Previous research has found that more embodied insults are identified faster and more accurately than less embodied insults. The linguistic processing of embodied compliments has not been well explored. In the present study, participants completed two tasks where they identified insults and compliments, respectively. Half of the stimuli were more embodied than the other half. We examined the late positive potential component of event-related potentials in early, middle, and late time windows. Increased embodiment resulted in improved response accuracy to compliments (...) in both tasks, whereas it only improved accuracy for insults in the compliment detection task. More embodied stimuli elicited a larger LPP than less embodied stimuli in the early time window. Insults generated a larger LPP in the late time window in the insult task; compliments generated a larger LPP in the early window in the compliment task. These results indicate that electrophysiological correlates of emotional language perception are sensitive to both top-down and bottom-up processes. (shrink)

Objective: Deficits in affective processing are associated with impairments in both mental and physical health. The role of affective processing in patients with functional somatic complaints such as irritable bowel syndrome remains unclear. Most studies have focused on the capacity for emotional awareness and expression, but neglect other dimensions of affective processing. Therefore, this study aimed to systematically analyze differences in six different dimensions of affective processing between patients with IBS and healthy controls. Additionally, we exploratively investigated the impact of (...) IBS symptom severity, psychological distress, and attachment styles on affective processing in IBS. Methods: A controlled cross-sectional multi-center study was conducted. Overall, 127 patients with IBS were compared with 127 matched HCs using multivariate analysis of variances. Affective processing was operationalized in line with the affect cascade model on six specific dimensions: emotional experience, emotional awareness, affect tolerance, affect differentiation, affect regulation, and emotional communication. They were measured using two subscales of the Mentalizing Questionnaire and four subscales of the Operationalized Psychodynamic Diagnosis–Structure Questionnaire. Linear regression analysis was used to investigate the influence of IBS symptom severity, depression, anxiety, and anxious and avoidant attachment styles on the different dimensions of affective processing in IBS. Results: Patients with IBS compared to HCs showed deficits in all six dimensions of affective processing. Deficits were largest for affect tolerance and lowest for emotional experience and emotional awareness. Moderate effect sizes were found for affect differentiation, emotional communication, and affect regulation. Moreover, explorative analyses indicated that affective processing in patients with IBS was significantly influenced by levels of anxiety and insecure attachment. Conclusion: The results indicate a specific pattern of affective processing abilities in patients with IBS. The deficits in affective processing are more prominent in the area of understanding and tolerating difficult affective states than experiencing affective states. This opens interesting perspectives for the development of specific psychotherapeutic interventions. (shrink)

An interdisciplinary and contemporary response to Irigaray’s work.

This article attempts to answer a question that many dancers and non-dancers may have. What is dance according to the media? Furthermore, how does the written word portray dance in the media? To answer these ques-tions, this research focuses on the role that the discourse of dance in media plays in the public sphere’s knowledge construction of dance. This is impor-tant to study because the public sphere’s meaning of dance will determine whether dance education is promoted or banned in schools (...) and in society. The aim of this paper is to contribute to the existing literature of dance in the media. One limitation of this contribution is that the research uses only newspaper articles as a source of analysis. Future research should include an analysis of visual and audio clips of dance as portrayed in the media. (shrink)

Dans cet article, nous examinons les constructions interrogatives portant sur un groupe prépositionnel dans un réseau de 10 points d’enquête en Kabylie. Certaines de ces constructions sont caractérisées par la préfixation de la préposition (P) sur le complémenteur (C). Nous mettons en évidence que si, dans une construction interrogative portant sur un complément prépositionnel, C est spécifié par un constituant interrogatif, alors C ne porte pas de P préfixée. Si C est spécifié par un constituant non interrogatif ou bien si (...) le spécificateur de C n’est pas réalisé morphologiquement, alors C est préfixé par P. Cet article fait partie d’un projet plus large portant sur la phonologie, la morphologie et la syntaxe des groupes prépositionnels dans différentes variétés du taqbaylit. (shrink)

