OBJECTIVES: To study the resuscitation preferences, choice of decision-maker, views on the seeking of patients' wishes and determinants of these of elderly hospital in-patients. DESIGN: Questionnaire administered on admission and prior to discharge. SETTING: Two acute geriatric medicine units (Southampton and Poole). PARTICIPANTS: Two hundred and fourteen consecutive consenting mentally competent patients admitted to hospital as emergencies. RESULTS: Resuscitation was wanted by 60%, particularly married and functionally independent patients and those who had not already considered it. Not wanted resuscitation was (...) associated with lack of social contacts. Sixty-seven per cent welcomed enquiry about their preferences and 78% wanted participation in decision, 43% as sole decision-maker. Wishing to choose oneself was associated with not wanting resuscitation, prior knowledge of it, and lack of a spouse. Patients' opinions remained stable during their admission. CONCLUSIONS: Discussion of resuscitation is practical on hospital admission without causing distress and the views expressed endure through the period of hospitalisation. Elderly patients' attitudes depend partly on personal health and social circumstances. This may assist doctors when patients are unable to participate themselves. (shrink)

We discuss some research that has examined approach motivational urges and how this research clarifies the definition of approach motivation. Our research and that of others have raised doubts about the commonly accepted definition of approach motivation, which views it as a positive affective state triggered by positive stimuli. We review evidence that suggests: (a) that approach motivation is occasionally evoked by negative stimuli; (b) that approach motivation may be experienced as a negative state; and (c) that stimuli are unnecessary (...) to evoke approach motivation. (shrink)

The action-based model of cognitive dissonance proposes an adaptive function for rationalization that differs from the one offered by Cushman. The one proposed by Cushman is concerned more with the cold construction of cognitions, whereas the one proposed by the action-based model is a motivated protection of a strongly held cognition.

Decisions about cardiopulmonary resuscitation may be based on medical prognosis, quality of life and patients' choices. Low survival rates indicate its overuse. Although the concept of medical futility has limitations, several strong predictors of non-survival have been identified and prognostic indices developed. Early results indicate that consideration of resuscitation in the elderly should be very selective, and support "opt-in" policies. In this minority of patients, quality of life is the principal issue. This is subjective and best assessed by the individual (...) in question. Patients' attitudes cannot be predicted reliably and surrogate decision-making is inadequate. Lay knowledge is poor. However, patients can use prognostic information to make rational choices. The majority welcome discussion of resuscitation and prefer this to be initiated by their doctors; many wish to decide for themselves. There is little evidence that this causes distress. The views of such patients, if competent, should be sought actively. (shrink)

Although parental choice of secondary schools is a subject of considerable public and academic interest, there has been relatively little research on the extent to which choice is undermining the traditional role of geographically defined school catchments. This paper, therefore, uses data provided by a case-study local education authority to examine the nature and scale of pupil flows across catchment boundaries. It does so by adopting a form of Geographic Information System as the principal research tool. The results show over (...) a third of Year 7 pupils moving to schools other than their catchment comprehensive. Interestingly, the inner-city catchments were the most permeable: by contrast, children in middle class and rural areas were the least likely to enter a school outside their local area. (shrink)

The present research was designed to test whether the subjective experience of more effort related to more reward valuation as measured by a neural response. This prediction was derived from the theory of cognitive dissonance and its effort justification paradigm. Young adult participants (n = 82) engaged in multiple trails of a low or high effort task that resulted in a loss or reward on each trial. Neural responses to the reward (loss) cue were measured using EEG, so that the (...) event-related potential known as the Reward Positivity (RewP) could be assessed. Results revealed no significant differences between low and high effort conditions on the RewP. However, within the high effort condition, a more subjective experience of effort was associated with a larger RewP. This research extends past research on the effort justification paradigm of cognitive dissonance theory by suggesting that effort justification is associated with an implicit measure of reward valuation. It therefore challenges recent perspectives on dissonance processes that posit that these evaluative changes should only occur on explicit but not implicit measures. (shrink)

The field of cognition and emotion has grown considerably over the past 30 years, with an increased emphasis on the relationships between emotional and motivational components and how they contribute to basic perceptual, cognitive, and neural processes. For instance, research has revealed that emotion often influences these processes via emotion’s relationship with motivational dimensions, as when positive emotions low versus high in approach motivational intensity have different influences on attentional and other cognitive processes. Research has also revealed that motivational direction (...) (approach vs. withdrawal) and affective valence (positive vs. negative) are not as closely related as once was theorised; that is, positive affect is not inevitably associated with approach motivation and negative affect is not inevitably associated with withdrawal motivation. These and other lines of research with anger have suggested that the field needs to move beyond a focus on affective valence and it needs to consider an integration of dimensional and discrete models of emotion. The article also includes some suggestions for improving methods of measuring and inducing emotions and some recommendations for future researchers. (shrink)

