Although research integrity practices in institutional settings is not a new area of study, because of its foundational importance in university settings it remains a topic worthy of study. In addition, rarely are all members of the university community included as participants in studies focused upon research integrity and ethics. Thus, to add to the existent literature, the authors investigated research integrity practices in a medium-sized Midwestern polytechnic university setting, including 467 participants from across all divisions of the university community. (...) This mixed data survey study was comprised of six sections; presented is information for two sections—sample demographics and research integrity. The demographics appear reflective of those of the larger survey, as well as the university setting of study. In the research integrity section there were two parts—one qualitative and one quantitative. Implications with regard to research integrity and ethics in the institutional setting of study are presented. (shrink)

Although research integrity practices in institutional settings is not a new area of study, because of its foundational importance in university settings it remains a topic worthy of study. In addition, rarely are all members of the university community included as participants in studies focused upon research integrity and ethics. Thus, to add to the existent literature, the authors investigated research integrity practices in a medium-sized Midwestern polytechnic university setting, including 467 participants from across all divisions of the university community. (...) This mixed data survey study was comprised of six sections; presented is information for two sections—sample demographics and research integrity. The demographics appear reflective of those of the larger survey, as well as the university setting of study. In the research integrity section there were two parts—one qualitative and one quantitative. Implications with regard to research integrity and ethics in the institutional setting of study are presented. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Causality of Prayer and the Execution of Predestination in Thomas AquinasStephen L. BrockIntroduction: The Question of the Reasonableness of Petitionary PrayerIn a lucid and witty essay published in 1945, C. S. Lewis addressed a common objection to the practice of petitionary prayer.1 This practice is not confined to Christianity, of course, but at least in relation to the Christian conception of the deity, it can seem to make (...) little sense. The problem is simple. If God is all-wise and all-good, what is the point of asking him for things? He is already perfectly aware of our true needs, and he already wants to provide for them. Many of our requests are ignorant and misguided, and the others, it seems, will be at best superfluous. Nevertheless, as Lewis observes, petitionary prayer is part of the whole Christian tradition. Jesus himself practiced it, urged his followers to do so, and taught them how. Lewis wanted to explain that the real purpose of the practice is not to inform God of our needs or to twist his arm. Rather, petitionary prayer functions as a kind of cause, a way of bringing things about. It does so by divine institution and as a kind of share in God's own causality. And so understood, it makes perfect sense. I think Lewis is right about this.Another matter, however, is Lewis's particular way of conceiving the causality of petitionary prayer, especially as to its relation to God's own causality and care for the world. I grant that his conception is quite [End Page 15] straightforward and clear, and that it even has a strong initial plausibility. Indeed, I suspect that it gives voice to the way in which many thoughtful people who pray for things conceive of what they are doing. This is why, even though it is not the main focus of the present essay, I think that it serves as a good way of entering to the topic. But I do hope to show that it contains some serious problems.In what follows, I shall first set out Lewis's answer to the question of the reasonableness of petitionary prayer. Then I shall raise one of the problems that I think it faces. This has to do with another attribute that has traditionally been ascribed to the Christian God; namely, omniscience, the knowledge of all things, including all temporal events, past, present, and future. In the essay on prayer, Lewis does not address this problem. But from things that he says elsewhere about temporal events and how God knows them, I think we can gather how he would have solved it.Rather than evaluating this solution myself, I shall turn next to another twentieth-century British thinker, the philosopher Peter Geach. Although Geach agrees with Lewis in ascribing a causal function to petitionary prayer, Geach's way of understanding temporal events and God's knowledge of them contrasts sharply with Lewis's. In fact, Geach argues—I think persuasively—that a position like Lewis's actually ends up making petitionary prayer unable to function as a cause, and therefore renders it pointless. At the same time, however, Geach's own account of how petitionary prayer fits into God's overall plan has something