventory and the sampled populations. Our own data suggest that correcting for both gives further support to the strategic pluralism model.

Cognitive models propose that both, negative interpretations of ambiguous social situations and ruminative thoughts about social events contribute to the maintenance of social anxiety disorder. It has further been postulated that ruminative thoughts fuel biased negative interpretations, however, evidence is rare. The present study used a multi-method approach to assess ruminative processing following a social interaction and negative interpretation bias in a student sample screened for high and low social anxiety. Results support the hypothesis that group differences in negative interpretations (...) of ambiguous social situations in HSAs vs. LSAs are mediated by higher levels of post-event processing assessed in the questionnaire. Exploratory analyses highlight the potential role of comorbid depressive symptoms. The current findings help to advance the understanding of the association between two cognitive processes involved in social anxiety and stress the importance of ruminative post-event processing. (shrink)

The legacy of Nisbett and Wilson’s classic article, Telling More Than We Can Know: Verbal Reports on Mental Processes , is mixed. It is perhaps the most cited article in the recent history of consciousness studies, yet no empirical research program currently exists that continues the work presented in the article. To remedy this, we have introduced an experimental paradigm we call choice blindness [Johansson, P., Hall, L., Sikström, S., & Olsson, A. . Failure to detect mismatches between intention and (...) outcome in a simple decision task. Science, 310, 116–119.]. In the choice blindness paradigm participants fail to notice mismatches between their intended choice and the outcome they are presented with, while nevertheless offering introspectively derived reasons for why they chose the way they did. In this article, we use word-frequency and latent semantic analysis to investigate a corpus of introspective reports collected within the choice blindness paradigm. We contrast the introspective reasons given in non-manipulated vs. manipulated trials, but find very few differences between these two groups of reports. (shrink)

How should scarce healthcare resources be distributed? This is a contentious issue that became especially pressing during the pandemic. It is often emphasised that studies exploring public views about this question provide valuable input to the issue of healthcare priority setting. While there has been a vast number of such studies it is rarely articulated, more specifically, what the results from these studies would mean for the justification of principles for priority setting. On the one hand, it seems unreasonable that (...) public values would straightforwardly decide the ethical question of how resources should be distributed. On the other hand, in a democratic society, it seems equally unreasonable that they would be considered irrelevant for this question. In this paper we draw on the notion of reflective equilibrium and discuss the relevance and roles that empirical studies may plausibly have for justification in priority setting ethics. We develop a framework for analysing how different kinds of empirical results may have different kinds of implications for justification. (shrink)

Fronto-parietal activity has been frequently observed in fMRI and PET studies of attention, working memory, and episodic memory retrieval. Several recent fMRI studies have also reported fronto-parietal activity during conscious visual perception. A major goal of this review was to assess the degree of anatomical overlap among activation patterns associated with these four functions. A second goal was to shed light on the possible cognitive relationship of processes that relate to common brain activity across functions. For all reviewed functions we (...) observed a consistent and overlapping pattern of brain activity. The overlap was most pronounced for the bilateral parietal cortex , and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex . The common fronto-parietal activity will be discussed in terms of processes related to integration of distributed representations in the brain. (shrink)

In this paper we explore the relation between health-care needs and patients’ desires within shared decision-making in a context of priority setting in health care. We begin by outlining some general characteristics of the concept of health-care need as well as the notions of SDM and desire. Secondly we will discuss how to distinguish between needs and desires for health care. Thirdly we present three cases which all aim to bring out and discuss a number of queries which seem to (...) arise due to the double focus on a patient’s need and what that patient desires. These queries regard the following themes: the objectivity and moral force of needs, the prediction about what kind of patients which will appear on a micro level, implications for ranking in priority setting, difficulties regarding assessing and comparing benefits, and implications for evidence-based medicine. (shrink)

Moral sensitivity and moral reasoning are essential competencies biomedical researchers have to develop to make ethical decisions in their daily practices. Previous research has shown that these competencies can be developed through ethics education. However, it is unclear which underlying mechanisms best support the development of these competencies. In this article we argue that the development of moral sensitivity and moral reasoning can be fostered through teaching strategies that tap into students’ moral imagination. We describe how moral imagination can stimulate (...) the development of these competencies through three different merits of moral imagination. Moral imagination can help students to 1) transfer and apply abstract moral concepts to concrete situations and contexts, 2) explore the perspective of others, 3) explore and foresee the moral consequences of different decisions and actions. We explain these three merits of moral imagination in the context of biomedical research and present a theoretical model for how these merits can be used to stimulate the development of moral sensitivity and moral reasoning. Furthermore, we describe multiple teaching strategies for biomedical curricula that tap into the three merits of moral imagination. These teaching strategies can inspire teachers to design ethics education that activates students’ moral imagination for the development of moral sensitivity and moral reasoning. (shrink)

Religionspsychologie wird in Deutschland zumeist im Bereich der Praktischen Theologie und Religionspädagogik betrieben und stellt kein eigenständiges psychologisches Teilfach dar. Theorien der religiösen Entwicklung sind daher häufig von ihrem theologischen Kontext beeinflusst. Gängige Modelle religiöser Entwicklung nimmt Allolio-Näcke in diesem Band aus psychologischer Perspektive in den Blick und entwirft erstmals seit 30 Jahren eine eigene kulturpsychologische Theorie religiöser Entwicklung. Ein historischer Rahmen, der die Entstehung der Religionspsychologie nachzeichnet und sie im wissenschaftlichen Kanon verortet, rundet den Band ab.