En este trabajo se presentan criterios que permiten estimar parámetros de desinfección mediante el uso de luz ultravioleta UV-C de onda corta, en agua, aire y superficies. Se indican métodos para evaluar la dosificación en función de la potencia de la lámpara empleada. Este tipo de estrategia permiten resultados de hasta 99.9% de desinfección, inactivando diferentes tipos de microorganismos. Estas referencias sirven de base para el diseño de dispositivos de utilidad en la presente emergencia por COVID-19, cuyo origen, al ser (...) viral, es susceptible al mismo método de desinfección debido al proceso de dimerización del ADN, donde el daño producido en la estructura celular, afecta la capacidad de reproducción y de funcionalidad. Palabras Clave: luz UV-C o germicida, desinfección UV, dimerización del ADN. Referencias [1]R. Wallace, M. Ouellette and J. Jean, "Effect of UV‐C light or hydrogen peroxide wipes on the inactivation of methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus, Clostridium difficile spores and norovirus surrogate", Journal of Applied Microbiology, vol. 127, no. 2, pp. 586-597, 2019. [2]J. Vargas, "Efecto de la radiación gamma sobre las características físico - químicas, sensoriales y microbiológicas en páprika en polvo ", Revista ECIPeru, pp. 68-71, 2019. [3]M. Ángeles García y P. Fernández, "Luz ultravioleta e inmunidad", Piel, vol. 21, no. 8, pp. 367-368, 2016. [4]W. Pachuau y R. Tiwari, " Deep Ultraviolet Light Emitting Diodes: Physics, Performance, and Applications", ECS Meetings, 2014. [5]W. Kowalski, Ultraviolet Germicidal Irradiation Handbook, 5th ed. Berlin: Springer Berlin, 2014, pp. 1-13. [6]W. Kowalski, Ultraviolet Germicidal Irradiation Handbook, 5th ed. Berlin: Springer Berlin, 2014, pp. 17-47. [7]"Germicidal Ultraviolet ", Media.ies.org, 2020. [En línea]. Disponible en: https://media.ies.org/docs/standards/IES%20CR-2-20-V1a-20200507.pdf. [Último acceso: 16 de junio de 2020]. [8]J. Bolton y C. Cotton, The ultraviolet disinfection handbook, 3rd ed. Denver, Colo.: American Water Works Association, 2008, pp. 13-33. [9]W. Kowalski, Ultraviolet Germicidal Irradiation Handbook, 5th ed. Berlin: Springer Berlin, 2014, pp. 8-9. [10]P. Aguirre, J. García y R. Mujeriego Sahuquillo, "Desinfección con cloro y luz UV en un proceso convencional de regeneración de agua", Ingeniería del agua, vol. 11, no. 1, p. 75, 2004. (shrink)

Metabolic pathways underlying brain function remain largely unexplored during neurodevelopment, predominantly due to the lack of feasible techniques for use with awake infants. Broadband near-infrared spectroscopy provides the opportunity to explore the relationship between cerebral energy metabolism and blood oxygenation/haemodynamics through the measurement of changes in the oxidation state of mitochondrial respiratory chain enzyme cytochrome-c-oxidase alongside haemodynamic changes. We used a bNIRS system to measure ΔoxCCO and haemodynamics during functional activation in a group of 42 typically developing infants aged between (...) 4 and 7 months. bNIRS measurements were made over the right hemisphere over temporal, parietal and central cortical regions, in response to social and non-social visual and auditory stimuli. Both ΔoxCCO and Δ[HbO2] displayed larger activation for the social condition in comparison to the non-social condition. Integration of haemodynamic and metabolic signals revealed networks of stimulus-selective cortical regions that were not apparent from analysis of the individual bNIRS signals. These results provide the first spatially resolved measures of cerebral metabolic activity alongside haemodynamics during functional activation in infants. Measuring synchronised changes in metabolism and haemodynamics have the potential for uncovering the development of cortical specialisation in early infancy. (shrink)

RONQUILLO C, BOSCHMA G, WONG ST and QUINEY L. Nursing Inquiry 2011; 18: 262–275Beyond greener pastures: exploring contexts surrounding Filipino nurse migration in Canada through oral historyThe history of immigrant Filipino nurses in Canada has received little attention, yet Canada is a major receiving country of a growing number of Filipino migrants and incorporates Filipino immigrant nurses into its healthcare workforce at a steady rate. This study aims to look beyond the traditional economic and policy analysis perspectives of global migration (...) and beyond the push and pull factors commonly discussed in the migration literature. Through oral history, this study explores biographical histories of nine Filipino immigrant nurses currently working in British Columbia and Alberta, Canada. Narratives reveal the instrumental role of the deeply embedded culture of migration in the Philippines in influencing Filipino nurses to migrate. Additionally, the stories illustrate the weight of cultural pressures and societal constructs these nurses faced that first colored their decision to pursue a career in nursing and ultimately to pursue emigration. Oral history is a powerful tool for examining migration history and sheds light on nuances of experience that might otherwise be neglected. This study explores the complex connections between various factors motivating Filipino nurse migration, the decision-making process, and other pre-migration experiences. (shrink)