very important in common with Lewis's. And in my opinion, what they have in common is very problematic.This will bring me to my main theme, which is Thomas Aquinas's view of the matter. Like Lewis and Geach, Thomas does regard petitionary prayer as a divinely instituted way of causing things. On their temporal status, his position is similar to Geach's. But on how prayer and its effects fall under God's providential plan, Thomas differs greatly from both authors. I find his account far more satisfactory. Unfortunately, it is also considerably more complicated and philosophically challenging, and my presentation of it will have to be correspondingly longer.The distinctive features of Thomas's view mostly pertain to the metaphysics of divine transcendence. My main task will be to show how, in his account, the full determinacy of God's eternal plan, including that part of it called... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Womb as Synecdoche: Introduction to Irigaray’s Deconstruction of Plato’s CaveKristi L. Krumnow (bio)“Le prisonnier n’était déjà plus dans une matrice mais dans une caverne, tentative de figuration, de métaphorisation, de la cavité utérine.”(347)1Entering the used bookstore in a university city not too far from Paris, I was anxious to find a copy of a certain Luce Irigaray book. When asked, the bookstore owner politely mocked me about wanting one (...) of her books. What could I possibly want that for? After all, the study of Irigaray was very popular in the 1970s and 1980s, but today, “C’est bien passé, Madame,” he enlightened me. While the bookshop owner was correct in assessing a time frame of the academic popularity of Irigaray’s work, I would argue that the work she did at the onset of 1970s feminism is no more passé than the philosophers she deconstructed. For this reason, I read Irigaray’s work alongside the work of founder-philosopher-father Plato, in order to highlight the timeless relevance of a supposed irrelevant work as “passé” as Luce Irigaray’s Spéculum de l’autre femme. In this analysis, I argue that the negligence of her reading of Plato’s cave and subsequent amnesia of it clearly substantiate her steadfast claim that masculine universality eradicates the feminine and does so quite ironically and even jarringly, as shown by the critical dismissal of Plato’s cave in Spéculum.2Irigaray’s work does indeed come out of a French national context highly invested in the studies of antiquity and, by the postwar ’60s and ’70s, in the questioning of social, cultural, and political institutions (Egéa-Kuehne 200; Leonard, “Irigaray’s Cave” 159–64; Leonard, “Classics” 143; Leonard,Athens 1–14), but this historical fact does not marginalize her work nor subject it to a mere temporal estrangement of feminism, as the male bookstore owner had insinuated. It certainly is a point of fact that Irigaray questioned the father of Western philosophical truth. In fact, reconsidering Plato was tempting to someone, like Luce Irigaray, invested in cultural and academic revolutions, someone who questioned and doubted, like other cultural revolutionaries3 of the late 1960s and early ’70s. The bookstore owner seemed to be saying that the tide has returned to normal, that is, the “normal” that signifies complacency, the “normal” that no longer questions the supposed truth-bearers. He seemed to be pontificating, “it is no longer status quo not to be status quo,” or more precisely, “The revolution is over. Now, go home, girls.” [End Page 69]Spéculum de l’autre femme, the WholeLuce Irigaray’s work Spéculum de l’autre femme [Speculum of the Other Woman]4 is anything but status quo. In an idiosyncratic prose indicative of her deconstructive project, Irigaray daringly reads untouched historical and philosophical works, ones that for millennia have remained a critical and foundational part of Western discourse. Her methodology is complex and knotty because the rhetoric used twists and winds through its own words, sentences, scenes, and discourse, thereby intentionally effecting an implosion within language.5 While on the one hand she innocently participates in an evaluation of Platonism that Derrida made fashionable a few years prior with “deconstruction” of “La Pharmacie de Platon” (Leonard, Athens 190), what she unveils by rereading Plato’s work à la Derrida is the proliferation and predominance of certain philosophical images and ideas. She names this proliferation “patriarchy,” referencing the “phallus” as the symbol of patriarchy and its dominant masculine discourse, thereby calling every thing masculine-related “phallologic,” all of which are neologisms borrowed and employed from either Derrida or her teacher Lacan. Inevitably, she centers her whole argument on certain Western texts as the cause and consequent advancement of the masculine. Spéculum appears daunting in its 462-page French original,6 although no less truncated, albeit ordered, footnoted, and proportionally spaced, in the English translation (Gill 9). In order to facilitate comprehension of a charged and impressive topic, Irigaray relies on images to elucidate her reading by employing ambitious albeit ancient Greek philosophical metaphors of light, sun, and vision. As she does... (shrink)