Astronauts often report experiences of awe and wonder while traveling in space. This paper addresses the question of whether awe and wonder can be scientifically investigated in a simulated space travel scenario using a neurophenomenological method. To answer this question, we created a mixed-reality simulation similar to the environment of the International Space Station. Portals opened to display simulations of Earth or Deep Space. However, the challenge still remained of how to best capture the resulting experience of participants. We could (...) use psychological methods, neuroscientific methods or philosophical methods. Each of these approaches offer many benefits, but each is also limited. Neurophenomenology capitalises on and integrates all three methods. We employed questionnaires from psychology, electroencephalography, electrocardiography, and functional near-infrared spectroscopy from neuroscience, and a phenomenological interview technique from philosophy. This neurophenomenological method enabled extensive insight in experiencers and non-experiencers of awe and wonder in a simulated space scenario that otherwise would not have been possible. Traditional empirical analyses were completed, followed by individual differences analyses using interview transcriptions paired with physiological responses. Experiencers of AW showed differences in theta and beta activity throughout the brain compared to non-experiencers. Questionnaires indicated that non-experiencers of AW gave more positive responses of religious and spiritual practices than experiencers of AW. Interviews showed that awe and wonder were more likely to occur when watching the simulated Earth view instead of the Deep Space view. Our study is a successful example of neurophenomenology, a powerful and promising interdisciplinary approach for future studies of complex states of experience. (shrink)

Many stage‐specific embryonic antigens (SSEAs) have been identified as glycoconjugates. These molecules may play diverse roles in the development of the embryo, including regulation of cell growth, recognition, and differentiation. The example of SSEA‐1 is described in detail. This molecule appears to play an essential role in compaction of the early mouse embryo, and may illustrate the general importance of carbohydrate‐carbohydrate interactions in controlling cell surface interactions in development.

Over twenty years of research have examined the cognitive consequences of positive affect states, and suggested that positive affect leads to a broadening of cognition (see review by Fredrickson, 2001). However, this research has primarily examined positive affect that is low in approach motivational intensity (e.g., contentment). More recently, we have systematically examined positive affect that varies in approach motivational intensity, and found that positive affect high in approach motivation (e.g., desire) narrows cognition, whereas positive affect low in approach motivation (...) broadens cognition (e.g., Gable & Harmon-Jones, Citation2008a; Harmon-Jones & Gable, 2009). In this article we will review past models and present a motivational dimension model of affect that expands understanding of how affective states influence attentional and cognitive breadth. We then review research that has varied the motivational intensity of positive and negative affect and found that affect of low motivational intensity broadens cognitive processes, whereas affect of high motivational intensity narrows cognitive processes. (shrink)

In order to improve our understanding of the components that reflect functionally important processes during reward anticipation and consumption, we used principle components analyses (PCA) to separate and quantify averaged ERP data obtained from each stage of a modified monetary incentive delay (MID) task. Although a small number of recent ERP studies have reported that reward and loss cues potentiate ERPs during anticipation, action preparation, and consummatory stages of reward processing, these findings are inconsistent due to temporal and spatial overlap (...) between the relevant electrophysiological components. Our results show three components following cue presentation are sensitive to incentive cues (N1, P3a, P3b). In contrast to previous research, reward‐related enhancement occurred only in the P3b, with earlier components more sensitive to break‐even and loss cues. During feedback anticipation, we observed a lateralized centroparietal negativity that was sensitive to response hand but not cue type. We also show that use of PCA on ERPs reflecting reward consumption successfully separates the reward positivity from the independently modulated feedback‐P3. Last, we observe for the first time a new reward consumption component: a late negativity distributed over the left frontal pole. This component appears to be sensitive to response hand, especially in the context of monetary gain. These results illustrate that the time course and sensitivities of electrophysiological activity that follows incentive cues do not follow a simple heuristic in which reward incentive cues produce enhanced activity at all stages and substages. (shrink)

In this concluding piece, we identify and discuss various aspects of convergence and, to a lesser degree, divergence in the ideas expressed in the contributions to this special section. These contributions emphatically illustrate that approach–avoidance motivation is integral to the scientific study of emotion. It is our hope that the articles herein will facilitate cross-talk among researchers and research traditions, and will lead to a more thorough understanding of the role of approach–avoidance motivation in emotion.

