Journal Name: Semiotica Issue: Ahead of print.

A fundamental fact about human minds is that they are never truly alone: all minds are steeped in situated interaction. That social interaction matters is recognized by any experimentalist who seeks to exclude its influence by studying individuals in isolation. On this view, interaction complicates cognition. Here, we explore the more radical stance that interaction co-constitutes cognition: that we benefit from looking beyond single minds toward cognition as a process involving interacting minds. All around the cognitive sciences, there are approaches (...) that put interaction center stage. Their diverse and pluralistic origins may obscure the fact that collectively, they harbor insights and methods that can respecify foundational assumptions and fuel novel interdisciplinary work. What might the cognitive sciences gain from stronger interactional foundations? This represents, we believe, one of the key questions for the future. Writing as a transdisciplinary collective assembled from across the classic cognitive science hexagon and beyond, we highlight the opportunity for a figure-ground reversal that puts interaction at the heart of cognition. The interactive stance is a way of seeing that deserves to be a key part of the conceptual toolkit of cognitive scientists. (shrink)

It is critical to remember details about meetings with healthcare providers. Forgetting could result in inadequate knowledge about ones' health, non-adherence with treatments, and poorer health outcomes. Hearing the health care provider plays a crucial role in consolidating information for recall. The recent COVID-19 pandemic has meant a rapid transition to videoconference-based medicine, here described as telehealth. When using telehealth speech must be filtered and compressed, and research has shown that degraded speech is more challenging to remember. Here we present (...) preliminary results from a study that compared memory for health information provided in-person to telehealth. The data collection for this study was stopped due to the pandemic, but the preliminary results are interesting because the pandemic forced a rapid transition to telehealth. To examine a potential memory deficit for health information provided through telehealth, we presented older and younger adults with instructions on how to use two medical devices. One set of instructions was presented in-person, and the other through telehealth. Participants were asked to recall the instructions immediately after the session, and again after a 1-week delay. Overall, the number of details recalled was significantly lower when instructions were provided by telehealth, both immediately after the session and after a 1-week delay. It is likely that a mix of technological and communication strategies by the healthcare provider could reduce this telehealth memory deficit. Given the rapid transition to telehealth due to COVID-19, highlighting this deficit and providing potential solutions are timely and of utmost importance. (shrink)

AntecedentsPrevious research on citizens’ reactions after terrorist events has shown that positive reactions can also emerge alongside pain and horror. Positive emotions have been widely associated with an abstract style of thinking. In the context of the Paris terrorist attacks in 2015, we explored Spanish citizens’ positive reactions – empathic concern, positive emotional climate, and esteem for humanity – and examined the relationships of these responses with an abstract style of thinking.MethodA longitudinal study was designed involving an online questionnaire that (...) was administered 10 days, 3 weeks, and 2 months after the attacks.ResultsEmpathic concern and personal distress toward Parisians decreased from the weeks following the attacks to 2 months later, with empathic concern always being more intense than personal distress. Emotional climate was perceived as more hostile than positive, although positive feelings persisted. People reported moderately positive esteem for humanity. Individuals with a more abstract style of thinking reported greater empathic concern, a more positive emotional climate, and more esteem for humanity.ConclusionsOur results support and extend previous research showing that abstraction enhances people’s resilience, even under traumatic circumstances such as those surrounding a terrorist attack. (shrink)

Previous research has shown positive relationships between fitness level and different cognitive abilities and academic performance. The purpose of this study was to explore the relationships between logical–mathematical intelligence and mathematical competence with physical fitness in a group of pre-adolescents. Sixty-three children from Castro del Río, aged between 11 and 12 years, participated in this research. The Superior Logical Intelligence Test and the EVAMAT 1.0–5 battery were used. Physical fitness was evaluated by the horizontal jump test, the 4×10 meter speed–agility (...) test, and the Course Navette test. The analyses showed positive relationships between physical fitness with logical–mathematical intelligence and mathematical competence. Specifically, linear regression analyzes indicated that the 4×10 speed–agility test significantly predicted mathematical competence and the horizontal jump test significantly predicted logical–mathematical intelligence. These results are in agreement with previous research, highlighting the importance of improving physical fitness from an early age due to its benefits for intellectual and academic development. (shrink)