Mathematicians routinely pass judgements on mathematical proofs. A proof might be elegant, cumbersome, beautiful, or awkward. Perhaps the highest praise is that a proof is right, that is, that the proof fits the theorem in an optimal way. It is also common to judge that one proof fits better than another, or that a proof does not fit a theorem at all. This paper attempts to clarify the notion of mathematical fit. We suggest six criteria that distinguish proofs as being (...) more or less fitting, and provide examples from several different mathematical fields. (shrink)

Studying teaching behavior in controlled conditions is difficult. It seems intuitive that a human learner might have trouble reliably recreating response patterns over and over in interaction. A robot would be the perfect tool to study teaching behavior because its actions can be well controlled and described. However, due to the interactive nature of teaching, developing such a robot is not an easy task. As we will show in this review, respective studies require certain robot appearances and behaviors. These mainly (...) should induce teaching behavior in humans, be interactive, match the study design, and be realizable in terms of effort. We discuss how remote controlling of the robot or simulating robot capabilities is used as an option. With this review, we introduce the field of research on studying human teaching behavior with robots as a tool in the experimental design. We will provide a structured overview of existing work, and identify main challenges of employing robots in such studies. (shrink)

My comment makes a point out ofRousseau's original insight: that education forsocial participation ought to start within thestudent's lifeworld, and not, as in our days, with the immediatedemands of modern, time-ridden consumerculture. When time is turned into a commodityand place is turned into a transit point forpeople constantly on the move, presence in acommon lifeworld is lost. I take issue with thedominant thinking of education in terms of timeand efficiency, and suggest that we startthinking of education more in terms of (...) placeand presence. I propose that modern thinkers ofeducation – of which I mention a few here –contributed significantly to the pedagogy ofplace or presence. I don't see time as a stringmade up of past-present-future, but rather asan expanding mental and pragmatic universe ofhere-and-nows. The term kairos catchesthis presence as the capacity for doing theright thing at the right moment, that is, themoment when the past has prepared the ground sothat the future can come as a gift. Thisconception is, I think, an important ground forthe idea of an education for citizenship. (shrink)

Kant, I. Hvad er oplysning?--Hartnack, J. Oplysning og fornuft.--Løgstrup, K.E. Videnskab og oplysning.--Favrholdt, D. Frihed og indotrinering.--Sløk, J. Fordummelsens tid.--Palle Hansen, F. Uvidenskabeligt efterskrift.

This work is a step toward the development of a logic for types and computation that includes not only the usual spaces of mathematics and constructions, but also spaces from logic and domain theory. Using realizability, we investigate a configuration of three toposes that we regard as describing a notion of relative computability. Attention is focussed on a certain local map of toposes, which we first study axiomatically, and then by deriving a modal calculus as its internal logic. The resulting (...) framework is intended as a setting for the logical and categorical study of relative computability. (shrink)

This article raises the problem of how to bridge the gap between moral thinking and moral life. As mediating terms between the two realms it picks out rules, skills and examples. After an introductory critique of rationalism and contextualism in ethics, the article makes a case for the uses of example in moral education in a wide sense, suggesting a poetics of ethics.

In 2015, the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals set an ethical imperative: end extreme poverty and hunger by 2030. Microfranchising can contribute to this critical effort by offering nonprofit organizations and businesses an opportunity to rapidly scale entrepreneurship within Base of the Pyramid markets. However, while abundant literature exists on traditional franchising, we know little about how to leverage microfranchising in resource-scarce contexts to alleviate poverty. To address this gap, we report a longitudinal case study of a microfranchise network aimed (...) at providing timely access to quality, affordable agricultural input, and services for millions of small-scale farmers in Bangladesh. Anchored in the BOP and microfranchise literature and drawing on innovation theory as an analytical lens, we provide a detailed account of how CARE—a global humanitarian and development non-governmental organization—developed and managed the network. We found that context played a strong role and that adaptability therefore was key to successfully recruiting and engaging BOP entrepreneurs and other business partners in the network. Moreover, as members joined the network with past ties and established practices, managing these path dependencies had important implications for network performance. Network sustainability in terms of financial and social impact was also a key theme that required careful consideration throughout network development. We combine these empirical findings with extant literature to discuss contributions to the theory and practice of microfranchising and innovation networking in the BOP context. (shrink)