The basic challenge that readers of the New Testament face is not only about what Jesus Christ teaches but who he is. Functional Christology has developed at the expense of ontological Christology. This challenge centres on Jesus Christ’s relevance, in terms of his identity, not only for Christians in particular but also for creation as a whole. The question ‘who is Jesus Christ in relation to creation?’ is thus of special interest to this study. Various authors such as Gunton, (...) class='Hi'>Gregersen, Peacocke and others have approached this question from different perspectives. The PhD study by Rabie-Boshoff was completed to shed light into the context of dialogue between Christian theology and the science of linguistics in an effort to understand the Genesis 1 creation story. This article refers to part of the study in an effort to make sense of who Jesus Christ is in relation to creation. This provides consolation in a time of worldwide lockdown because of the Coronavirus Disease 2019 virus. The human struggle of making sense of the world is brought into sharp focus in times like these, more so in terms of making sense of their creatureliness and mortality. Although science as a valid knowledge base may provide some answers to this human dilemma, Christians in particular appeal to the Bible and their belief in Jesus Christ. This turn to Jesus, and who he is, provides human beings with enduring and satisfying answers to their suffering and pain.Contribution: This article is an attempt to contribute to the ongoing discussion on creation in terms of how human beings make sense of creation, considering who Jesus Christ is in relation to creation. Human beings have always been engaged in a process of making sense of the world they live in. Ancient cultures provide such a window, allowing a glimpse into how those cultures perceived their world. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:94 Feminist Studies 47, no. 1. © 2021 by Feminist Studies, Inc. Jennifer C. Nash Black Lactation Aesthetics: Remaking the Natural in Lakisha Cohill’s Photographs In her 1992 essay “Selling Hot Pussy,” bell hooks recounts entering a “late night dessert place” with a group of colleagues who all began to laugh at a shelf of “gigantic chocolate breasts complete with nipples— huge edible tits.”1 For hooks, the chocolate Black (...) breasts are mammy imagery, a “displaced longing for a racist past when the bodies of black women were a commodity, available to anyone white who could pay the price.”2 For her white colleagues, the chocolate breasts are simply comical. Her colleagues’ response—their willingness to consume, laugh, and ignore racial, gendered, sexual violence—constitutes the racialized visual marketplace that hooks’s essay seeks to both describe and dismantle. The chocolate breasts become a rhetorical point of entry into hooks’s critical engagement with a visual marketplace where Black female bodies are delectable and disposable objects. hooks’s analysis has become part of a canon of Black feminist work exploring how Black breasts get taken up as signs of pathology, “excess flesh,” sexual deviance, hypersexuality, and alterity.3 From histories of the so-called Hottentot Venus and the preoccupation with her breasts, buttocks, and genitalia—including 1. bell hooks, “Selling Hot Pussy,” Black Looks: Race and Representation (Boston: South End Press, 1992), 61. 2. hooks, 61–62. 3. See Nicole R. Fleetwood, Troubling Vision: Performance, Visuality, and Blackness (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010). Jennifer C. Nash 95 signature works by Zine Magubane, Janell Hobson, Samantha Pinto, and T. Denean Sharpley-Whiting4 —to scholarship on the construction of black women’s imagined corporeality as “social dead weight” by Sabrina Strings, Black feminists have given critical attention to the construction of Black breasts as the location of Black women’s imagined racial and sexual difference.5 If Black breasts have been culturally and scientifically constructed as deviant, excessive, pornographic, and desirous, they have largely been uncoupled from an identification with nutrition—from the capacity to sustain and feed babies—except their connection with wet nursing and their conscription into maternal labor for white children. In this imaginary, Black breasts provide nutrition only when recruited as white property, with their nurturance capacity oriented toward white health and futurity. We might understand the cultural inability to interpret Black breasts as nurturing Black life as part of what Andrea Freeman describes as the “unmothering” of Black women, the unseeing of Black maternity except to elevate it as a symbol of brokenness or pathology.6 But in recent years, as I argue in my forthcoming book Birthing Black Mothers, Black breasts have entered the US cultural imagination anew. Black breasts are increasingly viewed as in need of support through seemingly benign state interventions to encourage Black breastfeeding. Indeed, Black breasts are recruited by an array of actors who often find themselves strangely aligned to champion Black breastfeeding —including NGOs, public health campaigns, and reproductive justice efforts spearheaded by Black feminists—precisely because Black breastfeeding is thought to perform urgent political, emotional, and 4. See Zine Magubane, “Which Bodies Matter? Feminism, Poststructuralism, Race, and the Curious Theoretical Odyssey of the ‘Hottentot Venus,’” Gender & Society 15, no. 6 (2001): 816–834; Janell Hobson, Venus in the Dark: Blackness and Beauty in Popular Culture (New York: Routledge, 2005); Samantha Pinto, Infamous Bodies: Early Black Women’s Celebrity and the Afterlives of Rights (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2020); and T. Denean Sharpley-Whiting, Black Venus: Sexualized Savages, Primal Fears, and Primitive Narratives in French (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999). 5. See Sabrina Strings, Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia (New York: NYU Press, 2019). 6. Andrea Freeman, “Unmothering Black Women: Formula Feeding as an Incident of Slavery,” Hastings Law Journal 69, no 1545 (2018): 1545–1606. 96 Jennifer C. Nash public health work. Black breastmilk is increasingly described as a crucial technology of Black life, one that supports Black infant life and inoculates it physically, psychically, and even spiritually against the array of anti-Black forces that wound and violate. The work that Black breast milk is thought to perform includes its posited... (shrink)