Kurrâ’ya nispet edilen aynı kelimelerdeki edâ farklılıklarının tartışmalara sebep olmasından ötürü kıraat ihtilafı olan kelimelerde ihticâc yapılmasına gereksinim duyulmuştur. Delil getirmek manasında kullanılan ihticâc kavramı, kıraat ihtilafları için söz konusu olduğunda ise kıraat ihtilaflarının sıhhat zemininin ortaya konması kastedilmektedir. Ayrıca 2. asrın sonlarında kıraat tevcîhlerinin yapıldığı müstakil eserler ortaya çıkmakla birlikte kıraat alan yazınına ait genel telifatlarda da kıraat ihticâclarının yapıldığı görülmektedir. Kıraat müelliflerinden biri olan İbnu’l-Cezerî de Neşru’l-ḳırââti’l-‘aşr adlı eserinde zaman zaman kıraat ihticâcına yer vermektedir. Mezkûr eserdeki kıraat ihticâcları (...) hakkında tespit edilebildiği kadarıyla yapılmış tek bir çalışma bulunmaktadır. Fakat bu çalışmada, kıraatten ve bunun dışındaki disiplinlerden yeterince istifade edilmediği belirlenmiştir. Ayrıca selef ulemasının Neşru’l-ḳırââti’l-‘aşr adlı esere ihticâc konusunda etkisi özelinde bir çalışmaya da rastlanmamıştır. Buradan hareketle elinizdeki bu çalışmada, İbnu’l-Ce-zerî’nin kıraat ihticâcına dair uygulamaları Neşru’l-ḳırââti’l-‘aşr adlı eser özelinde incelenmiş, me‘âni’l-Kur’ân ve me‘âni’l-kıraat literatürlerinin ortaya çıktıkları dönem dikkate alınarak h. 2.-4. asırlarda kaleme alınan bu literatürlere ait eserlerin İbnu’l-Cezerî’ye ait kıraat tevcîhlerine etkisinin olup olmadığı araştırılmıştır. Çalışmanın neticesinde İbnu’l-Cezerî’nin yaptığı kıraat tevcîhlerinden ele alınanların bir kısmına, söz konusu üç asırda kaleme alınan me‘âni’l-Kur’ân ve me‘âni’l-kıraat telifatında ekseriyetle yer verilmediği saptanmıştır. İbnu’l-Cezerî’nin ise kıraat ihtilafının olmadığı yerlerde dahi ilgili edâ için ihticâc yaptığı müşahede edilmiştir. Buna ilaveten İbnu’l-Cezerî’nin Neşr’de yaptığı ihticâc uygulamalarının me‘âni’l-Kur’ân ve me‘âni’l-kıraat telifatında yapılan ihticâc işlemleriyle benzeştiği görülmüştür. Yine Neşr’in tevcîh eseri olmaması hasebiyle de İbnu’l-Cezerî tarafından yapılan ihticâcların ihtiyaç merkezli olarak kendini gösterdiği belirlenmiştir. (shrink)

This article explores egg freezing experiences of women in Turkey. Since 2014, it has been legal in Turkey to use egg freezing technology for ageing women, while it was previously allowed only for disease-related purposes. In cooperation with a private fertility clinic in Istanbul, the authors conducted 21 interviews with older, single women who held either professional or managerial positions and who were undergoing or had undergone the procedure. Drawing on a qualitative analysis of these interviews, the authors explore the (...) social context in which women postpone motherhood and decide to freeze their eggs. The study also looks at the women’s emotional responses to ageing that were triggered by the experience of egg freezing and their narratives of empowerment as a result of the procedure. (shrink)