Grounded in achievement goal theory and self-determination theory, the aim of this study was to analyze the motivational determinants of precompetitive anxiety in the sports context, considering the horizontal motivational sequence: adaptive social factors, competence need, types of motivation, and consequences. This study was also conducted in order to analyze the mediating role of the need for competition and motivational regulations on social factors and consequences. The sample consisted of 217 athletes of both sexes engaged in elite sport, who answered (...) a series of questionnaires to measure study variables to develop an analysis of the structural equation model. The results showed that both the task-involving climate and autonomy support were associated with competence need, and competence need was associated with autonomous motivation in a positive way and with controlled motivation and amotivation in a negative way. On the other hand, autonomous motivation was positively associated with self-confidence, while amotivation was positively related to somatic and cognitive anxiety before a competition. Furthermore, there was a total mediation of competence need and autonomous motivation between task climate and self-confidence. In conclusion, these social factors favor self-confidence, and besides, these climates disfavor anxiety before a sport competition. (shrink)

We explored the home learning environments of 173 Mexican preschool children (aged 3–6 years) in relation to their numeracy performance. Parents indicated the frequency of their formal home numeracy and literacy activities, and their academic expectations for children’s numeracy and literacy performance. Children completed measures of early numeracy skills. Mexican parent–child dyads from families with either high- or low-socioeconomic status (SES) participated. Low-SES parents (n= 99) reported higher numeracy expectations than high-SES parents (n= 74), but similar frequency of home numeracy (...) activities. In contrast, high-SES parents reported higher frequency of literacy activities. Path analyses showed that operational (i.e., advanced) numeracy activities were positively related to children’s numeracy skills in the high- but not in the low-SES group. These findings improve the understanding of the role of the home environment in different contexts and provide some insights into the sources of the variable patterns of relations between home learning activities and children’s numeracy outcomes. They also suggest that SES is a critical factor to consider in research on children’s home numeracy experiences. (shrink)

Las metodologías docentes han ido adaptándose a los cambios de la sociedad, partiendo de un aprendizaje en el que el alumno tiene un papel más pasivo y se limita a escuchar una clase magistral, hasta aprendizajes más activos, utilizando metodologías como active learning, flipped learning, learning by teaching, rol play, entre otras.Esta investigación analiza la percepción de los estudiantes sobre el aprendizaje obtenido con la utilización de la metodología Learning by Teaching, para ello se trabaja con una muestra de 196 (...) alumnos de Grados en Administración y Dirección de Empresas, Marketing y negocios digitales. (shrink)

A 68-year-old patient who suffered from gastric cancer diagnosed 8 months earlier presented with multiple peritoneal and hepatic metastasis, despite several rounds of chemo- and radiotherapy. After admission to hospital, his general condition quickly became severely compromised. He was nearly emaciated, despite being on partial parenteral feeding. Four years earlier, due to a cardiac arrhythmia that was refractory to medication, the patient had a cardiac pacemaker implanted, regulated to go off at frequencies of below 70 beats per minute. Given the (...) patient's terminal situation, the team started developing some doubts about the pacemaker's effects during his dying process. The patient had mentioned his intention to donate his pacemaker after his death, but had not asked for its deactivation. The specialists were not sure about the effect of the pacemaker in unnecessarily prolonging the patient's final hour. Nevertheless, they opposed deactivation, which they considered ethically uncertain. The family, who had been initially for the deactivation, decided against it. The patient's condition was progressively deteriorating, as he was falling into a state of sopor and, later, into a coma. (shrink)

Retraction note: Espinoza Palomino, S. A., Silva Juárez, R., Seminario-Morales, M. V., Villalta Arellano, S. R., Arévalo Rodríguez, M. E. & Lujan-Vera, P. E. (2023). Organizational Climate: Characterization from the Perspective of Senati Students - Peru. HUMAN REVIEW. International Humanities Revista Internacional De Humanidades, 21(1), 47-54. https://doi.org/10.37467/revhuman.v21.5030 The Editorial Office of Eurasia Academic Publishing Group has retracted this article. An investigation carried out by our Research Integrity Department has found a group of articles, among which this one is found, that (...) are not within the thematic scope of the journal. We believe that the editorial process was manipulated and, furthermore, acceptance decisions were made under possibly inappropriate peer review. (shrink)

