Ce livre offre un parcours en compagnie d'ecrivains, philosophes et poetes, parmi les plus marquants de la deuxieme moitie du XXe siecle. Son point de depart est une question qui porte sur l'essence meme de la litterature: que signifie aimer avec passion une oeuvre et l'homme qui est derriere?... Comment vit-on avec? Et qu'y trouve-t-on pour vivre avec soi meme, apprendre a vivre ainsi? Il s'agit donc d'un livre ecrit a la premiere personne par un auteur qui aura eu la (...) chance de croiser le chemin de quelques grandes figures de la pensee francaise contemporaine: Edmond Jabes, Jacques Derrida et Andre du Bouchet, Maurice Blanchot de facon plus lointaine. On y trouvera pourtant une volonte clairement pedagogique. Didier Cahen reprend et etudie les enonces multiples de ces createurs de la postmodernite sur l'articulation de la pensee et de la litterature ou sur l'espace commun de la philosophie et de la poesie. Dans la foulee, il aborde des questions plus ouvertes, qui touchent a l'intuition de l'autre, au non-savoir qu'explore la face cachee de la litterature. Comme le demontrent les oeuvres singulieres de Roger Laporte et de Marcel Cohen, ecrire c'est mettre sa vie en jeu, se fier a ce qui vient, suivre l'ordre de l'Autre... en se jouant de l'etre. Indiscipline au coeur des disciplines, cet exercice de la litterature traverse ainsi les genres, engage son ecriture au-dela des lignes du livre, delivre le message qui se lit a livre ouvert. (shrink)

The coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic has strongly affected oncology patients. Many screening and treatment programs have been postponed or canceled, and such patients also experience fear of increased risk of exposure to the virus. In many cases, locus of control, coping flexibility, and perception of a supportive environment, specifically family resilience, can allow for positive emotional outcomes for individuals managing complex health conditions like cancer. This study aims to determine if family resilience, coping flexibility, and locus of control can mitigate (...) the negative affect caused by the pandemic and enhance positive affect in breast cancer patients. One hundred and fifty-four female patients with breast cancer completed the Walsh’s Family Resilience Questionnaire, the Perceived Ability to Cope With Trauma Scale, the Positive-Negative Affect Schedule, and the Mini Locus of Control Scale. Family resilience and internality of locus of control contribute significantly to positive affective responses. Family resilience is responsible for mitigating the negative affect perceived during the pandemic and is enhanced by external locus of control. Evidence suggests that clinical psychologists should develop and propose programs to support oncology patients’ family resilience, coping flexibility, and internal locus of control, allowing for decreased stress and improved adaptability for effectively managing cancer treatment during the pandemic. (shrink)

Cross-cultural comparisons face several methodological challenges. In an attempt at resolving some such challenges, Nathan Sivin has developed the framework of “cultural manifolds.” This framework includes all the pertinent dimensions of a complex phenomenon and the interactions that make all of these aspects into a single whole. In engaging with this framework, Anna Akasoy illustrates that the phenomena used in comparative approaches to cultural and intellectual history need to be subjected to a continuous change of perspectives. Writing about comparative history, (...) Warwick Anderson directs attention to an articulation between synchronic and diachronic modes of inquiry. In addition, he asks: If comparative studies require a number of collaborators, how does one coordinate the various contributors? And how does one ensure that the comparison is between separate entities, without mutual historical entanglement? Finally, how does comparative history stack up against more dynamic approaches, such as connected, transnational, and postcolonial histories? Gérard Colas, for his part, claims that comparisons cannot allow one to move away from the dominant Euroamerican conceptual framework. Should this indeed be the case, we should search for better ways of facilitating a “mutual pollination” between philosophies. Finally, Edmond Eh first asserts that Sivin fails to recognize the difference between comparisons within cultures and comparisons between cultures. He then argues that the application of generalism is limited to comparisons of historical nature. (shrink)

The development of executive functions is recognizably correlated to culture, contextual and social factors. However, studies considering all the basic EF are still scarce in Brazil, most notably in the Northeast region, which is known for its social inequality and economic gap. This study aimed to analyze the developmental trajectories and structure of four EF, namely inhibition, flexibility, working memory and planning. In addition, the potential effects of socioeconomic status and gender were examined. The sample included 230 Brazilian children between (...) 7-12 years old, homogeneously distributed by age, gender and type of school. The EF were assessed through the Brazilian version of the Child Executive Functions Battery. A global effect of age was found for most of the EF measures evaluated. Gender effect was mostly non-significant, except for 4 of the 12 tasks. There was a significant SES effect on 8 tasks, all in favor of private school children. Exploratory factorial and correlation analysis showed a 4-factor EF structure, corroborating the theoretical distribution considered in the CEF-B. A developmental progression is evident in the results for all of the EF measures evaluated. While gender had little influence on EF, SES seems to significantly impact the development of EF. As normative data are still lacking in Northeast Brazil, this study may help to understand EF development trajectories and provide tools for neuropsychological evaluation. (shrink)