Platonism and Christian Thought in Late Antiquity examines the various ways in which Christian intellectuals engaged with Platonism both as pagan competitors and as a source of philosophical material useful to the Christian faith. The chapters are united in their goal to explore transformations that took place in the reception and interaction process between Platonism and Christianity in this period. The contributions in this volume explore the reception of Platonic material in Christian thought, showing that the transmission of cultural content (...) is always mediated, and ought to be studied as a transformative process by way of selection and interpretation. Some chapters also deal with various aspects of the wider discussion on how Platonic, and Hellenic, philosophy and early Christian thought related to each other, examining the differences and common ground between these traditions. Platonism and Christian Thought in Late Antiquity offers an insightful and broad ranging study on the subject, which will be of interest to students of both philosophy and theology in the Late Antique period, as well as anyone working on the reception and history of Platonic thought, and the development of Christian thought. uity offers an insightful and broad ranging study on the subject, which will be of interest to students of both philosophy and theology in the Late Antique period, as well as anyone working on the reception and history of Platonic thought, and the development of Christian thought. (shrink)

Predictive processing as a computational motif of the neocortex needs to be elaborated into theories of higher cognitive functions that include simulating future behavioural outcomes. We contribute to the neuroscientific perspective of predictive processing as a foundation for the proposed representational architectures of the mind.

Exploring Textual Action questions how we analyse works of art after the performative turn and shows how the interplay of performativity (textual action), space and topography, and the converging of genres and art forms is essential in modern drama, theatre, prose fiction, poetry and film. The volume also fosters a keen concern for the development of congenial theory. Its 14 detailed essays analyse works of art ranging from Balzac, Melville and George Eliot, to Breton, Kafka, Benjamin, Blixen and Woolf; and (...) from W.C. Williams, Bresson and Scorsese, to Sarraute, Duras, Reygadas, Dumont and Waltz. The approach of these studies discloses the art works as creative and dynamic utterances with active and shaping forces so powerful, and consequential, that they have the potential to transform human perception and blur clear distinctions between art and "real" life. Using an alternative and dynamic method and suggesting a direction towards the detailed analysis of literature, art, media and culture, Exploring Textual Action addresses current debates within the humanities. (shrink)

Aim:The purpose of this study was to explore how adolescent patients displaying developmental trauma experience and describe meaning in life. Schnell’s model of meaning in life is applied to explore meaningfulness, crises of meaning and sources of meaning. Method: The study has a qualitative design based on individual interviews with eight adolescents aged 14–18 years in treatment in an outpatient clinic for mental health care for children and adolescents. The interviews were transcribed and analyzed using systematic text condensation. Results: The (...) adolescents related meaning in life to the experience of coherence, intrinsic values, progress and belonging, or the absence of these. Examples of sources of meaning among the informants were positive relations with meaningful others, structure and routines, moments of well-being, achieving goals related to education, work and family, and seeking something else outside oneself such as playing computer games, being engaged in politics, being with animals, having a belief in a god or being outdoors in natural surroundings. Conclusion: Although the topic of meaning in life was unknown to this group, they used sources of meaning intuitively. This group seems to have similar preferences to the general population. More knowledge is needed on how the topic of meaning in life can be useful in therapy for adolescents with development trauma. (shrink)

Monetary valuation of ecosystem services is a widely used approach to quantify the benefits supplied by the natural environment to society. An alternative approach is the monetary valuation of ecosystem functions, which is defined as the capacity of the ecosystem to supply services. Using two European case-study areas, this paper explores the relative advantages of the two valuation approaches. This is done using a conceptual analysis, a qualitative application, and an overall comparison of both approaches. It is concluded that both (...) approaches can be defended on theoretical grounds, and – if properly applied – will provide the same value estimates. However, valuation of ecosystem services is preferred from a practical point of view. Because there is no one-to-one match between functions and services, researchers should be consistent in their valuation approach. To avoid overlooking or overlapping of values, valuation should either be solely based on functions, or solely based on services. (shrink)

This study examined the influence of two organizational context variables, codes of conduct and supervisor advice, on personnel decisions in an experimental simulation. Specifically, we studied personnel evaluations and decisions in a situation where codes of conduct conflict with supervisor advice. Past studies showed that supervisors’ advice to prefer ingroup over outgroup candidates leads to discriminatory personnel selection decisions. We extended this line of research by studying how codes of conduct and code enforcement may reduce this form of discrimination. Eighty (...) German managers evaluated and selected candidates from an applicant pool including Germans (ingroup members) and foreigners (outgroup members). Supervisor advice to prefer ingroup members lowered suitability ratings of outgroup members as well as their chances to be selected for an interview. Ethical codes of conduct referring to equal opportunities limited this form of discrimination, but only when codes were enforced by sanctions and integrated into organizational every-day practice. The implications of these findings for research and practice are discussed. (shrink)