This study presents the application of self-organizing maps to air-quality data in order to analyze episodes of high pollution in Madrid. The goal of this work is to explore the dataset and then compare several scenarios with similar atmospheric conditions : some of them when no actions were taken and some when traffic restrictions were imposed. The levels of main pollutants, recorded at these stations for eleven days at four different times from 2015 to 2018, are analyzed in order to (...) determine the effectiveness of the anti-pollution measures. The visualization of trajectories on the self-organizing map let us clearly see the evolution of pollution levels and consequently evaluate the effectiveness of the taken measures, after and during the protocol activation time. (shrink)

At the time of writing the COVID-19 pandemic was entering its ninth month, with nearly 800 000 recorded fatalities and 22 million infections in 188 countries and territories.1 In previous ethics briefings2 we raised concerns about the possibility that demand for life-sustaining treatment would overwhelm supply, with a consequent requirement for health professionals to make challenging triage decisions. Fortunately, to date, these have largely not been realised, although there is a possibility that countries in which containment measures have been less-successful, (...) such as South Africa, may still be required to triage.3 Despite the successful ‘flattening of the curve’ in many countries, there is a wide consensus that we remain firmly within the pandemic. Enormous practical challenges remain. It is unclear whether the pandemic will ultimately take the form of two or more successive waves, or whether the patchwork of global responses will lead to a sustained slow ‘burn’ with sporadic flare-ups.4 Areas of uncertainty include whether infection confers some immunity, how long any such immunity might last, whether effective vaccines can be developed and if seasonal temperature fluctuations alter the spread of the virus. The pandemic will also be fundamentally shaped by the decisions that governments make and the extent to which their diktats are complied with by citizens. With the – possibly temporary – retreat of urgent clinical ethics issues, such as triage, opportunities have arisen to reflect on some of the ethical questions that underlie and structure the demanding policy decisions that governments are wrestling with. One of the early questions was how to balance the complex constellation of costs and benefits associated with lockdown. Countries that …. (shrink)

As the COVID-19 vaccine roll out continues apace, in the higher-income countries at least, concerns remain about the level of vaccine coverage in some health and social care settings. Although most countries have seen a relatively high uptake of vaccination against COVID-19 among staff, there continue to be some pockets of hesitancy. The risk of outbreaks in settings with potentially very vulnerable patients has led some governments across Europe to consider, or to introduce, measures compelling healthcare staff to be vaccinated. (...) The justifiability of mandating the vaccination of healthcare professionals is a longstanding question but it has come to the fore in recent months following a resurgence of cases of COVID-19 and the prevalence of the more transmissible Delta variant. In deciding whether the introduction of a mandate is appropriate, states have to balance a range of ethical and practical considerations. A voluntary approach, backed up with education, respects healthcare workers’ autonomy to make private healthcare decisions, which is valued highly in liberal democracies. However, healthcare professionals also have an obligation to ensure that they do not present a risk of harm to their patients. Similarly, healthcare providers have a responsibility to take appropriate steps to minimise the risk of infection. Alongside balancing these rights and responsibilities, governments must also consider the potential consequences and risks of enforcing vaccine uptake. For example, there are concerns that a coercive approach could deepen mistrust and resentment among people who are genuinely fearful or hesitant. Moreover, a large number of refusals and the subsequent imposition of sanctions, such as suspension or redeployment, could affect the ability of providers to staff necessary services. In the UK, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland have all ruled out the introduction of compulsory vaccination. However, in July, the English Parliament voted through …. (shrink)