Pessoa (2013) makes an impressive case that emotion, motivation, and cognition are neurally intertwined. Our commentary broadens the discussion to the functional, “mind” level. We argue that philosophical and computational considerations justify some modern “separatist” views. We highlight several psychological phenomena that illustrate independence, including affective and motivational reactions to rudimentary inputs, and the guiding role of such reactions in cognition.

In the opening chapter of this groundbreaking work, Bruce Kawin asks: can a film which is already the dream of its maker and its audience, and which can present itself as the dream of one of its characters appear, finally, to dream itself? Contrary to the classic assumption that all film narration is third person, the author contends that a movie can be narrated in first person through a consciousness that originates either on screen or off. Through a discussion (...) of Keaton, Welles, Resnais, Bergman, Godard, and even Chuck Jones, Kawin shows how the self-reflexivity of film stimulates the aesthetic, political, and psychological processes of the audience, making possible a greater knowledge and acceptance of ourselves.". (shrink)

Since the early 2000s, zombies have increasingly swarmed the landscape of popular culture, with ever more diverse representations of the undead being imagined. A growing number of zombie narratives have introduced sexual themes, endowing the living dead with their own sexual identity. The unpleasant idea of the sexual zombie is itself provocative, triggering questions about the nature of desire, sex, sexuality, and the politics of our sexual behaviors. However, the notion of zombie sex has been largely unaddressed in scholarship. -/- (...) This collection addresses that unexamined aspect of zombiedom, with essays engaging a variety of media texts, including graphic novels, films, television, pornography, literature, and internet meme culture. The essayists are scholars from a variety of disciplines, including history, theology, film studies, and gender and queer studies. Covering The Walking Dead, Warm Bodies, and Bruce LaBruce’s zombie-porn movies, this work investigates the cultural, political and philosophical issues raised by undead sex and zombie sexuality. (shrink)

The relative importance of the Jones’ [Jones, T. M.: 1991, Academy of Management Review 16(2), 366–395] six components of moral intensity was measured using a conjoint experimental design. The most important components influencing ethical perceptions were: probability of effect, magnitude of consequences, and temporal immediacy. Contrary to previous research, overall social consensus was not an important factor. However, consumers exhibit distinctly different patterns in ethical evaluation, and for approximately 15% of respondents social consensus was the most important dimension.

While some of the great thinkers (Socrates, Kant) have argued for an absolutist view of ethical behavior, over the past 250 years the relativist view has become ascendant. Following the contingency framework of Ferrell and Gresham (1985) and the issue contingent model of Jones (1991), a model for ethical research is proposed. The key components include the moral agent/transgressor, the issue type and its intensity, and the nature of the victim. In addition, a statistical methodology, namely conjoint analysis, is (...) introduced to investigate the trade-offs inherent in relativistic inquiry. In two ethical scenarios, in each of which three factors were varied, conjoint analysis provided important insight. The individual transgressor factor of gender had minimal impact on observer responses to two scenarios of questionable ethicality. In contrast, both the dollar magnitude of the transgression and the organizational status of the transgressor (salesperson/manager/owner) did affect observer responses. (shrink)

Offers a compelling vision of how to achieve and conduct a liberal but democratic society through the ideal of Neutrality--between people and ideas of the good--and using the tool of Neutral dialogue.

This paper aims to review the empirical and theoretical research on engineering ethics education, by focusing on the challenges reported in the literature. The analysis is conducted at four levels of the engineering education system. First, the individual level is dedicated to findings about teaching practices reported by instructors. Second, the institutional level brings together findings about the implementation and presence of ethics within engineering programmes. Third, the level of policy situates findings about engineering ethics education in the context of (...) accreditation. Finally, there is the level of the culture of engineering education. The multi-level analysis allows us to address some of the limitations of higher education research which tends to focus on individual actors such as instructors or remains focused on the levels of policy and practice without examining the deeper levels of paradigm and purpose guiding them. Our approach links some of the challenges of engineering ethics education with wider debates about its guiding paradigms. The main contribution of the paper is to situate the analysis of the theoretical and empirical findings reported in the literature on engineering ethics education in the context of broader discussions about the purpose of engineering education and the aims of reform programmes. We conclude by putting forward a series of recommendations for a socio-technical oriented reform of engineering education for ethics. (shrink)