Irigaray raises the question of sexual difference. Yet there are moments at which Irigaray’s own pursuit of this question recapitulates the kind of universalism it is meant to combat. She remains ensconced in judgments that close down the attempt to think beyond sexual difference. The article pursues this line of thought particularly in relation to her figuring of Antigone, suggesting that there is a need to open up sexual difference so that it does not function as a universal discourse, but (...) is open to other kinds of difference, for example, racial difference. (shrink)

Extant research provides compelling conceptual and empirical arguments that company-external as well as company-internal CSR efforts positively affect employees, but does so largely in studies assessing effects from the two CSR types independently of each other. In contrast, this paper investigates external–internal CSR jointly, examining the effects of consistent external–internal CSR strategies on employee attitudes, intentions, and behaviors. The research takes a social and moral identification theory view and advances the core hypothesis that inconsistent CSR strategies, defined as favoring external (...) over internal stakeholders, trigger employees’ perceptions of corporate hypocrisy which, in turn, lead to emotional exhaustion and turnover. In Study 1, a cross-industry employee survey indicates that inconsistent CSR strategies with larger external than internal efforts increase employees’ turnover intentions via perceived corporate hypocrisy and emotional exhaustion. In Study 2, a multi-source secondary dataset demonstrates that inconsistent CSR strategies increase firms’ actual employee turnover. Combined, the two studies demonstrate the importance of taking into account the interests of both external and internal stakeholders of the firm when researching and managing CSR. (shrink)

In the face of massively increased technological complexity, it is striking that so many of today’s computational and networked things follow design ideals honed decades ago in a much different context. These strong ideals prescribe a presentation of things as useful tools through design and a withdrawal of aspects of their functionality and complexity. Beginning in the mid-twentieth century, we trace this ‘withdrawal program’ as it has persisted in the face of increasing computational complexity. Currently, design is in a dilemma (...) where computational products can be seen as brilliantly designed and engaging to use yet can also be considered very problematic in how they support hidden agendas and often seem less than trustworthy. In this article, we analyse factors shaping this emergent ethical dilemma and reveal the concept of _a widening rift_ between what computational _things actually are and do_ and _the ways in which they are presented as things for use_. Against this backdrop, we argue that there is a need for a new orientation in design programs to adequately address this deepening rupture between the aesthetics and ethics in the design of computational things. (shrink)