Aims: The Research Diagnostic Criteria for Temporomandi¬bular Disorders (RDC/TMD) Axis I diagnostic algorithms were demonstrated to be reliable but below target sensitivity and specificity. Empirical data supported Axis I algorithm revisions that were valid. Axis II instruments were shown to be both reliable and valid. An international consensus workshop was convened to obtain recommendations and finalization of new Axis I diagnostic algorithms and new Axis II instruments. Methods: A comprehensive search of published TMD diagnostic literature was followed by review and (...) consensus via a formal structured process by a panel of experts for revision of the RDC/TMD. Results: The recommended Diagnostic Criteria for TMD (DC/TMD) Axis I protocol includes both a valid screener for pain diagnoses and valid criteria for the most common pain-related TMDs and for one intra-articular disorder. The Axis II protocol retains selected RDC/TMD screening instruments augmented with new instruments to better assess the interactions between pain and psychosocial functioning. A comprehensive classification system is also presented. Conclusion: The recommended evidence-based DC/TMD protocol is appropriate for use in both the clinical and research settings. Simple Axis I and II screening tests augmented by validated Axis I and Axis II instruments allow for identification of simple to complex TMD patients. (shrink)

This second companion volume on engineering studies considers engineering practice including contextual analyses of engineering identity, epistemologies and values. Key overlapping questions examine such issues as an engineering identity, engineering self-understandings enacted in the professional world, distinctive characters of engineering knowledge and how engineering science and engineering design interact in practice. -/- Authors bring with them perspectives from their institutional homes in Europe, North America, Australia\ and Asia. The volume includes 24 contributions by more than 30 authors from engineering, the (...) social sciences and the humanities. Additional issues the chapters scrutinize include prominent norms of engineering, how they interact with the values of efficiency or environmental sustainability. A concluding set of articles considers the meaning of context more generally by asking if engineers create their own contexts or are they created by contexts. -/- Taken as a whole, this collection of original scholarly work is unique in its broad, multidisciplinary consideration of the changing character of engineering practice. (shrink)

The provision of informed consent is a prerequisite for inclusion of a patient in a clinical research project. In some countries, the legislation on clinical research authorizes a third person to provide informed consent if the patient is unable to do so directly . This is the case during acute stroke, when the symptoms may prevent the patient from providing informed consent and thus require a third party to be approached. Identification of factors associated with the medical team’s decision to (...) resort to surrogate consent may help the care team during the inclusion process and enable the patient’s family circle to be better informed about providing surrogate consent. (shrink)

Pain, suffering and positive emotions in patients in vegetative state/unresponsive wakefulness syndrome (VS/uws) and minimally conscious states (MCS) pose clinical and ethical challenges. Clinically, we evaluate behavioural responses after painful stimulation and also emotionally-contingent behaviours (e.g., smiling). Using stimuli with emotional valence, neuroimaging and electrophysiology technologies can detect subclinical remnants of preserved capacities for pain which might influence decisions about treatment limitation. To date, no data exist as to how healthcare providers think about end-of-life options (e.g., withdrawal of artificial nutrition (...) and hydration) in the presence or absence of pain in non-communicative patients. Here, we aimed to better clarify this issue by re-analyzing previously published data on pain perception (Prog Brain Res 2009 177, 329–38) and end-of-life decisions (J Neurol 2010 258, 1058–65) in patients with disorders of consciousness. In a sample of 2259 European healthcare professionals we found that, for VS/uws more respondents agreed with treatment withdrawal when they considered that VS/uws patients did not feel pain (77%) as compared to those who thought VS/uws did feel pain (59%). This interaction was influenced by religiosity and professional background. For MCS, end-of-life attitudes were not influenced by opinions on pain perception. Within a contemporary ethical context we discuss (1) the evolving scientific understandings of pain perception and their relationship to existing clinical and ethical guidelines; (2) the discrepancies of attitudes within (and between) healthcare providers and their consequences for treatment approaches, and (3) the implicit but complex relationship between pain perception and attitudes toward life-sustaining treatments. (shrink)

In recent years, the construct of character has received substantial attention among developmental scientists, but no consensus exists about the content and structure of character, especially among children and early adolescents. In a study of positive development among racially diverse Cub Scouts in the greater Philadelphia area, we assessed the construct and concurrent validity of a new measure of character, the Assessment of Character in Children and Early Adolescents, among 906 Scouts and 775 non-Scout boys and girls. We identified an (...) eight-correlated-factor model as providing the best fit with our data. We further established measurement invariance and explored latent mean differences for ACCEA scores across two Scout groups, non-Scout boys and non-Scout girls. Girls were generally superior than boys on all character attributes. We further examined concurrent validity of ACCEA by correlating the character attributes with youth sense of school competence, intentional self-regulation and parental perception of youth school performance. We discuss implications for future character research and point to the value of the ACCEA measure being used by practitioners in character development programs. (shrink)

