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Heidegger on Ethics
No full textHeidegger is often understood to have forsaken the very possibility of ethics – we find numerous variations of this view in the secondary literature. And yet, in Letter on Humanism, Heidegger stresses the importance of ethics (thought anew as originary ethics) in the context of the dangers posed by the technological age. In this Element, the author will try to unpack what Heidegger might have meant by this. Ultimately, his account of the essence of the human being will prove to be the key to understanding what he describes as 'originary ethics'.</p
Diskriminierung von Menschen aus dem östlichen Europa: Das Jobcenter als Schnittstelle zwischen Arbeitsmarkt und Wohlfahrtsstaat
No full textNo description supplied</p
Cultural religiosity moderates the relationship between being in love and subjective well-being
No full textPrevious research indicates that the significance of love varies considerably across cultures. In the present study, we introduce an often-overlooked cultural factor – religiosity – to explore its influence on the relationship between being in love and five dimensions of subjective well-being. We conducted two cross-cultural studies with 31,608 participants from 117 samples across 83 societies. Our findings reveal that, in more religious cultures, being in love is a weaker predictor of well-being compared to more secular cultures in four out of six models. These findings indicate that national context influences the relative importance of various emotions and experiences for well-being, underscoring the need to account for cultural context in research on love.</p
Texture and friction classification: optical TacTip vs. vibrational piezoeletric and accelerometer tactile sensors
No full textTactile sensing is increasingly vital in robotics, especially for tasks like object manipulation and texture classification. Among tactile technologies, optical and electrical sensors are widely used, yet no rigorous direct comparison of their performance has been conducted. This paper addresses that gap by presenting a comparative study between a high-resolution optical tactile sensor (a modified TacTip) and a low-resolution electrical sensor combining accelerometers and piezoelectric elements. We evaluate both sensor types on two tasks: texture classification and coefficient of dynamic friction prediction. Various configurations and resolutions were explored, along with multiple machine learning classifiers to determine optimal performance. The optical sensor achieved 99.9% accuracy on a challenging texture dataset, significantly outperforming the electrical sensor, which reached 82%. However, for dynamic friction prediction, both sensors performed comparably, with only a (Formula presented.) % accuracy difference. We also found that the optical sensor retained high classification accuracy even when image resolution was reduced to 25% of its original size, suggesting that ultra-high resolution is not essential. In conclusion, the optical sensor is the better choice when high accuracy is required. However, for low-cost or computationally efficient systems, the electrical sensor provides a practical alternative with competitive performance in some tasks.</p
[Protocol] Efficacy and moderators of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) in ‘Difficult to Treat’ depression: protocol for a systematic review and individual participant data meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials
No full textIntroduction About 30% of depressed patients suffer from a protracted course in which the disorder continues to cause significant burden despite treatment efforts. While originally developed for relapse prevention, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) has increasingly been investigated in depressed patients with such ‘difficult-to-treat’ courses. This is a protocol for an individual participant data (IPD) meta-analysis aiming to determine efficacy and potential moderators of MBCT treatment effects in this group based on evidence from randomised controlled trials.Methods and analysis Systematic searches in PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, PsycINFO, EMBASE and the Cochrane Controlled Trials Register for randomised controlled trials were completed on 17 June 2024. Authors of identified studies have contributed IPD, and data extractions have been completed. An update search will be conducted immediately before the start of data analyses. We will investigate the following outcomes: (a) self-reported and observer-reported severity of depression symptomatology, (b) remission and (c) clinically meaningful improvement and deterioration. One-stage and two-stage IPD-MA will be conducted with one-stage models using the observed IPD from all studies simultaneously as the primary approach. One-stage IPD models will include stratified study intercepts and error terms as well as random effects to capture between-study heterogeneity. Moderator analyses will test treatment-covariate interactions for both individual patient-level and study-level characteristics.Ethics and dissemination The results will inform understanding of the use of MBCT in patients with current ‘difficult-to-treat’ depression and will contribute to arguments in favour of or against implementing MBCT as a treatment for this group. They will be published in a peer-reviewed journal and made available to stakeholders in accessible formats. No local ethical review was necessary following consultation with the Ethics and Governance Board of the University of Surrey. Guidance on patient data storage and management will be adhered to throughout.</p
Tuning light to make fruit look natural: memory colours, metamers and illumination modulation