Self-monitoring theory explains the individual differences in using interpersonal adjustment techniques like self-control, self-regulation, and self-presentation. Self-monitoring plays a key role for understanding the social life. Therefore, it has been one of most popular research topics in social psychology. The aim of this study is to find out if there is a meaningful relationship between religious orientation and self-monitoring, and to determine the direction of the relationship if it exists. Besides, examining the effect of religious group membership on self-monitoring is (...) another aim of this study. In accordance with this purpose, Religious Orientation Scale and Revised Self-Monitoring Scale are applied to sample group which consists of 437 female and 369 male participants aged16 to 65+ living in Bursa. The results has revealed that there is a meaningful positive correlation between intrinsic religious orientation and self-monitoring. In addition, no meaningful relationship between religious group membership and self-monitoring has been confirmed.Summary: The adaptation process of the human being as a social creature starts in a mother's womb and becomes more complicated in consequence of coming into the world which is full of stimulus. In the beginning, this process has only a physical aspect, but with the inclusion of emotional, cognitive, and social factors over time turns into developmental tasks that people will struggle throughout their lives. The social development involves the process of becoming of the individual as an organic part of the society. As the individual realizes the existence of the other, he/she develops similar patterns of behavior that can be approved by the other. Because the meaningful relationships that form the backbone of social development constitute an important part of the self. Belonging is one of the main needs, that the individual shapes his emotions, actions, and decisions more or less in line with this need in order not to encounter the possibility of social exclusion. While belonging is a universal need for every healthy individual, there are differences between individuals in terms of directing the course of the relationship, role sharing, and using situational clues. Individual differences in how people construct interpersonal processes led Mark Snyder to systematize and theorize the concept of self-monitoring. Self-monitoring is a concept that expresses individuals' control of self-presentation, expressive behavior, and non-verbal emotional expression and their regulation. Accordingly, individuals with a high tendency to shape their behavior according to the context are classified as high self-monitors and those with low tendency are classified as low self-monitors. It can be said that adherence to religion, which is one of the determinants of social behavior, is related to self-monitoring. In this context, the main subject of this study is the relationship between self-monitoring and religiosity. The study aims to examine the effect of intrinsic-extrinsic religiosity on individuals' self-monitoring levels. Besides, as a form of religiosity, to reveal whether religious group religiosity affects self-monitoring, the study examines also self-monitoring levels of individuals belonging to the religious group and those who are not.The sample of the study was selected by a simple random sampling method and it consists of 806 participants aged 16 to 65+ living in Bursa in 2017. 437 (54.2%) of the participants in the research are women and 369 (45.8%) are men. In this study, a relational screening model was used for determining the presence, direction, and degree of the relationship between the variables. The questionnaire technique was preferred as the method of gathering information. The questionnaire was arranged in a way that does not require asking the participant any other questions apart from the questions on the form. The questionnaire form used in this research consists of 43 items. At the beginning of the questionnaire, there is a 9-item personal information form that includes demographic items consisting of age, gender, educational status, marital status, occupation, place of residence, socio-economic status, levels of subjective religious involvement, and religious group membership. For the measurement of self-monitoring, a 12-item "Self-Monitoring Scale", which was developed by Mark Snyder, revised by Richard Lennox and Raymond Wolfe and adapted by İlknur Özalp Türetgen and Sevim Cesur to Turkish (α =.80) was used. For the measurement of religious orientation, a 22-item “Religious Orientation Scale” developed by Gordon Allport and Michael Ross and adapted to Turkish by Fatma Gül Cirhinlioğlu was used (α =.90). Data collected through scales were processed by One Way Variance Analysis (ANOVA), t-Test, Pearson Correlation Analysis, and Simple Linear Regression Analysis and turned into research findings.According to the results of the simple linear correlation analysis conducted to reveal whether there is a relationship between the self-monitoring scores of the participants and the intrinsic religious orientation scores, there is a positive and significant relationship between the variables (r = 0.102, p = 0.004 0.05). The result of the correlation analysis between self-monitoring and the level of subjective religious involvement shows that no significant relationship is found (r = 0.051, p = 0.146> 0.05).This research expected that there was a negative relationship between self-monitoring and intrinsic religious orientation. However, the analyses has not reported anticipated results as addressed in the previous research. Therefore, this study opens the door for asking new questions about the subject. Religious groups, by their very nature, can refer the individual to self-presentation control, obedience, to act as deemed appropriate by the group, to adapt to the group, to change behavior without attitude change, and therefore, to attitude-behavior inconsistency. It can be argued that not only religious groups but, by their nature, all social groups create harmony-oriented pressure on the individual. Therefore, it can be predicted that belonging to a group, in general, may have a significant effect on the level of self-monitoring. The high self-monitoring scores of the participants, whether religious or non-religious group members of this study may have reduced the observability of the difference between the two groups. Therefore, repeating the study on a different sample may produce different results. (shrink)