In a recent judgment1 the Court of Protection was highly critical of health professionals for continuing to provide clinically-assisted nutrition and hydration in the face of disagreement about the patient’s best interests, without seeking to resolve the issue. This hearing had been set up specifically to consider whether GU’s dignity had been properly protected, and if not why not, given concerns raised by the Official Solicitor about what she considered to be “a complete abrogation of responsibility to consider properly or (...) at all, and to determine whether it was in GU’s best interests and therefore lawful to continue to give him an invasive medical treatment, CANH.” In April 2014, at 63 years old and living in Thailand, GU sustained severe injuries after suffering from an electrocution accident. He sustained a cardiorespiratory arrest with a significant delay before cardiopulmonary resuscitation was started and was unconscious and unresponsive. In September 2014 he was transferred to the UK. In August 2018, GU’s brother made a request for a best interests decision concerning the continuation of CANH. The family met to discuss this and all except GU’s son, agreed that continuing CANH was not in GU’s best interests. In view of the fact that there was not unanimity among the family, a decision was made that CANH should continue. Commenting on this decision, Mr Justice Hayden said ‘the apparent assumption that in the face of family disagreement ‘ therefore will continue to be cared for by nursing staff ” is a troubling non sequitur’ and stressed that ‘family dissent to a medical consensus should never stand in the way of an incapacitated patients’ best interests being properly identified’. He also made clear that the responsibility for ensuring that a best interests assessment is undertaken rests with the …. (shrink)

This volume explores the state of literary theory today, decades after the repeatedly proclaimed end of theory. It builds on the idea that theory is historically constituted as it is “always becoming something else” as Leslie Fiedler claimed in the 1950s, arguing that the historical constitution of theory relies on theory’s procedural nature. In order to assess theory’s procedural challenge to the fundamental notions that all the disciplines within an episteme have brought to the fore, it addresses these questions: What (...) are the procedures theory has relied on? Are they a secret to its resistance, or is resistance its primary procedure? And if so, a resistance to what? Secondly, if resistance were theory’s principal vehicle, at which point does resistance, conceptualized only procedurally (as resisting something, questioning anything, criticizing whatever), display hallmarks of a disciplinary closure that must call for new resistances, and perhaps for a fundamentally another kind? The book turns to what theory does in order to avoid a partial answer to what theory is. (shrink)

BlOMQVIST K, THEANDER E, MOWIDE I and LARSSON V. Nursing Inquiry 2010; 17: 317–323 What happens when you involve patients as experts? a participatory action research project at a renal failure unitAlthough there is a trend towards developing health care in a patient‐centred direction, changes are usually planned by the professionals without involving the patients. This paper presents an ongoing participatory action research project where patients with chronic renal failure, nurses at a specialist renal failure unit, a hospital manager and (...) a researcher worked together to develop patient‐centred care. The project combined the expertise of patients in their own experiences of living with a chronic condition with the professional expertise of nurses, the manager and the researcher. As the workload on the unit was uneven, the development work needed to be low in intensity but long‐term. Based on a number of dialogues in focus groups, four main development areas were identified; access to test results, prerequisites for postponing the progress of the illness, general awareness and understanding of living with chronic renal failure, and family‐focused care. A number of changes have been planned or implemented, such as developing a prototype for a web‐based feed‐back system, expanding patient education to newly diagnosed patients, steering the nurses' role towards a guiding and family‐focused function, and planning a digital story‐telling workshop. Involving committed people who have the mandate to change practices were prerequisites for success. (shrink)

Civility is formed by social norms that guide our behavior and allow us to interact appropriately with others. These norms affect everyone and are learned through the socialization process. However, in the same process, people also learn gender norms that dictate how men and women should behave, leading to gender stereotypes and differentiated behavioral characteristics. The purpose of this research is to examine the relationship between gender and civility, and how we react to those who behave uncivilly given their gender. (...) The results of Study 1 showed that even in a fictional and gender-neutral society, uncivil behaviors were associated with stereotypically masculine characteristics, and those who behaved uncivilly were dehumanized. In Study 2, gender differences were observed in incivility. Women were harsher when facing uncivil transgressors than men, especially if the transgressor was another woman. Our findings support the notion that gender norms are applied to civility, leading those supposedly equal social norms to unequal perceptions and evaluations. (shrink)