Die Leitfragen dieser wahrheitstheoretischen Interpretation lauten: Welche Rolle spielt die Wahrheitsfrage in der ‚Kritik der reinen Vernunft‘ generell und in den einzelnen Abteilungen der Untersuchung? Welche Wahrheitskonzeption vertritt Kant, mit welchen Argumenten und welche Kritik konkurrierender philosophischer Positionen ist damit verbunden? Alle Hauptabteilungen der Kritik der reinen Vernunft werden in diesem Lichte erklärt, geprüft und kommentiert. Entgegen der verbreitenden Tendenz, den Wahrheitsbegriff bei der Interpretation der Kritik der reinen Vernunft in den Hintergrund treten zu lassen, wird demonstriert, dass sich deren (...) zentrale Philosopheme in wahrheitstheoretischer Perspektive erschließen. Indem sie die Wahrheitsfrage als Schlüssel zum adäquaten Verständnis der Kritik der reinen Vernunft erweist, eröffnet die Arbeit ein neues Verständnis der Kritik der reinen Vernunft und der kantischen Transzendentalphilosophie. Das zentrale Ergebnis der Arbeit integriert exegetischen und die systematischen Fragestellungen: Es besteht in dem Nachweis, dass Kant in der ‚Kritik der reinen Vernunft‘ durch die immanente Kritik des Erkenntnisvermögens das Widerspruchsprinzip, das transzendentale Prinzip analytischer Urteile, um ein transzendentales Prinzip synthetischer Urteile ergänzt. Dadurch wird die Wahrheitsskepsis sowohl in der rationalistischen als auch in der empiristischen Variante ausgeräumt und die Erkenntnisansprüche reiner Vernunft in ihre Grenzen gesetzt. (shrink)

Winner, 2020 Body and Embodiment Best Publication Award, given by the American Sociological Association Honorable Mention, 2020 Sociology of Sex and Gender Distinguished Book Award, given by the American Sociological Association How the female body has been racialized for over two hundred years There is an obesity epidemic in this country and poor Black women are particularly stigmatized as “diseased” and a burden on the public health care system. This is only the most recent incarnation of the fear of fat (...) Black women, which Sabrina Strings shows took root more than two hundred years ago. Strings weaves together an eye-opening historical narrative ranging from the Renaissance to the current moment, analyzing important works of art, newspaper and magazine articles, and scientific literature and medical journals—where fat bodies were once praised—showing that fat phobia, as it relates to Black women, did not originate with medical findings, but with the Enlightenment era belief that fatness was evidence of “savagery” and racial inferiority. The author argues that the contemporary ideal of slenderness is, at its very core, racialized and racist. Indeed, it was not until the early twentieth century, when racialized attitudes against fatness were already entrenched in the culture, that the medical establishment began its crusade against obesity. An important and original work, Fearing the Black Body argues convincingly that fat phobia isn’t about health at all, but rather a means of using the body to validate race, class, and gender prejudice. (shrink)

In this paper, we argue that the concept of environmental scaffolding can contribute to a better understanding of our affective life and the complex manners in which it is shaped by environmental entities. In particular, the concept of environmental scaffolding offers a more comprehensive and less controversial framework than the notions of embeddedness and extendedness. We contribute to the literature on situated affectivity by embracing and systematizing the diversity of affective scaffolding. In doing so, we introduce several distinctions that provide (...) classifications of different types of environmentally scaffolded affectivity. Furthermore, we differentiate eight dimensions that allow us to evaluate the quality and effectivity of scaffolds in particular applications. On that basis, we develop a taxonomy using paradigmatic examples of affective scaffolding. This taxonomy enriches the current debate by emphasizing distinctions that are often conflated and by identifying fields of application that are commonly overlooked. (shrink)

Although pain is one of the most fundamental and unique experiences we undergo in everyday life, it also constitutes one of the most enigmatic and frustrating subjects for many scientists. This book provides a detailed analysis of why this issue is grounded in the nature of pain itself. It also offers a philosophically driven solution of how we may still approach pain in a theoretically compelling and practically useful manner. Two main theses are defended: (i) Pain seems inscrutable because there (...) exists no property that is commonly shared by all types of pain and that is at the same time particular to pain, setting it apart from other bodily sensations. This applies irrespective of whether we consider the psychological dimensions, neural networks, causal relations or biological functions of pain. Consequently, it is impossible to refer to ideal far-reaching and ideal distinct generalizations on the matter of pain. (ii) Despite this challenge, by focusing on the resemblance relations that hold across pains, we can generate scientific progress in explaining, predicting and treating pain. In doing so, the book aims to provide a clear conceptual basis for interdisciplinary communication and a useful heuristic for future research. (shrink)