Background: The factors influencing parents’ willingness to enroll their children in biobanks are poorly understood. This study sought to assess parents’ willingness to enroll their children, and their perceived benefits, concerns, and information needs under different consent and data-sharing scenarios, and to identify factors associated with willingness. Methods: This large, experimental survey of patients at the 11 eMERGE Network sites used a disproportionate stratified sampling scheme to enrich the sample with historically underrepresented groups. Participants were randomized to receive one of (...) three consent and data-sharing scenarios. Results: In total, 90,000 surveys were mailed and 13,000 individuals responded (15.8% response rate). 5737 respondents were parents of minor children. Overall, 55% (95% confidence interval 50–59%) of parents were willing to enroll their youngest minor child in a hypothetical biobank; willingness did not differ between consent and data-sharing scenarios. Lower educational attainment, higher religiosity, lower trust, worries about privacy, and attitudes about benefits, concerns, and information needs were independently associated with less willingness to allow their child to participate. Of parents who were willing to participate themselves, 25% were not willing to allow their child to participate. Being willing to participate but not willing to allow one’s child to participate was independently associated with multiple factors, including race, lower educational attainment, lower annual household income, public health care insurance, and higher religiosity. Conclusions: Fifty-five percent of parents were willing to allow their youngest minor child to participate in a hypothetical biobank. Building trust, protecting privacy, and addressing attitudes may increase enrollment and diversity in pediatric biobanks. (shrink)

Now in his 89th year, Viscount Samuel, who with advancing age has had progressively to restrict the activities of his many-sided life, has reluctantly decided not to stand this year for election to the Presidency of The Royal Institute of Philosophy. It is but fitting, before he vacates the Presidential Chair in June, that PHILOSOPHY, as the official organ of the Institute, should pay a small tribute to one who has served its interests so devotedly, and whose claims on its (...) gratitude cannot be exaggerated. (shrink)

This article shows under which circumstances fraudulent accreditation can occur in Brazilian military hospitals, calling attention to the tone at the top as a critical aspect of military fraud deterrence – and hence as a critical aspect of this branch of military ethics. The problems allegedly found in Brazilian military health institutions were revealed through in-depth interviews conducted with 29 professionals who reported to work or have worked in a Brazilian military hospital. These fraud allegations were mostly associated with false (...) documentation and procedures designed to give the appearance that legal requirements for accreditation were met and could be traced back to a weak or corrupt “tone at the top” coming from military higher ranks. (shrink)

Sarbanes–Oxley Section 406 requires a code of ethics for top financial and accounting officers in public companies. The objective of this research is to discover the impact of a financial code of ethics on firm behavior. We performed a longitudinal tracking of firm adoption of a financial code of ethics starting in 2005. We checked these companies’ codes again in 2011 to confirm their continued implementation. Financial restatements were used as a dependent variable to measure improved financial reporting after the (...) adoption of the financial codes. The results confirm that the adoption of a financial code of ethics improves the integrity of financial reporting. (shrink)