Bruce L. Kinzer offers a rich examination of personal and political themes in the life of John Stuart Mill, one of the most influential liberal thinkers of the nineteenth century. By investigating young Mill's formative period and his relations with his father, Harriet Taylor, and Thomas Carlyle, Kinzer casts light on the challenges Mill faced in understanding himself and what he wished to become. Kinzer's political explorations probe issues central to the appreciation of Mill as an engaged political thinker (...) and actor and offers an insightful portrait of a complex and towering figure."--BOOK JACKET. (shrink)

From iPhones and clothing to jewelry and food, the products those of us in the developed world consume and enjoy exist only through the labor and suffering of countless others. In his new book Bruce Robbins examines the implications of this dynamic for humanitarianism and social justice. He locates the figure of the "beneficiary" in the history of humanitarian thought, which asks the prosperous to help the poor without requiring them to recognize their causal role in the creation of (...) the abhorrent conditions they seek to remedy. Tracing how the beneficiary has manifested itself in the work of George Orwell, Virginia Woolf, Jamaica Kincaid, Naomi Klein, and others, Robbins uncovers a hidden tradition of economic cosmopolitanism. There are no easy answers to the question of how to confront systematic inequality on a global scale. But the first step, Robbins suggests, is to acknowledge that we are, in fact, beneficiaries. (shrink)

How do the arts inform and cultivate our service to God? In this addition to an award-winning series, distinguished philosopher Bruce Ellis Benson rethinks what it means to be artistic. Rather than viewing art as practiced by the few, he recovers the ancient Christian idea of presenting ourselves to God as works of art, reenvisioning art as the very core of our being: God calls us to improvise as living works of art. Benson also examines the nature of liturgy (...) and connects art and liturgy in a new way. This book will appeal to philosophy, worship/liturgy, art, music, and theology students as well as readers interested in engaging issues of worship and aesthetics in a postmodern context, including Christian artists and worship leaders. (shrink)

In this book the author examines the stubborn philosophical belief in moral responsibility, surveying the philosophical arguments for it, but focusing on the system that supports these arguments: powerful social and psychological factors that hold the belief in moral responsibility firmly in place.--Publisher's description.

Philosophers writing on the subject of human action have found it tempting to introduce their subject by raising Wittgenstein's question, 'What is left over if you subtract the fact that my arm goes up from the fact that I raise my arm?' The presumption is that something of particular interest is involved in an action of raising an arm that is not present in a mere bodily movement, and the philosopher's task is to specify just what this is. Unfortunately, such (...) an approach does not take us very far, since a person could properly be said to raise his (or her) arm while asleep or hypnotized even though he (or she) would not be performing an action in the sense of 'action' with which philosophers are particularly concerned. To avoid this kind of difficulty I shall approach the subject of human action is a more academic way: I shall expound some important rival theories of human action, and introduce the relevant issues by commenting critically on those theories. One of the issues I eventually introduce is a metaphysical one. A theory of action makes sense, I contend, only on the assumption that there are such 'things' as actions (or events). After considering some key arguments bearing on the issue I conclude that, as matters currently stand in philosophy, a metaphysically noncommittal attitude toward actions and events seems justified. (shrink)

More than sixty reporters discuss ethical dilemmas facing the journalist and how they have personally coped with such problems as conflicts of interest, gifts, bribes, news leaks, and confidentiality of sources.

Can we legitimately speak of ethicsexperts? Recent literature in philosophy and medical ethics addresses this important question but does not offer a satisfactory answer. Part of the problem is the absence of an examination of what it means to be an expert in general. I therefore begin by reviewing my analysis of expertise which appeared earlier in this journal. We speak of two kinds of experts: persons whose expertise is in virtue of what theyknow (epistemic expertise), or what theydo (performative (...) expertise). Applying this analysis to the domain of ethics, I argue that we may speak of ethical expertise in three epistemic senses: a) expertise indescriptive ethics, b) expertise inmetaethics, c) expertise innormative ethics, and in a performative sense: d) expertise inliving a good life. I conclude with a brief description of some social roles of ethics experts. (shrink)

This book is an archetypal product of the Belief-Desire-Intention (BDI) school of multi-agent systems. It presents what is now the mainstream view as to the best way forward in the dream of engineering reliable software systems out of autonomous agents. The way of using formal logics to specify, implement and verify distributed systems of interacting units using a guiding analogy of beliefs, desires and intentions. The implicit message behind the book is this: Distributed Artificial Intelligence (DAI) can be a respectable (...) engineering science. It says: we use sound formal systems; can cite established philosophical foundations; and will be able to build reliable and flexible software systems. (shrink)