One specific instantiation of the storm-and-stress view of adolescence is the idea that “normal” adolescence involves high-risk substance use behaviors. However, although uptake of some substance use behaviors is more common during adolescence than other life stages, it is clear that not all adolescents engage in risky substance use—and among those who do, there is much variation in emotional, behavioral, and contextual precursors of this behavior. One such set of predictors forms the internalizing pathway to substance use disorder, whereby internalizing (...) symptoms in childhood such as negative affect and anxiety set off a chain of consequences culminating in high-risk substance use in late adolescence. However, findings linking internalizing symptoms to substance use are mixed, and it is clear that this link varies across adolescents and contexts. One heretofore unanswered question is whether and how geographic location, specifically whether the adolescent lives in an urban or rural location, moderates this link. The current report is a secondary analysis of data from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children, in which we examined the link between internalizing symptoms in childhood and initiation of substance use through age 19. Using a multiple event process survival mixture model, we identified three trajectories of substance use initiation in adolescence: one characterized by near-complete abstinence until late adolescence, another by earlier initiation of alcohol, nicotine, and cannabis, and another by early initiation of these substances and later initiation of more hazardous drugs such as cocaine and methamphetamine. Although childhood externalizing symptoms increased the risk of being in the second or third class, internalizing symptoms decreased risk when rural and non-rural adolescents were considered together. Few effects of rurality were found, but the negative relationship between internalizing at age 10 and high-risk substance use was only observed among non-rural adolescents. This finding, which was inconsistent with our initial predictions that rurality might confer higher risk for substance use, instead suggests a potentially protective effect of internalizing symptoms for engagement in risky substance use which may differ based on an adolescent’s geographical context. (shrink)

Intelligibility relates to a person’s agency in guiding their behavior to be logical and reasonable, and it makes sense during action. However, it does not always happen. Sometimes, intelligibility fails, and the subject’s actions become distanced from what had previously made sense to them or others. At that moment, what I have called misunderstandings within the agency appear. When the emotional process interferes with the action process, it is one of the causes of misunderstandings within the agency. Then, emotions interfere (...) with the action and produce a cognitive dissociation that makes it difficult for the agents to interpret what is happening in the scene. It breaks between intelligibility and meaning. This also creates problems of understanding and communication. This is why the analysis of the misunderstandings within the agency is of such great importance. (shrink)

The theory of social representations must be understood in terms of its proper epistemology so that it can accomplish its full potential in social sciences. This is often difficult to achieve because researchers comprehend it in terms of concepts that are part of static and individualistic Newtonian epistemology rather than in terms of dynamic and relational Einsteinian epistemology. This article considers three signposts that Moscovici identifies and analyses in the theory of relativity, namely the relation between epistemology and science, theory (...) and method, and the argument against the explanation of effects by their causes. The following question is posed: are these signposts also characteristic of the theory of social representations? This question is examined focusing on interactional epistemology, theory and method and the diversity of natural thinking and communication. Moscovici's Psychoanalysis shows that natural thinking appears in a plurality of modes according to the situation in which it takes place and according to social groups towards which it is directed. Natural thinking is controversial and communication-centred. Different professionals, groups and lay people use different kinds of speaking and different communicative genres when they try to resolve “the same” problem. The article suggests that bringing together dialogicality, dialogical linguistics and the theory of social representations may open up new possibilities for theoretical developments in social psychology. (shrink)

In this paper, we examine whether it is possible to improve democracy by encouraging ordinary citizens to participate in political decision-making and if participation in deliberative institutions can make citizens more competent decision-makers. By using qualitative data, we analyze the discussion from the Belgrade citizens? assembly focused on the topic of expanding the pedestrian zone in the city center. The CA was organized in Serbia for the first time, as part of a research project aimed at promoting and advancing innovative (...) democratic practices in the Western Balkans. The goal was to encourage the involvement of citizens in discussions of public interest. Our hypothesis was that, through the process of participation and deliberation in CA, ordinary citizens can make reasonable and informed choices, increase their knowledge of the issue discussed, and become more motivated to participate in political decision-making on the local level. Our qualitative content analysis suggests that deliberation had a positive impact on participants? knowledge of the chosen topic of the assembly. It also shows that citizens used exhaustive explanations rather than brief statements, could differentiate the good arguments from the bad, and more often appealed to general rather than private interests. Participants in the assembly reported a significant increase in interest in political decision-making that affects their lives, as well as a sense of being informed about politics. Finally, we wanted to draw attention to the challenges and open questions that remain, namely those that concern the impact of a deliberative body on political decision-making in the real world. (shrink)