Commentators onEpode11 generally begin by comparing the opening couplet with Archilochus : κα⋯ μ' οὔτ' ἰ⋯μβων οὔτε τερπωλ⋯ων μ⋯λει, and sometimes also Catullus 68. 1–40. In both of these the poet explains that grief at the death of a loved one has expelled all desire to compose verses. According to the comparison, Horace, in 1–2, is stating that the onset of love has, similarly, so absorbed his attention that he cannot write verse. The translation will then run ‘Pettius, I have (...) no pleasure any longer in writing verse, smitten as I am with a heavy love’. (shrink)

Clinical decision making is a challenging task that requires practical wisdom—the practised ability to help patients choose wisely among available diagnostic and treatment options. But practical wisdom is not a concept one typically hears mentioned in medical training and practice. Instead, emphasis is placed on clinical judgement. The author draws from Aristotle and Aquinas to describe the virtue of practical wisdom and compare it with clinical judgement. From this comparison, the author suggests that a more complete understanding of clinical judgement (...) requires its explicit integration with goals of care and ethical values. Although clinicians may be justified in assuming that goals of care and ethical values are implicit in routine decision making, it remains important for training purposes to encourage habits of clinical judgement that are consciously goal-directed and ethically informed. By connecting clinical judgement to patients' goals and values, clinical decisions are more likely to stay focused on the particular interests of individual patients. To cultivate wise clinical judgement among trainees, educational efforts should aim at the integration of clinical judgement, communication with patients about goals of care, and ethical reasoning. But ultimately, training in wise clinical judgement will take years of practice in the company of experienced clinicians who are able to demonstrate practical wisdom by example. By helping trainees develop clinical judgement that incorporates patients' goals of care and ethical reasoning, we may help lessen the risk that ‘clinical judgement’ will merely express ‘the clinician's judgement.’. (shrink)

BackgroundAs moral case deliberations (MCDs) have increasingly been implemented in health care institutions as a form of ethics support, it is relevant to know whether and how MCDs actually contribute to positive changes in care. Insight is needed on what actually happens in daily care practice following MCD sessions. This study aimed at investigating the impact of MCD and exploring how ‘impact of MCD’ should be conceptualized for future research.MethodsA multiple-case study was conducted in a care organization for people with (...) intellectual disabilities and/or acquired brain injury, by observing MCD sessions as ‘cases’, followed by interviews with health care professionals concerning the follow-up to these cases, and a focus group with involved MCD facilitators. A conceptual scheme concerning the possible impact formed the basis for analysis: (1) individual moral awareness; (2) the actions of health care professionals; (3) collaboration among health care professionals; (4) the concrete situation of the client; (5) the client’s quality of care and life; (6) the organizational and policy level.ResultsAccording to interviewees, their moral awareness and their collaboration, both among colleagues and with clients’ relatives, improved after MCD. Perceived impact on client situation, quality of care/life and the organizational level varied among interviewees or was difficult to define or link to MCD. Three aspects were added to the conceptual scheme concerning the impact of MCD: (a) preparations and expectations prior to the MCD session; (b) a translational step between the conclusions of the MCD session and practical events in the following period, and (c) collaboration with clients’ relatives. A negative impact of MCD was also found on misunderstandings among participants and disappointment about lack of follow-up.ConclusionsConcretizing and conceptualizing the ‘impact’ of MCD is complicated as many factors play a role either before or during the transition from MCD to practice. It is important to consider ‘impact’ in a broad sense and to relate it to the goals and context of the MCD in question. Future studies in this field should pay additional attention to the preparations, content and process involved in ethics support, including clients’ and relatives’ experiences. (shrink)