Food poverty and food waste are two major contemporary food system problems, which have gained prominence amongst both scholars and policy-makers, due to recent economic and environmental concerns. In this context, the culturally dominant perspective portrays charitable food redistribution as a “win–win solution” to confront food poverty and food waste in affluent societies, although this view is contested by many scholars. This paper applies the notions of framings and flat/sharp keyings to unpack the different narratives entailed by public discourses on (...) food waste and food poverty in Italy. The aim is to problematize the representation of the recent anti-waste/pro-donations law as the optimal policy measure to effectively rectify both food poverty and food waste. The paper argues that the widespread public support for the law reflects the interpretation of charitable food redistribution as a consensus frame, standing for the convergence between flat positions and is reinforced by confusion on terms and responsibilities. Indeed, the strength of the law lies in the capacity to reconcile different positions and bring actors together around a short-term objective, whose foundations have deep roots in the common ethics. However, if the debate is to be moved forward, trade-offs between different framings of problems at stake should be explicitly navigated when designing policy instruments. (shrink)

This article examines how the so-called disembodied criminal subject is given structure and form through the law of homicide and assault. By analysing how the body is materialised through the criminal law’s enactment of death and injury, this article suggests that the biological positioning of these harms of violence as uncontroversial, natural, and universal conditions of being ‘human’ cannot fully appreciate what makes violence wrongful for us, as embodied entities. Absent a theory of the body, and a consideration of corporeality, (...) the criminal law risks marginalising, or altogether eliding, experiences of violence that do not align with its paradigmatic vision of what bodies can and must do when suffering its effects. Here I consider how the bionic body disrupts the criminal law’s understanding of human violence by being a body that is both organic and inorganic, and capable of experiencing and performing violence in unexpected ways. I propose that a criminal law that is more receptive to the changing, technologically mediated conditions of human existence would be one that takes the corporeal dimensions of violence more seriously and, as an extension of this, adopts an embodied, embedded, and relational understanding of human vulnerability to violence. (shrink)

Many scientists regard mass and energy as the primary currency of nature. In recent years, however, the concept of information has gained importance. In this book, eminent scientists, philosophers, and theologians chart various aspects of information, from quantum information to biological and digital information, in order to understand how nature works. Beginning with a historical treatment of the topic, the book also examines physical and biological approaches to information, and the philosophical, theological, and ethical implications.

Bodily sensations, such as pain, hunger, itches, or sexual feelings, are commonly characterized in terms of their phenomenal character. In order to account for this phenomenal character, many philosophers adopt strong representationalism. According to this view, bodily sensations are essentially and entirely determined by an intentional content related to particular conditions of the body. For example, pain would be nothing more than the representation of actual or potential tissue damage. In order to motivate and justify their view, strong representationalists often (...) appeal to the reliable causal covariance between bodily sensations and certain kinds of bodily conditions or to the corresponding biological function that these bodily sensations are supposed to fulfill. In this paper, I argue on the basis of recent empirical research that arguments from reliable causal covariance and biological function cannot motivate the introduction of corresponding intentional content. In particular, I argue that bodily sensations are caused by a heterogeneous class of physiological and psychological factors and their biological functions are too diverse to be reduced to the representation of a particular bodily condition. Responses are available to strong representationalists, but they either require substantial alterations to their core assumptions or incur a significant empirical burden. (shrink)

Niche construction denotes the alteration, destruction, or creation of environmental features through the activities of an organism, modifying the relation between organism and environment. The concept of niche construction found application in various fields of research: evolutionary biology, enculturation, ontogenetic development, and local organism-environment coordination. This is because it provides a useful tool emphasizing different aspects of the dynamic interplay between organisms and their actively constructed environment. Traditionally, niche construction is considered a positive mechanism in the complementarity of organism and (...) environment. In contrast, this paper sheds light on the dark side of niche construction, that is, the different manners in which organisms may modify environmental features that are in some way or another harmful to them. First, the paper introduces a paradigmatic distinction of four kinds of niche construction as commonly addressed in recent literature, using more or less extended spatio-temporal scales as the distinguishing feature. Second, the paper elaborates on the concept of negative niche construction, providing normative criteria of (mal)adaptation that are suitable for the evaluation of environmental alterations, given the chosen spatio-temporal scale. Of particular interest are inter-scale conflicts: those cases of environmental constructions which appear adaptive concerning one spatio-temporal scale but maladaptive concerning another. Third, the paper distinguishes the concept of niche construction as a valuable instrument to better understand central aspects of modern medicine and the entangled contribution of evolutionary, socio-cultural, personal, and situational aspects to different health issues, using chronic pain as an illustrative case study. (shrink)