Human thinking is heterogeneous, and among its different forms, thinking in dyadic oppositions is associated with the concept of themata. Gerald Holton characterises themata as elements that lie beneath the structure and development of physical theories as well as of non-scientific thinking. Themata have different uses, such as a thematic concept, or a thematic component of the concept; a methodological (or epistemological) thema; and a propositional thema. Serge Moscovici has placed the concept of themata in the heart of his theory (...) of social representations which is based on ‘natural thinking’ and on forms of daily knowing, including common sense. In this article I shall explore some features of thematic concepts and of methodological themata in scientific theories and in common sense. More specifically, I shall refer to the significance of the methodological (or epistemological) thema the Self and Other(s) in common-sense thinking and in social practices. (shrink)

Recent works on narrative self-concept still do not pay enough attention to how a person’s actions influence her narration. Narrative structures may enable the subject to give meaning and continuity over time to her experience. But also, a person’s behavior can make sense of her self-concept. From this perspective, the Narrative Identity Theory might be insufficient for addressing the challenge of making sense of the subject’s actions during the interaction itself. The Dramatic Identity Theory's proposal can complement the Narrative Theory (...) on such points. Accordingly, this work will explore the relationship between these two theories in order to explain how the Dramatic Identity Theory can solve these problems, with a proposal based on the analogy between a theater actor’s performance and the subject's actions. (shrink)

This paper attempts to philosophically articulate empirical evidence on the positive effects of illness within the wider context of a discussion of the positive aspects of vulnerability. The conventional understanding holds that to be vulnerable is to be open to harms and wrongs; it is to be fragile, defenseless, and of compromised autonomy. In this paper, we challenge the assumption that vulnerability consists of nothing but powerlessness and dependence on others. This paper attempts to: (1) outline the theoretical conceptualisation of (...) the positive aspects of coping with illness, while simultaneously showing how these findings provide empirical support for some classical philosophical ideas; (2) influence a change in the manners in which the ill are usually perceived (as weak, dependent, robbed of a good life) and (3) point to the importance of modernising the prevalent biomedical conception of illness with the subjective dimension of health. Biomedical understanding of illness focuses on the vulnerable experience of the sufferer, suggesting the importance of philosophical additions. (shrink)

Kants Verwendung des Begriffs Ontologie ist eine doppelte: Meist bewertet er sie negativ, gelegentlich setzt er sie aber der Transzendentalphilosophie gleich. Rivero weist nach, dass beide Verwendungen nicht im Widerspruch stehen.

The Theory of Narrative Identity attempts to answer multiple concerns about the construction of self-concept. It suggests that the subject gives sense to their experiences by assimilating them as a set of narratives that explain their existence. This approach provides them with a foundation that makes it easy for them to gain self-understanding and plan their actions. However, the Theory of Narrative Identity is unable to face important difficulties related to intelligibility and social interaction. This work presents an alternative proposal (...) thanks to the Theory of Dramatic Identity, which focuses its study on the action of the individual itself. La Teoría narrativa de la identidad trata de dar respuesta a múltiples inquietudes sobre construcción del autoconcepto. Esta sugiere que el sujeto da sentido a su experiencia al asimilarla como un conjunto de narraciones que explican su existencia. Esto le proporciona una base que le facilita adquirir autocomprensión y planificar sus acciones. Sin embargo, la Teoría Narrativa de la identidad es incapaz de enfrentar importantes dificultades relacionadas con la inteligibilidad y la interacción social. Este trabajo presenta una propuesta alternativa a través de la Teoría dramática de la identidad, que centra su estudio en la agencia del sujeto. (shrink)

Frente a las más recientes interpretaciones del Timeo platónico, que procuran reducir el papel de la necesidad o anánke hasta volverlo casi irrelevante en la economía de la génesis del universo, defenderé aquí el carácter decisivo de su presencia en la composición del mundo, su relativa autonomía re..

La concepción platónica de las experiencias visual y auditiva en un doble nivel repercute en su propuesta educativa y política, expresada, entre otros diálogos, en República. Un estudio filológico de estos campos semánticos en el Libro VIII e inicio del Libro IX de República permite postular que, para el ateniense, los cambios en las formas de la polis están ligados a cambios en los modos de ver y oír humanos. Así, el desplazamiento puede producirse desde una mirada y audición profundas (...) a una mirada y audición superficiales, desde un oír- ver unitarios a múltiples, o del ver y oír al no-ver ni oír. En todos los casos,este desplazamiento tiene como correlato un desplazamiento en las formas de organización de la polis. (shrink)