No full textThe colour appearance of natural objects conveys information about their material properties that guides behaviour yet varies with factors both intrinsic and extrinsic to the object. The latter include variations in illumination and viewing context, which affect the range of colour appearances that are perceived as natural for diagnostically coloured familiar objects (their memory colours). Here, we ask how characteristics of the illumination spectral power distribution - specifically the jaggedness of the spectral profile, related to the colour fidelity index Rf, and the correlated colour temperature - influence the range of perceived natural colour appearances for familiar, diagnostically coloured fruits. Participants viewed real naturalistic fruits in an immersive chamber solely illuminated by spectrally tuneable lamps and selected the illumination under which the fruits looked most natural by smoothly modulating the illumination spectra along either a 6500K metameric axis (constant chromaticity and illuminance, changing spectral profile) or a daylight axis (broadband spectral profile, changing in chromaticity along the daylight locus). For the daylight condition, naturalness judgements were skewed towards warmer lights (∼4000K). For the metameric modulation, naturalness judgements encompassed a range of CCTs and corresponding object colour appearances but tended to skew towards less jagged, higher colour fidelity illumination spectra. Our results show that participants accept appearances under non-broadband illuminations and prefer warmer CCTs for naturalness of specific familiar fruits, with implications for commercial display applications and experimental paradigms.</p
Software application profile: TIDAL - Tool to Implement Developmental Analysis of Longitudinal data
No full textKey FeaturesTIDAL is a free and easily accessible research tool for analysing, visualizing and interpreting growth curve model data.TIDAL can plot complex, non-linear trajectories and aid in interpretation of those trajectories throgh features such as trajectory visualization, calculating scores at different ages and the area under the curve.TIDAL can examine interactions between trajectories and continuous or categorical covariates to obtain group specific trajectories.TIDAL is available in three formats: an R package, a Docker Image and an online RShiny application.</p
Enhancing the quality and reproducibility of research: Preferred Evaluation of Cognitive and Neuropsychological Studies - The PECANS statement for human studies
No full textAre scientific papers providing all essential details necessary to ensure the replicability of study protocols? Are authors effectively conveying study design, data analysis, and the process of drawing inferences from their results? These represent only a fraction of the pressing questions that cognitive psychology and neuropsychology face in addressing the “crisis of confidence.” This crisis has highlighted numerous shortcomings in the journey from research to publication. To address these shortcomings, we introduce PECANS (Preferred Evaluation of Cognitive And Neuropsychological Studies), a comprehensive checklist tool designed to guide the planning, execution, evaluation, and reporting of experimental research. PECANS emerged from a rigorous consensus-building process through the Delphi method. We convened a panel of international experts specialized in cognitive psychology and neuropsychology research practices. Through two rounds of iterative voting and a proof-of-concept phase, PECANS evolved into its final form. The PECANS checklist is intended to serve various stakeholders in the fields of cognitive sciences and neuropsychology, including: (i) researchers seeking to ensure and enhance reproducibility and rigor in their research; (ii) journal editors and reviewers assessing the quality of reports; (iii) ethics committees and funding agencies; (iv) students approaching methodology and scientific writing. PECANS is a versatile tool intended not only to improve the quality and transparency of individual research projects but also to foster a broader culture of rigorous scientific inquiry across the academic and research community.</p
Reciprocal longitudinal associations between symptoms of body dissatisfaction and disordered eating, self-harm and suicidal ideation
No full textBackground Eating disorders are severe psychiatric conditions associated with high mortality rates, particularly among young people. These disorders often co-occur with self-harm and suicidal ideation, yet the temporal dynamics between these variables remain poorly understood. Aims This study aims to elucidate the longitudinal associations between symptoms of body dissatisfaction and disordered eating, self-harm and suicidal ideation using structural equation modelling. Method Repeated measures of these phenotypes were used to construct a hypothetical model that includes cross-path analyses within and between the variables in two cohorts: the Twins Early Development Study (TEDS; ages 16, 21 and 26 years; N = 5196), representing a general population sample, and the COVID-19 Psychiatry and Neurological Genetics study (COPING; data collected between June 2020 and July 2021; N = 490), which focused on individuals with a history of anxiety or depression. In the TEDS cohort, symptoms of disordered eating, self-harm and suicidal ideation showed limited continuity across adolescence and young adulthood, with peak symptom severity at age 21 years. Results Cross-domain associations revealed that both self-harm and suicidal ideation at age 21 years were more strongly associated with disordered eating at 26 years than the reverse. In contrast, the COPING cohort exhibited greater stability in symptoms over time but showed minimal cross-domain effects. Conclusions The effects of self-harm and suicidal ideation on disordered eating in early adulthood are stronger than the influence of disordered eating on suicidality.</p
Engaging Newcomers with the Global Great Unread: Working Together to Expand the Canon
No full textLiterary scholars’ expertise is founded on knowledge of a small collection of texts, below which lies the vast realm of archived but long-forgotten literature that Margaret Cohen has called the “Great Unread.” Cohen’s account frames the Great Unread as the exclusive domain of highly trained specialists, while students are, for pragmatic reasons, taught to close-read the established canonical texts. This article argues that there is great value in facilitating the engagement of newcomers with the Great Unread, and in particular, the Global Great Unread. Within a course I created and taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, I guided undergraduates through exploring the Great Unread of nineteenth-century global periodicals, selecting a short story of interest and creating a digital edition to reintroduce the story to a present-day audience. In crafting editorial materials of various kinds, students independently studied and wrote about global contexts ranging from the linguistic to the cultural to the geopolitical. After the course was complete, students could choose to have their edition published on a website and thus actually become available to a public readership beyond the classroom. Through such initiatives, we can expand our understanding of the ways in which literary scholars and literary study can be valuable to publics on a global scale.</p