This inclusive cross-cultural study rethinks the nexus between engineering education and context. In so doing the book offers a reflection on contextual boundaries with an overall boundary crossing ambition and juxtaposes important cases of critical participation within engineering education with sophisticated scholarly reflection on both opportunities and discontents. -/- Whether and in what way engineering education is or ought to be contextualized or de-contextualized is an object of heated debate among engineering educators. The uniqueness of this study is that this (...) debate is given comprehensive coverage – presenting both instrumentally inclined as well as radical positions on transforming engineering education. -/- In contextualizing engineering education, this book offers diverse commentary from a range of disciplinary, meta- and interdisciplinary perspectives on how cultural, professional, institutional and educational systems contexts shape histories, structural dynamics, ideologies and challenges as well as new pathways in engineering education. Topics addressed include examining engineering education in countries ranging from India to America, to racial and gender equity in engineering education and incorporating social awareness into the area. -/- Using context as “bridge” this book confronts engineering education head on. Contending engineering ideologies and corresponding views on context are juxtaposed with contending discourses of reform. The uniqueness of the book is that it brings together scholars from the humanities, the social sciences and engineering from Europe – both East and West – with the United States, China, Brazil, India and Australia. (shrink)

The majority of women who freeze their eggs for non-medical or social reasons, commonly referred to as elective egg freezing (EEF), do not eventually utilize their frozen eggs. This would result in an accumulated surplus of unused frozen eggs in fertility clinics worldwide, which represents a promising source of donation to infertile women undergoing IVF treatment. Rigorous and comprehensive counseling is needed, because the process of donating one’s unused surplus frozen eggs involves complex decision-making. Prospective EEF donors can be broadly (...) categorized into those who have achieved motherhood and those who remained childless and have given up on motherhood aspirations. A two-step systematic counseling protocol is proposed. Firstly, it is imperative to verify and ensure that these women do not want to conceive any children with their surplus frozen eggs before proceeding with further counseling and signing of consent forms. Secondly, various motivating and dissuading factors in the donation of unused surplus frozen eggs should then be comprehensively discussed with egg freezers to facilitate informed decision-making. Key motivating factors for donation include reciprocity in wanting to share the joys of motherhood among egg freezers who already have children, goodwill to help others in need, and avoiding the wastage of surplus frozen eggs after expending so much money, time, and effort. Key dissuading factors include fear of accidental incest between natural and unknown donor-conceived offspring, as well as apprehension of unexpected future contact with unknown donor-conceived offspring due to either donor anonymity being abolished in their jurisdiction or widespread consumer DNA testing. (shrink)

In their first weeks of life preterm infants are deprived of developmentally appropriate stimuli, including their mother’s voice. The current study explores the immediate association of two preterm infant behaviours (open eyes or smiling) with the quality of a mother’s infant-directed speech and singing. Participants are 20 mothers who are asked to speak and sing to their medically stable infants placed in incubators. Eighty-four vocal samples are extracted when they occur in the presence of an infant’s behavioural display and compared (...) with random selections during periods of absence of target behavioural display. The results show that infant-directed maternal voice presents more marked emotional qualities when infants display a behavioural change than when infants are passive and expressionless. Specifically, higher values of mean pitch and maximum sound pressure level, as well as greater variability of these parameters are associated with a behavioural display. (shrink)

Le genre semble une notion et une démarche évidentes dans toute étude de la famille. En effet la place dans la parenté, qui est elle-même associée à un ensemble de normes de comportement différentes selon les groupes sociaux, est indissociable du genre, maillage plus large qui noue ensemble sexe, âge, sexualité, hiérarchies, rôles, etc. Pourtant une perspective spécifique de genre est relativement récente dans les études sur l’histoire de la famille. Au cours des dernières décennies, bon nomb...

Entre Nietzsche et le Saint-Suaire, qu'y a t-il de commun? Une ville : Turin. C'est là que le philosophe a passé les mois qui ont précédé son effondrement dans la démence, en mai 1888, tout près de la chapelle qui conserve le Suaire. Faut-il n'y voir qu'une coïncidence? Né de l'étonnement devant l'ignorance qui entoure ce dernier moment de la vie lucide de Nietzsche, ce livre nous fait découvrir le combat spirituel que le philosophe mène avec le Christ. Il commence (...) par une enquête historique à nouveaux frais et révèle des épisodes méconnus - voire encore inconnus - de la vie de Nietzsche à Turin. La figure de l'homme y apparaît sous un jour bien différent de la légende attachée à son nom. Puis Didier Rance présente le face à face entre celui qui s'était autoproclamé Antichrist et Jésus Christ. Les attaques de Nietzsche à l'endroit du christianisme et de son fondateur sont connues ; on les dit décisives. A travers la voix des papes contemporains qui ont tous médité devant le Suaire, il est possible de pressentir la réponse que le Crucifié apporte à la critique nietzschéenne. Une réponse fondée sur la miséricorde qui éclaire en profondeur le sens du nihilisme dont Nietzsche a voulu être le prophète, et dans lequel se trouve plongé notre monde. (shrink)