In recent years, the societal and personal impacts of pain, and the fact that we still lack an effective method of treatment, has motivated researchers from diverse disciplines to try to think in new ways about pain and its management. In this paper, we aim to develop an enactive approach to pain and the transition to chronicity. Two aspects are central to this project. First, the paper conceptualizes differences between acute and chronic pain, as well as the dynamic process of (...) pain chronification, in terms of changes in the field of affordances. This is, in terms of the possibilities for action perceived by subjects in pain. As such, we aim to do justice to the lived experience of patients as well as the dynamic role of behavioral learning, neural reorganization, and socio-cultural practices in the generation and maintenance of pain. Second, we aim to show in which manners such an enactive approach may contribute to a comprehensive understanding of pain that avoids conceptual and methodological issues of reductionist and fragmented approaches. It proves particularly beneficial as a heuristic in pain therapy addressing the heterogenous yet dynamically intertwined aspects that may contribute to pain and its chronification. (shrink)

Drawing upon two independent national samples of 201 and 241 psychology graduate students, this article describes the development and psychometric evaluation of 4 Web-based student self-report scales tapping student socialization in the responsible conduct of research (RCR) with human participants. The Mentoring the Responsible Conduct of Research Scale (MRCR) is composed of 2 subscales assessing RCR instruction and modeling by research mentors. The 2 subscales of the RCR Department Climate Scale (RCR-DC) assess RCR department policies and faculty and student RCR (...) practices. The RCR Preparedness scale (RCR-P) and the RCR Field Integrity scale (RCR-FI) measure respectively students' confidence in their ability to conduct research responsibly and their belief in the RCR integrity of psychology as a discipline. Factor analysis, coefficient alphas, correlations, and multiple regression analyses demonstrated each of the scales had good internal consistency and concurrent and construct validity. (shrink)

This book brings together an impressive group of leading scholars in the sciences of complexity, and a few workers on the interface of science and religion, to explore the wider implications of complexity studies. It includes an introduction to complexity studies and explores the concept of information in physics and biology and various philosophical and religious perspectives. Chapter authors include Paul Davies, Greg Chaitin, Charles Bennett, Werner Loewenstein, Paul Dembski, Ian Stewart, Stuart Kauffman, Harold Morowitz, Arthur Peacocke, and Niels H. (...) Gregersen. (shrink)

Pain is often used as the paradigmatic example of a phenomenal kind with a phenomenal quality common and unique to its instantiations. Philosophers have intensely discussed the relation between the subjective feeling, which unites pains and distinguishes them from other experiences, and the phenomenal properties of sensory, affective, and evaluative character along which pains typically vary. At the center of this discussion is the question whether the phenomenal properties prove necessary and/or sufficient for pain. In the empirical literature, sensory, affective, (...) and evaluative properties have played a decisive role in the investigation of psychophysical correspondence and clinical diagnostics. This paper addresses the outlined philosophical and empirical issues from a new perspective by constructing amultidimensional phenomenal spacefor pain. First, the paper will construe the phenomenal properties of pains in terms of a property space whosestructurereflects phenomenal similarities and dissimilarities by means of spatial distance. Second, philosophical debates on necessary and sufficient properties are reconsidered in terms of whether there is a phenomenal space formed of dimensions along which all and only pains vary. It is concluded that there is no space of this kind and, thus, that pain constitutes aprimitivephenomenal kind that cannot be analyzed entirely in terms of its varying phenomenal properties. Third, the paper addresses theutilityof continued reference to pain and its phenomenal properties in philosophical and scientific discourses. It is argued that numerous insights into the phenomenal structure of pain can be gained that have thus far received insufficient attention. (shrink)