Language research has come to rely heavily on large‐scale, web‐based datasets. These datasets can present significant methodological challenges, requiring researchers to make a number of decisions about how they are collected, represented, and analyzed. These decisions often concern long‐standing challenges in corpus‐based language research, including determining what counts as a word, deciding which words should be analyzed, and matching sets of words across languages. We illustrate these challenges by revisiting “Word lengths are optimized for efficient communication” (Piantadosi, Tily, & Gibson, (...) 2011), which found that word lengths in 11 languages are more strongly correlated with their average predictability (or average information content) than their frequency. Using what we argue to be best practices for large‐scale corpus analyses, we find significantly attenuated support for this result and demonstrate that a stronger relationship obtains between word frequency and length for a majority of the languages in the sample. We consider the implications of the results for language research more broadly and provide several recommendations to researchers regarding best practices. (shrink)

An engineer views mind as a graduated development of, and complement to the physical world, aided by the principle of microphysical coding of information.--G. L. C.

This book attempts to fairly summarize the thought of over four hundred "greatest" contributors to philosophy in addition to providing thumbnail biographies. As might be excepted, it fails. For example, all of Plato's dialogues, except the Republic, are allowed one sentence; Berkeley comes off as an influential moron. Heidegger is "to philosophy what Gertrude Stein is to literature...." Of Kierkegaard's nineteen lines, six are devoted to his alleged dislike for women, and none to his philosophic contributions of note.—L. C.

The editor has included eighteen of the best-known papers on positivism and linguistic analysis. Although the readings vary greatly in difficulty a careful selection would make the book useful for introductory courses. An introduction provides a brief survey of analytic philosophy since 1900. Included are papers by Russell, Moore, Ayer, Wisdom, Austin, and others.—L. C.

Objective: To describe the frequency of support for terminal sedation among internists, determine whether support for terminal sedation is accompanied by support for physician assisted suicide , and explore characteristics of internists who support terminal sedation but not assisted suicide.Design: A statewide, anonymous postal survey.Setting: Connecticut, USA.Participants: 677 Connecticut members of the American College of Physicians.Measurements: Attitudes toward terminal sedation and assisted suicide; experience providing primary care to terminally ill patients; demographic and religious characteristics.Results: 78% of respondents believed that if (...) a terminally ill patient has intractable pain despite aggressive analgesia, it is ethically appropriate to provide terminal sedation . Of those who favoured terminal sedation, 38% also agreed that PAS is ethically appropriate in some circumstances. Along a three point spectrum of aggressiveness in end of life care, the plurality of respondents were in the middle, agreeing with terminal sedation but not with PAS. Compared with respondents who were less aggressive or more aggressive, physicians in this middle group were more likely to report having more experience providing primary care to terminally ill patients and attending religious services more frequently .Conclusions: Support for terminal sedation was widespread in this population of physicians, and most who agreed with terminal sedation did not support PAS. Most internists who support aggressive palliation appear likely to draw an ethical line between terminal sedation and assisted suicide. (shrink)

Despite increasing scientific interest in self-generated thought-mental content largely independent of the immediate environment-there has yet to be any comprehensive synthesis of the subjective experience and neural correlates of affect in these forms of thinking. Here, we aim to develop an integrated affective neuroscience encompassing many forms of self-generated thought-normal and pathological, moderate and excessive, in waking and in sleep. In synthesizing existing literature on this topic, we reveal consistent findings pertaining to the prevalence, valence, and variability of emotion in (...) self-generated thought, and highlight how these factors might interact with self-generated thought to influence general well-being. We integrate these psychological findings with recent neuroimaging research, bringing attention to the neural correlates of affect in self-generated thought. We show that affect in self-generated thought is prevalent, positively biased, highly variable (both within and across individuals), and consistently recruits many brain areas implicated in emotional processing, including the orbitofrontal cortex, amygdala, insula, and medial prefrontal cortex. Many factors modulate these typical psychological and neural patterns, however; the emerging affective neuroscience of self-generated thought must endeavor to link brain function and subjective experience in both everyday self-generated thought as well as its dysfunctions in mental illness. (shrink)