This article describes the results of qualitative research into the moral issues faced by social work professionals working in projects targeted at teenage mothers. The research is part of the tradition of empirical and practice-driven ethics. The main questions were: How does morality become visible in the social services for teenage mothers and how do social workers deal with the moral dimension of their work? (How) can education, training and peer review offer space for moral reflection? Interviews and group meetings (...) ('focus groups') were held to answer these questions. Nineteen professionals (front-line professionals as well as professionals in executive roles) participated in the research. The findings describe the moral issues and the moral actions of professionals and the organizational context respectively. The results reveal that the everyday practice of social work professionals can raise complex issues inherent to their work and that there is often no explicit reflection on the moral dimension of these issues. The authors argue that there needs to be greater focus on the complexity of moral issues and elaborate on three dimensions of this complexity. (shrink)

According to pure imperativism, pain experiences are experiences of a specific phenomenal type that are entirely constituted by imperative content. As their primary argument, proponents of imperativism rely on the biological role that pain experiences fulfill, namely, the motivation of actions whose execution ensures the normal functioning of the body. In the paper, I investigate which specific types of action are of relevance for an imperative interpretation and how close their link to pain experiences actually is. I argue that, although (...) imperative theories constitute an apparently promising version of strong intentionalism, they cannot provide an imperative content that meets their own criteria of both sufficiency and necessity. I further argue that this issue cannot be solved by impure imperative theories either. (shrink)

Distributed Leadership (DL) is a feature of education in many jurisdictions. Similarly, in Ireland the principles of DL have been adopted as part of a quality framework to underpin a system that provides high quality student care, learning and teaching. This model necessitates an alignment of senior leaders (SLs) and middle leaders (MLs) whose actions are informed by the needs and priorities of their particular school. The traditional notion of the ML position as a management position is changing. The evolution (...) requires a reconceptualisation, a transformation of the role and how we support and develop it to ensure that MLs are an integral part of the leadership structure of the school. This pragmatic research explored the PD needs of MLs in Irish, Education and Training Board (ETB) post-primary schools. It involved a mixed-methods, exploratory sequential study. Stage one involved a set of five semi structured interviews with AP I post holders. These were used as an instrument to develop the online surveys. Stage two involved quantitative research. Online surveys were distributed to all ETB schools in the republic of Ireland. In stage three a summary of the findings of the survey were shared with ten AP Is who were subsequently interviewed to gain further insights. The study illustrated that the development of MLs requires the support of SLs, skills development, a supportive school culture and combined training for senior and middle leaders which should be facilitated by an independent person. (shrink)

What would be an adequate theory of social understanding? In the last decade, the philosophical debate has focused on Theory Theory, Simulation Theory and Interaction Theory as the three possible candidates. In the following, we look carefully at each of these and describe its main advantages and disadvantages. Based on this critical analysis, we formulate the need for a new account of social understanding. We propose the Person Model Theory as an independent new account which has greater explanatory power compared (...) to the existing theories. (shrink)

Pain is often used as the paradigmatic example of a phenomenal kind with a phenomenal quality common and unique to its instantiations. Philosophers have intensely discussed the relation between the subjective feeling, which unites pains and distinguishes them from other experiences, and the phenomenal properties of sensory, affective, and evaluative character along which pains typically vary. At the center of this discussion is the question whether the phenomenal properties prove necessary and/or sufficient for pain. In the empirical literature, sensory, affective, (...) and evaluative properties have played a decisive role in the investigation of psychophysical correspondence and clinical diagnostics. This paper addresses the outlined philosophical and empirical issues from a new perspective by constructing a multidimensional phenomenal space for pain. First, the paper will construe the phenomenal properties of pains in terms of a property space whose structure reflects phenomenal similarities and dissimilarities by means of spatial distance. Second, philosophical debates on necessary and sufficient properties are reconsidered in terms of whether there is a phenomenal space formed of dimensions along which all and only pains vary. It is concluded that there is no space of this kind and, thus, that pain constitutes a primitive phenomenal kind that cannot be analyzed entirely in terms of its varying phenomenal properties. Third, the paper addresses the utility of continued reference to pain and its phenomenal properties in philosophical and scientific discourses. It is argued that numerous insights into the phenomenal structure of pain can be gained that have thus far received insufficient attention. (shrink)